Living Ghosts and Mischievous Monsters

by Dan SaSuWeh Jones

  With his last ounce of strength he picked up his bow and arrow, aimed, and shot the buffalo closest to him. With a thump it fell beside him. It looked into his eyes as its life slipped away.

  “Thank you,” he whispered as his eyes closed forever.

  The last thing he heard, in the distance, were prayers of joy.

  The Kushtaka

  BASED ON A TLINGIT TALE, ALASKA, TOLD BY BROCK BATTENFIELD, SMALL TOWN MYTHS

  The Tlingit people of Alaska say the Kushtaka are evil spirit beings, part human and part otter. Their name roughly means “land otter men.” As shape-shifters, they change from one being to the other, and have even been described as “were-otters.” Kushtaka haunt the Alaska Triangle—a triangular stretch of land from Juneau, the state capital in southern Alaska, to Barrow, in the north. Across the area’s forests, mountains, caves, and icy landscapes, more than sixteen thousand travelers have disappeared since 1988. Perhaps fog or freezing temperatures or avalanches or wild animals are to blame. The Tlingit know better.

  It was Saturday night. A boy’s parents were away for the weekend and his friends were hanging out at his house. They passed the time the way high schoolers do, playing video games and watching TV. Soon it was well past midnight, and the boys had gotten bored. Someone suggested taking a nighttime walk through the woods.

  They all agreed. The boy’s house was just outside Juneau, and it sat near thick woods. The woods were especially scary at night—and the boys were in search of a fright.

  The group pulled on their boots, hats, and jackets made for zero-degree weather. They had spent plenty of time in the woods in winter. The snow would be deep and the temperatures cold.

  Otherwise, they weren’t concerned about anything dangerous. They knew their way through the forest. Because it was winter, the bears were hibernating, and other animals hid when humans came near.

  The boys headed out. The night was black, and clouds blocked the moonlight. A faint reflection of light bounced off the deep, white snow. The group could make out only shadows along a dim path into the woods. They crunched the snow as they tramped up a hillside, laughing and joking.

  Suddenly someone came running up from the back of the group, breathing hard. Everyone stopped and stared at him.

  “You look like you’ve seen a ghost!” the boys at the front teased.

  The boy sputtered: “There … there was snow crunching behind me. The steps stayed right behind me, like … like it was following us.”

  “Ha!” laughed one boy. “Maybe it’s a Kushtaka!”

  The rest of the group fell silent. They began looking behind them.

  Since they were little boys they had heard the Tlingit legend of the Kushtaka. If you are lost or injured in the Alaska wildlands, you’ll be approached by a man or a group of men. They’ll seem very friendly and kind, like kinsmen who are there to help you. Then they’ll lead you to a safe place—at least they say it’s safe. In reality, they bring you deeper and deeper into the unknown wilderness.

  Gradually, the kind men transform into creatures that look like large otters. And they are evil. By the time you notice, it’s too late. They will either tear you apart or turn you into a Kushtaka like them. Then your soul is trapped for eternity in an otter’s body.

  “I heard that Kushtaka make cries like a lost woman or a baby,” one boy piped up. “You try to rescue them and the Kushtaka captures you.”

  “I haven’t heard any babies crying,” said another boy. “We’re OK!”

  “We should have brought my dog,” said the boy whose house they’d been at. “Kushtaka are afraid of dogs.”

  “Hey, c’mon, guys!” another boy said. “It’s just a story. Parents tell it to keep their little kids from wandering into the woods.”

  “Yeah,” said the boy who lived there. “Anyway, it’s freezing out here and it’s almost three o’clock in the morning. Let’s head home.”

  Quickly the group walked back, each boy looking intently into the woods, covering every direction, listening for anything odd. At last they reached the edge of the dense tree line and saw the house ahead, glowing warmly.

  A baby’s cry pierced the darkness.

  In a dead sprint the group took off for the safety of the house. Once they’d made it into the yard, one of the boys turned around to look back at the forest. What he saw standing there was like no creature of nature.

