THE RITUAL: Prologue

Welcome to The Ritual. While the bulk of this tale leans heavily into mystery and suspense, this beginning section is a bit more, shall we say, visceral.

So, if you’re not feeling too squeamish, curl up in your favorite chair and witness something horrible that happened not too long ago in the town of Brook’s End . . .

Prologue

Darkness hung obsidian over the town: a silent, insidious haunting. The secret society of rats scurried through the sewers toward destinations unknown—the fur on their backs standing up, agitated by something evil in the heavy night air.

The house on the hill sat deathly still, slightly silhouetted by a distant streetlamp.

Inside, floorboards creaked.

In the master bedroom, the man lay on his side. The stubble still grew on his cheek; his face appeared calm, as though serene dreams engulfed him. But dream he did not. The gash in his throat saw to that; blood already soaked the sheets before him like a dark, wet, spreading cancer.

The floorboards creaked again.

The door to the boy’s room opened and a figure made its way forward. Not a sound escaped the young lips as the blade sliced across his neck. The cool, white pillow turned warm and red.

Creak…creak…creak…

As the little girl’s door opened, she awakened. She had always been a light sleeper. She looked up at her assailant with wide, confused eyes.

“Mommy…?”

The knife silenced her.

The murderer descended the stairs and entered the kitchen. She opened drawers as though preparing to make dinner. But she extracted only candles and matches. She lit the candles and dripped the wax on the floor, making a large circle around her and the knife she’d placed beside her. She then positioned the candles as she had studied: one every two feet around the perimeter to coincide with the points of the understood star. Then, naked and breathing through her flaring nostrils, she knelt in the middle of the circle.

Chanting in a strange tongue, she picked up the knife and cut deeply into her own wrists. She let the blood flow between her legs, saturating her pubic region with the hot, wetness. Then, she lay herself down spread-eagle in the circle—never stopping her litany in the odd, lost language.

As she began to lose consciousness, a sudden thought of her family above came to her: a momentary pang of guilt for those who had shared her life but never shared her secret passion. But it was too late. She always knew this day would come. And she was ready.

The candles had a way to go before they would burn out. But as the woman’s last breath slipped from her slowing lips, the flames vanished as though blown out by an unseen force—sending the house into a new darkness…

Thank you for reading! I’ll be adding new installments every Saturday, so use this link to the home page to navigate to the latest chapter:

https://www.wrizzit.com/post/the-ritual