The Dzjacquerat

"And thus, all this considered, I resolved to create a deity that would deal with such children." - Extracts from the Burnt Bible and Appendices of Artemis H.T. Agrippan

A smashed glass stunned Benji awake. In the darkness of his room, he spied the empty bed next to his where his little sister used to sleep. He tensed and listened to his father's grumbling and staggered footsteps downstairs. When the noise stopped, he tiptoed out of his bedroom, stepping over the floorboards he knew would creak. He shivered when he remembered his father's words earlier that evening.

"If you don't go to sleep, the dzjacquerat will get you."

The street lamps were all lit, the candles glistened on the windowsill and everyone in town had placed holly bushes by the front gates. Yet his father, teachers, friends and neighbors had all warned him about the dzjacquerat...and what it did to his little sister.

Downstairs, his father had fallen asleep in front of the fireplace, his arms hanging over the leather armchair. The embers had quietened to a warm breath. The shattered shards of the crystal tumbler lay under his father's hand, and Benji detected the habitual scent that followed his father, like sweet, smoky fire. He went to the cupboard filled with his late mother's belongings, and took out the brown leather satchel he had packed before his father came home. He put on his heavy coat, wool hat, fur gloves and scarf but stopped when his father stirred.

"Oh, you're running away?" he slurred. "Fine, go then. Leave me in peace." Then he snorted and went back to sleep.

Benji considered his father, snoring and sleeping alone in front of a dying fire, his mother's jewelry and gowns in the cupboard waiting to be sold, and the smell from the tumbler. He looked at his hand with the missing finger, lost in an accident the previous winter. Then he took a deep breath and walked out the front door, closing it behind him.

The summer evenings had been warm, but now the maples had begun to change. He had planned to leave before it got too cold. His grandmother's house was in the mountains, and soon the snows would fall. Hopefully she was still alive. There was just the Old Ones' Wood that lay like a black wall between the town and the mountain.

There were patches of darkness on the street between the streetlamps; hidden spaces where the shadows hid. Benji walked around these, always staying in the light from above or from the candles outside someone's house. The incinerated remains of the town wicker man crackled and smoked in the central square, just before Benji stopped at a row of cairns that stared out on a gloomy, sprawling field. Beyond lay the entrance to the Old One's Wood, a silver gate that glittered in the moonlight.

It was by the gate that he saw a long, black form on four legs. The back legs were longer than the front, so it gave the impression of a human walking on all fours. It had a thin, striped coat of black and white fur. At first, it seemed to be looking up at the gate but when Benji approached it twisted its hairy neck and glared at him. Two red eyes glowed from a monkey-like face in the darkness.

Benji froze, and took a backwards step towards the lights of town. The beast turned its body and stalked towards Benji. Its cat-like eyes were hypnotic and dizzying. Benji whimpered, and bowed his head. He just prayed it wouldn't be too painful. He was too afraid to look up at the beast's monstrous form, but there was an earthy, woody smell on its body, like a pine forest on a rainy day. The beast curled itself around Benji, wrapping him in its warm body. It purred like a cat.

"It's you, isn't it?" Benji whispered from his dry throat. "The dzjacquerat. You're the one who kidnaps all the naughty children."

The dzjacquerat stopped and stared at him, its maw open. It seemed almost shocked, and maybe a little hurt, by the accusation.

"If you're not going to eat me, can you take me through the forest, please?"

With the slightest of nods, the dzjacquerat lay down on its belly so that Benji could mount it. Before Benji could fix his satchel and settle in, the beast hurtled towards the gate.

Benji screamed as they crashed through the gate in still silence. Then, his vision burst with red and green stars and scintillating white lights that blinded him. He felt the dzjacquerat beneath him, panting and galloping past this chaos of starlight. Then, they arrived at a clearing in the forest. A hamlet of stone cottages rested in the middle, whilst a water mill churned and trickled near where a river ran deep into the woods.

Wooden doors clicked open, and the people who came out seemed oddly familiar to Benji. He gasped at a young woman who had his mother's soft brown hair and big eyes.

"Benji? Benji?"

"Mother?"

"No." She ran past the huddling crowd of villagers and bent down to pick Benji up and hug him.

"Kaya?"

Kaya's tears sparkled in the moonlight, the pale shine of which the dzjacquerat seemed to relish. It rolled around behind Benji like a dog in the grass.

Benji could not stop staring. She certainly looked like Kaya, but older.

