A Banshee's Tale Read online

  First published by The Writer’s Coffee Shop, 2011

  Copyright © Veronica Breville, 2011

  The right of Veronica Breville to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her under the Copyright Amendment (Moral Rights) Act 2000

  This work is copyright. Apart from any use as permitted under the Copyright Act 1968, no part may be reproduced, copied, scanned, stored in a retrieval system, recorded or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either a product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual people living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  The Writer’s Coffee Shop

  (Australia) PO Box 2013 Hornsby Westfield NSW 1635

  (USA) PO Box 2116 Waxahachie TX 75168

  Paperback ISBN- 978-1-61213-068-2

  E-book ISBN- 978-1-61213-069-9

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the US Congress Library.

  Cover image by: Mangojuicy, Gamemon

  Cover design by: Jennifer McGuire

  www.thewriterscoffeeshop.com/vbreville

  Veronica’s roots are firmly planted in small town life and love of family. She grew up in the East-Kansas town of Paola surrounded by cousins, aunts and uncles, grandparents and great grandparents. The attentions of one particular great grandmother, Helen, sparked her love of stories and books. Her great grandmother spoke of a frontier Kansas, the Great Dust Bowl, and hard times. She also spoke of the love of family and how life’s trials brought hers unsurpassed fullness. Veronica watched her write her life’s story and has since read her moving words. Helen’s daughter, Veronica’s grandmother Catherine, took over the storytelling reigns and at 83 hasn’t stopped. Catherine prompted Veronica’s own writing by telling her that even if she only writes it for herself and her daughters, it’s a gift that will live on.

  In 2002 Veronica married Curtis Breville, who brought with him a beautiful daughter. Since then they have added two more amazing daughters to their family. They live in the Denver Metro area with their dog, Bastian, and love enjoying the majestic beauty of the mountains whenever time permits.

  Flying.

  I’m flying and the world floats past in muted shades of green and blue. It’s all blurry, as I swing higher. My stomach drops with each back and forth surge. The wind catches my hair, bringing with it the smell of the ocean and newly blossomed flowers. Swinging fills me with freedom as the worn rope creaks against the branch above.

  In the distance is a house sitting on a small hill surrounded by vibrant spring color. I know that house, though I shouldn’t. It’s home and love and all good things. My focus stays there as I continue to enjoy my moment on the swing.

  Without warning, I feel like I’m being tugged away from the swing. Like a rope is tied to my waist, pulling me back with jerky movements. When I look back, I realize the swing is still occupied by a girl. It’s as though I am looking at myself but the hair is wrong. Mine is the color of molasses and this child’s hair is the color of sunshine. It shimmers and glows. When the light touches it, the strands ignite with a bright burst of red that reminds me of fire. It is beyond beautiful.

  Confused, I reach for her at the same time she slows her swing to a stop. I know her as I know myself. Yet I’ve never met her in my waking life. She turns, almost as if she can sense my confusion. The sun is behind her obscuring her face. The only things I can make out are her eyes. They are my eyes but in a face set in shadow and are hidden from my view. She begins to reach for me before pulling away quickly, her body turning in the direction her head did moments before. I look over her shoulder to see what has caught her attention, just making out a fuzzy black figure. It seems to be calling to her and her small form shivers.

  “Don’t go!” I yell. She’s in danger. I don’t know how I know this, but she is and I need to save her. The knowledge of this is so deeply instinctive it’s as natural to me as breathing.

  She takes no time to look back and heed my warning, opting instead to continue walking forward. Before another pleading scream can make its way past my lips, a bright flash of red and gold light blinds me, forcing my eyes closed. When I open them, she’s gone. The cloaked figure is in my periphery. The fear I feel fuels a full tilt run to the house on the hill.

  And, like so many nights before, I never make it.

