The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

The Bayou
by Kathleen McCluskey

In the bayou there are things that slither and things that creep. There are scary things and beautiful things. But there is one being that is feared by all, the voodoo priestess. She is all powerful, all knowing and very vengeful. The locals would always spit when they came across any of her shrines to nature. They hoped the spit offered some form of protection.

The blood moon was the time of the year that the veil between the world of the living and the world of the dead was the thinnest. This was the time of the priestess. She began in her shack with the customary sacrifice of a chicken. She then chanted and swayed as the spirit of the bayou took her. In a trance she knelt on her mud floor and gyrated insanely. As her eyes began to roll over white the earth shared its divine energy. She then knew who to curse and how.

The next morning she had the knowledge she needed to rid the swamp of the one that had betrayed her. She gathered her ingredients and began. Slowly she picked each piece of cloth, each piece of yarn and which thread to use. Carefully she built her tool to invoke the correct affliction. The results of past years hung playfully around her humble abode. The doll was finally complete. All it needed now was a bit of the damned.

Exiting into the humid air of Louisiana her powers knew where to look. She closed her eyes and walked to and fro through the soft water-logged ground. Without difficulty she came upon the remains of a gator trap. She took a bit of the fishing line that the blasphemer had cut himself on.

Back in her shack she tied the line onto the doll. She then placed a noose around its neck and hung it amongst the others. Soon the corrupt man would suffocate in his sleep. Her powers would now be recharged until the blood moon returned.

Fiction © Copyright Kathleen McCluskey
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com 

More from Kathleen McCluskey:

The Long Fall: Book 1: The Inception of Horror

Lucifer always cunning and intelligent challenges father to a battle of wits. Being the angel of light he casts a judgemental eye upon mankind. He begins a war with his fellow archangels and God. Michael, along with his siblings defend their home and mankind from their deranged brother. Broad swords and hand to hand combat drench heaven in blood. The four apocalyptic steeds are released, each having their own destructive power. Betrayal and lust are at biblical levels. Understand the very creation of evil and the consequenses that transpire in the first of THE LONG FALL series.

Available on Amazon!