Three Sisters
In a dim, dark hovel, a hissing cauldron bubbles over a smoky fire.
“Bring me the tail!”
The oldest, First, stirs the pot with the huge oaken spoon, gnashing around her tongue with her rotting and pointed teeth while her glossy, rose-colored eye rolls aimlessly. The other socket holds her pet spider. Pustulent green skin stretches, punctuated by constellations of warts over bones and sinews, giving her an elongated, twig-like appearance underneath her greasy rags.
The whiny voice of Second creeps from the shadows.
“Won’t,” she mutters, sulking. “Not until I hears my real name!”
“It’s not your name!”
Second bustles forward from her mucky corner, froglike body rolling voluminously with every step. Straw-yellow hair is strewn and frizzed and tangled with muddy leaves from her sleep.
“It is! Bill’s gift! He LOVED me!”
First smacks Second with the spoon. It hardly dents the padded and quivering flesh, but thwops! delightfully when it hits.
“Did NOT! He RAN AWAY!”
Second howls, scratching at First with crusted nails, jagged, filthy, and flails about with her spotted and meaty hands, as slime spatters from the tattered froth of her once-white lace gown.
Third cackles from her nest in the ash pit.
“He did. On all counts. But it doesn’t matter.” She slithers into view, her red scales gleaming despite their coating of char and ash. First and Second glare at her, wary of the venom in her fangs and claws.
“Why not?” First quivers, the spoon in front of her like a shield.
“Because I ate him,” Third hisses, “and so did you.”
“What?!?” Second shrieks.
“We did not!” Shouts First.
“We did.” Third whispers, grinning and glowing like the mad thing she is. “You gave me charge of the Wedding Feast.”
Thank you to writer & friend D Gestalt for the prompt that inspired this piece.
