Page 1 of Primal Hunger
Chapter
One
Erin
“You should call your newest pieceCornholed by the Cryptid,” Tyler says, and I shoot him a dirty look. “It has a nice ring to it.”
This is why college kids are the worst.
Prime example, right here.
I shudder. “Ew. No.”
He lets out a groan as we continue through the woods, weaving between tree trunks and carefully avoiding above-ground roots. “Why not?”
“Because what I’m doing doesn’t involve cornholing,” I reply tartly.
There’s no way I’m including cornholedanythingin my paranormal blog unless it involves haunted bean bags, and even then the chances are low. Besides, it’s not a spoof website.
I write about real paranormal activity that makes people afraid to go to sleep without the light on and has them checking over their shoulder if they’re caught outside late at night. The kind that chills your bones and makes your blood run cold. The kind that turns your dreams into nightmares.
Not getting railed by the creature that haunts these woods and terrorizes the townspeople.
Tyler has clearly missed the point of the assignment.
“You asked for my help.” He runs his fingers through his wavy blond hair, exasperated. “I’m just trying to do what you said.”
“Remind me not to ask next time,” I grumble. Stopping by one of the thinner tree trunks nearby, I drop to my knees to unpack a night vision camera from my bag.
It’s just a camouflage hunting camera used for capturing deer and other wildlife, but I’ve caught some incredible things on it in the past. Back before I moved to the east coast, I was hunting Bigfoot on the other side of the country and got some fairly distinct images of it before it disappeared.
Well, mostly distinct.
You could make out an arm and a torso, but there weren’t any footprints to back up my findings the next day. I didn’t care though. To me, the images spoke volumes.
Unfortunately, the Bigfoot piece that I’d dedicated several years of my life to didn’t take off the way I thought it would, but that’s neither here nor there. I’ve long since abandoned my quest to find Bigfoot in exchange for something much rarer and more terrifying:the Grim.
The lore surrounding the beast is scant but fascinating, setting every nerve in my body alight with curiosity. Supposedly, the Grim is seven feet tall and blends into the shadows, appearing twice a year to snatch prey from the woods.
However, it’s been hard to find anyone willing to talk about it.
The locals don’t even speak its name for fear it’ll show up on their doorstep and drag them back to whatever hell it comes from, so getting information about it has been tricky.
Tyler was the only local person to answer the questions I had.
My fingers fumble with the camera and I brush a thumb over the lens to clean it.
As a college student who’s a bit of an adrenaline junky, he didn’t mind explaining the Grim and the myths surrounding it to an outsider—after all, I’d just moved here and didn’t know much about the place. He thought the truth might dissuade me from going after it, but when he saw it only fueled my determination to find the monster, he joined my endeavor.
Now I can’t seem to get rid of him.
Besides, he’s the only one willing to speak to me, so maybe I shouldn’t look a gift horse in the mouth. That’s a real saying, right?
“Grab this and bring it around,” I say, handing Tyler the end of a long velcro strap.
He happily obliges, and we secure the camera to the tree. I check the angle several times before I’m satisfied and we move on to the second one.
They should be evenly placed along this stretch of woodland, where most of the stories place the location of the Grim every solstice. I want to make sure we cover the area properly.
