The Ladies of Horror
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The Rooted One  
by Kathleen McCluskey

The villagers warned me to stay out of the hollow. They whispered of the Rooted One, a shriveled figure bound by earth and sorrow, who claimed the souls of those foolish enough to trespass. I laughed then, a scholar fears no folklore. I wish I would have listened.

The hollow’s thick greenery swallowed me whole. Towering trees clawed at the sky, their twisted branches rising like skeletal fingers. The deeper I walked the heavier the air became,  humid and stale. I could feel the ground slightly breathe beneath my boots.

That’s when I saw it.

It stood motionless beneath the cracked shell of a dying Elm. Its skin was ashen parchment stretched over thin brittle bones. Veins of living roots wove through its flesh, tightening and constricting with every heartbeat that wasn’t their own. A tattered, moth-eaten red shawl hung from its shoulders, the only vivid thing in this decaying graveyard.

Its face was blank, yet mournful. Its hollow sockets wept thin black liquid. I was mesmerized and horrified at the same time, terror told me to run but I couldn’t move. Its gaze pinned me in place.

A sound slithered into my ear, “I was once like you.” It wasn’t really a voice, it was more a vibration. Older. Deeper. The whisper of dry leaves caught in a wind that didn’t exist.

I staggered backward. The ground beneath my feet began to writhe, roots crawled up my pant leg. Thin as wire, sharp as knives, they slithered like serpents. They tangled around my ankles and tightened with shocking strength.

I fell. My hands scraped across the cold earth as panic surged through me.

The Rooted One glided forward with the grace of decay itself, swaying as if pulled by invisible strings. Its hand rose slowly and pressed against my chest.

The cold invaded immediately. My skin blistered and bubbled under the touch. The roots burrowed into my flesh like possessive lovers. I gasped but they crushed my lungs. I clawed at them with trembling fingers, tearing skin and snapping nails. But they only writhed deeper.

The pain became something monstrous. I could feel them inside of me, exploring, searching. When they found my heart, they coiled around it and squeezed. My heartbeat faltered. Slowed.

“I need your warmth. Your soul.” It murmured. “As you will need another’s.”

A searing wave of agony swept through me. My blood thickened to sap. My muscles locked, sending my limbs into rigid unnatural angles. My spine arched, cracking as bark-like growth erupted around it. My vision blurred, flashing between the Hollow and darkness deeper than death.

I felt it take.

Not just my body but my memories. The smell of my mother’s baking, the warmth of sunlit mornings, the sound of my own laughter. I tried to scream but found no voice, my tongue had turned to ash.

My skin hardened and split in places, thin rootlets sprouted from the open wounds. My ribs cracked like dried kindling as vines threaded through, weaving into a cage of bone and wood. My hands stiffened mid claw, frozen into grotesque branches.

I watched, a prisoner inside of my own gutted form. The Rooted One stepped back, regarding me almost tenderly.

“You will remain, as I did.”

The final flicker of warmth drained from my core. My heart slowed to a single aching thud. Then silence. The Hollow grew still.

Now I stand beneath the dying Elm, neither dead nor alive. Roots have taken hold in my mind like serpents coiled ready to strike. The red shawl, heavy and rough, rests on my shoulders like a mantle of doom. I am the Rooted One now.

I watch the edges of the Hollow. The trees lean eagerly, the ground shudders with anticipation.

I wait.

I wait for the next unsuspecting warm soul to wander too far.

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!