The Hungry Mist

Ellis Holloway’s eyes snapped open to a world of swirling white. His cheek pressed against the damp earth, the acrid aroma of rotting leaves filling his nose. Something sticky clung to his skin, and as his thoughts clawed through the haze, he realized he couldn’t remember how he’d gotten here. Or even where “here” was. Outside his name, Ellis couldn’t recall a single thing about his life.

Groaning, he rolled onto his back. The fog above churned like something alive, thinning enough to reveal faint twilight, a sky caught between dawn and dusk. Ellis couldn’t say which. His chest rose and fell unevenly, and his fingers scraped across his forehead, smearing something thick and viscous.

Blood.

It covered his hand and sleeve. Not his, for he felt no injury. A strangled sound bubbled up from his core as he propelled himself backward in a scooting motion and thudded into something. It wasn’t a stone or fallen wood. Too soft. And it was ever so slightly warmer than the cold earth. Ellis turned, and his breath hitched.

A body.

It splayed in the dirt, mangled like a predator’s kill. He lifted his fingered to his face again and studied the blood and bits of flesh lodged beneath grubby fingernails. No. His dulled mind whispered.

The corpse was female, but not human. Her lavender-skinned face was utterly perfect. Overly large dark eyes frozen wide perched over a tiny upturned nose and full deep blue lips. Long, pointed ears sliced through silvery curled hair. But the feature that drew the most focus were the golden veined wings spread beneath the remains. 

“Fae?” It was the only word he had for what she was.

A memory struck like lightning: there had been others. Some like her, others wingless, with raven hair and pointed ears. Military perhaps because the dark-haired ones had worn the same black armor and red tunics.

That’s why he was alone deep in the Sauvie Island woods near his home. The Fae had been hunting him.  

The memory fled under a sharp pain beneath his ribs that doubled him over. His guts spasmed, and he felt hollow inside, like he hadn’t eaten in days. The breeze stirred, wafting across the dead Fae, bringing with it the coppery scent of blood and his stomach growled. 

Ellis’s hand moved before his mind caught up, dipping into the fae’s open wound. “No,” he whispered, his voice trembling. His fingers held a jagged strip of flesh. He tried to drop it, to resist, but the hunger roared inside him. His lips parted, and the morsel slid over his tongue.

Hunched over the beautiful corpse, he ate and ate. And wept. The tissue did little to quell his hunger. The more he consumed, the hungrier he became. Staggering upright, he stumbled away from the dead woman, clutching his chest as if to hold himself back. 

His throat ached with the force of containing a tortured wail. He was sure he’d killed the Fae. Worst of all, he’d eaten her. 

“Oh, god. No, no. no.” Ellis staggered backward, gaze riveted on the ruined body.

The mist trailed behind like it sought him, pushing the shock and self loathing aside.

It slithered across the ground, coiling around his ankles, then slithering up his leg. When it touched his skin, icy pinpricks followed its progress, and he gasped. His arms tingled as brown hairs sprouted along his forearms, spreading with unnatural speed.

He clutched at his skin, clawing at the changes, but it was no use. His thoughts blurred like the mist, internal dialogue dissolving into formless blather.

What’s happening to me?

He screamed and ran.

Ellis didn’t know how long he’d been running. His legs burned, and his chest heaved with every ragged inhale, but he couldn’t stop. 

The fog enveloped him like a living thing, brushing his face with clammy hands, sliding down his neck in beads of cold sweat. Sounds were swallowed whole, leaving only the dull thud of his own footsteps and the wet rasp of his breath.

The infernal whiteness finally dissipated slightly and something flickered at the edges of his vision. A shape, dark and rectangular.

He stumbled to a halt as the fog thinned, revealing a small brick house. Familiarity surged in his chest. “My house,” he whispered. His voice broke, and tears pricked his eyes. Ellis pushed through the back door, heart pounding with relief. This had to be a dream, a nightmare brought on by exhaustion or illness. The warm light of home would dispel this terror.

The kitchen was dark. No hum of appliances, no faint glow of the nightlight beside the sink. On the small cafe table sat a desiccated sandwich, its bread cracked and covered in a layer of green mold. Thick dust coated every surface.

Ellis froze, slack jawed. Weeks. The house had been empty for weeks.

Ellis moaned, bracing a hand against the marble countertop. The hunger wasn’t just an ache this time. It radiated through every sinew in waves, sharp and punishing. His anxiety dissolved beneath that primal, singular need to fill his internal void.

He loped to the refrigerator and yanked the door open. 

The stench hit him heavy as a blow. Sour, acrid, and faintly sweet. He gagged but didn’t stop, pulling out containers, cartons, anything edible. The flavors were as foul as the smell, but he ate anyway, cramming spoiled food into his mouth with trembling hands.

Despite his gorging, his appetite didn’t ease. If anything, it grew worse, a deepening void, erasing any rational thought.

Through the window, movement caught his eye. A fat, grey squirrel skittered around the base of the old oak tree in his backyard. That savage ache exploded again, mouth watering so fiercely a string of drool oozed from his lips and stretched toward the floor.

Before he knew what he was doing, Ellis smashed through the back door, bits of glass raining onto the patio. The squirrel didn’t stand a chance. Ellis’s hands moved faster than he thought possible, closing around the creature in an instant. He bit into its body, swallowing it whole.

The taste was exquisite.

“Oh my God,” he choked, his voice shaking as he stared at his bloodied fingers. “What did I just do?” There had been no contemplation of his action. Craving controlled him, emptied any moral thought. Like a vicious predator. Inhuman. The squirrel’s shriek played again and again and tears streamed down his face.

He turned toward the house, needing its familiarity to ground him, to pull him back from the brink. Bursting through the front door, he stumbled into the foyer and froze.

The wall of family photos greeted him strong as a punch to the gut.

Charlotte.

Her school portrait hung in the center, larger than the rest. Her warm brown eyes smiled at him from behind the glass. Tight black curls framed her sweet face.

“Charlotte,” he whispered, tracing the line of her jaw with shaking fingers. Beneath that photo was another of Ellis and a five-year-old Charlotte seated on the couch reading a book. She’d loved the book Green Eggs and Ham. Every time he’d read it to her, she’d squealed with delight. He’d even made her an actual breakfast of green eggs and ham with the help of a little food coloring. She begged for that meal every weekend for months. Ellis smiled. For a moment, the hunger quieted.

The memory felt like a lifeline, something beautiful and solid in his internal chaos. But then the lifeline snapped when his gaze shifted to a mirror. The face staring back was not his own.

Ellis lunged to the mirror above the couch, and an icy wave crawled over his skin. Every facial feature was warped.

Bony ridges arched over his eyes, and short, wiry hair covered much of his face. His lower jaw jutted forward slightly, forming an almost muzzle-like shape, and his teeth grew vaguely pointed. Blood and remnants of his recent meals colored all the strangeness.

His knees buckled, and a choked sound ground from his throat. I’m a monster.

The image of the fairy he’d eaten flashed in his mind, but he imagined her silvery hair and golden wings gone. In their place, he envisioned Charlotte. 

“No,” he sobbed. The obvious conclusion was too much for him to bear.

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