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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

#117: All Hallows' Eve

October 31st: Halloween — or All Hallows’ Eve, to give it its spookier name. Just an excuse to wear a costume? Or, for one night a year, do spirits walk among us?

The Celts certainly thought so — and many of our own holiday pastimes stem from the methods they used to keep Halloween ghosts at bay. Others, like bobbing for apples, evolved from Halloween rituals for matchmaking and divining the future.

Personally, I prefer to spend the holiday with my nose in a spooky story rather than a bowl of icy water, which is why this week’s prompts are designed to put you in touch with your macabre side. Happy Halloween!

This week's prompts

Start your story with the words “Everything was ready for the ritual.”

Horror – 48 stories

Write about a character who uses a night where everyone’s in costume as cover for something sinister.

Horror – 34 stories

Write about a missing person nobody seems to know or remember.

Thriller and Suspense – 49 stories

Set your story at the boundary between two realms.

Halloween – 69 stories

Write about someone whose busiest night of the year is Halloween.

Halloween – 26 stories

Stories

“'Neath Sleep's Sweet Veil” by Ardaschir Arguelles

Submitted to Contest #117

Next time you catch yourself at the point of slumber (suppose it’s midterm season, and you’ve been getting late nights) — next time you’re alone and reading of an autumn morning and feel your eyes closing and your head nodding at intervals — try and hold yourself there, in that pitching forward, in that interim before you jolt back to alertness. Turn the fall into a flight, if you can; for as long as possible avert the inevitable moment of hitting the ground and falling awake. You’ll find it’s like diving for pearls — you can go progressivel...

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“Daughter of the Mountain Star” by Mikyal Martinus

Submitted to Contest #117

Lexi stood at parade rest before the Elven Elders of the Council of Twelve to receive their verdict. The elven audience in the Grand Grotto amphitheater behind Lexi became silent while she shivered because of the mountain night air that swished through the pine forest. The Queen arose. Torchlight flic...

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“Mr. Bear” by Jarrel Jefferson

Submitted to Contest #117

tw: violent contentLouis the Man could not have possibly stood more still or been more quiet inside of her closet if he were to have turned into stone. He watched, with the patience of a saint, as Cynthia the Woman tossed and turned, the bedsheets over her body flowing like restless ocean waves. He watched, through the crack in her ajar bi-ford closet door, as her body began to calm until it stopped moving entirely. He watched even still until her breath settle into a little snore, when the night drifted her away into dreamland. Only when he...

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“Grazed the mazes” by Perillai Perillai

Submitted to Contest #117

“Basement 4 to Gate 4! Basement 4 to Gate 4! One infiltrator got stuck in maze 42. Let me repeat. One infiltrator got stuck in maze 42!” the walkie-talkie of Arthur blared.“Gate 4 here. Proceeding to maze 42. Over!” Arthur barked back into his walkie-talkie. Arthur then latched the device onto his pants and walked out of the door. Arthur is the head of security for Gate 4 and he had Connor and Elijah as his assistants. He had been guarding gate 4 as an assistant for eight years and he got promoted to head of security last year. “On...

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“The Afterlife of Theodore Gibbs” by Marlee Brooks

Submitted to Contest #117

Case File: Intermediate Soul No. 7593 Novice Assessor Report Completed By: Francine The job of an Assessor at Existence INC, as we all know, is to ensure an intermediate soul is ready to leave their old life behind and begin their new assignment on Earth. I knew Theodore Gibbs was not ready to leave his old life behind the second his soul walked into my office. I first learned of Theodore Gibbs in the monthly Revitalization Department meeting just a few days prior to formally meeting him. The agenda was not out of the ordinar...

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“Rude Awakening” by Cannon Taylor

Submitted to Contest #117

Imagine, if you will, nothing. If you are like most people, you are picturing a vast expanse of endless black. If you consider yourself to be an individualistic person, you may be imagining a white void instead. Either way, you’re wrong. “Nothing” has no color, size, nor recognizable form. By “nothing,” I do not mean a lack of visual stimulus; I mean a lack of sense itself. There is nothing to see, nothing to hear, nothing to smell, nothing to touch, and certainly nothing to taste. Furthermore, you are unaware of this lack of senses; in fact...

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“The Butler” by Juliet Riley

Submitted to Contest #117

Butler of this house was once more than just a character I played. This uniform I wear was once more than a costume. There were once parties, social events, a social standard to which we adhered. Now, only one night each year does the bell chime as it once did. Tonight, they will swarm the famously haunted mansion of Hallowed Hill. Tonight, the bell which has rung twice all year will ring many times. And I will answer. The house looks the same to me as always. It is still the grandest, the oldest on the street by decades. The world changes ...

