The second wolf leaped onto him. I ran up, firing arrow after arrow into the creature's back, but it kept up its assault on my father's neck. Out of arrows, my father convulsing under the beast, I picked up a fallen branch and swung, putting all of my small weight behind the strike—knocking the wolf off and splintering the branch.
The wolf turned on me.
I held the sharp shard of wood in my hand. It launched itself at me, and I held up the stake. Both of us fell to the ground, and the wood drove through the creature's throat, into its brain, killing it.
Pinned under the wolf's weight, my teeth chattered with fear. I pushed the corpse off and crawled to my father. He lay in the snow, his eyes fluttering, blood caught in his beard and dappling his cheeks. I put my gloved hands over the wound at his neck.
"Darling," Emmanuel's voice brought me back to the present. He held out another sugar packet. They were the brown organic ones, and I pictured him slipping a few extra into his pocket when he got his coffee in the morning. Had he thought of me then? Or did he always come here and offer sugar to this… spirit.
I dabbed the fresh tears with the sugar packet. As I placed it on the edge of the crypt, my hunger rose; desire licked at my insides, building heat and anger. I had no questions, only requests. "Return her to me," I whispered.
Stepping back, I clasped my hands in front of me, lacing the fingers, and feeling the bones crush against each other as I squeezed. I need to make the pain something I control.
Tears rolled down my cheeks. Emmanuel didn't say anything; he just handed me a tissue. "Are you ready to go?" he asked gently.
I shook my head. "No, I want to stay for a minute. Go ahead."
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“Okay,” he sounded unsure but Emmanuel didn’t argue with me. “I’ll see you at band practice.”
I nodded, not looking over at him. He waited for another beat and then turned and left.
As the sky darkened, voices of other visitors faded. I sat down, my back against the mausoleum across from Suki's, my legs out in front, ankles crossed a foot away from the offerings lining the base of the crypt.
I didn't know why I wanted to stay but some instinct convinced me I'd find answers in this death filled place.
Street lights turned.
I thought about my father, about the final sounds he'd gurgled out, the way his eyes rolled into his head.
I pictured Megan's empty room and couldn't help the flicker of hope that burned in my chest. I didn't know for sure she was dead. Miracles happened.
A group passed outside the cemetery wall, laughing. I pulled out my phone, swiping it awake; the screen glowed.
"We call it the spark of life for a reason," said a voice. I turned quickly, my speed fueled by adrenaline, to see a woman standing in the lane. "Those screens will be the end of us," she continued as I scrambled to my feet, shoving my phone back into my purse.
The stranger wore a long white skirt and loose blouse with a wide lace collar. Her hair was wrapped in a scarf dotted with red needlepoint stars.
"Don't be afraid." She shuffled forward, her movements accompanied by a jingle. Bracelets on her wrists, gold, copper, and silver, all tinkled against each other. "Stay," she said. "You are here for a reason."
The woman stood in front of Suki's mausoleum with her back to me as she reached up to the roof's edge and placed a fresh candle there. She struck a match, the scratch of the sulfur head against the rough grain on the box tingled over my skin. I love that sound.
"I can help you," she said as she raised the match to the candle.
Her movement produced more jingles as she turned to me, holding something close to her side. It was partially hidden in the folds of her skirt, but I could see black feathers and a strand of beads hanging down. "What do you mean?" I asked her. "You can help me?"
"You're looking for your friend."
"What do you know about her?" My voice came out uneven, as I took a step forward.
The woman smiled, her teeth yellow in the candle's flickering glow. "I can find your friend.” Her smile grew larger. "For a price."
"Of course," I shook my head, turning away, figuring she'd been listening in on Emmanuel and me. She was a fraud.
"Because I ask to be paid for my services, you think I'm a liar," she said to my back, her voice louder, edging on angry. "Do you play for free?"
I turned back to her. She was closer than I’d thought, almost touching me. "I don't know what your game is," I said. "But I'm not interested." She grabbed my bicep. “Hey!” I struggled to pull away, but her grip was like a vise.
