by Trinity Crow
As I worked, my senses seemed more alive than ever, the crisp morning air; the feel of soil on my hands, the scents of mint and sage, were all twice as vibrant. I found myself once again humming contentedly.
As the day dawned properly and the sun streaked bright colors across the trees, birds began to call back and forth as they, too, worked for their breakfast. But in spite of the ordinariness of the moment, everything had changed.
* * *
The morning light woke Nikki as well and she stumbled out the back door, stretching and yawning.
"You can really see the difference from the back porch now." she told me as she crouched down beside me. "What can I do to help?"
"This whole bed needs to be emptied," I told her. "I already checked and there is nothing I want to keep." I cast a curious look at the dark-haired girl as she carefully pulled and stacked the unwanted plants. "You wanted to talk to me?" I asked her cautiously.
Nikki avoided my eyes. "Not now," she said. "Maybe later."
I didn't push her. It was a lovely morning. The secret of the fox lay quiet in my heart only lightly tinged with unease. I pushed the last bits of fog away from the memory and bent to the task with a willing heart. The peace would be later shattered by the police. Later was fine. Never might be okay too.
The two of us made quick work of several beds. By eight a.m., the day was growing steamy. I washed my hands and face in the cool water from the well before making a quick breakfast for the two of us. Nikki waved away my offer of tea, taking instead a bottle of water from the case she had bought in town.
"I have an idea," Nikki said thoughtfully, after a moment.
We were sitting on the back step, empty plates in our laps, and I was brimming with happiness. With my back to the house and the ugly bricked up windows, all I saw was a garden and a future. My heart hurt with hope that sight created.
"What's your idea?" I said happily.
Let's walk down to the edge of the road and see if you have a mailbox."
I looked at her curiously and then smiled. It was a random idea, but maybe what she really wanted was a break.
"Okay," I said agreeably. "Let's go see."
There was no mailbox and it turned out Nikki didn't really care. She lured me across the nearby fields with the guise of showing me blackberry vines and then dropped a bombshell.
"Listen, Abby," she started, her eyes dark with emotion. "I need to talk to you."
"Is this later?" I asked, with a smile.
"Yeah," she said, her face serious. "It is. I never told you why I am on my own."
I shook my head. "You don't have to," I said, interrupting her.
"Yeah, I kind of do." She sounded so miserable that I stopped picking flowers and paid attention.
"My family is. . .different. Kind of like your cult. Well, not so controlling. But we are expected to, um, carry on the family business."
My eyebrows climbed up my forehead without my permission. "And you didn't want to?'
Nikki cracked a smile. "Oh, Abby, you're such a good person. Anyone else would have asked what the business was."
"That seems like it's not my business," I said slowly.
"Right, well, I'll tell you. I didn't want to because of what my family are. We're sensitives."
"Do I ask sensitive to what?" I said, even slower.
"Uh, people call it different things. Paranormal, supernatural, un-natural, ghosts, eviley, beyond the veil." She paused and gave me a wry look. "Stop me anytime."
"Oh, right. You can stop." I flushed, realizing my mouth had fallen open and I was staring at her in utter disbelief.
"So yeah, um, people call it different things, but most of them claim it's bullshit."
"And it's not?" I said, holding the flowers idiotically.
"No," Nikki said, terror flashing across her face. "It's not. I wish to God it was. It's scary. And the rules to keep you safe don't always work. Frankly, I don't want anything to do with it."
"You didn't have to tell me, Nikki," I told her reassuringly. "I'm okay with whatever reason you needed to leave."
"I did have to tell you and I need you to believe me, because. . . Because, Abby, there is something in your house." She gulped and then rushed on, clenching her hands into fists. "I'm not saying it's evil and I am not saying it is trying to hurt you. In fact. . .I'm more worried about how much it likes you. I dragged you out here because we are past the line of it's influence and because I don't think it would like me saying anything bad about it to you."
I wanted to laugh. I wanted to just tell her I understood and change the subject, but all I could do was think of that power that had seized my feet and forced me to walk the spiral. The sickening dream of the husband and wife blankly treading in circles under the harsh light of the moon flashed through my mind.
"What is it?" I asked hoarsely. "Is it a ghost?"
Nikki's hair swung as she shook her head no. The stark look in her eyes was chilling. "There may be a spirit or two there, but. . ."
A spirit or two? The words echoed in my head and I almost missed what she said next.
"But those aren't what concern me. There is something much stronger there. Some kind of land spirit. A minor deity of some sort."
The flowers fell from my fingers as her words sunk in.
"I don't understand what you mean. A minor god? You mean like a demon?"
"Abby," she sighed, "I know that you came from a religious background that sees everything as God or Satan, but most of the world's religious beliefs don't work that way. Half my blood is from the first people of this country. We didn't have just good and evil. We had many deities, large and small. They helped with the harvest or gave blessings to births. They also played tricks, had favorites and loved to be a part of our lives."
She gathered up my flowers and handed them back to me. My fingers curled numbly around them. Her hand briefly pressed against mine. "Keep it together, okay? This small god likes you. It wants you happy and I don't want it angry at me." Her eyes held mine until I nodded and gave her a small unconvincing smile.
