Witches Tale 3

“The three are idiots, totally worthless, a complete waste of life. But, I need them.” The witch said.  She stared into the crystal ball, the only light in the cave.  A heavy stone door kept her inside.  Behind her was the void.  A wrinkled finger, yellowed and spotted, drew a line on the globe.  She shuffled around in her dank dwelling , fiddling around with some dusty bottles on a rotten wooden table.  Spiders shifted and settled back into their dirty webs waiting for the day when she’ll stop moving and they can feast on her.  She went back to the globe, “They are going to bring me my girl and release us from this rocky prison.”

A swirling mass began to grow in the crystal ball as the witch started to chant.  Her name has disappeared from her mind, but her spells stuck in her mind like a splinter.  Next to the crystal ball was a big black cauldron, crusted with years of concoctions.  She poured the bottles into the pot, and a thin tendril of smoke began to float out.  Light danced among the swirling in the globe.  The witch glided over to a workbench on the edge of the dark room.  On the bench she felt around for the final ingredient, a bat she had recently caught and killed.  She drained the blood into the kettle and began to stir.

The crystal ball flashed brightly, showering the cave in light.  She shielded her big bloodshot eyes from the blinding light. Her body had adapted to the dark, giving her an uncanny ability to survive in blackness. There was a time she craved light, would cast a spell just to see the sun.  Yet, with time, she grew to loath the light, for it burned her skin and her hurt her eyes.  This made casting spells painful, blistering her skin every time the ball lit up.  She had to make each spell worth the pain and torture it caused.  

Chanting filled the cave, echoing off the rocky walls.  The spell was a low deep guttural sound, coming from deep within the witch’s stomach.  If someone listened long enough they would hear a melody to the spell, but the words were incomprehensible.  The witch knew what it meant, knew when to pause and when to speed up.  Inside of the globe, the swirling matched time with the spell, pulsing to the beat she kept.  The cloud inside started to dissipate and colors coalesced, forming shapes.  The shapes began to become more refined as the chanting sped up to an almost inhuman speed.  Her lips fluttered, her tongue twitched, the words running together as she reached the crescendo of the chant.  She collapsed when the last of the chant spilled from her mouth.  An image appeared in the crystal ball.

The witch stood up weakly, wiping the sweat from her brow.  Her body was spent, every bone creaked and popped as she leaned over the crystal ball and looked at the world contained within.  Her eyes reflected the scene she saw playing out.  A viking-like boat, with a dragon masthead, bobbed next to a wooden dock.  The boat looked like it had seen better days, paint on the masthead was peeling, barnacles grew on the sides, and the oars were rotten and splintered.  No other boats were tied to the dock while it banged a lonely beat against the dock.  She watched as the image moved to a gloomy bar squeezed between shipping company buildings in the port.  

Inside the smoky bar, sailors and pirates huddled together drinking dark beer.  A woman was by herself at the corner of the bar, staring at the wall.  Three ugly men sat in a dimly lit booth watching her.  The witch smiled, she always smiled when she saw the woman, and whispered to herself, “soon, we will be together.”  

She rubbed the globe and the scene focused on the men.  They sat around the table, a black cloth lay among scattered mugs.  On the cloth were some lines of text with a drawing of a map.  The witch knew the cloth and the handwriting, it was cut from her robe and written in her shaky hand.  The rail thin one, with a nose that was too big, pointed at the cloth.  Inside of her mind voices appeared, in line with the moving lips of the three men.

“I’m tellin’ ya, that’s her.” He said.

“We’ve been staring at her for like an hour, Scaz.”  The pig-nosed one said.  

“Well, she is, Krut.  Let’s finish up and grab her.” Scaz said.

Krut picked up his glass and slobbered the beer down.  Mord reached for the map and Scaz slapped his hand away.  He glowered at the wide face of the short man in a hood.  Mord pulled back his hand and stuck it in his wet mouth.  “Why’d you go and do something like that?”

“Because, you are an idiot and would lose it.  We need it to find the door and the treasure.  If you go and lose it, where would we be?  We’d be lost and without the money.” Scaz said.

The three looked back and forth at each other.  Daggers shot from Scaz’s eyes, while the other two were shaken and skittish.  Scaz had already planned on drowning the other two as soon as they got the gold.  

The last couple of days a beautiful woman came to him in his dreams and whispered in his ear that he couldn’t trust his friends anymore.  He could feel her breath as she purred into his ear, “they want the money for themselves, they’ll kill you.”

He didn’t want to believe her, they had been together since they escaped the orphanage.  But, every night she came to him, gave him pleasure and whispered how they were planning on killing him.  “Krut is going to slit your throat while you sleep.  Mord will poison your beer.  They are going to tie you to a rock and throw you into the ocean.  You are going to find yourself tied to a stake in front of a rat's nest, the rats are going to eat out your eyes.”  She’d scream as she climaxed.  

Each morning he woke up sweaty and shivering, her words in his head.  The other two would be awake, the campfire already started, and their eyes on him.  He’d bark at them about something, pour out the coffee Mord gave him, and clutch onto the cloth.  He couldn’t wait to have this over with.  They just needed to find the woman with blond hair and red dress, like the message on the map said.  Once he was sure they had the gold, he would find a way to get rid of them.  

Back in the cave, the witch shuddered at what she had done in the dreams.  The idea of touching the tall one made her sick, even if it was just her corporeal self.  She knew she had to get them to turn on each other.  They had been together for so long, if she hadn’t intervened they never would give up their blood willingly.  The other two were frazzled as well, she had sent the horrible ones from the void into their minds.  Things with too many legs and mouths, burrowed their way into their dreams and laid eggs that kept them on edge.  

In the crystal ball, she watched as the three enacted their loose plan on kidnapping the girl.  The witch waved her hand over the ball and the image disappeared.  She didn’t want to see what they were going to do, she was sure it was it would be brutal.  The globe shifted the image to the boat and she walked away to find a chair.  

Anger rose in the witch’s chest.  She tried not to think about how Mord or Krut would crack the girl in the back of the head with a club.  Then they would scoop her collapsed body up and drag her out of the bar.  She cursed the other patrons for ignoring it, either by being too drunk or just not wanting to get in the middle of it.  Then they’d take her out into the cold, throw her over their shoulder and carry her to the boat.  She had planted that boat there, knowing that no sane sailor would have a vessel out in the brewing storm. They’d steal the first boat they saw.  Scaz would growl at them to tie her to the mast head.  If they wanted to make it through the cave, they needed her as a beacon to push away the madness that lived within.  Once she was secured to the dragon, the three would hop into the boat and push off from the dock.  Then it was the open water.

The witch brought over her wooden chair and sat in front of the crystal ball.  One of her legs tapped incessantly while she watched the boat.  She chewed on a finger and chanted some more.  The waves became violent, smashing against the side of the boat, soaking the three thieves with freezing water.  They’d huddle in their clothes, eyeing each other; two of them frightened about the things squirming around in their minds, the third planning on how to kill the others.  And the girl stared straight ahead with a slight smirk on her face.

On the rocky coast, an outcropping of rocks jutted out wide into the water. A cave opened up on a side of the rocks, giving it the appearance of a giant mouth swallowing the ocean.  The coast was full of vegetation, except around the outcropping.  Nature avoided it, leaving only dark rocks that broke the waves.  Most adventures plotted their course wide of the cave, there were too many rocks just under the water to snag the hull of a boat and send the men to a watery grave.  There was a path, if someone chose to go down the giant’s throat, but they would need a small boat with a short hull to pass over the rocks.  No one was crazy enough to take a boat like that out on the ocean, except for three men blinded by greed and a woman tied to the boat.

Scaz pointed the boat to the opening.  Mord looked up at the rocks that seemed to be a face and swore that there were eyes looking down at him, waiting for its prey to sail into its mouth.  They crossed the threshold and entered into the darkness.  “It’s too dark!  It’s not natural” Krut said.

“Ah, shut your mouth!” Scaz looked in the direction of Krut, then turned toward the other, “Mord, light your torch.” Scaz said.

Mord fumbled for his flint and started to strike it when he realized he had nothing that was dry.  His cloak was soaked through, the torch he had brought was heavy with salt water.  “Uh, Scaz, I don’t have anything to light.”

“What do you mean?  You idiot, why’d you let the torch get wet? You had one thing to do.  How are we supposed to see in here?  Krut, give him your underwear or something.”

