<center>![](https://cdn.steemitimages.com/DQmQVgCVpafG4smaEB6LjNn21G4j4ETupd2zAMHgvjsuNKZ/image.png)</center>


<sub>[Part 1](https://steemit.com/horror/@calluna/the-baited-breath-of-beasts-short-horror-story) & [Part 2](https://steemit.com/horror/@calluna/the-baited-breath-of-beasts-a-short-horror-story-part-2)</sub>

The thick trees of the forest did not always let them slip through untouched. A tangle of fallen tree and shrub blocked the faint memory of a trail they followed. 

Dense bracken was caught in the foliage, making it impossible to silently ease past. The thick truck had splintered over trees broken in its fall. Huge gashes in the bark spoke of the creature that had sent this ancient tree on tumbling assault. Nothing could stop the pursuit.

The fractured wood littering the ground cracked with each reluctant step. Three long strides, weight slowly lowered, and she reached the bare bough. She clawed her way up the rough bark, his hands pushing her from below. Scrambling atop the trunk, she leant back down, offering him a hand to grip as he pulled himself up.

The other side was worse, the mesh of split trees and snapped branches knotted with uprooted bushes. The decimated clearing heaved with the scurry of life as squirming bodies devoured the flakes of pale tree heart. The tiny armoured invasive creatures would grow into the beasts that lingered at the edge of her thoughts. 

The urge to jump, to kill as many as she could in their relatively defenceless form was always hard to fight. The acrid smell of their blood would draw more, a swarming ball of hooked teeth, ripping through bone and flesh in cannibalistic fury. If it bled, the beasts would hunt it.

She felt his wary hand on her shoulder, the near blind larval beasts swarming below. They engulfed their prey, a writhing tide of hunger. When there was nothing left to hunt, they would turn on each other until only a few remained. The beasts best suited to this place.

Their pale, rippling plated forms triggered an innate repulsion. When these undeveloped beasts had first appeared, they were treated like any other insect, swooshed and batted away, splatted and squashed. Until only the strongest, most armoured, the fiercest ones remained. Then they grew. The hardened pupa gave way to the raging beast.

She tried to recoil, but he was crouched behind her on the toppled tree trunk. She bumped into him, his hands rising to steady her. He gestured up towards the roots. The higher ground did not heave with the swell of the larve, the uprooted tree had tumbled from a flattened path left by furious rampage.

She edged up the tree on all fours, careful to keep her balance. The vibration of a fall would summon the engulfing swarm of death. She could sense him behind her, his hand replacing her leg as they inched up the trunk, the splayed roots ahead tangled in foliage. 

Navigating the uprooted tendrils was like climbing through a snagging web. She went first. With each move, her clothes caught on the branching roots, she froze, letting him carefully free her. It was painstakingly slow, slipping the snaring roots without sending vibrations through the tangle dragged by the tree.

The path of carnage was still a few split trees up, a gouge led them through the broken wood, picking their steps between the smaller broken branches.

<hr>

Huge felled trees in the trail of devastation provided stepping stones easier to navigate than the dense woodland. With each moment, she was aware the beast that had ploughed through could only dwarf the colossus from the evening on the beach. The breadth of its wake was wider than the overgrown roads had ever been. She realised, the trees laid out before her, were all flattened in the same direction.

Something deep inside her shifted, they needed the food, they only had a few days worth still stashed by the boathouse, but she didn’t want to find out what left this path. It continued around the valley they needed to be in, they could follow it and bypass most of the valley, dropped down beyond the stream. A churning filled her stomach as she considered the chances of the beast heading back the way it had came. She waited, letting him jump onto the same felled tree as her.

“We can’t stay on this” her whisper thick with caution.

“I know, but we are making good time, we can get a little further before we come off” he replied in equally hushed tones.

“I don’t like this,” she objected,

“I don’t much like the forest either,” he returned,

He was right, it was no safer in there, but something about stepping from tree to tree under the open sky felt too exposed. They were following a path left by a beast bigger than any she had ever seen.

<hr>

Every moment she anticipated the nearing shake of ground, the thing rushing towards them. They nearly reached the point of passing above the mountain spring when he heard it.

A faint, rising rumble.

“Get down,” he called, grimacing as concern putting more sound in his voice than he had intended.

She couldn’t hear the rumble yet, but she didn’t need to, the pale colour filling his face sent her scrambling.

She slipped from the tree into the broken canopy below. Recently crushed leaves cushioning her slide through the snapped, clawing branches.

He grabbed her arm as they fell, pulling her towards him. The fallen trees rested on others, forming a splintered grating, giving way beneath them.

A shudder rang through the earth, growing nearer with each stride of the great beast. They had broken through the bottom of the crushed lattice to the shaking ground.

