Chapter 5: September 2025

The dead one tried to show me hell, but it was a pale imitation of the horror I can paint on the darkness in a quiet moment. ― Mark Lawrence

“The Witch-Mother” by J. E. Nordal

Miserable is he to whom the memories of childhood bring only fear and sadness. Wretched is he who looks upon lone hours in vast darkness and dismal chambers with the whimpering of one’s breath fading into hopelessness and who is cursed upon birth to see and forget the horrors of the unnamable and the madness from beyond. I know not which is better; to be mercifully relieved of these burdens or to be rescued and live to tell of what one has seen and does not believe? Oh! dear Mother – whose children preserve and sanction the impurity ye taught them, whose spells and witchcraft extend as ye please, and who sitteth brooding on that dark throne at the bottom of ye lake – have mercy! 

I was but a stout, weary lad, forsaken and misbegotten by my code of kin and sanctioned into the world of madness and despair, frenzy and horror by the purchase of doom’s eternal fate; for I, the dazed and the barren, the confused and invalid, whose design was a fate worse than death from the start, looked overlong at your visage. I was but a lad, when, misstepping into this realm forsaken by the old gods, I became prone – hideously prone! – to the accursed eyes which haunt me still when my eyes are closed. Those eyes I shall never forget; and not by design of mnemonic trial and mastery, but because I am forbidden to forget them. Mother dearest, I prithee, you will grant unto me –the miserable and unhappy – the blessing of the highest darkness, so that I may live in glory and wonder 

It is said – amongst the damned and forbidden witch-cults of old – that no feminine subject born into this world shall be wasted and cast for her disqualities, no matter her flaws and damnable features; for every woman is pure and sacred, and is favoured by the Mother of Witches who gave them life. They shall become old and learn many things which are forbidden for human eyes and blasphemous to the human mind, and that they will moreover teach and enlighten the generations to come. But should there be born a man amongst these monstrosities, no matter his qualities and purities, he shall be subject to blasphemy and defiled by his own mother for the traditions speak boldly and clearly. They looked upon men as simple, unworthy things which needed absolute cleansing for the centuries of impurity their putrid disease would bring. He who is born amongst the witches of the Witch-Mother will be punished and offered to Her; thrown savagely to plunge into the whispering lake, and meet the deity whose law is absolute. I was amongst those who met the mother; but I survived. 

I remember very little, for I was still so young; but what I do remember will eternally curse me and atoll me the mercy of virtue forever. Upon my birth I was not the only male creature who were offered to the mother – of whom I heard through the rotting wood of the house which harboured me and the others, always in an unholy procession of whispers and faint upkeeps of chantings and ungodly words which followed that name. The voices that whispered these names were all of a hideously evil quality; wheezing, hoarse and truly repugnant sounds which, although I knew were human by source, I was shocked by the tongues of other worlds which made me doubt what thing truly spoke.

For weeks I waited, whilst one by one the other boys who were with me in that cottage for safe-keeping and preservation were taken away and never returned. I remember this, because this scene haunts me at night; memory has not yet been mercifully deleted. All was still in that dark space of timeless abnormality, where the only sound one heard was the faint whimpering and of the occasionally yelping of the other boys who shivered at night, and the only sound – aside from the monsters outside the house – was the hideous creaking of the foundation and the wood which had never been maintained. Then, when the silence was broken by the morbid rites of the witches outside, the door was opened and we were all blinded by the brilliant light of the evening sun – the magic purplish-orange beams glinted wonderfully amidst the spectral morbidity of what followed. A robed and hooded figure stood crooked in the doorway and a long, monstrous hand reached into the room to pull at the leg of one chosen subject, and, with a scream so inhuman and disastrous that my ears can never shun, was dragged outside and we knew that we would never see him again. I never knew nor saw the faces of my brethren on any occasion, so terrible was the darkness; and my reflection, I knew must be truly hideous if my fate was sealed since birth. 

There was nothing we could do, for some of us had tried to escape; but this grave and spectacular feat was rewarded only by a quick and loathsome verdict which we neve knew; but since the screams were such that no thing should let out, I can only imagine. No one spoke – for no one had learned how – so we simply cried and wailed and slept and ate what we could, but with no light we never knew a life without it. Some of us, however, learned to pray to the weird wooden model which we found in the far corner; such a model was of no kind which anything of this earth could spawn. The thing was our god and prayed to see the end of the day and that our hopes were answered, and the torturing ceased. But never were our pities answered or met; our demands, though pitiful and only in small whimperings, were only met with the same silence. But still we prayed, and hoped that if we would pray hard enough and long enough – with a passion like no other – we would be heard by the invisible god. 

We all waited to be chosen, since there was nothing else we could do; the doors were locked and the windows were tall and boarded, so that our child-like strength could not reach or pound. Once, there was a boy who escaped the old house; he had devised a plan very poorly with the other infants that we should create a stair for him to ascend to the window and gaze at the morning light when the monsters were asleep. He had been there long, and had picked up some oral gift from listening to the creatures outside for so long, and explained without sight that an escape may be possible if we all worked together. After finding our way through the darkness and crawling to his voice where he said there was a window, we each positioned ourselves when some evil force pushed against our backs and crawled up the window. We then observed where we thought we saw the misshapen thing as he began to break down the boards and, after many anxious tries, he had done it and abruptly fell with a loud thud on the ground beyond. What happened then is not for me to say, but I can only say with certainty, that he did not reach very far; for promptly there was screaming, crying and lastly silence. 

Many nights we were unable to sleep due to hunger, and many more nights were we pulled from our dreams by the insufferable, maddening procession of wild chanting in the distance; where some monstrous ceremony was taking place, and the revellers screamed and laughed like monsters above the hills. Our fears I cannot express through words, partly because there is no word which can describe how we felt. Truly, they screamed like the ghouls which ride the night-wind, for madness howled in the wind that night. Lights occasionally flashed into our purified darkness, and there was no sleep to be had. The chants were monstrous and imposing. What gates they opened, and what mischief crawled during those black nights I dare not know. 

Then finally it came time for my judgement, when I was ready to see the mother. I knew not how long it had been since my birth, save that time stopped caring in that darkness. Perhaps it had simply been three months. I was all alone; the others had been cleared before me and only I was left. The door opened wide as I slept, the light shone brilliantly to intrude the abyss which I had known, and I did not flinch. Blinded, I turned to see the evil which sought me and saw only the haggard and hunched form of some morbid beldame clad in dark robes. It is only by sheer analogy that I call the thing human at all, and with such repugnancy and hesitancy that we were at all alike, for there was nothing human about it, those long limbs, broad shoulders and hunched back, that wrinkled face and long nose which I did not like without knowing exactly why. No human, of course, had I ever seen, yet I could scarcely imagine that all spawns were so hideous. The thing lurched into the room after chanting some words and grabbed me by the wrist, pulling me to my feet. Stepping outside, I felt my feet touch some insufferable and wet flooring which tickled and scratched me; the outside world which I hardly knew existed was no open to me, and presently a crowd of revellers looked down at me with ugly eyes and never stopped until I was walking in the dank forest. My feet were tiny and nauseously weak, so that all shapes around me towered like gods. The creature whose grip held firm around my wrist pulled me with insidious strength, growling and snarking as we were all alone and led me deep past the streets of trees and narrow alleyways when at last I saw the sight of clear water. 

