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

would serve as a lookout perfectly. Para-ah-dee-ah-tran scaled his way up. At the top, a gaping hole commanded his attention and he was surprised to discover that it was a cave, barely bigger than a manhole, just smaller in height than himself and ideal for a retreat from the cold.

The noontime sun poured in and in this way, he could see the end, a nice length of twenty feet. It may have been natural long ago but Indian hands surely had expanded it since its genesis for the sake of a hunt. Here Para-ah-dee-ah-tran would take refuge. Wood was chopped and piled inside. To cover his scent, he smeared the pulp from a cactus across his exposed skin. From the waterhole, he refilled his pot and for food, he collected jojoba nuts and closed pine cones, which with the help of a flame would open to provide him with seeds.

That evening, he started a fire close to the entrance of that little cave. From the canyon breezes which had plagued him the previous nights, he was sheltered. With much satisfaction, he lay down, bundled up in his blankets like a papoose. The cricket sounds filled the encroaching night and the coziness of his dwelling soon lulled him into an abysmal sleep.

Obscurity gave way to a dream state in which he was aware that he was dreaming but lacked the willpower to stop it. He was in a beautiful canyon bestudded with thousands of wildflowers, a dream indeed because he'd never seen so many wildflowers in real life. Nadah-neh-ii was there, with her hair flowing down as a dark river. They were walking hand in hand. With a laugh of confusion, she stopped to point out a quetzal, perched on top of a saguaro. Instead of a cheerful chirp, the quetzal gave a drawn-out, mournful howl. Why would it do such a thing? As much as he wanted it to tweet happily and tried to dream it, it refused and Para-ah-dee-ah-tran grew irritated to the point that he roused himself.

It was black. He sat up to find that his fire had become a lump of smoking ash and the wind had picked up a bit, which lashed the cave's mouth with a whipping sound. Outside, the stars twinkled in the inky sky. And then he heard it: the same cry from his dream, only real, a cry which he could not identify. He could only imagine what kinds of beasts issued forth such a sound. It was not the howl of a coyote and the weirdness of it troubled his heart. He heard it reverberate from a point way south of the canyon. Again and again, it came and puzzled him. The crickets, he became distinctly aware, didn't make a sound such that they were probably just as perplexed as him. Could it have been the wail of a revengeful mountain spirit? He'd been warned that mountain spirits disliked arrogant men roaming the ancient burial grounds but surely he'd done nothing wrong. No more wails came and he sat wide-eyed, looking through the tiny portal to the innocent sky, waiting ... and then the cricket sounds resumed slowly, as if they were testing the night. It was awhile before Para-ah-dee-ah-tran convinced himself to lay back down and close his eyes.

After finally falling asleep again, he had a disturbing dream in which a black-hooded ghoul descended to his cave by gliding through the air and he was sitting up and watching the thing approach with dread. The wind howled as if it were alive and the ghoul's robe, blacker than night itself, whipped about wildly. Its eyes were non-existent; just empty holes in the silken cloth. Even as he stared into those nothing eyes, he began to beg for his life. The thing reached out to him with a skeletal hand, then he broke from sleep, sat up quickly and with a gasp, saw the morning calm. His fire was dead cold. But he little thought of the nightmare as he remembered how the night had unfolded. Whatever the strange howl was, the morning gave no indication of it. Down at the waterhole, all was still.

For the remainder of the morning, he staked it out. Nothing came, not even so much as a deer. Time dragged and he grew bored. As he realized his defeat, he sighed and at about noon, he left to gather more supplies. Although animals mostly watered in the morning, the evening would provide another opportunity and it'd still be worth a try. The cave sheltered him from a sweltering afternoon. When the sun had changed to red and was about to disappear behind the canyon's rim, he again reclined and sat very still on the outcropping of rocks. Two boulders mostly shrouded him but there was a view of the waterhole between them. At his side were two arrows laid out, ready to go.

Para-ah-dee-ah-tran was watching the shadow grow long behind a pine when he noticed motion far down the canyon. It was a startling, springy motion. Some kind of animal must have been galloping this way. It was black and large but far too fast to be a bear. He stared hard, trying to figure out what it was for his vision was not so keen. And then he heard that long wail of last night, only much closer and he was awestruck by the discovery. Closer and closer, it bounded and he realized it was running on two legs. The clarity of it brought a shock to his fragile mind as he took in a hairy, black creature with a barrel chest from which two reptilian arms protruded and swung with its gait. More alarming than that was its head, its worst, most loathsome feature of all, being reptilian also in nature, having two black horns and smoldering red eyes. Para-ah-dee-ah-tran sat cluelessly rigid as the creature bounded up to the waterhole, stopped at its edge and leaned its body over awkwardly to lap at the water. Curved claws gripped the dirt as it steadied itself. Muscular legs flexed as it did this.

