“After you eat a heart?” Stephen asked, eyebrow cocked.
Liv expected him to look disgusted. Instead, he appeared intrigued.
“Yeah, George kills his own meat. In his clan, they believed if you ate the heart of the animal, you absorbed its strength. After I’ve eaten the heart of a deer, I will dream that I am a deer moving through the forest. My ears and nose are so powerful. It’s strange.”
“You’ve dreamed the future? Things that haven’t happened yet?”
Liv nodded.
“Dreams aren’t always easy to decipher, though. Before my mother said we were moving to Gaylord from Kalkaska, I dreamed I was running to catch up with a train. My mother, my stepfather and Arlene were on it. They were surrounded by boxes and suitcases. George was standing behind me, waving goodbye. Three days after the dream, my mom said we were moving here to Gaylord.”
Liv held the worm near her face.
“Did you just talk to that worm?” Stephen asked, wrinkling his nose.
Liv winked at him, threaded the worm on the hook and string she’d set aside, and then cast it into the water.
“Can you do other witch things?”
“I guess,” she murmured, biting her lip as she made little patterns in the water with the worm. After a few seconds, a dark shadow appeared near the dock.
“What was that?” Stephen asked, jumping from his rock and running closer to the water’s edge.
“A dog fish,” she told him.
The line grew taut and Liv pulled, jerking the string and the dogfish from the lake.
Stephen jumped back, and then stepped closer, watching as Liv put a foot on the fish’s wriggling body.
“What are you doing?” he asked, as she took the stick she’d sharpened to a point and plunged it through the fish’s eye. It flopped once and lay still.
“It’s the fastest death,” she murmured.
“Now what? You’ll eat it?”
“Yes,” she admitted. “But that’s not why I caught him. He’s a gift for you.”
Stephen stuck his hands in his pockets, as if he expected Liv to hoist the slimy fish into his arms.
“What do you mean? I wouldn’t know what to do with it.”
Liv smiled.
“You don’t have to. Meet me back here tomorrow.”
* * *
Liv cleaned the fish, careful not to damage his spine.
Arlene jumped up and down at the smell of fish in the frying pan, and Liv’s mother kissed her head before retiring to her room for a nap.
Her stepfather would work a double shift, not returning until the morning, which suited Liv just fine. Roy was nice enough, but no bond existed between he and Liv, and Liv knew that Roy longed for the day in the near-future when Liv would leave their little house and he could have her mother and his true daughter to himself.
She carried the spine to her room after dinner and wrapped it in a swath of fabric. She carved a dream stave on a piece of brown coal. The symbol consisted of a circle within a series of forked arms. The dream stave granted the sleeper dreams of the future. She added the coal to the fabric and closed it tightly, sliding the package beneath her bed.
George worked with many spells, but the dream stave with the dogfish spine had been one of the more common throughout her childhood. Each season, George place a stave and spine under his and Liv’s pillows, so they could determine what the next season would bring.
She lay back on her bed and stared at the cracked ceiling, imagining Stephen’s delight at the gift.
Chapter 17
August 1945
Liv
Three days passed without a sighting of Stephen. She didn’t see him at the pond, and on the third day, she turned brusquely away from the woods and instead walked into town. She didn’t want to go to town, but sitting at the shack mending clothes or reading her worn copies of Nancy Drew for the fiftieth time made her want to jump off the roof.
There were other young people who lived in the seedy little houses at the edge of town. Boys and girls with dirty knees and elbows, smoking cigarettes and drinking gin with their fathers. Sometimes the boys watched her with sharp, wolfish faces, but Liv steered clear of the lot.
The forest was her respite from the squalor of her home life, and she never complained — not to her mother and not even to George. Her mother worked too hard to carry her daughter’s shame as well.
In town, Liv was merely a spectator. She didn’t have money to spend and had grown weary of the shopkeepers who watched her with suspicious or pitying eyes.
Rather than look at people, she watched the sidewalk. Every few feet a weed poked from the hard surface, or much to her delight, a flower.
Step on a crack, break your mother’s back, Arlene liked to sing as she skipped down the sidewalk after school.
Superstitiously, Liv found herself avoiding the hairline cracks in the pale cement.
“Psst…” a voice whispered just behind her.
Liv looked up, startled, and spun to find Stephen.
“You looked very purposeful just now,” he said, lifting both eyebrows.
“Trying not to step on cracks,” she admitted, feeling foolish and wishing she could tell the flush in her cheeks to get lost.
Stephen’s eyes twinkled.
“Any truth to that? Step on a crack, break your mother’s back?” he asked.
Before she could answer, he took a step and leaped into the air, landing both feet with a thwack on a series of fractures in the cement.
He looked at her expectantly, and then burst out laughing.
“Oh, come on,” he said. “All our mothers would be dead if that were true.”
Liv shrugged.
“You haven’t been at the pond,” she murmured.
“I couldn’t,” he said, his voice irritated. “My mom’s been… sick.”
“Sick?” Liv asked.
