Gillian's Marsh Read online

  Three sharp twinges of pain makes her keel over. Staring at her face in the water's glassy surface, her scales melt and disfigure her face beyond recognition.

  Blisters form a pyramid on her left cheek. Her serpent tongue licks the knotty cysts that erupt like lanced boils and pour out miniature infant heads, each looking identical. The heads fall into the puddle which drowns their cries in effervescence.

  Panic spreads in every cell as she kneels by the water, watching her spawn slowly sink deeper, each face looking like a dim white marble. Plunging her hands into the cold sludge, she desperately tries to scoop up as many as she can before they are lost in the depths forever. She catches three, all of which bears dark-red abscesses on their left cheek.

  The Mark of the Pale Serpent.

  INNOXIUS MORTEM / NOXIUS GENESIS

  Gillianswick, 1868, Candlemas

  The blade glinted as Cyrus raised the heavy ax over his weak shoulder, sweaty dew spreading over his face.

  “What are you waiting for? Cleave the damn log, son!” instigated his barrel-chested father, who stood beside him with clenched jaws and flared nostrils.

  With a whimper, Cyrus let the ax fall down upon the log. A dull crack sounded and a cloud of numbing pain spread in his left leg. He lost his grip of the ax and dropped to the ground.

  The agony was sharp and unyielding.

  Gasping for breath, Cyrus caught a look at his leg and saw a wide slit bubbling with blood and the pulpy bone peeking out of the wound.

  “You're useless, boy,” his father snarled and stomped the ax's handle in two, scowling at Cyrus. “Can't even handle a damn ax!” He turned and walked away, leaving his bleeding son behind...

  Reiterman shook the memory out of his head and glanced at the four constables riding alongside him in the chilly morning. Their expressions were solemn due to the horrid secret about to be brought to light, closing in with each clattering hoof.

  Gillianswick would never be the same again. A new era stood on the threshold and Reiterman intended to use it to his advantage.

  If only his father had been alive to see it.

  When the five lawmen ground to a halt outside the house and got off their horses, a mob had gathered to see what was going on in the well-known, and of late ill-rumored, Wishum residence.

  Reiterman gave two sturdy knocks on the door while two constables untied a pair of three-feet long iron bars with manacles attached to their ends from the saddle hooks. The other two unshouldered their Winchester rifles and aimed them at the door.

  “Eleanor Wishum, open the door immediately,” Reiterman commanded, his harsh breath coiling to winter smoke.

  A tense silence spread among the bystanders as no answer came from inside the house.

  “Open the door, Mrs. Wishum,” Reiterman roared and knocked two more times.

  Still no answer.

  He took a step back and nodded to his inferiors before planting his boot on the door, which caved in with a loud crack. A second kick made the door swing off its hinges and Reiterman moved aside, giving way for the quartet of constables, who stormed inside.

  This headstrong action rallied up the onlookers, now advancing the house demanding to know what was going on.

  “What's her charge, sergeant? Getting drunk on communion wine? ” an old man yelled out.

  Blocking the doorway, Reiterman scowled at the punster and raised a warning finger. “One more word and I'll have you arrested for disorderly conduct.”

  A hysterical scream from inside the house silenced the mob. After the outcry came a series of muffled thuds and glass shattering, and Reiterman drew his revolver and stepped into the hallway.

  From the second floor came the constables pouring out, dragging Mrs. Wishum after them by means of the iron shackles latched around her thin wrists. She was stark naked and nearly bald, shrieking and kicking as they forced her down the stairs with the caution of transporting a feral animal.

  “For the heart of the people has become dull, with their ears they scarcely hear and they have closed their eyes!” Mrs. Wishum screamed in Reiterman's face as she passed him in the vestibule.

  He didn't even flinch.

  The constables yanked the shackles and Mrs. Wishum tumbled out the doorway and fell face first on the snowy cobblestone.

  The crowd outside gasped in unison when they saw the well-respected preacher's wife, now looking like a ghoulish hag with patches of dirty gray hair left on her scalp and bleeding scratch marks covering her gaunt frame.

  “None of you shall approach to any that is near of kin to him, to uncover their nakedness!” she rambled and spat blood onto the white snow.

