Ladies of Horror Flash Project – #Horror #author Jill Girardi @KandishaPress @Darc_Nina #LoH #fiction

Posted on October 30, 2021 by Nina D'Arcangela

The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Image04

The Accursed Night
by Jill Girardi

Ah, this accursed night. I drag my clacking old bones from the consecrated soil in the Old Dutch Churchyard, where I’ve been interred since the year 1685. My withered hands pass through empty space as I scratch a phantom itch on a scalp no longer there. I shake the dust from my coattails, stomp my riding boots twice, and hear a plaintive whinny in response. My faithful black steed awaits me by the church gate, as she does every year on this eve. My pumpkin head sits astride the saddle—I hate to put the rotten thing atop the stump of my neck. My ax hangs from a saddlebag. I mount my horse and leave the boneyard.
It is at the old bridge—named for me!—that I find my first victims. Four drunken teenagers desecrate my sacred territory. They don’t notice me until we’re nigh enough to crush them beneath my steed’s great hooves. How weary I feel as I raise my ax, swinging it down like a pendulum and decapitating two teens at once. A ten-foot squall of bright red blood splashes everywhere. After a moment of paralyzing horror, the two left alive begin to scream.
Run, you fools! I don’t have all night. Well, yes, I do, but I’d like to be back in my grave before dawn. It gets harder to do this every year. At last the two teenagers, girls, begin to run. They separate at the crossroads, one heading for the water tower. The other continues straight across my bridge. It is easy to lop off her head with my ax as I pass.
I wheel around, back in the direction of the tower. When I reach it, I see the girl climbing the service ladder. Her head turns, terrified. She spies me far below her on the ground.
The night is cold. Next year, then, I’ll catch double my quota. For now, I’m going back to sleep. I have no desire to ascend a cold steel tower for another tedious kill.
I’ve never had a head for heights.
Fiction © Copyright Jill Girardi
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com

line_separator2

More from author Jill Girardi:

GSanthoebookGraveyard Smash:
Women of Horror Anthology Vol. 2

Step through the prettiest cemetery gates you’ve ever seen and experience tombstone raves and widow’s dances, Japanese snow-spirits, Aztec bruja and temple goddesses, vengeful ghosts, djinn and cannibals, vampire hunters, plague bearers, graverobbers, and terrors beyond reason. Read through the night as the dead rise from boneyards all around the world!

#FRIGHTGIRLSUMMER recommended reading!

 Available on Amazon!  

line_separator2

Posted in Authors, Dark Fiction, flash fiction, FREE, Horror, Ladies of Horror, Writing Project | Tagged , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Ladies of Horror Flash Project – #Horror #author Linda Lee Rice @darc_nina #LoH #fiction

Posted on October 29, 2021 by Nina D'Arcangela

The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Image03I Believed Him
by Linda Lee Rice

He was handsome in an elegant old-fashioned way, genteel manners, and an old-world charm. I was swept off my feet with the after-sunset picnics. He plied me with a bouquet of beautiful flowers he said were called Oleander. The flowers were a lovely pink with a sweet delicate scent.
As we lay in the moonlight, he brushed a leaf from the flower across my lips saying he would love to spend eternity with me. As my heart started racing erratically, vomiting, I fell into a swoon, and soon darkness overtook me.
I woke up here in this cavern, naked, afraid, and alone. Behind me are skulls of his other lovers, the ones he had cast aside. I scream and scream but no one hears me but the grinning dead. A single torch blazes on the mossy wall, leaving shadows.
I claw my way around the walls of the cavern and through the layers of skulls. I find the latest victim; rigor mortis has long been there and gone. Rats have been nibbling here and there, enjoying their repast. Her neck had been bitten leaving puncture marks, her eyes wide open staring at nothing.
I smell the scent of Oleander, the faint sound of footsteps…he is coming.
Fiction © Copyright Linda Lee Rice.
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com
line_separator2

More about Linda Lee Rice:

me in burgandy hat2

Linda Lee Rice aka Ruzicka has poetry published in Twilight Times, Dark Krypt, Fables, Descending Darkness, Writing Village, Spine, and Page, Muses Gallery, Bloodbond, Lycan Valley Press Publishers, Alban Lake, Highland Park Poetry, Rosette Maleficarum, The Siren’s Call, Edify Fiction and the June Cotner anthology, “House Blessings” and “Garden Blessings

She has short stories published in The Grit, and Reminisce, Haunted Encounters: Friends and Family, FrostFire Worlds. Plus, a personal essay at Mamalode. She also has various articles and blogs published online as a freelance writer.