"I thought the dzjacquerat killed you?"

"No," she sighed and smiled. "He saved us. And now he's saved you."

Charli waited at the bus shelter as the snow began to fall. The clock read 00:45am. She had missed the last bus home after saying a final goodbye to her father at the hospital. Her stomach lurched at the prospect of moving in with her aunt and uncle.

The skyscrapers shimmered on both sides of the paved street, comforting her with their light. A shuddering cold air made her wrap her arounds around her jacket. In the distance, there were the cairns near the park that entered onto the Old Ones' Wood. Sometimes there were teenagers who smoked and drank in the park, but they rarely entered the wood itself. Her grandparents and great-grandparents told stories about monsters and an old man with white hair, but she struggled to believe them.

A stray aluminum can rolled past her, and she picked it up and put it in the bin. It was when she looked up at the hedge that she spotted a pair of luminous red eyes.

Charli screamed, but it came out like a squeak, a strangled cry. The eyes vanished in the darkness, and the hedges rustled. She ran away from the bus stop, passing under the skyscrapers, but in her panic she found herself at the cairns.

"Shit," she grumbled. At the silver gate, the red eyes found themselves on a monstrous form. It looked like a human walking on all fours with the face of a gorilla. Inside, she was screaming. The beast prowled towards her, but no sound came from her lips. Yet it moved and purred like a housecat. Not knowing what force compelled her, she reached out to touch the beast's long, shaggy fur.

"What are you?"

The beast made a little gruff bark. It sounded like...

"A dzjacquerat?"

The creature from her grandmother's tales made a slight nod with its head.

"Where did you come from?" Charli asked. "Will you show me?"

The dzjacquerat seized Charli with its paws, placed her on its back, then galloped towards the gate. Charli screamed as they shot into the forest, now illuminated with galaxies of rushing stars. All the time, she was screaming even though the fur of the dzjacquerat seemed to hold her in place. When the dzjacquerat stopped running, they entered into a clearing in the forest. She stared in awe at the enormous trees with their evergreen pines. Some old, rickety stone houses lay in the middle and a watermill stood empty, even though the river chuckled through the clearing and into the woods.

"It's like my dream," she said. "But where is everybody?"

Next to the houses, Charli saw a handful of wooden crosses. The dzjacquerat sat on its haunches beside her and bowed its head.

"It is beautiful here," Charli said. "But I can't stay."

The dzjacquerat made what sounded like a sigh or a dog-like groan. It lay on its belly, and allowed Charli onto its back and they travelled back to town. As they emerged from the woods, the dzjacquerat collapsed to the ground, panting and wheezing. It turned on its side and moaned, writhing in pain.

"What’s wrong?" Charli asked. She caressed its head and its stomach, and it suddenly felt very cold. Her heart pounding, she looked around but found no-one in the cold night to help. A mysterious cloaked figure emerged from the forest to her left. An old man, his white beard trailed to his waist, and when he took off his hood to reveal a balding head, Charli saw that his bare hand had a missing finger.

"So, you are the fated one who asked to return home."

"What?"

"When the dzjacquerat's time for its next life has come, a child it has saved will ask for it to take it home."

"No, no," Charli cried. "No, I didn't know! I'm sorry! I didn't mean to kill it!"

"Kill? No, child. Its next life. The dzjacquerat will be born again. But only you can make that happen."

"How?"

"Life for life. The dzjacquerat can only save or accept life willingly."

"Can't you do it?"

The old man lowered his eyes. "The dzjacquerat saved me once, but now I am too old. I did not know then what I have since discovered from the ancient texts. The dzjacquerat must continue its mission. You have heard the cries of desperate, frightened children. They need its help."

Charli recognized herself in the old man's words. But still, she felt the tremors of fear deep within her. "Will I die?"

"No, child. Like the dzjacquerat you will be reborn. You will live, and you will protect those who need it the most."

She looked down at the helpless body of the dzjacquerat. "Okay," she said. After a deep breath, she said: "I'll do it."

The dzjacquerat danced under the skyscrapers, now comforted by their bright light. Nonetheless, it knew it had to keep to the shadows for safety. It passed a bus shelter, and a few memories flashed in its mind's eyes. It took a dark alley turn, and came to the town square where the old people said they used to burn wicker men once upon a time. A child huddled under the edifice of an old church, shivering in the cold. The dzjacquerat felt a burst of warmth and hope as the snow began to fall.