The Grace Year(82)
Other than the disturbing night visits, Kiersten has steered clear of me, but the one thing I’ve learned about Kiersten is you can never let your guard down. I’ve been watching her, sometimes staying up all night to try to catch her sneaking off into the woods to move the bones, but she doesn’t seem to leave the camp. She’s been watching me, too. Sometimes, when we’re gathered around the fire, I catch her tracking me like prey. I try to ignore it, pretend it doesn’t spook me, but the fact of the matter is, the more I help them, the more they will remember.
And as the second full moon draws near, I find myself moving in shadows. I don’t feel at ease anywhere anymore. Not even in my own body. My skin.
It’s not just the sound of the ribbon, or the shifting of the bones on the ridge, it’s a presence I feel hanging over me everywhere I turn. Even the girls, who I thought would be further along by now, still spend most of their time listening to the wind, getting lost in the clouds, speaking of their magic like it’s a living, breathing thing. At first, I thought it was just to please Kiersten, a means of survival, but I’m afraid it goes much deeper than that. Maybe it’s something they don’t even want to give up.
Tonight, as the sun gives way to the moon, a million stars making me feel smaller than a speck of dust, I stand on the perimeter, listening to the incessant scratching noise. It’s so dark I can hardly see a few feet in front of me, but I can’t stop picturing her standing there, the ribbon snared around her neck, grating against the bones of her throat.
“Tierney.” Gertrude nudges me. “They asked you a question.”
I look back to find the entire camp staring at me.
“Well?” Jenna prods. “What are they saying?”
I haven’t spoken of the girl on the ridge yet; maybe it felt too sacred, too real, like it would be a betrayal of some kind. But maybe this is the one secret I don’t have to carry all by myself.
“I don’t know her name,” I reply. “But her bones lie on the highest ridge of the island.” As I turn my back on the woods, the scratching noise seems to grow more insistent … furious, but I don’t let it deter me. “Do you hear that? It’s the sound of the frayed red ribbon coiled around the bones of her throat. She was strangled so violently that her ribbon ripped in two.”
“Maybe she’s trying to find the other half,” Jenna says. “Just like the story of Tahvo.”
“Is that the Viking one?” Lucy asks.
Jenna nods excitedly. “His entire crew turned on him, stabbed him one hundred times before he fell. Instead of burning his flesh, a proper burial for a warrior, they left his bones to rot on a distant shore.” Jenna leans forward, the firelight dancing in her eyes. “But every full moon he rose from the dead to take his revenge. It took him eight years to hunt down every single one of them and their kin. Only then could he earn the pyre that would carry his soul to the heavens.”
I’m trying not to let my imagination get away from me, but what if the dead girl’s own grace year girls did this to her? Maybe she’s looking for revenge. And if she’s bound to the encampment forever … maybe we’re the next best thing.
* * *
As Gertrude and I settle into the larder, sweat soaking through our clothes, she says, “If you won’t keep the door open, you should at least take off your cloak.”
“I’m fine,” I say, pulling it tighter around me.
“If you’re worried about Helen taking it from you—”
“I told you I’m fine,” I say, shorter than I’d like, clutching the hatchet to my chest.
The sound of her skimming her fingers over the healed stubble on the back of her head grates on my nerves.
“You haven’t been drinking from the well, have you?” she asks.
“No.” I look at her sharply. “Of course not.”
“Then what is it … what aren’t you telling me?”
I take in a deep breath. “You know how I talked about the bones on the ridge?”
“That was a really good one tonight. And then when Jenna said the thing about the Viking … I almost believed it—”
“I think it might be real.”
“What?” she asks, trying to hide the goosebumps on her arms.
“The sound I hear in the camp … it’s the same sound I hear when I’m on the ridge … the ribbon scratching against her bones.”
She looks at me for a moment and then bursts out laughing. “Very funny.”
I laugh along with her and then turn on my side so she can’t see the tears in my eyes.
“You’re finally up,” Gertie says, straightening the jars of preserves on the shelf behind her. “I’ve been begging you to keep the door open all summer, and now that it’s finally cooled down you decide to open it?”
“I didn’t,” I say, sitting up, peeling the cloak away from my skin.
“I heard you do it.” She rolls her eyes. “Oh, and nice touch, blowing out the candle, scratching at your ribbon like that. The girls are going to eat that up tonight.”
“What are you talking ab—”
Reaching for the ribbon that was tied around my wrist, I freeze. It’s not there. It’s not in my hair. Panicking, I get on the floor to start looking for it.