Page 35 of Moon Chosen

“No,” Mari whispered reassurance. “She’s going to be fine. She’s just resting.”

In the distance there were more shouts. Mari listened carefully, but none seemed to be coming closer to them.

“A missing canine has caused this misery?” Xander spoke so low that Mari had to strain to hear him. “It makes no sense.”

“No, it doesn’t, but the Companions make no sense,” Mari spoke quickly, wishing that the man named Nik had never spoken. “Thankfully, the sun will set in moments and night will chase them back to their city in the trees.” Mari spoke to Jenna, who was still staring with wide-eyed fear at Leda. “Then I will carry Mama home where I can take care of her properly. She’ll be whole and well again soon. Don’t worry, Jenna. We only need to hide here a little while more.”

Mari heard Jenna’s father grunt, as if in agreement, but there was something about the sound that had Mari’s attention turning from Jenna to Xander. He was staring at Leda with a pained expression on his face, and as Mari watched, his skin began to flush with the sickly gray that signaled the setting of the sun and the coming of the Night Fever that cursed Earth Walkers.

11

“No! No! No! Not here, Daddy—not now!” Jenna crawled back, pressing against the rotting trunk of the dead tree and watching her father with eyes that were frantic with fear. She wrapped her arms around her knees and seemed to curl within herself, muttering over and over, “Not here, Daddy—not now!” Mari saw that the moonlight-colored tinge was creeping over Jenna’s skin as well.

But the girl wasn’t a threat—Mari understood that. If left alone for the night, Jenna would fall into despair, would cry inconsolably and lose part of herself to melancholy. That was sad and difficult, and left alone without the healing touch of a Moon Woman every Third Night, Jenna’s spirit would begin to struggle to find happiness even during the daylight. It would only be a matter of time before the despair of the night smothered any respite the day might bring. Without the aid of a Moon Woman, Jenna’s will to live would erode, leaving her to spend her short life in loneliness and depression. But Jenna wouldn’t attack anyone, nor would she hurt anyone except, eventually, herself.

Mari couldn’t say the same about Jenna’s father.

“Jenna! When was the last time your father was Washed?”

“Tomorrow is Third Night!” Xander answered for his daughter, his voice rough and low.

“Usually we’d be in our burrow, resting, and the Night Fever wouldn’t be bad on a second night, but out here—under the open sky.” Jenna shivered. “You have to help him, Mari! Please!”

Xander’s breathing had increased. Tremors quaked through his body, and with each tremor his skin became more and more gray and his breathing more and more erratic.

“Wake Leda!” Xander hissed.

“I can’t! She isn’t asleep—she’s unconscious.” Moving slowly, she positioned herself between Xander and her mother. “You should leave, Xander. Get back to your burrow and rest. I’ll watch over Jenna and Mama. You being here doesn’t help them. Not now. Not after dark.” She kept her voice low and soothing as she carefully reached into her pouch, feeling for a smooth stone. The slingshot was useless in such close confines, but she might be able to smash a rock in Xander’s face, and hope she could knock him unconscious long enough for them to get away.

“No! Daddy can’t go out there. They’ll kill him.”

“Wake her! Heal me!” Xander’s voice had gone so guttural that his words were little more than a growl.

“Xander, listen to me! Mama’s not asleep. She’s hurt. She can’t heal you.” Mari tried to reason with Xander, knowing that every moment that passed brought night more fully to their world, and with the darkening night, so, too, darkened Xander’s mind, causing his hold on sanity to slip further and further from him.

“Must. Heal. Me!” Xander’s body seemed to grow until the barely contained violence he personified filled their hiding place.

“You can do it, Mari. I know you can.” Jenna’s tear-filled gaze held Mari’s. “You have Leda’s eyes. You are her daughter.”

“Jenna, it’s not that easy,” Mari said. Then, with a snarl, Xander started to close the small space between them. Mari lifted the rock in her hand and drew herself up, glaring at him. She pitched her voice low, and tried to funnel her fear into ferocity. “Get out of here, Xander, before you make me hurt you.”

With a snarl that was filled with a father’s despair, Xander turned and began to push away from them through the concealing vines.

“No,” Jenna sobbed. “He’s all I have.”

Mari made the decision that altered all of their futures quickly, with only a fleeting thought for possible regrets. With one hand she grabbed Xander’s forearm, pulling him back within their hiding place. The other hand Mari raised. Xander whirled around, growling menacingly.

“On your knees!” Mari commanded, and was shocked when Xander obeyed and dropped roughly to his knees. She closed her eyes, letting the chaos and fear around her—Jenna’s sobs, her father’s terrible feral panting, and Leda’s frightening stillness—be apart from her. Deep within herself, in the calmness where Mari held the beautiful images she translated into sketches, she imagined the moon as it would be this night, rising a half crescent, white and glowing above the sleeping pines.

When the picture of the moon, bright and newly risen, was set in her imagination, Mari began speaking while she continued to sketch with the power of her mind.

“Moon Woman blood is within me

Become that which I see

Mind and heart your image will be

Salvation for these beloved three”