  I woke choking back a scream. My night had followed the same routine since I turned five, though the dream had never been so dark or detailed before now. I knew I should have felt scared for myself but all I felt was fear for the girl in my dream and anger with myself for not being able to help her. All I wanted was to save her, the little golden girl with my eyes.

  Normal. My entire life was the epitome of normal. Growing up on a small rundown farm smack dab in the heart of the Kansas Flint Hills had a way of making you feel like that. However, today would be anything but normal.

  Today was the first day of my sophomore year at Council Grove High School, and I, Catherine Aislin Dalry, had vowed to assert myself and stop being a wallflower, no matter how comfortable the wall. Rolling over and gingerly touching my feet to the floor, I stood up. With a new purpose in my step, I rushed around my room gathering my things. Not wanting to take a cold shower again, I quickened my pace down the hall and quietly closed the squeaky bathroom door.

  Orin, my oldest and most serious brother, had graduated last year and gone to the University of Kansas. His departure meant one less body to fight the morning rush. I was happier for it, though I did miss his sincere blue eyes and crushing bear hugs.

  Over the years, I had become particularly brilliant at selective hearing, so I ignored the ranting my younger brother, Murphy—the youngest of my three brothers still living at home—had started at the bathroom door and began my normal shower routine. My legs sufficiently lathered with copious amounts of shave gel, I began the laborious task of shaving them without turning them into something resembling hamburger. It was at this point that Murphy got creative.

  Bang, Bang, Bang!

  The intensity of the noise was fierce. The vibrations sent the water on the bottom of the tub dancing around my feet in time with the beat of the drummer at the door. I finished up with a nice nick on my ankle as my reward. My hasty hand had turned the razor just right and it had sliced into my skin, sending a river of red flowing into the drain. With mumbled curses, I rinsed the wound and cursed my little brother’s habit of annoying me at every available chance.

  After turning the water off and wrapping myself in my robe, I tried to stop the bleeding with a piece of tissue. I walked to the door to stop the annoying tirade coming from the other side. Just as I was pulling it open, Murphy leaned against it in defeat and ended up face first on the faded linoleum at my feet. The cursing continued but was muffled by the shaggy blue bath mat filling his mouth. Before I could contain it, a giggle escaped, quickly turning into eye-watering belly laughs.

  Between gasps I managed to tickle him just under his arm with my toe. “Serves you right, Murph. You made me cut my leg.”

  “Don’t blame me for your klutziness. Now...” He surveyed my foot, and I could almost hear the wheels of mischief turning inside his head as he turned quickly and started tickling the bottom. “Say uncle and I’ll let you go.”

  If ever there was a Dalry trait that was passed down to all family members, it was that of stubbornness. My younger brother would not bring me down. “Never!” My words came out as a choked laugh. I flailed my leg until it caught his chin and he let go, allo
wing me to turn to the door. A small moment passed when I considered just making a run for it, but I couldn’t turn away until I made sure Murphy wasn’t bleeding. Biting my top lip, I turned my head to take a quick peek. No blood and I hadn’t knocked him out. A sigh formed in my throat, but as I was about to let it out, I caught the look in his eye.

  “If I were you, I’d run, Catherine.”

  Grasping the explosive nature of the situation, I sprinted to my room, slamming the door just before Murphy could make a grab for my robe and tickle me to the point of torture. I leaned against the door, trying to catch my breath. My room had looked the same since before I could remember: yellowed and faded bluebird wallpaper torn at the seams in most places. I recalled my little girl phase when I had let my mom bombard me with the most over-the-top assembly of froufrou paraphernalia she could get her hands on. Being her only daughter was her excuse. My furniture had changed only because necessity demanded it, and then it was just to exchange my crib for a full-size bed when I was four. The summer before I started high school, I had begged mom for a desk so I wouldn’t have to sit at the kitchen table with my homework anymore. She had acquiesced the week before school started, but that was the last change I had made. Nothing ever changed around our one-hundred-year-old home.

