"Thigpen?" Edgar said. He turned to the woman. "Who is Thigpen? The dark man? The one with the eyes of ice? The snake?"
Lenore nodded. She studied Edgar with new concentration.
"How do you know that?"
"I wrote it. I was working on a story – a story about a lost love. Something… interrupted me. I did not finish that story, but began another. Two men – a gunfight – a death. The darker man was going to win. I felt it, and I could not stand that it might be true –so I – changed it."
"Changed...?"
"There was no bird," Anita said softly. "I was here. He drew his pistol first. He fired first, but at the last second, he shied away. I thought it was the drink. I thought – maybe the sunlight was too much after so little sleep. There was no crow. I stood right where you stand now. There was no crow."
"I changed it." Edgar said. "He was evil. He was faster, and he was going to kill that man. There was a woman, as well…"
Edgar stared at Anita, concentrating.
"You?"
Anita turned to face Edgar, as if seeing him for the first time. She started to speak, stopped, and simply nodded.
"He is gone now," Lenore said.
"How long ago did he die?" Edgar asked. "What did I just write … see?"
"The gunfight happened a year ago," Lenore said. "His spirit was…detained. I was working to release it – and Anita was telling me his story. I'm afraid it's a little complicated – a little more so with your inclusion. I'm Eleanor MacReady. My friends – what few there are – call me Lenore."
"Edgar. Edgar Poe. I'm a writer, among other things. The boy from the tavern told me you keep odd hours."
Lenore laughed then, and the sound broke the heavy darkness that had wrapped around them. Anita still looked bewildered, but not frightened. Edgar leaned back against the frame of his door and stared at the trees. Now that he knew, he could see it. The entire encounter, as he'd envisioned it, played out once more in his mind. He saw where the men had faced off, where the one – Thigpen? – had fallen.
"I think we are going to have to discuss this, Mr. Poe," Lenore said, breaking his reverie. "If what you say is true, and you caused a change in the image that I shared with Anita – then you have reached into the past. Or, more curiously, you seem to have been a part of it all along. I find that more than a little odd. And there is the matter of the crow…"
At that moment, there was a rustle of feathers. Grimm dropped from the sky like a dark cloud, whirled up and under the overhanging lip of the porch, and thumped onto Edgar's shoulder, nearly knocking him from his feet. Anita screamed, and Lenore backed away, but Edgar stood his ground, regained his balance and reached up to steady the bird.
"It's okay," he said. "For better or worse, this is my traveling companion. His name is Grimm."
Anita stared, one hand to her mouth to stifle any further outcry.
"We need to get inside," Lenore said. "Come to my room for now. We need to get out of sight before anyone else comes out to see what's going on. I'm not sure I could explain why I'm talking to a stranger in the middle of the night, and I'm quite certain I have no explanation for – Grimm."
Edgar closed the door to his own room, and followed the two women inside. His gaze was immediately caught by the drawing on the table. He crossed the room and leaned down to stare at it.
It was a drawing of a tree, except, bits and pieces of it were missing. There were five blanks in the branches, leaves, and gnarled bark – not places that seemed to have been left out of the picture, but bits and pieces that were simply…gone. One in particular held his attention. He reached down and traced it with the tip of his finger.
"That's where I found him," Lenore said. "That's where his face was trapped – his spirit. The tree held five spirits. It happens when someone fights very hard against moving on after death, or when some event – some tragedy or traumatic event – causes an unnatural binding."
"What bound him?"
"I don't know…at least, I'm not sure. Now I think…"
Lenore turned and stared at Grimm.
"He's not just a bird," she said.
"No, far from it," Edgar said. "I have told you he is my traveling companion, but it would be more accurate to say – I am his. He is very old, very intelligent, and I believe he is responsible for the visions that bring my stories – the insights that allow me to bring dark events to life with simple pen and ink."
"He is your familiar," Lenore said.