We approached the lake’s bed and my guide stopped to say some words of prayer, and I can say with some merciful certainty, twenty years later, that these words ran something like this: “Ogth, logth, hleyow Log-Both! Uth-lyeah karya m’gwha Klethoth!” in such a hideous tone as those monstrous nights of intense prayer and morbidity. Then, just as she had finished those godless words and songs, I felt the crushing lake-tides on my skin as the monster drowned and tossed me in from a small boat where we had sailed to the heart. I was powerless and lapping against the currents of madness when the sounds invaded my ears and the rushing motion became more than mere stream. 

Then suddenly I saw it. With only a singular churning to mark its rise to the surface and towards me, the thing slid into view below the dark waters, where the plunge became nightmarish. Vast, unwholesome and ancient, it darted like a stupendous monster of nightmares towards me, about which its hideously squirming arms like ropes hither and thither, the while it stared at me from the depths and gave vent to certain unmeasured sounds. I think it is then my madness began. 

It had two great wolf-like heads which sprung from a robust neck of fur and dust and tattered flesh; from each head, whose maws were fierce with daggers and whose squirming tongues emerged long and slippery from a black stomach who I detected breathed an ancient flame, there were six eyes and twelve in total. Such eyes were meant only for the being who spied on the mortal world from unclean sockets and the world where no human eye may gleam; and they were presently watching me. Above the waist it was semi-anthropomorphic, though its chest had the leathery reticulated hide of a crocodile or an alligator ; its hybrid, nightmarish qualities were such that no man should ever think to describe by pen, yet here I am. The back of the thing was piebald with yellow and black, and dimly suggested, between where those writhing ropes or tendrils flailed madly, the squamous covering of certain snakes. From the shoulders, however, and below the waist, it was the worst; for here all sense of natural or familiar resemblance fades away and sheer, wild phantasy begins. The skin was thickly covered in coarse black fur, and from the shoulders a hideous score of long greenish-grey tentacles with red sucking mouths protruded and undulated too much. This arrangement was odd, looking

back, and seemed to follow the symmetries of some cosmic, otherworldly geometry unknown to us and our three dimensions. On each of the hips, deep set in a kind of pinkish, ciliated orbit, was what seemed to be an evil eye; whilst in lieu of a tail there depended a kind of trunk or feeler with occasional purple markings, and with some suggestion of there being a mouth or throat. The limbs, save for the black gorilla-like fur, roughly resembled the hind legs of prehistoric earth’s giant saurians, and terminated in great hooves. Then, protruding from the thing’s chest I noticed the first limb which actually terminated in something like a hand; for indeed it was a hand growing limply and tediously like bones and where something brilliantly aglow like an eternal fire was emanating on top of the monstrous palm. 

I know not what happened after I saw the monstrous, nightmarish, alien thing; but I must have been spared by some instrument of merciful grace, for else I would not dream of those horrid moments twenty years ago. My dreams have never truly explained that, but I have been told time and time again that I had been saved by the Holy Spirit and suddenly found sulking around town where I now inhabit a miserable and wretched life. I know that I would not have had the power or will to perform some miraculous ascent myself, and I know that the thing in the waters would have surely claimed me whole in another minute – or worse! Had some other monstrous intervention rescued me and dragged me to safety; or had perhaps the creature below seen me for my worth? In my delirium I have said much, but find that my words have been given scant attention. I do not, moreover, deem it necessary to insist upon a thing which my fellow man will not believe. I have humoured my psychologist countless times with faint, wicked descriptions of the dreams that I know to be my past, and the ancient legends of the Queen of Witches, the Daughter of Chaos and the oldest of all things; Log-Both. When I saw that my listener was hopelessly conventional, I did not press my inquiries further. 

It is at night, especially when the moon is gibbous and waning, that I see the thing clearly. Those limbs, those eyes, those teeth, those tendrils, those nightmarish qualities and the eternal fire she bears! I have tried therapy and I have tried morphine and worse; but the drug has given only transient surcease, and has drawn me into its clutches as a hopeless slave. I have almost taken the step of ending my life, for there is nothing more for me. I often ask myself if it was a pure phantasm which I encountered, or a grotesque design manifested by the human fear – mere freak of madness – but never does anything less than a hideously vivid image come to me in reply. I cannot think of the sea without shuddering at the nameless things which at this very moment may be crawling and floundering on its slimy bed, worshipping their ancient idols and gates to other worlds. I dream of a day when they may rise from the lake-bottoms and cast their hellish magic without reprieve or mercy, and when all shall revel in the horror of their ancient knowledge upon the puny, war-exhausted mankind – of a day, and pray that day is soon dawning, when the world shall sink and the dark inhabitants of daemonic realms shall ascend amidst universal pandemonium. 

Oh! daughter of Chaos, first child of the Nemesis of angels and all life, I am here! I await ye!

“Black Fur” by Anabela Machado

The pain began during the night, waking Clara suddenly. It rose up from the tip of her toes to the top of her head, sensitive skin, heart beating outside of her body, worse than any cramps she ever had before. Cold seemed to seep into her bones, skinny limbs shivering, moonlight creeping in from the window. Sweat covered her, soaking her pajamas. 

When the morning came, there was sticky red blood between Clara’s thighs, and a soreness that didn’t seem to go away. As the days passed, she learned to live with the strange ache that wouldn’t leave her alone. Her whole body seemed like a stranger, and alien creature she couldn’t understand. 

Clara tossed and turned every night, kept awake by the dark skies. Most importantly, she kept bleeding.

Days turned into weeks, crimson staining her clothes, the taste of desperation familiar on her tongue. She wondered about her own funeral, coagulated blood on the top of her feet, a red smudge. She was dying, there was no other possibility, skin so hot, almost boiling, tears evaporating as soon as they dropped down her flushed cheeks. Eventually, Clara could no longer hide it from her mother, the suffering had taken over every aspect of her life, it could be seen in the edges of her eyes, broken blood vessels betraying her, her faked calm losing credibility by the second. 

With her back on the doctor’s table, shaky legs held up, Clara waited as he treated her body as a crime scene, a detective in a white lab coat, prodding the center of her being, watching her, waiting for the one thing that pointed to a solution. He couldn’t find answers in any test tubes. She went back home feeling violated by his disbelief that seemed to have infected her own mother. The blood was still there, gushing like a waterfall. But it was easier for everyone else to pretend it was just another strange female thing. A gory horror every woman had to experience, a rite of passage. It made her teeth ache, the strong anger infected her very bloodstream. She wanted to stop bleeding, to finally be able to look at her body in the mirror with understanding, to find reason between the muscles and the skin. 

Her wish was granted during the full moon. 

By the time afternoon began giving way to night, the blood had stopped flowing. Clara got out of the shower feeling truly clean for the first time in what felt like eternity. The hot water had calmed her tense limbs. She felt energized, brimming with wellness. Through her window she saw the full white moon, round and beautiful. Its light shone on her naked body, as it was slowly covered by black fur. How strange that weeks of pain led to a fairly smooth transition. There was only relief to be found, as Clara’s body stretched, its shape changing in seconds. Her mind returned to the basics, primal emotions the leaders of all that commanded the new body, wilderness hidden between her sharp fangs. On the other side of Clara’s struggle, power opened itself up like a flower, ripe fruit ready to be bitten.

It was the most natural thing to prowl down the hallway, paws making a heavy sound against the wooden floors, the long nails scratching, leaving their mark, their warning. It was instinct, led by the ugly hunger, to jump on top of her scared father. Regardless of her animal rage, she recognized him without trouble. It made no difference, as his flesh was ripped apart, blood dripping down her maw, his blood staining the same place hers had, a few days before. There was something ancient about it, the silence of the house similar to a church, worship living in every bite. 

