Sheri WhiteFeather - Never Look Back

He stopped to breathe in the spring air. At Fort Sill, the government had built houses for the Apache and put them to work, farming and raising cattle. But this wasn’t new to Raven. Farming was in his blood. His family had always grown their own food, even before the government had dictated their lives.

He knelt to touch a seedling. He had lived at Fort Sill since he was eighteen. He was thirty now, and he remained a prisoner of war, a man who barely remembered what it was like to be free.

He stood up, leaving the seedling to fare on its own. Some of the white men Raven had encountered over the years were cruel. But some were kind. He didn’t hate them. He had learned to live in their world. But even so, he had begun to wear his hair long again. It was his rebellion, his way of taking back what had been stolen from him.

The brightest spot in his life was Vanessa. She was his Apache wife, a small-boned woman with sun-warmed skin, long eyelashes and a teasing smile. He loved her with his entire heart. They had been married for eleven years, but they had no children. It was their greatest pain, their biggest disappointment. Someday they hoped Usen would bless them with sons and daughters.

He gazed at the sky. Darkness was beginning to fall. It was time for him to return to his house, to eat the meal Vanessa would have waiting for him. She never scolded him for working late, for remaining in the field after dusk, even though she worried that it was dangerous.

Because of the witch.

The one who had vowed to destroy him.

He took a familiar path with scattered trees. He walked with a strong, steady step. It was bad enough being under military custody. He wouldn’t allow a dead witch to control him, too.

Zinna had died several months ago. She had contracted an illness that had gone untreated. There was not a shaman among the Chiricahua who had been willing to heal her. Everyone knew she was a witch. She had been feared, and shunned, among the people.

He kept walking. By now, the moon was half full, creating diffused light and casting shadows. He stepped on a twig that snapped beneath his foot, but he didn’t flinch.

Not until a small voice stopped him. “Raven.”

He spun around and saw a young girl. She held a lighted candle, and the flame illuminated her face. She was a haunting child, strangely pretty, with hollow cheeks and hair that coiled around her shoulders. He recognized her as Zinna’s nine-year-old daughter, Sorrel.

“Where are you going?” she asked.

“Home,” he said.

“To your wife?”

“Yes.”

“To fornicate with her?”

Stunned, he could only stare. Children were supposed to be innocent, yet this one was rude and abrasive.

“My mother wanted to fornicate with you,” she said. “It was you she craved, not my father.”

Raven didn’t respond. Zinna’s love spells hadn’t worked on him. So she’d bewitched Sorrel’s father instead.

“Do you know what Mother did to get her revenge?” A wicked smile twisted Sorrel’s lips. “She stopped you from having children. She hexed your wedding night and made your wife barren.”

The pain, the horror of her words, clenched his stomach. He’d heard of ceremonies that made women sterile. But they weren’t witchcraft ceremonies. Some women chose to do them because they didn’t want children.

But Vanessa wanted babies, and he’d never associated her inability to conceive with any kind of ceremony, least of all witchcraft.

He narrowed his gaze at Zinna’s offspring. She was still smiling, still reveling in her mother’s deed. He wanted to crush this young girl, to stomp her to the ground.

“Go home,” he spat. “Get away from me.”

She laughed at his ire, enjoying her devious game.

He turned his back on her, then resumed walking. She persisted, following him, skipping along the way, making his blood run cold.

An owl hooted, and Sorrel dogged his heels. “Listen, Raven. Do you hear that? Mother is talking to me.”

He increased his pace. He didn’t doubt her claim. When a witch died, he or she became an owl.

The bird hooted again, its voice terrorizing the night.

Zinna’s daughter gloated. “Mother says she is going to destroy you.”

“She vowed to do that a long time ago.”

“And now she has the power to make good on her promise. She is stronger in death than she was in life.”

“I don’t care.” But he did. Deep down, he was afraid, especially when the moon slipped behind a tree and everything went black. He could no longer see the path in front of him.

He nearly stumbled on something beneath his boot. And when he looked up, Sorrel stood in front of him, holding the candle.

On her shoulder was an owl.

Zinna.

Sorrel smiled and nuzzled the feathers that tufted around the creature’s foot.

Mother and daughter.

Raven tried to run, but he couldn’t move. His limbs had been paralyzed. Was this what the Chiricahua called ghost sickness? Was this the first symptom?

He stood like a scarecrow, and the owl’s yellow eyes burned into him.

“Mother is going to curse you.” Sorrel unbuttoned his shirt, then reached up and grabbed the amulet he wore, snapping the leather thong that held it in place. The necklace, a flat stone with an engraving of a raven, had been a gift from his wife. She’d given it to him for protection. And now Zinna’s daughter had it.

He knew he was doomed. He should have heeded Vanessa’s warning about walking alone after the sun went down. But it was too late.

The witch was winning. She flew at him and her body grew bigger, expanding right before his eyes. Soon she was a human-size owl. A monster that was nearly as tall as he was.

She clawed his chest with her talons, leaving scars, making him bleed. He could feel her poisoning his veins, drawing energy from him.

“Mother is taking part of your soul,” the child said. “But you won’t die. Not for a hundred years.” She closed her fist around the amulet. “You will live as a raven. A bird that flies through the century in a timeless battle.” She paused for effect. “And then the day will come when Mother will take the rest of your soul.”

He tried to speak, but his voice was trapped, silenced in the wind. He watched the flame on the candle flicker.

Sorrel continued. “That day will be more painful than you can imagine. You will die an excruciating death.”

And Zinna would torture his soul for all eternity, he thought.

He wanted to lash out at her, to tear her apart, to rip the feathers from her body. But he was still paralyzed, unable to move, to defend himself.

So he prayed in his mind, asking Usen to help him. But he had already been cursed. He fell to the ground.

Sorrel stood over him with the necklace. “This is mine now. It belongs to me.”

He glanced up at the amulet and saw colors swirling inside it, making the etching glow. Sorrel tipped the necklace, spilling the colors onto the ground, grinding them with her foot. He knew she had just stepped on the missing part of his soul.

He closed his eyes, and suddenly he was a raven, soaring through the sky.

He tried to fly in the direction of his home, to stay near his wife, to look after her, but his wings forced him in the opposite direction, away from Fort Sill, from the Chiricahua. Being alone, missing the people he loved, was part of his fate, the isolation thrust upon him.

And as everything familiar disappeared from view, he heard the laughter of a child.

Then the dark, deathly screech of an owl.

Allie’s heart filled with shame. What Zinna and Sorrel did to Raven only reinforced the viciousness that marred her ancestry.

But it told another tale, too.

“I think the curse can be broken,” she said.