by Barb Hendee
Hefting my bag, I vanished back into the trees, took off my cloak, and unlaced the wool dress I wore. Opening my bag, I pulled out my fine gown of sunflower yellow. I put this on and laced it up the front. Then I unbraided my mass of hair and shook it out. Taking my brush from the bag, I brushed my hair for several moments before using my fingers to mess it up slightly and make it look as full as was possible.
When I stepped from the trees again, Werner’s mouth fell open.
“Oh… you look … you look…”
I smiled, relieved that he couldn’t finish a complete sentence. I hoped my appearance would have the same effect on whoever lived across the veil.
“Your turn,” I said.
He came right to me, and we both crouched down. Reaching into the bag again, I pulled out several more items I’d brought with me. I was quite tired by that point, and it struck me as almost funny that this was not the first time I’d helped disguise a man to make him look like a ghost.
A slightly difficult moment followed. “I’m sorry,” I said, “but for this to work, you’ll need to take off the eye patch.”
He hesitated. “You won’t like what you see.”
“I’ll be fine. I promise.”
After another pause, he reached up and took it off. Pity washed through me, and I touched his arm. His eye had been completely gouged out, leaving a jaggedly, scarred socket.
“Does it hurt?” I asked.
“Not much. Not anymore.”
He seemed relieved that this was my only question. I went to work.
First, I lightly dusted flour all over his face. Once his skin was pale to the point of white, I used rouge on his lips to make them red. Then I took some black mud and smeared it under his eyes to create a contrast.
Leaning back, I nodded in approval.
“How do I look?” he asked.
“You’ll be terrifying. I think we’re ready.”
Glancing at the waterfall and back, he said, “It just hit me that we’re really going to do this. I don’t know you at all, but I thank you. Thank you for coming back.”
“Don’t thank me yet.” I stood up, deciding to leave the bag behind. “Do we just walk through?”
“Yes, we can step onto the ledge from this side without going into the creek.”
It was then that I realized I might have waited to do Werner’s face until we passed through to the other side.
“Cover your head completely with your cloak, or you’ll ruin your disguise.”
“What about you?” he asked.
“I’ll do the same.”
He led the way, and I followed. Upon reaching the ledge, he stepped onto it and reached back for my hand. “Are you sure? We could both end up trapped over there.”
I swallowed. “I’m sure.”
We both lifted our cloaks to cover our heads. He jumped through first, and I followed, spending only an instant passing through the thin veil of water. My cloak was wet on the other side, but I was dry.
Then I noticed the darkness around. We appeared to have arrived in the middle of the night.
Werner lowered his cloak, revealing his make-up had not been marred. In the darkness, he looked even more frightening—which was good. I stepped up beside him and cast my gaze all around. Nothing was the same.
A sea of endless, nearly black trees surrounded us on three sides. Their trunks and branches were gnarled and twisted. Even the insects humming in the night sounded foreign, their pitch too low and hollow.
Turning, I looked behind me but I didn’t see the waterfall. Instead I saw a shallow cave.
“Werner?”
“Don’t worry,” he whispered. “I ran right into it and fell out the other side of the waterfall.”
Well, at least the path in and the path out were in the same location. I hadn’t thought to wonder about that before.
“Can you find the encampment?” I asked.
“Yes, I think so.”
He looked up at the night sky, and when my gaze followed, I saw the moon. It appeared to be the same moon as our side of the veil. Perhaps we were not in another world after all.
Then he started into the twisted trees, and I followed.
Going was a bit slower here as the forest was dense, and Werner had more trouble with his hop-drag method of walking.
Alone here with him here, I couldn’t help asking, “How did this horned man crush your foot?”
He stopped. “He clawed my eye out with his hand and then stomped on my foot. I felt the pain like an explosion… but then Bronson was there, pulling him back and somehow, I stumbled through. I crawled part of the way back to village, and my eye socket bled so much I thought I might die.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry.”
“Why? You didn’t do anything.”
“No, but I’m sorry it happened.”
“I was greedy. I deserved this. I was the one who urged the others to come through, and now they suffer because of me.”
“No one deserves that. And we’ll get the others back.”
We began walking again through the dense, twisted forest. I let him lead while I mulled over his account of this horned man, who was capable of violence. Thankfully, I had no plans for anyone to become engaged in any sort of fighting. I was no fighter.
Well, not in the literal sense.
Sounds in this forest seemed to carry, and I heard the singing well before I saw the camp. At the first hint of the strains, Werner slowed, and we lowered our heads, moving along closer to the loam-scented ground.
He stopped speaking entirely and began using his hands to motion our direction.
Finally, he dropped to his knees and crawled up behind a fallen log. Seeing light on the other side, I crept up and peered over the top.
It took a few moments for me to absorb the scene on the other side. A large bonfire blazed in the center of a circular clearing. Chairs of every make and size had been placed nearly everywhere in sight… all around the fire, up on top fallen logs, strapped to low tree branches. I lost count of all the chairs as I took in the strange smallish beings sitting inside them.
