Midnight Guests by Amy Michelle Mosier, Amy Muniz (the reader ebook TXT) 📕

*This is one of 13 short stories in a horror ebook I recently published on Amazon.

It's called Midnight Guests and Other Weird Stories.

Like amorphous ghosts rising from their graves, the fog gathered thickly among the low peaks, concealing their secrets. Its nebulous and fringed shapes moved steadily, sometimes meshed together and sometimes individually as if drawn by some unheard, sombre chant. Through a cloud, the sun little showed itself as a miry, crystalline sphere. Para-ah-dee-ah-tran, whose name means “Content One”, sat on a rock below in the village and imagined that the fog was composed of the very essence of his dead ancestors. Anxiously, he felt as though they were weighing his heart. Today, he was expected to battle this and many other elements on his own, and in so doing, prove himself to be a man.

Just as his father once did and many Shis-Inday before him, it was his turn to venture into the sacred mountains with the purpose of finding and slaying a black bear. Since bears are evil, the slaying of one for its claws is seen as a noble deed. Only then, would Para-ah-dee-ah-tran make the passage from boyhood to manhood. Yesterday, the chief Itza-chu, that is “Great Hawk”, announced to all that he would be leaving on his journey and the people came forward to bid good-bye. At the twilight hour, an endearing prayer, initiated by the medicine man named Natch-in-ilk-kisn, meaning “Colored Beads”, and repeated by the villagers, was prayed over him. After restless sleeping and a light rain shower, however, it all seemed very remote, especially in the vapid light of morning.

Throughout the village, people were stirring slowly. Mothers sat with their babies propped up in their laps as they fed them. Some men sat about a fire pit, smoking and mumbling among themselves. Two young girls, not far from him, were already cutting and stitching buckskin into men's pants. Further down, he was pleased to spot the face of the one who'd captured his heart, the one who make him feel good on his worst days, and that was the face of Nadah-neh-ii, “Butterflies Flutter on Top”, so named because immediately after being born, two butterflies landed on her nose, which had made her giggle. A cover of warmth slipped over him. She carried a small, earthen pot, which she'd made. Her eyes, as large as deer's, were fixed upon him.

With a flat expression, she offered him the contents of the pot. He took it and drank. It was mescal water. Looking about her first, she said lowly, “This morning, Natch-in-ilk-kisn found a dead eagle in front of his wikiup. He says it's an omen.”

Para-ah-dee-ah-tran mulled it over. This had never happened before. “Did he say if it was an omen for me or for everybody?”

Her nose wrinkled. “He said he couldn't tell but he'd already returned the eagle to the earth away from camp and that that was the best thing to do.”

He took her hand. While her face showed not the slightest amount of hardship, her hands told a different story. They were rough from cleaning, cooking, fetching water, grinding corn, sewing with the thorns of a barrel cactus, chipping obsidian into spears, collecting wood and all the other chores expected of young maidens. They were the hands of a diligent worker. He loved them. “Don't worry. Life Giver will favor me. I'm not asking to be chief. I will receive my good fortune.”

His words seemed to put back the strength in her eyes for she nodded. “For your humility, I hope Life Giver will be with you. Be swift like a coyote.” She took her pot and left him with his thoughts.

It was after the fog lifted and the sun began to sparkle that Para-ah-dee-ah-tran said good-bye to Itza-chu and departed the village. As he walked those first steps, he didn't need to look behind to feel a hundred pairs of eyes, including his father's, upon him. They always stared awhile before disbanding, perhaps wishing good luck silently or reflecting on their own journey in the distant past. Without a real plan as to where to go, he began towards the first canyon he saw. Over his shoulder, he carried the satchel he'd packed last night, which was filled with his survival needs. His other shoulder had strapped crisscross to it his sheath full of arrows and in his left hand, he carried his bow. Stepping lightly, his moccasins missed miry potholes. The distinct, earthy smell of rain filled his nostrils. Ahead was a canyon that was seasonally more verdant than normal. The coloring was due to wingnuts, which had miniscule white flowers barely visible to the eye and from a distance, they passed for grass. Huge boulders that dwarfed men were strewn amid the canyon. He skirted his way around these and proceeded forward. Hoodoos along the cliffs and other anthropoid shapes cast of stone solemnly observed his trek. Soon, his village was out of sight.

For many hours, he walked without sighting any animals. If he was to find a bear, it would be at a higher elevation, where the desert mixes with the forest in a bipolar kind of way and cacti live alongside ponderosa pines and Douglas firs. Occasionally, the bears, in a season of distress, would straggle into the lower hills but this wasn't common and the recent rain guaranteed that they'd remain higher up. Around noon, he used his knife to make a quick meal of prickly pear and its tuna. Always, he would go forth and then stop to catch his breath throughout and kept moving ever higher.