Her mother didn’t have the chance to open her eyes, blood gushing from her neck, flesh eaten in one big bite, hair stuck in the teeth, such an ordinary thing to be observed as your maker died. 

Clara’s belly bulged from the filling meal, black fur stained crimson, her form sticky and sated. The blood dried slowly, a metallic taste left in her mouth, sweet on her tongue. Outside, the moon smiled down at her.

“The Bougainvillea” by Alexander Blaine

Harper woke, ears ringing, shivering in the cold pool of sweat that pasted the bedsheets to her limbs as she stretched. She’d had the dream again. That same dream she’d had a dozen nights before that left the burn of bile at the back of her throat. She could still see their faces. A beautiful family, lined up in front of a smooth, white plaster wall, hands bound, gagged, on their knees, tears streaming down their faces. One-by-one, like pinatas, their beautiful little heads burst from the back and splatter on the wall behind them as the shots sound off. She can see the rifle, long and black, with a lacquered oak fore-stock. She can feel its heft and the kick of its butt plowing into the soft meat of her shoulder as each shot is fired. The last one to take a bullet is the father of the family. He manages to get his gag loose enough to lip it down over his chin. He chants, deep, mouth full of blood and gravel, in what sounds like Spanish, but she can’t make out his words. Then, his head, too, paints the wall as the final deafening shot rings her ears. 

Harper’s eyes adjusted to her surroundings, her bedroom, dimly illuminated by the glow of light escaping through the edges of the closed en suite door. She swiped her hand over the empty depression in the mattress beside her. Ice cold. She barrel rolled across Theo’s spot and snatched up his phone from his bedside table, the waking screen glistening off her sweaty face. 

She knew it was wrong. She’d been resisting for weeks because she assumed Theo would come around eventually. But she couldn’t wait any longer. He was becoming more and more distant by the day. He was like a zombie now. Hell, at least a zombie would want to eat her brains. Theo had wanted nothing from her since the first evening they spent in their new home. Gone were the bedtime erection assaults that stabbed her in the back, Theo’s ‘give me the pussy and nobody gets hurt,’ stickup. She missed the desire. His incessant need for affection that she often turned down and always took for granted. She’d give anything for that familiar desire. But now, all she had to hold on to was this goddamn recurring nightmare. 

She typed in the year he graduated high school, his usual password, and the lock screen disappeared, laying bare access to his home screen. As she opened the text message app, her eyes darted back and forth from the phone to the light beaming from the slit beneath the bathroom door, looking for any sign of movement. Harper scrolled and scrolled. Text messages, emails, photos. Nothing. He was clean. She cupped her hand over the tiny bump in her belly. She felt a rush of peace. Theo was a good man. She knew it, and this solidified it. But the rush quickly washed away in the all too familiar, creeping, black tide that she felt she’d been drowning in since they’d moved. It wasn’t anything she could put her finger on, really. Nothing that could be nailed down or described. Just a feeling, an aura of dread that seemed to weigh heavier as the days drug on and Theo slipped further away from her.

She set his phone back on his bedside table and scooted back into her spot. She stared down the mosaic of knockdown texture on the ceiling above her, trying to assimilate familiar shapes in the contours of the flat spots—there’s a bear, and that one’s a balloon, and over there, a little dancing devil with horns—as a child would when staring up at the clouds. 

What happened to Theo? She thought. They’d moved into this big expensive home because finally, after years of undergrad and then graduate school, he’d landed the job of his dreams. He’d started his college education much later than most of his peers. He went through a rough patch after high school. Drugs and partying took over, and he clawed his way out of that life, enrolled in college and busted his ass to get his master’s degree in mechanical engineering. 

Harper hadn’t been there for the toughest years. The years where he was in and out of rehab. They’d met in his second year of city college. That was when he was most alive. At least that’s how she remembers it, the way he made her feel. As the years pressed on, he got busier with more difficult studies, and now, after all the hell he put himself through to get his degree and land the dream job, he just seemed permanently, utterly fucking tired. 

The day after they moved into their new home, a switch seemed to flip inside him. It was unclear whether something turned off or turned on, but something was different, different in his eyes and his soul. Harper thought this new home, for them, for their soon-to-be child, would breathe that vibrancy back into their life. He was so excited about the move, like nothing else in the world mattered, like this place would make all their problems fade away. God, were they wrong. 

The open house was when it all started. When they first arrived, Harper was considerably more eager than Theo. He had said the home was too expensive, she agreed, but said it would be fun to look anyway, just to dream a little, and maybe get some design ideas. Harper loved the house, the land. Everything about it was perfect. Theo seemed to like it just fine, yet made little fuss until they stepped into the backyard. As soon as Theo set foot back there, his demeanor changed. 

Theo was in awe of the sights, the sounds, and smells. The exterior was staggeringly gorgeous, designed in the style of an old Spanish villa with whitewashed, baby smooth, plaster siding, and sweeping archways at the side of the house that led into a massive courtyard. Warm Terra-cotta tiles topped the house at a modest slope, waving along the rooftop, and seeming to spill from their hollows like a magenta waterfall was a wild, thorny bush that clung to the plaster in a primal embrace. The vines covered half of the backside of the home and were in glorious bloom. After admiring it, Harper walked on and looked at the pool, tiled in blue and green floral mosaics, and to the edge of the yard that dropped off over a shockingly steep cliff covered in ice plant, spotted in tiny red flowers, humming with the labor of a thousand honeybees. 

At the bottom of the hill was a black, rusted, wrought iron fence that swept the perimeter of a monstrous orange grove, seeming to go on forever, disappearing into the horizon. Todd, the realtor, would later inform her that the orange grove was once a part of the estate, and the operation, in its heyday, was the biggest in all of Southern California, run by the Welsh family. Eventually, Mr. Welsh sold it off to Citrana, one of the country’s leading suppliers of citrus fruits. And now that little rusted fence is all that separated the home from a multi-million dollar annual harvest. When Harper looked out over the green of the grove, each bushel harnessing a bounty of tiny orange globes, she noticed the white blossoms that dotted each tree, and their sweet, honeyed perfume overcame her senses. Her eyes watered and she wondered if it was her allergies kicking up, or the sentiment of the familiar smell from the garden in her grandmother’s backyard, where she used to play as a young girl.  

Harper loved the home and the property. She could see it now, their little bustling family sitting in the backyard, listening to the birds chirping and the bees buzzing, breathing in those wonderfully intoxicating smells and drinking in the gorgeous sights of their property. But she knew it was out of their price range, and mister rational, Theo, would never go for it. That’s when she realized he wasn’t by her side. He was still back there, on the other side of the pool, staring up at that big beautiful bush that climbed the back wall of the house. The bougainvillea, Todd had called it. 

Harper approached Theo and asked him if he was ready to head home. He turned to her, eyes full of tears. “Let’s put an offer in,” he said. 

Harper thought he was joking. They both knew it was out of their price range, but Theo’s face was stone, and fire replaced the tears in his eyes. He assured her he could afford it on the salary at his new job if they tightened up in other areas. It was unlike him, reckless, and frivolous. Harper knew it was a dangerous move. She blames it on the excitement of the moment, but also suspects she was drunk on the sweet perfume of the orange blossoms, nostalgia easing the needle of her rational compass. They approached Todd with the news, and they both cried on the drive home, making grand plans for their family’s future. 

