Spencer's Cove

by Missouri Vaun

  Foster was anxious to spend some time with Abby and find out how much of the story she knew, or what, if any, additional details Abby could provide.

  She held the front of her jacket together with one hand and walked up the gradual rise from the pier toward where she’d left her car.

  Chapter Ten

  The feed store and the hardware store were part of the same building, owned by a local family. Between the two shops, brimming with inventory, almost anything a person needed could be purchased. Evan left the store to pull the truck around back for the bags of feed they’d purchased, and Abby had wandered into the clothing department. Levi’s, Carhartt, and a few other outdoor brands hung on round racks. A pile fleece lined Levi’s jacket caught her eye, and she thought of Foster shivering in the early morning chill.

  Abby held up a men’s medium. That looked like the right size. She carried it up front and paid for it. Evan was pulling along the side of the building just as she stepped out onto the sidewalk.

  “You bought a jacket? Nice.” Evan looked over, then faced forward and put the truck in drive.

  Abby hadn’t gotten a bag for the purchase; she folded the jacket across her lap.

  “It’s for Foster.” Abby wasn’t sure why, but revealing the garment was a gift made her cheeks warm.

  “Oh.”

  Was Evan bothered by the jacket? Abby was sure she’d imagined it.

  As they turned north on Main Street to drive back to the estate, Foster stood on the side of the road next to her rental car, as if she’d conjured her.

  “Will you pull over?” Abby lowered her window as Evan eased the giant truck alongside Foster’s parked car.

  “Hi.” Foster smiled.

  “Hi.”

  “I’m really glad to see you. The car is dead.”

  “Dead?”

  Evan leaned on the steering wheel to listen, but she let Abby do all the talking.

  “I’m not used to these damn keyless cars. I think I must have left the ignition on when I got back in to raise the windows.” Foster sank her hands in her pockets. “At any rate, it’s deader than a door nail. I was just about to walk to the café and try to call someone when I saw your truck.”

  “I can give you a jump.” Evan spoke for the first time. She threw the truck in park and climbed out. She rummaged in the tool compartment in the bed of the truck, just behind the cabin. “Or maybe not.”

  “No cables?” Foster leaned against the edge of the truck bed.

  “I must have left them in the barn. I had to recharge the battery in the ATV the other day.” Evan frowned.

  “We’ll give you a ride home and come back later for your car.” Abby opened her door for Foster to climb in.

  “Let me get my bag.” Foster leaned in through the passenger side door and returned with a laptop bag.

  Abby scooted across the bench seat to make room for her. Evan seemed annoyed, but she wasn’t sure why. It wasn’t as if Foster had stranded herself on purpose.

  “That’s a nice jacket.” Foster’s elbow was on the windowsill, but the truck picked up speed, and after a few seconds the cool air caused her to raise the window.

  “Oh, I bought this for you.” Abby’s cheeks felt warm again as she handed the garment to Foster.

  “For me?”

  “Yes, you seemed…well, you seemed cold this morning. I thought you might need something warmer.” Abby smiled thinly and averted her gaze. For some reason she couldn’t look at Foster. Foster’s soft brown eyes made her feel things, and feeling things would only be dangerous for Foster.

  “Wow, thank you, that’s very generous.” Foster sounded genuinely pleased with the gift.

  That made Abby happy. Her mood brightened and she forgot for a moment the frightening vision of the ship at sea.

  ***

  Evan felt like a chaperone on a first date, and she wasn’t happy about it.

  She needed to relay the details of this afternoon’s event to the Council, but she couldn’t very well get away to make that call with Abby inviting herself along on afternoon errands. And now she had Foster to contend with too. Well, she’d drive them home and then come back to town to phone the East Coast. It would be late, but the Council did much of its business at night anyway.

  “Hey, would you mind stopping there for a minute?” Foster pointed toward a graveyard just ahead. “I just wanted to check for some names.”

  “We should get back to the house. I’m sure Abby has things to do.” Evan tried to deflect Foster’s request.