  About five feet tall, the thing stood straight up on its hind legs. It resembled an otter—but things were definitely not right. Large patches of thick brown fur covered its body. Wherever fur was missing, black, leathery skin shone through. Its almost humanlike hands were covered in the same black skin, with spindly, bony fingers that ended in large claws.

  The thing held the boy’s gaze, its head cocked to one side and its mouth twisted into an evil smile. Its teeth were long and sharp. Its eyes were a bright, burning yellow. With a wretched shriek, it fell on all fours and sprinted toward the group.

  Clambering over one another, the boys closest to the house rushed inside and slammed the door shut. But one boy was still outside.

  “Where is he?” shouted the boy who lived there. “He was right with us!”

  Terrified, the boys crowded around the window. Just outside, they saw the boy who had stopped to look back. He wasn’t calling for help or trying to get inside. He faced the woods calmly, as if frozen in place.

  Then he was on the ground, the creature bent over him, its fangs and claws moving closer.

  A loud bark shattered the night air. The boy’s dog raced toward the beast, growling and snapping. The terrified creature sprang from the boy and galloped into the trees. That’s when the boys inside knew they had been hunted by the Kushtaka.

  Shouting with relief, they all raced out to help their friend. As he slowly rose and walked toward them, the boys saw it. His upper lip was split like an otter’s and he reached out sharp, black claws toward them.

  Deer Woman

  TRADITIONAL PONCA LEGEND, TOLD BY DAN SASUWEH JONES, PONCA

  Deer Woman’s upper body is that of a woman, but she walks on the powerful legs and split hooves of a deer. Deer Woman has the strength of five men and runs with the speed of a deer. She is mystically ageless. She can appear out of thin air, mainly at night, some say, from an underground spring. Legend says that her quest is to find her dead mate, but it is an impossible pursuit. The frustration has led to madness. Few if any have seen her face and lived to tell about it; to gaze into her eyes will paralyze you and eventually kill you—possibly by taking control of your mind. If you are a husband unkind to his wife, you could disappear forever after her visit. Deer Woman is known to many tribes across America. From time to time she still menaces our Ponca tribe.

  It was a hot August night in 1955, the third Saturday of the month, to be exact. The Ponca Powwow, a celebration of our culture, was in full swing. Hundreds of dancers—both men and women—wore colorful regalia wonderfully decorated with patterns from hundreds of years before our time.

  Many more people were not dancing or wearing regalia, but were taking part as onlookers. As the clock approached midnight, the main event ended. The singers, dancers, and guests cleared the arena and the lights were turned off.

  Now it was time for the young adults to have their turn to celebrate. Their time is called “the 49.” The term is said to come from a time when fifty young Ponca warriors went off to war, but only forty-nine returned.

  The 49 dance is held in the dark, in a large circle with a drum at the center. On this moonlit night, all the faces of the dancers and singers were illuminated. During a 49, everyone sings along to the songs, including the young people as they dance.

  Two young people in love were dancing arm in arm, and the young woman kept noticing the woman dancing next to her. It was odd, she thought, that the other woman was dressed in a black skirt and her head was covered with a black shawl. Such clothes are a sign of mourning, and in the Ponca culture a person in mourning doesn’t dance for a ye
ar after losing a loved one. Along with the black skirt and shawl, the woman wore a white ruffled blouse that had an old-time look to it.

  Glancing down, the young dancer noticed that the woman’s long black skirt covered her feet so well that even when the woman kicked out her skirt as she danced, her feet were never exposed.

  That’s funny, thought the young woman. My skirt is the same length as hers, but I can always see my feet when I kick out. Now she was really puzzled. Maybe the woman had very small feet?

  The young woman went back to singing and dancing next to her boyfriend. When the song ended, she watched the woman in black. The woman was so covered up by the skirt and blouse that it was hard to tell her age. The woman walked off and sat on the bleachers alone.

