Stolen Tongues

Stolen Tongues (2017) is Felix Blackwell’s debut novel. The novel follows Felix and Faye, who are recently engaged, as they travel to Faye’s parents’ remote Colorado cabin. While there, Faye—who frequently talks and walks in her sleep—begins to have conversations with an entity they call “the Imposter.” The Imposter begins to manipulate her while she sleeps, sometimes to the point of possession, with Felix desperately trying to protect her. The text explores The Complications of Love and Intimacy, The Problem of Explaining the Supernatural Through Appropriated Folklore, and The Impacts of Isolation and Sleep Deprivation.

Stolen Tongues was originally posted as a contest-winning story on Reddit’s r/nosleep forum. The novel is currently being adapted for film by an undisclosed indie production company.

This guide uses Felix Blackwell’s 2017 self-published paperback edition.

Content Warning: The source material and guide feature depictions of anti-Indigenous racism, child death, death by suicide, suicidal ideation, graphic violence, and death.

Plot Summary

Faye and Felix drive to her family’s cabin in the Rockies. The setting is idyllic, though Felix points out the stereotypes of Indigenous peoples in this touristy region. Later that night, Faye wakes Felix and says someone is outside, but they find no tracks in the snow. Felix and Faye go for a walk in the woods, and Faye hears crying. They find what looks like a huge dreamcatcher made of bones, twigs, feathers, and twine. Faye calls William Pike, a ranger, who says that local children play tricks on tourists.

Faye continues to sense a presence near the cabin and experiences night terrors, exacerbating her characteristic habit of sleepwalking and talking. One night, Felix hears an angry woman asking questions, and Faye—still asleep—answers. When Felix addresses Faye, her voice is not her own. He wakes her, and they hear children singing. All night, they listen to the voices, and Felix finds dozens of tracks in the morning. Once, he wakes and finds Faye missing. He sees her outside, naked, facing the woods. She moves oddly, running into the forest. A moment later, he hears her voice behind him.

The next day, Pike and Faye’s father, Greg, arrive to help them leave. On the way home, Faye keeps vomiting. When Felix takes Faye to a doctor, the doctor claims that Faye is experiencing extreme stress. When Faye and Felix explain what happened to Faye’s mother, Lynn, Lynn admits that she was never comfortable in the cabin. She recalls how Jennifer and Tom Ball, from whom they bought it, moved there after their daughter died. Jennifer had nightmares and began to hear their daughter calling to her. Tom died by suicide two years later.

At home, Faye continues acting strangely. Felix hears Faye mimicking someone in an unfamiliar voice, and sees a huge silhouette behind the curtain. Faye gets up and walks into the hallway, flicking lights in patterns of five. When Felix touches her, she goes limp. He is certain that something followed them home. He again takes Faye to the doctor, who prescribes sleep and anti-anxiety medication, but Faye’s alarming behavior still escalates. She says a man’s been whispering to her and that there’s also a woman downstairs. Felix encourages her to start taking the sleeping pills.

A few nights later, Felix dreams about a pale man whispering hateful things into Faye’s ear. When Felix moves, the man growls and crawls under the bed. When he asks Faye about him, she says the man wants something from one of them. When he gets home late one night, he finds Faye running stiffly back and forth in the hall upstairs. Felix sees a man outside, running back and forth in a synchronized manner. Felix chases the man and runs into another “dreamcatcher” made with Faye’s hair. He goes to the guest room window, which Faye had sketched in her journal, and finds a “5,” drawn backwards to be legible to someone outside.

Meanwhile, Pike’s Indigenous friend, Tíwé Lopez, believes he knows what is troubling Faye and Felix. He wants his friend Angela to speak with Faye. Angela comes over and surmises that the guest room is where Faye lets the man in. Angela shares her suspicion that the man is a “hollow one,” a creature who is jealous of the living. She asks if they’ve lost anything important, and later, Felix searches for the engagement ring, which Faye hasn’t been wearing lately.

Felix’s best friends, Colin and Tyler, agree to watch Faye while Felix returns to Colorado. He visits with Lynn, who admits that the cabin is where Faye’s night terrors began during her childhood. One day, while Faye and Greg were playing outside, Faye wandered to the forest edge, talking to someone. Suddenly, she screamed and fell, rigid. The nightmares started a few days later. Greg gives Felix his truck keys and apologizes for not saying something earlier. At the cabin, Felix searches for the ring. That night, he sees a huge shadow through the curtains and hears a knock at the door. A voice mimics his own, threatening him.

