Butterfly 8

An Epic

(Paranormal Suspense Thriller)

Chapter One

The Khoi

“Sorceress, Sorceress! Burn her, burn her!”

The incessant chanting, nearly to a state of frenzy, was sufficient to silence any creature that dared to observe the spectacle from nearby, and it filled their hearts with dread.

A woman, her face succumbed by the price of the twilight years, and her lips parched from the mid-day sun, shuffled her way through the boisterous assembly until she had reached it’s foundation.  She held, with both frail hands gripped firmly around it’s base, a primitive walking stick, thrusting it again and again high into the balmy air.  

 “She has doomed us, she has doomed us all!” the old woman roared, “She is a witch! Burn the witch! Burn the witch!”

The intensity in her manner startled a fellow standing beside her, who, when he had recovered, took up her call for immediate action; retribution.  Soon, her demand had an effect on the remaining one hundred twenty-five Khoi that made up the village settlement; for those words she bellowed over and over again, “Burn the witch, Burn the witch”, as if they were an insidious virus, had passed from man to man, woman to woman, and child to child; and, ultimately, those very words would be repeated in unity by all who had gathered that dark day.

They were a proud and cohesive people, the Khoi.  Members of the same patrilineal clan, along with their wives and children, occupied the encampment.  Several natives of other clans with their dependents also called the village their home.  Herders of cattle, goats and sheep, after grazing in the local region became depleted the structures of the Khoi were dismantled, easily, and re-erected in other areas overflowing with green grasses.   

In a nearby reed covered hut, the principal of them all, made of green branches planted into the ground and then bent over and tied together, the shaman, elders, and the clan’s Headman debated the death sentence handed down by the tribal council.

Eight men sat on the ground, placed in a semi-circle, each on a seat of brittle straw.  The Headman, adorned in the feathers of that of an eagle’s wing, and positioned slightly higher on a mound of dried mud, listened with high interest.  The shaman stood before them.  

An elder, a spindly chap, slowly rose to his feet.  And in a manner of deliberation, with a furrowed brow, he turned toward the leader of the clan. “The girl has broken the sacred law,” he complained, bitterly. “She must be punished!”

“But, she is nothing but a misguided child,” replied the shaman.

“The dark heart of that child has brought evil to the village!” the elder snapped. With the burning eyes of a jealous rival, he stared at the medicine man.

The shaman, his lips quivering, focused his attention toward the face of the Headman. “But the heart of the child,” he began, “is no less impure than my heart——nor the heart of yours, or that of any of you.”

The chieftain struck his staff into the dirt with force, and then rose to his feet. “Gunab the malevolent walks among us,” said he, with a stern voice, “the girl belongs to Tsui, now!  It is he that is the god of all who practice the forbidden magic!”

Outside, in the center of the Khoi dwellings, a young girl of about twelve years of age stood on a pile of dried brush.  Strips of cow hide bounded her hands and feet to a long wooden stick.  Her tattered garments, made of animal skin, hung from a badly abused body, and trickles of blood still ran from her thin lips and dark skin.  Her condition, extremely dire, was the result of ritual performed hours earlier to rid her of unclean spirits, and the body of the young girl testified to the brutality of it all. 

In an attempt to expel the evil, members of the tribal council had shaven her head, and had left dried sheep guts on her ankles as an anchor to the deteriorating soul.  Now and again, she mustered enough strength to peer out, through swollen and blackened eyes, at her accusers.  Her mother stood in the crowd with other despondent relatives, weeping, as children of the village threw sticks and large stones at their battered kin.

After a short time, the shaman exited the council hut.  An ostrich feathered head dress with small beads blew gently in the wind, and a large copper necklace and bracelets adorned his neck and wrist.  He stood there for a moment with his staff gripped firmly in his hands.  And with a face, smooth and void of any expression, with dark, brown proud eyes, he peered out at his people.  

His presence temporarily silenced the madness.  The crowd, they parted, creating an empty passageway leading to the condemned.  The shaman walked slowly toward the girl, occasionally looking into the silent face of a man, a woman, or a child.  And when he had reached the pile of dried brush, he scooped water from a hollowed out tree trunk with his hand, and poured it between the girl’s bloodied lips.  He whispered something in her ear, and then turned to face his people, the Khoi.

“Today, my beloved child is sacrificed,” said he, his voice raised and slightly trembling, “so that all that once was, shall be again.  From this day forward let no one speak ill words in her name.”  He picked up a torch and placed the end in a nearby fire. “May Gounja, the chief of all gods, receive her soul in repentance and show mercy toward us, his servants.”