Page 11 of Barron

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Willow was up before Barron the day after the ride. It had been a wonderful and successful day. They had managed to get the two hundred horses that were requested, plus enough extras that her people could train and sell off to other shifters. She’d even gotten a little too much sun but was always careful of that.

Twice, they ran into hikers, one group on motorbikes, which was strictly forbidden in the park, that were well off the paths. Barron only had to tell the office where they were, and they were run off. The very fact that they had guns and rifles and were in the path of the family and the ponies made her think that they were going to try and steal them from the tribe. She had no idea how that was going to work, but they didn’t get them, and that was all the better for them.

Making her way to Maddy’s home, she had some things that her father had wanted to give the young woman. It wasn’t much, not in the way of giving, but she was so happy to get the few strips of leather along with some stones with holes in them that Maddy said the kids would love to work on projects with so they could have some fun. She was nearly to the front door to leave Maddy’s home when she saw Thad and a shadow of a bigger boy that she’d never seen before.

It had been a very long time since she’d seen shadows of the dead. Normally, they would only appear to her if they were from her tribe or they’d had a horrific death. The closer she got to the children, the more she realized that this young man was not just a part of one of the tribes in the mountains, but he also had killed in a violent way. It looked, too, as if he’d been in the water for a while.

As she drew shadows around her so that she could listen, she called to Maddy to have her join her, not only to not be seen but to listen in as well. Whatever was going on, she thought for sure that it was something that neither of the boys wanted to be a part of but had somehow gotten trapped in a way that was going to get poor Thad and his sisters hurt. If they weren’t all ready.

“John, I’m sorry about what happened to you. I am, but since people can’t see you, it’s going to be hard for you to get some help from us. Will you go back to the barn and keep an eye on my sisters? I promise you with all of my heart that I’ll make sure that your body is found so that your parents know. I don’t even care if they don’t believe me, and I get a big beating for them thinking that I’m lying. I’ll find you if it takes me all my life.” Thad swore on his mother’s heart that he’d find him for sure. “I wish I had known you before you were hurt this bad. Her pushing you over the waterfall, that wasn’t nice at all, and it hurts my heart to think that she’d been making you suffer like she did. I’ll find you on account of you saving me and my sisters when you did by telling us the rules of the mountain and water. Like I said, I know some people who might be able to talk to you better than I can. I know a lot of magical people, I promise you.”

“That woman, she sure is loco, Thad. Her saying those things about you and your sisters is just not right. Like her saying she can feel every little bitty bug that comes in out of the rain, and it being your fault that she has to hide out in the caves. I love staying in the caves when the weather is really hard. Besides, it’s raining on them too and they don’t like it no more than she does. But please find my body for my mother mostly. Dad will hurt too that I can’t be buried, but you make sure that you tell them that I loved them forever and will be watching over them in the great tribe in the sky.”

“I will.” Thad didn’t see her when he looked around but it wouldn’t have surprised her one bit if he had. The child and his sisters were brilliantly gifted, and they used parts of their minds that even she hadn’t tapped into yet. Right then, she decided to contact Barron. He’d been feeling sorry for himself long enough, she thought with a small smile.

“We might have an issue.” Barron told her just to roll him over the hill and leave him to die. He couldn’t move, that every part of his body hurt like he’d been riding a horse for twelve hours, and he’d even hurt his balls. “Goofy. I thought it was a blast. Father said you did very well for a greenhorn. But this is important. There are your people hiding in the barn. I don’t know all the ins and outs, but you can bet I will before the end of the day.”

“I’m on my way. Where are they?” She told him that Maddy was with her and that it was Thad and a boy named John, who had died, and Thad’s sisters. “Should I just happen upon them while coming to find you? Tell me what to do, and I’ll help all I can.”

“Do you know any faeries?” Whatever he’d been about to say, he stopped and didn’t say a word. “I thought not. They’re very secretive and don’t tell people that they’re around. Strawberry is the one in charge of those that are with—”

“I’m right behind you. I’m assuming since you can see her, she’s with you.” Nodding when Barron sat down next to her, she put out her hand. “I don’t see anything. Just…I don’t see Strawberry or a strawberry. Just tell me what it is you need me to do. You know that I’d die for you.”

Talking to Strawberry, one of her dearest friends, Willow asked Barron to listen to what the boys were saying. Willow knew whatever was going on it was a trap from Caitlynn, the crazy bitch. Why? Who knew? But it would be to capture someone—Barron’s name jumped to the front of the line on the who. Also, Willow didn’t know, but she’d bet anything that neither boy had gotten themselves into this predicament on their own. Maddy came back to sit with them after getting a few weapons of her own, and it was John, the little boy she barely knew, who sat down beside Maddy. Thad looked directly at them and said he was powerful, sorry.

“For what?” They didn’t have time for this, not with the other children’s health in the balance, but she could see the look on Thad’s face and knew that he had taken on this problem to his own tiny showers. “Do you mean talking to a shadow warrior? Or perhaps the promise you made him to find his body? Either one of those will have my people calling you a hero, not someone who should be doubting themselves. You came here to get help. Thad even had you not made those promises to John here, everyone would still consider you to be one of the greatest men they know. For one so young, knowing that you needed help is a lesson that grownups still haven’t learned. It’s a hard thing to ask for help. You’re a brave young man. It couldn’t have been easy for you to have left your sisters wherever they are. They’re all right, aren’t they?”

