by Willow Rose
And then she did.
He ran out of the forest and towards the cage, a big wolf with no tail running on only two legs like a human. Sara froze and stood still without making a noise and still the wolf sensed her. He stopped and looked straight at her. Her heart was threatening to jump out of her chest. His mouth was covered in blood from some animal he must have been eating. Or maybe it was from a human?
What would he do next? Jump her?
He walked closer to her and she could hear his heavy breath that sounded a bit like a horse. He stood in front of her looking like he might jump at any moment and devour her in a second.
And then she stared right into his eyes and saw something: the eyes of a boy. The very sad eyes of a boy not much older than her.
“I swear I will kill you if you touch her.”
The voice came from behind her. It was Moeselman, and he was pointing a big rifle at the wolf.
“Get back in your cage,” he said while stepping closer to the wolf still holding the rifle in its direction.
The wolf didn’t move but just stared at Sara.
“Now!” he yelled.
The eyes let go of Sara’s and the wolf obeyed. A few seconds later he was back in the cage and locked in. Sara couldn’t help but stare at him as he spun a few times around in the cage and then lay down as she had seen dogs do.
Moeselman looked at Sara.
“Don’t ever do that again,” he said.
She shook her head.
“If you are scared, he will smell it right away,” Moeselman said when they walked back to the caravan. “Then he will be dangerous. It is best not to show fear in front of a werewolf.”
“I will remember that,” Sara said.
Moeselman then sighed. He stopped and put his arm around Sara and squeezed her tight. “Always remember what I tell you. The woods and mountains are filled with scary creatures. Especially at night. Never show any fear when you meet them. Is that understood?”
“Understood.”
Moeselman yawned.
“Good. Now let’s get some shuteye.”
The following days, Sara couldn’t pass the cage without staring into it. Every once in a while she would meet the Wolfboy’s eyes and see that same look she saw that night. She couldn’t figure out if he was an animal in a boy’s body or if it was the other way around. Even in the daytime when he had a human shape his appearance was animal-like, with his big, bushy eyebrows that met at the bridge of the nose, the long and curved fingernails, low-set ears and swinging stride.
But the eyes always seemed to belong to a boy. A lonely and sad boy trapped inside the body of a beast. And she couldn’t help but wonder how he had become like this. How did anyone become a werewolf?
One day she asked Moeselman and he told her that he didn’t know how Wolfboy had become werewolf. He was like this when they found him.
“Where did you find him?”
“At a marketplace. A guy had caught him in the forest and was selling him. But who would want to buy a werewolf? He would just end up killing you in your sleep.”
“So why did you?”
“Because I looked him in the eyes and saw exactly the same as you did the other night. I saw a boy. I couldn’t just leave him there. People were throwing rocks at him and yelling stuff at him. I guess you can say I felt bad for the boy.”
“Doesn’t he have a real name?”
“Sure. It is Sami. But everyone here calls him Wolfboy.”
Sara was glad that the big Moeselman had a big heart to match. And from that night on she was no longer scared of Sami in the cage. She never went out to see him in the night, but she would sometimes wake up and listen to him howl at the moon.
From time to time she would get an urge during the daytime to go and talk to him in the cage, but she always stopped herself when she remembered her father’s words.
THE THIEF
In the fall, the forest turned brown just before all the leaves fell off the trees. The wind started to blow and brought the winter with it.
“These are the hard months for the Romani,” Sara’s mother explained.
In the winter most of the marketplaces were closed for business since people stayed home, and if they went to buy something they would hurry back home and wouldn’t take their time to stop and watch a performance.
So they made no money.
No more meat for dinner and no more music and dancing. The Romani, too, stayed inside their wagons where it was easier to keep warm. This year it was an exceptionally hard winter with lots of snow and frost. So the tribe decided to travel south for the winter and by January they reached Spain.
“Home of the flamenco,” Settela said as they crossed the border through the mountains.
“Flamenco? What is that,” Sara asked.
“It is a Romani dance,” her mother replied. ”You will see it soon enough.”
Sara saw it a couple of weeks later. The tribe had reached the southern part of Spain where the sun hadn’t stopped shining and the snow could no longer reach them. They had camped outside the town of Granada were the marketplace would open the next morning at seven, they were told.
As always, they camped in a clearing in the forest, but this time Moeselman asked the men of the tribe to stand guard around their camp.
“These Spanish forests are filled with thieves and bandits only waiting for us to go to sleep so they can steal all our possessions,” he said when Sara asked what he was scared of.
“I am not scared, Moeselman is never scared, but I am prepared,” he yelled. “Everybody should watch out for these Spanish thieves, don’t ever trust them,” he said while putting a fist in the air. “I once had a golden medallion that I had gotten from my dead mother and they had the nerve to come into my caravan while I was sleeping and steal it from around my neck in the middle of the night.”
Moeselman spat at the dusty ground where it hadn’t rained in weeks.
