I will tell you of my encounter with the Shape on the moor. It is a dark tale, and for those that might suffer from a visceral fear of the unknown, I would not be upset if you cast these pages away now. However, if you have a heart that seeks out the unknown, a spirit that yearns for the hidden side of reality, then possibly you may find something in this narrative instructive and, perhaps, cautionary. For in my travels and scholarship I have found reason to believe the Unnatural could be waiting around the corner for any of us.

Having taken a break from my studies, I determined to go on holiday to the timeworn village of Lydfordetown in Devonshire, and in spite of the words of the townsfolk warning me not go out on the moors that evening, I did.

But let me first provide you with my bona fides. In the years preceding the night of my audience with the Shape, I had the solitary habit of spending my evenings performing my own research into the pagan beliefs and practices peculiar to the countryside of Devonshire. This research principally took place in the library of Oxford College where I was enrolled as a student of the classics; Homer, Aeschylus, Euripides, and the like being my specialities. My connection to the county where lies Devon is through my Gran, my father’s mother, who in the evenings around Midwinter would tell my cousins and I tales of witches and pixies, of ghosts and other fairy creatures. Immediately after she would whisk us to bed with our young minds still reeling, fearing each moving shadow caused by the flickering of the single taper she would leave with us. But while these mystic studies have been a form of pure escapism from my serious education, I assure you, I was in all aspects a Skeptic.

On the night in question the public house was filled with townsfolk enjoying, albeit with a barely masked tenseness, an evening of drink and potato and ham stew. I was much the center of conversation; not so much my being a student at Oxford, but due to my family ties to the town. Stories were common both of my grandparents and of my father of their various dealings, both favorable and unfavorable, with the longer lived residents.

As I sat and worked my way around a particularly tough slice of ham in my stew, I
casually mentioned to the landlady that as it was a bright and clear evening, I would soon be taking my leave of the party for a stroll on the nearby moor.

“What? Out on the moors at this time of night?” exclaimed she, and all the house came alive with warnings and advice.

“It’s a full blue moon!”

“The crows had been calling all day!”

“My hens refused to lay!”

Raising my hands to quiet the crowd, which had grown more than a little hysterical since the landlady’s outburst, I spoke, “Good people, please. While I am certainly indebted to you for your kind words, we are living in the modern age with all the benefits brought to us by the Enlightenment, and the superstitions of which you speak are from long ages past. Therefore, I must insist there is an explanation to all your misgivings. An explanation which can be deduced by simple Reason and Logic. I can guarantee to you that were I to be so bold as to sleep out on the moors tonight, that I will most certainly be back here with you in the morning to break our fasts together.”

Several more warnings were voiced and tales regarding the moors were begun, but this time my gentle hostess came to my assistance.

“Now see here! The lad has his mind set to. We’ve done our best in trying to make him see things aright. All we can do now is give him this,” and she pulled out a little charm on a silver chain.

I held out my hand, but she shook her head and indicated I was to lower mine so she might place the charm around my neck. With care she secured and patted it into place.

“Milady, for what is this?” I asked as I examined it. “I thought I made it plain I was not a believer in trinkets, spells or anything supernatural. You waste your time.”

“Listen now,” said she. I could see in her eyes that the time was right for me to be quiet and attentive. “Witches and their familiars may be one thing. And on any other night you might on the moors be accosted and come out unscathed. But tonight is the night the Keeper will walk the moor.” I opened my mouth to begin a protest, but she raised an eyebrow.

“Tonight the Keeper walks amongst the brambles and tussocks of the heath. Think not that he is evil, however. No, not as such. To the witch and warlock he is death most definitely. But for any other it is foolishness to not be heedful of him.” The air of the inn was by this time completely still. Every patron held their breath as she spoke. “How many of you know someone to have disappeared on the moor? I daresay, you all.” Nods all around.

She continued, softer, “And their poor, lost bones? You know what the witches do with them if ever they are found, don’t you?” Again, the entire room showed their silent agreement. “The Keeper is he who safeguards those bones! Safe from the witches and the pixies and the dark fairies of the hills!” Her voice grew in intensity. “Safe to rest where they lay without fear of damnable servitude to the chthonic forces that dance and whir on All Hallow’s Eve as Old Nick himself whips their
hides, and prepares them to accompany him to the Abyss!” She finished with a flourish and brought down the mug in her hand roughly on the bar, breaking the spell she had them under. The tenseness lifted and the patrons released their held breath.

I looked around the bar and to a person, they each returned my gaze. I cleared my throat and asked, “The charm? The charm is—”

She cut me off. “The charm is like him, the Keeper. Neither good nor evil, but it will protect you from him. Hmmm...” She mused aloud, “‘Protect’ is not quite the right word, since if he wants you he will take you. The charm is more like a symbol of your good will.” She once again laid hold of my attention with her stare, and repeated, “Your good will.” Indicating to me that any ill will I exercised would be dealt with on the moor.

