The Lion of Farside by John Dalmas

“Staked out a chicken?”

“Oh, that’s right, yewr from up Illinois way. Yew don’t know ’bout Injun Knob. It’s a spirit mountain, and every full moon, the spirit comes a-hootin’.”

“A-hootin’?”

“Yep. At midnight. Most folks cain’t yere it, but I can, ’cause I’m a conjure woman.”

“Really!”

“Yep. And it’s good to give it a little somethin’ now and then. I’ll go up there, and the chicken’ll be gone. It always is.”

“Mightn’t a fox have taken it?” I asked. “Or some other animal?” I’d read they still had wolves in the Ozarks.

“Not up there. Ain’t no critters go up there on the night of the full moon. Fact is, up on top they ain’t no critters anytime, not even birds. They know better. A couple times been young fellas went up there on a dare, the evenin’ of a full moon, and they ain’t none of ’em ever come back down. Then, eight, ten years ago, a perfessor come yere from the university with another feller, both of ’em wearing big ol’ pistols on their side, and they never come back, neither.” She cackled again. “The sheriff come with a posse, a day or two later, and combed the woods, but couldn’t find hide nor hair of ’em.”

The hairs on my neck started to bristle, and the old woman grinned at me. “Yew wanna go up there with me?”

I nodded. Varia had said there was more than one gate.

After breakfast, we started up the mountain on a little footpath. Most of the birds were back for the summer, and the woods was full of their singing. I saw gray squirrel and chipmunks and rabbit turds, and lots and lots of oaks and clumps of pine. It was a long steep path, with lots of stops for the old woman to rest a minute, till finally I could see the top close ahead. There was lots of bedrock showing by that time, and the trees were sparse and small. And there weren’t any more birds or squirrels or chipmunks. I’m not sure what they felt that kept them away, but I was feeling something that had my neck hairs bristling again. Either that or I was imagining.

We took one last rest, the old woman breathing hard, and frowning.

“Anything the matter?” I asked her.

She didn’t answer, and after a minute we went on. At the top, she knelt down by a knee-high pine seedling with a leather thong tied to it: the tether she’d tied the chicken with. But there wasn’t any chicken now, nor feathers nor blood, like a possum or bobcat would have left. Just the leather thong, which was either awful short to start with, or something had shortened it.

She still wasn’t talking, and the frown was still there. She stood up and closed her eyes so tight her whole face skrinched together, and she began mumbling something I couldn’t make out. Cold chills ran down me from the top of my head to my feet. After a minute she started to talk.

“Some folks were up yere last night, in the dark. Two men and two women, folks o’ power. And the mountain took three of ’em—not et ’em; received ’em—two witchy women, young and perty, and one of the men. I’m a-goin’ back down, right now.”

We went. She didn’t have anything more to say all the way to her cabin. I didn’t either, but my brain was going a mile a minute.

I knew just what I was going to do: get me a job around there somewhere, on a farm or in the woods. It wouldn’t need to pay cash; bed and board would be plenty, and the bed could be hay in the barn. I had twenty-seven dollars in my shoe, more than enough to buy a pistol and a good rifle, and plenty of shells. And I’d be back on top of Injun Knob before dark, on the night of the next full moon.

PART 2: The Twice-Stolen Bride

5: Xader

The top of Injun Knob appeared ordinary in the moonlight, half bald, its scrubby trees scattered. The gate hadn’t opened yet, but Varia could feel it. Chuckling, Xader put his arms around her from behind, groping her through her housedress: “Might as well enjoy ourselves while we wait,” he murmured, and kissed her neck. His inborn psionic talent was sufficient that, unless she took him by surprise, he could hold off whatever magic she might try with handcuffs on. So she stamped hard on his instep, and swearing, he let her go, stepping back from her.

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