Dead of Winter

by Brian Moreland

Inside the watchtower, Anika heard a loud boom like dynamite going off. A force rocked her back against the log walls.

  The windigos stopped clawing at the walls and roof. She heard them hopping down to the ground. Their running feet thundered like a stampede of buffalo toward the gate. She peered out a crack in one of the portals. The howling snowstorm seemed to be retreating from the fort. The fog rolled across the snowfield, back into the forest. The pack of windigos sifted between the pines. Among them ran the Ancient One, its antlers snapping the branches. The storm clouds kept retreating over the treetops, until they were a far distance away. Along the horizon appeared the glow of the waking sun. The snow stopped falling. The wind died down. The only sound was a crackling fire.

  Anika opened a portal facing the village. A giant blaze consumed Noble House. The roof crashed in.

  “Tom!” She climbed down from the ladder. Ran toward the towering bonfire.

  Anika’s heart leaped, as Swiftbear and a young brave came running out of a cabin and ran alongside her.

  At the second floor of Noble House, Tom burst out of the smoking door with Father Xavier clinging to his shoulder. The two men ran down the steps. When they reached the ground, they collapsed at Anika’s feet. Her heart dropped at the sight of Tom’s gaunt face and elongated body.

  221

  Lying on a bed of snow. Shivering. So cold. Tom’s body spasmed. He coughed. Opened his eyes. The sky was burning. A tower of flames. Black smoke.

  Father Xavier was standing over Tom, praying. Two Indian warriors gathered around the priest with spears aimed at Tom.

  “Get back!” the priest yelled.

  “He must be killed!” spoke an Indian with silver hair.

  “No, don’t hurt him!” Anika stepped between the braves. She jumped to her knees and touched Tom’s face with a furry glove. His eyes welled up at the sight of her.

  Part Twenty-One

  Phoenix Fire Woman

  222

  Anika paced on the porch outside her cabin. She clutched the prayer bundle around her neck, praying to her grandmother and the elders of the Mediwiwin.

  In the courtyard, Father Xavier argued with Squawking Crow. “Let me see him! He needs my help!”

  The young brave kept pushing the priest back, blocking him with a spear.

  Swiftbear came out of the cabin and put a hand on Anika’s shoulder. “I have done all I can with my medicine. I’m sorry.”

  Anika shook her head. “No!”

  “He is lost. He is almost wiitigo.”

  “Then I will save him.” She walked toward the door.

  Swiftbear blocked her. “No. We must burn down the cabin before he wakes up.”

  Anika paced, searching her mind for the right medicine. “I will perform the Phoenix Fire ceremony.”

  He shook his head. “Too dangerous.”

  “Grandmother gave me her medicine bag. I can use her magic.” She pulled out a handful of white shells.

  “It takes a seasoned shaman to use owl medicine.” Swiftbear scowled. “If you fail, he will kill you.”

  Anika gripped her uncle’s forearm. “Tom is my destiny. If I am to die, then I will die with him.”

  “You are as stubborn as your grandmother.” Swiftbear looked toward her cabin door and sighed. “Go to him, Little Pup.”

  Anika hugged him and stepped into her cabin. She closed the door and took a deep breath.

  Tom lay on her bed, covered in buffalo hides. He tossed and turned. Anika fought back tears when she saw his face had grown even more angular, his pale skin stretched around the skull, all his veins exposed, like blue branches under a sheet of ice. His body was longer, his legs hanging off the bed. He moaned and cringed as if having nightmares.

  Anika undressed. With an owl feather, she stirred up smoke from sage burning in a bowl and smudged her nude body. “I call in the spirit of the Phoenix.”

  On the bed, Tom’s bones made popping noises. His head shook on the pillow.

  Anika put a hand on his bony chest. His skin felt so cold. She pulled out the flute that Tom and Chris Hatcher had whittled together. Her fingers felt the carvings of a white buffalo clashing horns with the antlers of an elk. She played a sacred song. This calmed him.