The couple waited on pins and needles after putting in their offer, then, after three days, the rejection came through. The property was hot and a bidding war ensued. Theo went all in, and ended up paying fifteen percent over asking, scaring the hell out of Harper. Yet, Theo continued to assure her he could make it work, and they were going to live the happily ever after they’d been dreaming of. 

Three months now they’d been nesting in their beautiful dream home, and happily ever after seemed farther away than it ever had before.

The sound of a whisper caught Harper’s ear, and her head perked up from the pillow. She surveyed the glow from the bathroom door for the shadows of Theo’s feet, but saw nothing. She listened longer, and heard nothing, then looked over at Theo’s bedside table, the phone still where she’d left it. Who could he be talking to at this hour anyhow? She listened a little longer and decided she must have imagined it. Harper laid her head back on the pillow, and just as she did, the whispering returned. 

Harper shot up in bed and listened. The house was dead silent. No sound from the bathroom, no creaks from the wind easing the old settling house into place. Then she heard it again, clearly a whisper, although she couldn’t make out what the voice was saying. She jumped to her feet and tiptoed to the bathroom entrance, gently planting her hands on either side of the door frame, and suctioned her ear to the cool, smooth surface of the door. 

Nothing. 

“Theo? Honey, are you okay?”

Silence. 

She turned the knob and eased the door open. Nothing but bare subway tile and Turkish cotton textile. Again, she heard a faint whisper. 

Harper walked to the open bedroom doorway and peeked her head out into the darkness of the second-floor hallway. “Theo? Are you down there?” The hollow stairwell walls reverberated and filled the house with the unease of her shaky voice. 

She heard the whisper again, but not from downstairs. The voice was at her back. She turned around to face the empty bedroom. The whispers continued. She walked toward the French doors that led to the balcony and pulled back the lace window covering with her finger. 

The whisper was definitely coming from outside, but all she could see were the shadows of two empty chairs and the stone railing of the balcony. She unlocked the door and cracked it open. A burst of cool night air rushed over her face. The whispering became louder. 

Harper flipped the light switch on, threw the door open, and burst onto the balcony, letting the sudden hit of adrenaline take over before the fear did. She placed her hands on top of the balcony railing and looked out over the glassy moonlit pool, water still as rigor mortis, and over the endless orange grove beyond the wrought iron, its leaves black in the night, the intoxicating scent of their blossoms now replacing the fond memories of her childhood with the feelings of dread that had haunted her days and nights since she’d moved into this godforsaken house. 

“Hello? Who’s out there?”

Again, she heard the voice just below her. No longer a whisper, but a muted conversational chatter. Two voices. One sounded like Theo, the other the deep voice of a Hispanic man. She knew that voice. She’d heard it many nights, just before the splatter, and the bang, and the soaking in her sheets. Her neck craned over the edge of the balcony, and below the moon’s gaze, she could see Theo standing at the base of the bougainvillea. 

“Theo. What the hell are you doing? Who are you talking to?”

Theo kept talking, but not to her. He was facing the broad base of the plant, right up against it, talking to it, casually, about what, Harper couldn’t make out, but he kept on as if he hadn’t heard her, like she didn’t exist at all, just as he’d made her feel every day since they moved in.

Harper ran back into the bedroom, slamming the door behind her. She grabbed her flats from the closet and slapped them onto her feet, feeling the molten blood fill her face as if it might pour from her ears. 

The bougainvillea. That fucking bougainvillea, she thought. 

From the day they walked into the house, and she found Theo staring at the bush that swallowed the side of the home, she’d felt like a guest in his life. He was obsessed with the thing, talked about it constantly, spent hours every week, scouring it with clippers, searching for bits to prune. She frequently found him outside, looking up at it, slack jawed, all-consumed. He even bought a fancy patio set and placed it at its base and insisted they eat every meal they could out there. He spent little time during those meals talking to Harper about her day, and almost the entire time glancing over at that fucking bush. 

She ran down the stairs, through the dining room, and into the kitchen, where she flipped the light switch beside the back door, illuminating the yard. She burst through the door and spotted Theo. He was still talking. His face, his arms, half of his body, buried in the magenta leaves of the plant, speaking directly into it. 

“Theo, what the fuck!”

He resumed his conversation. 

She ran over to him and shoved him away from the plant. He stumbled and spun around to face her. He was ghost-pale, and his pupils filled the entirety of his eyes, as black and hollow as the bottom of a thousand foot well. She stepped back, her anger replaced by fear. The fear that the man standing before her looked like Theo, smelled like Theo, it was her Theo. But it wasn’t. The man standing before her was the embodiment of the emptiness she’d felt since the day they moved into the house. He was cold and dry. A flaking, crunching, chrysalis of her husband, void of any trace of the soul that made Theo, Theo.  

“Harper?” He said, his voice distant, as if he were speaking to her from the other side of the world. As if he couldn’t see her and was asking the heavens if she was really there. 

“Theo, what’s wrong with you? What are you doing out here?”

Theo’s pupils shrank, revealing the thin outline and galactic swirl of his blue iris. The color seemed to rush back to the surface of his skin. His forehead, eyebrows, nose, lips, cheeks all twitched sporadically, as if the pistons beneath them began firing cold after a long dormancy. Then, his cheeks raised, the corners of his mouth widened, and his lips curled with the biggest, emptiest smile she’d ever seen. “Harper. What are you doing out here? You should be asleep, it’s…” his face dropped. “What time is it?” 

“It’s…” Harper’s words clung to her dry throat and crackled into the crisp night air, her fright extrapolated by the sound of the fear in her own voice. “It’s the middle of the night, Theo. What are you doing out here? Who are you talking to? I heard someone else out here with you.” She looked over at the bougainvillea where he’d been planted, half expecting to see a tiny doorway to another world filled with Theo’s new friends, who had been taking up so much of his attention. But nothing was there, just the tangled vines and their sharp thorns and brilliantly colored, paper-thin bracts, surrounding erect, waxy blossoms. 

Theo looked all around as if searching for someone. “Mr. Vargas,” he replied. “He—he’s around here somewhere. He was teaching me some new pruning techniques and told me some crazy stuff about the previous owner, Mr. Welsh. Sounds like he was a real bastard.” 

“What?” Harper said, shaking her head. “Who’s Mr. Vargas?” She looked around the backyard. 

Theo smiled again. That creepy, huge, hollow smile. “The groundskeeper, silly. Mr. Vargas. He’s worked the land for Mr. Welsh since the day this place was built.”

“Groundskeeper? Do you know how old this place is? That doesn’t make any sense.” Harper threw her hands up. “We don’t even have a groundskeeper.”

Theo laughed. “Oh, really? So, who do you think keeps this place looking so beautiful?” He said, arms out, motioning to the lush vegetation all around them. 

“You, Theo. You’ve been digging, and watering, and pruning since we moved in. That’s all you’ve been doing. That’s why you lost your job last week. You’re obsessed with this place. It’s all you care about. Especially that stupid bougainvillea. I can’t do this anymore, Theo. Something is seriously wrong with you. We’re going to lose everything…” That’s when she heard the tick, tick, tick of something dripping on the ground, and the rest of the verbal ammunition she planned to fire turned to blanks. 

Theo had gaping holes all over his arms, wrists, and hands, and long, snaking lacerations connecting the dots like a fleshy road map. Blood was trickling down his arms and dripped from each of his fingertips.

