The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

A Third Choice 
by Selah Janel 

One did not touch the knocker on the door at the very back of the cellar. It had been drilled into Joesephine since she’d been able to sit at her grandfather’s knee and listen to all the family stories. It had been a threat every time she or her siblings or cousins had ever acted out of turn. There were expectations of the Sanders family, one of which being to guard the door that would usher the end of the world.

She first saw it when she snuck down to the far reaches of the dank cellar during a game of hide and seek when she was eight.

She first heard the voices behind it when she was ten.

She put it out of her head, influenced by her grandfather’s warnings and her father’s lectures on responsibility. She was the eldest, after all, the house would be hers. The future was hers.

Until it wasn’t.

Father was found after he’d crashed through the window of his office upon receiving the news of the market. Grandfather suffered a heart attack not long after. Creditors and collectors darkened their door, and Mother took her aside for a very different talk on responsibility.

She’d pleaded that she was too young to marry, that Edwin Hapton was too old, too mercenary, too everything. Mother argued that his mother was a friend and marrying would allow them to keep the house, or at least give her the chance to plead the case to Edwin, who preferred Europe. Otherwise, everything would be sold to maintain some semblance of her mother’s standard of living.

Josephine supposed that Tremulous Manor was a bit old fashioned, but it was home. And it held the door she stared at.

You were supposed to protect us, as we protected you! She didn’t voice the accusation for fear of her voice carrying, but her glare at the lion knocker’s silent stare spoke volumes. It was polished and stately, bolted into an otherwise unattractive door that was rumored to have been there longer than the house. No one knew where it came from.

She’d have thought it wasn’t even real, a product of tall tales and fevered imaginations, save for the voices.

You know what you must do. There’s a choice you haven’t considered.

 She’d heard it all before. She’d be a queen in the new era, she’d want for nothing, Those who used her as a pawn would be punished.

Grandfather’s stories haunted her mind. “They’ll tell what you want to hear. They’ll use you for their own end. Nothing is worth the end of the world as we know it.”

“Joesphine. Whatever are you doing?” Her mother’s voice was quiet behind her. The young woman regarded the door for a few more quiet moments before she turned.

“It’s wonderfully decrepit, isn’t it? Except the lion. When I was little we used to call him Rex, for king,” Her fingertip trembled as it traced the details of its mane, its eyebrows, its snout. The metal was uncomfortably warm, waiting for a command.

Her mother was stately as ever, though her composure was betrayed by the panic in her eyes. Whether that was due to worry about her decision or the door, who knew. “You know better than to play with that awful thing. To listen to empty promises.”

“How do we know Edwin’s promises aren’t empty?” She asked, tilting her head.

“This is the only way, darling. The best way!”

“The best way for you. The way for you to keep your life to your standards and protect my brothers who will care for you while you either forget about me or use me to stay afloat in society now that Father’s gone. I’m tired, Mother. Tired of being strung along, of being a means to an end. Tired of the world, tired of everything being taken from us.” She blinked against tears, the inhuman purr behind the door twisting her stomach.

Her mother sighed, though she rang her gloved hands.”Sometimes we must do what we don’t like. A marriage is hardly the end of the world,” she scoffed.

She shook her head. “My freedom would be gone, I’d be separated from the Manor,” she whispered, turning her loving attention back to the door. “Besides, my world has already ended.”

She lifted the heavy ring and knocked before her mother could continue her lecture, not particularly caring about what lay behind it, as long as it was not more of the same.

Fiction © Copyright Selah Janel
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com

More from Author Selah Janel:

Mooner

Like many young men at the end of the 1800s, Bill signed on to work in a logging camp. The work is brutal, but it promised a fast paycheck with which he can start his life. Unfortunately, his role model is Big John. Not only is he the camp’s hero, but he’s known for spending his pay as fast as he makes it. On a cold Saturday night they enter Red’s Saloon to forget the work that takes the sweat and lives of so many men their age. Red may have plans for their whiskey money, but something else lurks in the shadows. It watches and badly wants a drink that has nothing to do with alcohol. Can Bill make it back out the shabby door, or does someone else have their own plans for his future?

Available on Amazon!

The Ladies of Horror
Picture-Prompt Writing Challenge!