  Even though the arena lights were off, the moon washed the area with light. A young boy wandered by the woman in black, and he, too, noticed she was sitting there alone. He noticed how her head was bent forward and covered with the shawl. And he noticed that she was very different from everyone else.

  As he gazed at her, his eyes followed her long skirt down to the ground. Then he saw it. One of her feet was exposed at last. It was shiny and black. He looked harder and saw it was the hoof of a deer, covered with black polish. The boy had heard the stories of her, and he began screaming at the top of his lungs: “Deer Woman! Deer Woman!”

  In a flash her shawl dropped to the ground, and she stood up to face the boy. He froze as she towered over him and looked into his eyes.

  Barely a moment passed before someone threw the switch to turn on the arena lights. Then several hundred young people stared at her in awe—and fear.

  Right in front of her, the frozen child who’d called her name was so overwhelmed he could barely breathe. He watched as the black skirt dropped away and a white tail flicked behind the powerful body. Still wearing the white ruffled blouse, the Deer Woman was a woman from the waist up. From the waist down she stood on the two powerful hind legs of a deer. She looked out across the crowd with cold, black eyes.

  At that very second dozens of young men started to run toward her.

  “Killer!” they taunted. “Get her!” Many of them had lost relatives to the beast. Now was their time to get even. They closed in on her.

  But she was faster. She turned and ran straight for the opposite set of bleachers, and in three bounds she leaped ten feet up and over them.

  The young men tried to follow her. As they raced around behind the bleachers, they could not match her speed. She disappeared into the trees.

  By the next day, many of our elders were aware of the previous night’s events—and they were talking. One of them told Deer Woman’s story.

  Out of those fifty Ponca warriors who went off to fight, the young man who never returned had a beautiful Comanche bride. She had married the young Ponca man, and their life had been so happy. When he didn’t return from war, she was filled with so much grief that they say she died of a broken heart.

  No one knows what happened, but for some reason her ghost never crossed over. Her broken heart found a home in the chest of a creature half woman, half deer. She wanders Earth as Deer Woman, looking for her husband. But because he did cross over, they will never meet.

  She has gone mad searching for him. Behind her she leaves a trail of death. They say she punishes any husband who is not as kind and respectful as her love, lost to her forever.

  The Stikini

  BASED ON A SEMINOLE TALE, TOLD BY BROCK BATTENFIELD, SMALL TOWN MYTHS

  By day, a Stikini looks like an average person. But after dark, beware. Its arms turn into wings and grow feathers; claws spring out from the tips of its fingers. Its nose becomes a beak, and the large black eyes of an owl peer out from a round, feathered face. Stikini, or Stigini, and sometimes Ishtikini, is a supernatural shape-shifter of Seminole legend—a witch by day that transforms into an owl by night. When the United States government forced the Seminole tribe to leave Florida for Oklahoma in the 1800s, the Stikini came with the people, planting its powers in a new place out west. While transforming, a Stikini remains as tall as a human until the final step: The creature vomits up its heart, liver, and other organs and hides them, often leaving them to hang from a tree or from the rafters of an abandoned building. This allows the monster to shrink to the size of an owl. Then it finds its prey—usually a sleeping human—and rips the heart out through the mouth. Flying back to its shelter in the woods, it savors its feast. As morning dawns, it retrieves and reinserts its organs. Then it transitions back into the community.

  On a warm summer night in Oklahoma, friends dared a brother and sister to go into an abandoned church that had been used by Seminole Indians in the early 1900s. Now it stood dark and foreboding.

  The church wasn’t far away—it stood at the end of the siblings’ own gravel driveway—and the two kids knew the way, down to every last tree. But on that evening, the walk was long and dark. Shadows from the trees danced around them, and they smiled nervously.

  But eventually, they came to the end of the path. They paused at the gate, for the churchyard was another matter. So confident when they started their walk, the siblings became more and more terrified at the thought of walking past the graves and into the church itself.