The next day, Pike brings Tíwé and Tíwé’s son, Nathan. Tíwé calls the creature Felix sees “the Impostor” because he imitates humans. Tíwé explains how, during the Gold Rush, thousands of Indigenous persons were displaced or killed by white miners, and the Ineho and the Pozi peoples allied against them. Ultimately, the colonizers bribed the Pozi to turn them against the Ineho. When the Ineho found out, they killed many of the Pozi and buried them head down, feet sticking above the earth so wolves would eat them, preventing the Pozi from returning to their home in death. Tíwé’s people believe the Impostor is drawn to sites of suffering. The entity only appears at night, his back to his victims because he cannot pass for human.

Felix shows Tíwé and Nathan the dreamcatcher, but Tíwé says it’s actually a totem of death and chaos. He tells Felix not to touch it, giving Felix a pouch with sage. That night, Felix takes a hot bath, and when the steam fogs the window, he sees a backward “5”; he finds more 5s on every window. The Imposter starts knocking at the front door and mimics Felix’s voice. He assumes the Impostor is practicing his voice to trick Faye into giving him information.

Felix goes to bed, but hours later, Tíwé wakes Felix, who was sleepwalking in the snow. Tíwé urges Felix to go home. Felix goes back to sleep and dreams of the “dreamcatcher” with Faye’s engagement ring in it. When he wakes, he finds the “dreamcatcher” with the ring inside and tears it apart. The Impostor immediately approaches, and Felix is horrified to see that it wears Tíwé’s face. His terror is so extreme that Felix blacks out after barricading the door. He wakes up in bed with something that looks like Faye, and “she” questions him about what “makes five.” Felix says he doesn’t know and says the creature will never get an answer. The Impostor attacks Felix. Felix grabs the sage, smashing it into the creature’s face, and it runs off. Before dawn, Pike and five other men arrive. Pike tells him that Tíwé is dead, and Felix goes home.

Gradually, Faye improves, and they move into a condo. One day, Nathan calls to speak to Faye. She listens before vomiting black liquid all over the carpet. Nathan tells Felix that Tíwé’s body was found naked and mutilated; he has learned that the Impostors salvage pieces of their victims’ bodies for their use. A few nights later, Felix helps Faye upstairs, and she vomits black sludge again. Felix wanders the house in a “hypnotic state.” He walks to a window and draws a backward “5.” When Faye vomits a third time, she wishes the Impostor would just kill her.

Faye’s sister, Becca, visits with her baby, Caleb. Felix asks Becca about the number “5”; he can tell she’s hiding something, and things are strained between the sisters. Nathan calls, saying he dreamed of the cabin and heard his father speaking. When Felix hears a scream, he tells Nathan not to go to the cabin and hangs up. He discovers that Faye has taken Caleb from his crib, and Felix and Becca follow his crying outside. Becca and Caleb leave immediately. Later that day, Becca texts Felix, telling him to ask Lynn about “5.”

Felix locates Jennifer Ball’s second husband, Henry, and reaches out for information. Henry leaves him a voicemail saying she had terrible nightmares and that one night, she disappeared. Her body was found buried upside down with her legs above ground, and animals had chewed them up.

Lynn shows up at the condo with a photo album containing unfamiliar pictures of Faye and of a heavily pregnant Lynn. Christopher, the baby, was stillborn. At the time, Faye couldn’t process her immense grief. Greg and Lynn took her to the cabin, and that’s when the entity first noticed her. Faye seemed to forget that Christopher had ever existed, so the family went along with it.

Faye emerges from the bedroom, snatches the book, and opens it to a page displaying a giant, colorful “5.” She remembers the significance of the number: She never saw Christopher, so she always thought of him as the number “5” because he would have been the fifth member of the family.

That night, Felix wakes up outside and sees the Impostor across the street. The monster wears Nathan’s face and speaks in his voice, demanding to know about the child. Felix vomits profusely, then runs away. Faye is awake, and for several hours, they communicate only in writing so that the creature will not overhear them. Faye has a plan.

Two days later, Pike says Nathan’s body was found buried upside down with his legs sticking up, his face and scalp missing. Angela arrives, and she and Felix summon the entity. When it arrives, Faye is calm. She tells the creature she had a baby brother; he was number five. She says she couldn’t remember for a long time because she wanted to forget. Now, she tells the creature that it knows everything and she won’t go with him. She tells the creature to go, and it does. After that encounter, the monster stays away, and Felix stops trying to understand.