See a Need, Fill a Need 
by Selah Janel 

The woods enveloped Gray in a cold, faded world of nothing. I shouldn’t have returned. It was far too late for the thought to have weight. He’d let his childhood village beckon him back. He’d taken the gold. He’d walked through the near-empty lanes with no one to greet him.

Now, Gray was alone with the woods and the ravens.

The birds perched covered the once-bustling village. He’d dispatched as many as he could before taking to the woods with bloody sword. There was talk of a curse driving the villagers out. It was why he’d returned— that and the gold. As a man for hire, he couldn’t be picky. See a need, fill a need.

Nothing existed but the bare trees, his forced breaths, and the mocking croak of a raven. They’d rushed, as if they were fighting to impale themselves first on his blade.

For a moment, Gray swore he heard the tune the neighbor girl used to croon when she swept the front path, then another bird fell from his handiwork.

Things shifted and larger, meaner birds started attacking, ripping his skin with beaks and talons, tearing at his beard. He couldn’t aim, couldn’t hide, so he ran. He fled deep into the forest to escape the onslaught.

He hadn’t realized he’d dropped to his knees until the wetness of the ground registered through his pants. For a moment he stared up through the branches that caged him into the terrible place and into the eyes of a single, arrogant bird that considered him with a smug, triumphant tilt of its head.

Gray couldn’t look away. His mind fumbled for a bit of the old tales of curses and came up blank. His mind grew fuzzier with the cold and the dull rustle of branches and wings.

He started and came back to himself, leapt to his feet and found he leapt too far. He was higher than before, and staring down at the ground.

Staring into his own eyes.

He swung his sword, but was only able to wave dark, feathered wings. He screamed and found he didn’t have lips and couldn’t form words. The pained call of a raven tore through the heavy solitude at his doppleganger.

No, his own body.

Gray’s face smirked up at him. Strange sounds escaped the human mouth, as if it was testing out a new tool and finding that it would serve the need quite well. When Gray’s own voice reached his ears, the inflection and tone were wrong. “We thank ye for your contribution, human.”

What the hell are you? He demanded, but could only croak in panicked bursts.

“Now don’t think too hard about it. Otherwise ye might do something stupid, like run yourself onto a blade like so many of your kin have.”

Dread shivered over Gray’s bones and he hopped across the branch. No. Surely I didn’t… The realization of where the missing villagers had gone was too horrible to contemplate. His gaze flit to the forest floor where he’d cut down the bird that had imitated his neighbor’s favorite tune, stomach turning at the thought that it was his old friend.

“Think of it as see a need, fill a need. I’ll be off now. Time for my lot to make our way and spread our numbers.” The smile on Gray’s human face was meant to be friendly, but reflected pure malevolence. “If you let it happen, you’ll forget soon enough. Or fling yourself at the next hired man who comes through. ‘Tis up to you.” Gray’s human hands hefted the sword and patted the bag of gold on his belt curiously, as if he wasn’t sure what they were, but appreciated their shine.

Gray flung himself toward his old body, but the creature who had switched them was too adept and he was too new with his wings. He ran himself into the ground, and pain slashed up a wing. Broken. The thought was dull and the capacity for thought lessened by the moment.

“Stupid fool, like so many other stupid fools. Our time has come, and ‘twill be far easier than we thought,” Gray’s former voice chortled, as his body headed back toward the village, whistling the song that had been his and his neighbor’s. Once he’d thought he’d marry her. Now, he could barely remember her.

The raven hopped with his broken wing, unsure and lost, looking for shelter or the inevitable as night descended and snow began to fall.

.

Fiction © Copyright Selah Janel
Image courtesy of Pixabay.com

More from Author Selah Janel:

Candles: A Christmas Tale

Christmas is a season of hope, but also brings the dark of midwinter. The holidays are stressful at the best of times, but when the zombie apocalypse comes out of nowhere, Jamie and her makeshift family struggle to find hope during the season. Unable to forget the mistakes of her past, she struggles to be grateful for the good things that are left in the strange new world she and her sons struggle to survive in. Little moments make for bright spots, though, and with the help of a fellow survivor, maybe she can find just enough light to cling to.

Available on Amazon!