He ran a hand through his hair and grinned. “I know.”
A glimmering golden swirl twisted around his legs, up his body, and swept him away in a hundred million perfect pieces. I fell to the dirt, an agonizing wail popping from my lungs, carried away with the wind. With white-knuckled fists, I pounded the earth, damning the heavens for taking him away from me.
God won’t help now, Lynn. I sniffed, reining in my tears. No time for crying. The day would pass and bring night and with it another change. There was no time for feeling sorry for myself.
“Carolynn Russell,” I said aloud. “You get your butt up off this ground and get out of these woods. You ain’t doin’ nobody any good cryin’ in the dirt.” I was talking to myself, but it was my nana’s voice I heard in my head.
She’d been my guide, the voice in my head, since I was old enough to have one. Nana would lay down her life to help me, no questions, no judgments. She always knew what was wrong and had some way of fixing it. Telling her what I’d done, admitting what I was, terrified me. Downright scared the beastly shit out of me. But losing Garret, that fear burned scars into my soul.
Courage bubbled up inside me until I couldn’t stop my muscles from taking over and doing what my head couldn’t. I sat up straight, squared my shoulders, and stood. One long, deep pull of air into my lungs, then out. I closed my eyes, feeling the beast stir inside me. Help.
My feet moved on instinct alone, carrying me through the woods. Strong legs pumped, an ancient tribal woman moving through her territory: fearless. The chilly morning wind in my face drew a grin across my cheeks. Ancient, powerful blood thumped through my body, feeding even the tiniest muscles—toes gripping roots underfoot, keeping me upright.
It’d been days since my head was clear, solid. No mess of worry or thoughts of who I was, what I’d become. What we’d done. The beast was in me, guiding me, showing me the way home.
My legs burned. Sticks and jagged rocks sliced my feet. I ran anyway, pushing forward, knowing I’d be there soon. Through a gathering of trees ahead, the worn-out green paint of my pickup.
One last shove of adrenaline, I burst from the woods. A woman, a beast, a warrior. I couldn’t stop my momentum and I slammed into the side of my truck with an echoed thud.
Without thought, I slid into my dirty jeans and pulled the shirt over my head. Heart wild in my chest, my fingers stayed steady. I shoved the key home and fired her up. The old beast—my first one—roared to a start.
A maniacal grin shoved my eyes into squints. I shoved the mirror away so I didn’t have to see myself, the wild thing I’d become. I had a few hours to put her to bed for the day, my beastly thing. We couldn’t right scare Nana, now.
Tell Me I’m No Monster
Nana’s house—a small once-white shotgun two-bedroom—sat at the end of a long dirt road pocked with potholes and lined in weeds. Paint had been chipping off for years and the screen had holes in it, but it was hers outright and she was proud of it.
Granddaddy’s hawthorn stood guard out front. My chin quivered at the sight, recalling Rusty’s promise and our summers together. “Fuck,” I hissed, choking on pity.
I swiped a hand across my filthy face, likely doing nothing to the mask of death I wore. The truck’s heavy steel door clanged when I slammed it shut. There’d be no doubt I was out front. No turning back now. I stood on Nana’s old porch, staring through the dusty screen door waiting for that divine providence to give me a push.
“Lynnie,” she shouted from the kitchen, wiping her hands on a blue-checked apron tied around her thick middle. The sound of a ring on every finger clanking brought comfort, nearly sent me to my knees. “Your brother’s been on the hunt for you.”
My lip shook. “I know,” I squeaked.
“You all right, sugar?” She pushed the screen door out my way to let me in. “Why you standing out there in the sun? Come on in.”
Two steps in and my trembling legs betrayed me, sending me to my knees. My body hit the hardwood floor with a sickening thump. I stared at Nana’s slim bare feet and skinny legs.
“Carolynn Russell, you get up off that floor. Ain’t no reason to be on your knees in this house unless you’re cleanin’ or prayin’. I don’t see a rag in your hand. You prayin’?”
Not anymore. I looked up at her and shook my head, tears pooling at my lashes. I’d left my warrior beast strength in the truck.
