Autumn Thorns (5 page)

Ivy let out a slow sigh as she sat back. “If you find it, I want you to keep it, because it will have meant that he actually got a chance to give it to Tamil. Duvall never let me talk to her again after the news came out. The ring was a rose gold filigree setting, with a half-carat diamond in the center. My father had it made for my mother when they got engaged.”

I nodded. Not sure what else to say—I felt as wrung out as a limp, wet towel—I leaned back against the sofa and glanced over at Oriel and Ellia. Both had somber looks on their faces.

“So, where should I start?”

Ellia stood. “I suppose we can start by going out to the cemetery . . . let you get a feel for what's going on and what is to come. That seems the best plan. You've been gone so long, I don't know how much you remember from your time here.” She motioned to the others. “Do you all want to come? It's not necessary, not tonight, but you're welcome if you do. I'll take my violin and play for the dead for a while.”

“Don't take her to the Pest House graveyard, though. Even
your
music can't calm the spirits who walk there, Ellia. And we're heading into a new moon—the dead love this time of the month.” Oriel opened her bag and pulled out a pendant on a chain. She handed it to me. “Here, this was your grandmother's. I took it from her body for safekeeping till you came home. You'll need it. Wear it at all times, even in the shower. It has been charmed to help protect you.”

The pendant weighed heavy in my hands. A silver five-pointed star in a circle, it hung on a chain that also looked to be silver.
A pentacle.
But atop the pentacle rested a skull. Not a screaming, Halloween skull, but a somber skull, carved from crystal, affixed firmly to the metal.

“Magical, isn't it?” A vague memory stirred—I remembered seeing Grandma Lila wear it, though she usually kept it beneath her shirt or dress.

Oriel laughed and the room lightened with her cheer. “Dear Kerris, it's
all
magic, isn't it? The world is a magical place, if people only were to open their eyes. Except the clouded can't always feel it surrounding them, so they think it doesn't exist. Magic runs through these ancient woods. The rain forest is primeval, so deep and thick that you'd have to be blind to not know it was here. Now put on your pendant, then Ellia will show you the graveyard, and you will begin to understand why we need you so very much.”

With that, she and Ivy headed for the door. I asked Ivy if I could come over later in the week—get to know her
better—and she said yes before she and Oriel left. Alone in the hallway with Ellia, I shrugged into my jacket and slung my purse over my shoulder. Ellia opened the hall closet and withdrew her violin case. She settled a long cloak around her shoulders, fastening it with a Celtic knotwork brooch. With her long skirts and flowing gray-streaked hair, she looked like she'd stepped right out of the pages of some historical romance.

“Do you remember the rules?” she asked me.

I nodded. Once you had lived in Whisper Hollow, you never forgot the rules. In fact, they were printed on a sign at the entrance to the town.

“Recite them, then.”

I let out a slow breath. “Okay . . .” I felt like I was in grade school again. We had recited them every day, a lot like the Pledge of Allegiance.

“One. If you hear someone call your name from the forest, don't answer.

“Two. Never interrupt Ellia when she's playing to the dead.

“Three. If you see the Girl in the Window, set your affairs in order.

“Four. Try not to end up in the hospital.

“Five. If the Crow Man summons you, follow him.

“Six. Remember: Sometimes the foul are actually fair.

“Seven. And most important: Don't drive down by the lake at night.”

Ellia nodded. “You remember. Good. All right then, put on your necklace and let's head to the cemetery. It's time you met the dead.”

T
he cemetery wasn't far from Ellia's house, or my own. It suddenly occurred to me that the fact that we both lived near it was most likely more than by accident. Ellia rode with me. She lived close enough to walk home if she wanted to, though I told her I would happily give her a ride if need be. The thought of her prowling through the streets after dark didn't set well with me. Not in Whisper Hollow.

The cemetery was on the appropriately named Cemetery Avenue, at the end of an L-shaped intersection that connected with Bramblewood Way, the road running past my house. In turn, Bramblewood Way bordered Bramblewood Thicket, a dense patch of forest on the western side of Whisper Hollow that was rumored to be home to a spirit called the Grey Man. It was also the home to the Tree of Skulls, a very gruesome little patch of woods.

The fog was rising as we pulled into the circular parking lot. Here, you could either park and walk into the gated graveyard or take a narrow access road to reach the areas farthest away. Ellia directed me to drive down the access road until we were overlooking the shore of Lake Crescent,
where we turned right and followed the narrow street to the end of the marked graves. I parked in a small turnoff and killed the ignition.

“Who's the undertaker now?” The undertaker was also the caretaker of the cemetery. When I had been young, a very old man had been in charge of the dead, but I couldn't remember his name and he had no doubt died during the intervening years.