As my father had told me, most of them would be about the height of a man’s thigh—when standing. They all had wild, snarled hair that grew outward and halfway down their backs. They wore pants and vests but no shoes. Some were thin, and some were stout. Some had long noses. Some had bulbous noses. Their features were recognizable, but wizened and not quite human.
Many of them carried small bows and quivers of arrows on their backs.
The gnomi.
Nearer to the fire, I saw seven young men with varied expressions. Some appeared bleak, and some frightened. Two of them looked angry.
And finally, my eyes moved to the creature who stood behind them, watching them carefully. He was taller than any man I’d ever seen. Though his chest and arms were bare, he wore pants and boots. His face was the same as any normal man, but there the resemblance stopped. His ears were covered in short, coarse-looking, brown hair, and they were pointed like a stag’s. The same coarse short hair covered his head, and a rack of antlers sprouted from behind and above his temples. I wondered how he could even hold up his head.
Every one of the gnomi was singing in a language I did not know, and an instant of panic hit me.
“Will they be able to understand what we say?” I whispered almost inaudibly in Werner’s ear.
“Yes, all of them understood us, and when they spoke, we understood them.”
“Oh.” I breathed in relief. My plan would fail utterly if I could not be understood. “Are you ready?”
He nodded, and I dropped my cloak.
Even though he’d offered his consent for us to begin, I crouched there for another moment, gathering myself, preparing myself, knowing that once I started, there was no turning back. Then I launched straight up. Gripping my skirt, I leaped up to the top of the log and hopped down into the camp.
The singing stopped. All eyes turned to me.
My s
unflower yellow dress glowed by the light of the fire, and my hair floated around my shoulders. I’d hoped to appear ethereal.
Perhaps I’d succeeded.
Pointing at the young men, I pitched my tone clear and strong. “I have come for them.”
All of the gnomi in their chairs were horrified and stunned. The man with the antlers took a step toward me, but in turn, instead of backing away, I took a step toward him.
“Stay where you are!” I ordered. “I am Coraline of the Móndyalítko, and I have power you cannot imagine. Release these men or I will cause suffering. And if you harm me, another of my kind will come... who will give no warning.”
A number of the gnomi were on their feet now or jumping down from trees, whispering wildly among themselves. I had once known a woman named Coraline who possessed the power to call up ghosts, and so for this night, I took her name.
The seven young men were on their feet as well, their bodies taut, their faces awash with confusion.
The horned man only stared at me. His voice was low and calm and threatening. “And how do you propose to make me suffer?”
I heard him clearly, and yet I was not sure if he’d spoken or the words had sounded in my mind. My courage wavered, and I struggled to call it up again.
“I’ve no intention of making you suffer at all,” I answered and my hand motioned over the crowd of small ones. “I will make them suffer. Without their help, you are powerless.”
The whispers of alarm rose, and a stout, short gnomi with a bulbous nose called, “Aronon! Let them go.”
Again, I understood him clearly but could not remember if he’d spoken. It didn’t matter.
Aronon.
I had a name for the horned man.
“Yes, Aronon,” I continued. “Let them go or I will call upon my powers of Tôlealhân, of will craft, and I will place a hàs one by one on the others who live here.”
Gasps sounded. I had hoped the gnomi would know the words for will craft and for the hàs: a curse set deep inside the mind.
It seemed they did.
My voice rang out. “I will curse each one of them so they are trapped inside the circle of this camp. If they put a hand or a foot outside, it will wither and rot and have to be cut away. If they step outside the circle, their bodies will wither and rot, and they will die in agony.” I turned, staring at the small beings who stared back. “And once you are cursed, once you are trapped, I will call upon ghosts to plague you here.”
The horror on their strange-featured faces grew.
“Aronon!” several of them cried. “Let your new sons go!”
The horned man only gazed at me in derision—and hatred. “She can do nothing. I sense no power in her.”
“No?” I challenged. “Do you remember a young man who came with these?” I pointed the seven young men from Tetovo. “An eighth one who tried to escape? You punished him. You tore out his eye and crushed his foot. He bled to death.”
“What?” one of the young men gasped, stepping around Aronon and speaking directly to me. He was muscular and had been wearing an angry expression when I’d first peered into the camp. “What are you saying?” he asked me. “Werner is dead?”
I turned back toward the log. “See for yourselves. He is only the first of such ghosts I will call.”
Closing my eyes, I raised my hands, “By the old way and the power of the mists,” I chanted loudly, as if speaking a poem, “I summon you from the gray between.”
On cue, Werner spouted up, standing behind the fallen log. He was a terrible visage in the firelight with his white face and red mouth and jagged socket where his other eye had been.
“Who calls me?” his voice echoed.
I gave him credit for better acting skills than I’d anticipated. “I do. To face the one who murdered you.”
Werner focused on Aronon. “Killer! Those who serve you will suffer.”
However, the muscular young man cried out in what sounded like pain, and he turned toward Aronon with an expression of such rage I thought he might attack. I hadn’t planned for Werner’s appearance to have that effect.
Thankfully, in the same instant, all the gnomi rushed Aronon in panic, and I could hear them shouting and demanding that he let his new sons go free. In the span of a breath, Aronon was surrounded by clamoring small beings.