line_separator2

Posted in Authors, Dark Fiction, flash fiction, FREE, Horror, Ladies of Horror, Writing Project | Tagged , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Ladies of Horror Flash Project – #Horror #author Mary Ann Peden-Coviello @MAPedenCoviello @darc_nina #LoH

Posted on October 29, 2021 by Nina D'Arcangela

The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Image02

Unreal Estate
by Mary Ann Peden-Coviello

“I can see it now, Caro, can’t you?” Thomas’s voice practically vibrated with enthusiasm.
“If you say so.” Caro’s did not. 
“The foundation’s solid. So’s the masonry. Most of the structure’s sound as the dollar used to be. It’s one of the dormitories of the old Marchbank College for Women, the last building standing from the college, in fact. Calloway Dormitory. Historical value, see? We can take the twenty-eight rooms on the two floors and make them into eight nice apartments, four on each floor. Add a laundry/utility room and a lounge on each floor. It’ll sell like hotcakes. The woodwork inside is to die for, honey. Come have a look.”
Caro followed her husband up to the old building’s front door. “Looks like a big, scary money pit to me,” she muttered to herself.
Thomas struggled to open the front door, using the key he’d wangled from the real estate agent. The door relented, creaking open with a sound like all the fingernails in the universe scratching against an eternal blackboard.
Thomas grinned. “Needs a little WD-40, yeah?” He stepped inside the entryway. “Look at the crown molding, Caro! And these baseboards! I bet they’d restore beautifully. And the floors are 100 percent oak, according to the listing.”
Caro edged past the doorway. “But I can smell mold, honey. And rats, I think. And it’s so cold in here. Why’s it so terribly cold? It’s at least 95 today.”
“It is a little chilly, isn’t it? Probably the thick walls.” Thomas trotted up the wide staircase toward the second floor.
A thin, grim-faced woman in a black dress shimmered into existence at the top of the stairs. Her white hair was pulled into a severe bun. A bit of white lace at her neck and the wrists of her long sleeves were her only adornments. 
“Stop!” Even though there was no actual sound, her voice shot through Thomas and Caro like an icepick. “We allow no visitors after hours – and especially no male visitors.” She imbued the word “male” with enough venom to poison a small city. 
Through the closed doors of the dormitory rooms, the ghosts of girls drifted toward Caro. She turned toward the front entrance, but before she could run through the doorway, the door slammed shut of its own accord. Spectral hands grabbed Caro and pulled her down. She began to scream.
Thomas, struck immobile by the sight of the ghostly house matron, stood rooted to the stairs as the grim woman glided down toward him. As she reached Thomas’s position at the midpoint of the stairs, her eyes began to glow red. She reached for him. 
Thomas’s screams merged with Caro’s till they reached a crescendo of pain. Then they were suddenly cut off.
Silence reigned again inside Calloway Dormitory.
Fiction © Copyright Mary Ann Peden-Coviello
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com 

line_separator2

More from Mary Ann Peden-Coviello:

maryannpedencoviello_frightmareFright Mare-Women Write Horror
Short Story: One Hour Before the Dark

Women write horror and have written it since before Mary Shelley wrote FRANKENSTEIN. This anthology is to highlight the fact women write great horror and to kill the fallacy that they aren’t in some way up to standard. They are. Read here stories by Elizabeth Massie, Nina Kiriki Hoffman, Lucy Taylor, and a plethora of other great writers as they work on your nerves, get inside your head, and bang out some of the scariest tales written today. I’m proud to present these women for your consideration, as Rod Serling might say, as I ask you to step into FRIGHT MARE. Lock the door and windows, put on a light, and remember, it’s not real. It’s not real. Midnight awaits, monsters scheme to take you away, the strange and weird wait in the shadows, but it’s not real. Is it?

Edited by Billie Sue Mosiman, the author who brought you the SINISTER-TALES OF DREAD collections and her latest suspense novel, THE GREY MATTER.

Available on Amazon!

line_separator2

Posted in Authors, Dark Fiction, flash fiction, FREE, Horror, Ladies of Horror, Writing Project | Tagged , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Ladies of Horror Flash Project – #Horror #author Kathleen McCluskey @KathleenMcClus4 @Darc_Nina #LoH #fiction

Posted on October 28, 2021 by Nina D'Arcangela

The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Image01William
by Kathleen McCluskey