“Jonah Westwood, the nephew of old Elijah. You probably remember Elijah as the undertaker. He held the job for sixty years. About seven years back, he died and his nephew moved to Whisper Hollow and took over.” She paused, then added, “I played for Elijah, and Penelope had an easy time escorting him through to the Veil. He deserved to rest after giving so many years of service to the dead. His nephew is an odd duck, though. We have to work together, but I steer clear of him during the rest of the time.”

That didn't sound promising. “What's the matter with him?”

She shook her head. “Just a feeling. I'm not sure, to be honest. Maybe nothing, but I'll tell you this: I hope, by the time it's
my
turn to leave this world, that he's not the one presiding over my interment.”

“Well, that makes me feel
ever so
much better.” Laughing softly, I locked the car and followed her down one of the narrow walkways. The air was damp, and even my jacket couldn't keep the moisture from seeping into my lungs. Unlike in graveyards in other towns, families didn't come to the cemetery to picnic, and most of the teenagers stayed away, saving their dares for other, safer areas.

One glance at the headstones and a barrage of whispering hit me. Shadows—misty forms—were moving through the graveyard. I caught them out of the corner of my eye, watching as they moved and swirled in the damp night air.

“What's stirring them up? I don't remember things being this uneasy when I left.”

Ellia started to say something, then shook her head. “I can't tell you . . . not yet. I think I know, but I'd rather be certain
before saying anything. Maybe they sense that Lila died and the town's been without a spirit shaman for a week or so. A few of the rites and rituals haven't been performed like they're supposed to be. But to be honest? Something else is going on.” She paused, then let out a long breath. “What I will say is this: There's a force moving against the town. The signs are all there, and the Crow Man has been calling those of us with power. The Walker in the Woods has been spotted five times in the past two months. The Girl in the Window appeared to Douglas McPhearson and he died the next week. And the Lady's appetite is growing.”

I grimaced. Those were signs, all right, and not good omens. “Do you think it's out of the forest, or pulled in by the town itself?”

The Hoh rain forest held its own spirits—Sasquatch, for one, and a number of other creatures out of Native American lore. They were real, never let anybody tell you otherwise, but they bordered the edge of my work with the dead, and while I knew about them and had seen evidence of their existence, I tried to steer clear because spirit shamans weren't geared toward dealing with elementals out of their world.

“Oh, Sasquatch is around and active lately, but I don't think he has anything to do with whatever's going on. Though a hunter was attacked three months ago up on Timber Peak. A handful of mutilated deer have been found, so yes, he's awake.” She stopped along the path, pointing toward a pair of graves. They looked well established. “Watch.”

“What are we looking at—” I started to ask but quieted down when two figures shimmered fully into sight next to the graves. A man and woman—teenagers, actually—appeared, facing each other. The girl was wearing an A-line skirt and a blouse, a sweater tied around her shoulders. Her hair was pulled back in a tight, bouncy ponytail and she had on loafers. The boy wore a leather jacket and skinny blue jeans. His hair was slicked back. Both looked soaking wet, and their faces were bruised so badly it was hard to tell what they had looked like when they were alive. I thought I could
hear a song playing in the background. I strained to hear what it was, and the whispers of Fats Domino's “I Want To Walk You Home” echoed from around them.

The boy reached out his hand and the girl took it, bringing it to her lips where she kissed it. Then, her eyes burning fiery red, she glanced over at us and laughed. The boy let out a snort, they stood, and then—in a blur of speed—they were standing directly in front of us, defiant grins on their faces. They gave Ellia the once-over, then turned to me.

I stared coolly at them, though inside my stomach was churning. Were they simply Haunts, out to cause havoc? Or were they Unliving, in which case we were in serious trouble? The girl met my gaze.

Without thinking, I reached up to clasp the pendant Oriel had given me with my left hand, then focused my energy and plunged my right fist into the girl's misty form. “Don't even think about it!” It felt like I had rammed my hand into an ice bath. I grinned, pleased to see I still had what it took. I'd used the maneuver on a few frisky spirits in Seattle, and it worked ten times better than the rituals I'd read about in books.

The girl shrieked and stumbled back. The boy hissed at me, his eyes narrowing, but he, too, cautiously stepped back. They stared at me for another moment, then, huffing like spoiled brats, joined hands and—in a blur—they were gone, racing out of the cemetery so fast I could barely follow their movements.

I let out a long sigh. “Well, that was special. I gather they're out to wreak some havoc.”

Ellia snorted. “You think so? Well, you certainly ticked them off. What did you do? I never saw Lila do that.”

“Yeah, they didn't look overjoyed, did they? That's a technique I developed to deal with spirits who like to get too touchy-feely. It's kind of like . . . think of using your energy like an electronic bug zapper. I assume that pair are Haunts? It works on Haunts the best. And Joanie and Chachi don't seem to have enough strength to classify them as members of the Unliving.”

