Authors: Amy Herrick
CHAPTER EIGHT
The Song and the Spider
For Edward, the next few days passed in the way days did in December. Everybody went rushing around, knocking each other over to buy gifts in crowded stores. There was that breathless feeling of anticipation. What was it for? He thought of Mr. Ross’s paleolithic hunter-gatherers huddled around their little fires.
All week the house was filled with clouds of cinnamon and sugar. There were always cookies and pies and fruitcakes baking. These were such good, comfortable smells. But when he tried to sit down on the sofa and watch some TV, his aunt appeared from out of nowhere and looked at him like he’d just committed a double felony.
“Are you kidding? Aren’t you reading the signs? What do you think you’re doing? We’ve got work to do! Time’s nearly up!”
She made him hang pine boughs over the doors and on the stairways to keep out evil spirits. She made him put candles in all the windows for lost travelers, and roll apples in peanut butter and birdseed and tie them up with ribbons in the little garden. Then she made him go back out and drag a tree home from the corner and set it up and decorate it with all her weird ornaments—her shark’s teeth and animal skulls all wrapped around with gold ribbon and her many bizarre decorated cookie people. She wouldn’t let him rest for a minute.
He pointed out to her that she was still living in the dark ages, when people didn’t understand about the solstices and how the earth travels around the sun. “Darkness isn’t going to swallow the world up just because you didn’t hang your pine boughs. As it happens, we were actually discussing this in science class the other day.”
She snorted. “Any scientist worth his suspenders know that every time you unravel one tangled ball of yarn, the universe sends you another. It is the nature of the Great Web.”
Edward resolved again to make sure she never got anywhere near Mr. Ross. The thought of the humiliation that would follow was terrible.
“A great deal is known. But much more is not. There are so many mysterious forces coming and going. Their names are always changing.” She waved her hand at various invisible things floating around in the air between them. “No sooner does science get hold of one explanation than that explanation turns to dust and is replaced by another.”
“So then why bother?” he said. “It’s exactly what I’m always saying. Why bother if nothing is solid?”
She shook her head in exasperation. “It doesn’t mean that things don’t matter. A sneeze at one end of the world can change the whole course of things to come. What’s important right now is the winter solstice, when we all look out and peer into the vasty dark. I suggest you humor me. If you’ll just go into the kitchen and get my good shears, we can trim these branches a little.”
Edward had wasted enough perfectly good energy on argument. In the kitchen he poked around in the drawers until he found the shears. Then, as he turned to go, his eye was caught by the gray spider on the windowsill. The one his aunt had rescued. The spider looked exceptionally busy this afternoon. It was running back and forth between the rosemary and the oregano and the thyme, leaving behind itself shimmering little spidery threads. It was exhausting just to watch, but Edward stood there in hypnotized fascination. What did the creature think it was accomplishing? It certainly wasn’t going to be catching any flies at this time of year. Edward noticed a small silvery gray ball resting on the windowsill next to the herb pots. He leaned over to take a closer look and was baffled to realize it must be a ball of spider thread. Was his aunt actually collecting the stuff? He wouldn’t put it past her.
“Edward! What’s taking you so long?”
He wondered if it was something she used in some recipe or other. Edward shook himself. “Yuck,” he said to the spider and turned away from the windowsill.
Danton took his little brother ice skating in Prospect Park one afternoon. They did at least one thing together every week. Danton loved his little brother and his little brother thought the sun rose and set at Danton’s command. They walked over to the library and took the bus up Flatbush Avenue and entered the park through the gateway at the corner. As soon as they passed through, Danton was struck with a feeling that he was supposed to be doing something he had forgotten to do. What could it be? His brother, who was eight, danced around him with excitement.
“Stay close to me, Jay.”
It was still light and the sky was filled with great streaks of gold and pink. But there was no one else on the path that wound through the trees. They went past the now-silent carousel, shut down for the winter, and soon found themselves crossing the road and approaching the rink.
“We’ll get hot chocolate, too, right? And french fries?” Jay demanded anxiously.
“Sure,” said Danton. This was what they always did. What was it? Had their mother asked him to pick something up at the store for her? No. That wasn’t it. He felt sure it was something he was supposed to do once he got into the park. But what could that be?