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“BEST HALLOWEEN EVER” by Janis Van Meter

Submitted to Contest #117

BEST HALLOWEEN EVERBy: Janis Van MeterEverything was ready for the ritual. I had just finished setting up the extreme Halloween party that my friends and I had been planning for weeks. I’m Bridgette Ryan, aka, Egghead or Egg for short. As my nick name implies, I’m an over achiever and will be graduating for college in three years instead of the normal four. My Major is English with a Minor in Historical Studies of Ireland. Ireland has been a passion of mine since I could talk. My grandparents are Irish immigrant...

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“GOING DOWN THE BLACK STEPS” by Mara Masolini

Submitted to Contest #117

GOING DOWN THE BLACK STEPS It was midnight . The last toll of the high bell tower arrived , even if as clouded by the fog(drowned in the fog) when Thaddeus announced to his guests that everything had been set up perfectly for the ritual to which all of them, as his precious friends, would have the very special honor of participating. Thaddeus wore a wide black cloak, long up to his feet, under which the red of his tunic and the yellow of his trousers stood out, when he, standing...

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“The Sacrifice on All Hallows' Eve” by Dani Martin

Submitted to Contest #117

Everything was ready for the ritual. My body was rigid with fear. Terrified of the unknown, terrified of what would happen after everything ended. The path below my feet was littered with fallen leaves and wayward branches. Each footstep was heavy with apprehension. Waves of nausea flooded over me. I instinctively groped the violet amulet that hung around my neck. The previous evening was full of foreboding – stifling and obtrusive. We felt it, sitting there in my grandmother’s kitchen; no denying the future was coming an...

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“Projectile Invocation” by Ginger Crook

Submitted to Contest #117

TW: Cults, implied violence, vomit Everything was ready for the ritual. Motya, sitting in the front row, began to feel nauseous. “Tonight,” Father whispered from in front of them, “reach into your own chest. Wrap your fingers around your heart and sense its true desire.” In protest, Motya’s heart beat faster still. She could almost taste blood in her mouth, stinging her gums and tongue with its flavor. “Remember, brothers, our desire must be Christ and Christ alone,” Father continued, rising in volume. “We are weak, so weak, and we n...

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“Party Time” by James Foreman

Submitted to Contest #117

Party Time Everything was ready for the ritual. The decorations are up. The cake is on display. The ice cream chills. The cool October air stopped neither his daughter’s mother from renting a bounce house for her daughter’s 5th birthday, nor the children from their outside fun. Their laughter is heard throughout the neighborhood and the bright yellow inflated top of the bounce house stood taller than the small two bedroom duplex that rested beside it. Liza looked outside the kitchen window while her daughter played with her neighborhood fri...

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“Dead Julie” by Amy Wright

Submitted to Contest #117

Everything was ready for the ritual. Pam had brought French bread for the offering; she said the yeast represented life. Julie-- dead Julie, not Julie M, who was very much alive-- dead Julie brought the stinking carcass of a roadkilled woodchuck. It was flattened in the middle where a tire had gotten it. This was meant to represent the finality of death. Except, of course, for Julie. Julie died on a balmy, sunshine filled May day as spring waned and summer lifted its wings. She fell off a cliff in South Africa, her blue eyes wide and...

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“Cabin Fever ” by R.S. Louvierre

Submitted to Contest #117

(Content Warning: Gore, adult dialogue, grisly imagery) It had been the fourth time they’ve had to quarantine since 2020. Once in January of that year, then in July, missing out on Independence Day celebrations with friends and family, March of 2021, and again in October. It was Halloween, and Jackie Barnes was determined to at least have their porch light on. Halloween is Jackie’s favorite holiday. He had already spent several hundred dollars on candy, an elaborate murder scene sticker decoration on the living room window with the word...

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“The Ghosts Of The City (And A Boy Called Bran)” by Faye Dorman

Submitted to Contest #117

Trigger Warning; swearing, mentions of child abuse Bran knew that Halloween was important, but he never could truly express why it was in words. It was more of a gut feeling, a feeling that gnawed at his soul each year he spent inside his empty dark space of a room rather than outside in the streets. His room wasn’t the problem anymore, though it had been when he was first placed here with the foster program; it felt like a prison with blank cream walls and a single square window that was too high up on the wall to see out of, and the bed...

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$250

Prize money

226

Contest entries

153

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - Oct 29, 2021 EST

Won by John Merino 🏆

Title: Sleep Story

Submissions must be between 1,000 - 3,000 words and will be approved and published on Reedsy Prompts within 7 days of the contest closing.

Read the full terms & conditions or check out the FAQ if you have any questions!

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