The Watcher

  “Okay,” Nathan nodded, running his hand through his hair with an exasperated sigh. “I’m willing to try anything at this point.”

  Kateri snorted. “Gee, thanks.”

  Nathan smiled for real this time. To Marie, he said, "Are the kids done with dinner?"

  "Yes," she said, "and they're cleaning up under Naira's supervision."

  Naira was Marie's sister, and she helped out every year.

  Nathan started toward the fire pit. "Then let's get the campfire roaring before it gets dark."

  Kids never change, really. These teenagers were the same as the kids in Kateri's middle and high school, the same as she had been, the same as her friends and enemies. They were alternately loud, dysfunctional, sweaty, cruel, ashamed, wise, lonely, awkward, too adult and blatantly childish.

  Speaking quietly, Nathan and Naira pointed out each kid in turn, so Kateri could observe them before they noticed her.

  Sitting closest to the fire were Jessica, Avni and Emily, the popular girls. They all wore the same mauve nail polish and stylish cowl-neck sweaters and thin black leggings, a silly choice for camping in the woods. Kateri could hear smatterings of their conversation, and it was as vapid as she remembered overhearing at the high school lunch table.

  “Mrs. Harton actually snapped at me because I didn’t turn in my English paper on time,” Avni whined. “I mean, it’s not like the due date was that firm.”

  Jessica tossed her blonde bob around her shoulders. “She’s so annoying. She acts like English class is important or something.”

  Emily nodded. Kateri guessed she was the newest to the popular group since her thick brown hair didn’t have expensive highlights in it … yet.

  Naira noticed Kateri’s expression and hastened to say, “They’re a good group of girls once you get past … all that.”

  Staring pointedly at the popular girls were Joe and Bryan, the oldest boys of the group and clearly jocks. They tossed a football back and forth with their T-shirt sleeves rolled up to show off their muscular arms. Their masculine posturing was epic, but something about Joe felt off, like he was trying too hard to prove himself. He was big for his age, bulky. She wouldn’t be surprised if he was already taking steroids. And she sensed a current of anger running beneath his easy smile. She’d have to watch out for him. Young men who hated the world made up a good portion of the criminals she dealt with on a daily basis.

  Marie went to sit with the younger, co-ed group. They were playing a rapid-fire card game, flinging cards onto the middle pile, and they looked up and smiled at her before turning back to their game. If Kateri’s own childhood was any indication, it was Speed. She remembered being amazing at that game…

  …If only she still had that kind of hand-eye coordination.

  According to Naira, the card players ranged in age from ten to twelve and included Mariah, Samson, Kelly and Aidan. Kelly was beautiful with long chestnut hair flowing down her back, deep green eyes and a ready smile. Mariah was plain and serious. Her long black braid was smooth, and her eyes were a deep chocolate color, framed by naturally dark lashes. She was biting her lip in concentration as she slapped the cards down in front of her.

  Holy shit! Mariah was Kateri at the same age. Native American heritage, fierce competitive spirit…

  Samson was the dorkiest of the group, trying to hide his acne with one hand. Aidan was small and lithe, elf-like. His light hair fell haphazardly over his brow, and he continuously tossed his head to get the long bangs out of his eyes.

  Nathan pointed to the last of the group, a girl standing nervously on the edge of the fire circle, watching the woods. “That’s Lily,” he said. “She’s been uneasy since she arrived, and she wakes from nightmares every night. We can’t get her to tell us what she dreams about, though. She’s quiet.”

  Kateri studied Lily. She looked to be about eleven, was very tall, and Kateri guessed she must have recently gone through a growth spurt because Lily slumped as though she were trying to appear smaller. Her wide tawny eyes were hidden behind thick glasses, and she was studiously keeping her mouth completely shut over a set of new braces that made her speak with a slight lisp.

  Nathan nodded toward the group. “They’re the same as every group of city kids we get. They’re polite enough, but they don’t really respect the camp or the leaders. Joe has tried to pick fights with Samson and Aidan already. Jessica has pulled Mariah’s braid and made horse noises. The usual bullshit.”

