"Now Is The Time For All Good Men To Come To The Aid Of Their Country"

“Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country.” A phrase any typing student knows well. Where did it come from? From what I have gleaned from the almighty internet is this: The original phrase came from Patrick Henry as, “Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their party.” Then, again, I also found that it was nothing more than a phrase from Charles Keller, a typing teacher. Either way, it makes for a resounding cry to any patriotic person from any nation.

Phrases from the past, from such noble historical figures such as Patrick Henry, George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Nelson Mandela, Malcolm X, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Margaret Thatcher, Winston Churchill, William Wallace, Robert Bruce, Plato, Socrates, Alexander the Great, etc., are fodder for anyone wanting to incite patriotism, energy, fanaticism, or even common sense from a group of people. (Wow! That was a long sentence.) These, as were all great historical figures, were people worth quoting. These were great men and women that accomplished great things. But, does it really take quoting a great historical figure to bring everyday people into the fold?

What about those people that are normal, every day, working-class people that have a good head on their shoulders? I have had people give good advice that no one has ever heard of. Some of the best knowledge comes from those that don’t have a college degree, that may not even have a high school diploma. I knew a man once that hadn’t even finished the eighth grade that had more common sense and usable knowledge that it was incredible. I would have traded all my formal education for a fraction of his ‘street smarts.’

You see, it isn’t education that makes a person smart. It is the knowledge gained from life that counts. A college degree shows that you have formal education in a certain area. You may know accounting forward and backward, or engineering, or political science, or medicine and not have an ounce of common sense. As an example, just look at Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Here is a woman that supposedly graduated quite high in her class from a major college with a degree in economics. When she opens her mouth, what comes out shows that she has absolutely no idea about real life, history, or common sense. I actually feel sorry for her at times. I’m not AOC bashing. I am using her as a great example of how formal education means nothing when it comes to living.

I have a friend that turned me on to a certain author. He brought over a book and told me that he thought I might like it. I’d never heard of this author, but I read it. It was a great read. Since that time, I have bought almost every book this author has written. Why? I have read this woman’s words because she writes about life, about how hard it can be, about how anyone can overcome any obstacle if they just persevere. “Over, under, through, or around. There is always a way.” The funny thing about it is that when I went to Barnes and Noble to buy her books, I found them in the – ROMANCE section. I’ve never read romance novels. I was surprised, to say the least.

Wondering who that author is, are you? Well, let me say this: this woman has had a hard life, she was abused as a child and as a wife, she is dyslexic, she came from a poor family, she has attained wealth and fame in spite of all she had against her. In her novels, she writes of overcoming adversity and betrayal. “We are nothing more than life’s whipping boys, but we continue to fight because of the ones we love.” Through her characters, she tells a story of how a person can be more than what the believe; that life isn’t fair but that, no matter what, we must continue to live, and things will get better.

The author: Sherrilyn Kenyon. Her books: The Chronicles of Nick, The League, The Dark-Hunters, The Dream Hunters, and The Belador Series.

Here is an example of how an everyday person can inspire anyone. This is not an advertisement for Ms. Kenyon or her books, although I do recommend them to everyone. This woman has overcome great hardship to achieve great things. She isn’t a great political figure, social justice figure, community organizer, or historical figure. She is just a common woman with a story to tell. Throughout her books are life lessons worth learning; especially in the Chronicles of Nick series.

You see, there are people that haven’t gained notoriety that are quite knowledgeable in life. Some of these people have little formal education. It is LIFE that teaches us the most. If you don’t have some form of common sense, then life will beat you down. That is the problem in today’s world: all it takes is a lot of money or knowing someone in power and you don’t have to worry about a lot. Look at any political party in any nation and you can see that common sense is not at the top of their agenda.

The days of patriotism, commitment, loyalty, and common sense are over. Today is the day of feelings; how a person feels about any given subject is what is important. What the individual wants is more important than what the community needs. Special interest gets the venue, not common-sense policy. It boils down to where politicians can gain more power; and it isn’t just here in the United States.

“Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their country.” A great quote, even if it is just a typing exercise. It’s just too bad that more people don’t take it to heart. This quote isn’t just about patriotism. It is about life. United we can achieve anything. Divided, we will fall to whatever comes along. Not just as a nation but, also, as normal, everyday people living together in a world that is hell-bent to destroy us.

Families need to get back to being families. Friends need to get back to being loyal and having each other’s backs. Communities need to get back to helping each other. “The good of the many outweighs the good of the few.” Too often the few demands more than the many can accommodate. When a minority’s wants are put before the needs of the majority it puts undue pressure on everyone. As can be seen in today’s world, minorities are fast becoming the influencers of policy regardless of the consequences of those policies. Political correctness is destroying the freedoms that every person should be enjoying. Families are no longer together, friends turn into enemies, communities become individuals hiding behind locked doors.

Maybe that great quote should be changed just a little. Maybe, instead of ‘the nation,’ or ‘the party,’ it should read, “Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of their neighbors, their families, their friends.” Whether it be local, state, national, or global, isn’t it time we came to the aid of those we care about? Isn’t it time we got out of the idea that the individual is more important than the community?

I’m not talking about opening our borders to anyone and everyone that wants to come to the US. I’m not talking about the working people paying more and more taxes to support those that are unwilling to support themselves. I’m not talking about giving up inalienable rights because of another becoming offended. I’m talking about making sure that those inalienable rights are available to everyone wherever they are. Maybe if the people of the world would just let each individual be who they are it would be a better place to live. Let the LBGT community be gay. Let the hunters hunt. Let the vegans eat their veggies while the omnivores eat whatever they want. Let people worship the way they please without demanding the oppression of other’s beliefs. Don’t demand that everyone think and believe the way you do.

It’s a big world that is becoming smaller every day. There are a lot of people living on this little rock in space. As the Beatles once said, “Let it be.”

Terrorist Attacks Since 9/11

After waking up this morning to more news of Radical Islamic terrorism in London I thought I’d do a little research on the ‘religion of peace’ and see just how peaceful this cult actually is. It was striking what I discovered. Since the attack on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, killing over 3,000 innocent Americans, radical Islam has attacked the world almost 31,000 times.

Think about that for a minute. This religion of peace has conducted almost 31,000 terrorist attacks against innocent people over the course of 15 and a half years; all in the name of Allah and to destroy the infidels. Last week they attacked a concert killing 22 people, some of which were just children. Last night they attacked innocents on London Bridge. When are the liberal idiots and governments of the world going to get it into their heads that the radical extremists aren’t going to give up? Worse, when are those peaceful Muslims of the world going to stand up against their extremist brothers and sisters?

From May 27 through June 2 of this year alone, Islamic terrorists conducted 40 attacks, killed 455 and injured 677 in 14 countries. That was in a week. A bloody week! And what do the liberals keep saying? “Oh, Islam is a religion of peace. They just need more understanding. We need to bring the entire bloody Middle East into our countries and give them love.” Right! Invite them in, give them free housing, food, and medical care and give them jobs that natural born or naturalized citizens need. Why do the governments of the world do that? They do it because all those ‘refugees’ are trying to get out of a war torn area to be safe from harm. By the by, did you realize that the Middle East has been fighting wars within the area since the inception of Islam and lasting peace will never happen because killing is all they have ever known? (Statistics are from thereligionofpeace.com.)

The Koran tells its followers that anyone who does not believe in Islam is to be killed just as God told Moses to go into the land of Canaan and kill them all, men, women and children, because they were not believers. The difference is this – Christianity, for the most part, has decided that killing non-believers is not acceptable in civilized times. Islam still believes that is what needs to be done.

I am not saying that all Muslims are evil, dangerous and murdering thugs; they are not. There are more peaceful Muslims than there are the radical extremists. The problem lies in that a person never knows which is which. Just as the soldiers in the Vietnam conflict couldn’t tell whether that child walking down the street was a Viet Cong bomb waiting to go off or not, how do you tell if that burka covered Muslim is wired to the teeth with C4? You don’t know. There is no way to determine whether a person standing around or walking down the street is going to go postal and kill people because that is their duty to Islam. To make the problem even worse, in today’s screwed up society, Islam is recruiting ‘homegrown’ terrorists by the hundreds. It may have something to do with those 72 virgins that are promised if you die for Islam.

