It was a dark and stormy night. Storming clouds swirled in a heavy vortex as thunder boomed and rumbled and lightning crackled, shaking the earth as if it wanted to plunge into its deepest layers and sap the ferocious, heavenly magma.
‘Alan,’ the old grandfather called with worry. ‘Don’t go too far.’ Alan, the younger son giggled hysterically and darted into the forest. ‘Stop him Jason,’ the old grandfather said to his older grandson as he gasped for breath. ‘Right!’ Jason said. Then he yelled,
‘Stop Alan, the forest is perilous, don’t go in there.’
The grandfather with his two grandsons and one granddaughter lived in the outskirts of Coconino-forest in Arizona. That night the grandfather had to run an errand to a nearby town (Moenkopi town) so his grandsons occupied him while his granddaughter sat in their cottage, preparing hot stew and broth for supper. Alan, the younger, mischievous and daring grandson decided to explore the forest because that night was the night of ‘Halloween.’
‘Stop!’ Jason yelled to the notorious Alan who wanted to run up to the heart of the forest.
Abruptly an animal growled. It was a ravenous wolf. His teeth chattered hungrily as the animal drool dripped from his mouth. His eyes symbolized the hungry nature of the wolves. Jason gasped when he saw the wolf. Alan stood petrified, his skin ashen and pale as white as chalk. The wolf roared looking at Alan as if he was a juicy sausage. Suddenly a bat swerved in the sky and many owls hooted. Candles floated in the air from one direction and shrill eerie sounds could be heard as if spirits were roaming. ‘Run!’ Jason said. It took a second for Alan to get out his shock but he scrambled up to a tree and climbed it as high as he could.
‘Hahaha!’ somebody cackled.
‘Perfect Halloween,’ said Jason who had climbed up another tree. ‘How can all this be true? I had heard all this was a fairy tale.’ The wolf galloped like a stallion to the tree which Alan had climbed and started shaking it. After five minutes, it was tedious for Alan to hold the bark of the tree.
‘Ah!’ he yelled. Suddenly a fireball shot across the sky, well not a fireball, a fire stone you could say. It was the old grandfather with an arrow. It was a fiery arrow. The fire shimmered in the dark night. The old man notched in and shot it straight at the wolf’s head. The wolf dodged it but the fire stone hit him and he roared in agony and wrath. He galloped at the old man, flame like projections flickering in his eyes. The old man ran back but tripped and fell to the ground with a muffled shriek.
The wolf lunged on him but at that moment an arrow was shot across the sky and it pierced through his body, swatting and slamming him against a tree. A girl with an arrow stood at the side of a tree. She had caramel coloured hair which was braided over a shoulder. Her almond eyes gleamed. She wore ragged and tattered clothes as if she was a hunter who had fought bajillion animals.
‘Who are you?’ the old man asked. She didn’t look at him, instead climbed up the tree Alan had climbed and brought him down. Then she ran back into the woods. ‘The mysterious girl,’ Jason said as ascended down the tree and clambered up to his grandfather.
Alan never went into the forest after that harrowing ordeal. No one believed Alan and Jason and that mysterious girl’s story in the town except Miranda, the old man’s granddaughter.
So, I say, “Think before you take deadly decisions and never go in the forest on Halloween night because all such things are very-very common.”
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