November

"There were near hurricane force winds down there," he said. "I think I lost my balance and got blown into the river. But I have no idea why I was down there. Wait, I was looking for something or someone, but I don't remember what."

"We think you were looking for your wife. Apparently she ran out on you and took a lot of your money with her. We read the note she left you. I hope you don't mind me saying it, but she was a bitch. You deserve much better," said Janet.

Cliff Darden looked at her curiously. "Officer, I'm not married. I don't have a wife," he said. "Maybe you're working too many cases and got me confused with someone else."

Later on that day Darden was examined by both doctors and psychologists. He was found to be suffering from a very mild case of hypothermia. That was probably due to exposure to the extreme cold from being plunged into the river. Other than that there was nothing mentally or physically wrong with him.

The problem was that he simply couldn't remember anything about his wife or the life they'd led. He in fact was married though. The ceremony and the marriage could be overturned easily by him simply going in front of a judge in any state and asking for an annulment. The marriage had been a fraud from the beginning. His wife had lied about everything on the marriage certificate. She had also married him under false pretenses. He struggled to get his mind around it when she'd showed him the copies of the documents.

Janet became a fixture at his bedside. Since Janet liked being with him and Cliff had no relatives in the area, she started doing things for him like contacting his lawyers. The psychologists also thought that she should be the one to break the news to him about his wife and help him figure out what to do about her and his legal status.

He'd been considering moving to a private room, but he couldn't figure out any reason to. The big guy in the bed next to him was in a medically induced coma. He'd been found in the same area as Cliff had, at nearly the same time. He was a big Native American guy with almost every bone in his body broken. They were going to try to wake him up the next day, if he didn't come out of it on his own.

* * * * * *

Ramona awoke and looked out the window of the small room on the ship. She heard the sound of footsteps and then the door opened.

"Jimmy," she called out cautiously.

"No, it's Carl," he said. "We need to talk. It's five am and I have some news for you. We have to get you off of this ship. The captain is back and we're going to head out in less than a half hour."

"Where's Jimmy?" she asked.

"Jimmy is dead," he said. "The police came by about two hours ago. I knew that you had nothing to do with it, since you were here asleep about the time that it happened. They also didn't ask any questions about you, so I didn't volunteer anything either. We need to get you out of here."

"But, I can't..." she began. She grabbed Carl's arm gently. "They aren't looking for me about Jimmy, but there are some people looking for me. Jimmy was going to let me go to Wisconsin with the ship so I could get a fresh start. My husband is rich and has lots of people looking for me. If they find me and take me back to him, he'll only beat me again. The last time I tried to run away from him, he beat me so severely that I couldn't come out of the house for nearly a month. Even when all of the bruises had healed there was still pain for a long time afterwards. I'll do anything you ask. Please, just hide me."

Carl listened to Ramona's story. He also looked at her. Carl was an older, smarter man than Jimmy had been. He didn't feel any sympathy for Ramona at all. In fact when he looked at her, he could tell that she was lying through her teeth.

"Strip," he said. Ramona took one look at him and knew that he meant it. If she wanted to stay onboard the ship she had to do whatever he wanted. Carl wasn't like Jimmy. She wouldn't be able to get her way with him nearly as easily. He also wasn't like Cliff. There was no love in his eyes as he looked at her.

She took off her clothes and stood before him naked. She stuck out her chest and arched her back so her ass stuck out too.

"Get over here and get on your knees," he barked. Ramona gave him what he wanted. She sucked his dick like there was no tomorrow, because for her there might not be. She was sure that Cliff had found her car and the note by now and there were probably police looking all over for her. She had to stay on this ship no matter what.

With no warning, Carl erupted straight down her throat. There wasn't a lot of fluid but the intensity at which he shot made her choke and gag. Carl wiped his dick off in her hair and zipped up his pants. "I'll be back after we've left the dock," he spat. "And I might bring a few friends with me. If you know what's good for you, you'd better do whatever I say without any questions until we get to our next destination." Ramona nodded and tried to cover herself. The only thought in her head was that she really should have stayed with Cliff.

