The Thread that Binds the Bones

by Nina Kiriki Hoffman

  “Forgive me, descendant; it is my long-term project, the only reason any Presence stays in the Hollow after we return our flesh to the earth. Those of us who don’t care about the Family go…elsewhere after death.”

  “So you’re in Tom because you think it’ll advance the Family?”

  “Yes,” said Peregrine. “Do you object?”

  “I want you to be Tom,” she said.

  “But I—” he said, in Peregrine’s low voice. “But I—” he said in Tom’s higher, lighter voice. “Okay,” he said.

  “But Laura,” said Jaimie, “he was going to teach me the silver calling.”

  “Oh, you do it like this,” Laura said, her tone annoyed. She looked around the room, rummaged in a couple drawers, and came up with a tarnished fork. She pushed plates and cups aside to make an open space on the table. “Find a piece of silver—real silver’s better. Sketch a circle with it, and these signs at the cardinal points, and this one in the center. The one that’s your element, focus on that a little while you’re drawing it, so it engages your powerflow. Then you concentrate on the Presence you want, and chant. Oh, something stupid like, ‘Peregrine, I summon thee; come to me, to me, to me.’”

  Tom felt Peregrine rise in him, almost breaking free of his nets along Tom’s bones, floating free of his body. A silvery aura smoked up out of his own green one and took the shape of a tall, sunken-cheeked man, haggard and beak-nosed, his hair long and straight. His eyes twinkled, belying the worry lines on his forehead and the deep brackets that framed his mouth. He took on the appearance of weight and matter. “What do you wish, descendant?” he said, and this time his voice came from the air, unconnected with Tom and unhindered by Tom’s natural timbre.

  “What?” said Laura. She looked up, saw his phantom form, and paled.

  “Child—have you summoned me in vain?” His tone sounded threatening.

  Laura and Trixie stared. Jaimie covered her mouth with her left hand. Maggie grinned.

  “I was just teaching her the basic summons,” Laura said. “That was necessary, wasn’t it?”

  He smiled. “Next time use a false tool, and a false name,” he said. “If you have no special needs, I’ll leave you now.”

  “Wait a minute,” said Laura. “Jaimie, did you learn that summoning from the demo?”

  Jaimie looked at the symbols on the kitchen table, scratched by a fork tine. “I think I can remember it,” she said.

  “You’ve got the symbols down, right?”

  “Uh—”

  “Look.” Laura traced the outline of one symbol. “Those strokes, in that order. That is air. Here’s water—see the waves? Fire, and earth here. Get them in that order. In the center, finally, here’s ether. This comes from the chapter of the text on things seen and unseen. Do you remember any of this?”

  “No,” said Jaimie. “How come you do?”

  “Because—I thought if I only learned it right, maybe it would work and I could get Michael. But I was always afraid to actually try anything.” She stood tapping the fork in the palm of her hand, looking down at her scratches on the table top. “Hmm. And that one worked. Peregrine!”

  “Yes, descendant.”

  “Did I do that right, or were you just humoring me?”

  “You have the hand of a master, descendant. You executed it perfectly.”

  “Oh, no. I remember all of Fayella’s teachings, including the dark disciplines.”

  Jaimie said, “Does this mean you aren’t wingless?”

  Laura touched her lips with an index finger; her eyes looked vague and unfocused. “Hmm. Maybe not. Okay, ancestor.” She looked up at him, offered a small smile. “Thanks for coming.”

  “You’re welcome.” Peregrine’s seeming faded; Tom felt him settling back inside, flaring a little here and there, then sleeping. Tom wondered if the manifestation had tired the Presence.

  Maggie started clearing the table.

  “Oh, Maggie, you don’t have to—” Laura said. She picked up some dishes and took them over to the counter by the sink.

  “Everybody shares the work in our house,” said Jaimie, grabbing two cups.

  “I’m going to sit this one out,” Trixie said, leaning back in her chair. “There’s not enough dishes for everybody.”

  Maggie filled the dishpan, frowning because there was no hot water in the single pump. She looked at Jaimie.