She shook her head. “Thankfully, no, they aren't Unliving.
That pair has been stirring up trouble for a while now. Lila and I were having trouble with them before she passed. Kerris, your grandmother was the most powerful spirit shaman I've ever met, but . . . she couldn't drive them back across the Veil. The ley lines are active, and the dead are restless.”

I nodded slowly. If Grandma Lila had been having trouble corralling them, then I was in for one hell of a ride. But what I had done to the girl wasn't exactly textbook, nor was it easy, and it shocked me just about as much as it shocked the ghost. I had some other tricks up my sleeve, so maybe they wouldn't be prepared for me next time, either. “I'm glad I decided to try that out. At least we know it works. I wasn't sure what part of my repertoire would actually be viable here, but I suppose ghosts are ghosts, the world 'round.”

“Blood wins out. Spirit shamans are born to interact with the dead—and to destroy them, when necessary. You come from a long line of women who walk between the worlds. It's your birthright. Spirit shamans affect the ghosts—all varieties—in ways that
no one
else can. Not lament singers, not witches, not necromancers. And I don't think it's so much the precise rituals that matter, but the energy you put behind it. But as to
what
it was you did to them, besides tick them off, I'm not certain.”

“Yeah . . . well, usually that tends to send spirits running for cover, but I think I just gave them a nasty shock and pissed them off. So, what are we going to do about those two? Who are they? Unless ghosts have a retro fashion sense, they didn't exactly look freshly buried.”

Ellia let out a little laugh. “You're very observant. And correct. That pair . . . when they were alive, they were Betty Jean Daniels and Tommy Freeman. They went to high school in the 1950s, they were a few years behind Lila and Ivy and me. Betty was the daughter of one of the town bankers, and Tommy . . . he was just trouble. They took up together and he brought out her inner Bonnie to his Clyde.”

“What happened to them? Did they die at the same time?”

She jerked her head toward the lake. “1960 . . . they were headed out to her grandma's one frosty November evening.
Rumor has it they were on their way to steal her money. Before they could get there, the Lady took them. Car skidded off the road. Witnesses said that for once, they were actually driving the speed limit, not speeding. It was chilly but the road was dry. One moment they were on the road, the next, they broke through the guardrail and went into the lake. The car sank so deep they never recovered it—or the bodies.” She paused.

I closed my eyes, thinking about my grandparents. About the Lady, dragging them down to drown in her icy arms. A slow burn rose in my heart and I sucked in a deep breath, trying to shake off the mix of emotions. Because as angry as I was that the lake had claimed Lila, the truth was—you live in Whisper Hollow, and you had to accept that there was always the chance that she would drag you down.

“What did the cops say?”

“Not much. You know how it goes here. They officially listed it as a murder-suicide, but everybody knew the truth.”

I stared at the gravestones. Empty graves, then. But you couldn't very well stick a headstone on the surface of the lake. “So they're still out there . . . whatever might be left of them.”

“Along with who knows how many other souls. Along with your grandfather.” Ellia shook her head softly as she rested her hand on my arm. “At least the Lady had the respect to give you back your grandmother's body. But here's the thing: Tommy and Betty? Not once have they ever walked . . . not before the past few months. I played for them at their funeral, and they were at rest. I was younger then, but I was more than able to work with your great-grandmother. Betty and Tommy started rising about three months back, and nothing Lila and I could do would send them back to the Veil, back to Penelope. When you think about it, they should have long gone through the Veil itself and moved on, so even there—something is amiss. Regardless of why, we need to banish them before they take it into their heads to unleash their anger on the town, because after all these years, they're
still a volatile pair. Whatever they learned after their death, well, if it was any good, it sure didn't return with them.”

“So you and Lila tried to send them back?”

She nodded. “Several times. I've played over their graves twice a week since they were first spotted, but it doesn't seem to do any good. And the magic Lila used . . . something was countering it, Kerris.
Someone.
” She stared down at the violin case. “At first, I was worried that I was losing my touch. That it was time to train someone new.”

I nodded, cautiously sitting on one of the gravestones. “That's not it, though, is it? Ellia, you've been playing for the dead since long before I was born. You won't lose your touch till you cross over.”

She smiled, then. “Thank you. Yes, I have the gift and it will stay with me till the end. And you're right—I may be seventy-five, but I still have a lot of good years in me. My family is . . . long lived.” Squinting, she scanned the graveyard. “Without your grandmother, it's only going to get worse. We need you to take over immediately, and then we need to sort out what's infiltrating the town before . . .”

She gazed off toward the lake, her voice falling silent. The wind swept through and sent a cold line of fear down my back. There was something riding it, some night hag laughing in her joy. The bare branches gleamed against the dim lights of the cemetery as smoke from the chimneys of the town drifted past, a pale hex against the cold chill of the autumn night.

Ellia shivered and rubbed her hands together, slowly pulling off her gloves. “There's not much more we can do tonight. I'll walk home after I play a few songs to try to quiet the evening. You go ahead and head out.”