Here in the United States, the liberal idiots are even going against Federal Law and becoming sanctuary cities, counties and states just to protect any illegal that wants to go into their boundaries against immigration law. Due to multi-culturalism that seems to be so prevalent in the liberal world of Utopia, these sanctuary municipalities are going to be the downfall for the rest of the country just as the EU is going to be the downfall of Europe. The radicals go in as refugees or illegals, move about with impunity and get where they want to be to do the most harm to innocent lives.

Until the world can get off is politically correct ass and admit that Islam is NOT a religion of peace and that the extremists are a real threat to everyone the world will continue to die a few at a time. Innocent lives will be lost because people are afraid of offending the enemy. The idiocy of political correctness is being shown every day, with every attack by the Radical Islamic Terrorists known as ISIS. There is nothing normal about this. It should never become something that we should just expect to happen. We should never become complacent about terrorism.

Instead of taking our guns so we cannot protect ourselves, we should be told to gather as many as possible. Not just here in the US but in every country around the world. If citizens were armed then these radicals wouldn’t be able to do near as much damage and carnage as they do. Citizens could stop the killing by gunning down the outlaws before they completed their ‘missions.’ Stop the idiocy and let us protect ourselves; after all, our governments aren’t able to do it.

A Very Sad State of Affairs

First of all let me get this out of the way: I stated at the very beginning that if Donald Trump wavered I would be one of the first to call him out. As you all know, very well, I call out the liberals constantly because I have a very conservative political view. That being said, I will get into the reason for this article.

The past week has been pretty… exciting? Bashar al Assad allegedly gassed his own people with Siran gas, one of the worst, because he’s just an asshole like that. Trump, not having drawn the line but not letting some Russian backed dictator cross it, used fifty nine Tomahawk missiles to level one airfield that the Syrian dictator (and the Russians) were using within hours afterward; this being done while our President was having a state dinner with the President of China. Rex Tillerson was in Russia speaking with his counterpart, Sergei Lavrov and then actually got to talk with good old Vlad Putin, himself.

Now, to top that off, our friend in North Korea decided to test more nukes and the Donald sent a few Navy ships toward the Korean peninsula as a show of force. Having LittleMan Sydrome, Kim Jung Un, the North Korean midget in charge decided to threaten the United States with nuclear war if we so much as fired one shot into his country.

Wow! Just….wow! Nothing like making history or watching it happen before your very eyes; I now know how the colonists felt as the Founding Fathers decided to declare our independence and then war against England.

Is it the end of times? I doubt it. Even though the North Korean midget in charge is a crazy bastard that would actually fire nuclear warheads at one of the two most powerful nations on the planet, I don’t think China would allow it. Although, it doesn’t seem as though China has a whole lot of sway over what Kim does anymore.

So, with all that out of the way, as a side note, if you want to get the shit kicked out of you just fly United Airlines on an overbooked flight. It isn’t enough that you get groped and prodded and interrogated and treated like you’re an Islamic Terrorist by the TSA in the airports, now you get to be treated like that on one of the biggest air carriers. Gotta love America.

Now to get to the heart and soul of what I want to say. This isn’t gonna make any liberal happy. President Trump did exactly what he should have done by tossing some explosives at Syria. I think he may have overdone it a little but, the thought was right. He did what King Obama should have done when the midget crossed HIS red line. Instead, the King decided to hang back and let the little bastard do what he wanted.

Did the Donald do anything to start WWIII? Nope. Hate to tell you this, folks, that war started on September 11, 2001. Even with the controversy (conspiracy?) of exactly what happened that fateful day as the World Trade Center fell, that was when this bloody war started. I know that I have a hard time believing the good ol’ government that it was Islamic Terrorists given HOW the buildings fell and that in the beginning there was actually no airplane in the wall of the Pentagon. That notwithstanding, the war started with George W. Bush against Saddam Hussein.

Now, with the downfall of the almighty Clinton Empire, the liberals are waging a war of their own against fellow Americans because they didn’t get their way; even the Congress is involved within their own hallowed halls, liberals against conservatives. Damn that Donald Trump! How dare he win a rigged election against him. Hillary was supposed to win so that she could finish off turning this country into a Socialist State.