“Didn’t think so. Now, you move yourself out of the way. I can’t shut the door.”
I nodded and scooted to the couch, slinking up the cushion without standing on two feet.
“Now, where in all of heaven and earth have you been? Garret’s been calling here fussing about you for a full day. I liked to’ve come out there myself and look for you if he’d not asked me to stay put. Said there’s an animal out there in the woods slicing people up. Oh, Lynnie, you’re lucky he didn’t call your mama.”
I hadn’t heard from her in a few weeks, but the phone call on my birthday. It wasn’t like I’d expected much from her, but she could’ve called me when I got out of the hospital. My mom was a good person, but without a man around to hold her down, she’d flitter off like a butterfly. “Where’s Mama?” Daddy’d been out on hauls all summer, no expectations there.
Nana sat beside me on the couch. “Garret didn’t want her upset.” My aching eyes didn’t have it in them to roll proper. “You know how she can be.” I did. She’d pack my bags herself and force me back home, shouting all the way how I was too young to be out on my own. Mama had always had the idea that I couldn’t handle myself no matter how grown I was. Or how little she could handle her own self. She could run out on Daddy on a whim. She could be gone for days. But heaven forbid her baby girl wanted to be free to live her own damn life. Whatever that was.
I laid my head on Nana’s overstuffed chest. “Nanny, I’m in trouble.”
She ran her fingers through my hair without a snag. When I was a kid, I thought it was magic how all those rings never caught in my long hair. “I could tell that by the dirt on your face.” Her heart thumped slowly, skipping half a beat then picked up again. “What’s got you snarled?”
“Heaps,” I whined. “Heaps and heaps.” I pulled in a shaky breath.
She patted my head. The beating in her chest changed rhythm. “You ain’t seen the start of trouble yet, girl.”
I sat up. “What?”
Blue eyes watched my face, then looked down at her hands. “Carolynn Russell, you better keep your soul about you, baby. God’s on your side, but He’s not in control of this. You got a long row to hoe and it ain’t gonna be easy.”
I blinked. And blinked again. “Rusty…” I swallowed, vomit bobbing in my throat. “What’s happening to me?”
Nana’s milky blue eyes glistened. “I knew the day you was born you’d become something special. Something different. Something most folks wouldn’t understand.” I shook my head in disbelief. “Your brother didn’t have the soul for it. Most men don’t. But you, my girl….” She nodded once.
“Soul for what?” Worried thoughts flooded back in. “What the hell am I?”
“You watch that mouth, Carolynn.” She took a deep breath and went back to her story. “Rusty came to me last night. Bless his heart.” I blinked a thousand times, not comprehending what she was saying. “I was thankful for the visit, but I didn’t need it. I knew, felt it in my heart, the night they made you.”
In the woods I knew Nana would help me, even if she wasn’t sure how. I’d never imagined that she’d known all along. “How— What am I?”
“Something ancient. Been around since man was throwing rocks at the moon.” Her voice, sure as the day was long, sounded far away, like talking through a can on a string. The sound of my own heart threatened to drown her out. “It was only a matter of time. The changing of the guards I guess. It’s been sixty years, give or take.” She looked down a
t her well-weathered hands, picking beneath a curved nail. “How was he? Still as beautiful as I remember him?”
The thrumming in my head screeched to stop. The man in the woods. “Rusty?” I asked, hoping.
“He’d always been a sweet boy, my Percy. How was he?”
What could I say? “Naked.” I’d killed that man. Tore into his throat until it gushed tangy blood into my mouth. “Young….”
“Handsome?” I nodded. She shrugged. “Before he died,” she added. Shock hit my face like a back-handed slap. “You ain’t the first, baby girl. You won’t be the last.”
My worry party’d been crashed by confusion and clarity swooped in with a sucker punch. It was a garish mess that would surely alert the law before long.
I sat back and stared at her. Tight white curls spiraled in tuffs from her head. Aunt Bobbi must’ve come by to give it a fresh perm . She’d sat there getting her hair done, gossiping, knowing full well I was about to become something special. That old woman had known all along this would happen and she hadn’t said one damn word.
