Craft
The Cursed Trilogy: Book 1
By: Lynnie Purcell
Edited by Benjamin Locke
Illustrated by Tatiana Vila
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2011 Lynnie Purcell
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
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Chapter 1: Feud
Some said the feud sprung from the depths of time as completely formed as the day was long; others said it was a tragic story of betrayal and misunderstanding; still others believed the Coopers went mad with craft and turned on their friends. The truth had changed with every telling. Fact had transformed to legend. Not even the eldest of the families knew the truth. The feud had taken on a life of its own.
For 15-year-old Ellie May Bumbalow, how the feud began did not really matter. To her, it was simply a way of life. She heard the arguing, the exchange of threats, felt the crafting in the air as both sides cast magical wards to protect against the others’ curses. She heard the indignation of her family when the casting went too far and one of her kin was injured or killed. She felt the cost of that casting as much as any Bumbalow.
She was used to hearing her sisters’ opinions on the Cooper family. Their opinions were as much a part of life as the violence. The vile epithets of hatred for the Coopers spread throughout her entire family, repeated until it became a mantra, a way of being. The bitter resentment all her kin harbored for the evils done by the Coopers was not easily set aside. Even people who were not directly involved in the fighting, like Ellie, believed the worst of the Coopers.
It was not difficult for her to believe the stories of murder and mayhem and to feel some of the same bitter resentment her family perpetuated in their stories. Ellie knew the Coopers had killed members of her family, just as she knew the sky was blue. Her father had been one of them.
The Coopers had ambushed and killed him when Ellie had been only five years old. No one knew what he was doing so far inside of town, but there was no denying the dark craft that had taken his life. The Coopers had gotten to him. He had paid the price for crossing into their end of town. That same day, Ellie’s momma had left Ellie and her sisters to fend for themselves. No amount of retaliation, or love for her girls, could fill the gap in Momma’s heart. The Coopers’ evil deed had stretched her heart to its limit.
Ellie simply knew it as the day her family had fallen apart. In a single moment of violence, the Coopers had taken both of her parents from her. It was a hard reality that only time had taught her to accept. Ellie had never contemplated a world without the feud. There would always be the push and pull of Cooper against Bumbalow. Nothing could change the years of hatred and pain. Nothing would stop the Coopers from trying to kill them all.
The feud had not only hardened her to the realities of its violence. It had conditioned Ellie to hate a Cooper if she saw one, to believe the worst in them. Even more than the rest of her family, Ellie’s hatred was based in fear. She had never seen a Cooper, had never even come close to seeing one. No Cooper had ever set foot on her property. She feared the Coopers as many feared the boogeyman. It was fear they would find her with their unnatural craft and kill her, as they had so many others in her family. It was a way of being that was so natural, so well-earned, that she did not give the fear and hate a second thought. The feud was as natural as breathing. Or so she thought.
Ellie did not know of, and could not believe in, a whole world of feud-less people coexisting outside of the madness of her existence. Such people were legends and stories told to children before bed, to make their dreams more peaceful. They were sweet stories, but stories none-the-less.
Proof of the Coopers’ violent nature currently sat in Ellie’s living room. The wet heat from the summer day circled them and made even breathing a difficult task. There was no escape from the sun’s glare. It found its way into every moment. Sweat dripped down Ellie’s back and face as she watched the scene unfolding in front of her.
The proof in question sat bleeding out onto the paisley sofa her great grandmother had crafted in her youth. Ellie’s older sisters, Careen and Neveah, crafted healing magic on the man Ellie had only ever known as Cousin. Their shifting bodies only added to the weight of heat in the house.
Cousin had found his way to the house only moments ago. His arrival had been unexpected, but typical for the feud. He had encountered the Coopers while in town. He claimed he had not meant to cross the invisible line between the Cooper end and the Bumbalow end, but the sisters knew he was lying. He was after blood.
His chickens had been killed only a week ago, and there was only one family cruel enough to murder a man’s chickens: the Coopers. It didn’t matter that Cousin could create new chickens, nor that the loss of said chickens was not very great. What mattered was that the Coopers had dared kill his chickens, on his land. They had crossed a line. The need for retribution was obvious to Cousin. Without retribution, the Coopers would do worse next time; it might not just be the chickens that the Coopers killed.
Cousin had been caught trying to pay them back for the invasion of his land and had paid the usual penance for seeking out Coopers in Cooper territory. Blood gushed from wounds on his chest and head. His face was pale from the blood loss. His eyes were closed against the pain. It was a miracle he had made it to Ellie’s house at all.
Neveah and Careen stood shoulder to shoulder as they leaned over Cousin. They worked together to heal him, their craft combined enough to stop the bleeding and save his life.
Ellie watched from the doorway that separated the living room from the kitchen. The kitchen was where she had been doing her chores when Cousin had barged in on the family. It was where she spent the majority of her days.