  “By Christ be quiet, Sibyl of Tartarus!” Reiterman retorted as he strode up to her and smacked her hard across the face. “Bring her to Justice Hill!” he ordered and mounted his horse.

  The bewildered townsfolk backed away with God-fearing apprehension as the constables sat up on their horses and trotted forth keeping Mrs. Wishum locked in the center of their square formation. The horses' steady two-beat gait made her teeter through the snow.

  Riding north from the Wishum residence on the outskirts of town, the procession soon arrived at the sloping hillock near the old windmill.

  The mob was close on their heels, mouths slavering with murderous glee.

  A wooden stake stood erect on the hill, the top of which was shrouded in smoky fog. Beside it laid a pile of hay, chains and torches.

  Reiterman climbed off his black horse and led it to a large secluded bush on the side of the hill. It whinnied nervously and he talked softly to it while stroking its neck and mane.

  “Nooo!” Mrs. Wishum cried desperately as she was being brought up Justice Hill and saw what was in store for her. “Why do you punish me, God, why!?”

  The chains rattled as the constables tied her to the stake, fired up torches and dumped hay by her squirming feet.

  Reiterman wore a proud grin as he watched his inferiors at work. Slowly approaching the stake, he fished out a rolled-up document from the inner pocket of his long overcoat and gave a subtle nod to one of the torch-bearing constables, who turned and formally addressed the chattering crowd. “Court is now in session. The honorable sergeant constable Cyrus Reiterman is presiding.”

  Silence grew over Justice Hill, leaving only Mrs. Wishum's banshee cry and the crackle from the torches audible.

  Clearing his throat, Reiterman unrolled the document and began to read it aloud. “By the legal power vested in me by chief magistrate Edward Burnham...” He paused and let his eyes wander among the entranced audience. “You, Eleanor Wishum, is hereby sentenced to death by burning, for the illegal practice of witchcraft, and by means of evil sorcery, having had Josiah and Louella Lee Wishum conjured away during September in our Lord's year of eighteen-sixty-six. May God have mercy on your wicked soul.”

  Mrs. Wishum's body began to shake. Her eyes rolled madly in their sockets as she gazed up at the grizzled sky. “They band themselves together against the life of the righteous and condemn the innocent to death...”

  Reiterman narrowed his eyes. “Light the stake!”

  The constables torched the hay and small pyramids of fire rapidly spread. Within seconds, tall hissing pillars hungrily devoured the hay and licked Mrs. Wishum's naked flesh. Coiling spires of thick black smoke clouded the sky as she was immersed in flames, her hideous howl echoing out over Justice Hill, sending a few partakers on their knees crying and clasping their hands in prayers. Others whistled and waved their fists in the air.

  Eleanor Wishum closed her eyes as the fire melted her skin. The clear blue heaven that opened up before her dispersed the red inferno outside. Harp music dinned in her ears, enveloping her senses and shutting out the sounds from the crowd. The cloudless sky exploded in white dazzling light from where bright angels rained down and dragged her soul out of her charred shell.

  From above, she watched the unholy gathering and the raging fire as she soared into God's Holy Kingdom.

&
nbsp; * * *

  At the same time in the cabin, Louella Lee pushed so hard she feared her spine would snap. Two babies coated in blood and mucus lay beside her on the bed, screaming from the top of their lungs while a third was busy exiting its mother's womb.

  “Give me that goddamn moonshine!” she cried and snatched the jar from Red's hand, slugging it down to ease the pain.

  “Just keep pushin', honey,” Red brushed away the sweaty hair clinging to her face.

  Breathing through her nose, she closed her eyes and let out an abysmal outcry that nearly shattered the window, eyes bulging out of her head as she squeezed out the baby from her cracked sex and passed out.

  Red hastily cut off the umbilical cord with tears of joy trickling down his cheeks as he gazed upon at his three newborn sons.

  It wasn't until next morning he noticed the peculiar rash-like birthmark each child wore on their left cheek.

  A knotty pyramid-shaped outgrowth.