  "You love them."

  "Of course. No matter how jaded and cynical they are, I firmly believe every child should smell wood smoke from a campfire at least once in their lives." Nathan helped them to learn about the old ways and gave them knowledge of basic wilderness survival, even if it was just for two weeks.

  "Where is this bunch from?"

  "Southern California."

  "Big change from home. They don't seem too nervous,” Kateri said. “They don’t seem particularly tense to me.”

  “Wait,” Nathan replied ominously.

  To the west, the sun was sinking lower, the shadows growing longer. The trees at the edge of the camp darkened to a deeper green until they seemed almost black. The temperature began to drop and the wind picked up, blowing through the tall grasses in the field behind the fire circle. The clouds went from rose and marigold highlights to cerulean to deep indigo within moments, and the wisps raced across the horizon as the darkness gathered. The woods came alive with nighttime creatures as the moon rose from behind the clouds into the clear night sky.

  The change in the group amazed Kateri. The popular girls stopped nattering, and Jessica chewed her mauve nail polish off. Bryan and Joe abruptly stopped tossing the football. The card game came to a halt, Mariah and Aidan gathering the cards up while checking behind them every few seconds. All of the kids, including Joe, gathered closer to the light from the campfire.

  Lily seemed especially panicked. Her eyes scanned the tree line and then, as darkness gathered, the line drawn in the dirt..

  Swiftly Kateri assessed the situation. They were clearly frightened of the night, although that had to be fairly common among younger teens. But she had never seen a group this on edge. Usually some bantering and jokes accompanied Nathan's evening story.

  Kateri turned away from the fire, too, and looked beyond into the gathering shadows. She smelled the rich scents of fresh growing evergreen, or old rotting leaves, of forest and sea and air. She felt the pain of her old injuries, the warning given her by their ache and their burn. She gathered her courage and her inspiration, and in a low voice said to Nathan, "I'll tell them the legend of the Frog God.”

  "You're going to scare the hell out of them."

  "I'm going to warn them." Kateri took a breath. "Play for me."

  Nathan nodded, grabbed his wooden and deerskin drum and went to sit near the fire with Marie, Samson and Aidan. Naira had set up a cloth-wrapped folding chair near the log pile, and she took her place there to monitor the fire pit.

  Kateri looked around the log pile near Naira and found a long thin stick. Picking it up, she began to walk in a circle around the kids and the fire, dragging the stick through the dirt and leaving a deep impression. The kids focused on her, their nervous murmuring finally stopping.

  Joe said sarcastically, “Oh good, the cops are here! We’re saved!”

  “I imagine she’s here to take you in, Joe,” Avni said sarcastically.

  Jessica joined in. “I bet Nathan brought in the reinforcements. Did you run out of stories, Nathan?”

  Nathan wasn't ruffled. “My dear, I never run out of stories. But Kateri here is the sheriff for Virtue Falls and surrounding area. As a fellow member of the tribe, she knows all about our gods, including one of the most powerful beings on earth – the Frog God.”

  Bryan guffawed. “The Frog God? Seriously?”

  Nathan continued as though Bryan had not spoken. “Actually Kateri is a true expert on the Frog God. After the earthqua
ke and tsunami that devastated Virtue Falls, Kateri was washed out to sea. So, unlike the rest of us, she has met the Frog God in the depths of the ocean, been imbued with his powers and lived to tell the tale.”

  “What kind of powers?” Samson said with trepidation.

  “The power to make you listen for a while. A power I don’t appear to have tonight,” Nathan retorted. “Anyway, she’s heard about our protective spells and the reason for them, and she wants to help us out. Please give her your attention before we head off to bed.” Nathan picked up his drum and began play the drum in a slow, intense beat.