  “That building is cursed,” their dad had told them. “Stay far away from there.”

  With fluttering bellies the two slowly stepped onto the chipped flagstone walk that led to the church’s main door.

  Not a sound broke the stillness. Gaining courage, they walked up to the big oak door and pulled the ancient iron handle. It was locked. Taking a deep breath, they made their way around the side of the church and peered in through a broken window.

  Something moved inside.

  In a panic they joined hands and pulled each other back to the flagstone path, then to the gravel driveway. Stopping to catch their breath, they looked back at the church. Above the roof hovered a set of bright yellow eyes.

  In seconds flat the siblings sprinted back to their house and screamed to the other children waiting in their yard: “It’s there. The Stikini is there!” They raced inside and slammed their door.

  The others laughed. “No way,” they said. “Let’s go take a look.”

  Halfway down the road, one child looked up to see a shadow hovering above them in the trees. “There!” she screamed as she pointed.

  On a high tree branch sat a human silhouette, hovering. Then the monster spread its wings and released an ear-piercing screech.

  In a shot the group took off, running back down the drive. They pounded on the door of the brother and sister’s house. The father answered and pulled the children inside.

  “What is going on?” he demanded. He sat quietly as the children spilled out the story of the church and the monster inside.

  “Hmmm,” he said, his brow knitted together. “My son and daughter didn’t tell me. We told them to stay away from there. But now you’ve all seen it—the Stikini. It was probably hiding its organs in the church.

  “You’d better stay here tonight,” he continued. “It may be looking for you. I’ll call your parents and tell them you’re safe.”

  The children climbed the stairs to join the brother and sister, who were already asleep. Soon the house was quiet.

  Outside, the Stikini hovered on a branch, its yellow eyes watching the settling house. As the last light flicked out, the Stikini raised its wings and swooped down toward an open window.

  Warning

  TOLD BY EUGENE REDSTEER, NAVAJO, ARIZONA

  Among the Navajo and other Native American nations, it can be an unlucky omen to hear a hooting owl. It may even mean death is nearby, as the ancient Aztec and Maya believed. Owls are sometimes said to carry messages from beyond the grave or to deliver supernatural warnings to people who have broken tribal taboos. A howling coyote can also mean trouble is up ahead. Sometimes evil medicine men turn into coyotes at night to practice black witchcraft. They’re called skinwalkers or shape-shifters, and
they’re dangerous. Saying prayers and burning cedar wood are strong protections against all these evils. Bravery helps, too, as you’ll find out in this story.

  This happened back in 2014, around October. I work at a factory here on the Navajo Nation. There were only two of us working on this particular night on the evening shift—me and a woman.

  We got off work around about midnight. Outside, it was windy and raining hard. It was very dark. Together we walked back to our vehicles in the parking lot. The lot was big and mostly empty, and our cars were parked far away—at the other end. The wind picked up and howled around us as we made our way through the black night. Above the parking lot, massive power lines dipped and swayed in the gusts.

  Just as we walked under one of the power lines, we heard it:

  Hoooo—hoooo … an owl called above us.

  A chill ran through me.

  We both looked up and searched the lines dancing above us. It was too dark to see the owl, but we knew it was sitting on one of those power lines.

  Hooooo—hoooo …

  Then, as we continued walking under the line, something crazy happened. The owl called out my name—both my first and last names.

  “Eugene … Redsteer.”

  The lady next to me freaked out.

  “Oh my God!” she screamed. “Did you hear that? It’s calling your name!”

  “Eugene … Redsteer!” It called my name out again.

  This time I’d had enough … I stopped and started yelling at it.

  “Get out of here!” I shouted. “You are afraid of me, so you hide in the dark and call my name!”

  I kept looking around, trying to find where the owl calls were coming from.

  “I said I’m not afraid of you—whoever you are!” I shouted. “Show yourself, you coward!”

  Just as I said that, the sky opened up, and it poured down rain—hard, like bullets.