Monday, December 10, 2012

Wandering Weeds Bloghop

I meant to post this earlier today, but here goes...

The Wandering Weeds anthology is having a bloghop today with these contributing authors

BLOG TOUR STOPS:
rebeccalbrownupdates.wordpress.com

Here is the introductory snippet of my tale GARDEN OF LEGION

The McHenry wagon train, bound for California, persevered through prairie fires, buffalo stampedes, Indian attacks, and even a bout of embarrassing dysentery, but their greatest struggle was when that flower of the prairie, nineteen year old Fannie Burton, became possessed.
Some recollected the pretty little blonde dabbled with an ensorcelled Ouija board stolen from a New Orleans juju man. Her mother claimed the girl was bewitched by a Navajo skinwalker, and still others said she had taunted Satan himself late one night around the buffalo-chip campfire after refusing to say grace. Regardless of the sinister origin, something hideous held the girl in demonic thrall.
The once shy and reserved Fannie swiftly took a rough frontier situation from dreadful to dire and finally to disastrous. She ripped apart the Conestoga’s, devoured the pitiful food supplies, guzzled or smashed their water caskets and, astonishingly, ate a pair of oxen…alive! The company attempted to subdue the normally weak girl many times, but even a dozen of their most able-bodied men were overpowered by the maiden with a newly developed voice that was deep as the pit of Gehenna.
She, or It, or Them, seemed determined to force the desperate McHenry party to die in the wastes, reveling in their cries of desperation and misery. Each day they grew weaker and she, It, or Them grew stronger. All hope seemed lost in the blossoming desert of the American southwest. Tormented by a devil in a black dress, it seemed the party’s bones would soon bleach under a merciless sun.
Being good Christian folk, they prayed for deliverance and a man they later called the desert prophet materialized. He appeared to be of late middle-age, medium height and build, walking barefoot upon the scorching earth and, most important, he could exorcise little Fannie Burton of her demons.
Spying the holy man’s approach, the girl cried aloud and wallowed in the powdered dirt, frothing, vainly trying to hide in a baptism of cinnamon-like soil.
The entire wagon train listened in hushed amazement as the desert prophet communed with the throng of evil spirits inside Fannie. “You don’t belong here. You must leave. I command you in His name.”
“Suffer us to enter into another set of the living,” came the bottomless well of a voice from the convulsing waif. “Even, He,” it gnashed, “was so accommodating.”
“You may enter into whatever lives on the other side of that nearest mountain,” allowed the mysterious holy man.
A vile grin split the girl’s face as her body shook one last time. An almost imperceptible mist spouted from her frame and flew like a swarm of ravenous locusts to the far side of the mountain.
Her own true voice restored, Fannie spoke hoarsely, “Thank you stranger, but who’re you?”
“One of three who tarry,” he answered, drawing her up from the baptism of fine powdered earth. “The demons shall not trouble you again. Go your way in righteousness.”
Fannie ran to her waiting mother and father. As the rest of the McHenry caravan came out cheering from behind their wagons, a dust devil sprang up out of the dunes and the desert prophet vanished.
The McHenry party never caught his name, his tracks vanished into the shifting sands. Their problems were over, but two mountains away, the hell on earth was about to begin...

This weird western (One of my Porter Rockwell's) was a lot of fun and I'm glad it's finally out.
LINKS:
Print in Createspace store: https://www.createspace.com/4081868

6 comments:

Angie said...

I really enjoyed your story in there!

nephite blood spartan heart said...

Thanks Angie-much appreciated, you'll love this-it came to me while sitting in conference.

Angie said...

Cool!

Paul R. McNamee said...

Way to go!

It's on my wishlist.

Charles Gramlich said...

Cool. I will check it out. hoping to get out from under school work soon and back to reading.

nephite blood spartan heart said...

Thanks Paul, it was a fun story to write-the bizarre premise made me stretch beyond where I might not normally have ever ventured.

I hear ya Charles, I have meant to get a lot more reading done than I actually have just yet.