  The kids settled onto the wooden benches surrounding the fire. As the beat and the increasing darkness surrounded them, the kids’ sarcastic and confused grumbling died away. Kateri moved to stand by the fire and in her mellifluous voice began the legend of the Frog God:

  Long ago when the world was new, the most beautiful maiden in the world ran free in the woods, not wanting to tend a fire and a family, but wanting only the independence to come and go between her tribe and the wild places. She avoided her chores of gathering berries and shellfish so she could swim in the inlet and run barefoot in the woods. …

  In the woods, the owls were grew quiet. The bats hid in their caves. No sounds of deer or wolves disturbed this clear, moonlit night. …

  One day, as the maiden roamed the wilderness alone, she met the most handsome man in the world. His hair was dark, his body was strong, his eyes were wide and intense. She was his equal in looks, and soon she found that he was graceful like a deer. He swam the inlet faster than she could, and he ran through the forest barefoot without a scratch on his dark limbs.

  At first she was bewitched by his charisma and his romantic words. Within hours, he convinced her that she was deeply in love with him. …

  Lily watched Kateri, her eyes large and afraid, straining to hear each word. She almost seemed to know the tale, to know what came next. …

  But gradually the maiden realized the handsome one watched her constantly. He watched her while she slept, while she ate, while she wandered through the cedars and swam in the cold waters.

  She knew what he wanted.

  He wanted to catch her, hold her, fence her, never release her.

  But the maiden did not want to be caught. …

  The darkness seemed to bear down on the group, the fire at the center of the ring of benches the sole focal point. Nathan’s drumbeat was soft, constant, hypnotic. The teenagers were still, hanging on Kateri’s every word. …

  The maiden turned to an old friend for help, a man who had long wanted to love her. Her friend told her this beautiful man was a sorcerer who would trap her and eventually consume her.

  At first, she did not believe him. Perhaps he said this only to possess her for himself.

  But as the days went by and the mysterious man continued to haunt her, she could see the truth in her friend’s words.

  Then she feared the handsome one.

  She asked her friend how to free herself from this powerful sorcerer. He left the tribe and searched the world over for the answer, and when he found it, he wrote the words on a piece of birch bark. …

  The beat of Nathan's drum rose to the heavens and shook the stars. …

  But before he could deliver his message, the sorcerer found him. They fought, and her friend, the only one who knew how to vanquish the sorcerer, was killed. His body was found in the waves that washed on the shore.

  There was no sign of the birch bark message.

  Knowing she would not survive once the sorcerer possessed her, the maiden ran away, far to the south. …

  The popular girls clung to each other and whimpered. …

  The sorcerer pursued the maiden.

  She feared he would capture her and keep her forever. Fear drove her, and she ran faster and faster until she rose in the air and joined the sun.

  Every day she rode the sun, her protector, as he passed through the sky, out of reach of the sorcerer.

  In despair, for he loved her as well as he could love, the sorcerer walked to the seashore and into the ocean. He shrugged off his human form, became the ugly thing that he truly was, and sank into the depths. He is the Frog God, the most powerful being at the bottom of the ocean.

  At the mention of the Frog God, the wind picked up, ruffling the cedars and stirring the meadow grasses. …

  For most days and months and years, the Frog God sits in the ocean and watches angrily as the maiden and the sun ride through the sky above him. He dwells in darkness, for without the maiden he cannot become what he had hoped to be. Possessing her, he believed he could become the most powerful god of the land, beloved by all the people who dwell in the longhouses and along the shores of the Pacific. …

  As the wind whipped around them, Aidan and Avni shivered, and the kids moved even closer to the fire and to Kateri. …

  Years pass. In the dark depths, the Frog God’s desire for the maiden grows. And grows. When his need becomes too great, he heaves his huge body off the ocean floor and leaps, trying to catch the sun. His ascent causes the ocean floor to shake. And when he lands after each unsuccessful attempt, the seas rise and eat the land. …

  Kateri could feel his presence, his eyes on her, his ancient anger ever-present. She would not allow him to overpower her, no matter how much her scars burned. Defiantly, she allowed the drumbeat to envelop her again. …

  Sometimes, when the Frog God despairs of ever reaching the maiden, he steals onto the land in the night, changes back into his human form, and walks the earth, always searching. Seeking the most beautiful woman in the world. …

  One by one, Kateri gazed at the girls, and her eyes were strange, green, otherworldly…

  Whenever he is able to find her, he watches her and he entrances her. If she falls in love with his fierce beauty and his practiced charm and walks with him in the forest, the next morning her body is found rolling in the waves.