"At some point, most of our people were gone. We had been killed, we had been shipped off to reservations, or we had been converted to Christianity and the European way of life.
"Even on reservations, traditions were lost. Some of the gods and ancestors we honored forgotten." Nikki took a step and picked a flower. I followed her, resisting the urge to look over my shoulder.
"So now there was a land that was wild, full of the kinds of spirits that in the Celtic tradition, they might call brownies, pixies, or whatever, but there was no one to keep the old ways. To acknowledge them. Honor them. Keep them happy. I don't know where they all went. I don't know if they, too, can die out. I do know what it feels like to be in their presence. And I know there is one claiming the land around your house. That wasn't graffitti on those boards, Abby. They were runes and hex marks to ward off evil."
After this barrage of information, we walked aimlessly, picking flowers. At Nikki request, I told her about some of the plants, their uses or if they were edible. We acted normal. We acted as if she hadn't just broken all those childhood fears of shadowy things in the night wide open.
"What will happen?" I said, at last. "What is the worst that could happen? I don't want to leave my home."
"The worst? It could kill you," she said starkly. "Like it did that couple. The police may or may not find their bodies but I can tell you, it killed them and is stronger because of it. I doubt it will, like I said it likes you, but it could refuse to let you leave. And the longer you stay the greater that reality becomes."
Dead. They were dead. The god thing had killed them.
But it likes you, a little voice argued.
"There are rules?" I said, proud that my voice was not shaking. "You said there are rules to help keep you safe."
Nikki sighed again, her breath gusting so hard the grasses in front of her stirred from the air. "Yeah. But I'm not trained, Abby. Shamans study for
years before dealing with this kind of thing."
"You know someone?" I said, uncertainly.
"I do." Her smile was gone. "I know I can't just turn my back and leave you to deal with this, but I also really don't want to get sucked back into my family."
"I understand that," I told her.
"Listen, I'm going to walk over to Tasmyn's house, just chill and look around. What I told you, I really appreciate it if you don't tell anyone."
I gave her a wan smile. "Scared Cassie might ask you for a palm reading?"
She snorted. "Yeah or a séance. She'd probably want to play light as feather."
I shivered. At New Eden, such things were considered witchcraft and the Bible's edict was "thou shall not suffer a witch to live." I knew they would see Nikki as a witch.
"Just take a few minutes, pick more flowers and get yourself together. You don't want to go back over there feeling fear, anger or anything negative. Okay?"
I nodded and took a deep breath. "Got it."
I stood there, watching her figure get smaller as she cut across the fields, wondering how I would find any serenity with the idea that in order to be safe, I would once again need to bow down before some god.
Chapter 18
I wandered numbly at first, my mind caught in the grip of what I had just heard. Then, as perhaps Nikki had intended, I began to notice the plants that surrounded me. It was no hardship to spend a half-hour in the field. Though the blackberries were long past, there was horsemint and bee balm. I gathered an armload, using my shawl as a sling to carry them in.
As my mind filled with plans to sort them and hang them to dry, the fear and apprehension slipped away. Whatever I had been doing so far had been good enough. Maybe it was the fact that I loved the house already that had put me in this being's good graces.
Moving through the cool house and out to the screen back porch, I used the rickety table there to divide the herbs and tie the stems together into bundles. From the garden, bunches of mint added to my morning's harvest. The thought of jars filled with dried teas to last me through the winter was a pleasing one.
In the still room, the faint smell of licorice hung in the air, and as I cleared the old bundles of herbs away, I saw why. One of the crumbly sheaves of leaves was the dried seed heads of a purple basil, the licorice scent still strong in the papery leaves. Others I did not recognize. Something made me lay the unknown bundles aside carefully for later identification before I hung my own fresh offerings. The fresh herbs would slowly dry in the dark room, away from the heat and light that would sap away their flavorful and potent oils. I closed the door and stepped back out of the pantry. And if there was a strange, hiccuping, little gurgle from the well behind the closed cool room door, I was careful to give no sign I had heard.
In the front room, I stood for a moment near the staircase, catching my breath. I had heard something. This was not my imagination and even if it turned out that Nikki's beliefs were not accurate, someone, somewhere must know what was going on here. The realization that I was alone in my house sunk in.
My house.
The thought was amazing and terrifying. Was it a sanctuary or a trap? With a dark history and the recent rumors of unnatural things occurring, maybe I should have been scared or uneasy, but what I felt was home, comfort and safety.
Knowledge, they say, is power. The elders at New Eden had greatly restricted the knowledge and information that came to our eyes and ears. I wanted no part of that deliberate blindness to the world. Retrieving the binder and Finn's background packet from the table drawer I had shoved them in that first night, I took a seat on the front porch and poured over the scanty facts the raffle binder provided.
Lot #52
Property: 2399 County Road 205
4 bedrooms
No bath
Single family residence
4.57 acres
History: Built in 1938 by Francois Dumaine as a residence for his daughter, Felicite. Occupied by Felicite Dumaine and her companion, Mrs. Eleanor Trout, until 1947. House has remained formally unoccupied since.
