Tiny Dreadfuls

By S. Faxon

Prepare yourself for a tour through the dark! Inspired by the classic Victorian Penny Dreadfuls, this collection of horror short stories and oddities from award-winning author S. Faxon takes you through cursed orchards, opium-stoked alleyways, haunted houses, and to the high-seas. With some of these stories based on real-life paranormal encounters, this book is a must-read for those who love the fanciful and unexplainable!

• Language: English
• Publisher: No Bad Books Press
• Release date: Dec 17, 2021
• ISBN: 9781735726199

S. Faxon

I’m an author and creative warrior. My writing career spans four published books, several short stories, and an emerging comic series. My published novels, The Animal Court and Foreign & Domestic Affairs are about a king and queen’s struggle to maintain power over the country that they love. Foreign & Domestic Affairs was featured in the 54th annual San Diego Public Library’s Local Author Showcase. My collection of horror short stories, Tiny Dreadfuls, is being hailed as a spooky-good time, and the creative-non-fiction, Lost Aboard I co-authored with my writing partner, Theresa Halvorsen, is about San Diego’s historical landmark, Star of India.

Book preview

S. Faxon

Tiny Dreadfuls

Horrors, Oddities, and Tales of the Dark

First published by No Bad Books Press 2021

Copyright © 2021 by S. Faxon

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.

This novel is mostly a work of fiction. The names, characters, and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination or in the case of the real-life ghost story, the names have been changed to protect the individuals involved. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

First edition

ISBN: 978-1-7357261-9-9

This book was professionally typeset on Reedsy

Find out more at reedsy.com

Publisher Logo

To my readers who encouraged this project and to my guardian, Little Kitty, this book is for you.

Contents

Acknowledgement

The Stowaway

The Boy and the Hunter

The Confession

The House

The Swarm

Among the Trees

The Windmill

The Red Queen

Beneath the Nightstand

A Halloween Short

The Kingdom of Clouds

On the Orchard

About the Author

Also by S. Faxon

Acknowledgement

Many of the shorts in this collection, including the retelling of my true-life experience of living in a haunted house, were published on my website in sections, week by week, following the format of the Victorian Penny Dreadfuls. Now, thanks to my publisher, No Bad Books Press, my collection of shorts is yours to enjoy in one sitting!

If you’ve been following me for many years, first of all, thank you, while some of these stories may feel familiar, they have been remastered and enhanced for your reading experience. The tales The Stowaway, The Boy and the Hunter, The Windmill are being revealed for the very first time in this collection.

Included with the stories to follow are my notes, which discuss the inspiration behind the tales. So sit back, grab your favorite blanket to hide beneath, and prepare yourself for Tiny Dreadfuls.

Cheers, dears!

-S. Faxon

The Stowaway

Euterpe pitched with every wake beating against her iron hulls. Her bow would reach out like she would touch the storm-laden sky, before barrelling down. The lines holding up her masts and bunted sails screamed and moaned in agony from the beating she was receiving.

Crossing the cape was hell to any sailor. Euterpe may have made this passing many times before, but the young cabin boy Timmy was green to the seas. He stared out the window of the sail maker’s cabin, clinging to the sill. His wide eyes watched the waves crash upon and over the decks.

A hand landed on Timmy’s shoulder. The boy jumped.

Come on, lad. Jack, the cook, patted his shoulder. Time to take the tray to first class.

Timmy looked back out to the deck. It was less than a one-hundred-foot sprint across the wet planks that had to be timed between waves crashing over the bulkheads. His white knuckles began to shake.

Lad, I know. I’ve been where you’ve been, but I wasn’t no stowaway what’s trying to earn Captain Hall’s trust. You’re lucky he didn’t throw you overboard.

Yeah, now I’ll get ripped overboard trying to cross that. Timmy pointed to the main deck with his brow, too scared to let go of the sill.

Jack grabbed Timmy’s shoulders and turned him around. Look, I like ya, lad. You work hard, and I know you’re trying to support your family back home, yes?

Timmy nodded.

Think of them. Loop the line that runs across the deck under your arm and remember… Jack handed Timmy the tray. He led him toward the door. When I say run, you run like there’s a thousand ghosts comin’ after you.

The door rattled as they approached. Timmy thought for the quickest of moments that Euterpe herself was affirming Jack’s words of wisdom.

Jack turned the door’s knob, but the gale of winds ripped the door from his hands, slamming it open against the cabin’s bulkhead.

The rush of rain pouring through the door made Timmy shiver.