Marjorie slowly opened her eyes as consciousness crept back in. The last thing she remembered was leaving the club, then…nothing. She tried to open her eyes but her left eye had been swollen shut. Wincing as she touched it she looked down at her feet. In the muted moonlight, the rusted shackle that was on her ankle came into focus. Large tears began to slide down her face as the distant sound of trotting horse hooves began to move closer. She listened; the hooves didn’t sound right, the rhythm was off. Marjorie screamed as the sliding door to the room slammed open.
   William entered the room; his large frame engulfing the opening. He came at Marjorie, she could only silently sob as he grabbed her and lifted her to his face. “Oh you are a treasure. I will cherish you.” He dropped her onto the filthy floor. She noticed that he had a bloody bandage on his thigh and limped as he walked into the adjourning room. She looked around trying to recognize anything; nothing seemed familiar. She held her breath and listened; crickets and the occasional rustle of leaves is all she heard. Then the noise of the off-beat horse trot entered the still night. She shivered as William once again appeared in the doorway. This time there was a grotesque half human half horse being with him on a leash. Marjorie screamed as her world went black.
   Waking on a metal table, Marjorie began to struggle against the restraints at her wrists and ankles. Her eyes had had their sight taken. Pain shot through her neck as she tried to scream but no sound would come; her vocal cords had been cut.
  William’s hand touched Marjorie’s face, his rough fingers pried her mouth open. “Now eat, my sweet. My flesh will complete your transformation. I will always be a part of you.” He giggled as she swallowed.
   He stroked the head of the creature on the leash, “Isn’t she beautiful? My horsey will soon have a partner. Your transformation will give me such pleasure.” Tears rolled down Marjorie’s face; she knew her fate had been sealed.
Fiction © Copyright Kathleen McCluskey
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com
line_separator2

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 judgmental 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 consequences that transpire in the first of THE LONG FALL series.

Available on Amazon!

line_separator2

Posted in Authors, Dark Fiction, flash fiction, FREE, Horror, Ladies of Horror, Writing Project | Tagged , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Ladies of Horror Flash Project – #Horror #author R.A. Clarke @RAClarkeWrites @Darc_Nina #LoH #fiction

Posted on October 28, 2021 by Nina D'Arcangela

The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Image04This Cursed Night
by R.A. Clarke

White as chalk. Dappled grey. Beneath the moon, it’s time to play. He comes to life devoid of breath. A brave young man is claimed by death. No rise and fall upon his chest. Off with the head… you know the rest. 
 
Or maybe not, this tale doth twist. A lantern perched on blistered cysts. It flames, it sizzles, whispers, taunts. But this pumpkin says not, “Ichabod”. It cries for mercy, weeps for peace. It begs for you to calm the beast. With the axe, may relief be found… If stolen and swept to hallowed ground. 
 
You dare to fight, unseat the gourd. Slice and smash of your accord. By grace, you live. The horseman withers. He wilts and crumbles, melts and shivers. You’ve won and live to tell the world! You cry in triumph… kiss your girl. 
 
But beware, my friend. Don’t turn your back. A demon waits in leather tack. 
White as chalk. Dappled grey. Beneath the moon, he’s back to play. He’s quick and snap! Reclaims his axe. Whinnies roar and hooves they crack. Brave young man, he cleaves your head. Anoints your neck with flames instead. Blood and rage course through your veins, filled with ancient, righteous pain. You cry for mercy; weep for peace. Yet, all the while, you ride the beast. With hours left before first light, heads must roll this cursed night.
Fiction © Copyright R,A. Clarke
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com 

line_separator2

About author R.A. Clarke:

bobThe Big Ol’ Bike
Oliver is small, from footprint to glasses. He gets an old bike for his birthday and loves it, but not everyone does. Challenged to a race by the meanest bully in school, will Oliver be big enough to prove heroes come in all sizes?

Get your copy here!

line_separator2

Posted in Authors, Dark Fiction, flash fiction, FREE, Horror, Ladies of Horror, Writing Project | Tagged , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Ladies of Horror Flash Project – #Horror #author Kendra Hale @DevourAllWords @Darc_Nina #LoH #fiction

