James McQueen

Written age 13
Dalkeith High School, Midlothian

THE SHADOW WITH THE SILVER EYE

Jake Callums was a twelve-year-old boy who lived to be scared. His favourite type of film was horror. His favourite genre of book was ghost. His favourite time of the year was Halloween. But no matter how many times Jake was frightened he never thought it was enough.

One late autumn evening Jake went out with his mates. The circus was in town, and if you'd seen them strolling down to the field where the circus as, you would have seen Jake in his pearl white sneakers and his denim jacket. He was laughing, an innocent laugh, harmless to anyone. It would be the last laugh that left his lips.

The field was filled with colourful tents. Clowns danced in circles with their juggling balls, and small children laughed hysterically at men on stilts. The circus had everything. Dodgems, a helter skelter, a small roller coaster, a twizzler and even a ghost train, much to the delight of Jake.

The boys went round everything, but Jake's head was always turned over his shoulder. He felt his small blue eyes being drawn to a single tent in the middle of the field. While the other tents were all blue and white or red and gold, this one was completely black. It looked old and worn, yet it also seemed majestic. Perhaps this was due to the silver eye painted in wiry lines over the flaps of the tent entrance. Inquisitive as he was, Jake left his friends and approached the tent. Surely it wouldn't hurt to take a look inside.

The interior of the tent was the same colour as the exterior, black, but this wasn't what Jake was looking at. All over the ground were dark and frightening items of an unspeakable nature; jars filled with dead rodents were piled on a huge brown trunk. Dolls with snapped arms and legs were in a net, dangling from the roof; a huge black box was under the dolls and there seemed to be banging coming from it. Jake ignored it; a single tooth was sitting on a chipped stool right next to a dusty monocle. Jake picked up the monocle and blew off the grey dust.

"Having fun?" shrieked a voice behind him.

An old woman in a long, green shawl was standing at the entrance to the tent. Her bland, wrinkly skin was stretched over her face and her huge cheekbones stuck out. The woman's cheeks looked similar to that of a horse. Her eyes were wide and glaring. Her mouth seemed to be just a thin slit below her beak of a nose.

Such a fright did Jake get that he dropped the monocle. It broke into thousands of little pieces on the ground. The woman screeched at him to get out, with the look Jake imagined a hawk to have on its face before it caught its prey, and he followed her instruction almost instantly. But just as he ran out of the tent, Jake could have sworn that there was a trace of a gloating smirk on the woman's face.

That night, Jake couldn't sleep for hours. When his eyes finally dropped shut, his night was plagued with a single nightmare.

Ahh. He was on top of a hill. It was dark. Jake could hear the wind howl like a dying man. He could hear wailing, the sound of a mother who'd lost her child. Ahh help. The howling got louder. He was alone. alone. alone. Something dropped into his pocket. He reached deep and pulled out the monocle. Almost as soon as his cold fingers touched the steel edge, everything changed. And he knew that something was at the bottom of the hill. Something running. Something running up. Running up for him. It had almost reached the rocky top now, he knew it. Sweet Jesus there it was. A huge, black, cloaked shadow flew over the ridge and shot straight at him. Just as it was upon him a hood fell from its huge head to reveal a wiry silver eye upon the dark mass that was its head. Arghhh!
 

He was going to die, Jake was sure of it. Wait! No! It had only been a dream. The shadow with the silver eye wasn't real. And the monocle, he'd left that at the circus. Jake couldn't remember being that scared since he was a young child. He was breathing like someone who'd just run a marathon. He was sweating as well, onto his soft sheets. All of a sudden though, a cool breeze reached his shaking limbs. "The window must be open," he thought. But he specifically remembered shutting and locking it.

A gust of wind caused the curtains to flap open for a moment. A huge full moon was peering through the dark, murky clouds. The light of the moon danced off something on Jake's desk. Jake already knew what it was before he had reached the desk. He slowly picked up the steel rimmed monocle. His heart sank.

Creak!

"What was that?" Jake asked himself. It sounded awfully like the creaky floorboard outside his bedroom door.

Jake watched in horror as the door handle slowly turned. He heard the familiar click of the opening door. "Oh god, this is it," Jake thought. The door was half open now. In his fear Jake threw the monocle out of his open window. Almost as soon as it left his clammy hand, the door smashed open. There stood the dark cloaked shadow from his dream. Its silver eye blinking. Jake let out a scream then collapsed on the floor.

When he woke up he wasn't in the comfort of his room. He was in a cramped, square shaped box. He tried banging at first but it was useless. It was then that Jake noticed a small hole in the box and light coming through, sharp and cold. He leaned close to the hole and squinted his eyes until he could see outside the box. He was shocked. His small 'cell' was inside the black tent where he had found the monocle.

Jake had expected it as soon as he realised where he was, but nothing could have properly prepared him for seeing himself walk through the tent entrance. He began to bang the walls again but it was no use. He watched himself pick up the monocle, and then watched the old woman come up behind him. Jake saw himself drop the monocle, which broke into thousands of shimmering pieces. Then he ran out.

The old woman smirked. She picked up the pieces of the broken monocle and in the palm of her hand they sealed together.

Just before she left the tent, the woman slowly turned on her heel and grinned evilly at Jake, just as she slowly changed into the huge shadow with the silver eye and left.