Horrific Shorts: Zombie Edition

The villagers of Greymarrow spoke of it in hushed tones—Howling Manor, perched on a windblasted cliff above the woods, where the sea battered the rocks and the moon never rose without wailing from its windows.

Evelyn Blackmoor stood at the edge of the cliff trail, the Lantern of the Forgotten hanging from her belt. The wind pushed against her coat like fingers trying to shove her back, but she pressed forward, boots crunching over frostbitten earth.

The manor loomed ahead—its silhouette a jagged mass of chimneys and crumbling towers. Windows flickered with pale light, though no one had lived there in over sixty years.

They said the manor sang when the moon was high.

They said the last owner, Baron Virel, had vanished into the walls.

The great iron doors creaked open at her touch, revealing a once-grand hall now riddled with rot and silence. The air smelled of sea salt and old decay. Tattered tapestries fluttered without wind.

Then came the sound.

A low moan.

No—not just a moan. A howl. Long, guttural, and brimming with sorrow.

It echoed from the floors above.

Evelyn ascended the staircase, its banister splintered, her lantern casting a cold, flickering light. The deeper she went, the more the manor changed. Portraits shifted as she passed. Some figures looked away, others watched. One smiled with sharpened teeth.

She reached the third floor—once a music parlor, now a ruin of broken instruments. A piano sat in the corner, keys blackened and warped, yet it played.

Three notes.

Over and over.

She stepped closer.

Behind the piano, the shadows thickened into a form—tall, slender, wrapped in a velvet robe soaked with something dark. Its head was angled too far to one side, neck snapped long ago. It turned.

Baron Virel.

His face was a mixture of elegance and monstrosity. Fangs gleamed behind pale lips. His eyes were hollow but burned with hunger.

"The music... must never stop," he hissed. "It keeps them quiet."

"Who?" Evelyn asked, her grip tightening on the lantern.

"The ones beneath the manor. The ones I fed."

Suddenly the floor rumbled.

From the cracked boards came hands—skeletal, clawed, rotted—pulling themselves up, moaning in unison with the wind outside. The dead residents of the manor. Former guests. Servants. Lovers.

They howled.

Baron Virel lunged, fangs bared. Evelyn swung the lantern, and its flame erupted, casting radiant blue fire across the room. The undead shrieked and vanished like smoke.

But the Baron only smiled.

"You carry the flame," he whispered. "The Hollow One will be pleased."

He dissolved into ash.

Silence.

Then… the piano resumed.

Three notes. Again.

And again.

Evelyn turned to leave, but paused. On the wall above the fireplace, new words were burned into the stone:

"Play, or be played."

She closed the door behind her, but the howling continued—this time louder than before.