“Yes, ma’am, when I left, they were. Belle is hiding in case that crazy woman comes and tries to take Maria from her. She’ll knock her off the high level if she does that. I wasn’t sure how to get back here, but John here, he appeared and showed me how to get back to this mountainside.” Thad looked at John, who, if she remembered, was about to be sixteen. “We were looking for small things in the water. Lots of pennies that people put in the water to bring them luck. John said that it was lucky for him because sometimes he had enough money to buy something for his momma when she was down. Now he can’t do that anymore.”

“No. I’m terribly sorry, but we’ll help her out by telling her how brave he was when he was needed. How he brought you here to get help. Not every person would have been able to do that to help people he doesn’t know.” She turned to John, holding onto Barron’s hand while she did. “I will be indebted to you for the rest of my life, John. You know that I’m an honorable person, don’t you? I will help provide for your mother, too, for the rest of her life.”

It was when she went to hug the young man that she hurt the most. A senseless death all because of some crazy woman that didn’t get what she wanted. Well, Willow thought, she’d messed with the wrong tribe this time. There was going to be a reckoning the likes of nothing she’d ever seen before.

Reaching out beyond where she was seated, having sat in the dirt to have the earth help with her search, she found young John just where Thad told him he was. Broken and dead at the bottom of the falls that ran along the mountain year-round, it was so swift and wide. Then, as she moved on, her mind’s eye forever looked for John’s relatives, and she found her father instead.

She told him everything that she knew about John and his killer. She also took the time to tell him of his shadow body and how he’d helped the Cross bears’ children before he left this world to the tribe in the sky. There would be much sorrow tonight and celebration. John’s parents would be honored, and his story told for many generations to come.

“Thad, they’re going to get John now. His parents are going to be with them when they do. My father, the chief, would like to honor you as well. But we’ll talk about that at some other time.” He hugged her while he cried. Her heart was broken too for the loss of one so young. “You are a good boy, young man, and smart. Don’t you ever let anyone tell you anything any different. You hear me?”

“Yes, ma’am. She just pushed him over the waterfall like he was nothing more than a stick. I didn’t see him again after she pushed him. Is his…you know, is his body there. All together?” She told him that he wasn’t damaged that badly. “Good. I don’t want his momma to see him messy. He was a nice person. I’m gonna keep the penny he gave me forever, too.”

Chapter 6

Maria watched the woman as she stomped around the barn. She was surely glad that the mean person couldn’t hear what was going on while she and Thad talked. She’d be so mad it just made her giggle a little. But to herself. Looking over at Belle, Maria winked at her while she hid under the straw. She’d fixed her up so that it didn’t itch no more but they both had to pee really bad. That’s where they’d been fixin’ to go, to the bathroom, when she snatched her up by her nice neat ponytail.

“What is taking that brat so long?” They’d learned real quick that when she asked them a question, they weren’t to answer her. She told him it was rhetorical. All three of them knew what that meant, but Maria didn’t think that the woman did. She said that it meant she knew what it meant, and they didn’t. It was an adult word that they couldn’t use. Thad told her that it meant that she didn’t require information from it. That anyone could use it. That got him a good slap in the face. The woman came stomping over to where she was, and Maria made it so that she couldn’t see Belle. “I asked you a question. What is taking that brat brother of yours so long?”

“How should I know? If I was with him, I’d be able to tell you, but then you’d not be able to ask me anything, so you’d still not know, I guess. You sent him to my parents’ house, and it’s a long walk when you only got ten year old legs, you know?” She drew back to slap her again, but Maria only glared at her. “Do you want me to make you hurt again?”

Maria couldn’t physically hurt the woman. She couldn’t hurt anyone really with her mind. All she could do was make them think that she’d punched them in the face or whatever. Or, in the case of this crazy loon, make her feel like Maria had kicked her in the legs a whole bunch of times.

Maria and her sister and brother had been out and about all morning this morning. They had found beautiful flowers that they were going to pick on the way home for their mom. John had told them the story about the Garden Fairy coming by the woods and planting them so that the animals could enjoy them when the snow melted. He also had warned them that the bulbs were poisonous and that they not eat them no matter how hungry they were.

They’d been tossing little bitty stones and sticks in the water to see how fast they went down. The bigger logs would get all caught up with other sticks and logs, and John, their new friend, had been going down to dislodge them. He said that it might cause the water to move in a different direction, and it might flood some animal homes down below. It made sense to them, but she still didn’t like him risking his life by going down after them. Then that mean woman had come up on them and pushed him over the falls when he said he wasn’t related to them but a friend. It still hurt her heart that he died so young.

They should have been paying more attention to what was going on around them, but they’d been so happy and having so much fun that they let themselves get caught. Belle had been napping in the upper level of the barn where they’d found a bunch of little kittens, so she didn’t get snatched up by her hair when she and Thad did, but she’d been helping them with her mind to make the woman behave as much as she could. Maria was stronger than the other two, and then Thad. While Belle wasn’t as strong with her mind, she could do enough to keep them as safe as she could.

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