Posted on October 27, 2021 by Nina D'Arcangela

The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Image03

A Taste for Rage and Roses
by Kendra Hale

Worse than the pain of betrayal.
Is the loss of control.
Not freely given.
No, forcibly taken with noone to call upon. 
A time not long past.
A young college student,
Caught in the hidden sex of the Forties.
My heart yearning to break the chains.
A line crossed, innocent though it seemed in the moment.
Brought forth a horror, an evil unseen. 
Not even in the worst of my dreams,
Nothing I could have fathomed in my cherry pie existence. 
Caught by the wrong person,
Unsympathetic to our plight.
In the arms of an angel,
Who set my heart into flight.
Our sexes the same, our only sin.
Allowing love to overtake our senses.
Closed minds soon settled in,
She sent home, her family shamed.
But for me, the asylum gained my name.
Told I was wrong, my sin spread out in front of me.
Poked and prodded, experimented on.
Death’s name like a lover, begging from my lips. 
The scared little girl no longer remains.
Innocence and joy replaced with fear and pain.
Spirit unbroken, but no avenue to fight.
A spirit I became one terrifying night. 
Electroshock in its infancy, misunderstanding in full effect.
My life ended as my body shook so hard my neck snapped.
That night I broke free,
More than enough anger to forever fuel me. 
Those who crossed me and had their way,
Were the first to feel my wraith.
They faced MY judgement that day.
Their blood flooded the halls that hosted their crimes. 
My spirit exudes my rage.
But I am not alone.
Our revenge has results in limbs strewn like decor,
Many new pieces to adorn our home. 
My Father’s head next to Mother’s in a place of glory.
The mistake of coming inside to check on me. 
Extracting the price of trying to write my story,
Death waits for all who enter this domain.
Fiction © Copyright Kendra Hale
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com

line_separator2

More from author Kendra Hale:

je


Just Emotions:
A Gothic Bite Magazine Anthology

A collection of poetry.

 Available on Amazon!  

line_separator2

Posted in Authors, Dark Fiction, flash fiction, FREE, Horror, Ladies of Horror, Writing Project | Tagged , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Ladies of Horror Flash Project – #Horror #author A.F. Stewart @scribe77 @darc_nina #LoH #fiction

Posted on October 27, 2021 by Nina D'Arcangela

The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Image02The Forever House
by A.F. Stewart

It changed with every decade, the house that was never there.
The year I saw it, in 1910, it glittered in the sun as a stately mansion, the epitome of the riches I craved. Even the door frame gleamed in gold as I entered. By the 1940s it transformed to a cozy, inviting farmhouse promising shelter and security, and in the 1970s it had become a hotel welcoming the adventurous and the wandering. These days, it presented itself as an old abandoned warehouse building. Or maybe a former servant’s quarters. I couldn’t quite tell, and I stopped caring a long time ago. It had attracted a few curiosity seekers, though.
Not everyone could see it, of course, the house that was never there. Standing in-between time on an empty lot, the property always stayed vacant, owners never quite getting around to developing the land and eventually selling to the next unsuspecting fool. The house liked it that way. It made it easier to lure us in, the ones it wanted, the ones like me.
We were considered the special ones, the ones with power, all of us that could see the house. Whatever it truly was, it waited patiently, tempted everyone with whispered promises if we just came inside. It needed us, but not in a good way, for once we entered, we never left.
We were perpetually lost in our despair, trapped in our hopeless web of pain.
You see, every living thing must feed. Unfortunately, it feeds on us eternally…
Fiction © Copyright A.F. Stewart
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com
 

line_separator2

More from A.F. Stewart:

vn

Visions and Nightmares

Tragedy spares no one… and takes no prisoners.
In the twilight shadows, secrets are revealed past the whispers of madness.

Wander into the realm of the old gods with Elenora, where humanity and marriage are a prison.
Step through a looking glass of dark horrors with an Alice you never knew.
Join with Zenna to seek the truth as her death by magic grows closer.
Journey with Olivia as she crosses paths with a monster of the forest and runs for her life.
Watch Isobel summon the faerie to solve her problem of an unwanted husband.
Shiver as Doctor Killbride experiments with corpses to create life from death.
All that and more await within the pages.

Ten stories. Ten women.
Who will survive? Who will fall? And who will succumb to their inner evil?
Find out in Visions and Nightmares.

Warning: This book contains disturbing scenes that may be upsetting to some readers.

Available on Amazon!

line_separator2

Posted in Authors, Dark Fiction, flash fiction, FREE, Horror, Ladies of Horror, Writing Project | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

RELEASE: The Sirens Call eZine Halloween 2021 Edition – Issue 55 | FREE Online #Horror and #DarkFic #eZine #magazine @Sirens_Call

Posted on October 26, 2021 by Nina D'Arcangela

2021_Halloween_ezine_cover

The Halloween 2021 edition of The Sirens Call!

The 55th issue of The Sirens Call is 184 pages containing 143 pieces of dark fiction and horror in the form of short stories, flash fiction, and dark poetry! This issue also features artist Victor Hugo Palacios Mendez who has shared 12 pieces of artwork with us; a glimpse at Cult of the Box and why you want to join; featured filmmaker Mike Lera with three short films – Frames, The Shell, and The Imaginist; and featured author Angela Yuriko Smith who offers us a glimpse into her Stoker nominated book, Bitter Suites.

