[throwaway316943]

The stories we tell are never cut from whole cloth, they are a constant mixing and blending of ancient tradition with contemporary experience. I don’t doubt that any folklore which has reached us from the distant past has been remade a thousand times but the heart of the story has likely survived. The fear of it is so intense it has been bred into us. The thump of something heavy in the night, the bristling silence of a stealthy, lurking beast. The glimpse of a dark fearsome shape. The looming threat of a powerful limb tearing you from your bed. The feeling that this presence is not simply some hungry and fearful animal but a malevolent intelligence that seeks to do you harm. You feel it deep within you, the fear not of tooth and claw but an inhumanly powerful hand grabbing you from behind.