“They are nothing but cowards and dishonest fools. You all better be aware of these people, or they will steal your souls.” He continued his roaring while the women of the tribe shivered with fear.
If there was one thing a Romani was afraid of it was to lose their soul.
So they searched the forest and found no one else nearby. They did discover another camp, though, in the valley on the other side of the river.
“They are Gitano, Spanish Romani,” one of the men that had been sent out to scout said.
Moeselman snorted and spat at the ground again.
“Just as I had expected. That scum. We need to get rid of them so they won’t come near the marketplace tomorrow.”
Moeselman spat at the dusty ground again.
“What if we spread a rumor?” one of the belly dancers suggested.
“We could tell the village people that they are cursed with a bad spirit and that they would bring bad luck to the town if they let them in,” an elderly woman said.
“Or maybe we could put a bad spell on them,” another woman said while holding her newborn baby in her arms. “A spell of bad luck.”
Moeselman was thinking. Sara knew that immediately because he always rubbed his beard when he was thinking.
“Since we don’t put bad spells on people that haven’t actually done anything to us, we will spread the rumor. It wouldn’t even be a lie, since these people do mean bad luck to have around,” he said.
Sara couldn’t believe what she had just heard. She got up and confronted Moeselman. She poked him in his big fat belly and stood with anger in front of him.
“That’s not nice,” she said. “Aren’t they Romani just like we are? Shouldn’t we be helping each other instead?”
Everybody in the crowd that had gathered around the bonfire was silent and awaited the big Moeselman’s answer. No one would ever dare to talk to him while he was in his angry mood (Before Sara came to the tribe, that is.) And especially not like that.
Even the strong man Gabriel stepped a little back in order
not to be in the line of fire. Moeselman snorted again and grumbled to himself. His face was red when he looked at Sara, and people would later say that they were certain he had smoke coming out of his ears. But much to everyone’s surprise he did not burst into one of his explosive tantrums like he used to. Instead he shook his head, turned his back to Sara and left.
Settela, Sara’s mother, put her arm around her shoulders.
“They are nothing like us. They are dishonest, they steal, they cheat, they are the ones giving the Romani people a bad reputation,” she took over and explained to her while Moeselman, mumbling and grumbling, went back to his caravan.
You see, Moeselman could never be really mad at Sara, for he loved her too much. Just the mere sight of her would make his heart pound with love. And he couldn’t have anyone knowing that her feisty temper reminded him of himself so much that he had to laugh out loud as soon as he was alone in the caravan.
That evening after dinner Sara left the camp area without anyone noticing it. They were all way too busy eating Spanish food and drinking the Spanish wine and singing and dancing to see her wander off.
Why did she do it? Because she was curious and wanted to see the Gitanos with her own eyes. Because she was the child of a fearless leader, she herself wanted to become fearless, and everyone knows that the only way to conquer your fear is to face it. On top of it all she didn’t want to be afraid of something she had never seen. That was just plain stupid, she thought while she ran through the forest hoping not to disturb any of the creatures of the night.
She came to the valley and crossed the bridge over the river. Lights and the sound of music filled the forest as she neared the camp of the Gitano people. She climbed one of the trees in the clearing and had a good view at the people her father had told her would steal her soul if she let them.
“They have made a pact with the devil,” he told her. “They have sold their souls to the evil spirits so they would have prosperity.”
So Sara wanted to see what the devil’s people looked like. She imagined they would have horns on their heads and tails on their backs. But they were nothing like that.
They looked perfectly normal (as normal as a Romani-tribe could be) sitting around their bonfire, clapping their hands while a girl danced in front of them.
She wore a big red and black dress. Sara liked the rhythm. It reminded her of the music her own tribe played only faster and more tempered.
The young woman stood still for a second. Only her chest was moving, while she breathed. She was looking straight in front of her with an intense almost angry look. On her forehead little beads of sweat glittered. Her mouth with the extremely red lips was a little open. A couple of seconds later the magic silence was transformed into a powerful movement. The woman stomped rhythmically on the wooden panel she was standing on. It made a loud noise. Her arms were moving fast in front of her face and over her head. Then she took her skirts and lifted them just so that they still covered her knees and then she swung them around her.
“Así se baila! Baile bueno! Olé,” the crowd yelled and clapped.
Then a boy sat next to her with his guitar and began to play fast and with great feeling The rhythm was incredible.
For hours Sara let the sounds, the lights and the smells blend and enclose her, and she had the feeling of being the witness to something truly magical. A passionate performance, she didn’t quite understand but it still allured her.
When the woman was done, everyone got up and started dancing and singing and Sara forgot all about getting back to her own camp.
When she finally remembered that she had to get back and climbed down from the tree, someone was waiting for her. As she placed her foot on the ground she heard a voice behind her.
“Who are you?”
She turned around and looked into the eyes of the boy that had played on the guitar earlier in the evening. He was a little taller than her, had brown eyes and curly brown hair under his soft hat. Her heart started to pound remembering what her dad had said about the Gitano people.
