Flash Fiction Series
Ashes on the Moor
The storm came out of nowhere.
Mara Keene had been cataloging the burial mound since dawn, her boots crunching through the frozen crust of Dartmoor. By mid-afternoon, the wind whipped up white walls of snow, swallowing her tent, her tools, and all traces of the dig.
When the blizzard passed, the moor was a perfect white sheet. Perfect—except for the prints.
A single line of hoof-like marks stretched across the drifted snow, leading straight toward the mound she’d uncovered that morning. They were unnervingly precise—four inches long, three inches wide, evenly spaced, like a metronome carved into the earth.
Mara crouched over one. Sharp-edged, deep enough to press through the fresh snow into the icy soil beneath. No animal in Devon could make such a mark, certainly not in a single, unbroken line.
Mara Followed
She followed them to the mound.
The prints circled it once Then they stopped, pointing inward.
A shiver ran through her that had nothing to do with the cold. She brushed snow from the mound’s exposed stones, tracing the ancient carvings she had uncovered that morning. Spirals, like wheels turning. Shapes that looked like hooves.
A sound carried across the moor, faint and rhythmic. Like hooves on hard-packed snow, distant but drawing closer.
Mara stumbled back, scanning the empty white. Nothing moved. Yet the sound grew louder, heavier, until it seemed to press against her chest.
The mound trembled. Snow slid from its crest, revealing a jagged crack in the earth—wide enough for something to slip through.
Mara turned and ran. Behind her, the sound of hooves exploded into the air, not galloping but walking, each step deliberate, closing the space between them.
She didn’t look back until she reached her Land Rover.
The moor was empty, silent again. The mound stood undisturbed.
But as Mara fumbled with her keys, her breath hitched in the cold air. A single hoofprint stamped in the snow by the driver’s door—sharp, deep, and pointing toward her.
Here’s more Flash Fiction and Folk Horror to link to.
- The Land Remembers: Aboriginal Monsters — The Bunyip - October 14, 2025
- Slavic Mythology: 4 Forest Spirits That Still Terrify Today - September 11, 2025
- The Devil’s Footprints: Black River Crossing - August 30, 2025