  PART TWO

  ~

  Deep in the woods, by the moss-clad stone

  The rank creature guards, his ichor ridden home

  Jokum, Jokum, skin like blighted urine

  Stench of fetid butter, nail as sharp as burin

  Five times ye must say his name, three coins pays the fee

  Lest ye want the troll to turn, ye to an amputee

  Jokum, Jokum, nose a pale-white maggot

  Teeth like sharpened hatchets, eyes like lichen agate

  Ye hear him through the forest roam, trees snap under hoofs

  Compelled by aching hunger, scents ye through yer roof

  Jokum, Jokum, his breath a belch of smoke

  Drains the leaking morels, that grow upon the Blood Oak

  ~

  CAPER IN THE WOODS

  June, 1876

  “Look what I've found!” Jimbo shouted from behind a poison ivy. Dwayne and Silver quit poking their sticks into an ant-hill and scurried over to the treacherous tree where Jimbo was crouching beside a wounded deer that lay in the shade.

  “Gak!” Dwayne gasped, an oil of disgust and fascination burning in his eyes.

  The deer bleated weakly, its head jerking sideways with pain.

  Behind Dwayne stood the skinniest brother, Silver, eyes fixated on the heap of entrails that spilled out of the deer's slashed gut. He spun on his heels and vomited into a gnarled tree-stump.

  “Ain't she a smeller?” Jimbo chuckled and put his nose an inch from the gory innards. He waved off a flock of horseflies, took a long deep sniff and closed his eyes, imbibing the putrefaction permeating the air in the glade. “We should bring 'er back for pappy to cook!”

  “Move over, idjit. I wanna play with it,” Dwayne demanded and kicked his brother in the ass so that he almost toppled over the dying deer.

  “Always have to ruin the fun,” Jimbo grumbled and shot him a dirty look as he scooched over to the side, sulking.

  Dwayne positioned his feet on each side of the deer's head. Its black eyes rolled back and forth before locking on Dwayne, who stood looming over it. Its bleating intensified and was edged with fright. A justified fear, as Dwayne raised his pointy stick and thrust it into the deer's pleading eye.

  Its body jolted and it let out a hideous shriek. A rivet of blood and eye-juice seeped out of the hollow socket after Dwayne yanked out the stick with the eyeball attached on top. With an evil grin he brought the drippy stick close to his eyes and studied the optical organ.

  Jimbo picked up a sizable stone. Giggling, he began to stomp the teeth out of the defenseless deer before bashing its brains in with the rock.

  Silver had just finished heaving and was wiping bile off his chin, when the gut-wrenching sight called for a second round of retching into the stump.

  Dwayne frowned and threw the eye-stick away. “I'm tired of piddlin' around here. Let's head to the Blood Oak.”

  “And leave all this meat behind!?” Jimbo said and dropped the gore-coated stone with a disappointed look on his face. “The flies'll eat it if we ain't...”

  “You'll be sick if you eat that anyways. Let's git.” Silver staggered away from the tree trunk, moseying after Dwayne, who was already moving decisively in direction of the notorious tree.

  Glaring rays of the sun filtered through the rich foliage, casting an auburn glow on the Swanson boys as they walked in a line, breaking twigs from the wild undergrowth not to poke their eyes out.

  Crossing a small snaking river and a sloping hillock, the boys soon reached a gigantic burdock bush they called the Purple Watcher. The prickly plant stood an impressive six feet, twice as wide, and provided shelter for the Blood Oak not a stone's throw away.

  The Swanson boys knelt and peeked through twig-work behind the violet burrs.

  In the clearing on the other side, two more deer laid dead. Bellies ripped in the same manner as the live one by the ivy.

  “Reckon 'tis the work of a bear,” Dwayne said and offered his brothers a look of concern. “Better keep our voices down. Pappy told me he'd spotted last year's cubs 'round here. Said they'd fattened up gracious plenty.”

  “Oh shit,” Silver whimpered and froze.

  “What?” Jimbo said, fidgeting.

  “That'd be mother bear over there...” Silver pointed at the Blood Oak.

  “Damn...,” Dwayne whispered, motioning to his brothers to get down.

  All three crouched slowly, eyes peeled on the creature by the oak. Standing against the sunlight, it ate hungrily from the red fungi that grew on the bark. Thick globs of crimson fluid were dribbling over its yellow fur.