The rink was pretty empty at first, but as it grew dark and the lights twinkled on, other skaters came sliding in.The air was fresh and cold and full of the smell of the nearby lake, pine trees, and the clean scent of the ice. He and his brother raced in and out of the throng, chasing each other around, sneaking up on each other, shouting with glee when one managed to surprise the other. They were both excellent skaters. Danton found some other kids from school and they all went around together for a while, laughing and making snakes and showing off, until his brother begged him to stop so they could get their french fries and hot chocolate at the refreshment stand.
By the time they got back on the ice, the rink had really filled up. His little brother shot ahead and disappeared into the crowd. This didn’t bother Danton too much. Where could Jay go? But Danton preferred to keep an eye on him. Looking for his brother’s red wool hat, Danton glided confidently through the head-bobbing river of people. He caught a flash of something scarlet and thought he had found Jay, but when he got closer, he discovered this definitely was not his brother. It was, in fact, an amazingly old lady with a red kerchief tied tightly under her chin. The woman was skating around the rink with her hands locked behind her back, a little smile on her face, studying the crowd with a hungry look in her eye. And now her attention had been caught by something. Danton followed her gaze and saw that she was watching his little brother. Creepy, but she had to be harmless. He shot forward, cutting in front of her and grabbing hold of Jay’s arm. Jay spun out for a moment, then caught his balance.
“Hey!” he gasped, laughing. Danton let go of him and shot forward again, making sure Jay was not far behind. They went around a few more times. Danton kept an eye out for the weird old woman, but he didn’t see her again. She must have left the ice.
Soon afterward, Danton announced that he was starving and it was time to go home and have dinner. Jay did not argue; the french fries were beginning to wear off.
As they passed through the gate on the way to the bus stop, Danton again had the sudden sharp feeling that he had forgotten to do something. But a moment later the bus pulled into sight and the two boys ran for it.
Brigit continued to hear the girl’s voice on and off all week, but that seemed to be mostly when she was in school. At home she heard other disturbing things. The wind kept her awake at night, keening and crying down the alleyway, knocking over the garbage cans as if it were looking for something. Then one night, when the wind fell silent, she heard her parents talking in the other room.
“Well? Is there any change? Has she spoken at all?” her father asked.
“No,” her mother answered. Then she said coaxingly, “I wonder if it wouldn’t help if you spent a little more time at home.”
Brigit could hear the bristling in her father’s answer. “Time is the problem, Celia. I don’t know where the stuff goes. You know how busy we are at work. Most days I don’t even have time for lunch.”
Brigit wondered if this was true. Certainly, her father had grown very thin in the last few months.
“Come home for dinner one night, Al. I’ll make the turnips and sausages you like.”
“I’ll try, Celia. But it won’t be until this big project is finished and that’s not going to happen for at least a few more days.”
Brigit heard her mother sigh. Then there was only silence. She wished she could call out to them and, for just the briefest of moments, she thought she felt a fluttering in her throat. It felt like a bird stuck in a chimney, trying to get free. But then there was nothing.
Her grandad was the only one who was really around when she got home from school. But he was disturbed all that week, too. Sometimes he seemed to know her name (they all called her Birdie), but then other times he thought she was Irene, her grandmother, who had died ten years ago. They said she looked like her grandmother and that she had the same fiery red hair, so you could see why he might do this. But still, there was something unnerving about being confused with your own dead grandmother.
By Tuesday, her grandad started insisting that he needed to make brandy pudding. He spent hours looking through the old cookbooks. But when he couldn’t find what he thought was the right recipe, he started to get agitated. Brigit soothed him and showed him how to look for a recipe on the Internet. Together they found something. She printed it out and he was excited, a little breathless, and he made her take him to the market. He hardly ever wanted to go out anymore, so she was pleased to do this, but when they got to the supermarket everybody was in such a mad rush, she knew the whole thing had been a bad idea. He stared fearfully at the people with their shopping carts stampeding up and down the aisles and asked her what was going on. Then a fight broke out on the line to the cash register. A woman with a two-year-old accused a man in a suit of cutting in line, and before you knew it, the two of them were screaming and cursing at each other. Her grandad grabbed hold of her arm so tightly, Brigit nearly cried out.
“What were you thinking of to bring me out here? ’Tis home we’re going, lass,” he hissed in her ear. “This is a dangerous time. Something has gotten loose that ought not to be.”
And they went home without the things they needed to make the pudding.
But the next day, Brigit stopped at the market and bought the dates and the fruit and the brown sugar. They had a lovely afternoon in the kitchen, mixing and measuring and baking the pudding, which wasn’t really a pudding, but a kind of cake. But then it came time to make the brandy sauce. Her grandad measured out the brandy and took a small glass for himself, and no sooner had he downed it than he started calling her Irene again. He took another small glass of brandy and then he began to sing. He had a beautiful Irish tenor and according to his own story, he had won Brigit’s grandmother’s heart with it by singing under her window. Brigit couldn’t remember the last time he had sung. He used to belong to a chorus in Manhattan, but she didn’t think he’d gone to rehearsals for months. This afternoon, though, he sang the song about the green growing rushes and then he sang “The Fiddler’s Green.” Then he had another glass of brandy and he sang the one about Mattie Grove who got caught in bed with Lord Darnell’s wife.There seemed to be an awful lot of Irish songs about people getting caught in bed with other people’s wives.
He went from one old tune to the next. She wished she could join in with him. She’d had a good voice, too. But that was before. Her mother and the doctors had told her many times that it wasn’t her fault that her brother had died. She’d been taking care of him that night. She’d sung him to sleep and tiptoed out of the room. It wasn’t till her mother went into the room later that anyone knew anything was wrong. It was just something that happened to some babies. She knew it was true, but lately she had been noticing that there were all kinds of ways of knowing things. You learned all kinds of things in school, but believing in them—really believing in them—was another matter. You could know the moon was thousands of miles away and that it was way bigger than a cantaloupe, but
believing
this was something else.
Her grandad had closed his eyes and was humming “Wee White Rose.” When he was done, he fell silent and closed his eyes. Perhaps he had fallen asleep. The clock ticked on the wall and the scent of the baking cake filled the air. Outside, the wind went sighing down the alleyway. And then her grandad started to hum again. Brigit was thinking her own thoughts and only half listening. Then she was listening more closely. Where had she heard that melody before? It wasn’t one of his usual songs, she thought. But still, it was familiar. She was sure she had heard it somewhere not too long ago.
Her grandad sat up in the chair with a groan and looked around the kitchen uncertainly, as if this was not where he had expected to find himself.
“Ah,” he said sadly. “I was dreaming she’d come back.”
Brigit went over and put her arms around him. He smiled then and tugged gently on her red braid. “There’s no escaping it, lassie. She gave you this and the heart fire that comes with it.” He frowned as if he were trying to remember something. “Ah, and she gave me something I was to give to you. Now what was it?”
There was silence in the fragrant kitchen, while outside they could hear the wind moaning and whistling through the alley as if it were looking for something it had lost.
“Ah, I remember now.” He frowned at her, trying to puzzle something out. “It did not make a whole lot of sense then, did it? She said I was to warn you that time runs short. She said you must remember the girl in the long coat.”
CHAPTER NINE
Nectar
One afternoon Red Kerchief gave Feenix an enormous basket of socks to pair. “Make sure they are matched up properly.”
There must have been four hundred socks in there. Big socks, kneesocks, dirty white sneaker socks, nasty nylon black socks, green socks, striped socks, polka-dotted socks, and socks with little blue poodles printed on them. Where they had all come from, Feenix did not want to think. They didn’t look like the sort of thing witches would wear.
“Forget it,” she said. “I’m not touching those disgusting things.”
Skuld picked Feenix up and shook her like a rag doll. Something fell out of Feenix’s pocket and went clattering across the floor.
Feenix tried to reach for it, but Red Kerchief blocked her way.
“And what might this be?”
It was, of course, Dweebo’s stone.
“Bring it here, girl,” Baba One Nostril commanded. She was sitting at the table, sucking the marrow out of a small bone.
Feenix bent over reluctantly and picked up the rock and brought it to her.
Baba stopped eating. She stared at the stone without moving. She sniffed the air. She turned to Feenix. “Who gave this to you?”
This was an uncomfortable question. “Well, nobody
gave
it to me. I found it.”
Baba eyed her coldly. “I believe you’re lying. But that is of little importance.” At first she touched the stone very cautiously with just the tips of her fingers. When it didn’t blow up in her face, she lifted it into her palm and examined it more closely. She muttered to herself, “Here is the answer to the puzzle.” Then she looked up at her sisters, but hardly seemed to see them. She gave a little grunt and leaned forward and blew out the lamp.
In the darkness the stone glowed in her hand.
“What is it?” Skuld asked.
Baba One Nostril did not seem to hear her. She kept turning the stone around and around, staring at it with a frown. She lifted it to her ear, then sniffed at it.
“I do not think this has been brought to us by chance,” she said at last softly.
“Well, what is it?” repeated Skuld.
“I believe it is a Fetch.”
A look of disbelief mixed with excitement came over Skuld’s face. “A Fetch? How could this child have come into possession of such a thing? The last one was hundreds of years ago, wasn’t it?”
“Yes. They keep themselves well hidden.”
“Smell it!” Gorgo exclaimed. “Have you ever smelled anything more delicious!”
It was true. The smell that filled the room made Feenix shiver with delight. It didn’t remind her of anything you would want to eat, but made her think of waking on the first day of summer vacation with the windows wide open and knowing she was going to live forever.
Baba One Nostril laid the stone carefully down on the table. She touched it with her fingertips and closed her eyes, inhaling deeply. When she opened them again, she spoke with decision. “Such a chance may never come our way again. The foragers will be sleeping now.”
“But if you wake them?” Skuld asked sharply. “If any were to get loose—”
“Quiet! Do not presume to advise me! I am trying to think.” Baba tapped very lightly on the stone with a long fingernail. “The treasure is protected with great cunning.”
“I know!” cried Gorgo. She hobbled to the other side of the room and brought out a small ladder that Feenix had not noticed before. She balanced it against the wall and climbed to the top. On a high shelf she found what she was looking for. She carried it down and brought it to the table and laid it in front of Baba One Nostril. A dusty wooden box.
Baba nodded, smiling. She unlatched the lid. She drew out a long black needle. Feenix shuddered. It was longer than a finger. “Yes,” Baba said. “The Darning Needle. I had almost forgotten it. How many centuries since we have last taken this down?” She wiped the needle on her gown and then held it up to the light. “A bottle,” she ordered. “Bring a bottle.”
Gorgo hustled obediently and placed a small crystal bottle on the table.
“With great care,” Skuld whispered. “Go slowly.”
Old Baba’s single nostril quivered with excitement. She lifted the needle over the stone then plunged it downward. It slid into the rock as if into a bar of soap. Feenix thought she saw two tiny sparks of light explode from the hole and then vanish.
“What was that? Did you see?” Skuld asked fearfully.
“It was nothing,” One Nostril answered. “A release of gases. The nectar is volatile on the inside. Now let me concentrate. The thing will close itself up quickly.”
She held the stone over the crystal bottle.
Feenix saw that a sticky golden substance had began to ooze out of the small hole left by the needle. The scent that spilled into the room was nearly overpowering. To Feenix it was spicy, wild, and golden. It made her think of roses and fresh-cut grass and running horses.
“Oh, oh!” Gorgo whimpered ecstatically.
Everyone watched. Ten drops fell, only half filling the bottle, then the oozing clotted like blood and the honey stopped. They could see that a sticky crust had formed like a scab over the tiny hole.
Baba put the stone down with a sigh and lifted the bottle.
“Come, let us have a taste,” Gorgo said eagerly.
Baba closed her eyes. “Yes. We will have a taste and I will go first.” With great care, she lifted the bottle and tipped it so one single drop of the honey fell into her mouth.
They all waited.
For the first moment, she looked frightened. She shut her eyes tight and her single nostril quivered. Then she moaned and threw her head back.
“What is happening?” Skuld demanded, squinting furiously.
A soft and rosy pink began to creep across Baba One Nostril’s old, ashy gray skin.
Her hair, which was steely gray and so thin it allowed her scalp to show through, thickened and darkened to a deep chestnut brown. Her face, loose and wrinkly like elephant skin, tightened and smoothed out. Her knobby, crooked fingers grew long and strong, and she flexed them as if they had been asleep for a long time and needed to be woken up. Her stooped skinny shoulders straightened, and she stood upright. She looked about two hundred years younger. She would have looked good, if it weren’t for the bad nose thing.