“Oh my God, Theo. You’re bleeding.”

His smile widened again, and his eyes turned wilder. “Did you know, in the Amazon, the bougainvillea is evergreen?” Theo turned to face the towering bush, looking up in awe, a smile still plastered across his face. “Can you imagine getting to enjoy this beauty all day, every day? That’s what lucky old Mr. Vargas had as a boy, growing up in Iquitos, Peru. It must have been disappointing, coming to California, working so hard, tending to this bush, and having to watch it shed these beautiful leaves every year, never keeping its beauty.” He looked back at Harper. “Don’t you think?”

Harper thought about running. Straight through the house and out the front door. She could be at her family’s home in Utah by this time tomorrow if she only stopped for bathroom breaks. She wished she could fly. Straight over the steep hill of ice plant, and the old wrought iron fence, soaring through the night, above the tippy tops of the black leaved orange trees. But she couldn’t do any of that. She couldn’t leave Theo alone here like this. Something was wrong with him. She was his wife, and he needed her now more than ever. 

Harper put her hands out, urging Theo to take them with his bloody paws so she could lead him back into their home, get him cleaned up, and start searching for the nearest mental health clinic. “C’mon, hon. Let’s go inside.”

Theo’s eyes softened. And he took a single step toward her. Then he stopped, and his ears perked up. “Do you hear that?”

Harper looked around, listening intently. “I don’t hear anything, Theo. C’mon.”

The smile returned to his face. “Mr. Vargas, he’s back. You have to meet him.” 

Harper’s hands dropped to her side as Theo backed away from her, toward the bougainvillea. He leaned his ear toward the bush and his eyebrows raised. 

“Mr. Vargas didn’t steal that money from Mr. Welsh,” Theo said. “But no matter how much Mr. Vargas pled for the safety of his family, Mr. Welsh wouldn’t let up. Killed them all. He was drunk off the land, and the money it bled into his filthy pockets, and the sick, sick, greed that consumed him.”

Theo leaned in close to the bush again. He nodded in agreement with the bougainvillea, and stuck up one finger toward Harper, suggesting he’d just be a moment. He pushed his arms into the bush and twirled them around the long ropey vines, then grasped firm onto them with his hands, digging his palms into clusters of thorns. As he yanked forward on the vines, the thorny ropes dug their talons and Theo’s head shot back and his jaw hung wide, as if he were chugging stardust from the heavens. 

“Theo!” Harper said and reached out for him. But she held short when his face snapped toward her, neck bent further than naturally possible. His eyes again swallowed by the empty, black cavern of his pupils. His Adam’s apple, ripe, begging to rip through the flesh of his throat, bobbed as the deep raspy voice from her nightmares flooded her ears. 

“Good evening, Mrs. Harper. I am Mr. Vargas. If you have the time, I’d like to tell you a little story.”

Harper backed away from her husband, never taking her eyes off him, until she stepped into the coiled garden hose and stumbled back on top of its spent hose reel. Her muscles were as tight as rawhide, and although she wanted to run, her brain wouldn’t tell her legs to move another inch as she breathed deep breaths of the blanketing sweet orange blossom laced darkness. “What the hell are you?” she asked, as her eyes, too, filled black with pupil.  

Theo’s Adam’s apple bobbed once again, sharp as a razor, threatening to rip through his throat as it sliced up and down beneath his thin stubbled skin. “I am nothing, Mrs. Harper. Yet, I am everything. I am part of the earth you now walk on, and the air you now breathe. You see, these lands that you inhabit, they were once pure, rich with life-giving qualities, ready to thrive in harmony with any who may give them the respect they deserve. But bad things have happened here, Mrs. Harper. This soil has drank its fill of innocent blood. It is in the roots and the stalks and the leaves, and the greed that has been squeezed from the profit of its fruit has hurt this world far more than I care to know. This land, it is poisoned, Mrs. Harper. And while my family passed on, I vowed to stay behind to protect it.” His black eyes looked down at the bump in her belly.

“Do you feel it, Mrs. Harper? The hold this land has on you, now that you’ve let the infection settle in? Now that the sweet smells and delicious juices from the fruits have worked on you? That little one growing inside of you, it will not differ from you, or Mr. Theo, or horrible, horrible Mr. Welsh. Humanity, Mrs. Harper, needs a little help, to remember what is important, and to return to the earth, away from greed, away from hostility, back to the land that birthed it. Humanity is the disease that plagues this earth, Mrs. Harper, and the sickness that poisoned the fruit of this land will ultimately be the cure. You will be docile and kind, and will care for the land. Your children will care for the land. Your children’s children, and theirs. All that blood will not have been spilled in vain, Mrs. Harper. Through the global distribution network of Citrana, the land will ease the human condition, one lovely little orange at a time.” 

Harper held still, transfixed, rigid, not with fear, but utter, relentless obedience. 

“Now, go rest, Mrs. Harper, for you and Mr. Theo have a big day tomorrow, and every day that shall follow. You see that grass, and those bushes, and those saplings far off there? They need your love and your care. Go rest, Mrs. Harper. Go rest and be well. Tomorrow, you return to the land.” 

“The Collectors” by J. B. Polk

As the sky in London darkens, Mary Louise flips a switch on her desk, reducing the six 40-inch displays on her office wall to tiny pinpricks of light. She has finished her tasks for the day. In fact, she has completed her activities for the extended bank holiday weekend. For the next three days, she can set aside cryptocurrency, bonds, and mutual fund performance. She can shed her successful professional persona, complete with her Gormley & Gamble linen suit and Louboutin stilettos, and return to being her true self.

She no longer needs to worry about how the fluctuation of banana prices in Panama will affect Berry Farm Inc.'s Nasdaq-listed equities. Copper prices in remote Chile and Peru will have little impact on her weekend plans. The rare earths mined by Congolese children, often as young as 10, will sit in hemp sacks until she returns to the office on Tuesday. Only then can they be transformed into batteries for EVs and cellphones, increasing the value of her clients' portfolios. And, for that matter, her own.

The thought of a restful weekend quickens her heart rate. She can't wait to leave her office on the 67^th floor of the Shard, complete with her Verona ergonomic swivel chair and a view of the imposing yet terrifying Tower of London.

Since its construction, the Tower has witnessed some gruesome events, including torture, forced confessions, and several executions, including three queens. Only the wealthy and influential, many of whom had their heads hacked off on the same scaffold a few years later, witnessed these secret executions, hidden from the prying eyes of the general public.

"Back in the day, people were accustomed to handling the rough stuff that came with violence." It wasn't a big deal. Public hangings were viewed as a way to liven up the monotony of daily life, almost like a twisted form of entertainment. Local stories always had a knack for turning notorious outlaws and their crazy adventures into epic legends that people love to share and pass down over time.”

“It probably felt like catching Les Misérables right in the heart of the West End. The crowd would cheer and boo while the condemned faced their fate. It was all about the blood and guts, which was super realistic, and the dead definitely weren’t just getting back up for an encore. For the crowd, it was just another day in a place where death was always lurking nearby,” she thinks as she hits another button to set the alarm on the wall safe.

She is convinced that she doesn’t belong in the woke and whiny contemporary world. She feels she should have been born in the Middle Ages or perhaps even earlier, in ancient Rome, when people embraced strong emotions.  But there's nothing she can do about it. Fate has thrown her into the gutless "here and now," where she must try to make the best of it and create her own version of authenticity and passion in a world from which she feels disconnected.

