I hate hiking.

Why am I hiking you may ask? Well my girlfriend wanted to and begged me join her, so here I am.

I just don’t get the appeal. Dirt, bugs, and exposure to whatever Mother Nature decides. Maybe I’m the minority, but I’d much rather be inside writing.

“Jo, can we take a break? It’s getting dark,” I say, glancing up at the darkening sky. Originally, this was supposed to just be a day hike, no more than two hours, but it’s been five, and my legs are about to fall off.

She appears to have tunnel vision on our destination which she still hasn’t disclosed to me. Said it would be a good surprise.

“No, Jules! We’re almost there!” She exclaims. I hope this is worth the amount of mosquito bites I now have on my leg.

Something catches me eye. In the distance, there are some strange lights. Flickering purple lights. That’s odd and a bit ominous.

“Let’s turn around,” I suggest, but it falls on deaf ears as she is almost in a trance. She walks robotically towards them.

“Jo? Are you ok?” There’s a hint of desperation in my tone. Now I’m concerned. She continues to trudge on a straight path.

I follow her until we reach a clearing. It’s not empty.

There’s a circle of wooden posts in the middle with those purple lights coming from the top of the spokes.

What is this? I open my mouth to ask just that when the world goes black.

Ow.

Why does my head ache?

Jo?

I struggle to lift my eyelids. When I do, everything comes back to me.

Jo is wearing this deep purple robe. Like a witch or something. “Jo? What’s going on?” No answer. Just great.

My mind begins to clear from the fog of unconsciousness, and I realize that I’m tied to a post in the middle of the circle. I shift to look around more. There’s more people in those robes with hoods over their faces.

“Jo whatever this is, it’s not funny,” I say, uneasiness building in my gut. Surprisingly, she responds, “You’re right, Jules. It’s not funny. This is serious.”

That amethyst glow shines brighter. Even I can feel something is happening that isn’t natural. “It is time.”

Time for what? This doesn’t sound good for me.

“We’ve come here today with this sacrifice.” My eyes bulge so wide, it would be comical in any other situation.

“Sacrifice for what?” I manage to stutter out. My question is met with silence.

“In this ritual, we offer this life up to our ancient sisters.” Oh is that all? So I die by witches? Wonder what my death certificate will say.

I drown out some of this long speech with my poorly disguised panicked thoughts until I hear the tail end of it, “By extracting the sacrifice’s life force.”

“Ummm….does that hurt?” I inquire. Though I should expect no one to answer.

Six people emerge from my peripherals and fill my vision, Jo in the front. In sync, their hands lift, a purple shimmer enveloping their palms.

Just when I think maybe this won’t be painful just weird, the light shoots from their hands and the beams strike me.

The pain isn’t instant. At first, it feels nice. I feel lighter like the weight of death is taken right off my shoulders.

Unfortunately, this only lasts a few seconds. Then it’s the mild throb slowly flow through me. Like a flash of lightning, searing agony travels through my mind and body.

I bite in my tongue until I taste blood to stop the groans of pain. If I’m going down, they don’t get the satisfaction of it.

After a tormenting amount of time, it just stops. Like the pain literally goes away. Poof. Gone. Just like that.

I register that the ropes either burned away from whatever magic was happening or I manage to loosen them since I’m on the ground, hunching over my knees, laboriously breathing.

“That’s peculiar,” one of the witches says to Jo. As if it rained when there was no rain forecasted.

“The ritual should have killed her.” Thanks for that. I kind of wish it did. I’m supposed to live knowing witches tried to kill me in a weird voodoo ritual?

The huddle together whispering something that I can’t even focus on at the moment. Once I regain feeling in my limbs, I stand up, hoisting myself with the wooden post I was tied to.

Jo breaks from the group and comes in front of me. “You were supposed to die.”

I scoff, “I gathered that.”

“When a sacrifice doesn’t die from the ritual, they become something else.”

“Look, Jo, if that is your real name, can you get to the point,” I say, tired of all…whatever this is. I just want to go home and forget this ever happened and never meet someone on a dating app ever again.

She glances at me, an emotion that I can’t quite decipher in her eyes. “It makes you one of us.”

Well…..crap.