Episode 1
The first time it happened, I thought it was just coincidence.
We had just gotten married, and I was too blinded by love to question what I didn’t understand.
My wife, Zara, was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen. Mysterious, soft-spoken, and captivating.
There was something ancient in her eyes—like she had lived a thousand lives and was still hiding more.
I met her in a remote town I visited during a work trip. She was working at a herbalist shop owned by her grandmother, and something about the way she touched the leaves, spoke to the roots, and whispered into the earth drew me in. She wasn’t just tending herbs—she was summoning life.
Or so it felt. Within weeks, I asked her to marry me. She agreed without hesitation. We didn’t date for long, and our wedding was fast and private. We didn’t even invite my family—just hers. Strangely, her people didn’t speak to me during the ceremony.
They only danced, chanted in a language I didn’t understand, and offered her gifts wrapped in black cloth. That night was our first night together as husband and wife. After our intense moment of intimacy, I was surprised when she stood up quietly, wrapped a red wrapper around her waist, and left the room. I followed her silently. She didn’t know. I watched from a crack in the wall as she walked into the backyard, lit a small clay lamp, and poured something red—too red—into a wooden basin. Then she dipped her hands into it and began washing her body, slowly, humming a chilling tune. I convinced myself it was some traditional herb bath—some cultural rite I wasn’t familiar with.
The next night, after lovemaking, she did the same. And the next. And the next. The same red basin. The same clay lamp. The same haunting melody. But I never asked questions. I thought I could handle it. Until last Friday. That night was different.
We had just finished when I noticed deep claw-like marks on my back—marks I couldn’t explain.
I asked her, and she laughed and said I must’ve scratched myself in my sleep. But I hadn’t even slept. She kissed me, stood up, and again left with her red wrapper. This time, I followed—but closer. I crept to the edge of the backyard and hid behind the plantains.
She lit her lamp again, took the same basin, and began to undress. But something happened. She began speaking—no, chanting—in a deep voice I’d never heard from her before. Her voice sounded like two voices overlapped—hers and something darker.
As she rubbed the blood on her chest, her reflection in the mirror beside the basin didn’t match her movements. It was like the reflection had a mind of its own—grinning when she wasn’t, lifting its hand when hers was down. I gasped.
Her head jerked toward me. “Who’s there?” she demanded, but her voice was not hers anymore. It was guttural. It echoed. I ran. I locked myself in our room and pretended to be asleep when she returned. She curled up beside me as though nothing had happened, whispering my name gently. But my heart was racing. And then came the breaking point. I woke up the next morning to find red stains all over the sheets.
I was bleeding from my sides, though I remembered no wound. She was in the bathroom, humming that same tune. I pushed open the door, and what I saw made my knees go weak. She wasn’t bathing in blood—she was drinking it. Her lips were stained, and her eyes glowed faintly red. She stared at me with no emotion. “You weren’t supposed to see that,” she whispered. “Not yet.” I couldn’t speak. Couldn’t scream.
I just turned and ran outside—only to see the same villagers who danced at our wedding standing silently in our compound, watching me. No one spoke. No one moved. Just eyes. Watching. And then the air turned cold. That night, I packed a bag and slept in my car. I couldn’t leave town—my tires were slashed. My phone was dead. No signal. I was trapped.
The next morning, she knocked gently on the car window, dressed in white, her eyes calm. “Come back inside, love,” she said. “You deserve to know the truth.” And I followed her. Against every instinct. Because something deeper than fear was pulling me back into that house. Something ancient. Something blood-bound.
Episode 2
Her hand was warm when she took mine, yet I felt a cold shiver crawl down my spine as she led me back into the house. The early morning light spilled into our sitting room, but it didn’t seem to touch her. Zara’s skin, though flawless, looked almost… reflective, like moonlight trapped in human form.
She didn’t speak at first. She just guided me to the center of the room, where she had cleared away the furniture. The floor was covered with white chalk symbols—strange spirals, jagged shapes, and what looked like an eye with seven lashes. My bare feet tingled when I stepped on them.
“I told you,” she began softly, “you weren’t supposed to see anything yet. But now that you have… you must see it all.”
I wanted to demand answers, but my throat was tight. My heart pounded in my ears as she reached into the folds of her white gown and pulled out a small, black gourd. She opened it, and the smell hit me—metallic, thick, unmistakable. Blood.
She poured it into a bowl carved from dark stone and set it in front of me.
“This is not human blood,” she said, as if reading my thoughts. “It’s older. Much older. My people call it the Breath of the Earth.”
I didn’t know whether to laugh or run.
“Why do you bathe in it, Zara? Why… why drink it?”
Her lips curled into a sad smile.
“Because it keeps me alive. And because it binds me to you.”
That was when she told me the truth.
Zara wasn’t just a woman. She was the last daughter of the Okoroshi—a blood-bound lineage that had existed for centuries, hidden in the folds of remote villages and whispered about only in rituals. Every woman born into her line was chosen by the spirits to protect a certain covenant between the living and the dead. To keep the pact strong, they needed two things: the life-force of a willing man… and the Blood of the Earth.
“When you married me,” she said, “you became my Keeper. Every time we’re together, your life-force feeds the covenant. The blood I bathe in restores what you lose… and strengthens me.”
I was trembling now. “And if I don’t agree?”
Her expression changed. The warmth in her eyes dimmed into something cold, ancient, and unblinking.
“You already have,” she said. “On our wedding night. The vows you thought were poetic were not in your language—they were in the tongue of the spirits. You swore yourself to me, in life and in death.”
I staggered back, my heel brushing one of the chalk symbols. The instant my foot touched it, the lines pulsed red, as though they were veins carrying blood. Somewhere outside, a chorus of low, throaty voices began chanting. I looked toward the window—villagers, the same ones from before, were circling the house.
“You can’t leave,” she said calmly. “Not unless you want to die before sunset. The covenant doesn’t let go of its Keeper willingly.”
My mind raced. “Why tell me all this now?”
She came closer, cupping my face in her cold hands. “Because the third moon is coming, and on that night, we must complete the final rite. Only then will you truly belong to me forever.”
The chanting outside grew louder. The air thickened, heavy with something unseen. I tried to step back, but my legs refused to move—as if the floor itself was holding me. Zara’s smile deepened, her teeth glinting strangely in the dim light.
“You’ll see it soon,” she whispered. “You’ll feel it. And then… you’ll understand why there’s no turning back.”
Somewhere deep in the walls of the house, I heard a heartbeat. Slow. Deep. Not mine. Not hers. Something else.
And in that moment, I realized—whatever I had married wasn’t just human.