Before leaving, she checks her iPhone, which she had turned off earlier in the day, to see if her date, a handsome British Airways pilot named Jordan, has confirmed their meeting.

"8.30 p.m., as agreed. "At yours," says the WhatsApp message, blinking at her.

"Wear as little as possible. Hopefully, just your bracelet."

Mary Louise glances at her slender wrist encircled by a delicate chain with five tiny charms: a guitar, a paintbrush, an oval inscribed with the words "fireman at heart," Themis, the goddess of justice, clutching a pair of scales, and a caduceus with two snakes twisting around a winged staff. It is a twenty-four-karat gold gift from herself to herself, created to her exact specifications by Vashi, a prominent London jeweler.

She flips yet another switch, and the office winks and goes black. The picture window displays an evening cityscape—an impressionist yet sombre image of steel, concrete, and a constellation of neon lights.

The taxi is waiting outside. As she gets in, her bracelet jingles a gentle, reassuring tune, accompanying the barely audible murmur of the TX4's engine.

"Ramsey Street," she tells the driver.

Her one-bedroom, one-bathroom flat is located in one of London's most expensive neighbourhoods and, despite its relatively small size, cost her well over half a million pounds a few years ago.

If she wanted to, she could afford something much fancier on her stratospheric City salary. But she likes this leafy and quiet suburb, where, after the sun goes down, she is no longer Miss Stock Exchange but Mary Louise, the demure thirtysomething with quiet hobbies and harmless rituals.

Since she was twenty-five, she has worked her ass off, seldom going out for a drink, let alone dating. It wasn't until last year that she finally decided it was time to "glow up," as Viv, her younger sister, put it. So she joined Tinder—Safe, Secure Dating for Mature Singles. Build Connections & Find Love. Fifty-five billion matches to date. Find yours.

And that’s what she’s been doing ever since—trying to find her match. One that would send her oxytocin levels sky-high and make her palms sweat, her thighs quiver, and her face flush.

She wasn't sure how the application worked initially but quickly figured it out. Tinder was an ocean full of fish, and she was an angler with a net—the swipe function—to catch the fish she fancied. Like to the right, hate to the left. Swipe, swipe, swipe, stop, and watch. Repeat.

To learn more about an individual, she could tap on his profile photo and scroll through their carousel for additional images. If she liked what she saw, she would select the heart button or hit the X to reject it.

She thought at the time, "Like the Roman Emperor Caligula deciding on a gladiator's fate—life or death."

“Doctor, frequent traveler. Yoga fan. More brains than looks. Want in? Message me."

He was in his late thirties. Indeed, not much of a looker, but in great shape. The yoga part was true, then. He was the type of man a woman would love to raise her children with. She wanted "in." 

"Geek (British Sheldon). I enjoy everything from board games, comics, and movies to technology and science. Corporate lawyer, boring stuff, so I'd rather talk about YOU. Call me. "

For a nerd, he was a handsome dude. Dark blonde hair, a thinker’s furrowed forehead, blue or green eyes—she couldn't tell. She would like him to talk to her about HER. Heart.

"I could spend my whole life discussing the Harry Potter saga. Want to be my Hermione? Let me show you my magic wand.”

She shuddered as she clicked on the X. The guy in the photo was not too bad, but the idea of a Harry Potter fan, naked apart from a long, striped scarf, levitating on her bed made her cringe.

“Pilot by day, magic carpet rider by night. Let me take you to cloud nine and beyond, whisking you away from the unbearable lightness of being. Yes, I read Kundera."

And now he's waiting outside her building—a carbon copy of the handsome, pale-faced guy whose images she's seen dozens of times. Much taller than she expected, a pilot to boot, dressed in light blue jeans, a white polo neck, and a leather bomber jacket! He is carrying something in his hand. She hopes it’s not flowers. It's far too corny for a first date. No, it’s not flowers. It looks more like a bottle. Hopefully, he has the same taste in spirits as he does in clothing.

Before the date, they exchanged messages, each growing in intimacy. By week four, they were swapping sexy pics in different stages of undress. In one, Mary Louise is wearing black lacy lingerie and her gold bracelet on her right wrist. Because her motto is "Make it quick. Make it happen." The last thing she wants is to waste time. She is a female shark who won't hesitate to tell her partner how far, where, and how deep to go. And when she's ready- whether for a highly complex merger or in the privacy of her bedroom- she goes straight for the kill. That’s what sends ripples of excitement down her spine, pumps adrenaline through her body, and makes her moist between her legs.

"Mary Louise?" The man has already crossed the street and is walking toward the taxi. He is now holding the car door for her. She winces—it feels a bit tacky. However, instead of criticizing, she flashes him a smile.

"Jordan. Great you could make it," she says politely, letting him help her out and hold her hand in his for a moment. She worries he might drop the bottle, but he seems to have it under control.

"We’d better go in. I see you’ve brought something to drink. I have everything else ready," she breathes a secret promise.

He follows her up the eight steps to the house. The massive oak door features a stained glass panel at the top, a brass letter slot, and a knocker shaped like a wolf's gaping jaws. She inserts the key and twists it in the lock, revealing a parquet-floored hallway. Her apartment is on the left. She pushes open another door. Jordan steps in, looks around, and whistles in approval.

“Cool," he says, and she laughs because it is such a millennial thing to say, and he must be at least forty-five, if not older.

"You like?"

"I couldn't have decorated it better myself," he replies.

Mary Louise shrugs out of her five-hundred-pound Gormley & Gamble jacket and carelessly throws it on the sofa, the charms on her bracelet jingling to the rhythm of her movements.

"Make yourself at home," she says, leading him into the living/dining room area.

As she walks to the kitchen, she can feel his gaze resting on the fabric of her skirt, where it hugs her buttocks. Aware of his growing excitement, she swings her hips in long, smooth strokes as if she were Naomi Campbell parading down the Berlin Fashion Week catwalk. She can hear him fidget for a moment, then sit alongside her discarded jacket on the sofa.

"Give me a minute!" she shouts from the kitchen, opening the fridge to retrieve a tray wrapped in plastic film that she had prepared in the morning. A wedge of Gruyere, a circle of Camembert, a lump of orange cheddar, a smaller piece of Jersey blue, and a piece of Extra Old Bitto (50 pounds for two hundred grams!) are surrounded by a wreath of black and green olives mixed with red and green pepper triangles. She pulls out a drawer and takes a wire cheese cutter with solid wooden handles, a box of toothpicks, and paper napkins decorated with toy planes and helicopters she'd bought specially for him.

In the meantime, Jordan has indeed made himself at home. He's taken off his leather jacket, polo neck, and even his shoes. He only wears his socks and boxer shorts with Ralph Lauren's name around the waistband.

"You tend to take things literally," she says flatly.

With considerable trepidation, he fumbles for his jeans and tries to cover himself. She can hear his mind tick with alarm: Did I misinterpret her? Will she chuck me out? Is this how the night will end?

She lays the tray on the coffee table and pulls the jeans from his hands.

"No rush," she says, noticing the pricey Alexander Wang brand on the label.

Jordan relaxes once more and leans against the backrest of the sofa. Although he is nearly naked, a few beads of sweat glisten on his forehead and bead his upper lip.

"I thought..." he stammers.

“You thought right," she reassures him as she runs a fingernail across his hairless chest, making him shiver.

"I’m thinking the same."

He is calm now.