  “I’ll do that part,” Jaimie said. She held her hands out over the water, narrowed her eyes, and stood very still, moving only her fingers. After a moment, steam rose from the water. Maggie dumped some soap in the water and stirred it. Tom found a towel and they all worked—Maggie washed, Jaimie rinsed, Laura dried, and Tom put away.

  Barney came back just as they finished.

  “Well?” Jaimie asked him, as she pulled the plug.

  “I don’t know. She’s feeling left out and depressed and useless. Sis, what can we do?”

  Jaimie said, “Just know she feels that way, I guess. Don’t talk in front of her like she’s not here.”

  Trixie stood up. “Listen. It’s been an interesting visit, but I’ve got to get home now. I ran off without even leaving Bert a note. He’s probably waiting for us and wondering where we are. What if he needed us? He hasn’t got silver calling or any of that stuff.”

  “Yes,” said Laura. “You’re all sanctioned now; you can come to town any time you like.”

  “I’ve got to see Father Wolfe,” Barney said. “We’ll set a wedding date as soon as possible, and invite you all. Good night.”

  “Can you make it back okay?” asked Jaimie.

  “Yes,” Tom said.

  When they stepped out onto the porch, cold attacked them. Maggie hugged herself, shivering. Trixie stepped back toward the front door. “Wait,” said Tom. He thought of fleecy nets wrapping them round in warmth, and they both straightened.

  “Oh,” said Maggie, looking at her feet. The porch was already white with frost, but her new warmth melted dark rings around her shoes, black holes eating outward.

  Tom looked at Laura to see if she needed warmth. She shook her head and smiled.

  He stooped so Maggie could climb on his back. “Sleep, Trix?” he asked.

  “That’d be best,” she said.

  He locked arms with her and with Laura. He cast a net of sleep over Trixie, then spun out nets of unsee the way Peregrine and Jaimie had that morning, let a big whale-shaped wave lift them skyward, and used silver threads to pull them back to the place where they had left the taxi that morning.

  They drove home without incident. The heater in Old Number Two didn’t work very well, but the cold didn’t bother them.

  Trixie unlocked the back door and flicked on the kitchen lights. “I wonder if Bert stopped by or left a note,” she said. “He’s got a key. Anybody want cocoa?”

  Dasher howled, a rising note that suddenly choked. Trixie screamed and staggered back. A hairy man with slanted glowing green eyes rose up on his hind legs, his furred hands still closing off the dog’s throat. He smiled, revealing pointed dog teeth. “Where have you been?” he asked, his voice a slurred growl. “I’ve been waiting nearly all day.”

  Maggie’s hands bit down on Tom’s arm.

  Chapter 17

  Tom touched Maggie’s hands, then pried them off his arm and slipped forward, pressing Trixie’s shoulder as he passed her. “Let go of the dog,” he said. Laura came to stand beside him.

  The werewolvish man released Dasher, who yipped and ran to Trixie, cowering behind her.

  “Do you recognize this guy?” Tom asked Laura.

  She frowned and studied the visitor.

  —Sense your own traces, Peregrine suggested. Tom glanced down, using Othersight, and saw the slenderest of threads reaching from his hands to the man: one of the first nets he had ever cast.

  “Oh,” he said. “Carroll. What do you want?”

  Carroll looked at Maggie, his eyes wide and burning. She cringed, edging toward the back door. Then she sto
pped. Straightening, her shoulders lifted, she walked forward with Ianthe’s confidence, each footstep sounding loud and firm. She stepped in front of Tom and leaned against him, pulling his arm around her. She tilted her head. She glared at Carroll.

  “No,” Tom told Carroll. “What about your promise to me?”

  “For a day it bound me, as I agreed. But now it is a new day. As for respecting the home place, this is not her home,” Carroll stood taller, staring at Maggie. “Her home is with me.”

  “No,” Tom said again.

  “Without her…” Carroll turned away, a frown furrowing his brow, then shook his head. “Faskish the rules. I’ll take the fat one, then,” he said. He stalked forward and seized Trixie’s arm, grinning like a hungry man who’s just seen supper. She tried to break free. He growled at her.

  “No!” said Tom.

  “You’ve got two. What can you want with another? Give her to me and I’ll go away and leave you alone. Maybe for a long time.”

