The May Queen Murders (15 page)

Papa paced near the gate separating our yard from the road.

Mama came up behind him and rested her hands on his shoulders.

Sheriff dismissed the last of his men and wandered toward my father.

“We’re gonna find this son of a bitch.”

“Why wasn’t this place found before?” Papa took off his glasses

and squeezed the bridge of his nose. “This is first time in twenty-five

years anyone’s found a place where Birch might live. I’m surprised.

Nothing more.”

“The screams, and every once in a while, some hunter stumbles

on a deer carcass that don’t look like anything a coyote would do.

There’s been signs he’s there, Timothy,” Sheriff countered. “Today we

went farther than anyone’s been in those woods for years. Even when

folks go hunting, it ain’t like we gotta go all that far to find deer or

ducks. No one
wants
to go in very far. Everybody knows if you go in

those woods, there’s a chance you ain’t coming out.”

109

Chapter Nine

Terra MacAvoy was a pretty thing, sweet as strawberries,

and gentle, too.

Crowning her May Queen was the right thing to do.

On the first of May, mere days after the discovery of Birch’s forest

lair, each evening haunted by howls from the search dogs, paper

cones filled with flowers were hung on all the doors in Rowan’s Glen.

Ribbons in pale blues, pinks, and yellows twined along the fences,

unfurled in gusting wind. A spring storm was coming.

I didn’t feel any celebration of life, no virtue and fertility in those

bouquets or sprouting from the ground. Fear of death tainted ev-

erything. Tales of Birch Markle walked up the chimneys and crept

through mouse holes in the wal s.

I wore a blue dress of eyelet fabric that had once belonged to Ma-

mie. A woven ivy crown sat upon my head.

Not a queen, a maiden.

I lined up with my parents. Papa’s face was pensive, perhaps because

his frustration was futile — the festivities were proceeding despite

his reservations. Whatever his thoughts, they remained unspoken.

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Mama fussed with my hair and spread the dark locks across my

shoulders while singing in Spanish. Her finger lingered on the acorn

necklace. I undid the cord and placed the necklace in my pocket. I’d

give it to August later.

“You and Heather still won’t speak,” she said.

“She’s Heather. I’m Ivy,” I answered flatly.

In nature, ivy and heather never grew together. They couldn’t be-

cause ivy liked shade, whereas heather required sun. They did better

apart because, side by side, one withered.

The beat of a bass drum, steady and hollow, began down the road

and signaled the procession’s start. Mama scrambled to gather some

long Timothy grass and hand it to my father. She checked over the

white and yellow scarves wrapped around her arms to flow behind

her, light perpetual. More families in costume, everyone from Coy-

ote Jones in an animal pelt to Iris Crenshaw with purple petals paint-

ing her face. The drum’s rhythm was louder, and I bounced in place.

I wanted it over.

The girls my age led the parade, the drummer behind them. They

laughed and scattered flowers. The order of the procession was the

maidens followed by the drummer and the youngest children. Oth-

ers filtered in after, I supposed to keep any rogue children from dart-

ing off. We’d walk forward, some dancing, some skipping, all to the

field where the May Queen waited.

I picked up a willow basket and sifted my fingers through lilies of

the valley and ivy leaves. The flowers were fragrant, the leaves fertile

green with edges so sharp they might cut. Then I fell into the parade,

walking in time with the drum’s beat. Close to me was Violet. Her

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dress was purple with a tiered skirt, and her crown mixed purple

and white violets against velvety leaves. When we were little, Violet

had begged to play with me. But Heather never let me give my atten-

tion to anyone but her. Violet was shy, and Heather was too much to

ignore.

Violet smiled. “Of course Heather was voted May Queen.”

“Was there any doubt?” I mused. “Did you know they couldn’t

vote for me ’cause of my mama?”

“Stupid rules. You think it’ll ever change?” She waved at a pair of

young girls in bunny masks and tossed sachets to them. The girls

scuttled forward to grab the flowers, giggling, excited. Maybe dream-

ing they’d one day be crowned May Queen. They had years to wish

and hope that all the prancing in this parade would be the first of

many to prepare them for the honor. I wondered if they understood

that only one of them would be chosen each year.

“It must be hard to be so close to someone like Heather,” Violet

mused.

“After a while, it’s impossible.”

I laid eyes on a little girl wearing a mask of black feathers with sil-

ver ribbons streaming through the black. Raven, Rook’s little sister.

I waved to her, and my gaze roamed the assembling crowd. I saw a

woman with a black eye mask and striped sleeves down her arms and

another wearing the mask of a fox with a long coat. The animal faces

blurred, the eyes all dark and empty, while human hands clapped.

The catcal s and cheers became a barrage of yelps and howls. A ring

of sweat beaded under my crown.

Then Rook appeared.

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He mounted a fence post high above the road, the stormy sky be-

hind his back. A black cape shaped like wings fluttered, and his face

hid behind a dark-feathered mask that came to a pointed, gray beak.

Beside him, a figure wore a gilded mask of a summer sun — August,

always at his friend’s side.

My neck grew hot, and I halted, nearly tripping Violet, and she

linked our arms to pull me forward. “Keep going, Ivy.”

I couldn’t stop. The crowd fell in place behind the maidens and

the drummer. We reached a clearing, a field unused in years, but

dried pumpkins littered the grounds, musty gray and riddled with

bumps where they rotted. On the side nearest the woods, a man in

a blue cloak and jaybird mask was posted, rifle in hand — Sheriff,

guarding the tree line.

