‘All my pink pills at once … YES! My heart will stop … this nightmare OVER …’
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“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it” ~ George Santayana
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Chapter 03
“A Witch’s Kiss”
Katrina Jack
Liverpool, England, United Kingdom
Against a backdrop of midnight blue, sprinkled with the tiny lights of a million, billion stars and planets, Celandine flew. Perched “side-saddle” on the narrow wooden pole, she breathed in the heady fragrance of autumn, drifting up from the night-shrouded ground below.
A gentle breeze ruffled her raven-dark curls, spilling out from beneath the brim of her hat. Albert, her green eyed, black furred cat, regarded her wisely from his place nestled amidst the bristles of the enchanted besom.
High above the earth Celandine soared filled with the peculiar joy that only Halloween could bring. It was the time of year that witches were at their most powerful; when spells could be cast with the sure certainty they would work.
Celandine clicked the heels of her boots together and increased her speed. Beneath her the stream of traffic on the motorway became a continuous blur of light. She squinted into the distance and spied the houses of the town. The sodium glare of streetlights dotted the edges of the roads. Celandine slowed the broom, until she was cruising above the rooftops.
She watched as human children progressed from door to door in search of “trick or treats.” Her lips curved in an indulgent smile and her heart, usually so cold, warmed at the sight of their rosy cheeks.
She flew on until at last she saw him, walking alone, head down and hands shoved into his pockets. She’d watched him for a long time now and coveted him, body and soul. Celadine’s pulse beat loud in her ears and she almost lost control. Albert hissed at her carelessness, before settling back again.
She brought the broom down, landing silently in an alley, where she dismounted, took off her hat, and shook out her hair. Albert watched her, as she headed off towards the street.
As she neared the head of the alley, she paused. Her Beldame had cautioned her against what she was about to do, warning her that at best she could lose her powers, at worst her life. Phh! What did the old know about love?
Footsteps echoed along the road and Celandine stepped out, almost colliding with the man she’d chosen. As she gazed up into his startled face, she knew she’d been right. He was so handsome and there was kindness in those eyes. She muttered the carefully prepared spell and a white mist, filled with twinkling dots of light, rose up, surrounding them both. As the charm took effect, the young man reached out for her and took her in his arms. Celandine offered up her lips to him.
The kiss was everything she’d hoped for and its sweetness permeated her from head to toe. Then pain burned through her and she opened her mouth in a wordless cry. The face now looking down at her was hard and cold, the eyes narrowed and the lips a thin, tight line.
As she fell to the ground, her life blood ebbing around the blade of the knife stuck between her ribs, Celandine realised her Beldame had been right.
‘Do not think that witch-hunters are extinct my dear. Even in this, the 21st century of mortal man, they still exist. Beware the hunter, for he will have no mercy. Is it not written that thou shall not suffer a witch to live?’
The young man looked down at the fallen girl and a sigh of almost regret escaped him. Such a beautiful creature, but beneath that beauty lay evil and he must never forget it.
*
He glanced up at the star strewn sky, until the sound of children’s laughter sounded nearby. With a deft movement, he scooped the body into his arms and walked off towards the local crematorium, where he worked. There was a cremation scheduled for tomorrow.
No one would notice a few extra ashes.
*
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Chapter 04
“Soul Mates”
Jaleta Clegg
Pleasant Grove, Utah, USA
Silence reigned in Teremun’s tomb, as it had for a thousand long, dry years, since the last mummy had been deposited and the crypt door sealed. Sand filtered into the hot darkness, trickling over the sarcophagus in amber waves that piled on the stone blocks of the floor.
Munahmunah the rat longed to flick his ears clear of the sand, but the mummification spell held tight. He lay on the carved face of Teremun, one haunch resting on the Ankh of Termuthis. Munahmunah wished to die completely. The Ankh prevented his spirit from leaving his desiccated body. He would have sighed in frustration, had he breath.
Sand was the least of his irritations. Maibe, the virgin sacrifice, faced Naeem, the undead defender, across the chamber, two mummies locked in eternal longing, unable to touch, to consummate the desire born and nurtured in silent death. Munahmunah lay between them, their raging lust pounding in his bones.
The entrance block slid, grating on layers of dry sand. A thief slipped through the gap, a burning torch clutched in one fist.
The Ankh of Termuthis flared into heated life, the spells of protection invoked by the intruder lending movement to dry muscle and bone. Munahmunah the rat squealed, leaping away from the angry glow of the Ankh. The hair on his rump burst into flames. He launched himself in angry attack at the face of the thief. The man screamed, clawing the dead rat free as he fled the tomb.
The magic of Termuthis surged through the burial chamber. Munahmunah chattered his rage at the unjustness of death and accidental mummification.
Maibe shifted, her tightly wound form lurching from the wall. One hand tore free of her wrappings to beckon Naeem forward, seduction in the tilt of her head.
Naeem, a bundle of ancient rags, inched towards the object of his desire through the sand drifts. His wrappings writhed as he worked muscles desiccated and decayed by desert heat.
