🪙 The Witch’s Coin

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📖 The Storyteller’s Library

The candle flame shrank.  
Shadows jittered like nervous creatures.  

Then—thump.  
A single gold coin stood on its edge at the Storyteller’s feet, vibrating before collapsing flat.  

The coin again.  
It never stayed gone.  

Heat surged when he touched it—feverish, slick, as though clenched in a fist. The etching was new: a crooked cabin carved into its surface, contracting like a scar under candlelight.  

The air thickened. Dust whispered his name. A book slid free from the shelf, glowing faintly across its title:  

The Witch’s Coin.  

The Storyteller exhaled and began to read.  

---

The Tale

The woods were a labyrinth of shadow and root.  
The traveler felt less like walking forward and more like orbiting something unseen.  

Light wasn’t swallowed—it was consumed.  
The air reeked of rot and old rain.  

Villagers had whispered of a witch bound to a cursed coin. Most dismissed the tale. But the traveler pressed deeper, driven by compulsion.  

Then—silence.  
A coin lay beneath the leaves, not glowing but beating.  

The hand moved without choice. The coin was truth.  

The wind died.  
The insects ceased.  
The silence crushed against the eardrums until their heartbeat thundered like a frantic drum.  

And somewhere in the dark, a door creaked open.  

A crooked cabin leaned ahead, timbers bent like a broken spine. Smoke curled from the chimney though the air was still. The coin’s heat sharpened into conviction, driving the traveler forward.  

From the doorway stepped the witch.  
Her eyes were pale voids, burning holes in a face barely human.  
Her skin stretched by tension alone. Nothing about her settled.  
Her voice tore like rusted iron.  

She raised her hands. The forest obeyed.  
Branches twisted. Roots surged.  
The traveler was lifted into the air. The coin seared white-hot in their palm.  

Then—her spell faltered.  

The coin slipped free.  
The instant it struck the earth, silence shattered.  
Sound roared back in a deafening wave.  
Branches snapped. Roots recoiled.  

The witch screamed—a sound that tore sanity itself.  
The traveler hit the ground hard, bones jarring, breath ripped from their lungs.  

Instinct took over. They ran.  

The forest lashed. Shadows clawed.  
But the witch’s strength was gone.  

When the trees thinned, the traveler turned back.  
The cabin had vanished.  
The coin was gone.  

But the silence left behind was not peace.  
It was a promise.  

---

The Library

The Storyteller shut the book.  
The candle’s flame shrank to a trembling bead of gold.  

The coin was gone.  
But the wood bore a scar—the crooked cabin burned into the grain, fresh as if something had burrowed out.  

When he brushed it, warmth pulsed once beneath the surface.  
Not a heartbeat. A seizure.  

The shelves creaked softly in reply.  

He leaned back, eyes fixed on the empty space.  
He knew it would return.  
It always did.  

And when it did, the next story wouldn’t be about a traveler.  
It would be about him.  

---

Author’s Note

If this isn’t your first visit to the Library, you’ve seen the coin before. It never stays gone.  

Some say it appears when a debt is due.  
Others claim it finds those who owe something to the dark.  

I’ve stopped trying to explain it.  
I just keep writing down what it shows me next.  

Stick around. Subscribe. Share.  
And if you dare… drop a comment with your favorite scary movie, urban legend, or horror memory.  

We’re just getting started.  
And if you’re reading this, maybe you feel the heat too.  

Stick around. Subscribe. Share.

X (Twitter): @NightlyStoryTel

Instagram: @NightlyStoryteller

Bluesky: nightlystoryteller.bsky.

Email. thenightlystorytellerblog@gmail.com

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