I tried to shake my uneasiness. The problem was the tables had been turned. This time we needed magic to get us out of trouble. Even though this place was spooky and we’d just had a fright, we were lost and exhausted. We had to get home from Headless Valley in one piece. That might be impossible without a little magical help.
I tried joking around to settle Sookie’s nerves. “Place of great power, huh? I don’t see any posh school nearby. There are no posters here to join a soccer match.” But the joke died on my lips because only Jasper’s eyes flashed with any recognition of that time in the past – and he wasn’t smiling. Since last Halloween, when we discovered a fairy school had sat on top of Grim Hill, spewing its evil magic like an active volcano, our lives had never been the same. But everyone else in town had fallen under its enchantment and couldn’t remember what had happened. Just thinking about the past made my feather, which was supposed to help me remember, sear with a heat that burned through my jeans, almost scorching my skin. There was magic around here – plenty of it.
“I … I … guess I can try and use the fairy mirror,” Sookie said. But then she pulled her gaze away from the window, came over, and grabbed my hand. In her quiet, little girl voice she whispered, “I don’t want to be a witch, Cat. Not really.” I tightened my hand over hers protectively.
“So far you’ve only used your magic to help us – that’s not maleficium.” If you used magic against someone bad – that wasn’t dark magic, was it? “No, of course you don’t have to be a witch.” We were in total agreement there. Also I was heartened that the little magic my sister had used hadn’t brought her closer to the edge. There hadn’t been any bad consequences. Still …
“Maybe we don’t even need the mirror,” I said. “If we just find our way back to the road, then we can use the bus radio to call for help.”
“Now you’re talking sense,” Clive said. But he didn’t look so cocky this time.
Amanda yanked the cobweb curtains over the window and I felt strangely relieved – almost as if the medicine wheel had been staring at us and not vice versa. The gloom in the place seemed to lift and the dark felt less oppressive.
“Let’s get some sleep,” suggested Amarjeet.
“Girls can have the space closest to the stove,” Clive offered. “We men, I mean, guys, can camp out closer to the door.”
The night had plunged into a chilling freeze and we fanned out from the stove. Too much of an icy draft radiated from the old door so we coaxed the guys closer. Mitch stacked the stove with a heavy log which would burn slowly through the night.
Sookie and I stretched out beside each other. We used my backpack for a pillow and my sister snuggled up against me. There were no spruce boughs beneath us like in the shelter and the floor was cold and hard. It was uncomfortable and I figured I’d never fall asleep. That lasted about two seconds.
*
I awoke in the deepest, darkest part of the night. A horrible stench of rotting dead things and moldering old fur clogged my nose and left a disgusting taste in my mouth.
Slump, thump, creak. Something was after us, something awful. It had climbed through the loft window and was moving downstairs in lumbering, deadly steps, lurching toward us. For a moment I thought I was dreaming –
“Did you hear that?” Mia whispered harshly in the dark. Okay, so it wasn’t a dream.
“Somebody’s upstairs,” said another voice – Jasper’s.
There was a rustling sound and then a few groggy voices. “Huh?”
I shot up to a sitting position, but it was too dark to see anything. The oil lamp Amarjeet had set on the table had burned out. There was only a tiny red glow from behind the stove door.
“Clive.” I stretched out my leg and shoved his shoulder with my foot. “Wake up.”
“Nhug?” was Clive’s mumbled response, then, “Huh?” Like me, he shot straight up and sprang into action.
We heard a deep, rumbling growl that sent chills over every square inch of me and set my heart racing. Mitch, who was closest to the stairs, jumped up with a yelp. A huge, black shadow moved like a wraith between the railing slats at the top of the loft.
“Grab pots and pans and whatever you can use to make noise,” I shouted.
“And we need weapons – use sticks, the mop, broom, anything,” yelled Clive.
We stumbled around in the dark cabin, grabbing whatever we could get our hands on, and charged toward the stairs.
We crowded around the bottom step, yelling, shouting, and making as much noise as we could. At the top of the stairs stood the black shadow, a hulking silhouette that growled and snapped in a menacing sneer. It hesitated, but I swear I didn’t know if I’d be able to stand my ground if it lunged forward. Except I had no choice – we were in this together and I had to protect Sookie.