  “It’s okay. I don’t mind stopping,” Abby said before Evan had a chance to craft a better excuse not to stop.

  Evan begrudgingly turned in. An iron gate hung askew, some of its hinges having rusted through, severing its connection to the stone arch over the entrance. This was an ancient cemetery by western standards. As they climbed out of the truck, Evan saw some of the dates went back to the 1830s.

  The fog was starting to roll in, creating a spooky, nearly twilight scene. Evan felt as if she’d stumbled into an old black-and-white horror film. This was the perfect setting for some sinister thing to transpire. She zipped the front of her jacket and shoved her hands in her pockets. Foster and Abby were walking away from the truck in the opposite direction. She had no choice but to follow them.

  Being in a cemetery was a terrible idea, but Evan hadn’t been able to deflect the excursion. This was an especially bad idea because Evan had no idea where Abby was in her transition. The dead carried much to the grave. Graveyards were charged with emotion—unsaid things, unfinished lives, unrequited love.

  Evan checked over her shoulder. Was the sky darkening or was that only her imagination?

  “What exactly are you looking for?” Evan was careful to walk between the graves and not on top of them.

  “I’m looking for the headstone of…there it is.” Foster stopped beside a small headstone with the outline of a ship in relief inset into the top of it. “Mercy Howe Spencer.”

  “Mercy…” Abby turned away, looking off, as if she was putting something together in her head.

  “Hey, are you okay?” Evan thought Abby looked pale.

  Abby wasn’t looking at Mercy’s grave, but at the headstones opposite Mercy’s. It only took a second for Evan to realize Abby was looking at her parents’ joint headstone. Foster was such an asshole for suggesting they come here.

  “Oh, Abby, I’m so sorry…I was so in my own head with the research that I didn’t stop to think…” Foster didn’t finish the thought. She stepped around the nearest grave and reached for Abby’s hand.

  Evan was too slow to stop her.

  Foster grasped Abby’s wrist to offer comfort, a very normal thing to do under any other similar circumstances. But the moment they made skin to skin contact a deafening crack struck down from above. A boom, as if the sound barrier had been breached, and an arc of intense light encircled Foster and Abby for only a second before it rippled outward, knocking Evan to the ground. Charged particles hung in the air around Foster and Abby like fireflies before the particles broke apart and sifted to the ground like stardust. Foster was still holding Abby’s hand but had dropped to one knee as if she were about to propose.

  What the fuck?

  Evan scrambled to her feet. It was as if Foster and Abby were frozen in time and space. Black birds flocked toward the cemetery and began to circle above where they stood, hundreds of birds, so many birds that they darkened the already twilight sky. Evan felt the beating of their frenzied wings in her chest. The wind had increased and the fog thickened to the point that Evan could no longer see her truck parked only thirty feet away.

  What just happened? Was that an uncontrolled binding? She’d never witnessed one before; she’d only heard stories about them. As far as she knew, there hadn’t been a binding like this in more than a century, maybe longer than that. She wracked her memory for the details. Either way, they needed to seek cover.

  Evan approached, but neither Abby nor Foster noti
ced her presence. It was as if they were lost in some trance.

  “Abby!” Evan shouted above the wind and the mad, swirling avian swarm overhead. “Foster!” She didn’t dare touch them until the trance was broken.

  ***

  The first thing Foster noticed was silence, absolute silence. She was standing facing Abby. She looked down at their joined hands. Something had happened when she’d touched Abby, and now they were in some other place. Foster rotated, while she maintained contact with Abby, but she couldn’t get her bearings. They seemed to be in some dark space with no horizon, no edge, no above, and no below, and yet, they were obviously standing on some sort of firm surface.

  “Don’t let go.” Abby spoke for the first time. She sounded afraid. She regarded Foster with wide eyes.

  “I won’t.” For some reason, Foster wasn’t afraid, and maybe she should’ve been. “What happened? Where are we?”

  “I don’t know.” Abby looked around. “When I touch people…things happen.”

