NYC Midnight Writing Challenge: Flash Fiction 2022, Round 1

https://www.nycmidnight.com/ff...

Submitted August 14, 2022

Genre: Horror
Subject: A jungle
Character: An engagement ring

Title: The Chosen One

Synopsis: Every ten years, the young girls of the village eagerly wait for their turn to be
presented to The Prince, hoping that they would be chosen to be his.

Words: 998

Final Results:
Round 1: 8th place (did not qualify for round 2)

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The shade of the hut does nothing to quell the afternoon heat. The sweat is sticky on her back, salty on her lips. The air clings to the remnants of the rain from last night, the smell of damp leaves and rainwater still lingering.

She needs a bath, Elita realizes. She hasn’t had one since the night before The Choosing.

The hut is conveniently located steps from a small pond, just deep enough for her to be comfortably submerged. Elita stands at the edge, waiting. She glances out behind her at the thicket of the jungle beyond the clearing. Everything is still, save for the rustling of the wind moving through the leaves and the chirping of the cicadas and beetles. It’s a familiar chorus of green and noise, but still, she looks.

She does away quickly with her flimsy ceremony clothes. She takes her time in the water, though her skin begins to prick and the hair on the back of her neck goes stiff.

After, she sits on the edge of her too small bed and brushes her damp hair.

“It is a great honor to be Chosen,” her mother had said, just the day before. Her gentle fingers smoothed the hair out of Elita’s eyes. “You will be doted on. You will never wish for anything, as it will all be given to you.”

She started arranging her hair around a soft crown of delicately yellow rue blooms. “My mama made me a crown like this when I was part of The Choosing,” she said. “It will bring you luck.”

Elita had just nodded. She said nothing as her mother’s fingers continued to tremble as she braided.

The braids that Elita makes are not as neat as her mother’s, but it’s good enough to get the hair out of her eyes. She’s naked still; the Elders gave her an additional dress when they escorted her here, but it was too hot to put it on so soon. She won’t need it for long, anyway.

There aren’t many overhead trees in the clearing where the hut is located, and the beginnings of the sunset pour in through the only window. Elita sits impossibly still and watches the daylight fade.

It’ll be evening soon.

Stories of The Choosing have been engrained in the minds of every girl in her village since infancy. The Elders said that the First Jungle spreads from here to the ends of the world. The Prince, they said, would spoil his Chosen with riches and trinkets from all parts of the Jungle; things that they would never be able to have in the confinements of their tiny village.

“You have to be sure to accept everything The Prince gives you,” they said. “As to not upset him.”

The girls giggled at the tales, imagining what it would be like to be by The Prince’s side for eternity, how handsome he must look, how benevolent he is for blessing their village in return.

As the night falls, Elita cools off enough to put on the spare dress. She lays on her side, staring at the wall closest to the bed. She reaches out to smooth her fingers along the unfamiliar indents that are etched there.

There is no moonlight that shines through the window now, as the Ceremony happens during the New Moon.

The villagers would lay out a path of dark red jasmine flowers that led to the Altar, and the girls who became of age within the last decade would walk in a procession through the village. Elita kept her eyes downcast as she walked with the other girls, a sticky sweet smell heavy in the air, the petals dying the bottoms of their bare feet red.

At the Altar, the girls stood side by side as the Elders chanted lowly in their ancient tongue, their voices growing louder and louder with each minute until they suddenly stopped.

There was a moment of weighted silence.

Elita felt her body become doused in sharp ice, the shock of which made her gasp loudly. Her left hand began to tremble. She looked down and watched the skin on her ring finger separate, the etching almost bone deep, creating a thick band around her finger. A circlet of blood and flesh. A ring. A promise.

The Elders erupted in ecstatic chanting. You are promised, you are promised!

She looked up at the crowed of silent villagers near the Altar. She met her mother’s eyes and tried to smile but frowned as she watched her mother’s mouth opened wide in a silent scream, face crumbled in despair.

It didn’t take long for the bleeding to stop. Even after her bath, the wound had glazed over. Elita looks at it in the cover of the night, her other hand coming up to feel the raw bumps of her bare flesh.

Then, the air within the hut stilled, as if all the sound had been sucked out of the space. There was no vibration, no air. Her eyes all at once adjust to the dark. She cannot move her body, though she trembles still, her eyes glued to the wall, and she finally recognizes the indents.

Scratch marks.

Elita suddenly remembers the nights she would sneak out of her mother’s hut, tip toe through the tall grass and sprint silently right to the edge of the Jungle. She would lean forward as far as she could without crossing the barriers the Elders created, her face against the heavy invisible wall. She whispered her deepest wishes in those moments, things she could never utter to anyone, the things she craved for in the dark.

Sometimes, she would feel an icy cold touch on her skin, just like the one that embraces her now. Too long arms wrap around her chest, palms flat and invading. Spiny cold breath moves up her back, stopping at her neck and inhaling. A smile against her skin.

“Mine.”

Elita smiles. “I’ve waited for you.”