“Let them go!” they cried in chorus.
I didn’t wait.
Rushing to the muscular young man’s side, I said quietly. “Werner isn’t dead. Run!”
He looked over my head, and I glanced back to see Werner motioning with both hands. “Run,” he mouthed.
None of this was lost on the other men, and when the one beside me bolted, the others followed, nearly flying over the log.
I ran after, jumping over the log myself to find the muscular man had stopped and was gripping Werner’s arm. “Oh, your eye,” he said.
“Bronson, go!” Werner answered. “I’ll try to keep up.”
The din behind us hadn’t lessened, and six of the young men had already vanished into the twisted trees. Bronson looked down at Werner’s foot and then grabbed his arm tighter, pulling him along.
We ran—or as least moved as quickly as we could. Bronson was apparently as strong as he looked because he half carried Werner and was still able to keep up with me.
However, not long into the flight, I realized I was uncertain where I was going, and I dropped behind them. Werner must have possessed a good memory and sense of direction, and he kept pointing which way to go.
I waited to hear the crashing sounds of Aronon coming behind us, but all I heard was the hollow buzz of countless insects and the three of us panting.
As we stumbled out of the twisted trees and into a clearer area, I almost couldn’t believe it when I saw the cave. The other young men were ahead of us, and two of them turned to look back.
Werner was holding onto Bronson, but he waved with his free hand. “Ives, go! You’ll come out at the waterfall.”
One by one, they disappeared into the cave, and Bronson half dragged, half carried Werner after.
“Elena, just run,” Werner panted.
I could see he was nearly exhausted, and I wouldn’t leave them. Instead, I moved to his other side, to try to help, and as I did, a hand reached out from the trees and gripped the top of my hair.
I felt myself jerked backward by a force of impossible strength, and the next thing I knew, my feet were off the ground, and I was staring into a human face with the ears of a stag. His eyes glowed with hatred.
“Trickster,” Aronon hissed, as if accusing me of mass murder.
I didn’t see his mouth move.
Wildly, I somehow managed to kick out with my right foot and catch him hard in the stomach. He gasped, probably more surprised than anything else, and let go of my hair. Hitting the ground, I tried to scramble backwards, but he roared and his hand whipped down after me again.
It never landed.
Something whizzed over my head and connected with Aronon’s face—with a cracking sound. He stumbled backward.
I saw someone over me, holding a tree branch, and I thought Bronson had come to fight. Then my eyes moved higher, and my heart nearly stopped.
It wasn’t Bronson.
It was Cooper.
He dropped the branch and grabbed my arm, jerking me forward. Ahead, I saw Werner and Bronson disappear into the cave. Cooper and I ran after. I didn’t have time to wonder how he’d come to be here.
I just ran.
This time though, I did hear the crashing behind us, and when we reached the cave, I couldn’t help glancing back.
Aronon was almost on top of us. I knew he didn’t want Cooper. He wanted me.
At the entrance, I saw Cooper lift one foot, and as he was slightly ungrounded, I pushed him. His eyes widened, but he hadn’t been ready for my hard shove, and he vanished through the wall.
Only when he was safe did I jump through myself.
Water hit my face, an
d a glint of sunlight hit my eyes…and then again, something grabbed my hair from behind.
I couldn’t help it. I screamed.
In the waterfall, Cooper caught me from the front, and something glinted past my head, landing with a hard but wet sound. Another roar sounded behind me, and then the waterfall sprayed red, and the grip on my hair let go. I fell forward, stumbling into Cooper.
Harlan stood beside us on the ledge, gripping a bloody axe in both hands. He must have hit Aronon’s arm.
I couldn’t take it all in, and I’d been on my feet too long.
The world began to spin around me, and the bright light of day began dim.
Then it went black.
·····
When I opened my eyes, I was lying in a bed in a strange room.
My husband sat beside the bed in a chair with his face in his hands.
“Cooper?”
His hands came away, and he looked at me. He said nothing, and I had no idea what to say. What could I say? I’d abandoned him to save a group of people I didn’t even know. Could I explain my reasons? Would he understand?
Finally, I said the only thing that really mattered. “You came after me.”
“I had to,” he whispered hoarsely, and his tone told me how much I’d hurt him.
I’d never wanted to hurt him. I’d only wanted to help someone else. “I had a plan. I had to try.”
“You could have told me.”
“I tried to tell you.”
He went silent.
“Will you forgive me?” I asked.
“What choice is there? I can’t do without you anymore.” He paused. “I only wish I knew you better. All those years when I watched you from the barge, thinking on you, I might have been making someone up… someone inside my head. You’re not what I expected.”
“Neither are you.”
Slowly, he nodded. “Promise me, that from now on, if you decide that you have to act on your own, you’ll make me listen. You’ll make me come with you.”
“I promise.”
·····
The next day, I had recovered enough for us to set off again. I had been thanked so many times by the villagers that I grew eager to leave.
But I’d learned a number of things. Apparently, even though Werner and I had only spent a short time through the veil—long enough to get the gnomi encampment and back—four entire days had passed out here.