The two sisters shuffled as close to her as they dared and stared at her openmouthed.
Skuld forgot her fears. “I will have my turn.” She reached out for the bottle.
“No, no! I will go next,” squealed Gorgo, trying to get in front of her.
Baba stopped her with a sharp gesture. “You are a greedy-fingered glutton. You will both have your turns, but I will hold the bottle.”
Gorgo glared at her with fury, but held her hands at her sides.
Baba went first to Skuld and tipped a single drop into her mouth. Then she did the same to Gorgo. She put the bottle on the table, stoppered it, and stood back to watch.
In a few minutes the other two were transformed as Baba had been. Gorgo still looked doughy, but she was a young and pink-faced doughy. She had muscular arms and a round pumpkin-shaped body.
Skuld, to Feenix’s surprise, was beautiful. She held herself like a ballerina, her head straight up, her shoulders back, her eyes glittering like little pieces of glass caught in a streetlight. Her red kerchief held back her long, flowing chestnut hair.
In every way—except eyesight—the three witches were stronger, healthier, and younger. To Feenix, it was not a happy improvement. They all took turns using the spectacles and peering at themselves in a little sliver of mirror that hung by the doorway.
“Let us have one more sip,” breathed Gorgo. She turned her gaze greedily to the stone. “I’ve never tasted anything more delicious.”
Baba One Nostril answered her scornfully. “What an infant you are. How long will it take you to learn when you have had enough? Besides, it would be prudent to save some for a later day, don’t you think?”
“I suppose,” said Gorgo sullenly.
“Let us turn our minds to other matters.”
Baba looked at Feenix. “I think now would be the perfect time to reward our young visitor, don’t you, my sisters?”
Skuld stopped examining herself in the mirror. “What do you mean?”
“She has brought us this great gift. We should let her go free.”
Feenix’s heart leaped up.
The two sisters stared at Baba. “Now?” asked Gorgo eagerly.
Baba tipped her head to one side and appeared to consider. “The time is ripe, don’t you think? And it would seem only fair, wouldn’t it?”
“Yes it would,” replied Skuld chuckling. “In the words of the great master, ‘Fair is foul and foul is fair.’ Let us be about the business. Darkness will fall soon.”
“Yes!” sang young Gorgo. “Perfect, perfect, perfect.”
Feenix couldn’t believe her good luck. Bless Dweebo and his stupid stone.
“We’ll even give her an extra good head start,” Baba said with a smile.
“What do you mean?” Feenix asked alertly. “Why would I need a head start?”
Why were they all trying not to look at each other like they might burst out laughing?
Finally, Baba answered. “Well, we’re going to invite you to play a game with us. It is like your game of Tag, but with a little Hide and Seek mixed in. We always celebrate in this way at the solstice. It is one of our favorites. And now, of course—” she glanced down at her youthful self—“we will especially enjoy ourselves.” She met Feenix’s eye. “You have brought us some extra time and we will give you some in return. All you need to do is cross over the wooden bridge. Once you are on the other side of the water, of course, we cannot follow and you will be free. If you don’t cross over, well, then . . .” She grinned, but did not finish the sentence.
Feenix felt fear go racecar driving around her circulatory system, but she wasn’t going to ask them for further explanations. Adrenaline would add to her speed. There was no way she couldn’t outrace these poisonous prunes.
“How much time will you give me?” she demanded.
“Umm—what do you think, sisters? I propose an extra count of six hundred. Ten human minutes.” She smiled again at Feenix. “We will unlock the door and permit you to go.”
“You’re going to close your eyes? You’re not going to watch which way I go, right?”
“We will not watch you.”
“And you’ll keep your eyes closed till you get to six hundred?”
“We will.”
“How do I know you won’t cheat?”
“Our word is bound by law.”
Feenix waited by the table staring at them. “Unlock the door.”
Gorgo went over to the door and unlocked it. She smiled at Feenix as if she were a particularly delicious looking piece of chocolate cake.
“What are you waiting for?” Feenix asked. “Go to the other side of the room and turn your backs to me and close your eyes and start counting.”
Baba laughed, but told her sisters to do as Feenix ordered.
As soon as they had turned to face the wall and were all counting out loud, Feenix lost no time doing what needed to be done.
She was out the door before the sisters had reached five.