Full Circle

Like a marionette, I lurched toward Marie.

“Nothing I need from you, cher.” She waved her hand, cutting my strings. I fell, twisting in time to see Nate slam into the priest.

Screams overlaid music I knew well – a lullaby of childhood, a spell of protection. Free, my mother’s spirit tore through his, burning his essence in a final act of retribution.

Her ghost appeared, young and beautiful. “One last souvenir, bébé.” Icy kiss from insubstantial lips seared like fire. I slumped, gutter fallen, rain washed, a new mark throbbing just behind my ear.

Nate coughed blood, then was still.

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Take Down

By Colleen Foley

Laveau’s words were music to my ears. Seth reached for the jar in my hand. Almost too late, I batted it away.

“No! Help her. I’ve got this.”

For once he actually listened. As I steeled myself, one mark flared. I howled in pain, launching myself forward. She dropped her hand, her power guttering, as I plowed into his chest, driving us both to the ground.

“Thanks for playing, douche bag. Here’s your souvenir.”

Grinning down at him, I shoved the bottle into his open mouth, slamming my other hand under his chin. Teeth and glass shattered onto his tongue.

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Danse Macabre

The dead child gained no entry, the only tattoo for which I’d paid finally proving its worth. Frustrated, he reached for Nate. I reached for salt, and the boy dissolved with petulant cries. Other spirits approached. I could not dispatch them all.

Marie’s child thrashed in a vulgar parody of dance, beat set by throbbing bead. Madame Laveau had been crowned Voodoo Queen of New Orleans, and the queen judged her son unworthy.

I wondered if my mother, spirit loosed from glass, would find me wanting. Compelled, I lunged for the wretched jar, seeking salvation or damnation. Either would do.

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The Final Countdown

By Colleen Foley

Marie Laveau appeared as Seth’s magic petered out. She held a bead, large, red/black and pulsing. It shot from her hand to hit the houngan in the chest. He screamed as it rooted into him like a parasite.

“You dare take da power I give you and use for it for dis? For petty revenge? And you call me whore? I …made …you.”

Everything slowed then, like viewing interactive performance art in some bugfuck mad gallery.

She never took her eyes from her son, but she spoke only to me.

“You are both out of time. Do it now, boy.”

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Last Stand

The Houngan howled. Spirits sporting wounds that laid them low raced toward us, a gallery of suffering turned to hate and madness. Unmarred women, all Black, all in white, encircled him, suffocating my flames.

Spells pouring from inexpert lips slowed vengeful phantoms for precious seconds, but all knew I would shortly fail. Beads of sweat joined rain in an attempt to render me blind, subtle redirection from better-skilled opponent.

Ghosts reached out, desperate parasites seeking to be housed in a living body, even for a moment. A young boy won the race, touched me, cold. Magic stuttered and was still.

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Calling the Tune

It’s a measure of how far gone we were that neither moving magic ink nor the dead queen of the undead elicited even a squeak from Nate. In the back of my head, that worried me. In the front, I was frantically trying to disengage before my wards returned to their maker.

Fate, a capricious bitch in the best of times, was having none of that.

Magic surged through me, words from my mother’s book coming fast from my tongue. I had always been her instrument. Fire rose around the tainted priest. He laughed, moved forward, and was held fast, burning.

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Maestro

By Colleen Foley

I palmed the vial, taking care that the Houngan not see. Seth seemed a bit more stable as my marks bled…into him?

Now I needed to elicit a chain of particular responses, one instrument at a time, building, becoming a symphony, or this was all going to go to hell.

“Why drag us back here? You could have finished this at the house. I know you were there.”

He smiled indulgently.

“So that capricious whore could see the end, of course. Because she denied me.”

An outraged shriek pierced the sounds of wind and driving rain.

She was coming.

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Feedback

Everything tangled, fingers clumsy, movements sluggish, clothing cumbersome.

“Get it together,” Nate hissed.

I lurched to him. A burning sensation ran down my arm where it brushed his. He jumped back, cursing. Then he pulled his gun and shot the priest in the head.

Discordant howling filled the graveyard, spirits crying out for bodies once inhabited.

The Houngan, unharmed, touched down. “My turn now.”

I leaned against Nate, using the shock loop to break the priest's spell. I relinquished the vile vial, then blinked the rain from my eyes. Nate’s tattoo was moving, color bleeding towards me, filling old scars.

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Eureka

by Colleen Foley

I grinned, shaking my head as I watched him rise.

“Dude. Floating? Isn’t that kinda grandiose?”

Seth looked sharply at me as the thing chuckled softly.

“You will learn respect. Mother and son will be together again, her soul inhabiting his body. Their talents, hers tainted by what she did, his so pure, will struggle against each other. That perfect discord will create such power as you have never seen. It will be mine to control and this time I will not be stopped.”

In that instant, I understood everything.

“All this talk has become cumbersome. Give me the jar.”

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Throwing the Gauntlet

I hate cemeteries. Funny, right? It’s not ghosts that bug me but the lingering memory of standing in rain – just like this – a too-tight suit, muscles quivering as they lowered my mother’s coffin, my face sloppy with tears and snot. Maybe if I killed the sons of bitches who had a hand in her death, I’d get over it. Maybe.

His voice, everywhere, “You know the prophecy is fabrication, yes? We created legend, made you in her to fulfill empty promises.”

Deep breath, steady. Magic ready, raging. “Not so empty now. Come and see.”

Like the moon, he rose, shining.

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Opening The Gate

By Colleen Foley

I'd explained as Seth drove. We were back at the cemetery, wending our way through rain-sloppy paths to Marie Laveau's grave. The storm started as we'd arrived, a fabrication of the priests, no doubt.