Visit Sirens Call Publications to download a free copy!

Posted in Dark Fiction, Dark Poetry, Free Download, Free Read, Halloween, Horror, Sirens Call Publications, The Sirens Call eZine | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Ladies of Horror Flash Project – #Horror #author Christina Sng @ChristinaSng @darc_nina #LoH #fiction

Posted on October 26, 2021 by Nina D'Arcangela

The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!


Image01Anchors
by Christina Sng

My legs feel like anvils
Anchored to the seabed.

My lungs, gravid with salt,
Struggle not to explode.

I cannot breathe
Nor see the sun above.

Only the blanket of night
Held tight over the sky.

There is no one but Death
Calling me in a voice so soft,

I no longer hear the shrieks
Of joy from my torturer.

Only the vision
Of my dead father

Telling me, I will be safe.
I will be home.

*

When the thick burlap
Is ripped from my face,

I do not see my murderer
Standing before me,

But my dad and grandma
Waving to me at the door.

Behind them,
The light is blinding.

Grandma bends down
To pick up my long-dead cat,

Boy, who died at age 17,
Now a kitten again

With bright blue eyes
And a mew so sweet,

I long so much to hold him,
Remembering

The days of being young,
The days of being strong,

When the world was full
Of hope and promise,

Before we innocently let
The darkness seep in

To completely devour us,
To completely destroy us.

My loved ones are safe,
In a better place.

It is time for me
To join them.

*

I get up with amazing ease
And step past my murderer

Who dissipates into dust,
Staring in horror at me

As he tumbles back
Into his existing loop of hell

While I race to my family
And together,

We walk through the door,
Returning to the place

Where evil cannot follow.

Fiction © Copyright Christina Sng
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com.

line_separator2

More from Christina Sng:

A Collection of Nightmares

Hold your screams and enter a world of seasonal creatures, dreams of bones, and confessions modeled from open eyes and endless insomnia. Christina Sng’s A Collection of Nightmares is a poetic feast of sleeplessness and shadows, an exquisite exhibition of fear and things better left unsaid. Here are ramblings at the end of the world and a path that leads to a thousand paper cuts at the hands of a skin carver. There are crawlspace whispers, and fresh sheets gently washed with sacrifice and poison, and if you’re careful in this ghost month, these poems will call upon the succubus to tend to your flesh wounds and scars.
These nightmares are sweeping fantasies that electrocute the senses as much as they dull the ache of loneliness by showing you what’s hiding under your bed, in the back of your closet, and inside your head. Sng’s poems dissect and flower, her autopsies are delicate blooms dressed with blood and syntax. Her words are charcoal and cotton, safe yet dressed in an executioner’s garb.
Dream carefully.
You’ve already made your bed.
The nightmares you have now will not be kind.
And you have no one to blame but yourself.

Available on Amazon!

line_separator2

Posted in Authors, Dark Fiction, flash fiction, FREE, Horror, Ladies of Horror, Writing Project | Tagged , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Ladies of Horror Flash Project – #Horror #author Alina Măciucă @darc_nina #LoH #fiction

Posted on October 26, 2021 by Nina D'Arcangela

The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Image04Imagine
by Alina Măciucă

Monsters and ghouls,
Headless horsemen,
Witches and all sorts
Of revenants,
All queued up
Waiting to pierce
Through the veil,
And rattle some chains,
Screech and howl,
And ride ghastly horses.
Clip-clop, clip-clop
Through rotting leaves.
Such a peculiar thing to
Imagine,
When we are
Always here,
24/7
— what is the meaning
Of time, anyway —
Watching you,
Touching you,
Changing the course
Of your thoughts.
And such friendly
Shapes you have
Envisioned us in.
Sometimes, we like to
Imagine
How you would react
To *knowing* what
We are.
And our laughter
Destroys worlds.
So we have to
Build new ones,
With brand new
Strange, little creatures,
Flesh and bone,
To shape us
As they will.
Fiction © Copyright Alina Măciucă
Image courtesy of  Pixabay.comline_separator2

More about Alina Măciucă:

meblurAlina Măciucă enjoys reading, writing, buying odd trinkets, and taking photos of beautifully decaying buildings. She has formally studied religion and hermeneutics at the University of Bucharest, and really has a thing for the Greco-Roman mysteries and Gnosticism, as well as for Renaissance magic. She lives in Bucharest with her very supportive boyfriend, their two cats, and an ever-expanding vinyl and book collection.

 

line_separator2

Posted in Authors, Dark Fiction, flash fiction, FREE, Horror, Ladies of Horror, Writing Project | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment