by Isobel Bird
All thoughts of Annie and Kate disappeared as Cooper walked among the trees, waiting for the sound to return. She could find her friends later. There was lots of time before the big dance started. What was it—six-thirty, seven o’clock? It was still light, although the shadows were getting longer. For a moment that worried her. She didn’t have a flashlight with her. But no matter. She could always go back to the cabin and get one, or surely Annie would bring one back with her. Annie was always prepared. It was usually Cooper who was flying by the seat of her pants.
The music trickled through the trees ahead of her. She walked faster, determined to find out where it was coming from and who was making it. Now she was following a narrow path that led away from the main one and into an area thick with elm trees. The pine needles that had been under her feet gave way to soft dirt and banks of hawthorn, and as she passed through a thick stand of trees she noticed that a small stream had sprung up and was running parallel to the path, winding around the rocks.
She followed the stream as it ran downhill. The music came to her from time to time, letting her know that she was going in the right direction, and she grew more and more excited as she walked. She didn’t know why, but the song she heard made her feel alive, as if she’d just woken up from a long sleep. It danced in her head, calling to her with its teasing voice, and then darted away again just as she was about to grab it and hold it in her mind forever.
She pressed through the trees, ignoring the way they scratched at her face, and came suddenly into a little grove. There the stream fell over several large stones, splashing into a pool beneath them. It was almost as if someone had dropped a cauldron into the earth. Around its edge grew water plants and reeds, and at one end a large rock jutted partly into the water, breaking what otherwise would have been a perfectly circular shoreline.
Sitting on the rock was a girl. She held a flute to her mouth, and her fingers danced along its length. Her eyes were closed and she swayed as she played, her body moving along with the song that came rippling from her instrument.
Cooper stared at the girl. She looked to be about Cooper’s age. Her hair was long and black and wild, and her skin was white with a rosy cast to it. She was wearing a simple white dress that left her arms bare, and there were no shoes on her long, delicate feet. One of the straps of her dress had slipped down her shoulder, but she didn’t seem to notice.
“That song,” Cooper said. “It’s beautiful. What is it?”
Hearing Cooper’s voice, the girl gasped and looked up, shocked. She looked frightened, as if she wanted to run away.
“I’m sorry to bother you,” Cooper said quickly. “I didn’t mean to interrupt. I just heard the music and wanted to see who was playing it.”
“You heard me playing?” the girl asked, sounding doubtful.
Cooper nodded. “I was back there,” she said. “In the clearing.”
The girl didn’t say anything for a moment. She seemed to be studying Cooper intently, looking at her face. Cooper saw that her eyes were the color of pale green spring leaves. Cooper wanted to say something, but she didn’t know what. Then she felt the flute in her own hand. She held it up.
“I play, too,” she said quickly. Part of her was afraid that if she didn’t say something the girl would just leave. “I’m not as good as you are.”
“Play for me,” said the girl.
Cooper licked her lips nervously. She didn’t know why, but she wanted this girl to like her. She wanted her to like her playing. Putting the flute to her mouth, she blew gently and played part of a song she remembered from her lessons. When she was done she dropped her hands. The girl’s eyes were closed, and she was nodding.
“Yes,” she said. “I see now how you were able to hear my song. There is music in you. You play well.”
“Not like you do,” Cooper said.
The girl smiled. “Perhaps not,” she said. “But I’ve been playing a long time. What’s your name?”
“Cooper,” Cooper replied. “What’s yours?”
“My friends call me Bird,” the girl said. “Why don’t you call me that, too?”
“Sounds good to me,” answered Cooper. Bird was sort of a strange thing to call someone, but a lot of the people she hung out with went by odd names. In fact, Bird was probably one of the least peculiar ones.
“Are you here alone?” Bird asked her.
Cooper shook her head. “I came with friends,” she said. “For the Midsummer ritual. Is that why you’re here?”