  “She’s not mine—”

  “Then you can hardly object. Come.” Carroll stared into Trixie’s eyes.

  “No,” said Trixie. She slapped his face, but he didn’t flinch. “No,” she said, twisting her arm in his grip. She raised her free hand again. He growled and muttered and her arm stopped in midair; her whole body stilled, as though frozen in a photograph.

  “Why are you doing this?” Tom asked, reaching to pull Carroll’s hand off Trixie’s arm. Carroll spun and snapped at Tom’s hand, almost closing those pointed teeth on him, snarling.

  —Don’t let him bite you! said Peregrine.

  —Is he rabid? Is it contagious? I thought he just picked that form.

  —There could be several reasons for him to choose it. But any kind of bite has power. Don’t take risks with this.

  “I need a fetch,” said Carroll. “I want Maggie. I miss her, and she’s mine. But if you won’t let me take her, I guess I’ll just go out and find some other little girl.” He laughed and edged for the door.

  Laura went to Trixie, tugging on her upraised arm. It didn’t budge.

  “Someone about eleven,” said Carroll, grasping the doorknob and twisting it. “Someone I can train myself.”

  “Wait,” said Maggie. “Don’t. I—”

  “You won’t,” Tom said to her. “Don’t give yourself up to stop him from doing something else wrong.”

  “If she comes with me of her own free will, nephew, you cannot stop her.”

  “She’s sealed to me. She bears my mark. Why are you doing this? What’s wrong with you that you need it?”

  “Nothing’s wrong with me. Ask what’s wrong with yourself, O great hope. Why do you cling to your scruples as if they were your bones, when all they are are bars? All the world is ‘I want.’ You will be finding that out, now that you’re awake. ‘I want.’ There’s no reason to settle for anything less.”

  “What happens when my wants clash with yours?”

  “I win,” said Carroll. He laughed again and opened the door. “I’ll find a little pretty girl—prettier than this one—younger and tenderer, someone who’ll scream for me.”

  Tom shifted into Othersight and saw the thick red net wound around Trixie. Laura’s hands glowed golden as she tried to melt the net, but her light spilled off without effect. Tom saw his own silver net still hazing around Carroll. He pulled it tight, stopping Carroll before he could step over the threshold.

  Tom reached out a mental finger to touch the black net around Trixie; it melted. She let out a great whoosh of air and relaxed.

  “‘I want,’ is it? I want you to stop this,” Tom said to Carroll, and he thought change at his in-law.

  —What are you doing? Peregrine asked, alarmed.

  —Shh.

  Tom still felt shaky after his failure with Maggie that afternoon, but, whatever sitva was, he knew now it made a difference in people’s elasticity, and he knew Carroll had it. He felt himself shifting into an adrenaline high, energy rising to meet whatever demands he was about to make. He told his net to engage with Carroll’s systems and consult them at each step to make sure Carroll stayed safe, to stop if the change was harmful. He prayed to the new pantheon he had glimpsed at the Hollow, wondering how far their influence spread from the home place, and whether they would help him if they heard him. He prayed to his own internalized ghost, Hannah, for aid and understanding. He remembered: without any training, he had turned a man into a bird. He had more experience now. “Become what you victimize,” he whispered, “become what you most desire.”

  Carroll keened and twisted, danced and collapsed inward, cloaked in a cloud of light and mist. Swords of silver light sliced at him, whittling without creating waste. When the air cleared, a young naked girl stood by the door, her hand on the knob. She had a tumble of shoulder-length blonde curls and a pale pure body, clean as though she had been sculpted from soap. Her face twisted. She glanced down at herself, touched the little nipples on her chest, looked up at Tom with tear-blurred eyes, and ran out the door into the night.

  “Wait!” Trixie cried, and ran after her.

  “What have you done?” Laura asked in a hushed voice.

  “I don’t know. I’m not sure,” said Tom. “I don’t know how he’s going to respond to that, but I feel like it will prevent him from going out and grabbing some other child.”

  “He’s a shifter,” Maggie said. “He likes changing shape. That might not make any difference to him.”