There was betrayal, pissing on the rug, puking in the roses.
“It would’ve been… forty-two? Yes. I’d turned twenty that year.” She picked at the skin around her nail. “I’d worried for a year that he’d go off to fight in that damn war and I’d lose him for good.” Sniff. “That night, under that damn moon, I left him. Alone in the woods with those… women. We should’ve never been out in those damn woods. Just couldn’t help ourselves.” She breathed soft, lost in memory. “I ran so far and so fast I’d like to’ve never found my way to the highway. It was dawn before I came across a single soul out that night. By the time we found them again, they were already dead.”
“The women?” I choked. “He killed them?” She nodded once. “You could’ve died, Nanny.” I grabbed her hand. “I ki—”
“I know. I know, baby.” Fear and sadness mingled at the tip of my nose. “Don’t you cry, now. Ain’t no time for it.” She patted my hand once and let it go.
Nana’s mostly blind cat slinked through the kitchen and into the living room, winding between her legs. “We’d looked for him, the whole town.” Havana hadn’t grown much in sixty years so I imagined a search party of twenty people, mostly all relation, shoving through the woods with torches. Pitchforks if they’d known the beast they were out hunting. “Our wedding day would’ve been three days later.”
I made a sad noise in the back of my throat. Rusty popped into my head. “What’d you do?”
She grinned at me. “I went home, looked for Móraí, my granny. She’d had a secret too.”
“I guess it runs in the family.”
“In the blood.” It’d been a joke. “Mostly. Percy took mine. My death.” Heavy breaths heaved my chest. “The deaths I would bring.”
“What am I?” I whispered.
Her face went still. “People around here call it the howler.”
I blinked at her. “The Ozark Howler? I’m the fucking Ozark Howler? A damn tall tale?”
She snapped at me. “Watch your mouth, girl.”
“That’s a real thing? I mean, it seems so… lame.” I’d been fully prepared for something you’d find in a dusty old book in the back of a magic shop. But a mountain myth?
“These old rednecks wouldn’t know an ancient beast from the hole in their ass. That’s just the name they gave it.”
“It? Me.”
“Do you have the marks?” I shoved my blonde brows into the middle. “On your body somewhere? Black lines, like tattoos. Percy had them on his arm.” She pulled on both my arms, inspecting them for tattoos.
I yanked my arms from her grip, rubbing the idea from my tingling skin. “Maybe it’s not real. Maybe I’m something else.” That seemed worse.
She looked down her nose at me. “Haven’t seen your mama yet?”
I shook my head. “Not in a while.”
She nodded. “Mm.”
“Mm? What does that even mean?” I groaned and flopped back on her couch. “Nana, I’m so lost. I need you to tell me what to do.”
She shook her head. “You’re gonna have to figure this one out, Lynn. I can’t tell you what I don’t know.”
“Why didn’t you tell me? You knew I’d become this beast.” I jumped from the couch. “You let this happen,” I shouted and stamped my foot with an echo.
Nana clapped her hands at me like I was a dog. I guess that fit. “You calm yourself now, Lynnie. You ain’t getting anywhere being ornery.” She huffed. “I know you’re scared. You ought’a be. Only idiots have no fear. Fear will keep you safe. But you gotta keep that under your hat. You hear me?” I nodded, lips pulled tight. “Be strong. Be with God.”
“God? Where’s God? He ain’t here, I’ll tell you that. He wasn’t with me in the woods when I killed Rusty.” I swallowed the word down like a bitter pill stuck on the back of my tongue. “When I killed Percy or those women. Where was God?” I waited a second for the man Himself to come down from the heavens and prove me wrong. He didn’t.
Nana stuck her chin out. “You may not’ve seen him, you better believe He was there.” She nodded, letting me know she was right and I damn well better get on board. “I’m sorry I waited. I’m sorry I waited even after Rusty. I just hoped… I hoped it wasn’t true.”
“I could’ve stopped it,” I whimpered.