"You don't want to find your friend anymore? Or are you afraid maybe she left you on purpose?"
I stopped struggling and looked into her dark and deep-set eyes. She held up a plume of black feathers tied to a chicken foot, the skin looking almost like scales. A string of red beads held the feather in place. "Pay me twenty and I will find your friend.”
“How?”
She smiled, her teeth shiny. "Magic," she said as she let go of me, releasing a laugh that ricocheted off the surrounding gravestones, and bounced back in a strange and disconcerting echo.
She walked over to the Suki crypt and squatted in front of it, her long skirt bunching on the ground. Placing the chicken foot at the center of the makeshift shrine, she looked over her shoulder at me. "You pay in advance."
I hesitated for a moment. I have nothing to lose but cash.
I pulled a twenty out of my purse. There was one more in there, and it represented a larger portion of my total assets than I liked to admit. Bending forward, I passed it to her. She snatched the paper from my fingers, staying in a squat at the base of the mausoleum, not bothering to look at me.
The candle threw light around our corner of the cemetery, flickering against the old structures, making their cracks and shadows dance in the little flame's glow. Above us the clouds hung low, the lights from the city reflecting off them as a burgundy glow.
"Put down your things," she said. I placed my violin on the ground. "Your purse too." I put my small leather bag next to the case, hoping she wasn't about to knock me out and steal them both.
She began to chant, letting her head rock back and forth. Gray smoke that smelled of sage and something else, something slightly rotten, rose up in front of her.
She stood quickly, so fast that her bracelets didn't jingle different notes but released one tone. Setting the feathered chicken foot on top of the mausoleum, she chanted words I couldn't understand. She turned around, slowly, bringing the smoke with her.
The stranger raised her hands above her head, the bangles tinkling as they fell down her arms. There was a smudge stick in her left hand: tightly tied sage, one end of it bright embers with pale smoke billowing from it. With each step she took toward me, her voice and the clinking of her bracelets grew louder. Her eyes swiveled in their sockets, and she bowed from side to side, circling with the sage.
Raising her left foot, she bent her knee up to her waist and then slammed it down hard. She raised her right leg before crashing it down. Spittle flew from her mouth, the mist growing thicker as she danced in front of me, the sounds of beads and bracelets and chanting overwhelming. I pressed against the mausoleum behind me.
She stopped suddenly, falling to her knees, the white skirt puffing around her. Nodding her head forward, the woman kept her hands up in the air. The smoke poured from the smudge stick, backlit by the flames of the candle she'd left on the top of the crypt.
She lowered it to her breast, the fog clouding up over her, creating a thick curtain between us. I heard a sharp intake of breath, and then she tipped to the side and collapsed onto the cemetery lane. The smudge stick rolled to my feet, the smoke turning white as it tapped against my shoe.
The soft sizzle of burning sage was the only sound. "Hello?" My voice caught on the smoke and shifted into a cough. I kicked the smudge stick away, and it rolled down the path.
I coughed again
as I bent over the woman. Her face was totally relaxed. She had a delicate nose, full lips, long eyelashes, and a sharp jawline. Lying still on the ground, she looked different; younger and gentler, pretty. Her eyes popped open, startling me. "You cannot see her again," she declared, her voice firm.
"What?" The wind changed, and vapor from the smudge stick blew over us.
She sat up and grabbed my shoulders, her fingers like claws, reminding me of the chicken foot. "You must stop looking for your friend.”
"Do you know where she is?" I asked, my eyes burning, the smoke growing thicker.
"You cannot find her," The stranger’s voice boomed, bouncing off the surrounding crypts.
I struggled free of her grasp, pushing into a standing position. "Tell me where she is! Tell me!"
Suddenly the stranger stood in front of me. I felt disoriented by the smoke. The flame from her candle seemed to glow brighter. "I'll pay you more.” I turned to my purse, pulling out the other twenty dollar bill. Grasping it, I spun to her. The candle backlit the stranger. She seemed to be just a silhouette, a shadow I was begging for help.