  Tom took her shoulders and turned her to face him. “Was it a mistake?” he asked. In his mind, an echo of Carroll’s words sounded: “All the world is ‘I want.’” He had wanted something, and he had taken it, without asking. Taking power over people. A chill whispered up his spine while he waited for Maggie’s verdict.

  “Don’t know,” Maggie said, “Don’t know, Tom. Just because he looks like that doesn’t mean he’s harmless.”

  “It may not change anything,” Tom said. Except me, he thought.

  —Can it—breed? asked Peregrine.

  —What?

  —Can it? I couldn’t tell. I couldn’t understand your actions. You made adjustments I have never seen before. Is it viable? If you could handle the fine details of such a transformation…

  Tom waited, but Peregrine didn’t continue.—What? Tom asked at last.

  —You could…make Maggie fly. You could accomplish almost anything if you took the time to think it through. You must be careful.

  —I remember.

  Being careful not to hurt someone was one aspect of it, and learning how to deal with so much power ethically was another. Tom wasn’t sure Peregrine was the right person to discuss ethics with, since some of his attitudes were antiquated.

  “Tom?” Laura said.

  He focused on her. She had a lot of ideas about the uses of power. Maybe later they could talk—

  “Trixie went after him. Her.”

  “Oh. Oh, God.” He turned and ran out the door, Maggie and Laura following him.

  They didn’t have to search far. The girl’s pale skin was a blotch under a shedding maple tree beyond the driveway, and Trixie’s voice a low murmur in the darkness. They ran toward it.

  “I’m cold,” said a light treble voice.

  “I have clothes in the house. Please come back. You’ll be safe.”

  “No,” said the girl. “No! He’s there.” She curled her arms around her body.

  “I’m here,” Tom said.

  The girl tried to run away, but Trixie grasped her shoulder, restraining her easily. “Please,” cried Carroll.

  “He won’t do anything else to you. My word on that,” said Trixie.

  “But you’re tanganar—how can you control Ilmonishti? Let me go, please let me—”

  “You can’t go running around jay naked in the middle of the night, child. It’s already freezing. Come back or I’ll carry you back.”

  “No!” she cried, struggling and kicking.

  Trixie picked her up and carried her. “T
ommy, you’re not about to do anything else to this child, are you?”

  “Depends on what she does.”

  “I can’t do anything,” said Carroll, lying limp at last over Trixie’s shoulder. “You stupid akenar! I’m too young! You mean you didn’t inflict this form on me with that in mind?”

  “Huh?”

  Laura said, “Oh, Tom, it’s—she looks about nine; if that’s her age, she won’t come into her powers for another three or four years.”

  “But—years?” He had thought of this transformation as a temporary thing, to solve an immediate problem. If Carroll couldn’t fight back…if Carroll couldn’t menace anybody for a few years…and yet, who was he to dictate what Carroll could and couldn’t do? Tom felt too tired to think through the implications. One night, at least, wouldn’t hurt, would it?

  They followed Trixie up to the house and into the kitchen.

  She put Carroll down. “Stay here. I’m going up to the attic,” she said. “You know everyone here, I think?”

  “Don’t leave me alone with them!”

  “Tommy won’t hurt you,” Trixie said, but Carroll clung to her arm, staring with wide green eyes—at Maggie.

  Tom looked at his adopted daughter. Her eyes blazed. Her nostrils were pinched, her face pale. He couldn’t tell if the corners of her mouth aimed at a smile or a frown.

  Carroll hid behind Trixie.

  “Oh, no you don’t, you beast,” Maggie said, and she swooped forward. “Waited a long time for this.” She ducked around Trixie and grabbed Carroll’s arm, then rained fierce undirected blows on her.

  Carroll hunched over, trying to guard her face with her free arm.

  “Stop them,” Trixie yelled at Tom, reaching into the flurry without managing to grasp either combatant. Carroll tried to hit Maggie back, without much success. She whimpered. Dasher jumped up and down and barked. Maggie was screaming; Carroll wailed, then screamed and snatched at Maggie’s hair. Laura started forward, stopped, held her hand out, pulled it back, finally put both hands over her ears as the uproar escalated.

  Tom stood paralyzed, his mouth open, his hands reaching toward them.

  —You could stop it with a word, Peregrine told him.