Krut padded his clothes to see if anything was dry.  The dark was too much for him, he felt like they were being watched.  Something heavy fell onto his leg and started to scurry down, tickling his exposed skin.  Krut’s hair stood up and his skin tightened.  Another thing fell onto his shoulder, it made an insect-like sound and it pinched his skin as it crawled down his back. There were more thuds and he could hear Scaz and Mord rustling with the unseen things.  Then one of them bit his ankle; a burning pain shot up his leg and it instantly fell asleep.

His screams echoed throughout the cavern, mixing with the sound of lapping water.  Krut swatted at the thing biting his foot.  His hand touched a hard body with prickly hair.  His mind reeled at the thought that these invisible enemies were the things that had invaded his dreams.  Mord started to scream behind him, but it was quickly cut short.  Then he heard a banging and the quiet sound of thread being pulled from a spool. In front of him, he heard Scaz curse and the sound of him smacking himself, but then it stopped.  Then the similar sound of cotton being torn.  He was sure he was going mad.  

“Mord! Scaz!  What is going on?” He screamed.

He stayed perfectly still, unable to move, his leg all pins and needles.  There was clicking on the wood, as they moved around him.  They ignored him and focused on whatever they were doing to the other two.  The sounds of chattering and whispering thread cut through Krut’s mind, shattering it to pieces.  He thought about jumping into the water, but couldn’t move.  

A blue glow appeared deep within the cave.  The outline of the dragon masthead revealed itself the closer they floated toward the light.  The woman was still tied to the boat, though if she was still living, he couldn’t tell.  A little further into the light and Krut could see what had happened to Scaz.  Horrible little things crawled all over him.  He saw the sticky thread that Scaz’s emaciated corpse was bundled in.  The boat was covered in the black shapes of strange insects with human-like faces.  Their big round white eyes stared at Krut, their sharp teeth chattered at him.  

Krut’s mind snapped and he dropped out of the boat into the water.  Mord and Scaz reached out to him, yelling.  But, the water swallowed him in inky blackness, the boat kept floating away and he was lost to them.

Inside of the witch’s prison a red glow came from the void behind her.  A whale-like moan accompanied the glow.  The witch turned in her chair and looked at it over her shoulder.  The glow coated the room in a red light; it was the first time the witch had seen the area in any kind of light.  She snorted and thought it looked better in her mind.  The witch looked back at the globe with a sparkle in her eye and she cackled out loud at the sight of Scaz and Mord crying over their ugly friend.

“Why were you such an idiot Krut?  Why did you want to kill me, we could have shared the money.” Scaz cried.  

Memories flooded Mord’s mind as he hung his head over the side of the boat, trailing his fingers in the cold water.  The first time they met was at the orphanage, where Mord found Krut being attacked by two older boys in the bathroom.  Before they knew what was happening, Mord was on them with a bit of pipe he carried with him.  After that, the two stuck together.  They met Scaz later and fell in-line with him as their leader.  It was Scaz who had broken them out of the orphanage.

He had kept them out of trouble.  Until now.  

Mord didn’t want to be here.  Everything about the cavern had him on edge.  There were strange unearthly noises all around them.  A floppy padding sound plodded behind them.  The other two didn’t seem to notice it, so he kept his ears open.  He had always imagined himself as the group’s protector; he never let anything happen to them before and wasn’t going to now. Then Krut had shrieked and fell into the water.  Mord had failed at the one good thing he could offer to the group.

Mord chewed on his lip and mulled over what Scaz had said. “Hey Scaz, what did you mean by saying Krut wanted to kill you?”

They were still in the dark.  Scaz listened to the echoes of the water.  So far, their woman hostage had done exactly what the cloth had said, protect them from the madness of the cave.  At least he thought that until Krut fell into the water.  Now he wasn’t so sure if they had the right girl.  He peered forward into the darkness, hoping for them to crash into a shore or something to let him know they can get out of this boat.  Mord mumbled something behind him.
“What’d you say?”

“I said, why do you think Krut wanted to kill you?” Mord said.

Scaz turned toward Mord’s voice.  I can easily take care of you with Krut out of the way, he thought.  Mord’s face started to form out of the darkness, outlined in a red glow.  The boat began to take shape in the redness.  They both forgot the unanswered question and turned toward the glow.  “We are near the end of the cave!” They both yelled.

The excited men clapped each other on the back and it felt like old times.  Each of them grabbed an oar and began to paddle toward the light.  The red bounced off of the rocks of the cave, giving it the feeling of being inside some living thing’s throat.  The water stayed black, with no hint of the red glow touching it. The waterway was narrow with a rocky path on either side. Light escaped through the edges of a big rock door, giving it shape and a goal at the end of the tunnel.

Mord heard the padding footsteps behind him again, between strokes of his oar.  He took the oar out of the water and turned to look for the source of the sound. While he turned, he knocked Scaz out of the boat, and onto the rocky shore.  Then the boat hit the rock and stopped.  They landed in front of the door.

The woman tied to the boat watched the men cast in red.  She looked at the door and smiled.

The witch got up from her chair and walked over to her side of the door.  She touched the cool rock with an outstretched hand, anticipation growing.  If she put her ear against the door, she could almost hear the men breathing on the other side.  But, she couldn’t see them, couldn’t open the door and get out there to take the woman.  The witch scurried over to the crystal ball and bent over it, eagerly waiting for the other two to die.

Scaz jumped up rubbing his head.  He felt groggy and dazed, the oar had cracked him hard on the head.  He looked for Mord, ready to fight.  Mord was out of the boat, looking the other way, mumbling something.

“I knew it!  You two were going to kill me.  Why?  Over some money?  We never let that get between us before.  I had saved you from that orphanage. Without me you would be nothing!”  Scaz screamed.

Mord watched the path.  Something was coming.  It was big, he could see the dark shape of horns rubbing the top of the cave.  It slapped its feet on the ground like a duck.  He squinted his eyes while he looked at it, he couldn’t discern any other features on the thing, it reminded him of a shadow moving on its own.  Then something hard hit him on his side and he fell to the ground.

Scaz stood above him, holding an oar in his hand.  The red glow outlined his skinny frame, giving him a demonic look.  Mord looked up at him, mystified at what had happened. “Scaz, can’t you see it?  It’s right there.” He pointed behind him.

“You think you can take the gold for yourself?  You are a brainless, stupid idiot that has never done anything right.  You can’t even keep your partner in crime safe.  Hell, you can’t even do something as simple as kill me!”  

Scaz swung the oar down over his head.  Mord saw it coming and rolled out of the way. The footsteps kept coming.

“Scaz, what are you talking about?  We didn’t want to kill you.  You two were the best thing to ever happen to a guy like me.”  Mord sat up on his elbows, his head swiveling back and forth between Scaz and the shape moving closer. “Why would you say something like I can’t keep Krut safe? He was my brother.”

“Yeah right, you should have heard what he said about you when you were away.  He hated you.  I’m sure it was his idea to kill me, he was always smarter than you.  He was probably going to dump you as soon as he could.”  

He swung the oar again, this time connecting with Mord’s leg.  Mord yelped out and pulled his leg away.  Scaz was trying to kill him and he didn’t know what to do. The creature moved past Mord and stood behind Scaz.  It put two long fingered hands on Scaz’s shoulders and whispered to him.  

Mord stood up and watched confused as the creature stepped into Scaz.  Scaz’s eyes seemed to grow red.  He couldn’t protect Krut, but he was going to save Scaz.

Scaz held the oar in his hands like a sword and wound up, readying his swing when Mord tackled him.  They fell to the ground, Scaz knocking his head hard against the rocks.  Drool and foam flew out of Mord’s mouth as he wrapped his hands around Scaz’s neck.  Tears flowed out of Mord’s eyes.  Panic sunk in, Scaz recognized the look in Mord’s eyes.  He was going to choke him to death.  Scaz gripped Mord’s wrists, trying to break the hold.  Then he bent his legs up and tried to roll.  Mord had fifty pounds on him, making it near impossible for Scaz to lift him.  

The two struggled with each other on the ground. Anger, confusion and panic swirled around them.  Mord’s fingers tightened around Scaz’s neck, cutting off more and more oxygen.  Scaz wasn’t going to let it end like this, he was going to get that gold.  He let go of Mord’s wrists and reached into his pocket.  With all of his dreams and thoughts of the others trying to kill him, he came prepared.  

In his pocket was a knife.  His fingers gripped the handle as his vision began to tunnel.  His mind swam and floated, he focused all his attention and anger at Mord.  He wasn’t going to let a fat idiot kill him when he was this close to his fortune.  He pulled out the knife and plunged it into Mord’s side.  

Mord slide off of him, clutching the wound.  His face contorted in shock.  “Why?  I was trying to save you.” He gasped.