  Satisfied that Murphy had retreated to the bathroom, I pushed away from my door and glanced at the outfit on my bed. It was casual, but in my opinion, chic enough for the first day of school. I’d chosen it last night, so that I had time this morning to try to tame the nest that was my hair.

  I pulled my vanity chair away from the table and sat down to view myself in the light of a new day. Turning left and right, I caught glimpses of my parents in my appearance, but while the rest of my family looked as if they stepped right off a boat from the Emerald Isle: fair freckled skin, hair the color of a harvest moon, and eyes as blue as a cloudless sky. We couldn’t have been more different. My skin was fair but unmarred by even the slightest hint of a freckle. Mom referred to me as her porcelain doll, but I longed for a beauty mark. At the ripe old age of four, I had decided to take matters into my own hands and drew freckles on my face. Let’s just say my mom wasn’t as thrilled as I was about the additions to my appearance or the fact that I had used a permanent marker. My eyes, well, I’ll get to that in a bit, but suffice it to say they are quite different from the rest of my immediate family. My body was very much like my mother’s: a tad taller than average, quite thin, and plenty capable of holding my own physically. I had a razor-sharp tongue to match, as well. My molasses-colored hair, the bane of my teenage existence, held only a hint of the family’s trademark red in the form of highlights, which this morning seemed freakishly bright.

  Grabbing my comb to investigate this new addition, I saw the morning light hit the side of my head; it sent brightly colored hues of red haziness rising from my hair. It rippled like hot air hitting cement on a summer day; almost liquid but the effect made me think of flames rather than water... it looked like my head was on fire.

  The warmth from the sun only intensified the issue. For a moment, I just sat and stared, transfixed by the colors and shimmering waves. Snapping out of my daze, my mind screamed the obvious. Fire! My head is on fire! Patting my head to no avail, I was barely aware of a scream echoing through my room. I knew somewhere in the back of my mind it was me. The scream that was ripping through my throat burned and stung, but I couldn’t stop it—any more than I could stop assaulting my own head in a desperate attempt to put out flames that weren’t even there. The volume and intensity of my voice took me by surprise and seemed to be the catalyst that brought my family in for a look, as well. Before I was able to muffle the remainder of the fear that gripped me, Aidan and Colm, my twin brothers, were standing in my doorway. If I wasn’t having a small breakdown, I might have found their expressions funny. There they stood, mouths hanging open in guffawing laughter and surprise, witnessing me in all my robed, screaming glory. That did it. I was practically naked with my head on fire. You know the line the straw that broke the camel’s back? Well, the twins were my straw.

  “Get out!” was all I could manage. It was effective enough; they both began to back out of my room.

  Aidan, palms out in front of him like a shield, decided to push the limits of my sanity. “We were just checking on your for mom. Uh, did you do something different with your hair?” He and Colm turned in the direction of the stairs, apparently deciding they didn’t need an answer to their question. I threw my brush at him but missed and hit Colm in the back of the head.

  “Jeez! No need for violence, woman!” He turned to look at Aidan and added, “I don’t think she appreciated your question, but I hear flames are all the rage this season.”

  “I said get out, jerks!” Breathing rapidly, I was sure at that point my eyes likely matched my hair. I was on the verge of completely losing it and tackling them both. The only thing that stopped me was my lack of clothing, but the more they talked the less even that mattered.

  As the thundering of feet down the hall got louder, I realized that mom wasn’t the only one running to see what the ruckus was about. I rushed to find something larger than my robe to hide behind, preferably something that I could cover my flaming head with as well.

  The only thing suitable was the quilt from my bed. I grabbed it and wound it around me twice, bringing it up and over my head like a hoodie. Mom and Dad burst into my room, apparently under the impression that I had lost my mind because of my screeching, only to find me sitting on my bed wrapped in my blanket and on the verge of a teenage breakdown.

  “What in the world is going on? Aidan and Colm were tripping over themselves to find us and said that your hair was on fire,” Dad accused.