First was the Russian hacking that, by the way, COULD have been our own Intelligence Community pretending to be Russian hackers. Then it turned into Russian collusion with the Trump Team. Then, lo and behold, came attacks on Team Trump associates. Liberal attacks at every level. Attorney General Jeff Sessions reclusing himself from overseeing investigations against the Trump Team then Devon Nunez reclusing himself from the same for the same reason – liberal allegations of biased investigating. Yeah, the war is in full swing and the liberals are flinging everything they can at the conservatives. Unfortunately, it seems as though the libs are in the lead by a league and the conservatives keep holding back.

It kinda makes a person wonder about what is going on in Washington. Is the Donald really ‘draining the swamp’ or is the swamp swallowing his administration one position at a time without any defense against it?

Why is the surveilling of Trump Tower a year before the election by the Obama Administration not being thoroughly investigated with hard evidence that it did happen while the Russian collusion is being beaten into the ground with all the Intelligence Community saying there is absolutely no evidence of it? Why is the Clinton Foundation not being investigated? Why is the Hillary email scandal a thing of the past, forgotten amongst the liberal outcry against the conservatives? Are the conservatives in DC really wanting to lose in 2018, 2020 and beyond?

There are more questions than answers in the world today. Why is Vlad so intent on supporting Assad when he knows that the Syrian dictator broke international law by using chemical weapons against his own people? Why is Kim Jung Un playing big man against an adversary that could wipe him off the face of the Earth? Why does Mexico get all pissed because Trump wants to build a wall to stop illegal immigration when they won’t allow Americans to illegally enter their country? Why do Americans want illegals to stay, no matter if they commit violent crimes against Americans?

The biggest question is this: why do we have to ask these questions? Isn’t the government supposed to be doing a thorough investigation into all things illegal that I’ve asked about? Why isn’t the Congressional committees demanding the ‘evidence’ that Susan Rice left with her unmasking scandal? Why won’t the FBI cooperate with Congress on this? Is the swamp so dense and thick that they don’t care about the law when that law is broken against the conservative party?

Yes, my friends, the war has already started. The evidence is there for anyone to see if they look with open eyes instead of a closed mind. World War III and a Civil War are going on at this very minute, this day, this month, this year and will continue as long as we, the People, allow it to. The question about this is what can we do about it? We are only a country of pampered children that want given to us what our parents and forefathers had to work hard for, fight and die for. So, what can we do? QUIT PLAYING BY THEIR RULES. I’m not advocating a violent rebellion such as the Founding Fathers had to resort to. I’m talking about not doing what the elitists want. Quit fighting about policy. Quit fighting about platform. Quit fighting about civil rights that aren’t being ignored. All these things are just distractions that have been bought and paid for by the richest of the rich.

You really think that Black Lives Matter started out as a terrorist organization bent against law enforcement and the establishment? I doubt it. Do you really think that all these gay rights activists really think that the LBGT community doesn’t have equal rights? There will always be discrimination by some but the majority of the people don’t adhere to such practices. Do you really think that keeping illegal immigrants in this country is really helping us out? Do you really think that we should bring those refugees into the country when there are places in their own region that could house and protect them better while staying with their own culture? The only refugees that WANT to come here are the terrorists and you are inviting them in.

All these things are orchestrated acts to keep us distracted from the real world and what is going on. There will always be war, discrimination, bullying, differences of opinion and viewpoint. Nothing can be done about that. What can be done is forgetting about all the shit that is being shoved down our throats and look behind the scenes to see what is actually going on. They don’t want us to get along. They love us to fight each other. That keeps them in power. OUR TIME IS NOW! Join the passive rebellion and quit doing what they want.  Liberal, conservative, socialist, communist, dictator or freely elected leader, it doesn’t matter, we are all being blindsided by an evil terrorist organization more secret than any other before. We are all just pawns on their chessboard and we are willingly entertaining them.

Open your eyes. Open your mind. Choose what you want. Fight on your feet for real freedom or die on your knees subjugated by the elitists. It’s your choice. 

Life is Like a Bowl of Cherries Just like Erma Said

Life is like a bowl of cherries. Erma Bombeck titled one of her books by that name. I have never read it, at least in its entirety. In fact, I really can’t recall one story in that book as it was many, many years ago that I actually read parts of it but, I know, that Erma Bombeck was a very intelligent author. She wrote her humorous stories around actual events in her life and experiences in a way that was entertaining, humorous and, if read in the right frame of mind, educational.

