A group of friends out hiking stumble onto what looks like an established campfire site, and decide to camp for the night—then accidentally discover the real purpose of the odd circle of stones…
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!).
Then 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 a while, so I decided to hammer it out and submit it.
Like The Road Home, The Ritual was selected as a finalist in the competition (however, I’ve since learned that they’ve discontinued publishing the flash fiction anthologies…)
So, I thought I’d share it here…enjoy!
NOTE: For anyone who may be interested, I’ve published more of my fiction under the category My Fiction.
• • •
The Ritual Copyright © Rand Eastwood | Eastwood Innovations, LLC | Woodlands Press | All Rights Reserved
They couldn’t believe their luck when they broke through the brush into a sizable clearing after hours of carefully picking their way through the thick woods.
In fact, there were several 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 had 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 were thinking they should head back because it was starting to get 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 eagerly 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 chimed in with affirmations as they fanned out around the stone circle and dropped their packs.
“So nobody in town knows about this?” Stacie asked, perplexed.
“Someone must,” Josh said, shrugging.
“Well, you’d think someone would’ve mentioned it at that diner, when we asked around for directions to the best hiking trail and a good spot to camp,” Stacie suggested.
“Yeah, everyone acted spooked and just 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 probably all nut jobs,” Dan said.
“But still, nobody bothered to mention this campsite,” Josh said, reiterating the oddity.
“And yet, based on the heavily charred center stone, it gets used quite a bit,” Roe observed.
“Well, at any rate, luckily we found it!” Josh said. “Now we just need firewood.” He peered 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 all returned with armloads of deadwood, dumping them in piles around the stone circle.
Then Dan held something up, exposing a dark wet ring under his arm, his big pale 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 twine, roughly the shape of a doll—it was so worn and tattered it was hard to tell the original intent—dangling from a length of old, frayed rope.
Dan shrugged. “It was hanging from a tree. Figured it would burn just as well as the deadwood, so I hacked it down.”
With that he tossed it in the grass next to his backpack.
“Looks like a voodoo doll…or something used in witchcraft,” 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 camping!”
He and Josh both chuckled.
“He brought me because I asked to come!” Mindy defended harshly.”
“I bet he’s still a virgin!” Josh laughed, winking sideways at Brad. “How about it, Dan? You ever actually been laid?”
“Hey, fuck you guys!” Dan barked, flashing his middle finger.
“Awww, we love ya, big guy,” Brad consoled.
“Yeah, we’re just kidding,” Josh added.
Agitated, Dan just sighed as he crouched and gruffly shoved his machete back into his backpack.
Then Brad turned to Stacie: “Wooooooo, witchcraft!” he teased, wiggling his fingers as if casting a spell. 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 that creepy thing hanging from a tree was probably just some kids messing around.” Roe offered.
“Yeah, you’re probably right,” Stacie conceded, as the rest nodded their heads in agreement.
While the others took their seats, Brad and Josh gathered wood from the various 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, forming 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 boombox 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.
“I took dancing in high school,” she said, ignoring him. “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 tribal—myriad acoustic instruments accompanied by soft background drums.
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 outside 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 it Dancing with the Dead.” Then, smiling, she added: “Sorry, I was totally goth back then.”
The others 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, like 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 swatted his arm, shushing him.
Somehow Roe timed it just right, completing her first lap and starting another just as the music intensified.
And nobody noticed the motion in the surrounding woods: faint silhouettes drifting and shape-shifting, which 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 and passionately to the beat, 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 behind 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 stick doll from the grass, jerking his hand 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 his thumb, he wiped it onto the makeshift doll then tossed it into the fire. Miraculously, it landed squarely on top of the flat center stone, where it quickly caught and burned, the blood sizzling and bubbling to black.
And nobody noticed the myriad shadows, specters, and apparitions that now moved out of the woods and into the clearing, floating and swirling in sync around and above the group as they danced around 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 full moon that bathed the dark campsite in a ghostly hue.
And nobody in town noticed the horrific screams that drifted down the hill from deep within the haunted woods before fading into the night…
The Ritual Copyright © Rand Eastwood | Eastwood Innovations, LLC | Woodlands Press | All Rights Reserved
Reminder: For anyone who may be interested, I’ve published more of my fiction, for free reading, under the category My Fiction:
Check Out Crystal Lake Publishing’s Book Shallow Waters Horror Flash Fiction Anthology at Rand’s Bookshop:
Check Out My Books on Amazon: | ||
 |  |  |
