Blood Moon

Delia DuBois was a reluctant witch. She'd been born into the DuBois family of natural witches who lived on the Black Bayou in Louisiana in the hamlet of St. Elizabeth. The DuBois were natural witches, drawing their power from the world around them and Delia's grandmother Irene assured her she was very powerful.

Delia hadn't cared about any of that, however and had refused to participate on the monthly coven rituals after she'd reached her majority and suffered her first period at age twelve. That had meant she was a woman and had come into her own as a witch and could handle the power that could flow through her from the natural world.

Irene had taken her before Rowan DuBois the High Priestess of the coven and told Delia she must show Rowan the evidence of her womanhood, but Delia found the thought too embarrassing.

"So, Irene tells me you are a woman now, young lady and can become a full member of the coven," The frail old woman with her white hair styled professionally said as she stared at Delia from the comfortable club chair in her den. "Does that make you happy?"

Delia remembered shifting on her feet uneasily before the old woman. "Not really, ma'am," she'd replied honestly. "I want to go to college and get out of this backwater bayou someday."

The old woman in her designer silk suit has smiled. "Do you know how to draw power to yourself?" Ruby had asked. "Has Irene been tutoring you on the basics? That would be a grandmother's duty, you know."

"I can do that," Delia had told the priestess uneasily. "Granny showed me how to do it ages ago but I don't like doing it," she admitted.

"Why?" Rowan asked with a soft smile on her thin lips tinted pink with lipstick.

"It feels like stealing," Delia had admitted with her lips trembling, "and if you take too much the creature can die."

Ruby had nodded her head of soft white curls and smiled. "That's why you receive training, "she'd said. "Will you show me what you can do by drawing a little power from me?" When Rowan saw the fear in the girl's bright green eyes she added, "Don't worry, child, you won't hurt me. I can manage the flow if I must. I just want to see if you can do it at all."

Delia had nodded and closed her eyes to find the tendril if power she always looked for in a creature to latch onto and draw into herself but she'd never tried to find that on a human being and was surprised to feel the power emitted by Rowan DuBois. It was like nothing she'd ever felt before and it frightened Delia as she reached out to touch the white-hot pulse of energy surrounding Rowan DuBois.

Delia stilled her pounding heart and reached out with her own pulse of energy to touch that of the old woman and latch onto it and begin drawing it into herself.

The sensation was amazing and Delia thought it must be like what drug addicts felt when they shot themselves up with drugs for the first time. She drew a little of the priestess's power into herself and then released the thread of energy.

When she'd looked back up at the woman, Rowan DuBois was pale and shivering in her chair. Her smile had fled her pale face and had been replaced with a hard line. "You are more than you appear, child, are you not?"

Delia didn't know how to reply to that and simply stood silent until her grandmother burst into the room. "What's the little chit done now, Priestess," Irene asked, giving Delia a hard look she knew meant trouble for her.

"The little chit, as you call her, Irene, is a wilder and must be dealt with accordingly."

Irene's eyes went wide. "A wilder?" her grandmother gasped. " That's impossible. She may be a little outspoken and stubborn when she wants something, but she can't be a damned Wilder. There's just no way."

"She killed her mother at birth, did she not?" Rowan DuBois stated matter-of-factly.

Irene stared at Delia. "The midwife said it was because of Catherine's blood pressure," Irene stammered, "and happened a lot."

Rowan glared at Delia. "Her midwife was a fool, and should have tested this child when it clawed itself from its mother's womb. It's a wildling and will be banished from civilized society to live out its days in the bayou or be burned at the stake now and be done with it."

Delia looked from the Priestess to her grandmother. Banished or Burned at the stake? What were they talking about and what was a Wildling?

"Get it into the bayou soon, Irene," Rowan demanded in a frail voice that held a sharp, edge none-the-less, "before it makes its change or I'll have it burned and sent back to the Abyss."

Irene had reluctantly taken Delia's hand and lead her from the DuBois plantation house. "That old bat has finally lost her marbles," Irene growled.

"What is a Wildling, Granny?" Delia asked in a state of fear and confusion.

Irene had turned to her granddaughter and stared in a manner Delia had never seen before. "It's a beast," was all she said.

When they reached their small cottage Irene sent her to her room. "Pack your things and I'll take you out to the old house where you can stay until this dies down a bit or I can make arrangements for a boarding school."

Delia smiled to herself. A boarding school far away from St Elizabeth and this miserable bayou would be a dream come true. That afternoon, they loaded Delia's clothes, shoes, and books into a borrowed boat and traveled through the swamp until they came to a hillock with a cabin built in it. It had been her grandfather's fishing cabin though Delia suspected the old man had used it more as an escape from her grandmother than for fishing. He'd died here when he fell into the swamp and drowned. The coroner had told them the alcohol level in his body had been well over the limit if legal intoxication.

"I threw together a box of food stuff," Irene had told her, "and the kitchen here is stocked with pots and pans, so you'll be fine out here for a few weeks." Irene smiled. Just think of it as a short vacation away from me and the chores around the house," she'd grinned, "though I'd wager boredom will get the better of you and you'll have this place spic and span by the next time I visit."