Bird nodded. “I am also here with friends to celebrate Midsummer,” she explained. “Where are yours?”
“I’m not sure,” said Cooper. “Annie went back to the cabin, and I think Kate is chasing her boyfriend around somewhere. What about your friends?”
“Getting ready for tonight,” Bird said, sliding off the rock and coming over to stand near Cooper. “Would you like to meet them?”
“Sure,” Cooper answered. “I don’t know when Kate and Annie will be back, so as long as I make it to the big dance later on tonight I’m fine.”
“We wouldn’t miss the dance for anything,” said Bird. “The queen wouldn’t hear of it.”
Cooper laughed. “I can’t wait to see what this queen looks like. Everyone’s been talking about her. She must be something else.”
“That she is,” Bird told her.
“So you’ve been to these things before?” Cooper asked.
“Many times,” said Bird.
“This is my first one,” Cooper explained. “You’ll have to tell me what to expect. It’s all a little new to me.”
Bird put her arm around Cooper. Cooper noticed that she smelled like the forest. “You never know what to expect when the queen and her people are in the woods,” Bird said as she started to walk.
They left the grove with the pool in it and entered the woods. Once again Cooper found herself surrounded by a golden haze as they walked beneath the trees in the fading sun. She couldn’t tell one direction from another, but Bird seemed to know exactly where they were going. She led Cooper through a series of twists and turns that seemed to Cooper to take them in circles. But Bird kept moving steadily forward until finally they passed beneath the low branches of a towering pine tree and were once again in a circle of trees.
A dozen or so people were sitting in the clearing. They all looked up at Cooper and Bird as they entered, and Cooper couldn’t help but stare back. Like Bird, the others looked like wild, overgrown children. Their hair was tangled and messy, some with leaves and twigs in it. The girls wore what seemed to be tattered dresses in various colors and the boys were all in shorts and shirtless. Yet while their clothes and hair were disheveled, they didn’t seem at all dirty. It was more like they had been cut from the trees themselves, their clothing and hair simply different forms of leaves and bark.
Those are really cool costumes, Cooper thought as she looked at the group. She glanced down at her own costume, which suddenly seemed overly fussy. The others looked like they lived in the forest all the time, while she felt like she was playing dress-up.
Like Bird, each of the inhabitants of the grove had an instrument. Some had flutes like Bird’s, while others had percussion instruments, bells, or what looked like small fiddles. They held them in midair, as if they’d been interrupted in the middle of a performance by the appearance of the two girls.
One of the figures detached itself from the rest and walked toward Cooper and Bird. It was a guy with long red hair that hung down his back. He’d tied feathers, acorns, and other objects from the forest into his hair, and they hung about his face like ornaments on a tree. Unlike Bird’s green eyes, his were deep brown, rich as the leaves that lay decomposing on the forest floor.
“Who is this?” he asked, shooting Bird a sharp glance.
“This is Cooper,” Bird told him. “She heard me playing.”
One corner of the redheaded boy’s mouth turned up. “Did she?” he said.
“She’s amazing,” Cooper
said quickly. “I’ve never heard anything like what she was playing.”
“She plays, too,” Bird added. “She’s good.”
“As good as you?” asked the boy.
Bird didn’t answer. Neither did Cooper. She just looked over at Bird, who was staring at the ground. Why wasn’t she saying anything? It was almost as if she was afraid of the redheaded guy. But why would she be afraid of him if they were all friends? And why did he seem to be so unfriendly? It didn’t make sense.
The red-haired guy turned his attention to Cooper and smiled, which made her feel a little better. “I guess I’ll just have to judge for myself,” he said. “Come over here and play with us.”
He turned and walked back to the others, motioning for Cooper to follow him. Cooper looked again at Bird, who nodded. “That’s Spider,” she said. “This is kind of his group. He’s a little bossy, but he’s okay.”