  From her medicine bag, she poured white shells around the bed. Then she chanted an Ojibwa prayer and imagined a bird of fire flying into her chest. Her entire body filled with heat. She placed a flat stone in Tom’s hand and closed his fist. Then she climbed under the buffalo hide and embraced him, warming his naked body with her own.

  223

  Tom was running through the foggy woods, half man, half animal, searching for something to feed his hunger. His keen sense of smell picked up the scent of pine and snow and, from somewhere, blood. He loped faster between the trees, snapping branches, and came to a clearing. In the center was a snow mound with a red spiral.

  The symbol was familiar, but he couldn’t recall where he’d seen it.

  “Father!” a boy’s voice called.

  The windigo shook his head and suddenly remembered he had once been a man. A father who had lost his son. “Chris!”

  The boy was standing in the mist at the edge of the clearing. He appeared transparent against the trees. A ghost. He beckoned Tom. “Come with me.” Chris’ spirit ran into the forest.

  “Wait, where are you going?”

  “They’re coming for us,” the boy called back. “Hurry!”

  Tom followed, wondering who was coming after them. Inside him, man and beast were battling to take over this body. The animal in him wanted to run the opposite direction, continue to hunt for prey. What was left of the man clung to his memories. The good years he had spent married to Beth and raising their son. The family shattered by their untimely deaths. And all the drunken nights that follwed as Tom’s life had gone into a downward spiral.

  Chris was leading him to heaven, where they could all be together again.

  The boy stopped at the edge of a lake covered in white ice. The mist swirled around an island of jagged rocks and pine trees. In the cliffs were several caves.

  Tom stopped. “This doesn’t look like heaven.”

  “It’s your new home.” Chris’ ghost evaporated.

  Tom shouted, “Son! Wait, come back!”

  Howls echoed from the island. And the beast within Tom howled back.

  The fog drifted over the frozen lake. Within the mist formed the broad antlers of an enormous beast with fiery white eyes. And Tom somehow knew that this was the Ancient One, he who was older than old. Behind the windigo loped dozens of smaller skeletal creatures. Their bodies were marked with ragged holes and exposed bones as if the pack had been feeding off one another.

  Tom started toward them and was stopped by the sound of flute music. It seemed to come from the sky. A flock of snow owls swooped between Tom and the horned windigo. It shrieked at the birds.

  Stay with me, Tom, whispered a woman’s voice.

  He felt a sudden warmth against his skin.

  Call on your totem.

  He opened his fist and saw a white stone etched with a buffalo. And he remembered where he came from. “By the powers of my ancestors, I call on the spirit of white buffalo.” In the woods behind him came the sound of thundering hooves.

  The antler-horned windigo stopped in the center of the frozen lake and roared. The other windigos retreated into the fog.

  Tom turned and stared into the peaceful eyes of the white buffalo. It snorted and bowed its head. Tom walked up to his spirit guide and put his hand on its forehead. Snowflakes speckled its thick white fur. Tom felt a warmth course through his body as he drew power from the sacred bison. He felt his long bones shrinking, his muscles growing thick. His claws pulled back into his fingers. His cravings for flesh dissipated. His strength returned.

  The antler-horned windigo shrieked, then turned and disappeared into the mist that surrounded the island.

  Tom’s heart filled with heat. He woke up to find Anika’s warm body entwin
ed with his. He embraced her.

  224

  A week later, at the village on Otter Island, Tom stepped out of a wigwam. He was feeling whole again. His body had returned to its normal size. His stomach was full from a delicious breakfast Anika had made him. She joined him, taking his hand. They walked together to the river, where several braves were packing a long canoe. Father Xavier stood at the shore. He looked ten years younger.

  Tom put a hand on the Jesuit’s shoulder. “Thank you, Father. I owe you my life.”

  Father Xavier smiled. “I owe you just as much. You, too, Anika. Tell your grandmother I said thank you again for my new hat.” He patted the coonskin that covered his bald head.

  As the priest climbed into the center of the canoe, Tom asked, “Is the nightmare really over?”

