Category: John Riley

Sarah

One sitting short ghost story best read during the hours of darkness.

A gentle tale of a mother’s love and a daughter’s devotion. When a mother lost to dementia and a daughter lost in thought, what comes like a ghost in the night to make Sarah seek otherworldly protection.

CRAFTED MINIATURE STORIES – GREAT STORIES – ONE SITTING – SHORT READ STORIES 

The Somnambulist

One sitting short ghost story best read during the hours of darkness.

William Harvey fears what seeks his life and born from death’s shadow. Can William discover the somnambulistic curse seeking sovereignty that left unchecked will lead to devastating personal consequences and the birth of a monster!

CRAFTED MINIATURE STORIES – GREAT STORIES – ONE SITTING – SHORT READ STORIES – AVAILABLE FROM THE GHOSTLY WORLD

CRAFTED MINIATURE eBOOK STORIES – ONE SITTING – SHORT READ STORIES

 

Splinters from the Source

…from a vision and a memory allowed…

…My thanks to Mr Jess Header for his patience and time…

 

Splinters from the Source by John Riley

IT IS AN ESTABLISHMENT ROOTED at the corner of crossroads called The Halfway House and built of hard stone set down upon the earth centuries ago.

A place where lost souls frequent and drown their sorrows with half-empty glasses. Upon the tabletop, the news is a familiar headline and destined for chip papers tomorrow.

Two gather, huddled around and bent over like hags staring into the abyss.

One has a question while the room shadows grow darker around the edge. Might a light extinguished? Or do you not notice the night creeps closer?

What can we remember? Not much, if anything at all. Let me say my friend, you are a good listener.

Remember the wailing banshee that sings out in minor key laments? A sad refrain atop the gates where solemn processions pass that parade of lost souls, and the truth is, my friend, we should have endured it to the end.

I’ve still one more round, even though last orders called again, and back there, the night holds onto such strange things.

Deciding there would be no more tomorrows, a time when downed a glass full of sorrows, sang a little rhyme mother taught as a babe to lay down to die. But, in the blinking of an eye, returning on a road straight to hell.

I guess I’m trying to help you in some small way. You’ve forgotten what you know and what came before, friend. I’m telling you, fella, you’re familiar, a little deja vu, see, the same old soul just wearing a different overcoat.

Stay a little while, take one more for the road and trust me, see it out, live for a new tomorrow, or it’ll be my round again and in the company of another. Are we the same or no different?

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The Storm Ghosts

We present to you the following diary entry. This handwritten piece, found with a bundle of other notes, was chosen for inclusion.

Among other antique objects was a wax cylinder, suitable for a headphonogram machine presently undergoing repair work.

The Storm Ghosts

DO NOT JUDGE ME MORE THAN A fellow man who expresses his labour through hard sweat and brawn. Would such a man ever face the eternal battle I have fought each day? Would I have followed my kin than answer the call___ Why have you abandoned me?

Haunt me if you must, for your presence terrifies me while lurking in dark shadows. Can you not grant me mercy from all I see with your eyes? What more must I endure when I see what you see? Do you not observe that I wander far from those I have abandoned? I have become a hermit, complete with a lantern, held high, searching in more ways than you know for the light.

To whom it may concern, I have little time to write a warning for those sceptical as I was. Much should be learnt from ancient tales expressed in romantic prose, for I did not take heed of the duality of nature. Do not dismiss these words, for they may protect you should you come by a fate witnessed by this writer.

Heed the warning these ancient signs foretell, for it is the hour.

Allow me, good people, an audience with you. I speak to you in all hope that you may save yourselves. In days approaching, they will enter from violent storms and electrical disturbances beyond what you have witnessed before; they will materialise from a supernatural vortex.

At the fading of the light, the drawing of a heavy grey veil darkens shadows and snuffs out the light. They will come. I plead with you all that this is no ramblings of a madman. I pray none of you are damned through ignorance. Please, I implore you and all that will hear my message. Understand and do not dismiss my words.

As they come closer, their growing intense presence is felt within the closeness and stillness of a charged night. Be cautious when a thunderstorm gathers across the land, its deep subliminal vibrations shaking our inner core. For it will do. I know it will.

All places on land succumb. Know this. One and all are vulnerable to a weakening of their vibration. Fear grows ignited by the lightning, the boom of thunder, and the roar of a wild wind.

Heed the warning that such a night is at its height from fear, brought to the forefront of the minds of mortals.

People do not seek out spectral forms. For they will seek you always. Such is the case when imagination gets the better of you when fear overwhelms all rationale.

Be mindful of the storm ghosts, fated creatures appearing suddenly in the quickness of a lightning flash. They all stand ready, illuminated, wide-eyed, drawn, gaping mouths dropped open.

Know their immediate appearance when the lights flicker. And, in a darkened room and closed eye, when a sudden flash of light flashes on and off, they are now here.

The lost crew from storm sunken sea ships, phantoms washed up by raging storms revisiting old haunts.

Know one thing to see one is to carry its haunting. It remains an entity attachment, seeking forever to prolong its fear so that it may exist alongside you.

Know this as well, for although touched by the fearful haunting, its presence within you awakens awareness and heightened senses, part of the realm beyond the veil of death.

If you experience a strange insight, wakefulness beyond the physical realm, ask yourself, would you seek help and return to a state you would describe as blindness…

 

Typed from original handwritten diary entry.

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The Last Performance

sponsors Dawkins & Booth & The Ghostly World Publication have given us permission for the following reproduction.

Jess Header obituary from The Ghostly World.

 

To find out more and the relevance of this obituary we draw your attention to the following story.  A Haunting Curiosity

 

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