Firestone Hot Springs Typhoid and swans

There was only one pool among the many that did not bubble excessively at its surface. The water was murky, turquoise and green with bacteria and minerals, and stunk. Having chosen to accept the rank shaman of Shearwater Bay as her beloved, though, Jinx hardly noticed the stench of the water as she approached it. She rolled the ghost rock on her tongue briefly, then parted her lips to let it fall into the water with a splash that released a gout of steam.

She whipped her head back to avoid searing her snout, but the rush of heat still pricked her eyes and brought tears to them. Swearing quietly to herself, the Alpha found her composure and settled sphinx-like at the spring's edge, awaiting some indication that the stone had special properties. Her eyes were trained on the roiling surface of the water, which was just below the point of boiling and so danced with itself in whorls.

She knew not how long she laid there, staring at the surface and imagining the shapes of beasts in the steam that poured off the water. It was the thud of feet that woke her from her reverie and simultaneously dismissed any possibility that the ghost rock had no magical properties. What she saw approaching her was a ghost, and an unwelcome one at that. The rock had summoned it here, of that she had no doubt.

Her nape prickled as she turned her hardened eyes up to meet the spectre of her mother, and in a quietly judgemental tone, she hissed, "get away from me." No spectre would come to unnerve her, not even that of her mother, who she blamed for so much.