Things that would bring a smile to his face he thought of often, like Nadah-neh-ii. For months, he had begun to notice in her a new woman. It was funny but before, she had blended in with all the other girls. Para-ah-dee-ah-tran was different from other boys who were also in their mid-teens. Some might call him weird but he thought that a wife should be more than just a worker for the husband; she should be more than a man-friend and be ever comely in his eyes. This was in stark contrast to the Shis-Inday's thinking and he never dared to voice his opinion. To them, this was folly. But he watched Nadah-neh-ii when she wasn't aware and noticed that she'd grown to be loyal and strong and for those she associated with the most, never had biting words. She was a better spirit than most and he counted these as the reasons why she should be his wife someday.

In fact, it was because of her that he told his father he was ready for this rite of passage. Unless a boy had become a man, he couldn't ask any maiden for marriage; it was forbidden. The girls had their own ceremony in which she was specially arrayed with beads and flowers and shut away into a separate wikiup overnight while the women and girls prayed for her. It was uncomplicated, nothing like the men's puberty rite. Nadah-neh-ii already had hers and this was his inspiration. How much better would he live up to his namesake if he married her?

At various times, he thought of his father, Eskiminzin, which is “Men Stand in Line for Him”, who was named as such for his fantastic prophecies that held much wonder for the Shis-Inday. Never was he present when his father received a vision but he remained curious of his father's method, if there was one. Eskiminzin spoke of a catastrophic event that would scatter all Shis-Inday, that a strange people learned beyond their imagination were coming to take their land. As the Shis-Inday had never seen pale men which Eskiminzin described, the prophecy made little sense and some mocked him while others believed. Para-ah-dee-ah-tran didn't know what to make of this; he could only respect his father and turned away from people who mocked him as well. He also thought about his brother, who before getting married and leaving for his wife's clan, used to sneak up on him amid the cornfields and sling-shot a rock into his back, laugh like a rabid pack of coyotes and then run away. He hadn't seen him for many moons and probably, he had a baby by now.

Under a canopy of silvery stars, Para-ah-dee-ah-tran slept the next two nights. His only fire kept one side of his body warm but always on the other side, a finger of cool air would tickle his neck. He was grateful it hadn't rained. All about him, silhouettes undulated rapidly with the roar of the fire and he wondered if the mountain spirits of whom Itza-chu spoke fondly lived in those figures or if they remained obscure, like one with the air. Either way, it was comforting to think that he wasn't alone. The crickets serenaded him into a peaceful slumber in which, upon waking, he remembered no dreams.

On the third day, he continued to hike upwards, ever striving to reach those sun-blessed forested heights and suddenly when he looked up and about the canyon, he noticed a stout Douglas fir that seemed to only grow because it'd taken root in a wash. Down the canyon, he could see more, better-looking ones growing prosperously. Soon, he passed an island of pines and their perfumed scent wafted in his nose. He saw a quetzal to his joy, a strangely iridescent songbird whose tail feathers contrast sharply with their black and white stripes. It flit among the boughs and cocked its head, as if both curious and nervous about him. If there was ever to be a good luck charm, he reasoned that the quetzal should be one and thought it strange that nobody else before him had figured such a thing.

It was while he sat upon a boulder to eat hackberries that he first spotted it: across the wash from where he sat, he saw the wall of the canyon come together in a curious way as if it weren't quite in one piece and in the center were many pines clustered together. Beyond that, it looked as if there might be a new and hidden canyon. So good was the effect of the trickery, that unless one stopped as he had, one could have been convinced that this was one long continuous canyon with no tributaries. Looking at it was a little intimidating because it was very brushy and seemed to only permit a small animal. Sense told him that if it was anything like a box canyon, that would be a good placeto trap a bear.

Springing like a yearling across the rocks, he approached the brush. One pine tree blocked the view perfectly and from it spawned many jojobas that competed for water and this was enough to shroud the crevice because it behaved like a spout. To the right side, it was clearer so by crouching and pulling back twigs, he was able to step through. The pass was narrow, only two feet wide and above him, two canyon walls intersected, therefore hiding it. This, he discovered, lead to a long, narrower canyon whose terminus could not be seen. His hopes for a box canyon were dashed but since it was so well camouflaged, he was curious.

For a few hours, he walked and just when he felt like he was deep inside, a furtive movement ahead distracted him and he looked in time to see a white-tailed deer prancing away. Walking a little further, he found a waterhole, recently replenished by the rain, from which the deer must have watered itself. It was clear and abundantly deeper than the other pathetic-looking waterholes he'd seen. The deer were drawn to it; so would be the bears. Above, the canyon wall had many boulders stacked together, which