Edgar frowned. He knew the term well enough, but not the context. It was a word normally associated with witches, practitioners of dark arts. He thought he might have recognized it from his research, but had certainly never associated it with himself.
"Don't look so shocked," Lenore chuckled. "It's a very old term, and very apt. You, and the bird, are bonded. He is as bound to you as you are to him, and that is why – when you needed something you did not have – a way to change what had already happened – he became your vessel.
"I am not certain about this, because, as far as I know I'm the first practitioner of my own art, and nothing like this has ever happened before, but I believe that it's possible this man – Thigpen – was waiting for you. For us. He was trapped for a reason. I think, just possibly, Mr. Poe, that you have bent time. It's a very impressive feat, I must say."
Edgar stared at the picture.
"The others?"
"Free," Lenore said. "Normally I'd know at what point that occurred, but I have no memory of this room, or the work, since Anita's story drew me in. I assume it was about that time that you yourself were caught up – an unexpected blending of energy, but, if I am correct, perfectly in accordance with something bigger – something grander."
"Fate?"
"Perhaps."
Anita, who had stood silently off to one side, staring, slowly approached Edgar. Her gaze was fixed on Grimm, and she moved forward with tentative courage. She held out her hand, obviously expecting the old crow to snap at her, nip off the end of a finger, something. When her finger brushed the top of his head, Grimm dipped at the neck so she could scratch more easily. When she did so, and then pulled back, he set to work preening his feathers.
Lenore laughed again.
"He is the only one of us not caught up in the how or what of it."
"Probably for the best," Edgar said. "So…you think something or someone – obviously more powerful than you or I – saw the dark outcome of a gunfight over a year ago, and, what, altered reality so that something distracted this man Thigpen, then trapped his spirit to await the opportunity to make that thing distract him?"
"Something like that. You have a better explanation?"
"There was no crow," Anita said, cutting in. "I was there, and there was no crow, but tonight – when I saw it tonight – I knew that it was right. I knew that it must be the truth." She turned to Edgar. "You saved my life."
Edgar stared at her, then back at the drawing on the table, and finally back at Lenore.
"I'm going to try and get some sleep," he said. "I suggest that the two of you do so as well. We will be able to think more clearly by the light of day, and I believe that we both have stories to tell – important stories."
"Anita," Lenore said, "will you stay?"
She nodded.
"I will get more blankets from the tavern. I have a key, and sometimes I sleep in an empty room, when there is one. I haven't liked walking home alone since…"
Grimm let out a soft caw just then, silencing her. Then, in a rush, the girl crossed to Edgar, threw her arms around him, including Grimm as well in an impromptu hug. She left the room then and Edgar stood, staring after her. Grimm, rumpled, hopped from foot to foot and glared.
"Tomorrow, then," Lenore said. "And well met, Edgar Poe. I believe we are well met indeed."
When she closed the door after him, he stood a long time on the shadowed porch, staring out at the trees, and the darkness, before slipping inside, closing his window, and climbing into bed for
a long, absolutely dreamless sleep.
Chapter Four
Breakfast was a fairly sedate affair at the tavern. Even the most hardcore of drinkers would not wander in until noon or later, so those who were awake, and aware, and present, took advantage of the silence.
The kitchen was open. There was toasted bread in large slices, soaked in butter. There were eggs, and there was bacon. The boy, Tom, had returned with a basket in one hand and a large sack over one shoulder. He'd struggled gamely under the weight, and when Edgar stepped out of his room and spotted him, he hurried over to lend a hand.
"I've got it," Tom said.
"I'm sure you do," Edgar said, "but I am going to assume that you remembered to do me a certain favor, and with that in mind, it's the least I can do to carry the basket to the tavern for you."
Tom grinned.
"Got the corn right here in my pocket," he said. "Whole bag of it. I know it's the right stuff 'cause my ma spends half her day chasin' crows out of the bin where we keep it."
"Sounds perfect," Edgar said. "Let's get this food inside."
