The Thread that Binds the Bones

by Nina Kiriki Hoffman

  “I’ll turn it back. I need some real gas to sample, though.”

  Pops looked at him a long moment. “Follow me,” he said at last, and led Carroll around the side of the building to his old Frazer Vagabond. He opened the gas tank. “Can you tell from here? This is premium. I don’t have any samples of unleaded or regular.”

  Carroll ran a finger around the opening of the tank, then smelled the gas. “All right,” he said. “I’m ready. Where do you want this one?”

  Pops opened one of the caps on an underground tank, and Carroll knelt and directed energy down into the hole. After a moment he got up again. “You want this in the other tanks?” he asked.

  Pops hesitated. “It would be okay for the regular. Not the unleaded. Can’t put it in unleaded engines, it clogs the converter. No, let’s just leave it like this. Thanks, Mr. Carroll.”

  “You’re welcome.” He went to Trixie.

  “What is this all about?” she asked.

  Carroll looked at Pops.

  “Well,” said Pops. “Well, we spilled a lot of gas. It was a fire hazard. Tommy asked the boy to clean up the mess, and he did; he made the gas into water. He just did it too good is all.”

  “This is where Tom disappeared to?”

  “I don’t know,” said Carroll. “He was here when I walked home.”

  “Miss Gwen came and tried to get Eddie back,” said Pops. “She knocked me on the head. When I woke up, she was gone, but Tommy, Mr. Carroll, and Miss Laura were here.”

  “That was Gwen Tom was dealing with?” Carroll said, fascinated. Then he said, “Oh, no. Oh, no, Aunt, I can’t get small then. What if she comes back?”

  “Tommy said she promised she wouldn’t,” said Pops.

  “She’s just like I am. If there’s a way to get around a promise, she’ll find it.”

  “That’s what you’re like, eh?” Trixie said.

  Carroll looked at her. “Was like. Was like, all right?”

  “Okay. Come on, let’s go home.” She took his hand again. “Bye, Pops.”

  “Bye. Thanks.”

  They hadn’t gone very far when Maggie showed up. She laced her left arm through Carroll’s right and frowned ferociously. “Don’t say anything. Not one word. I’m not in the mood,” she said, her frown almost a snarl.

  He walked down the road with his face tilted toward the sky, Trixie on his left and Maggie on his right. He felt very happy.

  Chapter 20

  “Is there a reception, or do we all just mill around talking?” Tom asked.

  “No reception,” said Father Wolfe. “We hadn’t planned on this being a big wedding. I had no idea anyone other than the principals would show up.”

  “Bert invited us,” said Laura.

  “I’m very glad, Miss Laura. I’m glad to see you at all. The town has missed you.”

  “Why—thank you,” she said.

  “Already I see your influence at work. Your uncle and your brother sitting quietly through a whole church service—forgive me, but I never expected to see the day.”

  “Oh, that wasn’t my influence; that was my husband’s.”

  “Tom?” Father Wolfe turned to him.

  “No,” said Tom. “I think you’re missing the point. They came because they wanted to. Annis is a relative. And people in Chapel Hollow take weddings very seriously; that’s almost the first thing Laura told me about them.”

  “I suppose Mr. Carroll and Mr. Michael are older than they were the last time I had anything to do with them…” His eyes reflected inward. He frowned.

  “And Michael got married,” Laura said. “Settled him right down. Have you met his wife? We’ll go find her.” She linked arms with Tom and led him off.

  “What?” Tom asked her when they were out of earshot.

  “It just fries me. He thinks the Hollow is full of Satan worshippers and demons, and everybody in town thinks I’m a saint because I was never strong enough to pester them. I’m like King Kong’s girlfriend or something, the pure fainting maiden among the beasts. I’m really tired of it. I don’t know Alyssa very well, but I bet she’d make a better saint than I ever did. I think I’ll nominate her.”

  Before they could find Michael and Alyssa, Laura’s high school English teacher stopped her, wanting to know about her college career if any, and what had come of it. “I’ve been seeing a face that looks a lot like yours on the covers of fashion magazines, but that seemed so unlikely,” said Miss Finch.