“Please don’t take my soul,” she said.
The boy laughed out loud.
“Why are you laughing?”
“Well, I haven’t heard that one before. A lot of other things, but never that one,” he said.
“What do you mean by that?”
“People call us all kinds of things and are scared of us for a lot of reasons.”
“That is because you take people’s souls. You have made a pact with the devil,” Sara said. “That is what I have heard.”
“You heard wrong,” the boy said.
Sara stared at the boy. Was she supposed to be afraid of him?
“So what do you do?”
“We sing and dance and I play the guitar. Flamenco.”
Sara had a hard time believing him.
“Is that all? What about bad spells? Do you curse people?”
“I don’t know anything about that. But you best be running along now. It has gotten very dark and the creatures are coming out soon.”
Sara looked into the forest and saw nothing but darkness.
“I am not afraid of a little darkness,” she said.
“Then maybe you are the one having made a pact with the devil,” the boy said. “I wouldn’t go in there without being on good terms with the evil spirits. That is for sure.”
Sara crossed her arms in front of her chest.
“I haven’t but I will be just fine,” she said, turning around and starting walking away.
She tried really hard not to do it, but after walking for awhile she turned around and looked to see if he was still standing where she had left him.
He wasn’t.
“Humph,” she said and entered the forest, leaving all the light behind her.
Sara tried to remember her way back and as she walked she grew confident that she would. She remembered a small clearing, a pond, and a big stone that she had passed earlier. She walked carefully always looking back to see if anything or anyone was behind her, and she would look up to see if anything was about to jump her from a tree. She stepped carefully not to disturb any sleeping animals or awaken the senses of the creatures that were already stirring. She could be as quiet as a mouse in her attempt not to let them know she was there.
But even though they are very quiet, mice often get trapped.
As Sara came to a larger clearing in the forest, she was sure she heard music. Thinking it was coming from her own camp, she started running towards it, but as she did she went deeper and deeper into the forest and suddenly she no longer recognized anything from earlier. The music seemed to come from far away, but it was so alluring she didn’t notice that it was really enticing her to go further and further away from the path she was following. And deeper into the forest. Deep into the heart of the forest where Nyx, the spirit of the night, lived with her brood of dark spirits, including the three fates, Sleep, Strife and Pain. They lived out of human souls. They devoured them.
And what Sara didn’t know was that they were the ones making the music trying to get her to go so deep into the forest that she would give up on finding a way out and then they would lull her to sleep with their sweet songs and calming music. If they succeeded in doing so, they could steal her soul and feast on it.
But Sara didn’t know any of all that, so she kept walking and walking until her legs were so tired she had to stop.
She sat down and leaned against a big rock.
“Maybe if I closed my eyes for just a second,” she mumbled as her eyelids slowly were about to close. The music, it was so … it made her so … sleepy.
As the eyelids finally closed on both her eyes, four spirits emerged over her head. The beautiful blond women in their light blue dresses were spinning around, singing their alluring songs, whispering in her ears that it was time to go to sleep, and then they started singing the lullabies from Sara’s childhood to her.
“Just let me sleep for a little while,” Sara mumb
led as she slipped slowly into the unforeseeable world of dreams.
The spirits now stood close to her still humming the songs, and as Sara slipped away they transformed themselves into beasts. Out of their beautiful goddess faces emerged beastlike teeth as they got themselves ready to devour Sara’s poor unknowing soul.
But just as the spirit of Pain opened her mouth and stuck her teeth into Sara’s neck in order to suck the soul out, a sound came out of the forest.
“Noo! You can’t fall asleep!”
It was the guitar-boy that Sara had met earlier. He was running towards her yelling as loud as he could in order to wake her up.
The spirits hissed like angry cats but they couldn’t touch him since he wasn’t asleep. Pain sucked all she could while the boy grabbed Sara and started shaking her.
“Wake up! Wake up!” He yelled all he could to try and penetrate her consciousness.
But she was too sound asleep. Her mind had drifted too far and was no longer in this world.
The spirits laughed as they were spinning around in the air. Pain was still sucking the life out of Sara.
Then the guitar-boy thought about what had always saved him in difficult situations and he took his guitar from his back and started playing. He played all he could as strong and tempered as his granddad had taught him and as loud as he had ever done before, enough to overpower the spell of the spirit’s song.
His fingers were hurting and even some of them started bleeding as he gave the performance of his life.
In her world of dreams Sara heard the guitar playing far, far away and suddenly felt like she was ripped out of her daze, the heavy spell that she had been put under and had not been able to escape on her own.
Now she realized that something was wrong and she fought all she knew how to in order to get back to life.
A struggle for her life was going on inside her.
“I want to live,” she screamed silently. “I want to live … I want to live …”
By her strong will to live she was able to break the spell and a moment later she opened her eyes.