Suddenly a vivid flash of light illuminated the cabin in a ghostly green glow. The gigantic black creature snarled at us, revealing dripping fangs the length of my finger. Its eyes glowed a menacing yellow. This was no wolf I’d ever read about. A rolling thunderclap made the walls inside the cabin shudder and I heard more glass break upstairs. The black monster slinked back up the top steps. With a sinister growl, it disappeared into the room and the door slammed shut behind it.
This time I made sure of it. I moved so fast, I didn’t have time to think about the consequences. I flew up the stairs and threw my weight into the door, but it really was closed. I turned to flee but ran straight into Clive and Jasper.
“Jam it with this,” Clive said, handing me a broomstick. I wedged it under the door handle.
“And use this,” said Jasper, jamming a kitchen knife into the doorframe.
As soon as Jasper placed the knife, I heard more glass smash inside the room and then an eerie silence.
CHAPTER 19 - A Menacing Fiend
“WHAT WAS THAT?” Blood pounded in my ears. Once more I checked the broomstick jammed under the door handle. It seemed firm.
We returned to the others and Amarjeet filled the lamp again. The feeble glow of the wick barely lit the dusty glass bowl.
“That was some wolf.” Skeeter whistled appreciatively.
“That was no wolf,” I said. Or at least not one I’d ever read about in my research.
“One of those legends my grandmother used to tell me about, only now I don’t think they were legends at all,” Amanda said softly, “was about a creature called the waheela, a bear-wolf that haunts the forests surrounding Headless Valley.” Amanda’s eyes grew round with fear. “Again, I thought that was just another stupid kid’s story to keep us from wandering in the woods. But she’s been right about so many things.” Her eyes blinked rapidly. “If only I’d paid more attention to her.”
“Those creatures looked familiar to me as well,” Jasper said slowly. He raised his hands to his eyes, remembered he no longer wore glasses, and then just rubbed his face. That meant he was deep in thought. He found his pack and yanked out one of his pocketbooks.
Come to think of it, he’d never torn up a single book, even when we were looking for paper to build a fire.
Jasper brought his book to the table and laid it beneath the oil lamp. He adjusted the knob on the lamp to increase the flame, and in the brighter glow, flipped through the pages. I leaned over his shoulder – he was reading a book on Celtic legends. Since our fairy trouble Jasper was always researching the Celts. Jasper signaled me to move because my shadow was darkening the pages. I stepped back, hugging my arms and glancing up at the loft as we all hovered around the lamp in heavy silence.
“Ah,” Jasper said, but not in a good way.
“What?” I practically dived back to the table.
“Remember when we were running to the cabin,” Jasper explained. “We ran through a bog.”
I nodded, and even as he said that I recalled the overpowering stench I’d woken up to. It was as if the dank smell of the bog had followed us here.
“Well,” said Jasper. “The Celts believed evil creatures inhabited b
ogs. They called them fiends.”
“We’re not exactly in Ireland,” said Clive.
“That doesn’t matter,” explained Jasper. “When we were in Sweden, they practiced Walpurgis, which was a Celtic festival.”
“Something happened on Walpurgis Night when we were in Sweden, didn’t it, Cat?” Amarjeet fastened her no-nonsense stare on me. “I keep having a weird dream about it.”
Mia nodded in agreement, her chin bobbing almost frantically. Clive’s expression became thoughtful and I wondered if he was remembering how we’d been captured. That’s right, whispered a voice inside me. You’ve been in tight spots before and worked them out, Cat. Take hope.
“Once more,” Clive struggled to stay patient. He didn’t snap at any of us, so I had to give him credit for that. “What does Sweden or Celts have to do with that … um, creature we chased away.”
Jasper held his book in front of our noses. On the page was an illustration of a huge, black, diabolical beast with hunched shoulders, gaping jaws, and blood red eyes. Except for the eyes, it was very similar to the creature we’d just seen.
