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Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

This Place 
by Rie Sheridan Rose 

It’s ironic, isn’t it? That this place of infinite beauty should be the very antithesis of life.

Once upon a time, my people made a sacrifice of a goat here in front of this tree every ten years on the day of the winter solstice to insure the crops would grow and the people would flourish. So it was for centuries.

Then the crops began to fail more often, and there was sickness in the village…so the elders decided the gods must be displeased with our offerings, and the sacrifices were now every five years. For a time, that seemed enough. The world returned to that we knew.

But it did not last. The gods seemed to despise us now, and the terrified elders grew more and more agitated. The sacrifices went from five years to one, to every season, to every month…and still the crops remained stunted and the people weakened.

Now, the sacrifices are daily, and it is my turn. One last sunrise cradled in the Life Tree—where the soil is full of the blood of the dead. When the sun crests the top branches, I will mingle my blood with that of my friends and family sacrificed before me. Perhaps we will laugh together again at last…forever joined in this place.

Fiction © Copyright Rie Sheridan Rose
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com

More from Author Rie Sheridan Rose:

Overheard in Hell:
Dark Poetry

Poems exploring hell and damnation. Tales of sorrow, vengeance, betrayal, and redemption. Ghosts, ghouls, and demons stalk these pages. Don’t read in a lonely house…in a darkened room by a single candle…

…unless you like the touch of an icy finger up your spine.

Available on Amazon!