  But sometimes the most beautiful woman in the world is not unguarded. Sometimes she recognizes the Frog God in the deep green eyes of the handsome one. Sometimes she knows the protective incantation of the people to keep him from possessing her. And sometimes there is a man who would save her from the sorcerer and the certain death. When this man appears, the sorcerer fights him, using his age-old knowledge of weapons and tactics. Only the most trained and determined warrior can survive and save the woman from the Frog God’s charms.

  But without the protection of the incantation or a great warrior, the beautiful maiden is doomed to become the Frog God’s own, destined to die and join him in the sea forever.

  Kateri finished her tale.

  Nathan's drumming slowly died away.

  Into the tense silence, Lily asked, “What’s the incantation? The one that will protect her from the sorcerer?"

  Kateri walked to the log pile and grabbed a log, seemingly at random. She placed it on the fire and watched the flames envelop the wood. She nodded to Nathan.

  He took up the drumbeat again, faster, deeper, louder.

  Kateri stood near the heat of the fire and recited the incantation in the language of her people, using her knowledge of the old ones.

  The teenagers sat entranced, listening closely even though they could not understand a word she said.

  When she had finished the protective spell, she glanced at the log and when it began to turn a greenish color, she raised her arms and shouted the final word, the word that would bind the spell to this place.

  The fire exploded in high red and blue flames, green sparks shooting far above the fire pit.

  Screams erupted from the teenagers, from Marie, from Naira. Even Nathan stopped drumming and gazed at Kateri with admiration.

  “Whoa!” Mariah said, holding her hand to her chest. The end of her braid was wet where she had anxiously chewed on it during the story.

  “How did you make it do that?” Aidan asked in amazement, flicking his bangs off his forehea
d for the fiftieth time.

  Kateri looked at the group mysteriously. “Old Native American magic.”

  They continued to stare at her open-mouthed.

  She laughed. “I put chemicals onto the log before I put it in the fire,” she confessed.

  “That’s lit,” Bryan said quietly.

  "Yes, it lit and…" Okay. That wasn't what he meant. Kateri was beyond keeping up with current slang. It changed much too frequently, and she was from the days when you just said “cool” and moved on with life. Instead, as Naira led the kids in a round of applause, she gave a small bow to the crowd.

  Nathan continued clapping and moved to stand next to Kateri. “Thank you so much for that fascinating story, Sheriff! Anyone have questions?”

  Aidan raised his hand and asked in a very serious tone, “How big is this Frog God? Because I visited New Orleans a few years ago and ate frog legs, and I bet the Frog God could feed us all for a good long while.”

  Mariah and Emily started giggling first.

  Naira guffawed from her chair by the fire.

  Soon the whole group was doubled over with mirth.

  As the laughter died down, Jessica jumped up. “Well, now that it's safe to leave the circle — it is safe, right?"

  The adults nodded.

  Jessica continued, "— I seriously have to pee.”

  “After that? I'm surprised you didn't wet yourself!” Samson said.

  Everyone laughed.

  He grinned and for a moment forgot for a moment to hide his acne.

  Jessica stuck out her tongue at him and gathered Emily and Avni to head to the wooden bathrooms on the other side of the longhouse.

  "Take the younger kids," Marie called.

  "Yeah, yeah," Jessica said, ungracious as only a popular teenager could be. But she turned on her flashlights and led the younger kids towards the bathrooms. Bryan followed them with another high-beam flashlight. For all his earlier show of sarcasm and football-throwing prowess, he seemed to take pride in keeping the camp kids from being too scared. As they left, Samson and Aidan excitedly recounted the fiery explosion.