“Milady, as you can see I am the most innocent of men. However, while the intent of my expedition tonight had originally been merely for exercise, it is now out of curiosity that I venture forth,” said I with the same air of confidence as my initial speech. But after her sermon my latter pronouncement was mixed with a tinge of false bravado. And the entire house, having noted my determination, nodded in acquiescence.

I finished my meal, and after thanking the landlady, I made for the door. All eyes were on me as I sauntered past the patrons; all the while attempting to recover the boldness I had felt when I first entered the tavern.

The moors were situated south of the village, and I took my time passing by the homes and shops situated along the main thoroughfare. The sun had set nearly an hour prior, and the moon was high in the nighttime sky as I passed the last of the houses on the outskirts of town.

The road I followed was well marked, and even though the moonlight was diffused by the overhanging woodland trees, I easily picked my way toward my destination.
Well before I expected it, the wood gave way to the moors: a vast open space extending for miles. The ground itself was irregular with tussocks of undergrowth and isolated tufts of trees. The moon backlit the clouds as they drifted past; its light giving them silvery tinged edges while they cast their almost imperceptible shadows in strange otherworldly shapes merging here and splitting there as they traced their way atop the ground. The few trees I could see at a distance were silhouetted against the scene at odd, incompatible angles. My eyes lost focus at this sight and I gasped aloud. I had to remind myself that this was purely an illusion caused by an unfamiliar landscape.

I knew a footpath traversed the moors, so after locating it, I left the carriage road and walked along the path that no townsperson would consider traversing at this time of night or this time of year. Following the trail as it wandered aimlessly, I passed isolated thickets and small depressions in the earth filled with rainwater.

In due course the flat of the plain folded itself into hillocks, and I was out of breath as I descended into a place of lower elevation where a mist had gathered. The air was not as still down here, and the haze moved as if it were a living thing; up and over hills, around the bases of the trees and mounds. Its coolness was refreshing as

I was beginning to feel myself overheating after my exertions in my heavy boots and jacket. At a copse situated around an elderly oak, I stopped to catch my breath. It was then I noticed the utter quiet of the place. Not a nocturnal bird was to be heard. Not the screech of an owl nor crake nor any water fowl that resided in the moor. Not even the sound of branches cracking in the wind.

I removed my jacket and idly dropped it on the dry ground. Immediately upon leaning back against the tree I felt something poking up from the ground. It didn’t feel like a stump or a root, and with a slight pull it came free. In the blue tinged moonlight I could see its lengthwise shape with bulbous ends joined together by a slender middle. It looked like a finger bone completely denuded of flesh. I rolled it slowly between my fingers and judged it to be that of a child. Were the tales the landlady told true? Had there been townsfolk and other travelers lost to eventually expire in these moors? But the more evocative questions that came to mind regarded the mysterious Keeper that was reputed to protected them.

As I sat ruminating what horror I may, with my willful ignorance, have walked into, I felt a cold chill on a stiff breeze that parted the deep mist. And through the breach I saw a figure. It was no more than twenty feet in front of me. I had not seen it walk up, but I should have since the top of its head would have towered above the mists even if they hadn’t been divided by the breeze. One second it hadn’t been there and the next second it was. I was at a loss to formulate a
rational and natural explanation.

The Shape, as I have come to call it, didn’t move its limbs in the least, and one might have thought it a statue, but for its robes swaying in the gentle wind. Its robes covered it entirely, but they couldn’t mask the width of it broad shoulders. The length of its arms were entirely concealed by long, dangling sleeves, and neither could I discern whether the thing’s feet were adorned with sandals or boots as these were hidden in the swirling mists.

But it was the Shape’s head, or where its head should have been, that I can still remember with full vividness. Its head was mostly obscured by a low hanging hood; except for where the face should be. Even in the moonlight, if any face had been there I should have observed it.

How can I explain this to you in a way that would enable you to understand? God in Heaven! Save me from such a vision! For under the Shape’s hood there was not simply the lack of a reflection; it was a void! An absence of matter casting back not the slightest fragment of moonlight! And I sensed if I were to reach under that hood I would experience the Infinite Nothingness untouched by the Original Creation. I knew insanity lay therein, and it was with a great effort of will that I pulled my eyes away. But, perhaps, the Shape released me, allowing me to retain my sanity.

As I sat speechless, unable to move, the bone of the child still clasped between my own thumb and forefinger, the Shape, almost imperceptibly, began to move toward me. There was no ambling side to side as a man would walk; it simply drifted forward. And still I sat, struck with a paralysis. As it neared me it raised its arm. At first I thought I would again be met with the frightening void, but when the sleeve fell back, I saw it had the hand of a man though deathly white and emaciated. The index finger uncurled and pointed at my newfound bone.

