I sat up as the driver—a man—got out of his car and hurried toward my sister, bending over to feel her pulse. My breath caught as I heard him swear and start fumbling for his phone, his fingers shaking. Setting down my dog, I crawled over to Celeste and frantically started looking for signs of life. There were none.
At first I didn’t believe my sister was dead. I actually thought I was checking for her pulse wrong, that it was there but I just wasn’t finding it yet. Then I saw all the blood that was spread across her clothes and on the road. I saw that her chest wasn’t rising or falling. When I looked into her face, her eyes were wide open and unblinking, staring up at the stars.
She was gone.
Despite my distaste toward Celeste, I found myself tightly grasping my sister’s nightgown with my fingers and crying, tears dripping off my chin. Wesley was near Celeste, too, his eyes looking up at me in a sad way, like he was sorry for me. He was actually looking at me like it was his fault. As I turned away from his gaze, I glanced at my watch. It was 11:44.
With a horrified jolt I realized what I had been seeing every night; it was Celeste reaching out—to me. The girl who came out every night was my sister. Celeste’s ghost was replaying her death before she even died.
###
Ashton McConnell
Ashton is a sixteen-year-old Australian-born writer currently living in Michigan. She is the oldest of three siblings. She loves to read anything she can get her hands on, but fantasy is, by far, her favorite. She has been writing since she could hold a pencil and has entered her work in a variety of competitions. Recently she completed her first novel, which will soon be published. “I guess one would say I eat, sleep, and breathe writing!”
You can read some of her poetry on her blog at https://ashton.pennywisepc.com/
The Huntress
Emily Roe
Chapter 1: The Coach
“But Dad! I don’t want to go,” she said angrily.
Dad looked around. Sigh. “Please just go. I know you’ll like it. You need to learn. I love it. Just do it; you’ll love it, too.”
“Okay,” Dawn sighed. “Let’s go.”
“You’re going to love this, Sweetie, trust me,” her father said with ease. He was driving his green rusty truck. “You’re going to love it,” he said with a smile.
***
“Ben, I’d like you to meet my daughter, Dawn.”
Ben stared at her with an ugly look. “How old?”
“Thirteen years old,” Dawn said.
It was silent for a moment. “So, um, Ben, I’d like you to teach my daughter how to hunt,” her father said awkwardly.
“So I see, but first archery must be taught!” Ben said. “Come, we must go learn safety first.”
“Okay, Sweetie, I will see you at 7:30,” her father said.
“You’re leaving me?”
“No, no, no, I’ll be back at 7:30. Love you!” he said with a smile.
“Ugh, love you too,” she said with a grunt. And her dad left in his big green truck.
Ben took Dawn to an old barn. “Welcome to my archery barn!” Ben said with excitement.
“This is your archery barn?” she said. It looked like it was going fall apart. It was an old red wreck-up barn with a dog living in it. Ben didn’t look at the barn like it was a mess; he looked at it like it was home. Dawn didn’t understand “This is it?”
“Yes!” Ben said with glee.
“So what exactly do we do again?”
“We learn how to shoot a bow and arrow,” Ben said wisely.
“What exactly is archery? Also, why did my father make me do this?”
“So many questions. Your father brought you here because of needing to find food. He’s getting old, and he needs someone else to hunt for food. If someone doesn’t, then you and your father will starve.”
“But why me?” she asked.
“Your father never had a son.”
“What does that have to do with anything?” Dawn asked.
“Your mother…uh…well, your mother…”
“I know. It’s no secret that she passed away.”
Chapter 2: Teachings
“Dawn,” Ben said, “here’s a bow.” The wise man handed her a skinny re-curve bow. It was red camouflage.
“So…what do I do with this?” Dawn asked.
“Nock an arrow on the bow. We’re going to try several bows till we find the one for you. Is that ok?”
“Yeah, it’s ok, I guess,” Dawn said. She slowly pulled back the bow, took a deep breath, and let go!
“How are you so perfect at shooting?” Ben asked eagerly.