Why did I choose this as the main topic of this article? I chose ‘life is like a bowl of cherries’ because, through the past week, I have lived that bowl of cherries. Along with that wondrous juicy red fruit that is so delicious, there are always those damnable pits.

I have a friend that has told me for years that I am the only person he knows that can think himself into a bad mood. With my choice of career I have plenty of time to think about things. Amazingly enough, this past week there have been many, many things to think about from the Senate’s agonizing debates about Judge Neil Gorsuch to the bombing of a Syrian airstrip along with enough every day, non-political, work related subjects to choke the life out of anything.

The point I want to make, here at the start of this article is this: Life is actually pretty good for most people here in the good ol’ USA. Most, but not all; I have it decent. I have a pretty good paying job that I really enjoy, a roof over my head and food in the fridge. My bills are paid and nothing is getting shut off so why would I say anything about the ‘pits?’ Without the dark, we wouldn’t know anything about the light. For example, today started pretty good as I got to my receiver at a good time with only a few trucks ahead of me; I waited only a short time before being put into a dock door and it seemed I would get home early. That is as far as the good went. I waited over seven hours to get unloaded and almost an hour after that to get my paperwork. After leaving the receiver I was driving along at the speed limit, got behind a slow pickup truck, moved over to the fast lane to go around and the damn pickup truck decided to match my speed thus making me back traffic up behind me.

No big deal you would think, just slow down, get back behind him and travel on. Let me let you in on a little secret there: personal vehicle drivers do not like trucks. On any given day I will get slowed down by people that speed up when I try to get around them only to slow back down when I can’t and get behind them again numerous times. As a professional driver in a vehicle governed at 64 miles an hour I am at the mercy of a lot of things. I’ve been cut off by people that had to get in front of me, just to slow down or make that exit ramp that I just passed. I’ve had people pull out in front of me with less than a truck length between us. It gets more than a little annoying.

Today, being aggravated by the slow unload, this driver just pissed me off. As traffic is backing up behind me and this idiot not letting me by I blew my horn at him. Now, he could have sped up or slowed down, either way, no big deal; what did he do? He hit the brakes, looked up at me through the window and pulled off the highway. I’m expecting a call from the company about this as I am sure he took down the company name and trailer number because I was being an ass. I could have done more, like start to pull over into his lane to get him to move the hell out of my way for one thing.

As you see, with the day starting as that sweet, juicy, delicious fruit of me going home, getting to the receiver and getting into a door early, there came the pit of taking most of the day to get unloaded and then an idiot driver. Life was definitely a bowl of cherries today.

Another great author that I have come to admire is Sherrilyn Kenyon. For those that have been living under a rock or don’t read anything but Forbes and the Wall Street Journal, Ms. Kenyon writes fantasy/adventure/romance novels (the only reason they are romance is that she does put some pretty graphic sex scenes in there and the main character ALWAYS gets what they want). Maybe you have heard of her Dark Hunter, Dream Hunter, League or Chronicles of Nick books that are international best sellers. My personal favorites are the Chronicles of Nick, the adventures of a teenaged Cajun from New Orleans that has an attitude.

Why do I put her up there with such a writer as Erma Bombeck? Sherrilyn Kenyon was an abused child and she persevered and won the day. She survived and thrived through things that would permanently scar most people. She puts the wisdom of those years and her survival into her writing. Her characters, for the most part, are hundreds, if not thousands, of years old (the oldest that I recall is an Atlantean god that is slightly over eleven thousand years old. When a character has lived as many lifetimes as hers have, they gain a lot of life wisdom.

Ms. Kenyon’s characters have been betrayed by loved ones, been tortured by enemies, lived through hell and, in the end, won the day by perseverance and sheer determination not to let life run them over. Some, the Dark Hunters, have even by murdered in some of the most heinous ways only to be brought back by the Greek goddess Artemis as warriors against evil. Even then, these people have stories to tell and wisdom to share.

The point I am getting at is this: there are a lot of times that the gods make humans their punching bags and don’t give a rat’s ass what happens to us. It is up to us, the human race, to decide whether we will let life kill us or we go over, under, around or through the hardships and keep fighting. There is always something to keep fighting for: a loved one, an important cause, honor.

