@Tyelkormo the Fair
You gift! Enjoy :]
Mama Coon always said, "When the night cones, we go to bed, and we stay there until the sun comes up."
When Little Boy Coon asked why he should stay in bed so long, when he wasn't a bit tired, Mama Coon shook her long-clawed finger at him. "If you don't stay in bed, the Tyelkoon will get you! Then you'll learn!"
Little Boy Coon asked what the Tyelkoon was, but all Mama Coon would say was, "if ever there was a bigger bundle of cunning and mischief in all the land, she did not know where to find it". So Little Boy Coon was to stay in bed, and not stir until the sun was up, when the Tyelkoon would leave the forest alone.
At first, Little Boy Coon obeyed his mother's warning. He went to bed when the sun went down, and in the summer that was not hard to do. But then winter came, and the days got shorter. Bedtime came earlier. Little Boy Coon stared out his window at
the shadows lengthening over a forest floor which had once been sunny, and he grew impatient at the sun, and at the warnings of his mother. But most of all, he began to resent the Tyelkoon, which was the cause of his early bedtime. So late one night, when the whole family but Little Boy Coon was asleep, he got up and went outside, taking only his trusty walking stick with him as a
weapon.
He'd never been outside at night before. Little Boy Coon stared up at the black figures of
trees, only visible by how they blotted out the rest of the night, and then he saw the stars, and the moon. They shone so bright and so pretty, Little Boy Coon forgot to be afraid, and he stared and stared up at the sky. But he couldn't see them clearly; the trees blocked out so much. So off Little Boy Coon went, towards a clearing he knew, where he would be able to see the stars and the moon more clearly.
He found his clearing, after a longer search through bushes he could hardly see and around tree trunks he accidentally blundered into. And there Little Boy Coon sat down, gazing up at the big, black sky, where so many stars shone, he could hardly believe his eyes. The moon was big and round, like a white-gold plate in the sky, and the little Coon marvelled at that too.
Then he heard twigs snap behind him. Little Boy Coon jumped, and all his mother's warnings came back to his mind. He spun around, clutching his walking stick like a club. He could hardly see anything, it was still so dark. The moon and the stars let him see a little bit, but beyond the clearing all was shadow.
The sound of a chuckle came from his right, and a tree branch rattled. Little Boy Coon whirled again, looking up to see if he could spot his antagonist. But even in the branches, only darkness lingered.
"Not asleep?" Asked a voice from behind him. Little Boy Coon squeaked in alarm and swung his stick in a wide arc, though he hit nothing but air. The voice laughed. "Everyone else is in bed, tiny tyke. Why aren't you?"
Little Boy Coon gripped his stick in paws strong with fear. "I came to fight you!" He cried out. "You're the Tyelkoon, aren't you? You're the reason we can't play outside when the sun goes down anymore! Come out and I'll...I'll show you better!" He squinted as hard as he could into the night, but still the Tyelkoon could not be seen.
The voice snorted. It now came from his right. "You silly boy. I don't hunt babies like you. I hunt the scary things which prowl at night. The
wolves and the
spiders, the bears and the nightbirds. You're no fun; you're too small and easy to sneak up on."
"Am not!" Little Boy Coon yelled. He waved his walking stick. "Show yourself, and I'll give you a reason to fear me!"
Through the shadows came a laugh so high and shivering, Little Boy Coon shrank back, wishing for a tree to brace himself against. A form moved among the trunks on the opposite side of the clearing, and stepped out into the moonlight. Something moved beside it.
The figure was so tall, Little Boy Coon had to crane his neck to look into the creature's face. This was none of his kind, nor even one of the feared
birds. This was a huge, two-legged, furless thing, with eyes which did not reflect light and a flat face devoid of snout or beak. A creature like a wolf paced beside it.
"Well, little one?" Asked the tall Thing which spoke his tongue out of its flat, furless mouth. "Do you still want to fight me?"
Little Boy Coon turned and fled. He ran squealing through the bracken and bushes, disregarding his blindness. He could still hear the voice of the Thing behind him, calling out into the night. Little Boy Coon ran and ran, until something great and big and black loomed up before him too quickly to be dodged, and he ran full force against it.
-
Little Boy Coon woke up in his own bed. The sun was shining, and a bird was singing outside his window. The child sat up and thought, at first, he must have dreamed the whole encounter. Then he saw his walking stick, which leaned against the wall beside his door, instead of on the hook by his bed.
Leaving his bedroom, Little Boy Coon found Mama Coon standing in the kitchen, taking a few moments to herself before starting on breakfast. She was gazing out the window, chewing a dried fish.
"Morning, Ma." Little Boy Coon tried to keep his voice normal. "Anyone else up?"
"You went out in the night." Said Mama Coon, without turning around. "I told you not to go." Her voice was soft, but Little Boy Coon didn't like to hear it anyway.
Picking up a fish, he offered it to Mama Coon and said, "I won't do it again. Promise, Ma."
His mother humphed through her nose. "You better not, little one. Almost scared me half to death when the Tyelkoon brought you home last night."