  “For Gustave’s legion… Oui.” Father Xavier set his black bag at his feet. “But the battle against evil is far from over. Satan has many legions.”

  “We will be ready,” Anika said.

  The brigade paddled away from the shore. Father Xavier waved goodbye. “Tom, if you ever find yourself in Montréal again, you know where to find me.”

  Tom put his arm around Anika. “Thanks, but my life is here now.”

  Part Twenty-Two

  The Four Winds

  225

  As Tom spent the remaining winter living on Otter Island among the Ojibwa, he learned that the Four Winds bring upon the change of seasons. In the dead of winter, the tribe always migrates to stay clear of the hungry windigos. The evil manitous have been around since the beginning of man and will still be here long after man makes his journey to the afterworld. But winters come to an end. And with the coming of spring, the tribe returns to their northern village to enjoy all the riches that the sacred land has to offer. Friendly manitous appear in the forest to help the tribal people find good places to fish and hunt and harvest rice. These manitous become their totems that connect them with the spirits of Father Sky and Mother Earth.

  At long last, the sun shining in the bright blue sky warmed Tom’s skin. The snow melted. All up and down Beaver Creek, ice fell into the trickling water. A herd of deer drinking at the stream watched the Ojibwa walking through the forest. Tom walked among them, dressed in buckskins and moccasins. He had a full beard now, and his hair had grown well past his ears. Anika walked beside him. Her belly was already starting to show. By autumn, they were due to have their first child. Anika, who was still just as stubborn as ever, had never looked happier. While Tom was looking forward to being a father again, he would never forget his first born. Thinking of Chris now once again brought Tom’s grief to the surface.

  The tribe gathered around the burial ground, where small spirit houses covered the graves. Grandmother Spotted Owl led the ceremony, chanting a native song. Anika, Swiftbear, and the other shaman joined in on the singing. Tom watched with teary eyes as a group of braves set a spirit house over a body wrapped in fur blankets. Then everyone fell silent and looked at Tom. He pulled out the flute that he and his son had whittled together.

  From the forest came a hooting sound. A white snow owl was perched on a branch above the burial ground. As Tom pressed the flute to his mouth and played sweet music, the owl spread its wings and flew upward, into the clear blue sky.

  About the Author

  Brian Moreland writes novels and short stories of horror and supernatural suspense. In 2007, his novel Shadows in the Mist, a Nazi occult thriller set during World War II, won a gold medal for Best Horror Novel in an international contest. The novel went on to be published in Austria and Germany under the title Schattenkrieger. When not working on books, Brian edits documentaries and TV commercials around the globe. He produced a World War II documentary in Normandy, France, and worked at two military bases in Iraq with a film crew. He also consults writers on how to improve their books and be successful. He loves hiking, kayaking, rock climbing, and dancing. Brian lives in Dallas, Texas, where he is diligently writing his next horror novel. You can communicate with him online at www.BrianMoreland.com or on Twitter @BrianMoreland.

  The dead still hate!

  Forest of Shadows

  © 2011 Hunter Shea

  John Backman specializes in inexplicable phenomena. The weirder the better. So when he gets a letter from a terrified man describing an old log home with odd whisperings, shadows that come alive, and rooms that disappear, he can’t resist the call. But the violence only escalates as soon as John arrives in the remote Alaskan village of Shida. Something dreadful happened there. Something monstrous. The shadows are closing in…and they’re out for blood.

  Enjoy the following excerpt for Forest of Shadows:

  They screamed.

  And impossible as it seemed, George Bolster was grateful for his family’s unbridled cries of terror as they masked the other unearthly sounds that ghosted their every move.

  Whump. Whump. Whump.

  The steady beat of an unseen giant’s footsteps up the stairs.

  “Into the bedroom, now!” George shouted at his panicked wife and sons. They scrabbled into the room at the end of the hall while the floor quaked beneath their feet. Once inside, George slammed the door shut and braced his back against its oak frame. His sons, Cory and Matt, clung to Sharon’s sides, their eyes wide and terrified, darting around the room, looking for death in benign shadows.