“I’m free now,” he told her. “And The Picture of Dorian Gray is playing at the theatre. Will you go with me?”
Liv’s heart gave a little leap. She’d only been to the movies twice in her life.
Stephen bought their tickets, two Cokes, and tub of popcorn.
As they shuffled into the dark theatre, Liv spotted several girls from her high school.
One of them, Veronica, their ringleader, glared at Liv.
Liv barely knew Veronica, but the girl had taken to bumping into her in the halls so that Liv dropped her books.
“Those girls hate me,” Liv admitted as they took seats in the theatre.
Stephen craned around in his seat to stare at them.
“Don’t look,” Liv whispered, poking an elbow in his side.
“Why not?” he asked, still watching them. “Believe me, they’re more uncomfortable right now than you are.”
He continued staring at them for another moment, and when Liv turned, she saw all the girls’ faces were red and they were looking pointedly away from Stephen.
“There, see?” He turned back around and offered her the popcorn.
She took a handful and munched it happily, surprised at the satisfaction she felt at the girls’ discomfort.
* * *
After the movie, Stephen and Liv walked out of town, following the train tracks.
“Wy don’t they like you? The girls in the theatre?” Stephen asked.
Liv shrugged.
“Because I live in the shacks, because I’m new in town. I don’t really know. Veronica, the one with the dark curls, seems to be the reason. My first day in school, I noticed her watching me, and she just had this expression like… like a cat gets when it’s hunting a mouse. I knew she’d be trouble for me.”
“We could kill her,” Stephen said casually, balancing on the tracks.
Liv imagined Veronica, with her glossy brown hair perfectly curled in the popular style of the times. She wore pretty bright dresses and pleated skirts. Her lips were always painted red, her face pale and smooth as an egg.
“How would
we do it?” Liv joked.
“Stabbing, shooting, hanging, burning. It all leads to the grave, but so unoriginal. I think we’d need your magic, Liv. We need the Volva on this one.”
Liv rolled her eyes.
“My magic is only for good.”
“Oh, come on. Play the game. What has George taught you about black magic?”
“He hasn’t.”
“Have you ever asked him? If the good magic exists, the bad does too. That’s the balance of things.”
“Your gift is at my house,” Liv told him, changing the subject.
“My gift? Oh, the dogfish?”
“Wait here and I’ll go get it.”
“I’ll come with you,” he said, but she shook her head and ran off before he could argue.
When she returned, the dirt road they’d been walking stood empty. She held the wrapped dogfish spine and the carved coal, fighting down her disappointment. An acorn flew from the woods and landed at her feet, and then another.
She walked into the shadowy canopy of trees and spotted Stephen halfway up a fat oak tree, one hand filled with acorns.
“About time you came back. I was sweating like a pig out there.”
Liv held up the gift.
Stephen climbed to a lower branch and leaped from the tree, landing and immediately folding into a somersault. He sprang to his feet and held out his arms as if he’d just performed a feat defying regular man.
Liv whistled.
“Very well done, Mr. Kaiser. And now for your prize.”
Liv handed him the package.
He unwrapped the fabric and gazed at the spine of the dogfish. He picked up the coal and squinted at the design.
“It’s a dream stave,” she said. “Put it under your pillow tonight.”
His eyes lit up, and he looked at the spine and coal with renewed interest.
“What will I dream?”
She smiled.
“You’ll have to wait and see.”
* * *
George frowned at Liv’s mention of Stephen.
“Why don’t you like him?” she asked.
She’d taken the bus the Stoneroot Forest the day before, arriving in time for the new moon. The new moon and full moon each month were their times for ritual, gathering herbs, and preparing tinctures. As a young girl, Liv had found the ceremonies fascinating, and she looked forward to the moon changes for days ahead. However, this visit she’d dragged her feet, packing her bag at the last minute and dreading two days without seeing Stephen.
George didn’t respond, but continued to meticulously chip away at a piece of granite. He made runes on the new moon of each month.
“George?” she repeated.
He looked up, setting his hammer aside.
“It’s not an issue of like, Volva. It’s an issue of trust. I don’t trust the young man you’ve indebted yourself to.”
“I’d be dead without him, George. So would Arlene.”
George looked away, staring out the window to the woods beyond.
“The fates always offer a fork in the road, a chance to make a choice. You will be faced with a choice regarding this young man. It will be troubling, and you will be tested.”
“I’ve been faced with lots of choices. Have I failed yet?” Liv demanded.
George smiled; a small, sad smile.
“Failure is not what’s at stake. It’s the purity of our hearts. If we compromise that, we are lost.” He returned to the granite.
Liv thought of continuing her quarrel. She wanted to argue with George until he came around to her side, choosing to accept and even like Stephen. But she knew better. George was unwavering in his beliefs. He saw something in Stephen he didn’t approve of. There was no shifting him.
* * *
George kissed her head, slung his leather bag over his shoulder, and walked out the door.
Liv watched the closed door for a long time. If George sensed something, which he often did, he would return.