  “What sort of things?”

  “It’s hard to explain.”

  “I’d say this…right now…is hard to explain.” Foster motioned with her free hand. “Has this happened before?”

  “No. This is something different.”

  It was so strange. They were surrounded by darkness and there was no discernible light source, and yet, Foster could see Abby so clearly. It was as if there was some sort of soft spotlight shining directly on Abby from above, some heavenly glow, while Foster’s position seemed to be in partial shadow. Abby looked up and the light enhanced the blue of her eyes to a brilliant hue.

  “Did you hear that?” Foster cocked her head.

  “Hear what?”

  “I could swear I just heard someone call my name.” Faintly at first, then louder.

  What was that other sound? The wind, and something else. Her ability to focus was returning. Had she passed out? No, she was kneeling. She was still holding Abby’s hand and Abby was looking down at her. She tried to let go but couldn’t.

  “Foster! Get up!”

  She turned her head as if in slow motion. It was almost as if she were drunk. She was lightheaded. She blinked several times to clear her vision. Evan was shouting at her over a torrential windstorm, but she couldn’t feel it. She and Abby were in some sort of protective bubble, although she could see that Evan was straining against howling gusts. Evan’s hat had blown off, and her hair whipped around her face. She leaned forward in an attempt to remain upright.

  Foster stood up. She shook her head. Abby was in some sort of trance.

  “Abby? Abby, can you hear me?” Foster lightly touched Abby’s face.

  The instant she made contact, Abby’s gaze regained focus. Foster felt Abby’s penetrating gaze pierce her chest like a spear. Abby held her with her eyes for a few seconds, then looked down at their joined hands. The instant she released Foster’s hand, whatever had protected them from the raging storm evaporated and Abby faltered. Foster managed to catch her just before she slumped to the ground.

  “Abby!” Foster cradled Abby in her arms. She was out cold.

  “We need to get out of here!” Evan knelt across from her.

  Evan hoisted Abby out of Foster’s arms and fought the headwind back toward the truck. Foster salvaged Evan’s hat from where it had been pinned against a gravestone. Once in the truck, she pulled Abby against her shoulder and held her. Evan shifted the truck into reverse so quickly that the huge off-road tires threw gravel. Raindrops the size of silver dollars had started to pelt the windshield. The storm was vicious and had come out of nowhere.

  “Where are you going?” Foster realized they were headed toward the Spencer estate. “Abby needs a doctor. We should go back to town.”

  “A doctor can’t fix this.”

  “What do you mean? What the hell happened back there?” For some reason, Foster had only just become aware that Evan didn’t seem shocked by what had transpired. “Who are you?”

  Evan glanced over with a dark expression but didn’t answer.

  A large branch dropped across the road, and Evan swerved to miss it. Abby’s head lolled to one side. Foster shifted and pulled Abby partially into her lap to stabilize her as Evan fought to keep the truck on the narrow, winding road.

  She didn’t want to relinquish Abby when they arrived at the house, but she didn’t think she could carry Abby by herself. She held the door for Evan. They escaped into the house. The wind drove sharp raindrops against the door as Foster braced her shoulder and used all her weight to close it.

  “What the hell is going on?” Foster initially hadn’t felt fear, but the longer it took for Abby to wake up the more anxiety crept up her spine to lodge itself at the base of her occipital ridge. She rubbed the hair at the back of her head briskly to get rid of the pins and needles.

  Once again, Evan didn’t answer. She started up the stairs with Abby in her arms.

  “Get candles from the kitchen.” Evan yelled to Foster without looking back.

  “Candles?” Foster was still following Evan up the stairs.

  “Candles! We need five candles, rosemary oil, and salt.” Evan glanced back, and Foster could see by her expression that she was deadly serious. “Lots of salt.”

  “Okay, okay…” Foster turned back toward the kitchen.

  “And don’t forget matches!” Evan called after her.

