Present Day…
Blood smelleddifferent in the cold…sharper. It cut through the air before it hit your nose. I learned vital information the first time I killed in the winter, and I’ve craved it ever since.
Tonight would be perfect for it.
The frost crystallized on the grass, and the moonlight shone through just enough to make the fog glow like smoke rising from a funeral pyre.
Of course, that meant a fresh mindless herd of rich little prey was coming. These men and women were simple-minded. They all wanted one thing—to get their jollies off by being hunted by the masked men in the hunt.
I could see them lined up now at the massive gate, bouncing on their heels, thinking they’re about to have the thrill of their lives.
They aren’t wrong.
It was true that though most of them would leave tonight with shaky smiles and stories for their friends, except for the lucky onesI chose tonight…
Well…they will never leave the maze at all.
That was the thing about my family’s annual hunt. Everyone thought it was a theater, a performance of a lifetime that demanded multiple fat zeros to enter. And just like every year, people paid without a second glance.
They wanted the performance.
They wanted the masks, costumes, and cameras they knew were tucked away in the trees. They clapped for the horror like it was a dream come true, never realizing the blood they saw dripping from my gloves wouldn’t be fake.
The Harding Hunt was just a fuck ton of noise. There were squealing crowds at the gates, floodlights swinging through the foggy arena of the corn maze, and the abandoned houses adding their own style of horror.
There were always actors screaming on cue, dumbasses lined up for their turn to slaughter. Year after year, their fear was painted on for the cameras. It was always the unmistakable truth written on their dumb, smiling faces: arousal.
These people wanted to be hunted.
They wanted to be captured and fucked without mercy.
Some of my fellow hunters gave them their wet dreams. It was the anonymity that masks provided, the excuse they all needed to whore it out for the night. All of them knowing damn well they’d be truly horrified to see what lay behind the plastic smiling faces.
Usually, the masked men were nerdy kids around their early twenties, or Cosplay gods that like to gender-bend and make everyone froth over them. It wasn’t the same shit they read in their porn books.
But the imagination was a beautiful thing.
In the studio lights, I gazed at the reflection. An actor getting blushed and fluffed to perform a miracle glared back at me. The other hunters swaggered around in their masks like they were part of some elite club.
To be fair, my whore of a mother always picked particular looks for the masked morons. She liked the boys who didn’t have brain cells, and even the few who did have some left seemed to have only used them to abuse their bodies into a sculpted submission that met her liking.
It may as well have been a fraternity for all the ‘bro’ and ‘dude’ interactions you heard around here.
I was highly intelligent, and my disinterest in everything about this shit show was evident in my posture.
But I did it.
Every fucking year, I put on the white mask with the warped smiley-face crudely carved into it, thick black marker lines accentuating the expression.
I squeezed my thick thighs into the leather black pants and let my sister, Xanthy, smear me with the congealed mix of animal blood and corn syrup. All to create the very best illusion for the masses.
I had a reputation to uphold, of course. Couldn’t disappoint the fans.
Millions of followers on multiple platforms created the adored image of me. The most ironic part was that I wasn’t putting on a persona for the posts and reels.
No.
I was nothing more than the bona fide psycho I portrayed. I showed videos of my hunts, the blood spilled from every victim, and the light as it left their eyes.