"No!" Her voice boomed around me as if it came from every corner of the graveyard. "You must stop looking for her. She is dead but not gone. The most dangerous place to be. Do not join her!"
The flame flickered out, darkening the narrow space between the mausoleums. The money slipped from my fingers; a whoosh of air, and she disappeared. Grabbing for my purse, I found my phone and turned on the flashlight app. I aimed my beam of light at the altar. The candle and feathered chicken foot were gone. A mist of smoke, the strong incense of sage, and a hint of something rotten lingered.
Gathering up my fiddle and purse, I hurried out of the graveyard, my flashlight making the spaces between the graves seem that much darker, so I ran, fear creeping up my spine, raising hairs on the back of my neck.
Chapter Five
I believed the first ten years of my life were a hallucination. I have vivid, joyful memories of growing up with a loving father who cherished me and died to save me.
"Run, Darling. Run." With his final breaths, each word punctuated by a spray of blood, he told me to get home and climb into the bottom kitchen cabinet. "Close the door, squeeze your eyes shut, and wait."
I did exactly what he said.
I sprinted through the snow, my body covered in sweat, fear and grief warring inside of me.
I burst through the front door, the smell of our home hitting me: a mix of smoke scent and rosemary, the musk of wet dog, the aroma of antelope stew.
There were pots and pans in the cabinet my father told me to climb in. I tore them out, tossing them behind me—they clanged on the wooden floor. The only things I took in with me were our bows. My father's was almost twice the size of mine, which made sense because he was about twice the size of me. I pushed it in first, angling it so that it fit. Positioning myself next to it, I drew my bow tight to my chest. Light leaked in around the door, but when I closed my eyes, it was pitch black behind my lids.
That is how they found me; huddled in a kitchen cabinet with my eyes squeezed shut. But on the other side of that cabinet door wasn't the two-room cabin my father built. It was an apartment in a four-story building. I was in the most northern housing project in all of the United Tribes territory. I was in a different world.
Police discovered me when they responded to calls from the downstairs neighbors about a putrid leak in their bathroom. Apparently, my "real" father died a very different death than the one I'd imagined.
I remember the police officer who opened that cabinet door as clearly as my father's dying words. It is seamless, and yet, impossible.
When I told the social worker about who I was and how I got in there, she listened attentively, nodding her head and taking notes on a yellow legal pad. She reached across the interrogation table and covered my hands with hers. They were warm and rough. She smelled like sweet summer flowers, even though snow still covered the ground.
"Darling, sweetie, I'm sorry. You witnessed something horrible—"
"I know," I said.
She shook her head, her gold hoop earrings brushing against her cheeks. "That whole thing with the dogs, Darling—"
"They weren't dogs. They were wolves. Sick wolves that killed my father."
"None of that happened." I opened my mouth to speak but she forged ahead. "It's okay. I'm going to get you some medication that will help."
I took the pills but when Megan and I ran away, I didn't take them with me. And since I'd left the north behind I'd been fine. Until the incident in the cemetery. Did I just hallucinate again? Is there any other explanation?
I sprinted all the way home, and when I got through my front door, I slammed it shut and forced the deadbolt into place. My heart wanted to escape my body. It will beat its way out. My lungs burned.
I walked into the living room on unsteady legs. Dropping my violin and purse on the couch, I went to the kitchen and filled a glass with water, chugging it down, water leaking out the sides of my mouth. Some went down the wrong way and I coughed, sputtering.
My eyes filled with tears, and I looked down at my hands. My vision was blurred, and my lungs hurt as I struggled to gain my composure. What is happening to me? I swiped at my eyes, clearing them; refilling the glass, I passed back through my living room and opened my balcony doors to get some fresh air.
Megan had always dreamed of living in this neighborhood and having a balcony where we could grow a small garden. I stepped up to the railing. The narrow space was lined with plants, and the smell of them comforted me. The wind rustled and leaves bent and swayed, brushing against me.