“Ugh!” Dawn screamed. “I didn’t make it anyway, so how could that have been a good shot? I missed the target by a mile!”
“Yes, but it’s not about if you hit the target. Well, it would be great if you hit the target, but really, what it’s about is the technique in shooting,” Ben said. “Let’s try a compound bow. It’s harder to pull back, but it has a lot of power to hit that target. Let’s start at ten yards. Pull slowly and let go nice and easy now.”
Dawn took a deep breath, pulled back, and let go. “I hit the target!” She was so excited.
“Yes, yes. This one will do,” Ben said. It was black, a little bear bow. “This is the bow you will start out with.”
Dawn looked at it kind of funny then nodded her head. “I’ll take it for now,” she said.
“When you get older and stronger we’ll get you a new bow.” Ben told her.
So Dawn started to look at Ben as a person, not an old man, and she started to listen to him. She couldn’t wait to come back next week. While she was shooting, she acknowledged the man. He had neither children nor a wife. He loved his old wrecked shooting barn, even though it was falling apart. He had never really had any friends, mostly only Dawn’s father, who helped this man every day as much as he could. That’s just how Dawn’s father treated people—with respect.
***
Dawn practiced and practiced.
“Hmm… Do you love shooting the bow and arrow now?” Ben asked one day.
Dawn stopped. “No, it’s just a thing to do in my spare time,” she said.
“Why are you really here?” Ben asked.
“Since my mother passed away and we need food, I knew I had to start hunting because Dad’s getting too old,” she said.
“Next time you come here, we’re going to do some more target practice, and soon you’ll be able to start shooting a deer target at different angles.”
Dawn just couldn’t wait. She was really beginning to like this archery thing and couldn’t wait for practice on the next Tuesday.
Dawn was very good at shooting targets. She even made some bullseyes! Dawn shot her heart out with Ben, and Ben made sure she was standing straight over the line. If she needed to make any adjustments, he helped her.
She was absolutely tired, and it wasn’t even time to go yet. “You need to shoot more, and you won’t get as tired,” Ben said.
It was time to go home, and Dawn’s father was there to pick her up. “Are you ready to go home, Sweetie?” he asked.
“Yep. Whew, I’m tired!” So Dawn said her good-byes to Ben and left with her father until next week.
“So, do you want to come back next week?” her father asked.
“One more time wouldn’t hurt.”
“You get better and better every time. It’s called practice,” her father said.
“Sure.”
Chapter 3: Don’t Judge a Book by its Cover
Dawn had been going to the archery barn for about a month. She was really enjoying herself and had some pretty great laughs with Ben. She was starting to think he was not as bad as people thought he was. He’s not an old grumpy guy; he’s actually nice and has a sense of humor.
Today Dawn would get a new bow. She had maxed out everything on the last bow. The new bow was different; it was not a bear bow (a bo
w for beginners). It was a real bow she would have for a while. It was made to shoot deer and other animals.
All the targets that Ben had were hay bales with a paper target pinned to them. Ben didn’t have the best stuff for shooting, but he had what he had. “It’s better than nothing,” Dawn’s father always said.
Dawn’s new bow was a nice one. There was something new on this one: there was a string thingy, and a rubber something on it, too. Dawn asked Ben what it was. “That is a de-loop and a peep-sight,” Ben said.
Dawn was very confused. “So what do I do with this deep-loop?” Dawn asked.
“You need a release,” said Ben. “Then just let go, okay?”
“Okay,” Dawn said. “Also, what’s a peep sight?”
“You have to look through it.”
Dawn didn’t quite understand, but she did what Ben told her to do, because he knew how to do everything bow-related. She trusted him and understood him.
Soon it was time for her to go. Her father came to pick her up and said he could help her tune in her bow. After all, Ben had taught him everything he knew about bows.
Chapter 4: Ready
It had been five months, and when Dawn came to Ben’s archery barn for practice, he acted…strange. He said he needed to do a couple of tests. Dawn didn’t really care; she just did what he told her to do. He blew up a water balloon as small as he could. “Alright, Dawn, try to shoot this,” he said.
