The Smouldering Effigies of a Voodoo Doll

A Joshua Alexander Short Story (Number 1)

1

The wine bottle was empty.

I peered inside it, just to check. It could have been a trick of the light on the glass, or of my mind on my eyes. It wasn't.

“We need more wine” I called into the sitting room.

“Get some yourself” the girlfriend “Your turn to go get it”

“Bah” I whispered loudly to the room at large. The girlfriend was hidden beneath my duvet on the sofa, watching reality TV and eating the last of my Monster Munch crisps. The omens concerning movement in the near future from her were not fortuitous.

“Bah” I repeated. The room steadfastly ignored me.

I sighed and checked my pockets. Seven pounds and fifty-four pence. All I had left until Thursday, when I got my next paycheck. I really needed some wine.

My name is Joshua Dennis Alexander. I have three first names, a constant source of bullying when I was at school, though at least I can be grateful that I was not named after my father (who goes by the name Alexander Frederick Alexander, the poor bugger. No wonder he married Mum). I work in a video shop to pay the rent and spend a few mornings a week learning Spanish in the hope that one day I'll get out of this dump. The rest of the time is mostly spent here in my attic flat, which was a good idea in the summer (when it was warm and I had some money to my name) yet now seems to have been one of my slightly less intelligent decisions.

I pulled a jumper on over my jumper, then thought about it and put another one over the top. I need a winter coat, but as funds stand I'll only be able to afford one and pay my bills in about three years time. I added a scarf that I had stolen from my Uncle last Christmas and wrapped it around my neck.

“I'm going to get some more wine!” I called into the living room. I was rewarded by a warm humph.

Ready to go, I skedaddled merrily down the hall, singing 'I feel good, na-na-na-na-nah'.

I passed the living room and made it to the front door without tripping over anything. I unlocked the bolt, called a goodbye, and humming to myself, bounded down my steps and out into the hallway.

Where an ogre was trying to eat my neighbour.

 

To say that Charlie McIntyre is strange gives peculiar folk a bad rap. He can't be more than five-eight, is a skinny little thing who could eat for years and never put on weight and has brown hair that hangs unfashionably around his face which, to my knowledge, never been combed. He always wears these loose, baggy clothes and jackboots. He listens to the Pixies, the Lemonheads and Frank Sinatra. His glasses are always breaking and he wears fingerless gloves even in the summer.

He also, I now realised, fights ogres in his spare time.

He was clutching onto a length of copper piping. The ogre came forward again and he swung it precisely, cracking into the ogre's nose and breaking it with a clean crunch. The ogre howled a bestial roar, surely attracting the attention of everybody in the building.

Then I thought about it. If I heard something like that, I wouldn't dare come and see what the problem was. Just in case it did happen to be an escaped ogre.

My mind snapped back to sanity and I reconsidered the situation. This couldn't be a creature of the fantasy world. It was obviously some insane criminal hyped up on drugs...

...who was butt-naked. And had black skin. And who could take a crack in the face with a copper pipe without flinching overly.

Oh s**t.

Charlie saw me and waved, gawkily.

“Josh, grab this. Keep him occupied for me”

I just about caught the copper pipe as the ogre turned it's eyes to me. It wasn't much taller than I was, and even though I'm a beanpole, six-five isn't that intimidating.

Nah, it was mostly the fists twice the size of mine that worried me.

He swung for me, his strength causing him to punch a hole clean in the wall. As he struggled to pull his hand back out, I thwacked him on the head, causing what should have been a dent the size of a Ford Focus in his head.

Nothing. Not even a cut. Bugger it.

“Get out of the way!”

Charlie had raised what looked like a tree branch and was brandishing it menacingly in the ogre's (and therefore my) general direction.

“Rafficas!” he yelled. A miniature hurricane emerged from the stick and pummelled the ogre into the wall, missing me by inches. I cursed and scuttled away from the flailing ogre.

“Quickly, in here” he motioned to me. Looking back at the thrashing beast, I followed him sharpish into his flat.

“What” I asked, sweating from fear “...was that?”