  “Sharon, push the dresser over.”

  Stifling a sob that made her entire body shudder, she reluctantly pulled away from the boys and ran over to the large dresser. George grunted as the unseen force in the hallway pounded against the door.

  “Hurry!”

  Matt leapt to his mother’s side to help push the heavy piece of furniture across the floor and against the bedroom door. Cory, who was only six and barely forty pounds, could only curl up into a corner and whimper. A clap of thunder made the entire house quake and they all shrieked in unison. George still pressed his weight against the door while Sharon and Matt gathered as much bulk as they could find and piled it as high and as fast as they could on top of the dresser.

  The door shook as it was rammed again and again, so hard that the arch above the doorway began to crack. It wouldn’t be long before the entire wall would collapse and then where could they go?

  A deep thrumming emanated from beyond the door, a sonorous hum that was not so much heard as it was felt. It hurt like hell. They felt it vibrate their chest walls, disrupt the hammering rhythm of their hearts. It crept up their spines and exploded in their skulls, threatening to liquefy their brains.

  So they screamed. Fighting fire with fire. The pile of debris stashed against the door shook as the pounding on the door continued. Staggering on jellied knees, George peered out the sole window into the moon bathed woods outside. It was only a drop of twenty feet or so. Maybe, if he jumped first, he could catch them one at a time and they could run into the woods. But it was so damn cold, well below zero, and they didn’t have a coat between them. Could they possibly navigate their way through the snow steeped forest to their nearest neighbor a mile away?

  Suddenly, everything stopped. The pain ceased and they all dropped to their knees. What sounded like a thousand tiny claws ticked across the hardwood floor of the hallway, retreating to the other end and descending the staircase that lead to the living room below.

  George shook his head and went back to the window.

  “Is it gone, Daddy?” Cory whispered.

  “I don’t know. Everyone stay quiet.”

  He kept his eyes on the faintly illuminated yard and his ears tuned for any sounds within the house. Matt and Cory muffled their cries into their mother’s breast.

  “What are you thinking?” Sharon mouthed.

  George pointed out the window and used two fingers to simulate running. It was their only chance.

  “George, we’ll freeze to death.”

  One look from her husband ended any protest. Gently pulling the boys from her sides, she went over to the dresser and found two blanket
s, several pairs of sport socks and one wool hat. She worked in silence, wrapping the boys in the blankets and putting an extra pair of socks on their shoeless feet. Cory, being the youngest and frailest, got the hat.

  George gathered his family by the window.

  “I’m going to jump into the snow out there. Matt, I want you to go next, then Cory, then Mom. Once we’re all out, I want you to stick close and run as fast as you can. We’re going to try to make it to Glenn’s house.”

  “But that’s really far and it’s so dark out,” Matt protested.

  George hugged him and felt close to tears. “I know, little man, I know. But we have to get out of here and Glenn’s house is the closest to us.”

  “Maybe it’s gone away,” Cory said. They all looked towards the door. The entire house had been silent for almost five minutes now.

  Sharon placed a hand on her husband’s shoulder. “It might not be a bad idea to wait a while and see.”

  George wanted nothing more than to run like hell from his house. Freezing to death was a welcomed option to the thing downstairs.

  “I’m not sure−”

  The floor exploded just five feet from where they sat as the assault recommenced, this time from below. A fist-sized hole opened up between the splintered wood. A maniacal rush of thrashing and clawing blasted from the fresh portal as the floor shook from repeated efforts to widen the gap.

  “Everyone up!”

  George threw the window up hard, shattering the glass. Without a moment’s hesitation, he jumped out into the cold night. He landed in a three foot pile of snow that cushioned his fall. His right leg throbbed a little and his lungs hurt as he sucked in his first draft of frigid air.

  “Okay, Matt, jump!” he shouted.

  Sharon plucked her youngest son and aimed him into his father’s waiting arms. George caught him and they both fell back into the snow. He was back on his feet by the time Cory had himself perched on the windowsill. Cory looked back at his mother, afraid to leave her alone, even if it was only for a moment.