  Foster rummaged in every single cabinet before she found rosemary oil in the pantry. She had a one-pound canister of Morton’s salt under one arm and a box of tea candles when she realized she’d forgotten matches. She jogged back to the kitchen and searched drawers until she found them.

  The lights flickered out just as she reached the door of Abby’s bedroom. The wind outside was making some rather otherworldly sounds. To say it was howling would have been an understatement. Foster strained to see what was outside the darkened window at the end of the hallway when Evan shouted.

  “Hurry!”

  Foster rushed into the room. Evan had moved all the furniture and the sectional rug to create a large open space. Abby was lying, still unconscious, on the bed, which had been shoved against the wall.

  “Quick, give me the salt.” Evan took the canister.

  Foster watched, dumbfounded, as Evan began to create a shape on the hardwood floor with lines of salt. It was hard to see exactly what it was in the darkened room until it was almost complete. Foster had seen enough horror movies to recognize the shape right away.

  “Hey, wait a minute. That’s a pentagram! I’m not gonna stand by while you work some dark spell here…I’m Southern Baptist you know, and I—”

  “Shut up, Foster, and hand me the candles. We’re running out of time.” Evan scowled at her as she held out her hand for the box of candles. She took three and handed the box back to Foster. “I put a drop of oil at each corner. Now place a candle at each point and light it.”

  Foster worked to light the candles, burning the tip of her finger once. While she struggled to keep them lit, Evan carried Abby from the bed and laid her in the center of the pattern she’d drawn on the floor. Abby was as limp as a rag doll.

  “By the dark and the light, let the unforeseen see nothing.”

  Evan made a motion with her hand for Foster to repeat the words. “By the dark and the light, let the unforeseen see nothing.”

  “By the dark and the light, let the unforeseen see nothing. Lift away this darkness that hides the light.” Again, Evan nodded for Foster to join her.

  She mimicked Evan, sitting cross-legged on the opposite side of Abby, just beyond the pentagram’s edge.

  “By the dark and the light, let the unforeseen see nothing. Lift away this darkness that hides the light.” Foster murmured the words in unison with Evan.

  “You have to mean it.” Evan frowned at her.

  “By the dark and the light, let the unforeseen see nothing. Lift away this darkness that hides the light.” If this helped Abby in any way, then Foster did mean it. She gl
ared back at Evan and spoke louder. Outside, the wind continued its frenzy. Rain pelted the roof and the windows. “By the dark and the light, let the unforeseen see nothing. Lift away this darkness that hides the light.”

  Foster wasn’t sure how many times they repeated the words when finally, Abby began to stir. The candles had burned almost to the floor.

  “Don’t.” Foster was about to reach for Abby, but Evan held up her hand to stop her. “Give her a minute.”

  Abby blinked, then looked from side to side. She slowly rose to a seated position as the candle nearest Foster went out.

  “Foster?” Abby sounded weak.

  “I’m here.” She nodded in Evan’s direction. “And so is Evan.”

  “I feel…I feel so strange.” Abby rested her palm on her forehead.

  For a brief instant, Foster could have sworn that Abby’s head had a glowing aura around it, but as quickly as it had appeared, it faded. Abby looked down at the five-pointed star on the floor around her and then glanced from Evan back to Foster.

  “What is this?”

  “A protection spell.” Evan got to her feet. She offered her hand to Abby.

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea.” Abby looked at Evan’s hand as if it were a threat of some kind.

  “It will be okay now.” Evan sounded so sure. “Take my hand.”

  Abby wasn’t convinced she could trust what Evan was saying. She was about to refuse again, but Evan stubbornly insisted. Abby closed her eyes as she reached for Evan’s hand, preparing for the worst. Strong fingers closed around hers and nothing happened. She opened one eye, half afraid to look, and then the other.

  Once on her feet, she didn’t release Evan’s hand right away. She stared at their clasped hands in disbelief. Ever since she was a teen, physical contact had been dangerous.

  “How is this possible?” Abby looked up at Evan.

  “I think you’ll feel something different when you touch Foster.” Evan tipped her head in Foster’s direction.