Maibe hopped once, twice, gaining ground toward the object of her thousand-year desire.
Munahmunah showed his teeth, disgust wrinkling his lip. The dead flesh cracked, flaking away to leave his jawbone bare.
The newly animated lovers ignored the smoldering rat in the doorway. The Ankh glowed, shedding a greenish light in the tomb. Power throbbed, giving temporary life to the dead. Naeem’s wrappings caught on the corner of Teremun’s sarcophagus. He sprawled in the sand, tripped by trappings of his death.
“Ah.” A faint breath of sound from Maibe as the defender sprawled, one abnormally short leg breaking free to roll across the sandy floor. Maibe's linen parted as she strained arms against ancient bindings. Her beckoning finger crumbled to dust.
Naeem rolled to his back. Maibe toppled, body pressed to his. A thousand years of watching, sensing his spirit, she would not waste this moment. Virgin in life, she would not remain so in death. Breathing a prayer of thanks to Termuthis for her Gift, Maibe tore at Naeem’s linen wrappings with mummified hands.
Naeem arched his back, responding to her urging. His arms came free. She paused only a moment to note the shortness of his arms. Physical deformities did not matter, not to one who loved his spirit from afar. Until now.
His claws tore the linen strips prisoning her dead flesh. She shivered with delight as his skin touched hers. He pulled her closer, limbs wrapping her torso. Maibe ripped at the face coverings. She must look on her beloved, kiss his lips, feel their passion burning bright.
He grunted beneath her. She writhed, wishing only for a moment that she still lived in truth. She pulled th
e last of his facial wrappings free.
Naeem’s long snout opened, fanged jaws crushing her skull. Both mummies crumbled as green magic exploded from Maibe's decapitated body.
The Ankh’s light faded, taking life with it.
Freed of their mummified servitude, the spirits of Maibe and Naeem rose from the tangled bodies on the sandy floor.
“A crocodile?” Maibe’s spirit voice echoed through the chamber.
Naeem snapped his spirit jaws in a reptilian smile.
“Virgin in life, virgin in death. Horus the Vulture-headed better have a good reward waiting.” Maibe’s voice faded as her spirit rose from the tomb.
Munahmunah gnashed his teeth as Termuthis gathered him to her Ankh. At least his eternity of sitting between unrequited lust and hunger was at an end. He had suffered for his inadvertent intrusion into Teremun’s eternal rest. But now, peace filled his soul as his body crumbled to dust.
Silence reigned in the tomb of Teremun, as it had for most of the last thousand years.
*
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Chapter 05
“Truth or Dare”
Carol Bond
Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
It had started as a dare, nothing more than that, so who could have known it was to end this way.
Poppinac reached into her pocket and pulled out a handkerchief; it was a pretty, embroidered piece from her sister’s drawer. Lying and thieving took first place in her young life. It pleased her to take what she wanted. Grinning the young girl mopped her nose, and silently called her sister a fool.
“Psst Rolen. Get in ‘ere, I am not going to walk these stairs on my own.” She hissed the words, a little fearful at the echo that bounced back at her from inside the darkened gloom. Cobwebs tattered and torn rippled in the musty stale breeze from the door pushed open. Dark shapes sat in wait for the pair and goodness knows what else.
Rolen was short for his age, everyone told him so, everyone that was except for Poppinac. He stepped up close, breathing heavily from the jitters he felt about entering the old man’s lodge. The window’s winked at him, the darkness of its empty belly within smelt like old man’s dirty socks, at least that was how he saw it. The old building had been empty for decades, not a soul had stepped foot inside forever and a day and the stories that floated around town were thick with horror.
“Why can’t you just leave it alone.” He knew he was whining but he also knew Poppinac and the stubborn streak that rose above good sense. “All we have to do it say that we went inside and if we hide for a bit, the rest won’t know. I swear it Poppinac we only have to say we went inside.”
She shot him a withering look, “For God’s sake Rolen. How can we do that without grabbing a trophy to say so. Those out there, with their knees shaking and their pants wet from the very thought of doing what they dared us to do, won’t accept the truth of it without a trophy.” Poppinac turned back to the yawning hole. “Well here goes.”
Rolen hung his head; he knew that the time for talking was done. Swallowing hard the young boy followed.
*
The man knew he was a ghost, knew that he was half mad with anger and grief. He felt so alone. He had a name once, all those years ago when he had walked with the living, it had been Charles Baron Wentworth but his mother called him Bert. Now names didn’t matter, nothing mattered in the endless shift of time. Not even the clock ticked anymore, its battery was long dead, just like him, a useless thing from a past long gone.
Over the years, he had learnt to manipulate the living world, little tricks to pass the time. The switching on a light, the slamming of a door and the one noise he had managed to conjure into the dead air. The word ‘Promise.” He never expected to use it but if he pulled in the energy around him and stood very still, pushing all of his will into this word, upon release it bounced about the house like a song. It pleased him sometimes to call it out.
Tonight on Halloween where the boundaries of the living and dead met, Bert sat brooding.
