By Eduardo Leora.
I spent the summer with my grandmother at seven in San Luis Potosi, Mexico. One night, I woke up from sleep to a loud cry. The shriek was horrible and human-sounding, and I was terrified. Immediately, I tried to wake my cousin and my brother, but it was as if I couldn’t move or speak. Lying there trembling, I listened to the shrieking for an hour. Finally, the crying stopped, and I could sleep.
The next day, I asked my grandmother to explain what I had heard, and she began to tell me the Legend of Coyote de la Muerte (Coyote of Death). Long ago, when my grandmother was a child, a coyote in the area as big as a wolf would often shriek at night just before someone died. The cry, which sounded like a woman, was so loud that the entire pueblo would wake at its shrieks. Her description was exactly what I had heard the previous night.
Immediately, I began to wonder who was going to die. Soon, we received a visit from my aunt, who was very sick from cancer. Incredibly pale, skinny, and with yellowed eyes, she was so frail I was afraid to even look at her.
The summer was over; I returned to Texas, and just after I got back, my mother received the bad news I already knew in my heart. My aunt had passed away.
To this day, people try to find the Coyote De La Muerte but find themselves doing nothing but going deeper into the Monte.
About the Author: Eduardo Leora now lives in Dallas, Texas, but grew up in Houston. Even today, he still thinks back and often remembers that terrible cry. Always loving a good scare, Eduardo promises to keep in touch and share more legends in the future.
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