Confused, I flipped the page, but there was no other historical details listed for the house that was promoted as a historical treasure. The thought occured to me that Mr. Hansen might have altered or omitted details to persuade people not to buy the house. Yet, all of this was new to me. I frowned. I had read the history before I bid, hadn't I? My mind went blank as I tried to remember, the day's events a blur of stress and nerves. No matter, I told myself, there was nothing here that would have stopped me. I turned to Finn's report eagerly.
Property: 2399 County Road 205
Nicknames: Witch House, Devil House. Dumaine House. Most common. . .Rickrack House
The history provided by the town historian is extremely concise, but in talking with older residents or those whose parents were alive during this time, there are a few items of interest that everyone agree on.
1. Known as the crazy Dumaine girl, common consensus agrees something was wrong with the daughter, Felicite Dumaine, whom the house was built for. This was apparently confirmed by her companion or nurse, Mrs. Trout. Later, when Felicite lived alone, she would very rarely come into town and those visits were much talked about.
2. Most people believe the house was built to keep Felicite out of the way. It was not uncommon at the time that children who were disabled or mentally challenged were locked away out of sight. Records show her father, Francois Dumaine, was running for mayor of nearby Cedar Falls. He could very well have wanted his unconventional daughter removed from the public eye.
3. At some point, Mrs. Trout left or disappeared. While no one seemed to have liked Eleanor Trout, they also seemed to have enjoyed her tales of her crazy young charge who at times became so distraught, she had to be locked in a special 'quiet' room.
A shiver went through me. How often had Felicite needed to have quiet time or had Mrs. Trout just wanted her out of the way? All alone out here with no one to stop her, had Mrs. Trout abused the trust placed in her? I rubbed my arms against a wayward chill, tugging my shawl back up. I stared down at the knitted garment, the security blanket I had not yet been able to shed. Maybe my uneasy feeling came from my own past and had nothing to do with whatever had happened in this house. Uneasy now, I returned to my reading.
Mrs. Trout often bragged she was set for life with a lucrative position and a whole house at her disposal. Her absence caused much talk as to why she would have left such a post. Perhaps, they speculated, she had never left and had instead been killed by a violent and crazy young woman. But was Felicite crazy? Here opinions differ.
*Mrs. Herbert Crawley, 92, claims her grandmother thought Felicite was a lovely girl. Her grandmother sold Felicite a hatching of chicks to start her own flock. Mrs. Crawley says the girl often walked over to her grandmother's farm and has a drawing of flowers with the initials F.D. which she insists was a gift from Felicite.
*Mr. Henry Dorgan's opinion is that Felicite was nuttier than a fruitcake. Family stories claim that on full moon nights, you could hear her howling like a "looney bin" inmate. One tale passed down in his family recounts his father passing by the house late one night. Strange noises caused him to begin reciting the Lord's Prayer as he hurried down that dark stretch of road. The father maintained to his dying day that he was attacked by a strange beast that was neither dog nor cat, but something unnatural. Mr. Dorgan, 89, expressed interest in recounting these local legends for tour patrons.
The story most often circulated is that the property is damned because Felicite was, in fact, a witch. Persons carrying Christian symbols onto the property have reported suffering unexplained headaches, burns, and vomiting. Multiple people swear that people are killed or made to disappear if they disrespect Felicite's house.
-A follow up with the chief-of-police showed one of the missing persons was a 65 year old alcoholic male found in a pond a half a mile away. The other, a high school student, is presumed to have run away from home but no new
information has been received from him for the past eight years.
Everyone agrees the house had a normal exterior until Felicite Dumaine became the sole resident. The existing wooden rectangles were cut, painted and attached to the exterior trim by Felicite. Several hundred rectangles make up the zig-zag patterns and diamond shapes alone. Some residents say there were carved statues that once stood in front of the house, but there is no evidence of them today.
The house has outstanding potential for a stop on the Supernatural Spicewood tour. It will be added as a drive-by attraction if the new owner is unwilling to host a tour of either the interior or exterior. Visitors would sign a waiver and agree to remove crosses and other religious paraphernalia to add to the "paranormal" experience authenticity.
The interior layout of the house was not available at the time of this brief. It is unknown if the house is suitable for a bed and breakfast, although the cost of adding a septic system and electricity would be prohibitive.
I put the paper down and stared off across the fields. There was more, lots more. His website. A brochure for the visitor's center. Special promotions to coincide with holidays and nearby festivals. I didn't know much about marketing, but Finn seemed to have put a lot of thought into it. The tour would cost $40 per person and be divided equally among the participants, minus costs.
But what held my attention was Felicite herself . . . and her father building a house to lock her up in. I knew now that the rooms upstairs had been hers, the drab bedroom and sitting room and when she was uncooperative or her minder was tired of her, she was forced into the quiet room and locked in. Then, when she gained her freedom, she had abandoned that hated prison and decorated the rooms she used in color and life.