“An ogre. Baby ogre, actually” Charlie was fiddling with something that looked like a bundle of sticks “Mean, nasty, killers as soon as they are born. Judging by the eyes, I'd say this one had just hatched”

“What is it doing in our house?” I asked, turning to look over towards the door. The wall was making retching noises – the ogre was trying to break free “And why are we not running?”

Charlie looked up at me, confused.

“I know why I'm here” he furrowed his brow “But why the hell are you?”

The ogre took that moment to crash through the door frame. Cursing the money that I would inevitably have to contribute when the building fell down due to structural damage I hefted my copper pipe and went to strike the beast down.

I needn't have bothered. Charlie McIntyre raised his bundle of twigs and placed them on a flat palm.

“Bruciare”

The twigs lit like matches and flew like darts, embedding themselves into the ogre. It gave a bestial roar and lurched backwards and forwards, writhing like a witch on a stake as it rapidly flaked apart and burnt to a husk.

“Hell” I commented

Charlie grinned.

“Nah. Hell is a lot more uncomfortable” He stepped over the charred remains and picked up his branch “I'm going to need some help. Fancy coming along?”

 

2

Snow had begun to fall. Not just a couple of flakes either. This was going to be one hell of a snowstorm if it continued. Considering it was mid-winter, it's not that surprising.

But hey, this is Cornwall. We never get snow, let alone enough to cover our ankles.

“What's going on?” I asked Charlie, who was stomping ahead at a brisk pace. For a short guy, he covers ground quickly, even given the treacherous conditions underfoot “Can I stop at the co-op for a bottle of red?”

“This way” He seemed to be following a path ahead of him, using his hand to feel out what was before him “We need to track it before it gets too far away”

“I thought you'd killed it?” I struggled to keep up with him, even with my lanky figure. Also, I had snow in my converse and it was starting to chill my feet to the bone. Yes, I am a wimp. Whatever.

“We killed the baby, yes” Charlie turned to me, looking up as we maintained the brisk pace “But what do you need in order to get a baby?”

“Holy s**t” realisation dawned instantly “A Mother”

“One very angry, pissed off and maternal ogre with post-natal depression, judging by my current luck” Charlie muttered “Ergo bad news indeed”

“Hang on” I stopped in my tracks “This isn't happening. I was on the way to get some wine, I tripped over on the ladder and hit my head. This is just a coma and I'm going to wake up in about ten years with a sore head and a distinct lack of a girlfriend”

Charlie pointed his stick at me and whispered something incoherent. I was literally swept off my feet (hardly as romantic as it sounds) and dumped in what was now a snowdrift.

“I don't have the time to muck about” he spoke quietly, but with an air of annoyance that I hadn't detected before “Thanks very much for the help with the ogre – I don't know many who would stand and fight one of them -”

“- Or many stupid enough not to run” I interrupted with a mouthful of snow, picking myself from the wet slush

“- But I don't have time to waste telling you all about the world of magic” he continued “So either hurry up and we'll track this beast down, or go on home and tell your girl that the store was shut. Whatever you do, do it quickly. I don't have any patience for indecision today”

I stared at him for a minute. Charlie McIntyre, as I knew him, was a politely spoken, shy, withdrawn geek. This was someone quite different. Much more threatening.

“I'm in”

“Let's go then” he gripped his stick “I think it's this way”

 

3

We stopped outside of the Co-op. A couple of cars had been abandoned in the car park and snow was piling on top of them. The store was still, miraculously, open. I had a feeling that would not stay the same for long.

Charlie passed me a twenty.

“Get a bottle of brandy or something” he looked at me “And dry off a little bit”

I went inside and pulled off the outer layer of my jumper trilogy. Under the first top I was relatively dry, though I had no idea how long it would take my jeans to dry.

I did my best to dry them under the hand-dryer, leaving me a little less soggy. After a quick visit along the wine aisle (reckoning I could use the £20 note to pay for the brandy as well as my wine – I figured it was an adequate payment) I went to the checkout where a bored girl sat at the counter.

“Do you have any I.D.?” She asked languidly. She had bright pink hair and a tattoo of Tigger on the side of her neck, which made her look about fifteen. I raised an eyebrow and handed over my driving license.

“£14.75” she held out the card for me to take back but I was staring out of the window. Despite the cold steaming up the windows outside, I could still make out Charlie, who was scrapping with some unidentifiable thing outside. I had a fairly good idea what.