Dawn took her time, and, Bam! She shot it! Then he took a toilet paper roll and took out the cardboard part. He stuck the cardboard part on the hay bale target. “Shoot inside of this tube,” he said.
Dawn took a deep breath and pulled back.
Total silence.
She imagined the arrow hitting right in the middle—and she imagined being so happy. Then she let go…
She hit it right in the middle!
Then Ben shot an arrow and told her to shoot right down the middle of it.
She took another deep breath, and…TWANG! She hit right down the middle of the arrow. She had Robin-Hooded an arrow! She was very proud of herself! So was Ben. He told her she could keep the arrow as a prize for how well she’d been doing.
Ben said, “It’s time to show the world your skills by entering a contest.”
And of course she said YES!
Chapter 5: It’s Time
Dawn had won the contest! She won first place in her division. She was so happy, and she owed it all too her mentor, Ben. She would not have been able to have done this without him. And she wouldn’t have been able to do it without her father to encourage her to try it. She was so glad her father had done that.
Her father took her out to the woods and set up her bow and got ready in a blind. She was so excited. “Dawn, are you ready for this?” he asked. “It’s going to take longer than you think. Are sure you’re ready?”
“YES!” she said. Ooh! She was so happy and excited. She was finally going to shoot her first deer.
Dawn waited and waited, and waited… She was starting to get frustrated. “Dad,” she whispered. “It’s been almost five hours. When are we going to see a deer?”
“Dawn, you don’t always see a deer the first time when hunting,” he said. “You need to have patience…”
At that very moment a deer came out of nowhere. It was a ten pointer! It was about ten years old, and in deer years, that’s big!
She pulled back and…
THWACK!
That deer dropped right to the ground. He was dead!
Dawn was so happy! She couldn’t wait for the future of her bow hunting skills.
Emily M. Roe
Emily M. Roe was born on April 22, 2004. She has always wanted to write a book. This is actually the first story she has ever written. “When I had the opportunity to write a story, I chose something I was inspired by; I made my little fantasy story about a girl like me, except she’s older and doesn’t want to do archery. But somehow her father talks her into it. I chose ‘Dawn’ for my main character because I think it is a beautiful name.”
The photo is actually Emily doing archery. “I thought it was a perfect picture; it looks so cool!”
Besides archery, her favorite things to do are play with her dog, Skittles, and cook.
Wind, Blood, and Stars
Grace S. Snyder
Onyx walked through the forest, the ground wet and soft with moss and moist dirt. Large roots from the trees stuck out of the ground like the veins of an elder's hand. Onyx kept looking for a decent place to stay, slightly fearful of what could be; the sounds of the night were not exactly soothing at times. The crickets played their usual rhapsodies, and the birds made their coos and caws, but Onyx kept walking. He even felt the movement of fish as he stepped into the flowing waters of a tributary.
"I think I'll like it here: no humans, plenty of things to eat, and the odds of the presence of dragons is higher here," Onyx said to himself. He still had hope for the dragons, even though they were considered extinct everywhere else.
Onyx spread his wings and flew up to a branch that looked sturdy enough to sleep on. He decided to imitate the behavior of a jaguar or a sloth for the night, just lying on the branch. His eyes fluttered, and light smoke billowed from his nostrils, his limp, sleeping tail swayed with the light breeze, and the dim moonlight through the canopy shone on Onyx and the rest of the forest. Onyx`s jet black scales gleamed in the moonlight, like the precious gem he was named after.
The next morning, Onyx woke well rested but realized quickly that sleeping in the fashion of a wildcat causes everything to become stiff. "Ugh, clearly I need to spend the day looking for better sleeping quarters," Onyx muttered to himself in disgust after cracking his limbs for a few minutes.
Onyx took off and soared above the canopy, looking for the tributary he had seen the night before. Little did he know, he was being followed. Silent and unseen, a dragon was gliding above Onyx, her wings spread. She looked down at Onyx and smirked. This dragon was native to the rainforest and was camouflaged to match the sky above. She was like an owl, completely quiet, whilst the prey remained oblivious. She spread her talons, ready to pounce on the largest prey she had found in a while. She tucked in her wings quickly and dived like a falcon for the kill.