She felt the hot spread of blood on her cheek. Panic filled her as she clutched at his hand, putting it to her wet cheek. He understood. The beast would smell the blood. She couldn’t out run it now. She had faced death many times; fearless, resigned, she had never felt this swell of terror.

Tears filled her eyes as she looked at him, desperately mouthing at him to “Go” as she pushed him away. He let her, his pale face barely visible in the leaf-filtered light. He stayed there, at the length of her arms, her palms resting on his chest, hesitating. 

The rhythmic shakes grew stronger, the low thuds of bone plating on wood louder. She leaned forwards, pushing him away again.

“Go!” She whispered, her soft voice choking “You have to…”

He cut her off, hugging her. Her resolve wavered. Silent tears streamed down her bloodied cheek, running red onto her shirt. 

The shaking stampede of the inbound beast rustled through the upturned canopies enveloping them, branches creaking with each low rumble. For years she pitched her way through life, stumbling from one mental crutch to another, running, hiding, hanging on to life, alone. The soft smell of his skin tinged with the faint hint of her blood, the fresh scent of torn leaves hung in the air, sweeter in the last stolen moment. Fear ebbed with acceptance. They had found each other, between the blood and beasts, between the callous heart beats of survival. In that moment, she realised, it had been enough.

The beasts pace did not slacken, it did not slow in its charge when it smelt her. 

The leafed cavern quivered with each thundering bound as the creature drew closer. The echo through the woodland, the resounding bass drum of battle. Between the thuds, she became aware of a faster, more uneven beat. A second set of frantic, lighter footsteps. 

The beast was in pursuit.

A stumbling headlong pace, drawing closer, rang through the wood. She froze, his arms almost smothering her. A guilt rush of relief prickled her skin as heat rose in her face. In that moment, she had been ready. She had weighed her life, and buried in his arms, she accepted the end. The hot flushed rush of possibility churned through her. Nothing would stop a beast in pursuit, would the faint scent of her warm blood... The rot of hope took hold of her trembling heart, destroying her calm resolve.

She became aware of his tightened grip, crushed her into him, he had heard the footsteps. His lips moved, tracing silent prayers to a long absent god.

The slam of sole on wood rung through the trees around them, the shifting spheres of broken sunlight eclipsed by a passing shape. 

The runner did not see her, in their desperate flight before the slavering jaws of death, they saw only the next step.

The normal passing of survivors, one huddled in fear, another running for their life. The desperate willing for the hunt to continue, to pass her by. The only way left for man to help fellow man, was to live on in their stead. Mankind had become the rats; hiding, stealing what they could, sneaking between the edges of death. There was no respite, no relent. Every day was a battle to hold on. 

Her bones shook as the beast bellowed past, blinded by the prey before it. The snapping of branches surrounded them, the tangle of trees compacting under force of the beasts smashing gallop. The wooden grating sagged with each pounding step, embracing them in her leafed safety.

The relief that hit her was like a drug. Her sobs hiccupped with laughter as he kissed her face. A dreamy rush drifted between the flattened trees, the high of survival easing into sheer exhaustion.

Adrenaline faded, the ache of tension slipping from her muscles left her weak, jellied. They spent the night lay there, in the hollow of the crushed forest, where death had passed them by.

<hr>

He had a chance to leave her than, but he had stayed, and hope had eaten away at her. She had always known he would leave her in the end, but after that day, she had let in the niggling hope that maybe, maybe he wouldn’t.

It was the death throes of that hope that cut her now.

It was three days since he had gone. Since he went out and never came back. The mornings without him seemed long and empty, the afternoons tiresome, the nights hollow. Three heartbreaking days, and she was running out of food. She had searched for him, but the first night, when the sun dipped below the hills, the last of the sky reflecting on the still water and she was still alone, she knew he wasn’t coming back.

He had left her. Like she always knew he would. Yet somehow, in each fleeting moment, she had loved him all the more for knowing that. The cold shadow cast in his absence was still his shadow. The loneliness that filled her now was not the one she had once known, it was the indent of him. It was all she had left, and she treasured it.

![](https://cdn.steemitimages.com/DQmd3N19H4nNtzrXWfm5WZrDx2V21qLXfRNUszY1RFAL4fB/image.png)

<i>The final part, this is another one of those stories, really, I was just telling to myself. It was a fun story to tell.</i>

Thank you, to everyone who has been so supportive of this story so far, I really appreciate it. If I haven't replied to a comment yet, I am so sorry, I am catching up, your words do mean so much to me <3

<b>This is based in my existential and absurdist beliefs, the only meaning in life is the meaning you give it.</b>


[Photo Credit](https://pixabay.com/en/forest-hack-blade-murderer-murder-2096088/) which is the same user as the photo from part 2, I am loving these girls with axes!

<sub>I hope you enjoyed this adventure - love and sparkle - Calluna</sub>