Once Upon a Haunted Moon (The Keeper Saga) Read Free Page A

ragged, brown dress. Where her hands touched the ancient fabric, the holes shifted and rearranged, leaving small patches of opal-white skin gleaming in contrast. A black, moldy fog twisted around her, giving her a look of being shrouded in rot. She stood aloof — tall and straight, staring one last time down on the small, unassuming town nestled between the mountains, and smiled a very sharp, very vicious smile. A smile that looked forward to her revenge.
    “Many names have I been called. You have named me Fire Witch, but I am Spriteblood!” she announced in voice that cracked like thunder, then stopped and crooned in a voice as soft as raindrops, “I am Zue. And soon…soon you’ll all be mine.”
    The rabbit hopped around her feet, one leg dragging behind it at a weird angle. Still moving with a lopsided hop, it headed back into the brush…
    …with eyes still dead.
    ***
    Brian
    Wighcomocos Reservation
     
    “You smell of burnt flesh,” the old man grumbled, crinkling his long nose as he let a rather large group of us in his back door.
    “Sorry, that’s me. I was helping Dad cook out,” Erik apologized, sticking an experimental finger in the smoldering, black hole in his t-shirt as three other boys shuffled past him, and everyone squeezed into the small living room of Evan Black Water, Sr. The old man was chief of his clan, old and wise beyond years. He had once been a Keeper, and was now considered the “go to” guy for all things weird and magical. He was also Adam’s grandfather.
    He must have known why we were there, though I never saw him ask Adam or anyone else why his home had suddenly been bombarded with six boys who could turn into wolves, and one girl who was always in the middle of whatever trouble found them.
    “You know, white man has come up with an easier and safer way to make fire on grill,” Ed informed Erik solemnly as he tried not to smirk, “White man name magic black rock — ‘charcoal.’“
    “Yeah, yeah…” Erik muttered, “…starting it wasn’t the problem…lighter fluid…it’s what happened after that…”
    “Quiet, you two,” Adam warned them in a low voice as the old man cleared his throat and sat down in a worn, brown recliner clasping his hands in front of him.
    “This story was told to me by my grandfather, now I tell it to all of you,” he nodded first to his grandson, then to the rest of us, “I hope the story ends with you, and will not have to be told to your grandchildren.
    “Long ago, began the story of the Fire Witch. It is said she was Death, herself, with eyes as dark as the blackest water, and that she came from the very darkest places on earth. Places no man could ever go. Places where only the oldest Magic lived and the blackest souls were made.”
    “She took village after village bringing death to them all, both white man and Indian. One day, she came to our village, and our wolves stopped her, and trapped her with their magic, but she swore to one day be free. The U-la-gu, the leader of the very first Keepers, had eyes the color of sunlight. She bit him with her sharp teeth, turning his eyes as black as her own, and told him one day she would come for her revenge. When his eyes showed their true color once more, she would be free,” the old man gestured to his own eyes, so dark they appeared black, “It has been many years since the U-la-gu trapped the Fire Witch, many generations of his sons came after him, with black in their eyes. Eyes like Black Water. But you, my grandson…” he looked at Adam, whose eyes shone like liquid gold, and nodded gravely, “Your eyes show their true color, and she will come for the blood she thinks she is owed. She will come for us all.”
    “What is she and how can I kill her? What do I need to do?” Adam looked at his grandfather, “If they trapped her before, we can do it again.”
    “I do not know if she can be killed. The story was never told of how or where she was trapped. The Keepers kept their