He scarcely dared to breathe. As the thing drank, his sense returned. The elders had described various beasts of the forest, which some of them claimed to have seen personally and not one had this likeness. Did they not know of this one or were the mountain spirits shapeshifting so as to tease him? Whatever it was, it was certainly more evil than a bear and more hideous to look upon. A bear has a more prideful existence than this thing of unnatural nastiness. He felt that it didn't deserve to live. And just when he thought this, though Para-ah-dee-ah-tran had made no motion, the creature erected itself abruptly and turned to stare right at him, its pupils narrowing as it even looked through him, those eyes bright like burning embers.

There was no time to think. He grabbed his bow and sheath full of arrows and scampered up the rocks. Behind him, he heard a new sound, a shrill scream as of anger, one which nearly melted his heart. Without turning, he clambered up, never having reacted so quickly in all his life before. Just as he leapt into the manhole, he felt something clip his right calf and he knew the creature had actually touched him for its presence was very heavy upon him. From the back of the cave, he stared while the creature fiercely made lunging motions with its forearms. It was too big to squeeze through. It clawed at the fragile entrance which broke and fell in clumps but otherwise, it could not reach Para-ah-dee-ah-tran. The creature shrieked at him, filling the cave with that awful sound and from its mouth, nasty saliva dripped onto the rocks. For the first time, he noticed the knife-like teeth it bared as it snapped at him. His heart raced almost out of control and yet a small part of him knew that for now, he was safe. Too distracted to look, he only half-realized that his calf burned.

Para-ah-dee-ah-tran thought of his arrows and that he should try them, though the creature seemed impenetrable and he couldn't begin to guess where its heart lie. He aimed one at the center of its great chest and let it fly. The arrow went in a considerable depth but only served to infuriate the creature. It let out a scream but it continued to claw at him with the arrow still stuck. Regretfully, he'd left two arrows behind and there weren't enough arrows to keep fighting it. He struck the beast four more times, hoping it would give up on him before thinking to hit it in a sensitive area, like an eye. So he loaded another arrow as it stared with the comprehension of a lizard but when he let the arrow go, the creature happened to snap at him at the same time and it lodged in the roof of its mouth. Para-ah-dee-ah-tran watched with hope as it shrank back in obvious pain. Oddly, it took the arrow gimpishly with its two hands and pulled it out, although it didn't seem possible for it to do. Blood spurted out and mixed with the saliva so now as it snapped at him, horribly bloody saliva hit the rocks.

Without explanation, the creature backed away and seemed to lug itself down the canyon. Para-ah-dee-ah-tran's heart raced and he sought to slow it down. It was apparent that it was not giving up, only retreating for he could hear snorting just outside. It was going to wait for him. His food and water weren't substantial. The creature, having an instinct foreign to him, would probably be more patient. It would wait and wait until he was dead if necessary. How would he ever get home?

His calf gave a surge of pain so he dared to look at it in the fading light. The claw had drawn a long, shredding mark along the muscle, but he tested it and realized that it wasn't terribly deep, just putting out enough blood to make it look more serious than it was. If he taped it up with a piece of blanket, he could keep the skin attached and medicate it later with ironwood sap. Using his knife, he cut a square and two long, skinny pieces with which to tie the square and neatly wrapped it. The blanket soaked up much of the blood. He then rested his back on the furthest point inside the cave and stretched his legs in front. Twilight descended and still the creature was present, sometimes snorting below or filling the night with that damnable howl and at other times, peering in at him with a suspicious glare.

Para-ah-dee-ah-tran built up a fire and reclined, with one less blanket than before. He ate what little food he had before attempting to close his eyes and catnap to the best of his ability, a truly monumental feat. The flames drew the attention of the creature and yet, it seemed to detest the fire. Intermittently, the creature would perch on the outcropping like an eagle and its illuminated head seemed to hover above the flames as its baccate eyes, eerie and devilish, pierced the dark. He hated looking for he knew that that image would forever remain etched in his mind and would plague him with doubts only immortals are fit to possess. It was a long night from which he garnered hardly any sleep.

At the first hint of morning, the last star twinkled out and Para-ah-dee-ah-tran drew up his head warily with some hope. A small remnant of his fire smoked but gave no light. There was no more wood. He listened for a long time, too leery to approach the entrance for fear that he'd be suddenly snatched away. He set an arrow in his bow, aimed it for the rocks across the canyon and shot. The head squarely struck a boulder and bounced back with a