Back in March of 2020, my flash fiction (1500 words or less) story The Road Home was a finalist in Crystal Lake Publishing‘s monthly flash fiction competition, and published in It went on to be included in their huge Shallow Waters horror Flash Fiction Anthology (the top 100 selections from the entire series, over 350 pages trade paperback!).
In August of this year, the theme for the competition was “camping”, and just so happens I’d had an idea for a camping short story bouncing around in my head for about a year, so I decided to hammer it out and submit it, which took me about 3 evenings.
Like The Road Home, The Ritual was a finalist in the competition; however, I’ve since learned that they are no longer publishing the flash fiction anthologies.
So, I thought I’d share it here…enjoy!
The Ritual
by Rand Eastwood
They couldn’t believe their luck when they broke through the brush into a large clearing after hours of carefully picking their way through the thick woods.
In fact, there were already large stones set in a circle around a larger center stone—like someone had already set up the perfect campfire site!
After a short stop for lunch in the nearby town, they’d pulled off the road and parked the old van at the foot of the wooded hill, gathered their gear, and headed up on foot. And right when they started thinking they should head back because it was getting dark, they stumbled onto the campsite—just in time!
“Looks like we’ll be setting up camp here, huh?” Dan said jovially, wheezing as he slid his sweaty arms out of his backpack straps, sweat dripping from his forehead when he bent to set the pack on the ground.
The others followed suit, chiming in with affirmations as they fanned out around the stone circle and dropped their packs.
“So nobody in town knows about this?” Stacie asked.
“Someone must,” Josh said, shrugging.
“Well, you’d think someone would’ve mentioned it at that diner, when we asked directions to the best hiking trail and a good spot to camp,” Stacie pondered.
“Yeah, they just acted spooked and clammed up,” Brad recalled. “And that old geezer at the bar said the woods are haunted, that we should just stay on the highway and keep driving—what a nut job!”
“It was a backwards, hillbilly town—they’re all nut jobs,” Dan said.
“But still, nobody bothered to mention this campsite,” Josh reiterated.
“And yet, based on how much the center stone is charred, it’s been used quite a bit,” Roe observed.
“Well, at any rate, luckily we found it. Now we just need firewood,” Josh said. He gazed up at the gray overcast sky, then checked his watch. “Probably be dark soon, especially with the cloud cover, so we better hustle.”
Digging into their packs, they produced various cutting tools: small hatchets, hunting knives—and Dan even a machete—then scattered outward from the site to the surrounding woods.
Soon they returned with armloads of branches and deadwood, dumping them in piles around the stone circle.
Then Dan held something up, exposing a dark wet ring under his arm, his belly bulging out when his shirt lifted with the motion.
“Fuck is that?” Josh asked, as they all stopped to look.
Sticks and thorns tied together with vines and string, roughly the shape of a doll or toy—it was so worn and tattered it was hard to tell the original intent—a long leather strap dangling.
Dan shrugged. “It was hanging from a tree. Figured it would burn just as well as the deadwood, so why not? Hacked it down.”
With that he tossed it in the grass next to his backpack.
“Looks like some kinda voodoo doll…or maybe a witchcraft artifact,” Stacie said, wide-eyed. “Did you see that movie? Those people lost in the woods, haunted by a witch?”
Of course he didn’t see it, he’s never been on a date!” Brad chided. “That’s why he brought his sister!”
“He brought me because I asked to come!” Mindy defended harshly.
“I bet he’s still a virgin!” Josh laughed, winking at Dan in jest.
“Hey, fuck you guys,” Dan said, flashing his middle finger.
“Ah, we love ya, big guy,” Brad consoled.
“Yeah, we’re just kidding,” Josh added.
Agitated, Dan crouched and gruffly shoved his machete back into his backpack.
Then Brad turned to Stacie: “Wooooooo,” he teased, wiggling his fingers as if casting a spell on her. “Witchcraft!” Then he lowered his arms, hands outstretched. “I mean, you don’t actually believe in that crap, do you?”
She shrugged, embarrassed.
“That’s why they don’t burn witches at the stake anymore,” Josh added. “Because there’s no such thing. It’s just an old superstition.”
