NaNoWriMo 2007 Fifteenth Chapter

Raven Red Tooth stood alone in the crow's nest, letting the wind carry tears across his leathery cheeks while he stared at the stars.  The moon faced him with authority, full to the outer rim, brilliant, and defiant.  Circled in a fuzzy ring, a mysterious glow, the moon challenged Raven.  You think you know me? The moon's face winked.  You know I truly belong to the race of women, Raven, you know they are my servants, my profits, and my sorceresses.  The time of the moon is here, Raven.  The time of the moon is upon you.

Holding his moonstone bead in his longest braid, Raven stood confused.  Was he furious or reverent?  Did he believe that the time of the moon was safe?  Lucky?  Or was the lunar path ahead going to create intense trouble and turn their pirate life into a painfully dangerous experience?  What magic lay ahead?  Good white magic with miracles and wonders?  Or did black magic await them, filling their hearts with terror and their heads with torturous nightmares?

Raven rubbed the moonstone between his thumb and his middle finger, closed his eyes, and tried to see the future.  The lake air tingled his skin, the hair on his neck stood on end, and his warm eyelids relieved the wind burn on his eyeballs.  The air swirled in his nostrils, curled in his lungs, and tickled his guts.  Raven had a hard time understanding if this was the excitement of wonderful happiness ahead, or if that was the feeling of horror, loss of control, and disaster.  His stomach flipped, his lungs shivered, and his clavicles buzzed.  The air smelled green, pregnant with life.  The moon kissed his thick black eyelashes, and tried to wake him.  When Raven opened his eyes, the moon was glimmering and giggling, winking at him and smiling.  He felt like a fool.

Climbing down from the crow's nest, Raven lambasted himself for his sensitivities to the elements, his squirrelly superstitions, and his cursed lineage as a gypsy.  He started to hate the sound of the rocks and charms and bones that rattled with him.  His small leather pouches of tokens and spells, candles and oils, matches and garlic cloves, herbs and locks of hair- all of these items were a simple necessity to the gypsy life.  He knew how to ward off bad lovers and invite fortune into the near vicinity.  Unfortunately most of the spells need ground, soil, a house, domestic animals, land.  Few gypsy spells were designed for the life on a boat.  For a cart or wagon, sometimes their were spells, or curses, or blessings.  For a ship?  Raven would have to ask the spirit of his great great great grandmother, but she probably wouldn't come to him on water either.  She preferred land after so much traveling, escaping, finding safe lands.  And what would he ask his great great great grandmammie?  Why the moon laughed at him?  Is this the time of them oon?  The time for women?  Are women taking over the world?

Such ideas and questions made his head spin into a migraine.  His feet touched the deck and he immediately sat down.  He rubbed his temples.  Rosemary, where was his rosemary.  He had it in one of his pouches, somewhere.  His eyes ached, his forehead throbbed, his neck squeaked.  Damn those women, they were doing this to him!  Women are bad luck on the ship.  Women are bad luck on the ship.  Women are bad luck on the ship.  Raven could not stop this low, quiet, mumbling chant, his solo meditative protest.  Women are bad luck on a ship.  Women are bad luck on a ship.  Women are bad luck on a ship.

Copyright 2007 Laura Beck Nielsen