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The kitchen was in shambles. Broken crockery, pots flung about - Victor couldn't imagine how this could have been done without waking him and Maggie. Knifes were buried deeply in the wooden cabinets, in a strange, swirling pattern. Angel pulled on his boots, and a shirt, and went outside. At first glance, the barnyard seemed alright, but there was a strange pattern etched into the dirt, in darker dirt? Victor crouched down and touched it, then sniffed his fingers. Blood. He turned and looked over the barn yard, and then at the door he'd just exited. Gouges scarred the door - deep ones, as if some giant dog had tried to get in.

"Dog..." said Victor, and rushed around the house. "Cal Carri!" The large, wolfish dog was nowhere to be seen. 'Of course,' Victor said to himself, 'he's been sleeping in the barn to guard the stock.' The barn door was closed and whole, and John whinnied a hello as Angel opened it. A tired, aching whinny, but John was still alright, and eager to get out of the barn. Victor smelled blood. The floor of the barn was covered in it, no wonder the horse wanted to get out. He opened the stall door, and grabbed John's halter before the horse could bolt out.

"Cal Carri?" called the dark haired man again. There was no answering bark, or a dog leaping out to lick his face. Still holding onto John's halter he inspected the rest of the barn. All seemed safe, but for the blood on the floor. But there was a lot of that. He went outside, and clipped the horse on lunge rope, though the large brown gelding seemed content to follow Victor patiently for now. He walked around the barn, eyes sharp, looking out over the brown-grey autumn fields, and the golden, red and orange forest in the distance. They were to have gone nutting today. A flash of scarlet caught his eye, and Victor turned. He dropped John's lead rope and covered his mouth with one hand. He had found Cal Carri.

Or rather, what had been left of the poor loyal dog. The dog had been sliced open, its thick grayish fur coated in blood, and skin peeled entirely away from the scull. Victor fought to keep the remains of his dinner down. A detached corner of his mind wondered how he was going to tell Adrian about the death of his beloved pet. As if on autopilot, Victor put both horse and the sheep in the pasture closest to the house. John eyed the sheep suspiciously then snorted and set about cropping grass. Victor grabbed an old horse blanket and wrapped it around the remains of Cal Carri, then he carried them out across the yard, and set them beside the back door. When he reentered, Maggie was there, preparing breakfast, as Sarah picked up shards of pottery, and Adrian pulled the knifes out of the wall.

When he entered, they all turned and looked at him for a moment, then gathered about him in a great group hug.

"What brought this on?" he asked, a short time later.

"You weren't there when we woke up," Maggie said softly.

"I was afraid. It hasn't hurt any of us, but..." Sarah said, and sniffed, then went back to picking up shards of pottery.

"Is it very bad?" asked Adrian. Victor studied the pattern the knifes had been thunked into the wall in.

"Most of the sheep are there..." he said at last. "The cow is alright. John is a little shaken, but fine." He paused. "There is blood all over the yard, and barn. I'll go clean it up after breakfast."

"What of Cal Carri?" asked Adrian. "I heard you call him." Victor didn't say anything, but then, he didn't have to. Adrian's face crumpled inward, and Victor found himself, for the second time in twenty four hours, comforting a crying person. Adrian's tears dried up quickly, though.

"We hav' ta bury him," the boy said.

"You don't want to see him," Victor told him.

"Fine... But we hav' ta bury him." "We're still going nutting," Maggie said, her chin tilted upward, and her jaw set. She set the porridge on the table. "We can bury him near your father at the edge of the woods."

It was a few hours from midday, when the blood was cleaned from the barn floor, and the kitchen was put back in order. Victor hitched up the wagon, and Sarah began loading bushel baskets into it, as Victor went to get the bundle that had been a loyal dog. Adrian looked over the flocks and Maggie came bustling out carrying a basket of food. Victor carried the dog's remains up to the wagon and loaded it behind the bushel baskets. The small red haired boy came up with a shovel and tossed it in, then climbed solemnly up into the wagon. Victor was perfectly willing to let Maggie steer the wagon, and sit on the back board, smoking a clove, and looking at the homestead as it receded. They topped a small rise, and the dark haired drifter saw the pattern in blood that covered the courtyard. It seemed familiar, but he couldn't remember where he'd seen it before, spirals and swirls, that looked random and haphazard up close, but from here, a definite pattern, even after the scuffing they'd given it this morning. Victor exhaled smoke and thought about this, deeply.

The ride took place in silence. When they reached the small family cemetery, Victor took turns with Adrian, who seemed set in burying his beloved dog almost as deep as a human, digging the grave. Sarah and Maggie went into the woods, and came back with a young tree, about as thick around as Sarah's wrist, with most of its roots intact. At last, Adrian lined the hole with a sheep skin and accepted Victor's hand up. Victor laid the bundle into the grave, and began solemnly to shovel the dirt in on top of the blanket, as Adrian and Sarah began singing a dirge.