“Whatever,” Stacie muttered.
“Look, this campsite is obviously used a lot, so it was probably just some kids messing around, or pulling a prank.” Roe offered.
“You’re probably right,” Stacie agreed, as the rest nodded their heads in agreement.
While the others took their seats, Brad and Josh gathered wood from the separate piles and stacked it around the center stone, which was oddly flat on top, so they were able to lean some of the longer branches up against the edges, making a perfect pyramid.
Before long the fire was raging against the night…and soon a brown bottle was being passed around. And, as the talking and laughing escalated, Brad flamed up a glass pipe, which the group eagerly toked as they passed it around.
Then Roe pulled a small boom box from her pack, pushed a button, and music began playing.
“Josh knows this, but the rest of you probably don’t: I used to be a dancer,” she said, looking around at them.
“Pole dancer?!” Dan guffawed.
The group laughed, Mindy elbowing him.
“No, I took dancing in high school. Eventually made the dance corps in college. Was pretty good, back in the day. Even choreographed my own dance.”
With that she turned up the music so the rest could hear. It was strange: very somber, mysterious—almost spooky—myriad acoustic instruments accompanied by soft percussion.
As Roe stood, Stacie handed the pipe up to her, and she bent and took a lungful, held it for a moment, then exhaled, smiling.
“That’s good shit,” she rasped as she passed it to Brad.
Stepping to the outside of the circle, she stood up straight and raised her arms, almost in a pirouette. Looking over her shoulder at the others she said, “I call this Dancing with the Dead,” then she turned back. Smiling, she added: “Sorry, I was totally goth at the time.”
They smiled around at each other, eyebrows raised in expectation, then back to her.
As the music picked up she began, stepping forward as she waved her arms gracefully in the air and her body bent, then straightened, then turned, then bent, then straightened, then turned again, all in very smooth, fluid motions, her long black hair flowing behind, her arms extending her bodily undulations into waves out and above, almost as if she was releasing energy into the ether. She repeated the sequence as she slowly walked around the stones, the rest of the group fixated in awe.
“She looks like she’s actually summoning the dead,” Brad whispered, snickering. Stacie backhanded him in the arm, shushing him.
Somehow Roe timed it just right, the music intensifying just as she completed the first lap around the stones and began another.
And nobody noticed the shadows that began moving in the surrounding woods; drifting and shape-shifting, they could easily be mistaken for flickering shadows cast by the flames…
As she passed Brad on her second lap, he took a swig from the bottle and passed it to Dan, and, wiping his mouth with the back of his arm, stood, stepped over his stone, fell in behind Roe, and began emulating her moves. A little clumsy, but he did okay. The booze and THC probably helped.
Moving together, nearly in sync, the two slinked past Mindy, who was now passing the bottle on, and she stood, fell in behind them, and began mimicking their dance.
By the time Roe had reached the end of the third lap, they had all joined the dance, nobody speaking or laughing, just moving silently, passionately, enjoying the heat of the moment in their various states of altered consciousness.
And nobody noticed not only the shadows moving smoothly with them—fully in sync now, circling the campfire with them, staying just inside the tree line—but now multiple specters and apparitions had joined above, almost imperceptible, gliding and weaving through the upper branches…
Suddenly, Dan bent and snatched the doll from the grass, jerking his hand as he did so as a thorn pierced his thumb. Without breaking his dance, he shook his hand painfully then held it up to look. Seeing blood running down the inside of his thumb, he wiped it off onto the makeshift doll, then tossed it into the fire. Miraculously, it landed squarely on top of the flat stone, where it quickly caught and burned, the blood sizzling and bubbling to black before vanishing into smoke.
And nobody noticed the myriad shadows, specters, and apparitions as they now moved out of the woods and into the clearing, dancing and swirling in sync with the group as they circled the altar…
As the doll’s black smoke rose and mixed with the gray smoke of the campfire, intertwining into a vortex that rose high into the night sky, the overhead clouds suddenly parted, exposing a reddish full moon that bathed the dark campsite in a blood-red hue.
And nobody in town noticed the horrific screams as they drifted down the hill from deep within the haunted woods, then vanished into the night…
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