  “It was mine.”

  “What happened to you? Use your mind, girl. Quick, before you lose your face. Or is that one of those things you Boltes don’t do? Age, I mean. I loaned you The Picture of Dorian Gray once, didn’t I?”

  “That was one of the meaner things you did. Yuck! Miss Finch, this is my husband, Tom Renfield.”

  “Do you find yourself in an analogous situation?” asked Miss Finch.

  “Analogous to what?”

  “I mean your literary precedent—your name, Renfield—Dracula’s insect-eating sidekick. Any truth in names, or would you smell as sweet with another?”

  “Are you casting me as Dracula?” Laura asked.

  “It would be an interesting choice, wouldn’t it? If you applied yourself, you could be quite good. Hmm. I see now I should have loaned you some different books. Your problem was never the proper use of power, was it?”

  “What do you think it was?”

  “Claiming power. Look what you’ve done with yourself! Turned yourself into a flat unspeaking image, incapable of movement. Isn’t that what your pestiferous brother was always trying to train you to do? Now you do it for a living!”

  “I’m good at what I do, and I make a lot of money. Are you telling me that’s wrong?”

  “What happened to your acting? You had talent. I’ve never had another student who could change so completely under the influence of a role; it led me to speculate about what you must have endured at home, to be able to see other viewpoints with such conviction. That’s a gift, Laura, not a liability. Why don’t you exploit it? Why didn’t you at least try to pursue it?”

  “I did. That’s how I got into modeling. I was in a play at the college theater, some ingénue dewy-eyed part, and an agent saw me and told me to put together a portfolio. She got me a job right away. Most of the actors I know don’t work at acting—no eating money in it. How dare you berate me for choosing survival?”

  “I just hate to see you betray your muse. Hey, you, Renfield. Why don’t you support her until she gets a break acting?”

  “Okay,” said Tom.

  “See? That’s the only reason to marry—latch onto someone who’ll help you survive until you get a chance to follow your dream.”

  “No,” said Laura. “I’m happy now.”

  “Wearing things thought up by men with Spanish Inquisition minds to convince women they want to undergo torture to look like you, knowing they’ll never succeed in looking like you, only in suffering? I’m sorry!”

  “Are you trying to provoke me?”

  “Provoke you to do what?” asked Miss Finch.

  Laura looked at Tom. Her tawny eyes had gold sparks in them. He grinned. “Provoke me into claiming my power and turning you into a toad,” said Laura.

  “Is that possible? I had no idea,” said Miss Finch.

  “It’s possible.”

  “But is it a mature response?”

  “Who cares? I’m tired of being grown up all the time. And I’m tired of being the family saint, and I’m tired of taking care of other people’s business when I ought to be on my honeymoon. Tom, take me away from all this.”

  “How? Up through the roof? Just disappear? Or would you rather walk out the front door?”

  She gave him an irritated glance, then said, “Let’s go through the roof. I’m mad at Father Wolfe.”

  Tom shook Miss Finch’s hand. “A pleasure meeting you,” he said. “I’d like to talk with you again sometime.”

  “I look forward to it.”

&nbs
p; Tom put an arm around Laura’s waist. A lifter pulsed up out of the floor, and he communed with it so that it supported them on up into the air; when they reached the ceiling, he spun a net so quickly they did not even pause but slid through boards, beams, insulation, space, rafters, tarpaper, and shingles.

  They stood on the roof. “How did you do that?” Laura asked.

  “I don’t know.” He had an idea that they had stepped sideways into the travel dimension and back out on the roof. But he wasn’t sure.

  “So ghostly! So perfect. Thank you, my love.” She kissed him.

  “Where do we go from here? Chuck it all? I’ve got a new suit. I’m happy. We could fly off to Mexico.”

  “What about Maggie?”

  “Have you looked lately? She can take care of herself.”

  “What about Carroll?”

  “I’m getting the feeling that you don’t want to leave town yet.”