'For a dog,' thought Victor, but somehow it seemed appropriate. Victor couldn't really understand what they were singing, and many of the sounds were guttural. Maggie began singing a counterpoint, in a fine soprano. It was easy to fall into the rhythm of the song, as shovelful followed shovelful into the hole. At almost precisely noon, the grave was filled, and the sapling stood proudly at its head. Adrian knelt and drew something in the loose, rich soil with his finger, then dampened his finger, and drew it again on the slim tree.

"Come children," Maggie said, throat choked. "Say your respects to your father, and we'll be off. The squirrels won't wait for us."

Angel stood at the dog's grave and looked at the glyph. There was something odd about it, and again, the sense of something familiar. Automatically, he reached into his pocket, and withdrew a tiny silver cross on a delicate silver chain. It was plain and unadorned, but it had been his mother's. Unthinking, he fastened it around his neck, and tucked it into his shirt. The cool metal felt comforting against the skin of his scars. Then Angel began to turn, and realized how that glyph looked familiar. It reminded him of the blood glyphs he'd been cleaning up all morning. He turned to ask Adrian about it, and saw that there was a second tree, much bigger than the one they'd brought to mark Cal Carri's grave, standing nearby. Carved into the trunk, obviously a few years old, was a series of glyphs in the same style. The children went past it, and bowed their heads in respect. Maggie just looked at it and shook her head.

"Adrian," Victor asked as they gathered nuts in the woods. "What did those glyphs mean?"

"Which ones?" asked the spry boy, turning leaves over with his foot, and gathering the nuts it revealed.

"The ones on the trees." Victor decided that perhaps he shouldn't mention the ones that had covered the barn floor.

"It t'was Cal Carri's name. The other was me Da's," the boy said carelessly.

"Where did you learn to write like that?"

"Me Da taught me. Mama taught me the other way." The boy looked out on the horizon. "When Cal Carri's tree gets bigger, I'll come back and carve his name on it, jus' like I did with me Da." Victor went silent, and continued to think. Something about the swirl of the marks had touched a faint memory of his. But what was it?

It was almost sun set when they returned to the house. Victor hurriedly tended the horse, and sheep, as Sarah milked the cow, and they barricaded the barn doors, all of them. Then they hurried across the barnyard. Angel looked at the rising full moons, and tried to figure out how long he'd been working for this family. It boggled him so bad that he paused for a moment, just outside the door. Sarah grasped his hand, and pulled him inside.

"It's almost Samhain," he said softly.

"Tomorrow," Maggie said, building up the fire.

"I dunna wanta sleep alone, Mama," Adrian said softly.

"Neither do I," Sarah chimed in as she strained the milk and set it in the cooling chest.

"We'll all sleep in the same room again," Maggie said spooning out the stew, and setting a loaf of bread on the table. Sarah brought a lump of butter to the table.

"I'll stand watch," Victor said quietly. They looked at him, and Maggie put her hand out, and covered the drifter's with hers.

"You don't have to do that," she said softly.

"Eat your stew," Angel said, turning his face away from hers. "It needs to be done," he added. Even Maggie had to admit that, even if she didn't want to.

ictor tucked them all into Maggie's huge bedstead, all pale and worried, made sure their shutters were closed, and left a light burning. Then he went out into the dark hall. There were no windows that looked into the hall that ran the length of the house. It was a simple two story house, but well built. The upstairs was divided into four rooms, with he hall running the length, two doors on each side. One was Sarah's room, one was Adrian's, and one was Maggie's. Maggie's was bigger than either Sarah's or Adrian's, so that made the forth one smaller. It occurred to Angel that he had no idea what was in the fourth room. It wasn't a bedroom, because if it had been, they would have offered it to him by now. Had he really been here three months? Almost four? It seemed as if he'd barely arrived, and at the same time as if he'd always been there.

The pale, dark haired man headed down the stairs, his boots sounding hollowly on them. Behind the stairs he knew, was the kitchen, where the hearth fire would still be blazing. It would be blazing all night if he had anything to say about it, and he had plenty to say about it. The kitchen was large, and when one included the upstairs pantry, took up half the ground floor. A sitting room, and a living room took up the rest of the ground floor. There was a small scrupulously clean basement. A small trap door in the upstairs pantry led to that. All in all it was a small domain to guard. Victor wasn't going outside. He walked around the house, drawing the drapes against the night. It was going to be a long one, he could tell that now, as he heard strange noise in the distance. He went into the kitchen and sat beside the fire, ears sharp and waiting. He could hear creatures moving around the house outside, and the screaming bleats of sheep. He tensed himself. Tonight he would deal with what was inside the house- tomorrow the things outside. Victor picked up the salt cellar. He murmured under his breath and strewed the salt around him. Scraps of wood came out of his pockets, and he laid them over the windows and doorways. There was a faint hiss of annoyance, then a feeling of emptiness in the kitchen, except for the lively fire that danced. Victor felt that that was going to be the easiest fight of any he had. He passed the kitchen door and heard a faint scratching then yelps and howls. Victor continued his circuit.