Scaz straddled Mord’s body.  He put the knife to Mord’s neck.  “You are pathetic.” Then he slide the blade across the skin, blood spurted out.  Mord’s eyes went dark.

Blue light emerged out of the void, mixing with the red.  The whale-like moan intensified.  The cave began to rumble.  The witch stood up and went to the door, ignoring the crystal ball.  She stood behind the door and waited, she knew it would soon open.

Scaz sat on top of Mord’s lifeless body with the knife still in his hand, catching his breathe.  He felt the cave rumbling beneath him, and saw the blue light coming out of the door.  He knew it was close.  There was just one more thing he had to do. It was the one part he hadn’t told the others.  He wasn’t sure why he didn’t tell them.  Maybe, subconsciously he had always planned on killing the others.  

The woman was still tied to the boat.  Her face a mask of red and blue light.  Her mouth was twisted in a grin and her eyes on the door.  They had never left the door.  Scaz walked over to her and cut the ropes.  She fell to the ground in a heap, cutting her bare legs.  She rubbed her arms where the ropes had rubbed them raw.  Scaz grabbed her wrist and dragged her over to the door.  He idly tossed his knife down near them and began to undress.

The witch listened behind the door.  Her body quivered at the thought of her girl being so close.  There was just one bit of nastiness left.  It was the one thing she had dreaded.  Scaz’s dream flashed through her mind.  She couldn’t let him have her, couldn’t let him defile her.  The witch ran over to her table and reached up into the corner of the cave.  

Her hands pushed through the spider webbing and she wrapped her fingers around a fat spider.  The spider squirmed in her hand, trying to find some flesh to stick its fangs into.  She whispered something into her closed fist and the spider froze.  She went back to the door and bent down, then pushed the frozen body through the crack.  The witch whispered another word and the spider woke up angry.  It scurried under the rock door and searched for a victim to take its anger out on.

The cave was cold, the air stung Scaz’s naked flesh.  He tried to ignore it, excited at a chance to get between this woman’s thighs and open the door.  The woman looked up at his thin naked body, ribs poking out, bruises and scars painted across his skin.  She twisted her face in disgust.  He spat and fell on top of her pinning her down.  She struggled, but he was wiry and stronger than he looked.  

Before he could enter her however, a sharp pain shot across his leg.  He looked down to  see a fat spider attached to his leg.  He let go of the girl and tried to get it off of him.  The woman took the chance and grabbed the knife he had dropped.  She picked it up and stabbed Scaz in the side of his neck.  He dropped to her side, his head against the door with the knife handle protruding out of his neck.  She scrambled away from his body and stood up.  The spider crawled over the body weaving a web.  The heavy door began to shake.

Green light mixed with the other two forming a bright sun.  The void blinked open, pulsing and pounding.  The witch backed up as the cave door opened.  On the other side stood her girl, in a thin dress.  Blood had splattered on her blonde hair.  They stared at each for a moment, like looking in a carnival mirror, on one side the picture of beauty, the other side framed a wrinkled and ugly woman.  Then they met in the middle in a lover’s embrace.  They fell to the ground, legs wrapped around each other, lips locked.  The void hungrily opened like a baby’s mouth, sucking in and sucking out.

The ocean outside of the cave began to roil as rock began to shake free from the coast.              Rocks tumbled into the water and two lights glowed on the face as the cave mouth closed.  The earth itself shuddered as the ancient beast awoke, the spell fulfilled.  The two bodies inside continued to make love, giving life to the old one.  A mountain lifted out of the land and began to walk the earth, ready to begin its reign as overruler.

Witches Tale 2

Mabel had been trying to not think about what she had done. The thing that had caused her to pack up her life and toss it into a backpack. The life before didn’t exist anymore. It was now little vignettes of checking into an hourly hotel to shower, grabbing something to eat from a gas station buffet, or stealing a new disguise from from a department store. She tried not to look into the eyes of anyone, afraid that they might tell she was on the run, and then inform her pursuers where she was. Someone had to have been telling on her, how else did they know where to find her? They always kept Mabel looking for a new town, and she had just run out of towns to hide in.

The last town she was in was on the edge of the wilderness. Everything beyond it was uncharted territory. Mabel looked at her wrinkled map as she sat over her meal in a diner. Red X’s covered all of the towns she had used. There were no names left on it. All that was left was the edge of the map, the unknown. She took a bite out of the greasy burger and wiped a bit of ketchup off her cheek. As she chewed on the sandwich, Mabel hoped that she could make it beyond the map, that maybe the others wouldn’t think to look for her there. If it was empty and soulless, there wouldn’t be anyone to tell on her. She swallowed the meat and as she started to take a sip from her pop, she heard the warning sound that told her it was time to go.

The sound was less a sound and more a feeling. Her life of running had given her a second sense on when it was time to go. And the warning feeling was blasting high-alert in her head. She grabbed her green canvas backpack, threw some money on the table and ran out the back door. The fog hit her as she exited the building, mist coated her in a cool wet blanket. The lights in the parking lot had halos around them as she peered around the corner of the building. Some headlights appeared in the lot. She turned and headed into the woods behind the diner.

Inside the woods, everything was behind a vale of a gray cloud. The edges of the trees and ground were faded making it feel as if she was running through a dream. The trunks of the trees were dark brown and black from the moisture in the air. The moisture entered her lungs as she ran, filling them with water, causing her to cough. Inside the foggy forest every sound seemed to fall flat, yet she had to stifle her cough in case the others heard it. She was running blind, peering behind her shoulder to look for the tell tale signs of flashlights. Mabel knew what they would do if they caught her, so she pumped her legs harder and ran deeper into the woods.

Time in the forest seemed to stand still for Mabel. It felt as if she were running on a large treadmill with fake trees that popped up along the track. The only way for her to tell if any time had pass was the growing pain in her lungs and the aching in her leg muscles. Nothing else changed; tree trunks appeared out of the mist and disappeared behind her into the mist. But, she couldn’t tell if she had made any progress, if she had been running for an hour or just ten minutes. Could they be hidden in the fog behind her, slowly following her, waiting for her to get tired and then pop out to catch her in their net? Maybe they were in front of Mabel, digging a hole and filling it with razor wire and sharpened sticks, waiting for her to impale herself as they fill it back up with dirt? She pushed herself harder, and kept her eyes peeled for any possible traps. As vigilant as she thought she was, it shocked her when she came out of the woods and ran into large clearing with a massive house at the center.

Mabel stopped in her tracks at the sight of the mansion. It felt out of place in the middle of the woods. There were no signs of a driveway leading up to it. The house seemed to have been dropped here by a giant. She thought about turning around and going back into the woods, when she thought she heard someone calling out in the forest. Mabel crept over to a large tree and looked back and forth between the woods and the house. It felt like she was being watched from both directions. Yet there was only silence. Mabel sat on the wet dirt and leaned against the tree staring at the mansion. She felt something, a presence maybe, but there were no lights on in the house. It appeared to be abandoned. The wind bit at her skin and froze her wet clothes. As she shivered against the tree trunk, the mansion looked more appealing and worth checking out.

The fog and trees crowded around the edge of the perimeter of the clearing, as if afraid to get too close to the unnatural structure at the center. Grass in the clearing was not afraid, however, it grew long and full, grabbing at Mabel’s jeans. She looked up at the mansion, with its tower and gables, its black windows all focused on her. The windows reminded her of the hollow eyes that were behind her every step. They watched her, and waited with the expectancy she saw in junkies waiting for their heroin being cooked. Mabel hiked up her backpack and ignored them.

Chipped paint littered the wooden steps up to the house-sized front porch. They creaked at the pressure Mabel put on them as she lightly sprinted up the steps. The porch was bare and faded into the distance as it reached around the house. She bent down into the shadows of a pillar and watched the fog. Her heart pounded in her ears and she caught herself holding her breath. She wished the thick mist had been around the house to conceal her path. If they hadn’t seen her come up, she might be safe here for a while. They might have lost her in the woods and maybe they won’t notice the house. If she could get into the house, she could go up to the tower and watch the woods. If they did see her go to the house, maybe she could lose them in the large mansion. But, first she needed to get in.

The door was as tall as some of the diners she had eaten in. It towered over her, lost in the shadow of the top of the porch. Mabel touched the bowling ball sized handle and wondered if giants lived here. She started to turn the handle and then stopped. The thought of giants made her wonder if the house really was abandoned. Just because the lights were out didn’t mean it was empty. They could just be asleep. Mabel came up with an alibi about being lost in the woods and needing a place to get out of the cold until morning, just in case. A strange and distant howl broke the silence and Mabel decided giants would be better to deal with than what was out in the woods looking for her.