Lenore was already seated at the table to the rear of the tavern, beneath the great window. Instead of shadows, the surface of the table was bathed in morning sunlight. Anita bustled among the tables, polishing the surfaces, wiping down the chairs. The morning was far less forgiving than the dark of night; food, stains, and stray glassware had found its way to the far corners of the room, and now kept her occupied.
Edgar took it all in in an instant, and smiled. He crossed to the bar, laid the basket on top, and turned to Lenore.
"Do you mind if I join you?"
"I would be offended if you didn't. I trust you slept well?"
"I slept as if every ounce of energy and strength had been drained from me. There were no dreams, and all things considered, I will consider that a boon."
Lenore laughed, and Edgar took a seat beside her, but not too close. She was drawing, and he didn't want to bump her arm, or to spill something on the work in progress.
"What do you see?" he asked.
"Nothing," she said. "I am as drained as you are. For once, I'm just drawing. It's difficult, creating art – and then cutting out pieces of it – knowing that once the faces and spirits are gone, I'll have to fill back in the blanks. It's how I make my living, such as it is. I sell the drawings. I do portraits. I draw or paint people's homes. It's not a bad life, but it's not always very lucrative, either."
"It sounds very similar to the life of an author," Edgar said. "I am beginning to do a bit better, but it has been a long road, and there have been…problems."
"You live in a cloud," Lenore said. "I saw it last night, but there was too much else to concentrate on. It follows you – and defines you. What is it that has caused such pain?"
"There are many things, but the worst of them is the failing health of my wife. Despite all that I have been able to do for her, none seems able to help. She wastes slowly away…I fear that soon I will lose her."
"Life is a cycle," Lenore said. She turned back to her drawing.
Edgar glanced down at the paper. She had drawn a crow in flight, wings spread and eyes bright. It reminded him of Grimm, and, at the same time it did not. This was a wild creature, young and strong. Grimm was strong – but his strength was of a deeper kind, and he was – as the farmers were fond of saying – no spring chicken. Still, somehow, she had reached inside, and drawn out the spirit. There was no doubt that it was Grimm, and there was no doubt that she possessed an incredible talent.
"It's amazing," he said. "I think you captured him in a different time, or a different life, but it could be no other."
She shaded the feathers of one wing carefully.
"Time does not work like that," she said casually. "It's not a string with an end tied and another winding off into some unknown dimension. It is more like…a plane. Do you study mathematics, Edgar?"
"I have dabbled, but I don't see the connection."
"There is always a connection. Some believe that time is a direct path, beginning to end. Others claim that it is a circle, or a figure eight, winding in and back upon itself like the serpent Ouroboros. History may run in cycles, but time? Time is a static thing. What is happening now – and what happened in your grandfather's time? Both happen simultaneously."
"It's an interesting theory," Edgar said. "But I am not certain it's quite right."
"No?" she glanced up at him. "Then how would you explain the fact that your bird – at the direction of your pen just last night – disrupted a gunshot that occurred a full year ago? Or how the spirit of the man that was killed by that gunshot could have waited, trapped in the branches of a tree, for you to come along and do it? Is he dead now? Was he dead a year ago? Will he ever really be simply dead, or will he be alive, and dead, for eternity?"
"Questions too heavy for early morning sunlight, and offered before a proper cup of coffee."
"Laugh if you will," Lenore said. "I have seen this more times than I can count – never like what happened last night – but there are things that just can't be explained in a linear fashion. If it was not true, I suspect you'd be very short of stories – or at the very least, that your stories would be much more mundane and ordinary. I believe, never having read one, that they must be spectacular. Dark, deep, drenched in mystery – and pain."
"The latter is certainly true," he said. "I have been told more than once that my stories lack hope. That people want to be dropped into the shadows, but only if there is a ladder, or a rope that will bring them back into the light. I write, and I tell my tales, but it seems that I am fresh out of ladders, and there are no ropes in sight…"
“And yet,” she said, “you sensed the need last night, and you responded. You write about the shadows, but I think – maybe – you dream of other things – lighter, happier things.”