"Music? And something to drink," she offers, picking up the remote control and unleashing a volley of sound from the other side of the room, where the Sony equipment flickers to life.

Jordan gazes up at her in disbelief.

"Not exactly romantic," he observes.

"What did you expect? Michael Bublé? The Way You Look Tonight? I’m not that kind of girl."

"Who's the singer, anyway?"

"Boy George and the Culture Club. Long before our time. My mom’s favourite."

"Kinda gaga, isn’t it?”

"Not everyone’s cup of tea," she admits, shrugging.

"Why don’t you just shut up and listen?"

She turns up the volume a notch. 

Give me time to realise my crime

Let me love and steal 

I have danced inside your eyes.

How can I be real?         Do you really want to hurt me?

She senses his unease when he reaches for his jeans.

"What's up?" She teases him, her voice smooth and sweet like molasses. 

"You don’t like my taste in music? That's why you're bailing? Are you worried that I might want to hurt you?" 

She has touched a nerve. He sighs, abandoning the search. 

“It's just ... I was thinking... I thought we could grab a drink or two, snuggle up a bit, and..." 

"And?" Like a hungry viper, she playfully flicks her tongue at him. 

“You know. You definitely weren't holding back in those pics you sent.”

She strolls over to the table and gestures at the tray.

"Why don’t you have something to eat while I open the wine you’ve brought?"

"Champagne. Veuve Clicquot Brut," he corrects.

"Champagne, then."

She picks up the cheese cutter, slices off a piece of cheddar, and motions for him to open his mouth.

"There. Say "cheese." Then we can have some fun. I’m sorry you don’t like the song.”

Her face is nearly touching his. His eyes resemble two black quasars, blinking before shifting away. She moves toward the back of the sofa and runs a fingernail along his shoulder blades. A tremor tightens his muscles, making them stand out against his brown skin. She traces the outline of an extra-tense knot, massaging it with her forefinger. He feels completely at ease now. He has swallowed the cheese and seems to be bracing himself for what’s to come.

The song is about to end just as she loops the cheese cutter around his neck, crooning, “Looks like I really want to make you cry…”

She pulls hard, with rage, every muscle in her body straining against his resistance, her hold on the wooden grips solid. The wire's snug fit prevents him from raising his hands and yanking it off. The struggle intensifies. With each passing second, her determination grows stronger, thwarting his efforts to escape. 

She continues to tug while he thrashes on the sofa, lifting his feet off the floor and clearly trying to avoid walking to the legendary light at the end of the tunnel. Saliva streams from his lips as his breathing becomes harsh, resembling the retching of a sick dog straining to empty its stomach. His face turns blue. Then purple. Then, ashen gray. 

The charms on her bracelet jingle softly as she pulls harder and harder.  She glances down at his underwear - he has soiled himself. The Ralph Lauren shorts are dirty and reek of urine and panic. But this is nothing new. That’s how everyone reacts when faced with the ritual. Even the doctor, who practiced yoga and should have been more in control of his bodily functions, soiled the sofa. She had to call in the cleaners and explain that her 3-year-old nephew had emptied his bowels. They tut-tutted with sympathy and used steam-powered machines to clean up the mess.

All of the other Tinder dates, like Jordan, were caught off guard. None of them expected anything beyond fantastic sex and an engaging conversation to top it off. Well, maybe once. The fireman. She can’t recall his name now, but it doesn’t matter because she always remembers them by their jobs.

Something like a sixth sense made him sit in the armchair next to the curtainless window. She was worried that her neighbours would notice, but her need to reach this incredible sex-free climax was so intense that she threw caution to the wind. It was ultimately a huge letdown, as the muscular man blacked out like a damp candlewick in less than twenty seconds.

She wonders what might have happened if she had right-swiped the Harry Potter freak. Could she have used the striped scarf instead of the cheese cutter? Would it have been as thrilling as it is now?

The man on the sofa is still. She squeezed hard enough to knock him out but not hard enough to break the skin and veins and muck up her apartment like she did the first time. Blood splattered with such force that it stained the carpet and the chest of drawers on the opposite side of the room. She had to replace them at a significant cost. She finally got it right after the guitarist—her third try. All she had to do was turn off the air supply with the appropriate pressure and one or two handle twists.

She knows she must get the iron cord to finish the job. But first, she walks to her bedroom and takes out a small velvet box containing a dozen tiny items. She tosses aside a pair of miniature handcuffs, a stage mask, a chef's hat, a book, and a few more charms until she finds the one she's looking for—a plane with extended wings. She can now attach it to her bracelet. It is the most critical aspect of the ritual. She is creating her own legend—a story of bravery and adventure that might not be passed on through generations but that will make her life exciting. Like in the times when they beheaded kings and queens. 

Her iPhone pings, and she heads to the living room to read the message. It makes her smile. Bananas in Panama have recently gone up in price by seven cents per kilo. This deal will net her client more than a hundred thousand pounds and earn her a five percent commission.

She notices a slight movement on the sofa as she stretches the cord in her palms. A twitch - most likely involuntary. It's the natural response of dying nerve cells, but she can't afford to take any more chances. She has put this off for far too long.

She is consumed by the prospect of Jordan’s imminent death. The urge to finish the task and hang the gleaming plane alongside the other charms is overwhelming. She laughs. There are no regrets. Only delight in her growing collection.

“The Rememberthens” by Cole Hediger

Rememberthens were there before and shall be there after, bring no harm to the Rememberthens. A fateful warning my parents passed down to me as their parents had passed down to them. An old wives tale that promised history would protect us so long as history was  respected. For those that dared cross those lines; for those that did evil, evil would be done unto them. 

Our Rememberthens were places of history, places of worship, places of bloodline. We, as children, listened to ancestors tell us the stories behind the Rememberthens, the most powerful being the old cypresses that grew through the green swamp water by town. Stories tell that these were our elders, people who settled with the earth rather than against it and fought tooth and nail to keep it that way. When greedy hands of people who sought to turn the land into something less than human attempted to convince the old folks, our ancestors seeped into the swamps to protect the soil and spare their lives. Their souls grew up in the cypresses. Their roots sent unblinking gazes at those who stumbled upon the cheap land and shooed them away with swamp creatures and sunken boats. 

When we rowed through the swamp we were to touch the cypresses and pray for safe passage. It was only just for how they had protected us all. When our town got bigger and new faces started to arrive, we simply harked the warning of the Rememberthens and saw great protection. People are wise enough to leave Rememberthens alone, people often admire Remeberthens, and if this was all there was to be human, I’m sure no Rememberthen would become a ruin. 

But people also admire money. People sell their souls to the dollar bill, and this transaction tears from their human form the very thing that Rememberthens symbolizes: humanity. If I had it my way, the want for the dollar would be a lesser want than food- lesser than.

shelter. The whole concept would be done out with when it came to things like the Rememberthens for nothing should have a greater power than that of our history. Yet still, in the wake of the hottest summer in the South, suits rolled in with their automobiles and cloth hats, wearing smiles with pearly teeth, talking nonsense to our town about new construction and building real change. “The world was changing”, they had said with a grin that gobbled up all concepts of reverence to the past, “It's time we changed too.” Things were all good and well in Porter Bay, we had told them. No body hurting no body. Nobody stealing from nobody. All was good. All had been good. Should we continue in our ways, all would continue to be good. But they had a concept of living that we weren’t abiding by and this somehow offended them, though we never saw them before, though we had never spoken, though these men knew nothing of the Rememberthens. Hell, if one of their Rememberthens had sprouted in their yard, they wouldn’t give it two thoughts before ripping it out unless it was spitting out paper and coins. 