She struggled with the handle and her heart stopped as it didn’t budge. She put both hands on it and threw her weight into it. The knob cried out as years of rust began to crumble away. The bolt slowly pulled into the door and it began to move. Mabel pushed as hard as her body could and the large wooden door silently gave away, throwing her balance off and she fell to the floor. Mabel was in the house.

The door swung toward the wall and then bounced back. It slammed into her as she was getting up and knocked her back down before closing with a thud. Inside, the house was too dark. Windows along the walls allowed a small amount of light in to puddle on the floor. It seemed like the light was afraid to go much further into the house, leaving Mabel alone. Mabel stifled a sneeze and stood up. She instinctively tried to look around but couldn’t see much else than the windows. With her hands out, she backed into the door and felt for a light switch. Light might have warned the inhabitants of the house or the things outside, but the dark was too much.

As she felt the walls, her other senses tried to make sense of what was around her. The house creaked and moan, and there was a slight breeze that flowed around her. Her fingers felt the smooth wood, carved with shapes she couldn’t decipher. Despite the breeze, the room had the musty smell of moldy furniture and rotten vegetation. After a couple of minutes of feeling the walls, she decided to give up. Maybe the house was built before electricity or if there truly were giants living in the house, the switch was up higher on the wall. She cursed the lack of time she had to prepare her bag, otherwise she would have a flashlight right now to use.

Mabel decided if she was going to follow this strange fairy tale logic she had spinning around in her head, then maybe she could be in wonderland and there was a giant table with a magic potion on it. She shuffled to the side of the door, hoping to touch a large table leg. Her foot kicked something that made a loud clank, and she could hear something wobbling back and forth. She blindly reached out, half expecting to feel the huge table leg, but felt the smooth glass of a normal-sized table. Mabel swept her hands back and forth above the table and felt a lamp. Her hands patted the lamp until it brushed the pullchain, she pulled it.

Light exploded in the room, blinding her. After a moment her vision came back and she was able to get her first real look of the room. The lamp didn’t offer much light, much of the room was outside of the light’s glow. But she could see that the room was large. Golden starlight twinkled throughout the room, along with something large in the distance. The starlight appeared to belong to other lamps on tables, all normal size. So no giants, she thought to herself. She left the comfort of her light and started going to the other tables, leaving a trail of little islands of light. After five minutes all of the lamps in the room were lit and she saw the room in most of its glory.

The largest open staircase she has ever seen was the centerpiece of the room. There was a fireplace that she could have stood in on one of the walls. Four doorways of darkness punctuated the room. Each table had dirty white tablecloths with the tarnished brass lamps. The light from the lamps were not bright enough to light the ceiling, though Mabel could see the shape of a huge chandelier hanging down. Besides the tables, there were also chairs and couches covered in graying white sheets. Underneath the tables were Persian rugs, dotted with dirt and dead bugs. The rugs laid on top of a checkerboard tile floor.

Mabel stood awed by the room. She had never been in anything so beautiful before. If the room hadn’t been covered in filth she would have felt out of place. However, the dirt and disrepair of the place matched how she felt. What was this place, she thought. If the lights still worked, could it be abandoned? Shit! If it wasn’t abandoned, she just announced to everyone here that someone was in this room. She dove under a table and listened.

The room was silent except for the lonely moan she had heard earlier. Something felt off as she sat under the table. There was something missing. She looked around and touched her backpack. Three legs held up the table. Cobwebs hung down from the table and stuck to her blonde hair. When a couple of minutes passed and she couldn’t stand the strange feeling under the table, she decided it was enough time. She climbed out from under the table slowly, then put her hand on the tabletop to help her stand up. The lamp caught her eye. That is when it dawned on her, there was no power cord for the light.

Streaks of black and gray tarnished the lamp, giving it an ancient appearance. Mabel picked it up, to see if there was a slot for batteries, but the bottom was smooth except for some tiny screws. She sat it back down on the table and decided it had to have been battery powered. Maybe they didn’t want to ruin the look of the room with power cords or outlets, she thought. She hitched up her backpack and headed for the stairs.

As she climbed the large steps, she tried to picture where the tower was on the house. The steps creaked quietly and some bent under her weight. When she got to the top, she saw that the balcony was part of a hallway that connected each wing of the house. She looked out at the room as she thought about which way to go. The room seemed much larger from the balcony, it looked like she was above the night sky. From this height she could just make out the large chandelier. It was made of bones. Each light bulb was being held by a skeletal hand. Dusty cobwebs completed the ensemble. Mabel moved away from the rail, horrified at the sight. The chandelier began to sway back and forth. Then the stars below started to go out one by one.

Mabel watched the lamps blink out. The darkness began to grow. Panic filled her stomach at the thought of being in the house in the dark. Then the moaning increased. Mabel was at a loss on what to do next. She put her hands over her ears to try to block some of the sound. A warm moist breeze began to blow out from the openings. It felt like the house was breathing. The bone chandelier creaked and rattled in the breeze. The tablecloths on the tables floated around the tables knocking over some of the lamps. All of the lights were now out except for one next to the bottom of the staircase.

The room was now a cacophony of sound. Lamps rolled around on the ground. Some light bulbs popped as they hit the floor. The chandelier bounced back and forth on its chain, sometimes smacking the ceiling with a crunch. The moaning would hit high pitches at times and other times a deep bass. Mabel’s screaming added to the choir of noise. Her eyes spun around in her head, trying not to land on the strange dance happening in the room below. Eventually her sight landed on the one source of light and she focused on it.

While the room was in a state of madness she went down the stairs. Mabel knew she needed the light. She knew she needed to get up to the tower and see if she had been followed. No matter how crazy the room was acting, it was better than what was after her. It was better than what would happen if she was caught. The house was big and old, she thought. She had opened the door and had messed with the pressure of the house. Clearly no one was in the house, so the logical explanation was that she had caused some sort of destabilization, maybe shifted something and the air was coming in from outside. The lights probably went out because of old batteries, she thought. She would grab the lamp, take it back up stairs and try to find the tower. Eventually everything would calm down.

The bottom step was the last sanctuary of normal before the swirling insanity of the room. She stood there with blinders on, focused on the one table still acting like a table. It was just within reach so that she wouldn’t have to step onto the floor. Mabel was sure if she did touch the ground she would be caught up in the madness and wouldn’t be able to recover. She bent over as far as she could and her finger tips brushed against the cool brass of the lamp. The lamp wobbled for a moment and settled down. She grabbed the tablecloth and gently pulled the lamp closer. Her hair whipped around her head, blinding her while she reached out again, this time getting a good enough grip to bring it to her. She hugged the light and ran up the stairs and down a hall, not looking back.

The hallway stretched out before Mabel in darkness. Doors and antique tables marked her way. A plush green carpet muffled her footsteps. The light in her hands allowed her to see a few feet around her, but not enough to tell her how far the hallway went. All of the big oak doors looked the same, with ornate carvings on them. She thought about opening them, but was sure that the staircase to the tower wouldn’t be behind a door.

The sound from the main room slowly disappeared as she traversed the hall. She wondered if the things chasing her were outside. If they heard the noises from the house and knew she was in here. Would they be able to ignore the craziness and know she was upstairs? She knew they would. She knew that they were part of something much crazier than what was happening in the room. They were something that lived in that type of world every day, they fed on it, lived for it. Maybe they were the cause of it, she thought. This could all be some elaborate trap to drive her into their arms. What she had of theirs was enough for them to do this. She clutched her backpack tighter and picked up her pace.

A sound behind a door brought her out of her thoughts. She stopped and looked at the door. It was like the others, big, wooden, with shapes carved on it. She walked over to it, her light reflecting off the varnished wood. The shapes on the wood came into focus. They were people. Each person looked to be in agony, contorted into strange positions. The sound called out again. It sounded like something crying. Mabel watched the door.

Nothing happened. Then she heard whispers and what sounded like a smack. Could there be people in there? Mabel touched the handle as she heard some whimpering. She got down on her knees and looked through the keyhole under the handle.

Blue permeated through the room, giving everything inside a cold look. From what Mabel could see, the room didn’t match the rest of the decor in the house. The walls were bare and there was a dirty mattress in the corner. On the mattress was an emaciated person. It was hard to determine their sex because of the torn rags they wore. She stared at the body and wondered if it was a corpse. Then the body gasped and made the same whimpering she had heard before. A shape came out of the area of the room she couldn’t see from the keyhole. Mabel fell away from the door horrified at the sight.

