Myth of the Phantoms Page 3

     "I know something bad is going to happen. I can feel it." She said softly, talking to herself, "I do hope mother will be alright. She should have taken me with her."
     She picked up a blanket from a nearby chair and wrapped it around her shoulders. She walked over to the fireplace, and looked around it for something.
     "Oh dear, It seems I shall have to go into town and get firewood."
     In the shadows, something was watching her and she could feel it.
     "Who's there?" She called out, but no one answered.
     Shrugging it off, she headed for the door. That something watching her moved, but she took no notice of it as she was half way out the door.
     When Lemaya arrived at the town square, there was a big crowd gathered around a shipping's carriage. Lemaya wondered what all the commotion was about so she got closer to find out.
     "I'm telling you, that orphan girl is a demon!" trumpeted a bruised and scratched up carriage master.
     "You drunk old fool! Are you to say that malnutritioned little beast did this to you? Do you really expect us to believe you?" shouted someone in the crowd.
     Lemaya giggled to a woman next to her, "Looks like old lady Granhelm put a little something extra in his ginger root."
     The lady turned. It was Granhelm. Lemaya gasped and tried to hide a little smirk. She couldn't help but see how funny, yet awkward, a situation it was. However Granhelm was not amused.
     The old woman yelled out, "I believe him!"
     "Of course you would!" yelled out another in the crowd.
     Granhelm was an old, unsightly woman who everyone in the town disliked. They always seemed to connect her with acts of witchery and more often then not she was in fact behind them.
     "Beware! The time of darkness shall once again engulf this world. In three new moons this land will be forgotten and all who oppose the coming of the Phantoms will be purged of this land!"
     A silence filled the crowd. They knew her prophesies to almost always be true. Then Finally…
     "Nonsense! The Phantoms are nothing more then a myth, an old fairy tell our mothers would tell us when we were children!" Lemaya blurted out.
     "You are a fool to believe so. The Phantoms are real and they are coming," Granhelm hissed.
     The old witch gave Lemaya the evil eye and walked away. The crowd erupted with laughter.