  “Maybe not,” she said. They looked down at the people in the churchyard and parking lot; few had driven away. Most of the businesses in town had closed for the wedding. Tom saw a car come down the ramp from the interstate. He wondered what the driver wanted. Probably something that wouldn’t be available until talk about the wedding had ran out.

  Father Wolfe came out of the church and peered up at them, an action that proved contagious. Jaimie waved from the front gate.

  “What do you think? Notorious enough for you?” Tom asked.

  Laura laughed. “I don’t think I’ve destroyed my good girl image completely, but I don’t know if I want to take the next step and grow horns and a tail. Let’s go up.”

  He caught another lifter and they rose until the town dwindled to a dark triangle of cross-hatching nestled in the golden land beside the gray snake of highway and the much wider silver snake of river.

  The day was cool and hazy, birdless except for some transient gulls come up the river from the sea, haunting the rest stop to the east and living off tourists’ garbage. Tom and Laura stood on air. Far south he saw the trees around Chapel Hollow, a bulge of dark green and black and gold that erupted from the twisty meander of trees along the creek. Peregrine woke inside him and looked at the view, savoring it, telling Tom he had never been a very good flyer, though he was an air power. They watched waves rise from the ground.—This vision of yours opens worlds, said Peregrine.—I wish I knew where you got it. I pray your child has it.

  They waited as a cold wind blew past them, fingering their hair and clothes without chilling them.

  “This is what Maggie wants?” Laura said at last. “A kite’s eye view?”

  “I can give it to her now. Peregrine says there’s a way. I just have to be more careful, and plan better. I must admit there’s real pleasure in making everything tiny and looking down on it.”

  “Mmm.” Another moment. “You think Trixie has any more cocoa?”

  “Carroll bought some; I put it away.”

  “Let’s go down there…of all the places I’ve ever been, Trixie’s kitchen feels most like home. Everything in my apartment in Portland is blue and white, the colors of air and distance. I don’t even remember the bed being warm. Tom?”

  “What, love?” He guided them down slowly, using the invisibility Peregrine had taught him on their journey crossing the river.

  “I don’t feel the cold anymore. Is that something you did?”

  “No. More gates opening, probably.” They landed on Trixie’s driveway with a faint jar, taking a step to steady themselves. “How do you feel about that? Would you really want to turn your old teacher into a toad?”

  “She was acting like one.”

  “Was that typical behavior?” he asked.

  “No.” Laura stared into a distance that wasn’t there. “She was my real teacher, Tom. When everybody at home kept trying to convince me I was worthless, she snuck me books and told me I had a gift. She taught me how to be curious and search for answers. She encouraged me to act, and she let me stay after school and help her with things. She made life bearable.” She looked at him. “I should have said thanks, instead of arguing with her.”

  “I think she was having fun with you.”

  “She was always tricky. She used to give us simple-sounding homework assignments, like write an essay on our family, and then she’d cull the statistics from the essays and give us a lesson on demographics—number of single parents, siblings, what the birth order was, how the sample in class matched with the community at large. She’s a very weird woman.”

  “I liked her. Did you really want to turn her into a toad?”

  “I really wanted to turn Father Wolfe into a toad.”

  “Now that you know you have powers, do you want to use them like Gwen does?”

  “No!” She took a step away from him and glared. “I wouldn’t, even if I knew how! I just wanted to see what it felt like to act like everyone else in my family.”

  “How did it feel?”

  “Familiar. Like I was someone else, but somebody I know really well. And don’t like much.” She turned and walked up the driveway. “I still don’t see why I have to be the one who acts grown up all the time!” she yelled at him over her shoulder as she opened the kitchen door. Then, in a quieter voice, she said, “Oh. Sorry. Didn’t know anybody was home.”

  Coining up behind her, Tom grinned at Michael and Alyssa, who sat at the table playing a card game with a layout he had never seen before. “There you are,” he said. “We were looking for you to introduce you to Father Wolfe.”

  “Wasn’t that ceremony torture enough?” asked Michael.