Ellie desperately wanted to help them with the craft they were working, to help heal Cousin, but that was not an option. Careen and Neveah never let her use her craft. At least, not when they could help it. They did not know that Ellie could have healed Cousin by herself, or that her help would have meant less work for them. They did not care. Using her craft in front of them was as good as asking for a beating. Ellie only ever practiced her craft in private. Even then, she had to be careful so that Neveah did not find out about her experiments. She feared Neveah’s beatings as much as she feared the Coopers. The beatings were more tangible than an enemy she had only ever heard of secondhand.
There was a quiet peace surrounding Neveah and Careen as they wove their healing around Cousin. The craft whispered through the air, sending tingling shockwaves of magical energy through Ellie’s body. She let the magic wrap around her, loving the peaceful feeling, and listened as it connected her to her sisters in ways even they did not know about. The peace was the best thing Ellie liked about seeing her sisters work craft. When they crafted, they were not bossing her around, bullying her or forcing more chores on her for no other reason than because they could. They were focused on the task, instead of Ellie. They were doing something that had been passed down through the generations; an act that had transformed from ability, to talent, to craft through years of practice. Their craft was innate and beautiful.
Twenty minutes of intense concentration passed. Neveah and Careen did not speak. Their eyes were closed as they visualized Cousin’s body knitting back together. Their hands remained raised over his body. Ellie stayed as motionless as possible. She did not want to be a distraction from the healing. She did n
ot want to be blamed if something went wrong.
Finally, Cousin sat up and coughed once. The wounds on his head and chest had healed. There was no sign of the injury, just the lasting effects of wooziness from the Coopers’ dark craft. Neveah, her light-colored eyes vivid against her tan skin, smiled once and held out her hand. A glass appeared in her hand, and in it a drink of water. She offered the glass to Cousin, and he took a sip of the crystalline liquid. He coughed again and started complaining about the Coopers to the sisters. His rough, old voice was thick with a southern accent. It reminded Ellie of winter winds and summer days spent outside under an unforgiving sun.
Her sisters immediately joined in on the discussion of the Coopers. The conversation progressed to the inevitable conclusion that there was no way to handle the attack on Cousin beyond retribution. They would have to retaliate, and quickly. The Coopers could not think that an attack on a Bumbalow would go unpunished. Doing nothing was a sign of weakness. That perceived weakness could spell trouble for all Bumbalows. Fear was the only thing that kept the Coopers in check.
Ellie turned away when she was certain Cousin was healed. She moved through the sparkling white kitchen she had just finished scrubbing and left the house. The screen-door slammed shut behind her as she jumped down the three steps separating her from the ground. At the base of the stairs, she turned to look at the house that had been in her family almost as long as the feud. She had always liked her house, even though she spent the majority of her time cleaning it. It was white, with two stories and broad, open windows. It was always full of light. A large, green yard surrounded the wood and stone. At the front of the house was a narrow interstate. The majority of the time, the road remained empty. People preferred the larger interstate to the east. No one came through the desolate countryside of Ellie’s home. They knew better.
From the books Ellie spent hours at a time reading, she knew witches were not supposed to have old, white houses that looked so peaceful and sunny. Witches had shacks, huts or caves, where they cast magic and wove complicated spells out of animal parts and herbs. Witches spent disproportionate amounts of time turning people into toads and using spirits to do their evil bidding. That was the misconception, at least.
Ellie found the idea of using anything but her hand to weave craft hilarious; killing an animal just to get its parts for some ridiculous spell made Ellie shiver. She could not imagine how people had thought of such macabre things, or why they associated craft with darkness. Her books always talked about witches as being good or evil – never both. Witches always made evil spells full of spite, or danced naked under the full moon at midnight. Ellie would have been mortified to dance anywhere naked, let alone outside and under a moon bright enough where others could see every part of her.
The stories she read were fun, though, despite their inaccuracy. She made a study of them, collecting a whole catalogue of books on the subject. Ellie made a study of most things. Her books were her solace. They encouraged her to dream about faraway places and a world where things were always changing, instead of the repetition of chores and bullying from her sisters. She dreamed of adventures and fighting battles like the heroes from her books. She wanted more, but she did not have the means to search out her own adventures. The books were the safest way of finding those adventures. They did not come with the threat of Neveah’s wrath.
Ellie had found the idea of shacks and hovels being the place of choice for ‘her kind’ so amusing that she had decided to live in one. She was lucky in that she did not have to look far. An old shack, which was wedged between tall grass and a sprawling forest behind her house, provided the perfect place. She had begged Neveah to give it to her not long after her father’s death. It had been abandoned for thirty years when Ellie took it over. Ellie did not mind the cobwebs in the corners or the broken parts of the structure. Those things were easily fixed, and the shack gave her privacy and space. No one bothered her there.
Ellie slowly walked through the tall grass, lost in worry over the attack on Cousin. She was worried her family’s retribution would come at an unreasonable price. Cousin had only barely gotten away. What would the Coopers do to him next time? Would Neveah get involved? Ellie knew that would only spell trouble.