Mabel slowly got back up and looked into the keyhole again. The shape edged closer to the body. It was human shaped, but definitely wasn’t human. In what might have been its hand, but resembled a tentacle, was a large syringe. Mabel instinctively itched her arm as the shape tied off the body’s arm and injected something into the exposed vein. There was a pleasurable moan as the body curled up.

Mabel jumped up away from the door and started to run down the hall. Cries, whimpers, and moans echoed out of each of the doors in the hallway as she ran. Mabel fought the urge to stop and reach into her bag. The metal container rattled around in the bag, and Mabel’s mind. What is this place, she thought, trying to push away thoughts of pulling out the box. Could there be people behind each of these doors? Is there something she could do for them?

Selfishly she thought these people could be a blessing for her. The things chasing her would have a hard time finding her if they stopped to check any of these rooms for her. They might even get trapped and she wouldn’t have to worry about them any more. She smiled at that idea. Maybe she could use these rooms of hell to her own advantage. If she could set up some sort of signal for them, they would come into the house and then it was just a matter of getting them to open a door.

A plan started to form as she ran down the hallway looking for the staircase. Mabel used the sounds to push her further, to steel herself for what she needed to do. She ran past the tortured souls, the hallway lasting longer than she thought it would. It felt like a dream, as if she was running in place. She was reminded of running through the woods and wondered why this kept happening to her.

Mabel’s lungs were on fire and her legs felt like rubber when the stairwell appeared on her left. It wasn’t as grand as the main staircase, just a normal wood stairwell that you would see in any house. She stopped to catch her breath when she noticed a room behind her with the door open. The light didn’t give her much view into the room, but she could tell it wasn’t like the blue room. It looked like a room that actually belonged to the house. There was a canopy bed, modern dresser, and a table. The bed looked inviting and she was exhausted.

First, she was going to execute her plan, and then she was going to take a nap.

Mabel turned away from the room and went up the stairs. Purple wallpaper coated the walls of the staircase. Some was peeling and hanging down, there were strips laying on the stairs. Light danced around the walls from the windows up in the tower. She clamored up the steps to get into the natural light, her eyes and mind gasping for the light after being in the dark house for so long.

The tower was a lot bigger than she thought. It also seemed to be the most neglected room of the house. Creaky wood planks covered the floor, along with bird and bat droppings. The walls were plaster and lath with four big windows looking out at the four points of the compass. Mabel crept over to a window, the floor crying out from her weight. Mist dominated her view. Beyond the fog, Mabel could make out the forest, a dark shadow behind the white fog. She went to each window to see if she could determine where she had left the woods. It all looked the same.

Mabel had a moment of panic. If she put the light in the wrong window, would they know someone was in the house? Wind blew through the tower, shifting something above her. Mabel looked up at the sound to see a wooden chandelier hanging from the ceiling. There was a wire coming down from the light leading to a push button switch on the wall. Mabel crossed her fingers and pushed the button, the chandelier flickered for a moment before coming on. The entire room lit up like a beacon. Her plan was falling into place and Mabel was excited at the chance to possibly be done with running. Then she saw the shape in the corner.

A pulsing black mass that looked like a bunch of snakes squirmed in the corner. The shape was too dark for the room, as if the light stopped when it came to it and ran back to its source. A wet slurping sound emanated from it as it quivered. Mabel slowly backed away from it, her hand outstretched behind her to feel for the staircase. The thing didn’t seem to notice her, too busy writhing around itself. She went down the stairs watching behind her. When her foot touched the carpet of the hall she let out the breath she had been holding. She went into the bedroom across the hallway and opened her backpack. It was time to enact part two of her plan.

After twenty minutes of wandering around the hall she was back in her room with the door closed. Her backpack was empty of everything she had collected, except for the metal box. Most of her clothes were also off. She had spread little clues from the big staircase to a couple of different doors in the opposite wing of the house. It was much worse than hers, so many noises of pain and suffering. She had heard the crying so much that she was used to it. In fact, she almost welcomed them, knowing that they would be the sounds of her salvation. Mabel sat down at the table and looked at the metal box. Her bare arms were exposed in the tank top she was wearing. The metal box was cool to the touch. The house and the forest had distracted her, but now that she had time to relax, her thoughts went to what she wanted. She fought the urge and looked around the room.

Coziness permeated the bedroom. Mabel felt comfortable and relaxed as she examined the objects throughout it. The bed was hidden beneath a large heavy canopy. The mattress was thick and plush, she imagined sinking into it and letting it envelope her in softness. The wooden dressers were tall and dark with a thick coating of stain on them. There were pictures of scenery on the strange wallpapered walls. The pictures were the only things that unsettled her. Strange scenes of other worldly landscapes. She walked around the room on her bare feet, letting the pile of the carpet caress her feet. If the house wasn’t some horrible hell, I’d live here forever, she thought. She yawned and sank into the mattress, the metal box and her hunters forgotten.

Voices and evil laughter seeped into her dreams. She rolled over in her sleep, trying to shake the sounds out of her head. A light touch on her skin woke her up. The sheet covering her slide off and she bolted up out of her sleep. Different colored lights danced around the bed. She rubbed her eyes, but the lights were still there. The room was freezing, she reached for the sheet when she saw that a silk ribbon had been tied around her legs and attached to the bedposts. The lights congealed into shapes.

She wanted to scream, but she was confused at the sight, her mind not comprehending what she was seeing. The shapes were outlines of humans. It was like looking at living drawings, they had no bodies -just blackness in between the lines- but the human shapes had weight. They all looked like men. Some of them leered at her half naked body; a blue one touched her with its outlined finger. She recoiled from the touch, it was cold, but there was more in that touch then temperature. Memories of her past life came rushing back. The urge to fight pulsed through her body and she clawed at the silk binding around her legs. Laughter boomed in the room, freezing her in place.

A different shape in the bedroom appeared out of the darkness. It was holding her syringe. The outlines grabbed her arms and tied them to the bedposts. She fought, but they were stronger. Her mind reeled as the shape came at her with the syringe, the needle sparkling in the darkness. Her body craved the blackness inside it.

Mabel’s mind shattered leaving her with nothing. She numbly watched the shape push the needle into her arm. Her arteries opened up, welcoming the blackness worming its way through her body, corrupting everything and instantly making her want more. A few of the shapes began to touch her slowly. She stared up at the ceiling, trying to slide into the darkness of her mind.

A wooden door closed in a big house. A light in a tower went out, and a shape in a tower squirmed and quivered in delight. A room full of tables and lamps settled down and reset themselves. Outside of the house the mist drew a curtain around it, muffling the screams and moans that radiated out.

Witches Tale 1

Here is the first of my weekly Witches Tales re-imagining...

We’ve been kicked out of every dirty town we’ve performed in.  Every broken down stage has held us and booed at our cheap tricks.  He picked the stages that had seen better days because the lights couldn’t show the stains on his clothes, his slight of hand, or the fake props he used.  The dingy yellow lights blinded us from the drunk bored audience, the acoustics blocked out the din of conversation, and roar of anger at a trick that he would botch.  After that, I’d hastily pack up his trunk of magic tricks and wait by the back door as he argued with the owner for our cut of the door.  By the time the owner realized he had been swindled, we would be out of the building and running for our wagon.  The sound of yelling and gunshots followed us out into the night and on our way to the next town.  This was our life until we ran into Cannondale and his final magic act.

I am his assistant.  The pretty face in the sparkly red dress that absorbed the jeers and sexual cheers from the drunken crowd.  I’ve been his assistant since before I filled out that sparkly red dress.  I still remember seeing it in his trunk, crunched up in the corner, collecting dust as fast as it lost its sequence.  He would make me try it on and shake his pointed beard as it hung off me.  It was years of setting up his table with trapdoor, years of taking care of white rabbits, years of scrubbing vomit out of his tuxedo before I filled it out.  Part of me was beyond excited when I looked in the mirror and saw the curves sparkle around my body, knowing that I could finally make him proud of me.  Another part of me was sick at the look in his eyes as they shined behind me in the mirror.  I’m still not sure if his black eyes reflected the money I would bring in, or if they had a more sinister purpose behind them.  I didn’t care, I wanted to be on the stage.  I loved it and would have done anything to be on the magician’s stage forever.

We rode into Cannondale with lint in our pockets and nothing in our stomachs.  The magician swayed in the driver’s seat with his hands barely holding the reins of the two donkeys driving our coach.  I was laid out on the floor of the coach half awake staring at the moldy ceiling dreading the show.  Last night over the fire, he told me he was quitting.  Hanging it up.  Which left me with no options.  My dreams of being on the stage were dashed.  After he told me that, we had stared hard at our rabbits, trying to decide if it would have been worth losing his best magic trick over a meager bit of meat.  He concluded that money was more important than food, and continued to fill his stomach with the vile liquid in his dented flask.  I scrounged out some seeds and nuts from the woods, pushing my hunger aside with dreams of being a big star.  