  “I’ve never seen a tanganar wedding before,” Alyssa said. “It was ugly, except for the flowers. It went on too long, and there weren’t enough thanks, and they with a baby already.”

  “Well, I’m glad you left. We needed an excuse to leave too,” said Laura. “And we left through the roof. So there.” She stuck her tongue out at Michael.

  He stuck his tongue out at her.

  “Laura?” said Alyssa. “What was that you were saying about acting grown up?”

  “Oh—” She glanced at Tom, who had moved past her and was getting instant cocoa out of a cupboard in the kitchen area. “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe I’m just jealous. Tom keeps going off to take care of other people. Or—”

  Tom leaned over so he could peer at her through the gap between the counter and the hanging cabinets.

  “I wonder where you came from,” Laura said to him. She came in and shut the door behind her. “Is this what you always do, Tom? Sweep in and take charge of wherever you are?”

  “I never did it before I met you.”

  “You’re saying I had something to do with it?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” said Tom. “There are a lot of things I never did before I met you. All connected to everything.” He straightened, set mugs on the counter, filled the kettle with water, put it on a burner, and turned the burner on high. “I feel—I feel like I was only half alive until you walked into the bar.”

  “This is so romantic I may vomit,” said Michael.

  Tom came out of the kitchen alcove and leaned against the wall, his arms crossed over his chest. His gaze met Laura’s. “Toad?” he said.

  “Toad,” she said.

  “Why not try something creative, like a kangaroo or something?”

  “Toad,” she said.

  “Will you do it, or shall I?”

  “Well, I’ve never done it before. But—”

  “Yes, about time you did your own spinning. Let me help you this first time.” He went to her. Standing behind her, he put his arms over hers. “You imagine net spinning out of your fingers to encompass him,” he said. “You did it before—spun a net around his hand, when you stopped him from casting at Trixie.”

  “Oh. Hmm. Net?”

  “That’s what I see. What did you think?”

  “I didn’t know.”

  “Wait a minute,” said Michael. “Are you talking about transforming me?”


  “Yep,” said Tom.

  “Don’t be ridiculous! That’s way out of her range. She’s only a minor fire power.”

  “Net,” Laura said.

  “Uh-huh.”

  She flicked her fingers, working them back and forth. Tom saw blue threads striking out and clinging to Michael, eeling around him and knotting to each other. It looked different from when he did it—his nets usually spun together in air and then wrapped around people. Michael tried to slap the threads away, but they tightened around him until he couldn’t move.

  “Not so tight,” Tom said. “You don’t want to strangle him. Tell your net, ‘Michael. Michael.’”

  “Michael,” she said, still spinning, and the net relaxed. Michael could move, but it clung to him like another skin.

  “Enough net,” Tom said. To his Othersight, Michael looked like a blue man. Laura stopped spinning. She snapped her fingers, severing the last threads, which wrapped around Michael.

  “Now it’s your net around him. You speak to it, and it’ll turn him into whatever you like.”

  “Tom? Fayella never gave us any lessons like this. Where did you learn?”

  “Part of it is how I see, and part of it is instruction from Peregrine.”

  “Bless the Presence,” said Laura. She hesitated, staring at her younger brother, who looked shaken. Laura glanced at Alyssa. “Your permission, Sister?”

  “To turn my husband into a toad?” said Alyssa. “For how long?”

  “That depends.”

  Alyssa frowned. “Oh, very well. But I want him back soon.”

  “Toad, toad,” Laura whispered to her net, and Michael shrank down to toad size. Tom saw a shadow of Michael’s human form hovering over the small toad-shaped piece of himself. When Carroll had changed Tom into a jackass, where had the extra come from? Did everyone own bigger selves than they knew, with much of it residing sideways from them along some other axis?

  The toad in the kitchen chair thrummed. Laura slid away from Tom and danced around the table. She touched the toad’s head and laughed. Then she ran back and embraced Tom. “Okay! I did it! Now I can let go of it. How?”

  “Tell your net, ‘Michael. Michael.’”