The Appalachian Revival

Emerald hills lay stair-stepped in the shadows of majestic mountains splotched with brownstone outcroppings. Molly stumbled down the two-mile-long rutted road at the center stage of the natural Appalachian amphitheater. Her new twenty-dollar tennis shoes blistered her heels and sweat beaded on the nape of her neck. I hope the woman's deodorant ads were accurate, she thought, or my body odor won't be a secret for long.

"What was I thinking?" she panted, "Junior Reporter my ass. Show us your work, they said, and gave me this bullshit assignment."

After fifteen years of marriage and being dumped by her jack-leg husband she had eked out a living while raising two boys and going to the local community college. Her lifelong dream had been to be a journalist. At fifty-six years old she had received her diploma and a notification her ninety-six thousand dollar student loan debt was no longer deferred. Two months later, with bankruptcy looming like the mountains around her home she had landed the interview with the Asheville Times and had been hired.

A bee buzzed across her ear and a kamikaze deerfly bit her neck. Wind-milling her arms in panic she tripped and fell to the hard-packed dirt skinning her knee. The blazing summer sun beat down on her exposed neck and legs. Tears burst from her eyes as the long-fused vertebrae in her spine screamed in agony.

"Stop crying, dammit."

Molly watched as butterflies flit and Bees buzzed around the jasmine and honeysuckle lining the road. She took an intoxicating breath of the perfumes of nature and stood.

"I've come too far to quit now,"

Adrenaline coursed through her veins as she noticed movement on the ridge above the road. Wiping sweat from her eyes a stationary full-sized white dog transfixed her with its hungry stare.

The village is closer than the Camry parked on the highway she thought, fight or flight? Picking up a broken branch by the road she screamed.

"Go away!"

Her voice broke the dog's trance and the canine disappeared into the treeline.

Twice more she spied her stalker lurking in front and then behind her as she continued forward. Molly crested a steep hill and the village she sought, Stonehaven, revealed itself in the valley below. Three log houses on the left and four on the right channeled the widening road to a stone-faced building with an American flag hanging from its front porch. The front yards in the village were over-run with wild growth and old gardens lay fallow. Old Glory lay limp like a dish rag hung out to dry. The village reminded her of a portrait of a ghost town. Molly thought, Where are the people?

Minutes later, she stepped onto the porch of the stone building. A wood-carved sign read McGowans General Store. A white metal sign hung over a rusted red Coca-Cola drink chest that read, U.S. Post Office.

Molly pushed the heavy front door open and stepped inside. Musky odors of ancient mold braced her nostrils as her eyes adjusted to the dark. A potbelly stove, surrounded by mismatched chairs, stood sentry over rows of faded canned goods lining the shelves. Farming hardware hung from the rafters would enhance any museum and sacks of dry goods stacked against the back wall were long banned by the Food and Drug Administration. Sunlight filtered in from blown glass windows illuminated the sales counter with its rays. A handwritten note on the counter read,

Om Shant. Gone to the bonfar at the holy site. Unbelievers, take what you need and settle later. If you ain't thar then you're the missing link.

Daniel McGowan

The bullshit assignment given to her was to investigate long-held rumors about the Summer Solstice ritual in the village of Stonehaven. Molly knew from her research that Om Shant translated, I am at peace.

I could use some of that, she thought.

"First, the rumors are true, so maybe this story isn't total bullshit. Second, how the hell do I find this sacred site? Third, as an outsider would I be welcome?"

She turned to the window. Her stalker, the only living creature she had witnessed on this journey, stared through the glass. The dog was twice the size she had estimated from a distance. Its orange eyes buried in mattes of gray feathered white hair blazed at her like cold embers.

"Oh my god," she said, "That's a wolf, a Canis lupus, not a dog."

The decimated wolf lifted its head, howled, and ran from the porch. Molly moved to the window. The stalker had moved to the yard leading with its head to the side, and howled again. Three times the wolf ran twenty feet further and repeated the act.

"This old beast wants me to follow her. Is it safe? Or am I just its little piggy? I'm not sure she has any teeth left."

She stepped out of the store much like Joan of Arc, and followed her guide deep into the forest.

***

The Lupus jumped from the trail as they approached a clearing and spoke in a low trembling voice,

"You are kin of old Eleanor. They need you. I need you," she said and leaped into the forest.

Assuming delirium from the heat, Molly was not shocked a wolf could speak. Ignoring her fears, she stepped into the clearing and discovered people gathered around a massive stack of wood. Seven people to be exact. Five hunched over canes and one held onto a home-made walker. The seventh, a middle-aged man, lifted a log from a horse-drawn wagon. Midstride he dropped it as he stared at Molly.

"What brings you here woman? This is private. Outsiders are not welcome."

"I'm Molly, Molly McElveen, from the Ashville Times. I want to write a story about Stonehaven and the Summer Solstice."

"We don't take kindly to strangers around here. And our business is no ones to mind. So, leave back the way you came. Besides, we haven't completed the ritual in twenty years, since my wife died."

"Please sir. I just have a few questions."

"How did you find our holy place? You follow us? A spy? Spies are like witches and only good for a bonfar."

"A white wolf led me here."

"Did you say your name was McElveen?" said the bent woman holding the walker, "The McElveen's of Glasgow?"

"My great grandfather was of the Glasgow Clan."

"Do you believe girl?"

"Believe in what?

"Litha, and the power of summer solstice."

"I don't know. I've heard stories."

"Unbelief is the destroyer of dreams…peace remains locked in the annals of the universe. You are blood to us. Believe and you can stay."

"Eleanor," said Daniel, "We don't know her."

"The wolf queen knows her and led her here," said Eleanor, "She's the missing link, our eighth. We thought all is lost, but tonight we are revived!"

Molly stepped closer,

"The wolf said Eleanor and I are kin. What do you mean, your eighth?"

"We have waited two decades for the missing eighth link to revive our village. This Summer Solstice was our last chance at a miracle, for we are old, too old. It takes the blood of the ancient eight to channel the light of the Universe into our lives. Litha has sent you."

"Soon we will find out," said Daniel and moved toward Molly and sliced her arm with his knife.

She stared at the slash in shock as blood erupted, ran down her hand, and dripped to the ground.

"I have endured all these years to die in the woods forgotten?"

Gray curtains in her mind closed over her eyes and the world as she knew it went black.

***

Molly envisioned a puppy licking her face and woke to the queen wolf lapping her cheek.

"Awake, and watch," the wolf said, "You did this."

Flames soared into the black of night from the bonfire as the once old couples, now forty years younger, danced around the blaze chanting,

"Om Shant, Om Shant, Om Shant."

A younger, handsome, version of Daniel stood watch as the couples jumped the flames, kissed passionately, and gyrated their bodies together coupling in wanton pleasure.

Daniel moved to Molly and said,

"I ask you to dance with me."

Molly realized her back no longer hurt, her skin was silky, and the weighted years of her life had disappeared. Daniels's hand touched hers to pull her from the ground and electric shocks shuttered through her body in places long forgotten. He led her toward the fire and she turned to the queen wolf. The once frail animal was whole with a gleaming white fur made bright by the firelight.

"Welcome home, Molly," said the wolf, and bared her renewed fangs and howled with delight.

Underneath the majestic emerald mountains, Molly danced with Daniel. Their lithe bodies leaped the flames together like deer and they chanted together,

"Om Shant. Om Shant. I am at peace."