“That’s a waheela,” Amanda assured us. “My grandmother drew me a picture of one once. She told me the waheela was like a giant wolf with supernatural powers and … and …”
“Tell us,” demanded Clive. “We need to know.”
Amanda swallowed. “She used to say this forest was infested with evil spirits, and that the waheela was responsible for the headless corpses.”
For a while nobody said anything. Then Jasper broke the silence. “Your grandmother’s bear-wolf and the Celts’ fiend are probably the same thing – a creature from the Otherworld.”
Amanda nodded. “Grandmother told me to always remember that we walk in two worlds at the same time, ours and the Otherworld.”
“Your grandmother is wise,” said Jasper gently.
Almost in a whisper, Amanda replied, “I know that now.”
“Fiend, waheela, who cares?” said Clive. “The question is: how did it get upstairs?”
Then Sookie said a funny thing. “Because you opened the door.”
“No,” I explained to both Sookie and Clive. “The creature crawled in through the broken window. We’d left the door shut – the wind must have blown it open again.”
“That makes sense,” said Clive.
But Sookie only shook her head and didn’t say anything more.
Mitch and Clive had found a hammer and nails in a kitchen drawer. They pulled apart the dilapidated table and hammered its boards across the loft door. Amarjeet, Mia, and I threaded pots and pans with old string we’d found in another kitchen drawer. We then strung the clattering line across the top of the stairs to sound an alarm. It wouldn’t scare off a waheela, but it would give us more warning.
It occurred to me that the creature had behaved a little like a wolf. Wolves learned by stalking and watching new prey. They were clever and could even unlatch gates … or, I gulped, doors. Then, as if to mock me, chilling howls ripped through the night.
The fiend wasn’t far away and it had friends. Those creatures had been stalking us and the one we had seen today must be the scout. They were getting braver – that was not good.
All of us huddled in a circle around the stove. Skeeter was keeping the fire going with his usual gusto. Clive had to grab the wood out of his brother’s hand when the flames roared and the stove grew red hot. My forehead broke into a sweat.
We had to try and rest for the remaining hours of the night, since we’d had almost no sleep the last three nights. I nearly laughed when I remembered that I wasn’t able to sleep two nights ago because I’d be visiting my new high school the next day. Good one, Cat – new teachers and older students didn’t seem so scary anymore.
We lay down, but it wasn’t easy for anyone to drift back to sleep. Amarjeet snapped at Jasper, accusing him of kicking her. Mitch and Mia bickered about whose idea it had been to hike back to the bus. Skeeter snarled at Clive when his older brother took the wood away and forbade him to put any more in the stove. I thought I heard Amanda sniffle, but she’d rolled onto her stomach and her arm covered her face. Once more I cozied up to Sookie.
*
A flash of green light on my face made my eyes flutter open. Clive was snoring softly and Jasper sighed in his sleep. The lamp had once again gone out and the cabin was cloaked in murky darkness. So where was that light coming from? That was when I noticed Sookie was missing.
A bright beam flashed across the room. Was it lightning? I spotted Sookie. She was standing by the window. She’d pulled the cobweb curtains away from the glass, revealing the stone medicine circle outside. Harsh moonlight beamed through. But that wasn’t what was making light flash across the room.
My sister was humming an unearthly tune under the lunar light. She held a silver object in her left hand – Lea’s fairy mirror. Moonlight reflected back from the mirror, painting my sister’s face with ghostly illumination. I swear she no longer looked like a child of this world.
Then my heart stopped.
The mirror flashed once more and I heard someone singing back.
CHAPTER 20 - Disturbing Visions
“SOOKIE,” I RASPED. “What are you doing?” This didn’t make sense. A short time ago my sister had told me she wanted to stay away from magic. So why was she playing with the mirror now?
Did she say that, Cat? that annoying voice in my head piped up. She said she didn’t want to be a witch, but she didn’t mention staying away from magic. A cold lump of ice formed inside my stomach and I remembered how my plans always backfired. But not this time, I swore to myself. My sister wasn’t going to become a witch. We were going to avoid that trap – that terrible fate that ran in our family – one sister becoming a fairy fighter, the other turning into a witch.