With all that is going on in the world today, especially since the election in November, there have been a lot of times when people have asked me how my day is, I’ve replied, ‘If it got any better I may as well take off my own head.” After years of fighting depression, it’s getting kind of hard to keep fighting the good fight for me but I do. I fight on because I have things worth fighting for, even if some of those things don’t care about me. As Dom Torreto said in Fast & Furious, “Never give up on family, even if they do.” I happen to have a lot of family, most of which are not blood.

To sum it all up, it doesn’t matter if you are liberal or conservative, Democrat or Republican, wealthy or poor, mentally balanced or have mental illness, physically healthy or ill, there is always something or someone that needs you, would miss you, would die without you. It doesn’t matter who is in the White House, Congress, Supreme Court, who controls what country, who has done this or that, we all have our roles to play. What we do today, what we say tomorrow, what has happened in the past or will happen in the future, does not matter one iota to the Universe. It will all fade into nothingness through the mists of time. What will remain is whether we kept going, kept fighting for life or whether we gave in and ended it all without a fight.

Over, under, around or through, there is always a way. The gods are childish, narcissistic asses that look at the human race as entertainment. We only get what we earn by working for it and there will be no one there to help us. Friends come and go. We can’t take anything with us and no one gets out of life alive. It is our decisions whether our lives are a beach or a bitch. If you want some good life lessons, some good outlooks on life, read some Erma Bombeck and Sherrilyn Kenyon. There are other great authors out there that, through telling their stories, have wisdom to give but these two are my favorites. Give it try, read instead of staring at your phone or computer screen or game console. Chronicles of Nick, Life is Like a Bowl of Cherries, House of Darke (by Colin R Parsons), Wizard’s Quest (by yours truly) are a few titles for life lessons through stories. Fahrenheit 451, Animal Farm, Dangerous Minds, Divergent, a few other titles for what life could be, even the Harry Potter and Percy Jackson series’ can be more than entertainment if you really sit down and read them.

Don’t let politics, religion, nationality, or ideology cloud your mind. Life IS a bowl of cherries; all you have to do is spit the pits out and keep eating the sweet stuff….  

The Red Cap of Castle Glen

It was a dark and stormy night, the wing howling through the trees like the dreaded beansidhe and the rain falling in torrents making it difficult to see anything. Holding his hand up to his face, trying to keep the rain out of his eyes, Ben trudged on toward his destination. A destination that he feared more than the night creatures that kept watch over him. The words of his father kept going through his mind, “Fear does not exist. Danger is real but fear is a choice.”

Fear was all he felt this night. It wasn’t a choice. It was overwhelming. The old man in the village had told him to make this journey, this night, or his family would die a torturous death. Only the creature that lived here in the Black Forest could change their fate. This creature that no one ever survived seeing, much less bargaining with.

Suddenly the woods opened up and the old castle ruins came into sight. No one ever came here, especially at night. There was a stillness in the air now. No wind whistling, even the rain had stopped. Moonlight shone down upon the ruins almost like a spotlight on a celebrated actor on stage. The shadows, deep around the battlements and portcullis, almost formed an evil face on the façade; a face that threatened anyone that would dare venture near. Ben looked upon the sight with more trepidation than he had ever felt before. Thinking only of his family’s safety, he started across the overgrown garden.

Closing the distance between the safety of the forest and the portcullis of the castle, Ben slowly gained some semblance of courage. The creature that resided here would surely kill him on sight but if that was the price he had to pay, he would pay it gladly. Mary, his wife, and Angus, his baby boy, would survive if he could strike a bargain with the Red Cap. The old man had told him that reciting Scripture or showing a cross would make the creature disappear but that is not what he wanted. He needed help. The old crone had placed a curse on his family, one that would kill them slowly and painfully. Magick is a strange thing. The old man had told him only a Red Cap could reverse the spell she had used. The only problem with that is Red Caps hated humans and would kill them on sight.

He didn’t understand what it was about this night, at this time, that would keep the Red Cap from killing him, least of all, get him to help. Ben had never heard of a Red Cap that could do magick but the old man was adamant about this. The moon was full, true, and that was a magickal time and it was during Samhain, the time when the veil between worlds was thinnest. Hopefully, these things would protect him and bring him victory.

