Bean Stalk
By MoonTideMyth
A long time ago before you were even born, there lived a witch. She had been cast from her own village like a demon. Her own parents joined in the chase, to cast her from the village. With torches raised to the night sky and with any weapon they could find at hand. Hunting dogs bayed and trampled through the brush hot on her heels. Her bare feet pounding on the raw; untouched terrain. The wind twisted her skirts about her legs and her hair made a dark halo around her head. She came to a sudden stop; dust was kicked up around her feet. She wrapped one arm around a tree trunk next to her. A couple feet ahead, invisible to the human eye, was a vast canyon cliff. The baying of the dogs grew closer as did the angry shouts of the villagers. She turned around to face the trees where they would come from. Torches glowed and came closer. Pushing through the trees were the villagers. Their dogs hid behind them, sensing the power that came from the young women that stood before them. She wrapped her arm around the tree trunk again, her back to the canyon. Still advancing upon her they raised their weapons.
"Stop!" The witch cried, her voice trembled in her throat, but the wind caught her fear and made it vanish. The villagers froze in their steps; they waited for her to make the first move. Breathing in the early autumn air she gathered her wits. A spell she will cast with but only her words.
"Stop your advances you fowl creatures, or the next step you take shall be your last!" The mob of people was silent but one man began to laugh.
"My fellow friends, we have chased this witch a mile from our safe homes. Yet not once has she cast a spell at us. My friends look around you the sky is black, tis a night of the new moon. A night when the devil has no power over his minions. She has no powers tonight." He smiled in the torch glow, a murmur rippled through the crowd. Many people shouted to hand the witch there, on the branch of the tree she held.
"Aye you have called my bluff, I have no powers tonight." The crowd roared to life when the witch admitted her weakness but she soon added. "If you have called my bluff then you mighty butcher take the first step." The man who had first spoken froze. His grin was frozen on his face as panic filled is eyes. People stared at him, waiting. Sweat slid down his face.
"Fine." He agreed. "But I shall be the one to put the noose around your neck!" The crowd cheered and without a second thought he took one step forward. He let out a shriek of pain that lasted only a second, but echoed in the canyon near them. His eyes rolled into the back of his head and he fell to the ground. Simply dead.
People panicked and moved away from the witch. The dogs whined and whimpered. Her eyes stared at the body with disgust.
"It is said that in death one can see your true nature. So it is with a true statement I add he was nothing but a leech. Living off others with such soft skin if poked he bleeds." Her hair whipped into her face giving her a ghostly appearance. "I promise to you I will be back! On a night when a new moon should be rid of the full moon, a blood moon shall shine in full glory. The full moon shall shrink and when a new moon should be born and began to grow, a full moon the color of my blood shall take flight. You will all feel my wraith when I come back." The curse was laid down heavy upon their heads. With many steps backwards she found the mouth to the canyon.
"Blood Moon… blood moon, I will come for you soon, You shall pay a toll, With the labor of your soul, Creatures from under thy bed, Even the one's inside your head, Shall help me make the rules, For you are all surely fools, And silver rain, Shall deliver pain, Blood moon…. Blood moon, I shall come for you… soon." Leaning backwards her body plummeted into the canyon below. No one could see her face for her hair was in the way but they all assumed she had been smiling. The witch was never seen again. The villagers left leaving the body of the dead man to rot. They feared to touch the body for fear of being just as cursed as he had been in his last seconds of life. They crawled back into the safety of their homes sensing an emptiness in their town; they just couldn't place a finger on it.
If only they had realized the man that they left to rot was only petrified and he appeared dead. His fate was a cursed death to be eaten alive by the insects of the woods, when only being taken into a warm home for one night would revive him. So he spent the rest of his life very much alive. So be the legend of the Witch, she has yet to return. But as she said, "Blood moon… blood moon, I will come for you soon." She has yet to complete her promise, that she swore her very existence to. Check the moon dear friend for if it is blood red you will have to pay for your ancestors mistakes.