Hidden Spirits

Prologue
The night was busy. Dancing leaves swirled in the wind, trees whispered to each other the secrets they've heard throughout the day, the small river traveled, carrying even the smallest form of life to its destination, never once stopping for a break. Nature was alive. It had no reason to fear man. Man was asleep, tired from his work all day. What work? Man hardly did any work. It was nature who does real work. The only work man does is destroy nature. While nature creates life, man destroys it. Nature creates, man destroys. That's been the cycle since the first breath of life.

And this was the occurring thought that flowed in Jeena's head as she sat on her porch reading ancient scriptures. She read thoroughly through the pages. Tonight, under the full moon, she read one of the sacred texts of Hinduism, the Vedas. It was strange how humans take the matters of what the spirits want into their own hands. They set down rules and regulations, telling the people that it will help them receive what they call salvation. Jeena shook her head. If only humans truly knew life.

The strawberry bushes in front of her house rustles. Jeena raised her hand, prepare to fire at whoever may be prowling on her property. People have before. Big mistake. Mother Gana did not intruders with a kind heart.

As the bushes rustled more, Jeena was just about to blast her energy, but her spirit calmed down as her four-legged friend padded out of the bushed. She relaxed, moving over a little to offer the critter some room, but he just shook his head and sat in front of her.

Jeena reached out to pat his furless head, which he let her, just for a moment. She leaned back, lifting up one knee and resting her arm on it. "What news do you bring Rock?"

Rock didn't answer. His shinning eyes just looked at her.

She looked up at the sky. "It's a full moon Rock." She looked back to him. "Don't you usually stay in you tunnels on full moons?"

"Tonight was an exception." Rock's voice was croaky, like the old cat hadn't spoken for a long time. But then again his voice was always like that.

Jeena pushed aside the Vedas. She lowered herself more to Rock. This had to be important if he left his tunnels. It was dangerous for a spirit to be out of their shelter on the full moon. Jeena knew well of the frightening experience of being away from her shelter and caught in the middle of the full moon's light.

"What do you mean Rock?" Jeena wasn't in the mood for Rock's non-straightforwardness, a habit of his.

Rock scratched behind his ears before he spoke. "Evil has found a way to wonder this world."

Jeena raised her left brow. No much of a surprise. Evil's found a way to sneak through the cracks the spirits left it in.

"And you risked the full moon to come tell me that?" Jeena laughed. She reached for the Vedas, but Rock pounced on it, hissing and barring his teeth at her. She stared down at the creature, narrowing her black eyes, but slowly drew her hand back. "Alright, well then speak."

"It's not that simple!" he roared, like a small hairless lion. "It seems evil has help from down below. I'm afraid someone has found out to work evil and it's magic and intends on bringing it into this world. He wants revenge, but the power he's about to unless will kill those that are not even part of his species!"

Jeena shook her head. She thought for a minute, and then realized something. Looking down at the furless spirit, she asked, "Did you say not even part of his species?"

Rock nodded. "Just like evil, fools come in different forms too."

"Well, tell me the form! Human or animal?"

"Cat."

Jeena looked down at Rock weirdly. "Cat?"

"Yes, cat," Rock replied. "I visited the underworld myself and saw him."

Jeena couldn't help but laugh. Such fools all mortal-creature or human-were. They knew nothing. Nothing, compare to what the spirits knew.

As Rock and Jeena sat in silence looking at the strawberry bushes rustling in the wind, both thought the same thing: What were they going to do?

Over the centuries evil has come in thousands to millions of forms. The spirits have managed to control it, destroying it over and over again. Could they do it again? As hard as it was to believe, spirits get tired too.

Rock finally jumped from the Vedas he was sitting on and began to pad off. Before leaving he turned around and looked at her. "Mother Gana, we're on a ticking clock-"

"Aye! You don't think I don't know that!" she hissed at him.

He narrowed his eyes at her. "Just a warning." Swishing his furless tail, a tall tree formed on the side of Jeena's house. With another swish of his tail, ten white flowers budded on the tree.

"Ten flowers, ten months," Rock said. "We have that long to defeat the evil. If we can't be the time the last flower falls off the tree, then it's hopeless." Rock trotted away.

"Don't worry," Jeena called after him. "I'll think of something."

She peered at the rows of houses that seemed to formed a line. They went on, almost endless, until they reached that big lake. The humans had the right idea staying away from that lake.

Peering closer to the houses, Jeena saw, roaming far from the fences that kept the human homes safe, were some young humans; three males, two young females. All of them were as pale as the moonlight that showered them, expect for the smallest female. She was as brown as fertile soil. Her hair as black as a new moon. A true natural beauty. But it wasn't her beauty that kept Jeena's eyes on her. There was something about this child, something that made her different from the other humans.

Jeena drummed her fingers on the old wooden floor of the porch. "Yes," she whispered into the wind. "I'll think of something . . ."