Entering through the massive, broken oak doors of the main hall, Ben straighten his posture and called on courage he had not known he had. Looking left and right then up the grand stair, he called out, “Red Cap! I come for your help. Show yourself to me.”

From the darkest corners came an echoing reply, “Why should I not kill you? A human, walking into my home is fair game. If I show myself, I shall surely tear your innards out of your body.”

“I do not believe you will. I come to bargain. The crone has cursed my family. The old man told me you were the only one that could help. Show yourself so that we may discuss the terms.”

“Terms? Are you mad? There are no ‘terms’ and there are no bargains. The old man lied and the crone must have had good reason. Why should I help you? You are nothing to me.” The voice was behind him and much closer than before.

Fear, once again, set upon Ben. With shaking knees and wavering voice, he turned to face the evilness that lived here. Out of the darkness the creature emerged. It was then that the young man knew that he, indeed, had been tricked. The hairless old man that came forward from the shadows smiled. His razor sharp teeth glinting in the moonlight and his claws clacking together were not near as frightening as the executioner’s axe that he dragged along the floor behind him.

Raising the axe and laying it upon his shoulder, the Red Cap stared at the frightened young man. He knew the boy was terrified, just as all humans were when they saw him. Smiling he spoke again, “I frighten you and yet you stand there. Why do you not run?”

“I have no reason to live if you do not help me. My family will die. Without them, I have nothing.”

“Even so. I should tear you apart and scatter your guts around the room. Yet, you intrigue me.” Uncharacteristically, the creature stood back and, scratching his chin, pondered why he had not killed this human already.

Samhain, the time of year when the veil between worlds is thinnest and creatures enter our world from the other side, is a magickal time. When the moon is full during the season it is especially so. The old man had not tricked the boy, he knew that this night, of all nights, was the only time in a thousand years that a Red Cap was incapable of killing. This night, at this time, midnight on All Hallows Eve with a full moon made the most evil creature to haunt the Scottish countryside unable to rend any victim. The only night that Ben would be able to barter for his family’s lives.

“What do you have to bargain for?”

“I have gold, livestock, food. Whatever you desire, I will find it.”

“I have no need of anything. I live, I kill. That is all. What would I do with riches or livestock? Food I can get. Is there nothing that you will give to me, willingly, to save your loved ones?” Looking at Ben with menacing eyes, belying the horror beneath his words, the small, evil creature continued, “There is only one thing that I desire in this world and that is to kill.”

Understanding finally came to Ben. The Red Cap wanted him to willingly give up his life to save his loved ones. Fear, guilt, shame all came at once. He was afraid to die and felt guilty that he was not brave enough to give his life for someone else. The shame of his cowardice overwhelmed him. Turning to flee from this wretched creature and crumbling ruin, he stopped at the broken oak door.

Turning slowly, Ben smiled. “I will not bargain my life. Without me my family will die anyways. But, I will bargain with yours. You will cast your magick and save their lives or I will take yours from you.”

Never before had anyone ever lived through an encounter with a Red Cap. Even if they survived by running away they would still die within twenty four hours. Now, this boy was threatening the life of this evil sprite, one of the vilest of creatures. Was he mad?

“Nae! Ah willnae dae it. Ye cannae make me.” The small creature belied his uncertainty, glancing around the dark room.

With a speed and strength he had never known he possessed, Ben was across the room and had the small creature on the floor, knife across his throat. “I will.”

The night was drawing to an end. Soon it would be dawn and the veil would close, the magick lost. Pushing harder against the Red Cap’s throat, Ben demanded, “Do it! Do it now or die!”

With blood starting to trickle down out of the blade’s cut, the Red Cap relented. Closing his eyes he mumbled in ancient Celtic, so low that Ben could barely hear, the spell to break the curse. Opening his eyes, all he said was, “It is done.”

Rising from the floor and releasing him, Ben wiped the blood from his knife. “If you have tricked me, if my family still dies, I will return and fight you.”

“You will lose. No one ever survives me. I have not tricked you, they will live. And you and I will meet again. Soon. I will exact my revenge on you.” With that, he disappeared just as the sun shone through the empty windows; laughter echoing through the ruins.