I stretched my legs on the dusty road as the magician searched around for a stage.  He had a nose for towns that had enough idiots to pay us.  Cannondale was in a valley and attached to the intersection of two rivers like a tick.  The town was dirty and crooked and perfect for our show.  There were brick buildings further along the road we had come in on, but on this stretch of road most of the buildings were made of wood, with a rotten wood sidewalk.  I couldn’t tell you what the town did, but it smelled like dead fish and there was a black cloud that permanently hung low in the sky.  

As I waited for the magician to come back I scoped out our eventual escape.  It was one of the first things he taught me, to always know where the exit was.  We never wanted to go back the way we came, because it would just lead us into the arms of the previous town we cheated.  At the corner of the road we came in on I stopped at the intersection and saw that if we followed the new street it would bypass the downtown and take us into the hills.  I started to walk down it when something caught my eye, and my mission was forgotten.  I saw a new dress.

The dress was in a shop window and it was beautiful.  It was yellow, low cut and best of all, new.  It wasn’t faded from years of wear, wasn’t torn or frayed, and probably smelled like flowers.  I stood there hypnotized, dreading the thought of having to put on my red dress that night.  I must have lost track of time because I didn’t notice the magician standing behind me until he caressed my shoulders with his dry dirty hands.  I jumped and in the window I saw his twinkling eyes reflected over the dress.  I shuddered and turned around to face him.  There was a smirk underneath his pointed nose as he squeezed my shoulders.  He asked me if I was okay about what he said last night.  I told him I was fine, I’d figure something out. He shook his head, then he told me that we have a show tomorrow at a theater down the road. I asked him what about tonight?  He stared at me for a moment and said first we have something we have to do.  We had to find some witches. Tonight.

It was a blur after that.  I remember following behind him to our wagon and dropping it off behind the theater, with promises that it must be kept safe or the stagehands would be cursed.  Their stupid faces were blank as he asked them if they knew about the magician's curse.  Then he weaved a tale about some fools who had peeked into a great magician’s coach once and when the poor souls woke up  they were bleeding from every orifice.  Their mouths hung agape and the magician arched an eyebrow asking them if they understood what he was saying.  The one that looked like a bag of meat glanced over at his little friend, and the little friend asked if he meant their dicks.  Sure, the magician said, and any other hole that was on their body.  Realization dawned on their faces and they vigorously nodded with understanding and promises of keeping everyone out.  It was people like that they never made me feel sorry when we ripped them off.  We then headed towards the hills, the magician looking at a crude drawing, a map that lead to the  witches’ cave.

We rode on our donkeys through the woods that covered the hills outside of town.  The magician began to tell me about a meeting at the theater, how someone told him about three witches that used to pester the town.  A posse had been formed to scare them back into the hills and they haven’t been seen since. I asked him what that had to do with us.  He said that I didn’t need to worry about it and then rode ahead. I was a bit upset with him, so I mumbled loudly that I didn’t think witches were real. He stopped his donkey and looked back at me with his sparkling eyes.  I lead my donkey next to him and told him that I think the person who told him that was pulling one over on us and was probably currently selling our coach.  Before I knew it, he slapped me hard enough to knock me off my animal and onto the ground.  

I stared up at him as he said I was getting too mouthy.  I am an assistant, he barked at me, I shouldn’t be thinking or questioning him.  The job of the assistant is to never question, only to nod and smile and look pretty on stage.  Heat burned on my cheek where he hit me and I looked down at the muddy ground.  When I looked up, his hand was outstretched to me.  I grabbed it and apologized.  He told me it was okay.  I climbed back up onto my donkey and we continued on our path.  There is a legend to witches, and yes they are real.

Witches and magicians have a tenuous relationship.  Both deal with magic and tricking people.  However, the difference is that magicians deal with earthly things such as money and witches focus on the unearthly like human souls.  I don’t really care about the human soul, the magician told me, I like the feel of a heavy purse and the finer things. He thought this was the perfect way to begin his retirement.   Sometimes the two find a way to work together and make an agreement, where they can both profit.   I was still rattled at the fact that we were trying to find witches, on top of the prospect of having nothing in a couple of days.  I dreaded the thought of living with him if it meant I wasn’t going to be on the stage in front of an audience. He continued to blather on about witches while I looked around at our surroundings.  The forest we were in was dead.

 It was early fall, so most of the trees we had passed were covered in beautiful shades of orange, red and yellow.  But, here, the trees were black and rotten.  There wasn’t a leaf in sight, except for the moldy brown ones littering the ground.  Instead, the trees were skeletons reaching toward a darkened sky.  A lonely breeze moaned through the branches, chilling me through my ragged clothes.  The moon was bone yellow among the grey clouds.  A crow would cackle every once in awhile.  We turned a bend and saw the cave.

The cave was the mouth of a demon frozen in a scream.  The earth around the cave was twisted and tortured.  White mushrooms spotted the ground in front of the opening.  A demonic scarecrow of sticks sprouted from the ground.  Animal bone wind chimes hung from branches, the breeze played them like a haunted xylophone.  A strange smell of wet earth and something else bellowed out of the opening.  Our donkeys began to bray and spit at the smell.  No one came to the sound of the animals.  

We entered the cave and were enveloped in blackness.  I reached out for the magician but I touched nothing.  I found there was no difference between my eyes being opened or closed.  Visions from the dark recesses of my nightmares began to dance around in front of me. The nightmares reached for me and I swear I could almost feel their touch.   I wanted it to stop.  I could feel my legs get heavier. It was through sheer force of will to lift a foot up and put it back down.  I was sure I was going to go mad in that darkness.  At the brink of losing my mind a loud pop and whiff of smoke brought about the beautiful blossom of white light.  It settled down to a yellow glow in the magician’s hands. The magician looked back at me; the flame danced across his face as he winked at me with the look he put on after performing a trick.  I gave him a half-smile, appreciating the light and showmanship but wishing he wouldn’t think I was one of his idiot audience members.  

As my eyes adjusted to the light I was able to view the abandoned cave.  It was underwhelming, and there were no witches. The space looked like a spot for some hobos to hide in, possibly from a storm or the people of the town.  The magician’s hands lowered and he hung his head in defeat.  I assumed he had hoped that the witches were hiding in the dark, or something, but the place looked deserted.  He asked me in a dejected voice me if I could find something for him to use as a torch, he didn’t want to waste the lighter fluid.  In the center of the room was a big pot, that could have been considered a witch’s cauldron, but could have easily been just a pot for someone to cook a stew.  There was some firewood next to it, which I gave to him.  I stood next to the pot, not wanting to bother him.  When he passed by the cauldron with his torch, something inside caught my eye.

I wanted to believe it was just some leftover broth that was reflecting the light, but something about the way the light sparkled called to me.  I edged closer to the pot and bent over to look inside, putting my hands on the lip.  The cauldron felt gritty in my hands, it must have been covered in years of smoke and soot from countless fires.  Inside, I saw a reflection that wasn’t mine.  It was of three beautiful women.  They were talking to each other through ruby lips, laughing about something. I wanted to know what they were saying, they looked so happy and full of life.  I couldn’t believe it was happening, that what I was seeing was some trick of the light or that my eyes were playing tricks on me.  So, I rubbed my eyes with my hands, the dirt and soot stinging my eyes.  I cursed myself for being stupid and grabbed my shirt to rub my eyes clear.  Once my eyes were clear I looked again and there was nothing.  I thought about telling the magician what I saw, but decided he would just think I was acting crazy.  I grabbed the cauldron again and the vision appeared again.  But, this time the women were looking at me through the reflection.

Maybe they were just looking into the cauldron I thought.  But, they shook their heads.  Then they started to speak again.  I whispered into the cauldron that I couldn’t hear them.  They laughed after that.  One of them rubbed their eyes in mock cry as the others pointed at me and laughed more.  I could feel my face flush.  I wasn’t going to be mocked by three women in a reflection.  I shook the cauldron, splashing the broth and wrinkling their reflections.  The blond one put her finger up to her mouth shushing me, while another pointed out of the cauldron.  I looked up and saw the magician looking at me.  I waved him off, telling him I thought I saw a spider.  He grunted and continued to search the workbenches.  Inside the cauldron, the women were looking at me with an expectant look on their faces.  What, I asked them.  They pointed again toward the magician.  Then one waved their hands and their reflection faded into a view of the magician in the cave.  