Heather waited in the field near a massive brush pile. Her red,

ruffled skirt billowed out around her. Pink blossoms on a fernlike

crown topped her curls. Pregnant Aunt Rue beamed under the heat

lightning skirting the clouds. Farther back, almost invisible, Mamie

stood. So strange to see her away from her room in the attic, away

from her octagon window where she watched the Glen’s days pass.

I hadn’t expected her to come. Could it be that she’d final y speak?

What would it take to break her quiet? She held a walking staff. The

end was covered with knotted cloth, most likely soaked with moon-

shine, and burned amber flames.

The drumming ceased. Silence. I surveyed the crowd, the animal

masks, and elaborate costumes.

Heather and Mamie joined my aunt. Mamie handed the torch to

Aunt Rue, who passed it to Heather. Applause went up, a roar that

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rattled my skul . Numbness deadened me from my fingers to my

chest, from my toes to my hips, as I watched Heather approach the

brush pile. She was so much like one with the fire while she heaved

the torch onto the leaves with a
whoosh.
Plumes of smoke streamed

toward the sky. The perfume of fire and smoke was so heady, I diz-

zied, tipping backwards until a hand caught between my shoulders.

“Breathe in through your nose, out through your mouth,” my fa-

ther instructed. “It’ll keep you from hyperventilatin’.”

I did as he said, and the brain fog lifted. My bel y stayed queasy,

though I wasn’t convinced that was only smoke.

A sack was near Heather’s feet. The harvest inside was valued

more than all precious metals. It took hours of sifting through re-

mains of last year’s harvest to select the best seeds. Heather plunged

her hand deep into the sack and withdrew a palm filled with these.

She flung out her arm, seeds raining, some picked up by the breeze.

The dirt would find the seeds and drag them into darkness. In time,

they’d sprout. In time, another harvest would come. But some plants

wouldn’t grow, strangled by another’s roots.

Heather was the May Queen. Beautiful, nurturing, simple.

That was the surface. Beneath were secrets and the desperation to

keep them hidden.

"

The songs were old, from the mountains, and smoke muddied the

blue dusk. Amid the banjo and tambourines, the cheer of hillfolk,

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the sun drowsied. A soft voice settled the noise, Heather’s, as her

fingers plucked an acoustic guitar. I leaned against a maple tree and

closed my eyes. I couldn’t stop hearing her.

“
Down in a wil ow garden . . .”

My ivy crown itched, and I reached up to yank it away.

“
My true love and me did meet . . .”

I ringed the crown around my forearm and spun it until some ivy

split free and drifted to the grass.

“
There we sat a-courtin’ . . . My true love dropped off to sleep.
”

Empty bottles of wine stacked up. The music and dancing con-

tinued, so much dancing. Rook busied himself entertaining Raven

and the little ones by being a horse for them to ride. Small girls wove

ribbons around the maypole with Heather and Violet leading them,

everyone prancing and laughing.

I was apart from it. Not sure where I belonged or wanted to be.

I gave a halfhearted wave to Heather accepting embraces and kiss-

kisses on her cheeks. Her gaze flicked my way, then a jut of her chin

and a spin away. Her skirt rose and fel , the curls in her hair rose and

fel , and inside, I fel .

My father stayed back from the hillfolk, and I spotted him with

Sheriff at the perimeter. I slipped between the crowd where Violet

twirled between August and Jasper Denial until I was away from the

celebration. I crouched near a trellis that’d eventual y support sugar

snap peas if the dead vines wrapping it were any indication.

“They best not’ve made those bonfires outta peach wood,” Papa

said.

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Sheriff twisted around from his post and tipped his head. “I saw

Mamie pickin’ over the fire piles at dawn, throwin’ out any cursed

wood. She carried it to the river for cleansing.”

“You see anything out there, Jay?”

“Sun ain’t even full set. Woods are wide.”

Papa rocked on his heels and scanned the trees, I suspected, for a

shift in shadows, a crack of a twig, anything strange. “Some folks are

sayin’ this is foolery.”

“That’s the wine talkin’. They’re too relaxed and lettin’ down their

guard,” Sheriff replied. “You know, Timothy, this is my job. You try

and enjoy May Day.”

My father gave Sheriff a pointed look. “Ain’t gonna happen.”

Sheriff clapped Papa on the shoulder. Something unspoken float-

ed between them, an ether of memory.

A bellow rose up from the woods across the river, beginning low

in pitch, then rising to
yip, yip, yip.
It cackled and screamed, a mad-

man’s cal . The echo chased shivers down my back and arms, my

fingers gripping the trellis tighter.

The celebration silenced. The dancing stilled. Only the spit and

crackle of bonfires and whipping flames broke the paralysis. Sheriff

took his lantern off his post and held it up to shine across the river.

“Some loons, Jay!” someone yelled.

Another dissenter joined in. “And a turkey!”

There was laughter from some gathered, while others shifted and

pulled together. It was birds, but what had sent them calling? No one

knew what to believe. Who to trust. It was a bad root that spread

infection beneath the earth.

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“What’re you doin’?”

I pivoted to find Violet breathless from dancing. In one hand, she

clutched a bottle of blueberry wine, burgundy liquid rolling around

inside. She pushed in against the trellis.

“Trying to find somewhere quiet,” I explained.

She took a good look at Papa and Sheriff. She smelled of sweet

wine. “My mama says Birch Markle is real. She remembers when

he killed that girl. Now those dogs and Rook’s horse . . . Someone’s