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“Poppinac?” The young boy’s hand shook as he clutched for her shoulder.
Freckled faced with a shock of orange hair gave Poppinac an almost ethereal expression. “Well what is it?” and she pouted “Look all we have to do is walk the stairs and take something that used to be his. Rolen, I promise.”
Even whispering her voice rang in Bert’s ears like a hammering anvil. His ghostly head lifted from his hands. Someone was here, in his house, talking as though they had a right. “They dare come into my home. They dare walk the same steps I did as a young man.” Empty words coming from a dead man, still it was his house even if his corpse laid in a coffin some miles down the road.
Soft footsteps drew him to his feet. Anger bubbled in an empty breast, real enough for this ghost.
“Rolen don’t step on my heels. There’s nothing here to worry about. It’s just an old house with the lights turned off.”
The sun was setting and the lengthening shadows twisted into shapes on the walls as the sun weakly pushed it will through the broken glass windows and discolored curtains. Rolen could hear his heart thumping in time with the breaking of sweat of his forehead. It dripped down the back of his neck, snaking its way to the soles of his shoes. He was a fearful mess.
From the corner of his eye, Rolen saw Bert. The ghost had pushed his head out of the wall just above the next step and Rolen screamed. He hadn’t meant to but what would you have done in his place. Poppinac missed her step, she had jumped on that scream, and as the poor girl slipped her body crashed into her friend. Down they both went, all legs and arms as they bounced off each other on the way down.
Bert stepped through the wall, he pulled on his most hideous face and lifted himself into the air to greet the banged up pair. The lights flickered and upstairs several doors opened and closed in resounding bangs. All of it a spectacle to alarm, he wanted those children gone. How dare they walk his house as if they had a right.
*
Rolen lay under Poppinac. She opened her eyes, nothing broken, but she had the makings of some pretty bruises and a nasty headache. Pulling the handkerchief from her pocket, Poppinac wiped her face. It was then that she realized she was sitting on her best friend.
“Rolen are you alright? I’m sorry but you scared me.”
Rolen laid so very still.
“Rolen please get up.” Her voice took on a begging tone. It was fretful for she was only a young girl.
Blood crept towards her feet from underneath his head and his arm, bent at an impossible angle pointed to the top of the stairs. Hanging in the air some feet above the ground was Bert. Oddly enough, he wasn’t angry anymore. Wonder filled his dead eyes at the sight of Rolen’s corpse on the floor.
Tears fell and Poppinac dropped to her knees. “Oh what have I done? It was supposed to be a dare, that’s all.”
It all stopped, the door banging and the flashing of lights and in its place stood another ghost. Rolen looked at Poppinac, his dead eyes questioning, sadder than anything she had ever seen.
“Oh Rolen I am sorry. I didn’t mean to fall.” She hiccupped in her grief.
Rolen’s ghost looked on, as silent as the dark house he was now chained to. Bert held out a hand and Rolen took it. The ghostly pair made ready to leave, Poppinac was all but forgotten.
“Wait – please.” Entreated the young girl, “Don’t go. What am I to do now, you’re my best friend, my only friend.”
Rolen lagged and Bert stopped, they both turned, ghostly apparitions on a stairwell. The lengthening shadows were long gone, not even the full moon had the sense to send its beams into such a place.
“They’ll blame me and I’ll be sent away to be locked in a prison wit
h bars and no one to keep me safe. Please Rolen what should I do.”
The ghost once called Rolen shook off Bert’s hand and gently walked the stairs back to Poppinac. He reached out and with fingers alight with the last measure of living energy, snatched her handkerchief from her pocket. He looked to Bert, and with a nod Bert opened his mouth. Poppinac felt her heart miss a beat, now it was her turn to sweat.
“PROMISE.” Came a booming voice.
“Promise? What do I have to promise?” She was a little more than scared now.
Rolen smiled and she knew what it all meant.
“Okay I promise.” The handkerchief left his hand and floated to rest nicely on his cooling corpse.
She sniffed as they disappeared through the wall. Now she was truly alone. Rolen belonged to a dare, one that she had foolishly accepted and the promise now made with love for her dear friend, was the one of truth. Straightening her shoulders, Poppinac left the old man’s lodge and took to the street. All she had to do was tell the truth. For the rest of her life Poppinac had to walk the path of the straight and narrow, no more stealing, no more dares, just the acts of a good girl doing the right thing. With a sniff and a wipe of her nose with her stolen handkerchief, Poppinac walked the long walk home.
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Chapter 06
"The Swamp Vine"
Matthew C. Nelson
Jacksonville, Florida, USA
And so the legend goes....
A long time ago, before the land across Europe was greeted by Ponce De'Leon and his crew, smaller shadow-filled swamps surrounded the much larger Okefenokee. In one hidden swamp, a small village lay nestled within a circle of cypress trees, one which the local people called Turtle's Shadow. Along the edges of the village, a little girl by the name of Swamp Flower, used to play for hours. One day, her grandmother, Sand Crane, approached and sat beside Swamp Flower.