The tall grass ended at the front of Ellie’s shack. Thick vines and overhanging trees created the illusion her shack had sprung from the forest completely formed. Ellie liked the vines covering her shack the most. Vines were the hardest of plants to manipulate with craft. Her sisters could never manage to move them beyond a few inches. It was one reason Neveah had been so willing to give the shack away. She hadn't thought Ellie would be able to get inside. Ellie had no trouble getting the vines to obey her craft. It was easy, as easy as raising her hand.
With a gesture, Ellie made the vines part. With another, a wooden door she had painted yellow opened. She waved her hand again as she entered, and the candles she had placed throughout the shack lit up as one.
Though the exterior was humble at best, the interior was well-loved and exceptionally well crafted. Ellie had taken special care to make her refuge as comfortable as possible. She had spent months perfecting her home. She had made a sofa and a small coffee table with her craft; flowers she changed daily were on the table. The floors, walls and ceiling were the same red wood throughout, though Ellie’s extensive book collection took up most of the floor and walls. The books were stacked at uneven intervals around the cramped space. Candles were on top of the book stacks. The wax from the candles did not drip on to her books. Ellie made sure of that.
Items Ellie had picked up from her cleaning and the others’ trips to town were spaced around her book collection. They were reminders of the others’ adventures. They were proof that town existed. Despite the seeming chaos of so much stuffed in a small space, there was warmth and peace. It was a haven in the dark.
Ellie picked up a book off the coffee table and settled on the sofa to wait for Cousin and her sisters to stop talking. She figured they would be cursing the Coopers for a while. She was barely two pages into her book, however, when she heard Neveah call her name. It was not a call in the typical sense; it was a long-distance shout the Bumbalows had perfected with their craft. A person could be miles away and still hear the call. Neveah was queen at it. There were times when Ellie thought she would be able to hear her name called from across the world.
“Ellie! Get in here!” Neveah yelled.
Ellie automatically rose. Not responding as quickly as possible would spell trouble. Neveah did not like to wait. She was too impatient. Ellie rushed out of her shack. She waved her hand once. The candles went out, the door opened, and the vines peeled back to reveal the sun once more. She waved her hand to close the door and replace the vines. She did not look back as she ran through the tall grass. She trusted her craft.
Neveah was waiting for Ellie in the kitchen. Her foot tapped out an impatient beat on the wooden floor. Ellie slid to a stop in front of Neveah, gasping for breath and sweaty from the run in the heat.
“What took you so long?” Neveah asked.
Careen, who was sitting at the small kitchen table to the right of the door, snickered. Careen was the middle sister and had long ago figured out that agreeing with Neveah’s teasing was easier than standing up for her little sister. It meant less trouble and an easier time getting what she wanted. Ellie thought the way Careen always agreed with Neveah was the reason Careen looked so soft around the edges, where Neveah was so sharp and pointed. Neveah had taken all of Careen’s sharp edges for herself. Ellie ignored Careen and focused on Neveah.
“What do you want?” Ellie asked.
“Cousin got business in town. We're gonna go and make sure he ain’t bothered,” Neveah said. “I want the chores done by the time we get back. And if dinner ain’t on the table, there’ll be trouble.”
“Can’t I come?” Ellie asked.
Ellie knew Neveah would not agree to take her along. Ellie always asked to go to town, and Neveah always said
no. Ellie hoped that one day the answer would be yes. The hope kept her asking.
“Of course not, stupid,” Neveah said. “You don’t want them mean, old Coopers to get you.”
Neveah poked Ellie in the chest with her words. Careen and Neveah laughed at the expression on Ellie’s face: fear for the Coopers mingled with irritation at Neveah.
With a smirk at Ellie, Neveah left the house with Careen on her heels. Cousin was waiting outside in his truck. He was smoking his pipe as he sat behind the wheel. He impatiently gestured at Neveah and Careen when they appeared at the kitchen door. He was past ready to leave. The sisters hurried to join him, slamming the door of his truck hard as soon as they were inside. The rumbling of the truck switched sounds as Cousin changed the gear to drive. It gave a choking sputter, and then the truck lurched forward.
Ellie watched them drive away from behind the screen-door. She was jealous of her sisters. She wished more than anything that she was going with them. It was not just the fact that she wanted to see town more than she wanted to see anything in the world.
She knew Cousin’s business was not any business beyond retribution. They were after blood: pain for pain. Ellie wanted to make sure her family stayed safe while they searched for that retribution. She would not get so lost in revenge that she would allow others to be hurt.
Ellie had endured a lot from her family over the years but she did not want to see them murdered. She did not want another family member to fall by some unknown Coopers’ hand. She sighed once as Cousin and her sisters disappeared from view. There was nothing she could do to help – she had to stay and do as Neveah had commanded. Anything else was just foolish hope.
Ellie turned away from the door and refocused on her chores. She swept, mopped and wiped down all the surfaces without craft, aware Neveah and Careen would know if she cut any corners. They could not feel craft the way she did, but they could easily see the difference between doing things by hand and doing it with craft. It was a subtlety that made a profound difference to Ellie’s back, knees and neck.
Craft Page 1
