The Cabin Is Always Hungry (A Dungeon Core Horror Slasher)

DEAD PACIFICA

Part 2

Mother Gertrude’s book club was attended by a few of the residents of the dungeon.

Including myself.

As much as I didn’t want to admit, it was pleasant to talk to people about books and stories even if they were literal monsters. It was Circe’s turn to pick a book, and being a hopeless romantic, she chose The Cruel Prince for the whole club to read. I just finished chapter twelve last night, and it already got to some exciting parts. I am not a big reader of romantic fantasy, especially the spicy ones people over on the internet loved to devour, but I liked all types of genres.

By ten o’clock in the morning, I was already nearing Mother Gertude’s cottage. It sat at the edge of the Lower Glade, nestled into a lazy hill where moss crept up the stones. It was built in the style of a medieval Tudor home, as if it had time-traveled from a village where plague doctors still roamed. Half-timbered walls framed the cottage in dark, sturdy beams and white plaster. The roof sagged in places, heavy with mossy fur. Smoke puffed lazily from the crooked brick chimney, smelling faintly of wormwood, cinnamon, and something floral—none of which paired well but somehow smelled like home.

I walked past the front garden, which was filled with wildflowers tangled with carnivorous blossoms that snapped at fat bees and other insects. A wooden wheelbarrow overflowed with mushrooms in impossible colors like radioactive orange, bruised purple, and bone-white. A stone path wound through it all, uneven and strangely warm underfoot. Clusters of dried herbs dangled from the crooked porch beams of the cottage, rattling softly in the breeze. Lavender. Nightshade. A bouquet of something red and stringy. A battered wooden sign hung beside the door: NO CURSING, NO FIGHTING, NO MESS.

As I approached, a window creaked open next to the front door. Gertude’s face appeared behind the glass, round and flushed, eyes twinkling like she knew every embarrassing secret I’d ever had. She was in her less monstrous form and instead assumed a portly, sharp-tongued, seventy-year-old woman with frizzy graying hair wound into a bun. No claws. No greenish tinge to her flesh. No teeth like oyster shells. Under this form she looked like someone’s grandmother who would scold you for leaving the milk out on the counter for too long.

The door opened.

Mother Gertrude pursed her lips. “What did I say, my liege?” she asked, voice carrying that grandmotherly disappointment

I was confused for a moment, then I realized what she implied. “Oops. Sorry.”

Her eyes narrowed. “There will be no floating gods in my cottage. Bad for the upholstery and my plants.”

“Sorry, Mother Gert.”

“But I’ve already brewed your favorite tea, sire. I didn’t forget.”

I sighed and activated [ Shapechanger ].