If you have been following the Busted Gulch story here at the Storytellers Saloon then you know Ruechari has been selected for a special destiny...yet to be revealed. Having grown up in the KitKat Nation. Chief DamagedGoods was the only father she h...
Ruechari opened her eyes but could see nothing but darkness. Was it over? Had she won at the price of her own life? Not that she wouldn't gladly give it for those that she loved and hoped to protect, it struck her, however, how many of them were already gone.
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The loneliness tried to grab hold. The pain of the losses dug in deep.
That was when she heard it. A deep, long, slow, maniacal laugh.
"That's right they're all gone. YOU couldn't save any of them. What makes you think you'll do any better now?"
"It was not my fault," Ruechari batted back, although she felt the sting of those words.
The Wraith could sense her doubt. "You don't truly believe that, do you? Both your grandfather and father died in your arms while you had done NOTHING!"
"NO! That's not true! There was nothing I could do."
"Really? You ARE the Shaman of the west are you not? You could have healed them. You could have saved them. Instead, you let them die because you were unprepared."
Ruechari thought of her father in her arms, how she begged to save him. She could have saved him. She knew that the Wraith was right, but then she remembered her Father and Grandfather's words.
"No, they were beyond my reach. They wanted to move on. They were at peace."
Ruechari shivered as she heard the laugh again the darkness. She could hear it but she could see nothing but black all around her.
Her mind filled with images of all those that had fallen, all those that had lost their lives, be they human or spirit, for her, the last images were of her grandmother and mother.
The weight of those losses was a heavy burden. She felt smoothed under that weight and crashed to her knees.
Ruechari had to battle the darkness. She could not let it win.
"No!" she said standing again, although with great effort. "It was their choice, and my mother and grandmother were gone, long before I came. My father and grandfather wanted to be with them and now they are. It was their choice."
"You're right. They were lost to you long ago and you are but a child, still naïve, evident in your choice of where you decided to bring me. You've brought me to the one place I can do the most harm. The one place I am most powerful. I live for darkness, and this is where I thrive."
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