She focused on things she’d normally do at the cabin. She peeled potatoes next to the wash basin and put them in a pot of water over the fire. Afterward, she swept the floor, carefully moving in an eastern direction to encourage not only dirt but evil spirits to leave the cabin. Pulling open the door, Liv gazed into the empty woods. She listened for the crunch of twigs underfoot.
Satisfied that George had indeed walked to town and would not return for several hours, she slipped back into the cabin. She grabbed the edges of George’s straw bed and pulled it aside, revealing the rough-hewn floor beneath.
There were three loose floorboards. Liv had watched George retrieve items from beneath them before. She had never dared open them, though he had never given her a direct order not to do so. It was an unsaid thing between them. She knew it was forbidden, and as she pried up the first board, she experienced a little pang in her chest.
She squatted on the floor and inched the board up.
She had never lied to George. For most of her life, she believed it was impossible to lie to the man. He knew things. He sensed lies before they were even told.
She could drop the board back into place, tell Stephen she’d found nothing, and return to life as she knew it.
The dark crevice beneath the board seemed to glow with mystery. Finally, unable to will herself to push the board back down, she lifted further until the hole within was exposed.
It was anticlimactic. Beneath the floor lay a jumble of worn leather books. She got on her hands and knees and peered into the hole, looking for the magic it surely contained.
Disappointed, she pulled out one of the books. It was oddly clean. The cover was plain, not an image or title in sight. When she opened the book, she saw words written in another language. Old Norse, she figured, based on George’s occasional use of the language. He had never tried to teach her the language of his ancestors. Few in the world still spoke it, he’d told her many times. His own mother had clung to the words, but George too had been more devoted to English than an ancient language that no longer offered much value.
Though all the books were in Old Norse, one of them was translated. Norse was written on the left page and the English translation on the right.
Halfway through the book, her eye caught on a spell to displace favor among the gods. She slipped a leaf between the pages and continued flipping. Near the back of the book, she paused and read a much more sinister spell.
“Eternity in Darkness,” she read. The spell implied that the person who fell under it would bypass the afterlife and exist in perpetual nothingness. A torment of the worst kind, a note beneath the title stated.
The spell itself was disturbing, calling for the hide of a freshly skinned black cat for the template. It went on to describe that the spell must be written in menstrual blood.
Liv wrinkled her nose and shut the book.
She tilted her head and listened, but only the forest sounds filtered in.
Putting the book in her bag, she slipped on her shoes and shuffled into her coat before leaving the cabin. She didn’t leave George a note. She rarely did. He understood the comings and goings and never expected word, one way or another.
As she walked, the book in her bag thudded against her side. Each nudge grew sharper, and the bag heavier. When she reached the train, it took all her effort to heave the bag into a moving car and haul herself in after it. She pushed the bag into a dark corner and fell asleep on a sack of wheat.
Chapter 18
September 1965
Mack
Mack stood before a Victorian mansion silhouetted against the starry sky. Lights blazed in the windows, and the sounds of music and laughter drifted out.
A masked man in a tuxedo stumbled onto the porch, a waif-like woman in a silver dress hanging on his arm. They laughed and supported each other down the wide wooden stairs before climbing into a white car and driving down a driveway that disappeared into the trees.
In an upstairs window, Mack saw a young woman. He should
not have been able to see her face, not from the lawn, and yet he could make out the ‘O’ of horror frozen on her mouth. Her big brown eyes were filled with tears.
“Mack, Mack.”
He turned on the lawn, looking into the trees, seeking the voice who called out to him. But the trees had begun to fade.
Mack blinked.
A slimy tongue slid across his cheek, and he batted Misty’s nose away from his own.
He looked through Misty’s ears to find Diane, her eyes big and full of tears, not unlike those from the woman in his dream.
Diane gasped, put a hand to her chest and closed her eyes.
“Di?” Mack mumbled. He tried to sit up and his head spun.
He leaned over the side of the couch, bracing a hand on the wood floor and trying not to throw up. His head pounded and his mouth tasted sour and fuzzy.
“I thought you were dead,” she breathed. “I knocked and knocked, and then when I walked in, I shook you and you didn’t move.” She sank into a plaid chair next to the television.
He struggled up and rubbed his eyes.
“Thought I was dreaming ya for a second there,” he said, smiling.
“Mack, what’s going on? You look…” She didn’t continue, and Mack had a pretty good idea of what her next words might have been: drunk, exhausted, terrible.
Purple shadows hung beneath his bloodshot eyes. His copper-colored beard and mustache, which he’d been shaving for a decade, had grown in. He hadn’t been to the barbershop in weeks.
He self-consciously patted at his face, and then glanced down at his coffee-stained shirt.
“Has it gotten so bad?” Diane asked, gesturing at the empty glass on the table.
“I’ve had a hard week,” he said at last.
“Because of your break-up with Tina? Dennis told me,” she admitted.
Word traveled fast in small towns, especially when you beat feet on a girl like Tina.
Mack let loose a harsh laugh, propping his elbows on his knees and resting his head in his hands.
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