The clock chimed eleven. There were more howls and snuffles. The sounds of dying sheep had ceased. Victor took a coal from the fire, and lit a cigarette.

The clock chimed midnight.

"Angel?" called a faint voice. Victor cocked his ears. Had he really heard that? There was a faint sound of foot steps, then suddenly a blood curdling yelp, and silence. The dark haired drifter raced for the stairs. There stood Sarah, face as white as his in the light of the candle she carried. Her eyes were wide in terror, and her night shift flowed around her.

"Sarah?" he said softly. "What is it?" She whimpered but didn't make any more sound than that. The candlelight flickered, and Victor saw what it was. A giant hand on a great long arm had reached out from the darkness below the stairs and had a grip on her ankle.

"Don't move," Victor said, and his eyes darkened. Sarah squeezed her eyes shut, as Victor leapt upon the hand. The hand, feeling his movement, released the child's ankle and withdrew, but not before Angel had grabbed it. The drifter was drawn into shadows and Sarah screamed fit to raise the dead, running back to her mother's arms. No one in the house slept for the rest of the night.

The clock chimed one. Victor was lost in a realm of shadows, in which nothing was real. He bared ivory fangs at the darkness, and his dark brown eyes pierced the night around him.

"I am Rawhide and Bloody Bones," moaned a voice in the darkness. "Leave me to my task."

"Get out of this home," Victor snarled.

"A strange guardian of children," murmured the monster in the shadows. Great knuckles flexed in the dark, and Victor couldn't see anything more than that.

The clock chimed two. Victor was splattered with the night creature's blood, and had many gashes along his chest and arms, as well as a long gouge from the creature's nails that drew a line across his forehead.

"You will not win," murmured the creature's voice, rough and dark, abrading like a cat's tongue against Victor's senses. "I am a legend and you... you are nothing."

"I'm more than you can handle," Victor said, taking advantage of the pause in battle to light a clove. He got the feeling the beast was looking at him in derision. Cigarette clamped between his lips, he drew his knifes again.

The clock chimed three. The family despaired ever seeing Victor again, and huddled together in front of the fire, covered with blankets, as the sounds of great strange beasts wuffled at the doors and windows. Angel thought he was going to die. His legs and arms burned, and his shirt was ribbons on his back, scratches, new, raw and half healed covered him. Even his leather breaches were torn and blood covered. His only reward was that the blood was not all his. He didn't even have the energy to act flippantly as the monster gathered itself for the next attack.

The clock chimed four. Victor's breath tore itself raggedly out of his lungs, but he was laughing, the monster groaned beneath his feet, and Victor tore another hunk out of its misformed body.

"Tell me!" snarled the pale, blood stained man, as the shadows around him flowed with disturbing mind boggling patterns. "Who else is in this house?"

"No one," moaned Rawhide and Bloody bones. "I am under the bed, in the closet. I am what snatches out of the shadows at the end of the hall."

"Leave this house," ordered Victor, breath hissing in and out.

"It is my task!" The night creature tossed him out among the distracting hypnotizing shadows again.

The clock chimed five. The creatures that wuffled around the house fled the first light of dawn. Maggie put another log on the fire. He couldn't think anymore, there wasn't room for thought, just attacks and defenses from those great, taloned hands, and arms like oak trees. Dodge as the creature flailed about wildly, and attack again, drive it away. In the faint light of this shadow realm, the cross on Victor's chest glinted as he moved. the child's nightmare gave a convulsive swing and faded, as Victor flew through the air and his consciousness faded.

The clock chimed six, and Maggie stood up in the faint dawn light, leaving her children huddled on the hearth. She climbed the stairs, looking nervously at her feet, still bearing a lantern against the dim darkness that remained. In the lantern light of her room , she bared the eastern window to the sun's rising light, and dressed. Back down the still dark hall, she opened the doors to her children's rooms, and then opened their drapes, to send as much light as possible down the hall, and down the stairs. She would never, Maggie was sure, feel comfortable walking down those stairs again. Timidly, with a large kitchen knife tucked into the back of her belt, she opened the door to go out and do the chores.

Lying in the dusty court yard, clothes in tatters, but apparently untouched, was Victor. She screamed. The children woke up and dashed to her side. Angel remained there, lying sprawled, head cradled on his arm. They ran out to him, and looked him over. It appeared to them that the drifter was alive, and as it had appeared at first glance, unharmed except for his clothes. Through group effort they got him inside and laid him on the pallet beside the hearth. It looked as if he was sleeping. Maggie went out, and today it was her that found the remains of the eviscerated sheep. The cow was nowhere to be found, and John was panicked, rolling his eyes. but he was alive, with blood on his hoofs. Somehow, the horse had made it through the night. Maggie had no illusions about the brave beast surviving the next night. Samhain was always worse, and it would be the last night of the full moons.