The tall ship began to heel forward, making her way down another wake.

Jack held to the back of Timmy’s shirt, helping to steady the boy with the cargo in his hands.

Timmy’s stomach felt like it was lifting as they fell.

Alright, lad, Jack started, anticipating the force of the bow striking the sea. Get ready.

Timmy swallowed hard and looked to Jack who didn’t seem bothered at all by the deluge of rain and salt upon his face.

The booming echo reverberated throughout the ship as the sea slammed into Euterpe’s figurehead. A wave rushed over the sides of the forward bulkhead. The white hands of foam raced across the deck, reaching for anything or anyone they could steal to the sea. The wave roared past the open door, spilling into the cabin, but the brunt of the sea’s power rolled onward.

The waters aboard had barely begun to pour out from the scuppers before Timmy heard Jack say, Go!

Timmy leaped out of the cabin. He felt the ship begin to level out for a moment before the sea began to point the bow back toward the sky.

He found the line leading from the sail maker’s cabin that stretched across the deck. His feet slapped against the wet planks as the vessel continued her slow ascent.

His foot slipped from underneath him. The taught line bit hard into his ribs as he fell against it, but he did not stop. Timmy gritted his teeth and dashed the last ten steps to the saloon’s door.

He shook the brass knob, feeling the ship climb the mountain of a swell. He did not dare look back. He did not want to face the monster of water that would swallow him whole.

The knob was stuck.

Let me in! Timmy cried, pounding his fist on the door.

Timmy leaned hard against the door, the shifting of the ship slipping his feet against the threshold. He clutched onto the knob and braced himself for the hands of the sea to rip him from the ship.

The door swung open.

He fell forward into the room, but something caught him by the shoulder, stopping his fall.

Slipping from his hands, the tray of food landed on the deck with a loud clunk.

The door slammed shut as the vessel’s bow hit the water.

Timmy wriggled himself free of the man’s grasp and hopped over to the tray. The boy’s terror of the sea was replaced by his discomfort from this man’s piercing eyes.

Thank you, sir, Timmy said. He avoided meeting the eyes of Army Officer Benson. Instead, he took the tray to the table in the suite and unlatched the top. He began to pull the fiddlesticks from their compartments to secure the tray from rolling off the table.

The hair on the back of his neck stood.

He could feel the army Lieutenant’s eyes upon his flesh.

Timmy gulped.

He hurried along with finishing the chore of pulling the food out from the tray.

Why did no one come out when the tray fell?

Timmy tried not to glance at the army Lieutenant who continued to stare. After a second of reflection, he realized that the gale pounding the sides of Euterpe made the ol’ girl scream enough to where any other sound would disappear in the din.

Stowaway, Lieutenant Benson’s voice hissed. The sound had been barely above the volume of a whisper and yet, somehow, Timmy swore the word echoed all around him.

His shoulders arched, his muscles clenched. He had been trying so hard to focus on his work, that he hadn’t seen Benson close the distance between them. The man was mere inches away. Timmy felt the heat radiating out from the man’s clothes. The closeness sent a chill down his back.

A door opened.

The lieutenant took a step away from the boy.

Timmy jumped away.

The captain of Euterpe stood tall in the opening to his cabin. His eyes locked upon the army officer, his brows furrowed. Everything alright in here? The captain’s voice was just above a whisper, but his horizon-blue gaze and squared shoulders radiated power.

Y-yes, Captain-Sir, Timmy replied. I brought food from Cook, Captain-sir. Timmy hurried to the potbelly stove near the captain. He busied himself with stoking the black coals in their cage back to life.

As he kneeled, he could feel the tension between the two men press upon him.

Regardless of this storm, we’re right on course for New Zealand, the captain informed in the same quiet tone.

"If we survive the storm." Benson grimaced and slapped his hand to a beam above him.

Euterpe began to lean forward once more.

"Oh, Euterpe will make it alright, don’t you worry yourself about that, the captain assured. And you, Lieutenant Benson, will serve your motherland honorably. And. The captain looked down at Timmy. You will not be saying another word to this boy or any of the other lads aboard. You stay away from them. Do you understand?"

Captain Benson said nothing.

From the corner of his eye, Timmy saw Benson’s hands form into fists.

Lieutenant Benson, do you understand? Captain Hall pressed.

Benson scoffed. "You are not an officer of Her Majesty’s army. You have no authority over me."

No authority? Captain Hall’s mustache slanted to the side. He looked to Timmy and said, "Be a