I handed her the twenty and snatched the card from her.

“Keep the change” I bundled the alcohol into a bag and hurried out of the store.

 

Now, I had thought that the last ogre was quite big. I had also kinda hoped that the next one would be a little smaller, maybe ogres shrinking as they grew up and all that.

No such luck. This one was a good seven-foot tall and had greenish-black skin. Her hands, as I guessed her to be the mother, wielded claws as long as kitchen knives. She was fat, ugly and quick, at least for a fat, ugly thing.

Charlie ducked out of the way of one claw and brought his stick about him in a circle, causing a dome of protective energies to gather around him in a grey haze. The ogre struck at him again, her attack blunted by the dome. Enraged, she snarled, turning and glaring directly at me.

Ah. S**t.

I turned to run as she bounded towards me at a hell of a lick. I distinctly remember yelping at that point and scrambling beneath the bicycle rails, as if they would protect me.

The ogre came at a run and threw itself at the rails, as if they would break beneath it as it hit them. I managed to scramble away just in time for it to slam onto them, crushing them beneath her.

A hideous wail of pain emerged from the beast as it began to thrash about wildly. I noticed that tiny bits of the steel rails had become stuck in its hide.

“Iron compound, of course” Charlie had emerged from his dome and was somehow standing next to me “Nice work, Josh. How did you know faeries are intolerant of cold iron?”

“I didn't” I replied. I checked the plastic bag. The brandy was still intact, but the wine bottle had broken and was dripping to create blood soaked splotches in the snow “Bugger”

“Leave this to me” Charlie walked calmly towards the beast. As he raised his stick, she raised her head.

“Kill...” she rasped. Charlie smiled, and with his stick ablaze, he plunged it deep into the ogre's chest.

“We need to get out of here” he walked past me as I tried to wash off the wine from the brandy bottle using the snow around us “Do you have any petrol in your van?”

 

 

 

 

4

My VW Camper is so old that I think it's something like seventh- or eighth-hand by now. It used to be a cornflower yellow, but over the years the paint has peeled and faded so it is mostly a light grey now. It's barely roadworthy on a normal day, but today more than ever I was wary of using it.

I had fuelled it to the top when I actually had some money, so I wasn't worried about running out of petrol wherever we were going. But traction isn't good at the best of times and in the middle of a snowstorm I was worried sick about crashing it.

Charlie had no such qualms and had installed himself in the driving seat. We pulled out of our drive and turned down the road towards the centre of town, though centre is perhaps a little inaccurate, since our town consists of mostly one long road winding through the middle and a few others mostly running parallel to it.

“Slow down, you'll get us killed!” I snapped as we skidded over a traffic bump in the road “And would you fill me in on what's going wrong now? What are those things that we've been killing?”

“Your standard Blackskin Ogre, though you won't have seen one before. They rarely cross over” Charlie replied

“Cross over from where?”

“The Other side” Charlie looked straight ahead, focusing on the road “Also known as the Never-never, the veiled half, loads of different names. Where you'll find a load of nasties if you're dumb enough to go looking for it”

“So what where they? Why were they here?”

“The Blackskin is a faerie, a mercenary at that” Charlie continued “They are often hired by mortals to carry out their dirty work for a price”

“And what is that price?”

“Blackskins can only reproduce when they are in the mortal realm, on our side. And they are bound to the other side, some kind of ancient magics. The only way they are allowed across is due to a bargain with a mortal, an exchange, as it were”

“So that mother was allowed to cross over as long as her and junior took a swipe at you?”

“Not just mother and baby” Charlie grimaced “I get the feeling that father will be on his way pretty soon”

I sagged back in the chair and swigged back a tot of the brandy. It burned my throat but helped dull the pain from throwing myself around in the car park.

“Could my evening get any better?” I closed my eyes for a second, before opening them suspiciously “So what does that make you? I mean you were toting some serious powers around before”

“The technical term is a wizard” he replied “Though in Britain we prefer the term 'Magician'. Less Harry Potter connotations, to be honest”

“How long have you been, well, magical?” I asked “I never noticed until this evening”

“Since I was seventeen” Charlie shrugged “My talents have improved loads over the past six months. But I've still got a long way to go”

“Can you take this ogre that's coming for us?” I asked

“I don't think so” Charlie kept looking forwards “Not unless I can get some supplies”

 

5

I grappled with the passenger door for a while as we emerged from the Camper. We were next to a field by the woods on the outskirts of Lelant, a village a few miles down the road.

