Return to New Arden

Mother crocodile

They say that when the reservoir of New Arden was created by flooding a valley, they had to drown the small village of Nixville. It is said that if you go there on a Sunday and listen closely you can hear the sound of church bells still ringing from beneath the water. It is strange to think of the fish swimming the streets down there.

Then there are other things said to lurk within the reservoirs waters even though fish and wildlife have reassured the public that there is nothing dangerous in the water. Every so often someone drowns in the lake. Not quite often enough for it to be considered suspicious but enough to give the place its ghosts. These are the stories they used to tell each other as children when they went to the school camp on the far side. At the end of school it is a right of passage for teenagers to go for a swim. That is what has brought Daemon and his friends down here.

There have been other nights when they have partied here or brought a girl here but this is the last hurrah for who knows where life will take them now. Some off to New Arden college, some to jobs in the city. No one wants to admit that they are staying at home, sucked back into a family business. This is Daemon's fate, his grades aren't up to much but he is good with his hands and so will join his father at the garage even while he draws and dreams of what it would have been like to go to art school.

All that is forgotten for now. Instead he stands bear in hand looking out over the black waters of the reservoir. The air is hazy not from mist but from bushfires that have been burning this week. Twilight is coming in fast making the trees on the far shore mere skeletal outlines.

"Come in," calls his friend Rob and others join the chorus.

He takes a moment to finish the drink and sets it down before taking off his shirt and heading for the water. Daemon wades in following the shallow incline near the bank until it suddenly drops away and there is nothing but dark water beneath him. They bob there in the water trying not to imagine what lurks below. Rob ducks under and grabs an unsuspecting friends leg so that he shrieks and thrashes.

"Not funny," he sputters while the others laugh.

"You thought I was the catfish."

They proceed to tell tales of a catfish almost as big as a boy who is suspected to lurk in these waters. If the story were true the catfish would have to be a hundred years old because it is a tale their grandfathers have told.

Daemon listens half smiling to himself. It is very peaceful floating there. He is gazing at the far distant shore and thinks he sees a person crouched by the lake. A girl with long dark hair and pale skin. He nudges Rob,

"Is that a person out there."

"Nah just some drift wood that's been bleached white."

"I think it's a person, I'm going to go and see."

Daemon sets off swimming across the reservoir, it is further than he thinks so that he has to pause half-way and float for a little before taking off again. The water is flat and calm, there are no waves or strong currents here. The closer he comes the more the figure resolves itself. It is a girl, entirely naked standing up to her hips in the water close to the bank. Her skin is pale white, as pale as the moon, as pale as the underside of a crocodile. She watches his approach and smiles a little.

Usually Daemon would be shy but now he is not, a feeling of lust washes through him and he comes to stand close to her looking into her strange amber eyes. Without a word she leans forward taking him in her arms and kisses him. Water pours across her lips into his mouth like a reverse kiss of life. Daemon struggles to break free but can not, his hands scrabble at her back and he feels the rough texture of scales. Not human, his mind is screaming. With great strength she topples them both into the water and locking him in a death grip spins him round and round until all life is wrung out of him. Then she hides his corpse under the bank where some roots that reach out over the water. This is her larder. With a splash mother crocodile swims away content with her nights hunting.

On the other side of the reservoir Daemon's friends have noticed he has been gone. They splash about and call his name and then uneasily convince each other that he must have gotten out further up and gone home. Only later do they realize that he has joined the ghosts of New Arden's reservoir.