“Let’s just agree,” he said, “that it is progress that I dreamed of nothing this past night.”
Lenore’s smile widened. With quick flicks of her wrist, she added sprinkles of shredded corn dropping from the crow’s beak. Edgar watched the way the muscles rippled in her arms, the way her fingers played across the surface of the paper, brushing aside flecks of lead and smoothing the surface.
“So, why are you here?” Edgar asked. “I can’t believe it was accident. I mean – I believe you are traveling, and paying your way with your art. You are very talented. This just doesn't seem like a very … art conscious location?"
"You'd be surprised who might want a drawing, a portrait, or a painting," she said. "This area is filled with old money – it's as old as the country, after all. Still, you read me correctly. I sought this place out. You might say I was drawn here."
There was a loud squawk, and Grimm dropped to the windowsill outside. The bird cocked its head, tilting to one side to stare in at the two seated beyond the glass pane, and at the drawing on the table.
Edgar grinned at the bird. Lenore glanced up, smiled, and then shot back away from the table as if she'd been smacked. She nearly toppled her chair over backward, and it was all that Edgar could do to prevent her smacking her head on the floor as she went over.
"What…" he said.
She shook her head, and then pulled away. She was on her feet in an instant, staring at the window. Grimm sat there, met her gaze for a long, silent moment, and then, with a great cry, leapt from the sill and back into the sky. Edgar stood, stunned, and everyone in the tavern had turned to gape.
"Are you okay?" Edgar said.
Lenore shook her head again, and then turned to him. "I'm not sure. I…I saw something that I did not expect to see – something I can't explain. I'm not even sure that I should tell you – I…"
Edgar took her by the arm and led her back to the table. She took her seat, and he helped her organize her pencils and the loose sheets of paper she'd scattered. Anita walked over, her pretty features twisted in a frown of concern.
"It's probably nothing," Lenore said. "I just saw…I
think I … no, I did. I saw something in Grimm – or on her – or – I'm not sure how to explain it."
"Her?" Edgar said.
Lenore turned to him and nodded. "I'm nearly certain. I would not have had any idea before but…"
"But what?"
"I saw a face superimposed over the feathers of the chest. A very young girl. She stared right at me – and I believe she is trapped."
Edgar stared at her, and then down at the drawing on the table.
"What will you do?"
"I…I have no choice," she said. "I will draw what I have seen, and I will set her free."
Edgar sat very still for a moment, and then, he nodded. He knew that what she did was the right thing for those who were trapped, but he had traveled with the bird for a very long time. If what was to come removed the magic – if it ended, and Grimm flew off into the trees and the swamp to never return, he was not certain that he could stand it.
Lenore studied the emotion burning from his eyes, the effort he made to remain calm.
"If she is meant to be with you," Lenore said, "she will be. The girl is trapped, but the crow – Grimm – is a familiar. Your familiar. I do not believe she was a party to whatever happened, or that she could be happy carrying another soul trapped inside her, but neither do I believe anything will be lost."
"If you did, though, you would do this anyway," Edgar said.
"I would. If I did not, I would slowly go insane thinking about it – wondering what evil I might have become a part of."
"And I," Edgar said softly, "will be utterly, and absolutely alone, I'm afraid, if something goes wrong. It is a recurring theme in my work. They say that art mirrors life."
"I don't believe that," Lenore said. "It imitates, at best."
She reached for her drawing of Grimm, and the gum eraser that sat beside it. She worked quickly, and as she worked, she spoke.
"Why does this remind me of a story?" she said. "I don't remember any stories of crows as prisons…"
"There is one," Edgar said softly. "Not a crow…a raven. It was written by the Brothers Grimm – you know their work?"
Nevermore: A Novel of Love, Loss, & Edgar Allan Poe Page 4