“I keep a shed out here for supplies” Charlie explained as he led me through a maze of trees. I know the guy who owns the land, he lets me store some stuff here so I don't blow anyone up”

“What do you need?” I asked

“I'm not sure yet” he replied tersely “If you keep quiet for a minute I'll be able to think of something”

We paced through the woods for a minute or so in silence.

“You do this sort of thing often?” I asked

“Luckily, I manage to avoid more than most” Charlie fumbled with his gloves, almost as if he was considering removing them “I've got into a couple of scrapes in my time. Learned how to keep my head down and out of trouble, though”

“Until today”

“Yeah. Until today” His small face lit up “Of course. That's it”

“What is?” I asked. A huge roar echoed through the trees. If you've ever heard a lion's roar up close, then you'll have an idea of what it's like. I didn't hear the roar so much as feel it coarse through me.

“I thought these things could speak?” I asked as we began to run. Ahead of us a tiny, ramshackle hut came into view.

“The females can usually thread a sentence or two together” Charlie answered “But the males are mindless. Much harder to kill and lethally strong. Also so stupid that they'll keep fighting until they are utterly destroyed. I've never seen one beaten in a fair fight”

“So how will we beat it?” I asked

Charlie smiled.

“By fighting dirtily, of course”

 

6

The hut was subterranean. The wooden frame visible from the outside did it no justice at all; a huge space had been dug underneath the ground and fortified with steel supports. A workbench and table, cleared of clutter, sat in the middle, with objects of all sizes and shapes adorning the metal cabinets. I noticed a circle had been imprinted in the centre of the table, with what looked like Italian words engraved around the outside.

“I guess Italian is the language of magic, then?” I asked, amused

“For me” he replied, deadpan “I could never get my head around the grammar rules” He began to search through one shelf, flinging stuff on the floors “It's always better to choose a language you never otherwise use to channel your magic with”

I watched him for a minute.

“I don't mean to be a pain” I commented “But won't the ogre be smashing through here any second?”

“Oh, yes, of course” Charlie turned from his searching and ran over to the circle on the table. He blew any dust clear, then placed his palm on the centre.

A spiral of saffron spun fiercely around the circle, levitating until it had risen a couple of inches from the ground. Satisfied, Charlie made a small grunt and turned away from the circle, which continued to emit a steady stream of evaporating saffron energies.

“So what is that?” I asked, crouching beside it and cocking my head to peer inside.

“Don't touch it!” Charlie called out as I went to poke it. I quickly withdrew my hand “It's a ward. It'll keep the ogre out for a while – hopefully long enough for us to get what we need”

“Which is what? If you tell me I can help you look”

“That would be unwise” Charlie frowned. He was looking at a weapons cabinet “Here, take this”

I took it from him, what looked like a sword wrapped in a leather scabbard that was decaying with age. I removed the sword from it's scabbard, revealing a sword that looked older than time itself. It was dulled with age and unimpressive with age, yet had an edge to it that even I could see was needle-thin and sharp enough to cut with a touch.

“You have one task” Charlie explained “Cut the ogre enough to draw some blood. Then get yourself over to me and I'll do the rest”

I nodded.

“I've never used a sword before. I barely know how to hold the things”

“You'll get used to it quickly” Charlie replied “It's like swinging a cricket bat with one hand”

He had shoved a couple of things into a rucksack and zipped it up before I had a chance to look. He shrugged his coat back on and opened a trunk, grabbing a jumper and a pair of black drainpipe trousers.

“There's a toilet over there” he pointed to a door “I'd get changed out of those jeans. But be quick”

I just about managed to struggle into the drainpipes, though they were about an inch too short for me. The jumper was too big for me, so I rolled the sleeves back a couple of times.

