And the Trees Crept In(60)

Nori?

Nori?

The echoes then echo, distorting and bending around one another.

Nori? nOri? NoRi? NOrI? norI? Nori? nOri? NoRi? NOrI? norI? Nori? nORi? Nori? nOri? NoRi? NOrI? norI? nOri? NoRi? NOrI? norI? Nori? nOri? NoRi? NOrI? nORi?


“Stop it!”

Stopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopitstopit!





I collapse onto my knees, pressing down on my ears. The noise is so loud it’s going to burst my eardrums. It is dripping derision.

“LEAVE ME ALONE!”

It’s like someone flips a switch. The world is mute.

When I lift my hand, I am in another place. It is dark in here, and closed in. Slanted wood panels all around me. A shuttered window, high up. It must be night because moonlight shoves in through the cracks, silvery white.

A little girl sits in the center of the room, head bowed low over something in her hands. Her hair is blocking her face, but I know her anyway.

It’s Cath. Little Cath. Only older now. And the room is different. More cluttered. Less clean. Cobwebs hang from the corners of the attic and a thick layer of dust rests on all the surfaces she hasn’t touched. Where she has, there are streaks.

I kneel in front of her, and she ignores me. Or maybe she can’t see me. Her hands are nimble and quick as she sews the doll. A new doll? The same doll? It’s an ugly thing, like the other, made of sackcloth, a black slash of a line for a mouth and no eyes. She seems to be repairing a tear in one of his long legs, but the thread isn’t right.…

I squint and peer closer. Mud. The thread is dipped in mud. Or clay. There is a little bowl of it beside her thigh.

“He’ll come with the shadows,” she sings, “to take your fears away, he’ll guide you like a father, he’ll take away the pain.”

Something about the scene is terrible to watch, and I notice with revulsion that Cathy is wet. A putrid smell rises from her, and I realize that she has messed herself.

She’s terrified.

And dirty—she’s filthy.

And then I notice other things.

Her hands are shaking.

Her hair is oily.

Her spoiled dress is dry—she’s been here awhile.

And no one has come looking for her.

And there are dolls everywhere… sackcloth dolls—the Creeper Man—everywhere. I stumble back, horrified. Dolls piled in the corners. Dolls nailed to the walls. Dolls dangling from the beams. Dolls scattered on the floor farther off into the shadows.

There are hundreds, all of them sightless and smiling.

“Oh my God.”

“He’ll take it back I know it, he’ll take away this curse. He’ll say he’s sorry, truly. This can’t get any worse—” She breaks off her thread with her teeth, leaving a muddy line across her face like an elongated grimace, then she lights a candle and places the pathetic effigy beside it.

And then she reaches into her basket and pulls free more straw, and another piece of sackcloth, and begins again.

“Three little girls knelt by an alder to summon a man to be their protector. The little girls found their game hard to bear when their protector turned and gave them a scare.…”

I bend down until I am looking at this child and everything comes out. “You made me think it was me. You told me I was to blame. But you brought this curse down on us. On our family. And now he has Nori, too. And you were always insane. Weren’t you?”

I realize that it no longer matters.

Cathy is gone.

Nori is gone.

And I don’t have any answers.

“Stop this.”

Gowan is beside me, standing in the shadows.

“Gowan?”

“Stop getting distracted.”

“What?”

He grabs my arm and yanks me to my feet

and I’m back in the cave.

He puts a gentle hand on my shoulder, like a warm blanket

and I am facing the cave opening.

Or is it the other way around—am I on the inside of the cave, looking out at the forest-manor? Standing before me is the tall, thin, blind man, and he is smiling—too wide to be natural.

I blink

and he is a tree.

I blink

and I’m back in the bright version of La Baume. A sharp pain in my cheek and now I’m in the woods. Gowan is standing over me, shaking me. “SILLA!”

The pain again.

He slapped me.

I don’t know what’s real anymore.

I look up at him. “I always told you I was crazy.”





27


—. — — —



Try to hold your stomach tight

till those feelings pass

close your eyes and think of light

the darkness doesn’t last.