I looked around the cave.  How could this be now?  The magician was still poking around the bench with his back toward me.  I looked back at the reflection and it was an upclose view of the magician.  His hand grabbed something.  It looked like a locket of hair, but it was hard to tell in the reflection.  Whatever it was, he put it in his pocket.  The reflection vanished and I was back to looking at a greasy puddle of fluid at the bottom of the cauldron.  I stared at it trying to figure out what had just happened when something started to move at the bottom of the pot.  I leaned closer and a skull bobbed out of the soup, its jaw chattering at me.  I jumped back and tripped on something and fell to the floor.  The magician quickly turned from the work bench, his hand in his pocket.  The look on his face was as if I caught him being a peeping tom.  He came over and helped me up telling me we have to go.

A low moan came from the back of the cave and the magician rushed us out.  The haunting noise followed us out and onto our donkeys and all through the woods.  We pushed the donkeys as hard as their old legs could take us.  The path we had taken seemed to close in on us.  Branches scratched and clawed at my face.  The wind had picked up since we were in the cave and it now whipped the dead leaves into a frenzy.  The moan echoed off the trees and embedded its lonely sound into my mind.  I couldn’t get the visions of the women out of my head, their silent laughter and their warning squirmed around in my thoughts.  What did the magician put in his pocket?  He called out in a loud booming voice that I didn’t recognize, there was an edge to it as it cut through the wind.  I tightened my grip on my donkey as I heard that voice, afraid at what it meant.  

We drove into Cannondale on the crest of a thunderstorm.  The thunder boomed and crashed as we pounded through the streets.  Windows were boarded up, lights were out and I could almost imagine the children hidden under their parents’ sheets at the sound.  The magician lead us to the back of the theater, where our wagon was parked.  The two men were in the doorway, one smoking and the other picking at the wooden steps with a knife.  They jumped up at the sound of our arrival.  The little one started to speak when the magician stopped him in his tracks with a quick look.  He told them to take care of our animals and left them like chided dogs.  The magician lead me up the steps into the theater and pointed me to our room above the stage.

The room was actually two rooms at the top of the theater.  One room had two beds and the other a couple of chairs.  It was one of the better guest rooms I had seen in a theater, most were just a few tables and mirrors, with some rickety chairs to sit on to do makeup.  It had been a while since I had slept in a bed, yet with what had happened that night, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to sleep or if I wanted to.  The magician was different, the booming voice and strange light in his eyes kept flashing in my mind.  He told me he had some things he had to do before going to bed, then he slammed the door. His was distracted and distant.  I sat on the bed and stared at the door, afraid at not knowing what to do.

It was a long night of tossing and turning.  Lost in thoughts of being younger and on the road with the magician.  He was never friendly with me, which I was fine with.  I knew he wasn’t my father; I still had vague memories of my parents.  So, I never expected him to treat me like his child.  And now I was going to be alone again.   I thought about times he disappeared at night, leaving me alone in a strange room.  He’d come back smelling like liquor or a strange smoke, stumble into the room and pass out on the floor.  But, tonight when he left me it was different, I could feel it.

The wind howled through the building.  It passed through cracks in the walls, chilling the room.  I stared at the ceiling listening to the deafening sound, waiting for the walls to crumble on me.  Underneath the sound I could hear strange mumblings and whimpering.  It sounded like a dog being beat by its master.  I thought it was the magician, but I couldn’t be sure.  After a little while, voices wafted through the door, low sensual whispers, and giggling.  I was reminded of a time we had to stay in a hotel that had a brothel attached to it.  I tried my hardest to listen and not move, my blood pumping at the sounds.  The room behind the door began to creak and a sweet smell came to my nose.  My eyelids became heavy and my ears felt like they were filling with cotton.  I began to fall asleep when the door cracked open flooding the bedroom with light.

I couldn’t tell if I was dreaming again.  Or if Cannondale was even real.  I heard the donkeys grunting as they pulled the wagon, and the timbers of the wagon floor scratched at my arms and back. The hooks of my dress dug into my skin. I wondered if I had forgotten to take off my dress before falling asleep in the coach after we were chased out of town. Could it have been a dream?  Is it possible that he isn’t retiring?  He has a few more years left in him, just enough for me to get the attention of another magician.

The thundering pain in my head and the pin and needle feeling of my arms jarred me awake.  It all came flooding back: the witch’s cave, the magician’s voice, and the whispers in the other room, they were all real.  I opened my eyes; I was in the wagon.  I tried to sit up and felt the thick itchy rope around my waist, legs and torso.  My arms were behind my back, which explained the feeling of pins and needles; but I couldn’t place why my brain felt too big for my skull.  I tried to look out one of the windows, all I could see was the night sky, punctuated with lightning that reflected off the sequence of my dress.  At the front of the coach I could hear the magician raving to himself.  I thought about screaming, but any movement sent shockwaves of pain through my body that left me exhausted and helpless.  

The coach stopped roughly, bouncing my fragile head off the floor causing me to yelp in pain.  The magician opened the door and grabbed my ropes.  He tossed me out of the wagon and onto the ground as if I was one of his props.  Stars blossomed in my vision as I landed.  The magician stood above me.  His hair stuck out from his head at crazy angles, and his eyes, his eyes were ringed red as if he had been punched.  The rest of his face was aged and haggard, the face of a mad man.  He pointed to the ground and spat out for me to stay put.  My eyes were glued to him as he walked back over to the coach and pulled out a shovel.  That was when I looked around and realized we were in an old cemetery.  

The magician dragged the shovel as he shuffled over to an upside down cross stuck in the dirt.  I was transfixed as he started to dig.  With each shovel load of dirt he grunted, sweat beading on his face.  Mud began to cover his black tuxedo.  He never stopped, his face a mask of determination.  I never knew his age, I always assumed he was old; yet as I watched him remove dirt from the hole, he moved like a much younger and stronger man than I thought.  The moon shone a yellow spotlight on him as if he were on stage.  I could hear a low murmuring, the sound of an audience anticipating the magician’s big reveal.  My instinct was to move around on the stage, to help him prep the act and look pretty on stage.  But then I remembered the ropes cutting into my skin and I was brought back to the cemetery watching a man digging into a grave.

The metal shovel cracked into wood and the world stopped.  The magician jumped out of the hole and laid among the piles of dirt, reaching down into the hole for something.  I rolled closer, messing up my dress, but wanting to see what was down there.  The magician pulled his hand out and held a slender white arm.  Attached to the arm was one of the most beautiful women I had ever seen; I was instantly jealous.  

The woman stood up in the hole, her head above the ground.  She had long red hair, big brown eyes and full lips.  There wasn’t a spec of dirt on her unblemished skin.  She bent down and helped up another woman, this one a little smaller than the first.  The new one had blond hair with blue eyes.  The redhead reached down again and pulled up a black haired beauty, taller than both of the others.  This one rested her arms on the ground and looked up at the magician.  

The magician stood up and whooped.  Tears streaked the mud on his cheeks.  The black haired woman reached up for him and he got down on his knees in front of her.  She caressed his cheeks, rubbing the tears away.  Then she kissed him on the lips.  The other two watched him, their mouths quivered in anticipation.  Yet, their was something about their eyes.  The blonde one looked over at me and winked a yellow eye.  She licked her lips with a black swollen tongue and for a moment her beautiful skin transformed.  It became rotten and festered with blisters.  Then he beauty instantly snapped back as the black haired woman ended her kiss with the magician. He sat on the ground dumbfounded.  The blonde reached up to him next.

I began to scream and thrash against my ropes.  I cursed the women and cursed the magician for bringing me here.  I yelled at him to wake up.  I screamed that they were the witches.  The magician turned his dumb face toward me, drunk from lust.  He blinked slowly, and a thin trail of blood leaked out of his mouth.  Then he looked back at the women.  They cackled and their beauty melted away as if made of wax.  Their hair fell out in clumps, The blonde one’s nose shrunk back into her head until it was a pig’s nose, the other’s had long thin noses like the beak of a bird.  Their lips pulled back until they were no more, revealing long fangs.  I watched as the magician’s sanity cracked and he began to laugh.  I kept screaming, hoping someone would hear me.