I could feel the energy rising from the street below. Dinner hour was coming to an end, voices were growing louder, instruments were being tuned. Soon the neighborhood would fill with people, with revelers; music would blare, feet would stomp, and the heart of Crescent City would beat right below me.
It hadn't, before that moment, occurred to me to leave. But as I stood there looking down at the people milling beneath me, I realized I couldn't stay. Without Megan, I would be gripped by madness, again. I needed her back. Or I need to move on with my life.
Tendrils of pleasure rippled away from me—a stone dropped into the center of a still pond. Heat flickered over my body, flames starving for my flesh. I do not fear them. I am of fire and light.
He laughed against my neck, and it spiraled down my body. Tension built and unraveled, like a rope losing its form, until just a single thread remained, pulled taunt.
A slice of pain and the tension released. Empty nothingness remains.
Hunger flooded me. I tore at flesh, my jaw wide, the taste of blood on my tongue invigorating. Throwing back my head, I groaned with satisfaction. Flesh fuels me.
The dream shifted, and I found myself alone in the woods, again. A chilled mist spiraled around me as I turned, squinting into the veiled landscape. My nightshirt provided little protection against the cold, but I clutched it close as my teeth began chattering. I should run. But where?
A movement in the mist startled me—a creature close and circling closer. My body vibrated with the need to run. I gave in to it, sprinting through the darkness, hands out in front of me, batting away branches and glancing off trunks.
A root caught my foot and I flew forward, landing hard on the ground, something sharp cutting my hand. Ignoring the pain, I scrambled to my knees, grabbing at a bush—shaking loose cold water—but before I could find my feet, fingers gripped my hair and yanked me back.
The fresh pain brought tears to my eyes. A hard, muscled arm wrapped around my waist, forcing my back flush against a male body. My feet lifted off the ground. I kicked, meeting shins. A deep rumbling chuckle radiated from him to me.
“Let me go,” I yelled.
“Oh, but I don’t have you.”
The fingers loosened in my hair. His arm slid around my neck and applied light pressure. I tried to twist away, but the forearm at my throat tightened.
Go limp. But I couldn’t. Some part of me couldn’t give in. I fought harder, and the pressure increased. My chin tilted up as I opened my mouth and gasped for air, but there was nowhere for it to go.
The darkness of the forest closed in, spotting across my vision until it filled with pure black.
A pinpoint of light grew slowly as if walking toward the end of a tunnel. But I wasn’t moving. I lay totally still, my heart beat thudding loudly in my ears as a pure, bright whiteness flooded my vision.
“Stop searching,” a voice spoke in the void.
I tried to sit up, to gain some kind of traction on the space, but I couldn’t move. I can’t move! It’s a dream. Only a dream…
Knocking sounded in the distance. “Give up,” the voice said again as the white faded into grey. As I rose to consciousness, the knocking grew louder. I reached for my dream journal, the last wispy memories of another dream slipping away from me as a male voice called my name.
I pulled my robe on over the T-shirt and cotton shorts I'd slept in. "Coming," I snapped.
"About time," the man responded—it was Michael. What's he doing here? I didn't think I could take getting reamed again. But when I opened the door, he was grinning and holding a beer; Emmanuel stood next to him, a subtle smile curling his lips.
"Hey," I said.
"You're still sleeping?" Michael ran his eyes over my body, taking in the stained robe. He smiled. "It's two in the afternoon."
I leaned against the doorjamb. "What can I do for you boys?" I asked.
"Get dressed and run a brush through your hair, girl; it's making up for being an asshole day," Michael said. Emmanuel cleared his throat, and Michael looked over at him. Emmanuel raised his eyebrows, and Michael sighed. "Also," he said, turning back to me. "I'm sorry." He cast his gaze to his feet. "I didn't mean to be so hard on you." Michael glanced up to see how his apology was landing. “Like, I said, I’m an asshole.”
"Thanks," I replied, feeling my throat constrict, tears filling my eyes. Way to get over emotional. "Come in," I offered, gesturing into the apartment before I lost it.
Lost Secret Page 3