  “I... I... I... ah, I don’t... This is so not what I need this morning.” I sighed, and then quick as a flash, my hormonal impulses took over. Noisy sobs replaced the earsplitting shrieks from moments earlier.

  “Slow down, love. What happened?” I could always count on mom to be the calm in the storm, but at this point, I feared she was in over her head. “Colm made it sound awful, but it seems he might have just been spouting a bunch of blarney. I truly wish you kids would take the time to see what’s happening before you go blathering on and on...”

  “Mom! Okay.” Interrupting her before she could go on and on about how we were always making a mountain out of a molehill, I tried to plead my case. “I was sitting here trying to fix my hair and the sun came through the window and I... I... I...” Sucking in a deep breath to fend off both the cries and the shouting, I collected myself and pushed forward. Getting this out was going to be extremely difficult if I couldn’t control myself. “I swear my head looked like it was on fire, or well, my hair maybe? I mean it was all normal and blackish, and then I tilted it like this and the light caught it and whoosh,” I threw my hands up and out for effect, pulling my hair with them, “it’s all ablaze and looking redder than it has a right to.” I shook my head and groaned. “It’s never done that before, and then the boys barged in while I’m half naked making it all worse. I just don’t know what’s wrong with me.” With pleading eyes on the brink of more tears, I looked at my mother. “Mom, what is wrong with me?”

  “Sweets, nothing is wrong with you, and I’m sure it didn’t really look like your head was on fire. I think you’re just overly anxious for your first day back at school. Take a few more deep breaths, go wash your face, and get ready for school. You have about forty-five minutes before you have to be at the bus stop,” she said. Her words were so nonchalant, so matter-of-fact. If I hadn’t been looking at her, I would have missed the fear and pain in her eyes. She knows more than she’s telling me, I realized as her eyes were drawn to my new hair.

  “Mom, what aren’t you telling me?” I narrowed my eyes and pursed my lips, giving her my best “give me the truth, mom” look.

  What do you mean, Catherine?” There was an edge to her voi
ce, a warning, I think, to drop my line of questioning. It didn’t work.

  “You’ve got that look. The one that says... I know more than I’m saying.” My mother’s back stiffened minutely before she looked down and adjusted the bottom of her shirt.

  “You and your brothers... heads always in the clouds... imagining things... too bloody stubborn,” she muttered before addressing my question. “Whatever it is you think I know can wait until after your first day of school. Now, get yourself together and make it quick, love.” She scooted out the door, pushing my father with her and closed it quietly.

  Thinking over her response, as cryptic as it was, I desperately tried to decide if she had admitted to knowing more. The puddle of overanxious goo that was once my highly functioning brain made the effort far too difficult. I would have to get to the bottom of my mother’s curious behavior but not until I got this nightmare of a first day of school out of the way.

  The remainder of my miserable morning passed without more drama. After shoveling my breakfast in my mouth, I grabbed the first hat I could find: a garish orange, purple, and red winter stocking cap complete with a fuzzy ball on top. It was sure to bring attention since it was the end of summer and not winter but very capable of hiding my hair, so I smashed it onto my head.

  Making my way out the front door, I slowly trudged up the dusty road to the bus stop. Normally, this walk and the sight of the never-ending hills and shallow valleys in the distance would have invigorated me, but not this morning. Unfortunately, this morning I was in such a foul mood even the beauty of the remaining wild flowers couldn’t improve my outlook.

  For a brief second, I watched the expansive blue of the sky above me as clouds began to roll over the hills and blot out the sun. Apricot and blush-tinged gray clouds slowly bled across the sky, over coming the bright blue in a darkly beautiful way. Even the weather was conspiring to make my day worse: I had forgotten my umbrella at home. My reaction to what would normally be exhilarating and magical was tunnel vision. I focused only on the road at my feet: brown, rocky, boring, and harsh. The parallels to my own life did not escape me.