“Put away the fairy mirror, Sookie,” I urged her.
“It’s okay, Cat.” Sookie’s voice sounded faint, as if it had to travel a great distance. “I’m sure now I can use the mirror to call for help.”
“What do you mean?” I took a step closer, reaching for Lea’s mirror, but Sookie snatched her hand away.
“Hey,” I said in a warning tone, putting my hands on my hips.
“I can reach people through this mirror, Cat.”
“Which people?” I asked suspiciously. Then I shook my head. “Forget it. I think you’d better hand it over.” I
held out my hand, determined to take back my mirror.
“People you want to see,” Sookie said.
My hand stopped in mid-air. “Who?” Then I repeated more forcefully, “Exactly what are you seeing in that mirror?”
“I can see a lot of things,” Sookie said coyly. “Come look for yourself.”
I stepped closer to Sookie, letting the cold moonlight wash over me. Then I leaned over my sister’s shoulder and stared into the fairy mirror. At first it was foggy, just as the glass had always appeared since I got it. Then slowly the fog lifted. I could see shapes forming in the looking glass. “No,” I gasped.
I was staring into my own living room, where I could see Mom. My eyes began stinging and I blinked back the tears. She was sitting on our couch with a quilt tugged over her shoulders. She had fallen asleep sitting up. The telephone was on her lap, and her fingers stayed close to the receiver. Crumpled paper cups, half-filled with coffee, littered the coffee table. Stacked plates carried sandwiches that had only one or two bites nibbled out of them. Balled up Kleenex tumbled from her lap into a huge pile on the rug.
Shadows circled Mom’s eyes and her hair stuck out in every direction. Her blouse wasn’t tucked in to her skirt and it looked like she’d slept in her work clothes more than once. I didn’t know my heart could ache so much. “We’ve got to get back to Mom fast, Sookie.”
My sister nodded. The mirror swirled with mist again and when it cleared I felt a shock run through me. Staring right back at us through the looking glass was Great Aunt Hildegaard. She regarded us with a stern expression,
waved her finger at Sookie, and shook her head. Then she spotted me hovering above my sister, or at least that’s how it seemed. My aunt wasn’t pleased with us. Worse, a deep sadness fell over her face.
Sookie shook the mirror and mist fogged up the glass again. “That’s enough for now,” she said bossily.
She had that right. After a short tussle, I won back the mirror from my sister.
“I didn’t do anything wrong,” Sookie complained. “The mirror summoned me.”
“What?” That so didn’t sound good.
As if reading my mind, my kid sister said, “It’s okay, Cat. It was Lea. She knew we were in trouble and she’s sending us help.”
My jaw dropped and I gaped at her. I never thought I’d see my friend again. “Get her back,” I said quickly.
“Then hand me the mirror,” Sookie ordered.
I almost did. That’s how badly I wanted to see my friend once more. Maybe it was the greedy expression on my sister’s face. Maybe it was those moth wings brushing against my stomach again. But suddenly I was overwhelmed with the notion that giving my sister back the mirror was the worst thing I could do. I turned and went back to where we’d slept. “No,” I said, stuffing the mirror back into my pack. I slipped my backpack over my shoulder. Let her try and sneak the mirror out now.
“Do you two never sleep … wait, what’s that smell? Is that smoke?” Mia sniffed and coughed. “Wake up everyone!”
she shouted. “The cabin is filling up with smoke.”
I’d been so transfixed by the mirror, I hadn’t even noticed the smoke. There was no mistaking it now – thick black clouds curled out from inside the stove. My throat began to burn and water streamed from my eyes.
Suddenly the stove exploded into searing flames that ate through the wall farthest from us. Everyone screamed and scrambled for the front door. “Sookie!” I ran to get my sister. Another explosion echoed in my ears, muffling all other noise. It was like I was stuck in slow motion and no matter how fast I moved, I couldn’t cover enough ground. Finally, I made it across the room. I could barely make out my sister’s blond head in the stinging black smoke. I grabbed her hand.
Grim Hill: Forest of Secrets Page 9