The monstrous witches crawled out of the hole like spiders.  The magician picked up the shovel and started to swing it at them.  I tried to roll away from the hole, but the little pig nosed witch grabbed my ankle with her lizard like claw.  My skin began to burn at her cold touch.  I kicked at her with my with other foot, putting my three inch heel through her face.  She laughed and twisted my ankle until I screamed.  I fell into the hole, landing onto their wooden casket.  I looked up from the dirt hole as the other two began to claw at the magician. He fell down to the ground and out of my view, but I could see him kicking wildly and screeching a high pitched screech.  Among the screeching I could hear him say that she was his sacrifice to them, that he tied her up for them.  They laughed and pushed him into the hole on top of me.  His body was torn to shreds, his blood mixing with the dirt on me.  I squirmed around until he fell off of me.  We both laid there looking up at the night sky framed by the dirt hole.  

Dirt started to fall down the hole onto us.  The tall witch stood above and watched us, while the other two continued to bury us.  She then said that we can everything we want: the magician can have all the money he wanted and I could have a life on the stage, then she began to chant.  The casket beneath me started to shake violently, slamming into my back, stabbing me with splinters.  The magician flopped with the movement, but didn’t react, I wasn’t sure if he was alive or not.  Dirt continued to fall down, covering us up.  I tried to scream, but they kept aiming for my mouth.  So, I just stared up at her as I was buried alive.

Before I was fully covered the three witches stopped and held hands around the hole.  They chanted again, swaying to the rhythm of the spell.  That was when I felt something slimy snake around my body.  I could see black tentacles wrap around the magician’s body and pull it under.  Then the tentacles tightened around me and yanked me down into the dirt.

We are on a stage.  The lights are so bright we can’t see the audience.  Our different acts are on the stage with us: a table and saw, the wheel of death, and the tank of water.  The smile on my face is so big that it hurts my cheeks. I imagine the audience is so big that I can’t see them or hear them.  I know this won’t end because even though we die on stage every night, we wake up on the stage again. I don’t want this to end.  I got what I wanted and if I try really hard I can almost forget what had happened to us in Cannondale.

A new plan for the new year

Late last year I came up with a plan for this blog and an exercise in writing.  About a week ago I started to implement that plan, which I am ready to post here on the blog.  Then I realized that I should probably talk about that plan before unleashing it and no one understanding what is happening.

So here we go...

A couple of years ago I saw on Boing Boing a post to this blog featuring covers from old Witches Tales Comic Covers.  Basically, Monster Brains found a bunch of these comic book covers from the pre-comics code era on the Comic Books Archive.  If you check them out, you'll see that they are basically a Tales From the Crypt style comic from around the 60's.  They all look pretty ridiculous and goofy.  

But, I wondered, what would be like if someone tried to take those covers and make stories out of them now?  We could probably make something even more bizarre.  Maybe a little more twisted and darker than they might be.

I let that idea simmer for a couple of years until the end of last year.  I wanted to do something to fill up this blog.  As well as to give myself a writing challenge.  And these covers in their bright techni-color popped into my head.  Why not write those stories?  And why not try to do one once a week?

---

That is my challenge and what I am going to be doing.  Once a week I will be posting a 3,000 - 5,000 word story from one of those covers.  I have not read any of the comics.  I am just going to do what I think would fit the cover.  Some of my stories might be good, some might be terrible.  But the point is just to come up with a new story once a week.

As you read them and you have suggestions for new covers, please let me know.  Or if you notice something wrong, let me know that as well.  This is for me to learn and maybe entertain you along the way.

Please join me as we explore the Witches Tales!!!!

Sorta Book Review: A Head Full of Ghosts by Paul Tremblay

I've been wanting to update this blog more, but I've been busy working on my book and focused all of my writing time to that.  But, as I wind down on my first draft, I would like to pick this back up and start adding more.  I've got a pile of short stories that I think would be great to add here and this post could be a start of a book review/writing feature, where I review the book but focus on the writing of it and maybe what I learned from it.

So here we go...

A Head Full of Ghosts  by Paul Tremblay is a modern day horror novel that plays out more like a family drama with some *maybe* horror moments. The horror came from the family dynamics and how each member of the family treats the youngest daughter. I found it disturbing mainly because I am a father of two small girls and reading what happens to the daughters hit a nerve.  I wanted to scream out at the dad for his treatment of the younger of the two, who is the narrator of the story.  And the older daughter fed the little girl enough creepy stories and lies that I wanted to reach out and hug the girl.  I couldn't help but see my daughters in the story, which might be a bit messed up if you have already read the story.

I'm trying to not spoil the story too much.  I think it is worth your time to check it out. The writing is great and it had enough of a hook to keep me flipping the pages.  However, for me it just didn't hit the spot that it needed to.  Tremblay took you to the edge and then quickly backed away.  As a horror fan I think you should go all out, don't skimp back and act like this story needs to take place in the real world.  If you want to keep it in the real world fine, but you can add some magic to it to keep it planted in horror. Don't call it horror and then deliver a good family drama.  There is a great concept in having a demon possession take place in this day, we could explore the social media aspect, the TV aspect, and dig deeper in what it means for a connected world like this.

We do get some of that in this book. The main drive of the narrative is the reality TV show that is used to show the exorcism and give the family an income after the father has been unemployed.   There is also blog dissecting the reality TV show fifteen years after the show has been aired.  Tremblay uses the blog to point out the issues with the show, and how it was set up as a fiction to make the possession seem creepier than it actually was.  He dissects the TV show in what seems to be an attempt to make fun of those types of shows, you see how the producers set up rooms to make them seem scarier and how the cameraman gets in the way of the family to get a shot.  For me, that feels real.  I can totally see a show editing and intruding in a situation to make a better show.  The blog comments on the other side of the show, what it looks like as a watcher.  It comments on again the quick edits and the use of effects to make it more of a horror TV show than a reality show.  It is a nice way as the author to have the TV show in the story.

The other drive of the story is an author writing a book about the show and is interviewing the youngest daughter, again fifteen years after the show.  Each of these scenes take place at the beginning of a section of the book.  It is where Tremblay reveals big plot points of the story.  Yet each of these reveals are thrown in and passed by so fast that we don't get to savor it.  I understand what he is doing, it's a way to see the little girl in the present day and how she has *sorta* come to terms with what happened.  The author of the book acts as a mother/investigator into the family.    I think the revealing of the plot points were used because you could probably skip over those parts and not feel like the story is missing anything.  It doesn't give you anything to work with on a horror level until maybe at the end(again there is a random point that maybe could be considered scary, but you were on the last page and it fell flat).

So, Tremblay does some of what I was asking for.  And yes, I understand that the narrator is an eight-year-old girl so you aren't going to see everything.  You are seeing it through her eyes.  As a writer I can understand that you are hiding it, letting the reader fill in the blanks.  But, since you are giving us two sides of the story, you could give us a third.  Maybe make a blog that is from one of the producers?  Something like that.  There is too much hinted at that doesn't pay off.  I appreciate the openness of it, but it felt like there were too many threads left for us to pull at.  And then others that we really didn't need.

I think some of the plot points(again, I'm trying not to spoil anything) could have been used as more of a section ending, or landed it at a point where you as the reader are shocked.  Instead, a couple of the big reveals are tossed away as if it should have been something we had seen coming.  It would have been like in Star Wars if Darth Vader just randomly revealed he was Luke's father and just kept on going.  It would have ruined that moment.  I think Tremblay could have gotten the same impact if he just timed out his reveal a little differently.  It was something that totally shocked me when I found out, but it was stuck in the middle of a paragraph in the middle of a chapter that if I wasn't paying attention I could have missed it.



I don't know why that bothered me so much.  But, it did.  Either Tremblay is trying something new with just running ahead without stopping at the stop sign at the exit, or he didn't want it to be as important as it was.  I don't know.  I guess what I can take away from that is that I won't do that in my stories.  Or maybe I should, it got me all worked about it and made me dust off the blog to talk about it.  It could be a good way to get some attention.  And maybe it is something like real life.  Real life doesn't stop when a big event happens, time just keeps on rolling.  But, this is a horror story, it isn't real life.  You can linger on your big event and roll around in it a little bit, let it seep into your pores until your skin can't breathe any more.  Stretch out in that room and stick the reader's face into each dusty spider-webbed corner.  When they are laying in their bed reading your book, give them the time to wonder if something is crawling up their sheets or coming down from the ceiling.  If you breeze past the room with the murderous clown, they might see that bit of color in a drab room, and fill in the spaces of why that clown is there; but if you stop and give the clown a chance to see the reader and walk up to the threshold, the reader's night of sleep is going to be ruined because the clown saw them and looked into their eyes.  Put their imagination onto that cart and you control the path, instead of just hinting at where they should go.

Anyway, it is a really good summer book.  I didn't want to put it down.  And I'm not saying it was ineffective, I clearly was affected by the family and the daughters.  I just think there could have been a little bit more to make the horror part of the story pop more than it being a family drama that had horror elements.