Onyx was especially surprised, and he let out a fearful cry to prove it. He still couldn't see the mysterious force that had clobbered him, but he knew its claws were digging into him.
They eventually crashed into the forest floor, and the female dragon camouflaged herself into the surroundings of the forest.
"Excuse me, I don't want to interfere with the whole ‘Circle of Life’ thing, but who are you?" Onyx asked in a mix of English and the little bit of dragon tongue he still knew.
The dragon lowered her spread wings and un-camouflaged, revealing her true colors; they were vibrant like a macaw's. She seemed to have feathers and a prehensile tail. Her feathers were an assortment of bright blues, greens, reds, and yellows, and her eyes were dark brown.
"None of my prey has ever asked me that before," the dragon said.
"Oh, well...I'm not going to ask you to continue eating me," Onyx stuttered.
"II apologize. I have been a bit desperate lately when it comes to food."
"I can tell. There is a tributary this way full of fish," Onyx suggested.
"You don't know dragon tongue very well, do you?" the dragon asked.
"No." Onyx sighed.
"Well, I can help you. I'm Tourmaline, by the way," the dragon said with a smile.
"We should head there right now. I'm getting pretty hungry," Onyx said.
"Yeah, who knows, I might just eat you at any minute!" Tourmaline shouted just before bursting out laughing.
Onyx laughed nervously. "Yep, wouldn't want that to happen."
Onyx and Tourmaline took off toward the tributary, both soaring gracefully, and the speed they were flying would have shamed any bird. Onyx was gliding in a straight line towar
d the water, but Tourmaline playfully swooped up and down, occasionally cutting off Onyx by swooping in front of him.
"Do you mind? I'm trying to get to the water," Onyx said.
"Yeah, the boring way," Tourmaline scoffed. "You are a StarJumper dragon, aren't you? Those are some of the best flying dragons, and yet all you do is fly straight?"
"Oh, you got me there. I guess I'll give swooping sloppily up and down a shot," Onyx sighed.
Onyx and Tourmaline swooped up and down in total sync with each other. Their flight paths were parallel, but they never flew next to each other, one was always up and the other was down. They weaved through the sky like rope, laughing all the way, until they dived, side by side, to land on the edge of the water.
"The rumors are true; StarJumpers are awesome flyers," Tourmaline smiled.
Onyx chuckled. "Not too bad yourself."
The two dragons took a few sips of water until they noticed some fish wriggle by. Onyx and Tourmaline looked at each other. "Race ya!" Tourmaline shouted as she jumped into the water with a splash.
"Hey, wait up! You'll scare the fish away!" Onyx said, leaping after her.
"Not the way I do it," Tourmaline smirked as she pulled out her paw to reveal a skewered fish. Tourmaline bit off the head of the fish and spat it playfully in Onyx's direction. "I use the element of surprise. I just pounce on anything that moves."
"Excellent strategy," Onyx said sarcastically.
"Just try it." Tourmaline sighed.
"Fine," Onyx scoffed. "And for the record, I have not met anyone so childish in my entire life, except for children."
"Well," Tourmaline scoffed back, "I have never met anyone so adult...ish." She went back to pouncing on fish, and Onyx decided to try it, too. Onyx had quite a few fish slip out of his paws whilst Tourmaline continued to catch fish and spit the heads in Onyx's direction.
"Okay, I admit, this plan would work if I were a quick pouncer," Onyx said with a light smile.
Tourmaline spat out a head. "Why thank you! Are you full?"
"Yeah," Onyx responded.
"Do you have any place to stay?" Tourmaline asked.
"No," Onyx replied.
"Then come on!" Tourmaline shouted as she took off.
Tourmaline and Onyx decided to slalom through the forest instead of fly over it. They were kept apart by the trees but remained parallel to each other. Onyx sneaked looks at Tourmaline; he had an urge to gaze upon the magnificence of her.