“The bone. It is not yours,” it rasped in a deep timbre. I presumed it came from under the hood, but from what tongue and mouth the words were formed, I could not fathom. As the breeze grew in intensity it continued, “Not yours. Not yours,” and as it repeated this mantra, it moved ever closer to me. It raised its other arm until both hands were thrusting forward, thumbs almost touching, the claw-like fingers spread wide reaching for my neck.

Nearer and nearer it approached. I was held immobilized not only by fear of its touch but by an even greater dread of what may lie under the dreaded hood. The wind was blowing fiercely now and its robes swirled all around. The shadows formed by the clouds raced over the whipping grasses in the moor beyond with increasing speed. The hooded Nothingness pricked and pulled at my conscious mind. I felt its desire to subsume my being, and an intense pain wracked me as
my spirit began to be torn from my body feeling like the stripping off of my living flesh.

Regardless of the pain, my attention was dominated by the Nothingness under the hood. As its blackness neared and filled my vision all else was cut off from my sight, and I lost the capacity of thought. At last, with my essence nearly engulfed and my neck within its grasp, the clouds gave way to the shining light given off by the fullness of the moon’s circle. Compared to the dimness a few seconds prior its brilliance was that of the noonday sun. And with it my incapacity was broken just enough to allow me to slip back a few inches; thereby causing the landlady’s charm
to fall to the center of my chest and reflect the moonlight with all its splendor. (Oh dear, sweet landlady, how I am forever grateful for thy prescient gift!)

Seeing this, the Shape drew back. The wind died to complete stillness. The moon shone full upon my body. The Shape stood for a moment, arms dangling, the opening in the hood where its face should have been oriented in my direction as if contemplating me with a new understanding. “Not yours,” it repeated a final time, and after giving me the slightest of nods, it vanished.

Not wanting to press my luck with the power the charm held over the Shape, I clambered to my feet. Without conscious thought, I reached with both hands for the charm at my neck, and with a final look across the field I fled the small hillock and retraced my steps back over the footpath to the road and back into town.

The moon released by the newly cloudless night sky guided my steps, and I was soon knocking at the door to the inn. For in this selfsame inn where I had supped, I had also booked a room for the night. The landlady seeing my distress, opened the door and led me to my room without questions. I spent a sleepless night and at first light, I eschewed breakfast and hailed a coach back to the safety of my student accommodations at Oxford.

Upon my return to university, I renewed an uncompromised study of the classics. All desire was lost for tales of folklore, and I had not resumed my former haunting of that section of the library. Soon, as they always do, the terrors of my evening on the moor began to fade, and I began to wonder if it had all been merely a dream.

In my haste to return to normal, I had yet to unpack my case, but after several weeks the urge at last fell upon me. I untied the straps, unlatched the clasp, and opened it. The smell of the moor flooded the room. Then, as I pulled out the various items of clothing, something dropped from my heavy jacket and landed with a sharp click on the wood plank floor. It was the finger bone, and I remembered the warning of the Shape: “Not yours.” I felt my strength slip away, and I fell unconscious upon the bed.

A heavy knock on the door awakened me. I must have lay in a stupor for several hours as night had now fallen, and my room was lit in a twilight of darkness. As I sat up to gather my wits, the knock came again. It was more urgent this time, and I feared its violence may wake the other students on my ward.

I stood and walked to the door. I whispered out the keyhole, “Who is there?”

Several seconds passed before the reply, “I come from the Keeper. The Keeper requires that which is not yours.” As it knocked again an odor of decay seeped through the keyhole, and I fell back retching.

My choice was to either open the door immediately or risk involving the entire hall in my ill-advised business that seemingly had followed me from Devon. I twisted the lock open and turned the handle. The door swung inward, but the thing on my doorstep did not enter. The darkness of the night kept me from seeing the details of its form, but I could tell this was not the Shape from the moor. As it reached out a hand, in the fading light I could see the rottenness of the upturned palm and clasping fingers. It wheezed, “You will give it to me.”

To my great fortune, I was able to put my hand straight away on the bone even in the darkness. Trembling, I placed it in the thing’s hand, making sure not to touch the dreaded creature. I no longer had the charm and had no idea if, after acquiescing to the thing, it would leave in peace.

Its fingers clenched around the child’s bone, and of a sudden the moon shone through the window. I saw it in the fullness of the moonlight! Again I fainted. I cannot bring myself to describe its facial features, but when I awoke, it was gone.

Dear friend, take heed. If you go to Devonshire, do not go alone on the moors at night. But if you must, do not take what is not yours.

Eric has a PhD in Writer’s Procrastination. When not walking the dogs, studying foreign languages, playing guitar, attempting to read Moby Dick, or watching reruns of New Girl, he can possibly be found sitting at the keyboard working out how to get his characters into and out of strange situations. More likely, he’s scrolling through YouTube. Seriously though, as he would tell you, he loves writing, and the thought of causing a smile, a furrowed brow, or an exclamatory “what the...” with his writing brings him joy.