The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

Blood Beach
by Alyson Faye 

“They call it ‘blood beach’,” Emmet said with a nervous giggle, as he helped Kelly pull the rowing boat onto land and moor it to the nearest emaciated tree.

Kelly spat out her gum. “Yeah, right, whatevs.”

No way was her shield of cool indifference, years in the making, going to crack ‘cos of some creepy stories and red sand. “You know, idiot, it’s the iron content that turns it red.”

She sashayed her way up the beach, hair spiky, skinny-ribbed and to Emmet, totally desirable. He’d never have dared come here without Kelly. This was His big chance.

Do NOT blow this, man. He told himself, for the tenth time. He scurried after her, carrying the rucksack stocked with weed, booze and food.

He tasted copper in the air, the day was supernaturally still and blazing hot. He thought he caught a movement in the tree-line.

“Er, Kelly? Did you see that?” He pointed.

Kelly up ahead, was laying out her beach mat and didn’t reply.

Emmet blinked hard, tried to focus but sun-dazzled, saw nothing. “Could there be anyone else here?”

Kelly shrugged. “Doubt it. Gimme the rucksack, time to get high.” She winked at him and his spirits lifted.

He tried to relax, stretched out, with Kelly’s thigh next to his own, but the sense of being watched bugged him. He kept turning round and scanning the trees, but the contrast between the bright sunny beach and the shady recesses of the trees defeated him.

“Gotta go pee,” Kelly announced, standing up.

Emmett grabbed her ankle. “Maybe go in the ocean, Kells. Not into the trees.”

“No way.” She walked away from him, cross and determined; she vanished behind the first tree.

Emmett waited. The silence hung heavy. There’s no bird sounds. So weird. He tasted copper in the air, and wrinkled his nose.

The minutes ticked by. Kelly didn’t return. Emmett’s gut churned, his nerves shrieked at him. “Kells?” he called, or whispered. Pathetic. He tried again. No reply.

He caught a flash of red in the trees, moving fast. Very fast. It freaked him out. Was that Kelly? The silence pressed down. The sand burned his bare soles.

She’s been gone too long. Something’s happened. Maybe she’s hurt, twisted her ankle. Why doesn’t she answer?

He rummaged through the rucksack, searching for a weapon, but only came up with matches and bottle opener. Armed with these, he walked away from the safety of the shoreline. Sweat trickled down his neck, spine and face.

“Kelly?” he croaked, lips cracking. He paused on the boundary line of trees and blood-red sand. He heard a rustle, a whisper and saw a flash of movement. “Stop playing this stupid game, Kells. Just c’mon out and let’s leave.”

He heard a whimper, it was enough to draw him in.

***

 It watched the prey, clumsy, slow and bi-pedal, clump its way into its domain. Prey always came, though lately less often. So its hunger had grown. Along with its desire. Its tongue erupted from its jaws, tasting the coppery air. Now the hunt began.

 ***

Emmet walked on, deeper into the trees, which he noticed were sickly-looking, green, gooey sap leaking from the bark, and the shrubs all bore savage prickles as though in defence against . . . whatever’s here, he thought.

The air was fetid, swollen with decay.

He glimpsed movement several meters away, fast, a flicker of substance amongst the shade. He swallowed. He knew it wasn’t Kelly. Too fast, too low to the ground. He prayed it was a wild dog, or even a wolf.

“Kells?” he whispered, afraid to speak louder.

Another whimper drew him on, though he sensed eyes, an intelligence watching.

He found Kelly in the next minute. He wished he hadn’t. He wished he’d never come looking and just got in the boat and left.

She was hanging by her ankles, from a low branch, dripping blood from several deep gashes. The stench was toxic. Clearly she was dead, and something had bitten chunks from her.

So who or what’s whimpering?

A rustle behind him, and Emmett’s latent feral senses went into overload. His fingers nudged the match box open, sweat made his fingers slippery.

One strike, one chance.

He turned, struck the match and prayed for fire, as his ancestors had done. It landing on the creature’s bony spine, where tufts of black fur sprouted. It ignited, a fireball of burning flesh, howling its agony.

Calling to its pack.

.

Fiction © Copyright Alyson Faye
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com

More from Alyson Faye:

The Lost Girl & Spindleshanks

The Lost Girl
A nailed-up door. An inheritance which comes with a ghost. A missing girl. A fifty-year-old mystery. Parapsychologist Berkley Osgood is hired to investigate. What he uncovers reveals secrets the living want to hide and the dead will never forgive.

Spindleshanks
Adam is having nightmares about a skeletal shadow figure, who he calls Spindleshanks. Soon his whole class are sharing the same nightmare. Adam’s dad, Rob, knows that Spindleshanks can’t be real. But is he? One terrible night Rob has to face his son’s nightmare creature and fight for his son’s life. What would you sacrifice to have your child back safe?

“A decent two-for-one. Alyson Faye brings the engaging and eerie in equal measure.” CC Adams – horror / dark fiction author

Available on Amazon!