“Are you ready?” Charlie had picked up his large stick (I suppose one would call it a staff if they wanted to be technical, but it's hardly more than a glorified tree branch really) “Let's go kick some ogre arse”

 

 

 

7

The Ogre had been stopped about fifty yards away from the hut. Charlie whispered a word and the circle of protection, which the Blackskin had been pounding against, fell to the floor.

Dear God, that thing was hideous. Easily twenty-odd stone, it had the same blackened skin, large claws like the mother-ogre and huge great spikes coming from it's shoulders, elbows and along it's spine. It was even bigger than the last one, which just wasn't fair.

And all I had was a glorified knife. This just didn't seem like a productive way to be spending my weekend.

I yelled at the top of my voice and charged at it.

It stopped in its tracks.

I guess ogres don't often get foes charging towards them. I guess it makes them think twice about attacking themselves.

It eventually recovered and began to charge itself, but by then I had the advantage of speed. I might not be the fittest, but I have long legs that mean I can leg it when need be.

As I came up to it I rolled past him and sliced at his leg. It screeched in pain and kicked out at me, knocking me a few yards into the nearest tree.

I groaned heavily, thanking myself for the brandy that had fortified me on the way over. I picked myself up, looking for a second at the dripping, purple blood that came from the sword.

Of course. The sword was made of iron. No wonder it had hurt the bugger.

“Josh!” Charlie was bent over something, fiddling with some sort of string and what looked like a toy doll “Get yourself over here with that blood”

I made to go over there but the ogre had risen and was galloping towards me once more. I kept my feet and swung the sword at him as he swung and missed me, giving him a glancing blow to the unprotected part between his shoulder and spine. It screamed again and veered off away from us.

I ran to Charlie and handed him the sword. I realised that he had a little stuffed doll, bought from Woolworths.

Hmm. Charlie McIntyre: Magician. Killing evil beasties one dolly at a time.

He took a smear of blood from the sword and spread it over the doll, and over the end of the string that he had sellotaped over the mouth. Technical stuff, this wizardry.

Charlie looked up at the ogre. And I looked into his eyes properly for the first time today. Something had changed. This wasn't the Charlie McIntyre that I knew. This was someone far tougher, far more self-assured.

That scared me a little. More than I liked to admit.

“Abolgare Fissare!” He snarled, wrapping the string around the doll, constricting it and binding it tightly. As I watched, the ogre seemed to be bound by some unseen force. I realised what Charlie was doing and hollered with joy.

“Ooh yeah. Don't go messin' with the voodoo” I shouted

“Josh, shut up” Charlie mumbled “I'm trying to do something here”

With a great effort he tied a knot in the string. The voodoo doll began to replicate the struggles of the ogre and Charlie threw it in front of him, where it levitated slightly. The ogre began to spin uselessly in air too, looking like a deformed ballerina to my untrained eye.

“Pass me the brandy from the bag” Charlie commanded

“Is now the time to start drinking?”

“Just do it, Josh, Jesus”

“Yes Sir”

He took the brandy and unscrewed the top. He took a sip for himself and then poured it out over the doll. A pungent whiff of alcohol spread over the woods and I realised that brandy was running off the ogre as it numbly struggled against its magical trappings.

Josh took the last weapon of his out of the bag: a box of kitchen matches, the long ones. He lit one and shoved me roughly back.

“This might get a little warm” he warned. He placed the match to the doll and we watched as the tiny toy and the huge struggling ogre burst into flame before our eyes.

We waited, watching as the beast was reduced to a powdered set of ashes before us. The cold began to bite again and I shivered.

“We'd best be heading back” Charlie gave me a slap on the back “Thanks for the assist”

8

I checked myself for bruises as I nursed a tumbler of brandy on the sofa. The girlfriend had relocated to the bedroom where I could hear her gently snoring. My chest hurt from being blasted into a snowdrift, my legs were sore and my arms were killing me from waving the sword around.

I wondered how I would explain what had happened to my girlfriend. Thinking about it, I realised that I had no way of explaining it to myself. She'd only think I was crazy, or worse.

I looked at the sword, propped against the side of the sofa. It was wholly unremarkable, though I'd asked Charlie if I could keep it. After all, you never know when something nasty might try and eat you in your hallway. Particularly when you have a magician living below you.

 

The End.