* * * * * *

John Lake awakened in the hospital. He had bandages or casts over most of his body. Everything he could think about hurt. It was as if he'd been run over by a truck. He knew that he should be grateful to even be alive. He'd spoken to his great grandfather the day before. The old man had given him a powerful totem. The war club had great power supposedly and he'd used both of the names for the elemental of the fall storms. He'd used both the Ojibwa version of her name and the name that the great lakes sailors called her. It should have worked. It hadn't. A day had passed and it was Halloween now. Tonight the veil between all dimensions would be thinner than ever and all spirits, especially spirits as ancient and powerful as a wind elemental would be at their greatest strength.

He'd blown his chance. His best chance to stop November from doing whatever she wanted to do was gone. He could feel it in his bones that the man she'd killed the first time they met was as, she said, only a snack. She wanted to kill someone else and there was nothing he could do about it. He realized now that he wasn't much of a Shaman. Yep, he drove around in his Mustang, wearing his black leather, but when it all came down to it. November had chewed him up and spit him out. She did it much like her Sister, Gitche Gumee did to ships. It was like the verse in that song about the shipwreck.

"That good ship and true was a bone to be chewed when the gales of November came early."

The only things that had saved him were location and caprice. He'd met the witch in the Detroit River. Her power, though immense, was not nearly as powerful as she'd be in one of the great lakes. She'd be especially powerful on Lake Superior. That was another line from the song and also one of his people's legends about the great lakes.

"The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down, of the big lake they call "Gitche Gumee."

"Superior," they said, "never gives up her dead when the gales of November come early!"

Both the song and his people's legend said nearly the same things. If November was chasing someone or something, and she caught them on Lake Superior, there would be deaths. Quite possibly there could be very many.

John knew that the only other reason he was still alive had been the witch's capricious nature. The first time they met, she'd simply smiled and left him with a warning. This time she could have killed him. She'd even made a joke about leaving him the use of one arm. John decided to simply say a prayer for the spirits of all the men on the lakes because there was nothing he could do to save them.

There were things here that simply did not add up though. The witch of November was the name they gave to the early fall storms on the great lakes. When and how did she acquire a body? Why would she need one?

John's thoughts were interrupted by the clicking of high heels on the hospital floor. A woman walked past his bed and over to the man in the bed next to him. She was pretty. He was lucky. John had been in a few relationships but never had he been with a woman that loved him as much as this one obviously did that guy in the next bed. He tried to fall back asleep and ended up eavesdropping on their conversation. He knew he shouldn't but shit, he didn't have a TV or a radio.

They were talking about some woman who'd done the man wrong. He'd supposedly been totally in love with her and she'd ripped out his heart. The man kept saying that he simply didn't remember her at all. When the woman or the doctor with her, showed him a picture, his face had no reaction. He simply didn't remember her. Even under hypnosis he couldn't remember anything about her or ever seeing her. Under hypnosis he did describe another woman though. He described her as being thin with scraggly flowing hair. He also claimed that she floated on the wind and blew him into the river. The psychologist thought that the mixture of drugs used to hypnotize the man had been too strong and he'd been describing a dream instead of real life. But John's aching bones grew cold and terror gripped his heart. He knew that the man was telling the truth.

After the psychologist left, John saw the woman who was supposed to be a police officer, arrange the blankets around the man as he drifted off to sleep. She shook her head sadly and whispered, "If only." Then she leaned over and kissed him very gently on his cheek. As she straightened up, she made eye contact with John and realized that he'd been awake and watching her for some time.

Before she could think of anything to say in her near panic state, John eased her mind. "Don't worry," he said. "I've been there. I won't say a word." The woman nodded her thanks and left the room. John noticed that she's come to see the man again even though she was off duty and not wearing a uniform.