He introduced himself as John Benedict. John Benedict wore three-piece suits, with pocket watches. He had slicked hair and sharp cheekbones. John Benedict spoke to us slowly, as if our lack of structural development reflected our education, and explained that we were far behind the times. A slimy man, he spoke to us with his one golden tooth shining in every toothy charming grin he shot at us between talks of ‘total upheaval’ and ‘new builds’. We, far cleverer than he believed, shot down his advances and made clear that all Port Bay needed was its people. His people did not agree with this, though we did not understand this at first, for clear as day they packed up and left.

We returned to Port Bay life. We kissed our trees, we prayed our prayers, and we showed kindness. But sure enough, weeks later, John Benedict rode into town once again with his men. He hopped up upon the hood of his automobile and spoke to us in a shout. 

“This dirt! It's worth money to the government! Money, that I and my men have! Money that was spent- traded for this here land! In not-so-subtle means,” He pulled a cigar from his pocket and chewed it between his teeth as he lit a match, “I own this here land.” 

This was met with a calamitous cacophony of shouts and protest, quieted- as men like him are so prone to by gunshots, fired in the air. We coiled back. These weapons seemed to multiply overnight, as soon all his men were carrying about firearms to keep us, locals, in place. We didn’t go completely without a fight. When they burnt down the first Rememberthen, an old church out on Maple, we rallied together- pressing forward on their line. They fired their guns again, making us take cover. And so this pattern continued until one of us started swinging on his men one night. It was late, they had to use torches to light their path of destruction, and it was hot. The heat must’ve been part of what sent us spiraling. A young man, a boy really, pent up with the frustration of his history’s systematic destruction and fed by the summer heat, knocked the man square in the jaw and sent a tooth flying out into the grass. 

John Benedict stepped forward with a stern look on his face and scowled down his nose at the boy who had done it. With a quick twirl of his finger, his men took heed to an unspoken word. They stormed off to the swamp and the cypresses. 

“Down with them!” He cried out, cloaked in the burning torches of the mob. “Out with them!” The men jeered as they stormed into the swamp with saws and hatches. We cried out from behind the torches, being burnt and singed around our edges to keep out tempers taut. They sunk into the water, screaming to one another- calling out which Rememberthen would be first.

Some of us screamed; some of us prayed; some of us cried but we all went silent when the first cypress was cut down. It splashed into the water and splattered the men with algae. They continued on their rampage, violent in their pursuit. As John Benedict stepped foot into the water, drawn out into the swamp by his own delusions and greed. He screamed orders to his men with a frothing tongue that spat foam out to the corners of his mouth. 

The mob of townspeople bumbled forward, fighting against the violent hands that pushed us back. Nearly overpowering them, we were silenced as a rifle was pulled and fired yet again, but not into the sky. A farmer from town crumpled like paper, in a way so unnatural to life, and hit the ground with a thud. The townspeople quieted and stilled until the only noise that filled the swamp was that of the savages who tore up the trees in the swamp. 

“Tear them from their roots!” John bellowed, “Splinter their trunks if you have to!” Hatchets, axes, pickaxes- weapons of brutality tore through the cypresses and sent them crashing into the water. Like they were lost in a trance, they never flinched at the water or the sound. Their rage at our past urged their fury in the present. They huffed out hot air that had filled their lungs and poisoned each other’s breath with only more insanity. In the midst of their great destruction, from the water splashed out grayed, moss-covered hands. Disembodied, hands balled fists of fabric from the mens’ clothing and pulled them viciously into the water. Their burly screams and shouts shrunk into yelps and squeals as one by one their bodies were yanked into the dark, black water. The men with torches shuttered on land, their eyes darted from one comrade to the next as they were jerked from view. Their torches whipped in the wind. They back away from the water, pushed in on the space they had cornered us into.

“Fear not, brothers!” John Benedict called out. His attention turned to the thick no man’s land between him and his men on shore, “We are greater than any creature! We are men and this is land! These things go together stronger than any pair! Come now!” 

He waved his meaty hand, but the line of torches did not disperse. 

“Cowards, are you?” He called out with a chuckle, “Weak minded! Where was this timidity in the other escapades of our manifest destiny? We faced hardship! This here,” He waves out over the water, “This is nothing but swamp dross!” 

To emphasize his point, he kicked at the water and stomped on the churned-up debris. In the swoop of his leg back up, one of those cold, wet hands snapped up out of the water and grabbed hold of his ankle. John Benedict, in all his horse-shit glory, tumbled backward, sending water splashing out of the swamp. He attempted to scramble back up to his feet, but hands engulfed him. They pulled at his jacket, his tie, his buttons, his cheeks- they looped into his mouth and his eye sockets, they pulled him in opposing directions. His screams echoed off the cypresses and pushed his men back into us. 

The hands of the living were the next to attack. We grabbed hold of his men, seized them when their fear was high, and lugged them into the water. If not our hands that drowned them, then the hands of the Rememberthens as they reached up in encouragement and pulled the men further into the water. Their torches were gathered up by Port Bay townsmen and held up to ensure their opposition's demise. We let their bodies float out from the mud, watched them get torn down into the water, and returned to the ruins of our town.

Author Bios

my name is Jóhannes N. Eggertsson and I am an avid horror enthusiast from Iceland writing anthologies in 19th century Gothic England with occult twists and monstrosities which are ancient and awoken, and preserved by unspeakable black magic. The only horror which is ever considered frightening is that of the unknown; and I write my tales of terror, for I have written a total of twenty in the past two years, in a manner not too dissimilar from Lovecraft and Poe.

Anabela Machado is a 23 year old Brazilian writer. Her book, The Sacred Deer and other stories, was independently published on Amazon in the beginning of 2025. Her short stories (including Black Fur) can be found on Substack

Alexander Blaine works full time as a project manager for a painting company. He finds solace and strength through the practice of writing and draws from the hardships he experienced as a young man for story inspiration. You can find many of his flash fiction and short stories in his Substack publication, Dark Fiction Bodega. Alexander lives with his wife and daughter in Fort Collins, Colorado.

J. B. Polk is Polish by birth, a citizen of the world by choice. First story short-listed for the Irish Independent/Hennessy Awards, Ireland, 1996.  Since she went back to writing in 2020, more than 150 of  her stories, flash fiction, and non-fiction, have been accepted for publication. She has recently won 1st prize in the  International Human Rights  Arts Movement literary contest. 

Letters from the Editors

A huge thank you goes to our readers and authors for joining us in another full issue of The Dread. Every month, I am constantly wowed by the amount of talented writers we have the privilege to feature in this magazine. There is no greater joy than getting to champion indie horror writers in this little space we’ve carved out. I’m especially excited about our new influx of submissions, which continues to impress me as much as it overwhelms me. Please remember to support our authors if they have social media accounts, read indie books, and stay Dreadful.

M. Anne

It has been such an honor to join The Dread and to form this team. I am at times blown away by the submissions I read (this occurrence is often- I read submissions nearly every day). I'd like to highlight "The Witch Mother" by J.E. Nordal, featured in this issue, because that story was the first one I read and immediately became excited about. Since then I have read many others of which have given me the same reaction, but "The Witch Mother" was the first, and for that, it holds a special place in my heart. I hope you enjoyed it, along with the other stories here, which must also be given their due. I must repeat myself. Being here is such an honor.

Lila