I stumbled across this old intro to a short story I wrote awhile back to complement some nerdy tabletop RPGing I was doing at the time and found myself energized to write fiction again, but was curious to hear outside opinions. My determination to write fiction isn't so strong that I'll be put off by negative feedback, so please, don't hold back on constructive criticism. I'm not worried too much about punctuation and other syntax issues, just general narrative and storytelling critiques.
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The stranger rode into town, increasing its living population to one. In the center of the main thoroughfare stood a white, gnarled tree, it's branches twisting and reaching out like withered arms. A solitary crow sat on one of the limbs, cawing loudly; a dead man hanging below it. “Death,” the bird seemed to caw. The decaying corpse, its eyes recently gouged out of its face by local carrion-eaters, swung back and forth like a pendulum serving as a warning. The stranger shivered inwardly and glanced towards the setting sun. With dark approaching he knew he would need to stop for the night, rather than risk running his mount into further danger. He would ride all night if he could, but the men following him would bed down for the night and he knew he needed to do the same. It was late, but why there was no activity in the town the stranger couldn't quite figure out.
“Howdy,” he called to no one in particular, his only response the clattering of a busted weather vane nearby. A deserted town reduced his prospects of a decent meal in his stomach and a warm whore in his bed, but he couldn't object to the lack of local law. He cantered down the street, taking inventory of the small town. The buildings were rotting with age and the lack of upkeep, and there was a cold, uneasy edge hanging in the air, but otherwise the stranger found the town rather hospitable to his needs. A roof over his head, a trough of relatively clean water for his horse, and no sheriff meant he could rest easy for the night before he had to put more miles behind him. The horse he'd stolen had no sentimental value, but it was a sturdy mount and he figured with proper care it could continue to serve him well.
He led the horse to a trough in front of the saloon, the second 'O' on the sign hanging lopsided from a rusty nail, and tied her down while she greedily lapped up water. It wasn't particularly cold or fresh, but it was wet, and that seemed good enough for the chestnut filly. The man sauntered over to the lonely soul hanging from the tree and gave him a once over. It wasn't a pretty sight. The man's empty eye sockets gazed into the stranger, as if there was still some semblance of life behind them. His mouth was caught in a rictus grin, an unnerving sight that quickly made the stranger avert his gaze downward. The loose flesh hung limply from the man's bones, mottled and starting to turn slightly green. The stranger gagged on the smell, as it violently forced its way into his nose and mouth, refusing to leave. He hacked and coughed and in his fits noticed something bulging in the man's coat pocket. He examined further and found a bag of recently prospected gold. Several gleaming nuggets about the size of a chicken's egg stared up at him from the bottom of a ragged, brown bag. While the stranger couldn't deny his good fortune, the sight of the gold made him more skittish than the corpse itself. Who goes to the trouble of hanging a man without first turning out his pockets for valuables? It didn't make sense and it was more than a little unnerving. Pocketing the forsaken gold, the stranger slowly backed away from the tree, the crow continuing its mournful call, and walked back towards the saloon. The horse could stand to be bedded, but without stable boys around to help, and the weariness from the last two days' ride creeping through his bones, he decided she could sleep just fine outside as she could in a stall. Besides, he thought, he'd prefer she were nearby should he need to leave town in a hurry.
The stranger pushed aside the swinging doors of the saloon and made his way towards the bar. An empty town wouldn't miss a shot of whiskey or two; the corpse certainly didn't look too thirsty. The stranger grabbed a nearby bottle and a glass and slowly headed upstairs to find a bed. The sun was nearly gone and he knew he'd sleep well with some warm whiskey filling his gut. He opened the first door on his left and found a desk and a couple of small sitting chairs. The stranger pillaged the desk for valuables, but couldn't find anything beyond a smattering of ancient invoices. He moved towards the next room, but the door was locked and he didn't feel like having to break down a door for a decent night's rest. He moved onto the third room, not noticing the broken line of salt seeping out at the door's bottom and turned the doorknob. The whiskey bottle and glass smashed at his feet, the brown drink pooling around the salt as it slowly poured out of the overturned bottle. The stranger wasn't sure what to make of the horror before him. He took a step back, his body quivering, as he surveyed the scene. All manner of people: men, women, and children, their necks filling nooses, hung from the rafters. Their bodies were completely still, their faces contorted in the same rictus grin he'd seen outside. A handful of toppled chairs littered the floor, beneath them writing burned into the wood, sloppily and maddeningly repeating the same words, ' Swing Swing.'
Before he could examine the room further, he could hear a horse outside, the frantic sound of its cry echoing the stranger's own terror. He backed away from the room and fled towards the stairs, eager to get away from this haunted place. As he descended the flight of steps he could hear whispers all around him, exploding in his head, “Swing swing” they commanded. He tried to shut them out as he raced outside, but they just got louder, “Swing swing, swing swing, swing swing!” over and over, taunting him with their haunting chorus. He crashed through the swinging doors guarding the entrance and found his horse lying limp on the ground, the corners of its mouth pulled back to reveal that same devilish smile that had come to haunt him, its eyes empty and lifeless. He looked towards the tree, tears stinging his eyes, the corpse from earlier swung from side to side and the crow called out, “Swing!” The stranger crumpled to the ground, sobbing hysterically, his sanity slowly eroding as the whispering chant continued to pound at him.