Cooper walked over to the others and took a seat in an empty space between a guy holding a fiddle and a girl with a bell. Bird stood nearby, watching, and Spider stood in the middle of the circle, looking at the players gathered around him.
“We’re just going to play,” he told Cooper. “It won’t be anything you know. Just join in when it feels right, okay?”
Cooper nodded. She wondered why Bird wasn’t playing with them. She almost felt as if she was auditioning for something. She wanted to play well, to impress the others with her ability, but she wasn’t sure what she could do. She hadn’t played the flute seriously in quite a while. In fact, before digging it out to use with her costume she’d barely touched it in over a year.
There was no time to think about that, though. At a signal from Spider, everyone began to play. The air was filled with a sound unlike anything Cooper had ever heard. It was similar to the song Bird had played, but it was even more wonderful. The melody ran here and there, never going where Cooper expected it to. She was concentrating hard, trying to memorize it so that she would be able to play against it, but just when she thought it was going to do one thing it darted off in another direction completely, leaving her confused.
After a few minutes, though, she began to understand the song. It still didn’t go in one direction long enough for her to really grasp it, but she thought she could follow bits and pieces of it. It was easier when she closed her eyes. Then the music almost became images, which were easier for her to focus on. She saw people dancing, moving in a circle. They moved quickly, so quickly that they were a blur. It was as if they had turned into some kind of spinning top hurtling around and around.
Hesitantly, Cooper put the flute to her lips and began to play. At first she played only a simple countermelody, her notes bouncing off the ones the others tossed into the circle. But as she became more and more sure of herself she let her song become bolder. She wove her own tune around the one that was now becoming more and more familiar to her. She could hear her music flowing with that of the others, sometimes leaping up to rise above it and sometimes moving side by side with it.
She’d never felt such a sense of connectedness while playing with other people. The closest she’d ever come was when she played with T.J. and the rest of their band, Schroedinger’s Cat. But even that wasn’t like this. The music she was making with the other people in the circle was otherworldly. It made her feel as if she’d been caught up in a whirlwind and spun around until she was dizzy, then dropped out of the sky onto the soft earth.
The music stopped. Cooper opened her eyes and looked around. She was sorry that the song had ended. She could still feel it inside her, calling to her to let it out again. She wanted to return to it, to run wild with it and feel once more the exhilaration of just letting go and allowing the music to take control. She looked up and saw that Spider was looking at her and smiling.
“You play well,” he said. “Most people can’t keep up. Even Bird had a difficult time when she first joined us, although she’s become a much better player since.”
“Thank you,” Cooper said. “Did you write that song?”
Spider nodded. “We write all of our own songs. That one was written especially for tonight.”
“You mean for the Midsummer celebration?” Cooper said. “Are you all witches?”
The kids around her laughed loudly and happily, as if she’d said the funniest thing they’d ever heard. Cooper was confused. What was so odd about asking them if they were Wiccan?
“Are you a witch?” Spider asked in return without answering her question.
“Sort of,” Cooper said. “I’m studying it. I’ll decide next year if I want to be initiated or not. So what are you all doing here?”
“We go where there is magic,” Spider told her simply.
Cooper nodded. She still didn’t know whether the other kids were witches or not. If they weren’t, she didn’t understand why a bunch of people her age would be at a pagan gathering if they weren’t into it themselves, but she guessed it really didn’t matter. She liked the music they played, and they seemed to like her.
“Is she in, then?” Bird asked abruptly.
Cooper looked at Bird. She was standing apart from the others, her flute in her hands. She was shifting from side to side nervously and looking from Cooper to Spider and back again.
“We’ll see,” Spider said. “The dance isn’t until midnight. There are other tests we need to put her through.”
“Tests?” Cooper said.
“Don’t worry,” Spider said. “They’re nothing too difficult. Think of it more as an initiation. You know, like the one you’re considering to become a witch.”
There was more laughter from the others. Cooper saw Bird frown. “What are we talking about here?” Cooper asked, confused.