* * * * * *

Ramona laid her head back on the filthy mattress on Jimmy's small bed. At the rate this ship was moving she'd probably die before they got to Wisconsin. It was Halloween night and the crew was celebrating. For the Captain and the officers that meant that they had a small glass of rum and told a few creepy stories about weird things that had happened on the lakes. For the other 20 men it meant that they were taking turns coming down here and fucking the shit out of her. At first they came one at a time, but as they grew bolder they began coming in two's and three's. As soon as they learned that they could fuck her ass, it was on. There was no longer any tenderness or compassion to what they were doing. They just showed up and fucked her as if they had a right to.

It took a couple of hours before Ramona learned the truth. Carl was charging his shipmates a fee to fuck her. He was pimping her out. He was making a bundle off of her too. She already fucked all twenty of the noncommissioned men aboard the ship; some of them more than once. At fifty dollars a pop, Carl had made more than a thousand dollars off of her so far. At this rate by the time they hit Wisconsin he'd be a lot richer and she'd be too sore to move. She was already beginning to ache in both her vagina and her anus. Her jaw was so sore she could barely open it to speak. And Carl didn't care.

The worst part was that he hadn't fucked her after the first time she was with him. When she'd asked him why he wasn't taking his turns, he just looked at her like she was crazy.

"Do you know what kind of diseases I'd risk getting by fucking a woman like you?" he asked. "It's just not worth the risk. Besides the best sex comes from someone who cares about you. Not just some whore who'll let any man fuck her. Who wants that?"

Again she was left with the one thought that had been plaguing her since she'd left the house yesterday. "I should have stayed with Cliff. That man loved me. We could have made it work." She buried the thought. Her whole life had been like this. It was too late to change it now.

There were only two types of people in the world anyway. There were the ones who did the taking and the ones who got taken. When she was younger one of her favorite bands was an all-girl band called "Poison Dollys." Yep, they spelled the name wrong, just like Def Leppard.

Anyway they had a song that she'd based her life on. "Love is for suckers," was the song. It spelled out her whole ideology. The two years she'd spent with Cliff were a brief fantasy, not her life.

Two more men just showed up and marched into the room as if they owned it. "Fuck this," she thought. "I'm taking a break."

* * * * * *

At midnight November appeared above the waters of Lake Superior. She reached out with her mind and the wind touched every boat on the lake. The one she was looking for would be here soon. She felt the big boat churning through the water at almost 15 knots. It was just moving past the Black Bay on the American side of the lake. It wasn't really into the Lake proper yet, but she could already feel the evil and the pain that her target had wrought.

With only a thought, the winds across the lake blew stronger and colder. The stronger winds across the lake caused an increase in the size of the waves. November smiled. As her winds caressed the big freighter she could feel the lives of the men aboard her. Whether the boat survived this night and whether any of its crew perished was out of her hands. It would be their decision this time.

Aboard the Maitland, the radio and communications officer contacted the national weather service. His name was Paul Pittman and he was worried. The waves had kicked up just a bit. It was just a little bit choppier than he'd been expecting, but he had a bad feeling.

The report he got from the weather service predicted both warmer temperatures and smaller waves. He radioed ahead to a friend of his on a ship that was somewhere else on Superior. The lake was huge, so big in fact that there were times when it rained on one part of the lake and not the entire lake.

After speaking to his friend his bad feeling increased. The temps and wave heights near the other ship matched exactly the predicted conditions for the night. Of course he couldn't say anything to the captain or any of the other officers. They'd laugh at him and he'd be the butt of all kinds of jokes for years to come.

An hour later, Pittman called the captain. He needn't have bothered. The temperatures had dropped so low and the winds had kicked up so strongly that the ship was actually moving through the water at half the speed her engines were putting out. Also the size of the waves had nearly doubled since they'd entered superior. It was nothing the ship couldn't handle but it was scary sailing none the less.

Pittman looked up as one of the older deck hands asked permission to come up to the bridge. It was Isaac Turner. He'd been on the Maitland for over 10 years. He looked green in the face.

"We'll be okay, Ike," said the Captain, Gordon Song. He was a Canadian who'd worked the great lakes for nearly forty years. "I've seen hundreds of storms like these and so has the Maitland. I know what you're thinking but this is just a spike. Go on back to your berth. Have a drink and this'll be over before you know it."

