Free Deep in the Darkness by Michael Laimo

added uncomfortably, "This is just folklore, an ancient tale from the old lady, right?"
    "Legend," Phillip replied.
    "I'm sorry?"
    "Legend. Not folklore. Not just a tale."
    "What's the difference?"
    "Difference is that legends never go away."
    I felt a bit of a shiver race down my back. I drank the last of my water. "What's that supposed to mean?"
    "It means that what the old lady was telling me was not only true, it was real. You see, she had a responsibility, a job, and that was to protect the people of Ashborough. I was the new kid on the block so I needed to be educated, and protected."
    "Protected from what?"
    He paused, looked to the canopy then back into my eyes. "The Isolates."
    "Wait a minute," I said holding a palm up, then thought, Why am I standing here listening to this? He's playing a nasty cruel joke on me, the neophyte in town, just like the old lady did to him thirty years ago when he first moved here—that's if there really is an Old Lady Zellis! Deighton is either playing me for a fool or off his rocker, "You've got to be kidding me, Phillip." I wanted to leave, but stayed and listened, as though I were...tranced.
    Ignoring me, he continued, "So the lady just reaches down behind the large rock and pulls up a possum. The thing looked as though it'd been drugged. It was still alive, that much I can say for sure because it wriggled a bit in her arms and its eyes caught the moon in such a way that they glowed like two searchlights. She stroked it some on its fur then placed it down on the big rock in the center. The animal crouched on its haunches and went still, as though willingly playing a role in the ungodly act about to take place. Michael, if legends were to be made, then this was one event to be handed down in history, my own personal history, just like the first conflicts between the natives and the Isolates were all those years ago."
    "You didn't..."
    Phillip nodded. "I did...I had no choice in the matter. The old lady's eyes started glowing this odd golden color and they had me hypnotized. I couldn't move, that is until she came forward and handed me the knife. Don't ask me where she got it from but it appeared right there in her hand just as sure as her eyes glowed that strange golden color, and then she ushered me to the stone and before I could even attempt to pull my captivated mind and body away from her, she began an odd chant that compelled me to further participate in her unholy act. Seconds later I was kneeling on the stone grasping the squealing possum by its neck and plunging the knife over and over again into its body until it squealed no more."
    "Jesus, Phillip..." I tried to speak but a sudden lump in my throat blocked my words. My Sunday afternoon stroll through the woods hadn't turned out as relaxing as I wanted. My nerves jangled like fire alarms and I promised myself that once I got back home I'd leave the woods to themselves for the rest of my time in Ashborough. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't Phillip's stories of Isolates, Old Lady Zellis, and cannibalism that had me all spooked out. It was Phillip himself. His cuckoo was in need of rewinding.
    "I stayed kneeling over the dead animal," he continued, "and it seemed as though an hour's time had passed before I finally climbed down from the rock. I still had the knife in my hand, the animal lay spread out on the rock; but the old lady, she'd upped and vanished, nowhere to be seen as if she'd never been there in the first place. The woods fell as silent as a vacuum as though everything out there had died along with that possum. No owls were a-hooting, no crickets chirped. I'm talking complete and utter silence, Michael. The only thing I could hear was my breathing and a sharp little hiss of gas coming from the punctured possum. After some time I looked down at my hands and saw all the blood. It was everywhere. On my hands, my shirt, my pants.
    "I looked at my watch and realized that I'd been gone for over an hour. Without doubt Rosy