Irene hugged her granddaughter, climbed into the boat, and left Delia standing alone on the rickety dock. Somehow Delia knew she'd never see her grandmother again and that life as she had known it was over. She trudged back to the cabin with tears stinging her eyes and began sorting through her things.

As she sorted through her books to arrange on an empty shelf she found one she didn't recognize. It was old and bound in leather On the front gold lettering read Grimoire Du Monte.

She opened the strange book and saw that it was hand written in what she thought was French but old French or possibly Latin. She was taking a French class this year in school but she hardly be able to read a book like this. Delia was about to close the book and set it aside when the letters of the words began to change on the page and become English written in the same flowery script.

Don't close me until you've gleaned the knowledge you seek from me. The first line read and Delia nearly dropped the book. The next line read, I am the directory. Speak what you seek and I shall direct you.

Delia's mouth fell open and she said the first thing to come into her mind: Wilding.

Foul creatures the book read as pages began to flip on their own until they stopped on one titled Wildings in bold print. Wildlings are changlings born to human women who have the natural power of witches. These creatures will learn and absorb the witches power and take it for its own. At puberty, the Wildling will begin its transformation and upon the full moon transform into an animal-like creature that will absorb the power of any human within its range until that human is dead.

Delia set the book aside. She couldn't possibly be one of these things. She rose and began to pace about the small cabin until she finally decided to begin cleaning and taking stock of what she had there. In one cabinet, she found bags of seeds. The island was small, but there was enough room behind the cabin for a garden if the seeds were still viable.

Two days later, after finding gardening tools in the shed in the back, Delia had a garden turned over and planted. If her grandmother ever returned, she'd ask her for more seeds or even some plants like sweet potato and onion slips.

It rained the next day and Delia spent the day cleaning the dusty cabin. She even washed down the walls, rewashed all the dishes, and scrubbed the pots and pans. The windows had no curtains but they did have shutters that closed on the inside. Delia opened them all and the little dark cabin was transformed. She hung her clothe in the tall, blue wardrobe and took an inventory of everything she had on hand. She found a can of lamp oil in the shed and filled her lamps, happy to have light she could read by at night.

She crawled into bed that night satisfied with her accomplishments and fell asleep without weeping for the first time. She woke later to the sound of a boat's motor and raised up on her elbow in the bed when it stopped outside. Had her grandmother returned for her after all?

Delia didn't think so when she heard male laughter and the sound of heavy boots on the dock outside. The door had no lock and the men came in without knocking first. Delia saw their faces in the glow of the lamp she'd left burning low on the table and recognized them a Marcus and Tommy LaRue, the sons of the man her grandmother had borrowed the boat from.

"Daddy said the old bitch brought her granddaughter out here for some reason," Marcus said with a chuckle.

"Yah," Tommy said as he reached for Delia, "for us to play with." he said laughing maniacally. "Looks like we have our own private fuck toy out here, brother." He dropped onto the bed and grabbed Delia by the hair. "We can train her to suck our cocks just the way we like it." He grinned and grabbed one of Delia's breasts beneath her thin summer gown.

"I say we get started now and see what she has hiding between these long legs," Tommy joined in as Delia kicked and wrestled to try and get away from the brothers.

"Get off me and get out of here," she yelled.

Marcus slapped her hard. "You're gonna be our bitch now miss Delia, so just shut up, lay back and enjoy it."

Tears of pain, fear, and rage welled in Delia's eyes and suddenly something clicked in her mind. She tried to calm herself and reached out with her power to latch onto theirs. She touched Tommy's first as he probed between her thighs and pulled down her panties. "Damn," he grumbled, "the bitch is on the rag."

"Then fuck her asshole," Marcus laughed.

Delia's eyes went wide with fear. Did men really do that? How nasty! She increased the flow of the energy she was taking from Tommy until he toppled down on top of her and stopped moving. Delia was drunk with the power as she reached out for the tether to Marcus and began to suck it into herself.

He slapped her again. "Come on, bitch and open your mouth. "I'm getting blue balls waiting to empty 'em down your sweet throat."

Delia opened her mouth but increased the rate she took his power and before he could put his nasty thing into her mouth, he fell over against the wall as his heart took its last beat.

After extricating herself from the bed where the brothers had assaulted her, Delia stopped before the mirror in the wardrobe door. What was wrong with her face? She stepped closer to study it. Her features all had distinctly feline characteristics and when she opened her mouth, it was filled with long, sharp teeth.

Was this the Wildling? Had she triggered the change by taking the lives of the two brothers? As she stood staring at her face it began to resume it's regular shape and her features changed back to normal. Relieved the change wasn't permanent, Delia dropped onto the settee and stared at the bed in the corner. What was she going to do with the bodies?

Delia drifted off to sleep planning what to do with the two men and thinking how nice it had been of them to give her a boat. She smiled, knowing a boat would be useful and might bring more men here to look for Marcus and Tommy--men who could feed her Wildling's budding addiction to their life force.