Ike saluted and nodded his head. He'd known the captain was lying, but he was a good mariner and always obeyed orders or gave the appearance that he had. He also understood that the captain hadn't lied because he was dishonest. He'd lied because he needed to put up a front to keep the crew's confidence in the ship and her captain to survive this, as high as possible. If the captain seemed to be afraid, what would happen to the rest of the crew? It was a necessary lie. Kind of like what they called a benevolent deception in medicine. If a doctor told you a shot was going to hurt like hell, most people would never let anyone give them a shot. Likewise, if the captain told the crew that he was afraid or started spouting old superstitions, who knew what could happen.

But Isaac had never seen waves like these in all of his years on the lakes and this ship in particular. It was like being on a fucking roller coaster. And a ship this big was supposed to smash waves, not climb them and ride them down. Everywhere he looked he could tell that every man knew, as the captain did too, it was the witch of November come stealing.

Isaac saw men who normally stood on the deck at night and watched the water during even the roughest waters, huddling in the cabins with fearful expressions on their faces. Ike knew that by morning this crew would either have a story to tell their grandchildren, or be part of a story that someone else told to theirs.

As Ike carefully made his way out of the bridge area a strong gust of wind slammed him against a bulkhead. For a fraction of a second he held on and then was swept off his feet.

Suddenly an even stronger gust of wind caught the large man and held him in midair. He settled gently back on his feet and looked around himself. That was weird as hell he thought. Jimmy would have loved hearing about that. Of course he never would have believed it.

"Jimmy didn't believe in anything, Isaac. That was his fucking problem," said a voice from behind Ike. He turned around and looked. There by the railing where he and Jimmy had watched the kids waving at them back in Detroit stood a slip of a woman.

"Come and talk to me Isaac," she said calmly. It seemed to Ike that all of the tossing and turning that the ship was doing didn't affect her. She stretched out her arms and her long hair blew in the winds. She smiled as if she had no fear. At that second the ship started to drop down the side of a monstrous wave. Isaac couldn't tell if it was raining sideways or if the wind was just blowing streams of water over the deck. Either way the rain nearly froze him as it touched him. Why wasn't the woman cold? She barely had any clothes on. And why wasn't she afraid?

Ike was scared shitless and this was his ship. Why wasn't that woman afraid? Then it dawned on him. Recognition brought cognizance. Fear gave way to resignation. Ike walked over to the railing beside her.

"You're HER aren't you?" he asked.

"Afraid so," smiled November.

"You're...you're..." he began.

"Yeah, Ike," she smiled. "I'm early this year. You know what that means, right? But it doesn't have to be a bad thing."

Ike gulped in a big breath and looked over at the woman standing beside him. Something inside of him told him that the thought going through his mind wouldn't be advisable.

"Even if I let you throw me over the side, Isaac. I wouldn't die. I can't die as you call it because I'm not actually alive. And boy, would I be pissed when I came back up. I hoped that you were smarter than that. "

"What do you need me to do?" asked Ike.

"Go and get your captain," she smirked.

Isaac slowly made his way across the deck and back to the bridge. This time he burst into the room with a look of abject fear on his face. All of the officers in the room turned and looked at him.

"What the hell do you think you're doing Ike," yelled Pittman. "You know better than that."

"What's going on Ike?" asked Captain Song.

Ike with his face as white as a sheet said, "Captain, it's the witch."

"Ike every mariner worth his salt knows what these storms are called and why," said Captain Song. "Get a fucking grip before I have you thrown in the brig."

"No Captain," yelled Ike. "It's really her and she wants to see you. She's here on this fucking ship and if you don't talk to her none of us will make it to morning."

"What in God's name are you talking about?" asked the Captain. "The witch of November isn't a person. It's the name for the storms."

"Tell that shit to the woman standing against the railing in a near gale force wind like she was just out for a stroll on a sunny afternoon in fucking Florida," screamed Ike. "If you think I'm wrong, just go out there. You can always throw me in the brig or fire me. Just get your ass out there and talk to her."