Every muscle tensed, just enough, as I ticked off reasons, in my head, for destroying him. The bottle. The zombies. Seth's poor goddamned mother. The manipulation and murder of so many innocent people. That fucking dog. My...rape.

Cold, comfortable rage knifed into my gut. I let it in, let it bloom, and kept it contained, let it anticipate its release.

It was time to end this.

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Turning the Key

Nate is old school: music, mores, muscle car all terribly out of date. It comes off as charming, in certain company.

The Houngan we hunted cared nothing for such quirks. He wanted Nate, or me, depending on who told the tale. Or perhaps he really had wanted my mother, enough to steal the remnants of her soul and fabricate a copy of her to house it.

Someone willing to go to such lengths wouldn’t be sloppy enough to discount us. Which begged the question, who was playing whom?

The engine roared as I headed down the road , seeking answers.

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On The Road Again, One Last Time.

By Colleen Foley

“Really?” I reached behind the seat, grabbing something to swipe the blood from my left brow, exceptionally pleased that it was Seth's favorite shirt.

Magic snapped through the car; a deranged symphony of tiny whirlwinds.

“Listen. I just meant...I know touching that thing is killing you.” I gestured to the lump in his jacket pocket.

“I get it. But the blend of you and it is like a magical beacon. He's coming for us, and we're not where we need to be. Now, get out. You're driving. I can't see. And don't fuck up my car.”


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No/Holding Back

Pure instinct: my hand shot to Nate’s temple. Satisfying to see his head bounce off glass. Too obstinate to be knocked out, though.

Second prong: magic. It slid over scars, filling bumps like trenches, red, then black. It craved free reign – I craved it - but distention leads to bursting, and the world didn’t deserve that. Neither did Nate.

“I want credit for you still breathing.”

His swelling eye narrowed.

“Last time someone attempted to make me a human sacrifice, it didn’t work out well. For anyone. So, go ahead, try to convince me why this time will be different.”

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Calculated Risks

by Colleen Foley

I patted Seth’s shoulder and grinned widely at him.“Sit tight, little brother.”

I kept my visit with Kaia short by necessity. She told me what I needed to know and warned me about the cold stone. Truth was, there was going to be no varnishing Seth’s ass with logic on this one.

In the car, I leaned close, and whispered, “Do me a favor, hold off on murder long enough to just listen, OK?”

With that I leaned him forward and slapped him hard on the back.

The stone popped neatly into my hand and the world erupted red.

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Means to an End

My magic threatened to erupt. “Pull over.”

Nate ignored me.

“Pull over, or I fry the engine.” Energy balled between my shaking hands.

He complied. “Why not threaten to kill me?”

“Unvarnished truth? You wouldn’t care as much.”

“Look, Seth…”

“Call Kaia. There has to be another way.” I slammed the door, walked away. Magic released left a blackened crater.

“Feel better?” Nate asked when I got back in.

I opened my mouth to answer. He popped a cold stone onto my tongue. Both muscles and magic went dead.

“I’m sorry. Really.”

Unable to answer, I began devising suitable retribution.

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Inhuman Sacrifice

by Colleen Foley

“Light it, little brother. We gotta go see Kaia.”

“What? Why? I thought the shackles and screaming ‘til you have cottonmouth had to wait!”

I pulled away from the house, grinning, as thick rancid smoke and liquid screams poured from the windows.

“Because, you sick little shit, she removed the infection. I don’t think the priest knows that, but I need to be sure. If he still thinks I’m infected, he still thinks he can control me. I can flatter him, get close, offer him something he really wants, and then…”

“Wait! Nate…offer him what?

“You. You and that jar.”

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Homecoming

Me and Jasper come down through the mountains just after the pass opened up in the Spring. Folks in town stepped aside as we approached.  Winter in a cave don’t allow for much prettying up, and I never did get the bearskin properly tanned.

 Jasper usually stinks, but this time his stench could've knocked out a goat.  Which may explain why Ella charged me twice the usual amount for a bath and sent someone out back with Jasper. No way his hide was sullying her pretty copper tub.

“We thought you were lost to us.” Ella scrubbed my head with the medicinal soap.  Would have been wiser to shear me like a sheep, but I don’t gainsay her when she’s of a mind to groom me.

“I could blame Jasper for running after that cougar, but that wouldn’t be the whole truth.”

Ella doused my head. “Never is.”

“I couldn’t resist going after an elk I spied.”

She snorted. “One of these days, your sense of adventure is going to lead you straight to the grave.”

I took her hand, placed it between my breasts. “I know, but I won’t go alone.”

She kissed me soft on the lips.

“No, you’ll go with Jasper.”

At the sound of his name, Jasper burst into the room, skidded to a halt next to the tub, and shook the water out of his long coat, soaking Ella’s dress.

“And I’ll feel better knowing the two of you are setting off for heaven together.”

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Written for Thursday Threads

ETA: And it got an honorable mention!

Stoking Coals

I hate this part. The deer eyes creep me out when they move, as if it still lives, fur burning next to oak balls, bone stew, and Jeremy’s tomatoes. Smoke trails from its nostrils like steam on winter mornings. When it blinks, I yelp, same as always.

“Ritual’s started,” Tanya says. “Get the new girls.”

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Written for the 55 Word Challenge

Daily Grind

“We need a vacation.” I hacked off the grasping hand of a zombie girl.

Nate kicked her grandfather in the chest, then pulverized his head. “Ya think?”

I doused the room in kerosene. “I’m thinking Kaia, some shackles, and a thick cotton flogger…”

“Dude, no! I don’t need to hear this.” Nate tossed in a match and slammed shut the doors. “Besides, you flatter yourself if you think she’d beat you, much less for free.”

I grinned at his possessive tone. “Never said I’d be the one bound.”

Nate snorted. “Keep dreaming, Seth. First, we have a priest to kill.”

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