“No. Ain’t no stopping it. Ain’t no leaving it. You’re no monster, Lynn. You’re death for some. Vengeance for others. You’ll kill. You’ll hide.” Her voice shook. “You’ll leave. And you’ll die. Young and perfect.”
“I’ll never get married.” Rusty’s face grinned at me. “I’ll never have kids.” I panted. “I’ll never have a night to sleep in my own damn bed.” White spots specked my vision.
My legs gave and I fell to my knees. I dropped my head into her lap, back-shaking sobs pouring out.
“You got two choices, Carolynn Russell. You can sit on my dusty floor and cry until you turn into that beast and gobble me up. Or you can get up, shake away those tears, and deal with your demons like a real woman should.”
My nana had two ways of handling things. She’d either hold you and rock you until whatever was wrong went away, or she’d smack you in the head and tell you to shake it off no matter how bad it was. She was scared. I heard it in her voice.
“I ain’t scared of nothing.” She read my mind. Or maybe it’d been written all over my face. “Especially not a little green dog.”
“I feel more like a cat,” I said, muffled against her cotton dress.
“You better not run from me. I lived without Percy. I can’t live without you.” I looked up at her. She wiped wet cheeks. She’d lost two people she loved to the beast. It wasn’t surprising she’d kept it from me. How could you tell a little girl she’d one day be a green monster of death?
“I am scared. I’m scared for Garret. And You. And Hattie. Hell, Nanny, the whole damn town.” I snotted all over her blue-checkers.
“Don’t you worry about this town. They’ve survived a lot more than an old green cat. If Percy managed to not swallow up the whole town, I reckon you’ll be just fine.”
Percy left. I blinked tears down my cheek that soaked into a wet spot I’d made. “What am I supposed to do?” Eventually, I’d have to leave too.
She sighed. “Well, baby, I don’t know. But when you figure it out, you best come and tell me. I’d been waiting on Percy to come back and tell me all about it.” Her voice got low, thick with sorrow.
“There’s not a secret scroll hidden in an old chest in the cellar or nothing?” I looked up at her. Darkness moved across her eyes a second before laughter washed it away.
Her round belly shook. “Where’d you come up with that?” She had a silver tooth that flashed when she smiled.
I sat quiet, listening to the sound of her rings sliding through
my hair. “Nanny. Tell me I’m no monster.” Glassy wet eyes, looking so much like Garret’s, look down at me. “Tell me I’m just a girl.” Tell me it’s all a nightmare.
“You’re something so much more than just a girl, Lynn.”
I shook my head. “I don’t want it. Take it back. I’m scared for me more than anyone, Nana. Scared that one day soon I’ll just be the beast.”
“You will always be Sharlene Carolynn Diamond Russell and I will always love you. Ain’t no beast can take that away from you.” She held my face between her two hands. Rough bandages wrapped tight around the bands of a few rings to keep them sized right scratched my cheeks. “My mama was an fáidh. Saw things, images from God, she’d say. Said it was in the blood.” The gory face of the redhaired woman flashed in my memory. Her fiery hair the same shade as my great gran’s before it went white. I swallowed back the sick that came along with it. “Ancestors were some kinda druids, you know. We come by it honest, some would say.” She was smiling and showing off that silver tooth again. “But she was just an old Irish woman. Had superstitions for everything. Even said there were fairies out in these woods.” Nana had retold those stories so many times I could say them backwards. “A family of divine women, I guess.”
I thought about Mama. “Must’ve skipped a generation.”
Nana raised her barely-there brows and stifled a chuckle at her only daughter’s expense. She took one quick breath, nodded, and stood up. “You better get yourself on home to your brother before he comes out of his britches. You’re lucky he didn’t get the law after you.” I’d have rather the law than Sue Ellen Russell. “You know he’d die right along with you if something ever happened.”
Something did happen. “I have to stay away from him. What if I hurt him like—”
“Garret will just have to take his chances. Come on, now,” she said, pulling me from the floor.
“What if—”
“No. You have no room for ifs anymore, Carolynn. Whatever your job on this earth, you’ve already clocked in. Get to it, girl.”
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