Red Blooded

The moon lit up the road, making it seem even more eerie than it had first seemed. The houses were all hidden behind the tall, dark trees that let loose a flurry of leaves every so often, creating a trickling sound similar to that of a waterfall. However the sound did not soothe in this place. Over here, in this town, it only caused a man to break a sweat, to look over his shoulder, wondering if anyone was following him. And they never saw anything.

The silence of the town was suddenly broken by the sound of a door being slammed shut. A pause, then someone or something ran over the leaves that had gathered up in the doorway of each house over hundreds of years.

A young woman, of about 20, broke out of the line of trees. She had a small bag slung over her torso and her clothes were dark, worn specifically to blend in. She looked around before walking briskly across the street. She hesitated, as if contemplating what she was about to do, then walked over to a little entrance in the hedge and stopped. As if waiting. She almost blended in with the darkness. The moon sparkled as if it seemed to know something was happening. Something big. The woman waited, seeming to become more and more hesitant with each passing second.

10 minutes, 30, then an hour passed, still she did not move. What she was waiting for did not happen. 

The woman sighed and turned to the hidden house behind her with regret, then set off into town, determination clear on her face. She did not look back, only walking through the maze of streets she seemed to know so well.

At last, she came to a dead end, a netherworld of darkness and tall black trees. The woman paused, lost in thought then sorrowfully turned back. It would have to wait.

A blood-curdling scream shattered the peace of the night and the young woman stopped. She squinted as if trying to place something. Then her mouth fell open in shock, a squeak escaping her throat. She turned back to the dead end with renewed confidence, taking a torch out of her bag. She jumped into the darkness and flew through the trees, seeming determined to find the source of the scream.

Chanting. The woman stopped, switched off her torch and slowly crept back to where the sound was louder. She almost screamed at the sight. A large clearing. Tribe-men. Tribe men chanting and dancing in a circle with the women sitting around the edges of the clearing, some with small children on their laps or next to them. They all had strange orange and red and green markings on their faces. In the middle, a tall pole stood affixed to the ground, a man tied around it. The man had green and red markings on his face but he was instantly recognised as not to being one of them. The man appeared to be in his early twenties. His arms were crossed across and tied to the pole behind him, his feet tied up too, his eyes closed. He was stood dangerously close to a large bonfire, its sparks lighting up the entire clearing and rising up into the sky.

The woman, still hiding, reached above her to reach a branch then swiftly climbed up through the tree to reach a height where she could easily view what was going on in the clearing below her. She appeared to take in a deep breath then climbed further out on her branch.

‘Psst.’ When the man did not respond in any way to the woman, she pushed herself to climb further still out into her branch. ‘Psstt.’

Suddenly, the chanting stopped and everyone paused in place, a new tension building up in the air. The woman, perhaps sensing this, slowly shuffled backwards to the safety the tree offered. In the middle of the clearing, a tribe-man walked over to the man and poked his cheek. The tribe-man had more markings on his face and more chains around his neck. He spoke, in a strangely high-pitched voice, to the others who stood around and they retreated back in to the edges of the clearing with the women, barely visible. Only a few stood in the clearing now. While the Chief tribe-man stood and watched the man, others hummed; a slow sorrowful tune. The tribe-people in the clearing then proceeded to throw leaves into the fire, no ordinary leaves either. These leaves caused the fire to turn green and throw out more sparks, threatening to hit one of the many trees. The Chief spoke in a deep voice, chanting again. At this point, several tribe-men came out of the forest with a long sharpened metal rod. The man tied to the pole groaned in pain, his eyes closed still.

The woman gasped.

The Chief’s voice grew louder and the fire turned from green to black and then they moved.

They moved, and the next moment, a bloody man lay crouched on the floor, unable to carry his weight any longer. His brown eyes had opened and were glassy and unfocussed, his arms still around the pole.

The woman screamed. And the Chief looked at her.