  “The hell is that?”

  “Ssch,” Dwayne shushed Jimbo, elbowing him in the arm.

  The creature stopped eating, dropped the bleeding morel in its paws and let out a long low growl.

  The boys swallowed, for as it moved away from the sun, they saw clearly it wasn't a bear but a monstrous creature with a worm-dripping snout and green glowing eyes staring straight through the Purple Watcher and into theirs.

  “Git!” Dwayne shrieked and flew up from his squatting position, nearly knocking over his brothers as he fled like a scalded dog back into the woods.

  The grizzly-bear sized beast roared as it charged with heavy hoofs toward the bush.

  Heart hammering through his chest, Silver abandoned ship a split second after Dwayne.

  Jimbo kept his seat. Paralyzed with fear, he watched the yellow horror close the distance between them. Eyes transfixed on the maggots covering and squirming on the thing's long nose, he heard Dwayne call his name from somewhere behind him.

  It sounded like hundreds of miles away.

  He tried to stand, he tried to turn, and he tried to do anything at all, but couldn't move. His muscles wouldn't obey the part of his brain ordering him to flee.

  The creature lunged into the bush that shook fiercely as it clawed and thrashed its way through, its talons raking Jimbo's face.

  Blood trickled into his eyes and made him snap out of his shock, just as two sets of hands grabbed his sweat-drenched overalls and pulled him out.

  The foul-smelling yellow beast bored itself halfway through the bush before the fur got stuck in the burrs. Howling with frustration, it desperately clawed at the escaping prey.

  MIRTH AND MURDER

  July, 1876

  Exuberant laughter sounded from Dwayne, Silver and Jimbo, who were playing chase on the yard and around the cabin while Red and Louella Lee sat on a blanket on the grassy front yard, enjoying the sunny afternoon.

  They were having their annual family picnic and Red had prepared the salt-cured meat by letting it seep in his marinade of wild forest herbs for days before he cut it into strips and smoked it in the hut. The soft breeze carried the smell and made everyone's mouth water.

  On occasions like this, only the choicest morsels from human were good enough. That went for the high-proof spirits as well.

  “Oh, Red, the smoked venison smells delicious,” Louella Lee crooned. “Feels like a coon's age since w
e had a nice picnic together.” She leaned over and kissed him.

  “Yup,” Red muttered and took a swig from his jar. “Sure love eatin' and gettin' corned, that's fer sure.”

  “That is all you men think about, isn't it?” Louella Lee laughed, adjusting her bonnet.

  “It ain't all,” Red replied with a sly grin. “There's one more thing I's thinkin' of.” He turned his head, making sure the boys weren't lurking around nearby, before he ran his course hand up her thigh and in under her long skirt.

  “Oh, Red!” she squealed and jolted as his fingers fondled her sex. “Not in front of the boys.” Kindly removing his hand, she shot him a prudent look that hinted mischief.

  The look drove Red nuts with desire.

  “You's one hell of a tease, darlin'!” He snickered and stood, kneading down the bulge on the crotch of his blue jean overalls. “I could need some serious distraction right about now. Better git into the hut and check on them meats.” He whistled as he lumbered down to the shadowy hut.

  Well inside Red locked and bolted the door, imbibing the rich hickory smoke. From metal wires between the walls hung various strips of meat. A variety of skinned human body parts covered in salt. An arm, a hand, a torso... Red snatched a tender tidbit of meat from a charred palm and wolfed it down. The dry stuffy heat in the hut did little to ease his raging libido.

  Peeking at Louella Lee through a chink between two logs, he unbuttoned his overalls, whipped out his dick and began to rub one out.

  It didn't take him many moments before his face sweated up as he was about to come. His knees began to tremble and he had to grab hold of a leg that hung beside him not to lose his balance. A primate groan escaped him as he shot a deluge of semen into the grimy corner.

  “You's hotter than hell's fire,” he muttered under his breath and pulled his overalls back up. Wiping off his dirty hand on his shirt, he took down a sturdy meat cleaver from a hook on the wall and began to cut up nice thin slices from the smoked torso and stacked them on a wooden tray.