“We’re considering letting you join our group,” Spider said. “Letting you play with us at the dance this evening. But we have to be sure that you’re the right person, the one we’re looking for. The one Bird has been looking for. Right, Bird?”
Bird didn’t say anything in response. Cooper was getting more and more confused. She’d be happy to play with the group. They sounded great, and the music was fantastic. But what was the big deal? They were acting as if she was auditioning to be the newest member of a superstar rock band.
“Bird?” Cooper said. “Are you okay?”
Bird smiled, looking more like the happy girl Cooper had first met. “Yeah,” she said. “I was just thinking about the night I joined the group.”
Someone giggled, then quieted down after a sharp look from Spider.
“Bird was the last person to join us,” Spider said. Then he put his arm around Cooper’s shoulder. “But perhaps you’ll become the newest member. Are you ready for the trials to begin?”
Cooper stood with Spider’s arm resting on her shoulders. The others were all watching her closely. She still wasn’t sure what these so-called trials were all about, and part of her was a little suspicious. Then she thought about where she was and what was going on. It was a Midsummer gathering. All kinds of strange things were supposed to be happening. This is probably just another one of the games, she thought. These guys are probably all part of some coven that plays at different festivals, and they’re having a little fun with me. Well, she could play games, too.
“Why not?” she said. “I have nothing else to do.”
CHAPTER 4
Annie hurried down the path back to the cabin. She was annoyed at herself for leaving her paws behind. It meant she was missing out on all kinds of things. She wanted to start exploring the woods to see what kinds of surprises the different covens and other groups had set up in them. She’d already passed by some interesting-looking stuff, and she wanted to get a closer look. But she also wanted her costume to look perfect. She’d spent so much time on it, and she was proud of what she’d created. Several people had already commented on how great she looked. She couldn’t wait to start walking around in full hedgehog gear so she could show off the whole outfit.
She came to the place where the
main path broke off into smaller ones that led to the cabins. She knew that she, Cooper, and Kate had come down one of them on their way to the gathering, but now she couldn’t recall which one it was. They all looked the same.
I should have left a trail of bread crumbs, she thought. Like Hansel and Gretel did.
She looked from one path to another. It was irritating how similar one narrow strip of dirt through the woods was to all the rest. Why didn’t they have some kind of identifying markers? She was just going to have to pick one and see where it took her.
One of the paths led between two trees that sort of looked familiar to her. She decided to take that one, telling herself that she could always backtrack if it turned out not to be the correct way back to the cabin. Stepping onto it, she entered the forest.
It seems to be the right one, she thought as she walked. Because of the papier-mâché head, it was difficult to see much more than what was directly in front of her. But there was indeed something about the trees she was passing and the way the path twisted and turned that felt familiar to her. After a few minutes she stopped worrying and just enjoyed being in the woods. Pretty soon she would be at the cabin, and she could grab her paws and rejoin the others.
She couldn’t help but wonder what kinds of surprises were in store for them. The dance later that night sounded like a lot of fun, but she was even more excited about the other things—the things no one had explained to her. She liked that everything had been kept a secret and that they would just have to wait and see what happened. It made the whole idea of Midsummer seem much more magical, like anything could happen and probably would.
She was thinking about this as the path took a turn and she found herself at a crossroads. One path went straight ahead while the other veered off to the right. She definitely didn’t remember that from their walk earlier in the afternoon.
“Great,” she said aloud. “Now what?”
She couldn’t help but think about the last time she’d stood at a crossroads in the woods. It had been during the Tarot ritual they’d done in their Wicca study class just a couple of weeks ago. That night, wandering in the woods and meeting the coven members dressed up as various Tarot cards, she’d had an encounter with the goddess Hecate. Standing at the crossroads now, she wondered which path she should choose. Where did they each lead? Was one of them the path back to the cabin, or was she totally lost?
