By These Ten Bones (10 page)

Maddie didn't realize she was crying until she was back outside the castle. She stood in the rain by the loch shore and cried and cried, and she didn't care that the men were watching.

Father Mac stayed that night down by the Hole. Black Ewan was keeping watch, and he complained about it.

“Stop singing songs!” he said irritably. “You sound like a catfight, and I don't see what that has to do with preparing a soul for death.”

“Ah, lad,” rumbled the big priest cheerfully, “just you hope there's someone to sing with you when your time comes.”

Early next morning, the townspeople gathered outside the castle. The older ones remembered the dawn executions of former years, when their chief had lived there with his family and warriors. Maddie was too young. She didn't remember the busy times, when the castle was a place of power. She knew only the quiet little settlement that had remained when the fight for the land was over.

Black Ewan went into the castle with his three farmhands while the quiet crowd waited outside. They heard the grinding and clanking of the trapdoor and then indistinct voices within. After a time, the farmer reappeared, his execution finished. His men dragged the body of Ned out behind him.

Father Mac emerged, too, and he walked over to Maddie and her parents.

“He made a good end,” said the priest in a low voice. “He confessed his sins and had the Last Rites of the Church. That's something to think of, young Madeleine. The best thing we can do in life is be ready for our own death.”

Maddie wasn't listening to this consoling speech. She was staring at the castle doorway. A wide track of blood crossed the stone threshold. It matched the brown smear she had seen in her dream.

“Hey, now!” called out the priest. “That's not necessary!”

At work over the sprawled body, Black Ewan didn't reply. He was hacking the head off the old Traveler. Horse and Gillies brought up a long ladder and leaned it against the castle where a thick beam jutted from the wall overhead. The farmer tied a knot in Ned's greasy gray hair, climbed the rungs, and hung the head from a hook on the bottom of the beam.

“I protest!” said Father Mac indignantly. “This isn't a legal execution, and we don't need that kind of pagan display.”

Black Ewan climbed back down the ladder and looked up to study his handiwork. What the head meant to him he couldn't exactly say, but he felt a deep satisfaction at the sight. His distant ancestors had returned from battle with such heads slung about their necks and belts, convinced that they owned the souls of those dead enemies.

Mouth and eyes open, the head of the old man stared vacantly out over the crowd. It swayed in the breeze and turned a little, hanging from its knotted hair. Blood rimmed the dark neck and dripped sluggishly to the ground. Watching those drops soak into the earth, Maddie felt decidedly ill. Whenever they passed that place, the townspeople scuffed a cross into the dirt with a toe. She herself had done it since she was a small child. Now she finally understood the reason. Human blood fell there and had fallen there many, many times before. As long as the castle had stood, heads had hung from that beam and dripped onto the cross-marked ground.

A loud cry rose from behind them, like the bellow of a cow that had lost her calf. The whole crowd turned around to see. Mad Angus shuffled forward, bleating and wailing. Tears ran into the madman's filthy beard as he lifted the corpse of his comrade in chains. He sank down onto the ground to cradle it, howling with grief.

There, you see what you've done with your meddling, thought Maddie angrily. She looked around for Black Ewan, but the farmer was already walking away with his men. Father Mac stepped forward instead.

“Come along, Angus,” he said to the weeping giant. “Let's get him buried as well as we can.”

While the rest of the town followed their priest away to the churchyard, Paul returned to Maddie's house. She lingered outside to wait for him. The young man emerged carrying a sack and a small carving of the Madonna.

“You'll give this to your mother for me, won't you?” he asked, handing the carving to her.

“You're leaving!” she gasped. He didn't answer. Instead, he walked away. Maddie hurried after him.

“But you can't leave!” she cried as they reached the path that ran along the loch shore. “Ma will be so upset, you not saying good-bye, and we haven't buried Ned yet, you should stay to pray for him.”

Paul didn't slow down. “I don't think my prayers would help any,” he said. “You do it for me, Madeleine. You're better at it than I am.”

“You can't go,” she repeated desperately as they came to the rotten stump. “You know you can't! You need my help—for the next time.”

The young wood-carver stopped and looked around carefully before he looked at her.

“I'll be as far from here as I can be before the next time,” he said. “Don't worry. I'll manage it somehow. Maybe I'll take a boat out onto the water, or maybe out to sea. I don't think I could get out of one when I'm changed.”

“You'll drown, surely,” she protested.

“That's no loss,” he replied.

“When will you come back?” Maddie demanded.

The young man looked at the high hills across the loch. They were starting to turn golden and tan in the frosty nights.

“I won't ever come back here,” he answered.

Maddie took a deep breath. “Then I'm coming with you.”

Paul actually hesitated. Then his face grew grim. “That would be a fine return I'd make for all your parents' kindness.”

“But I promised Ned!” she exclaimed in distress. “I have to look after you.” This was such a stupid thing to say to a grown man that Maddie blushed deeply, but the carver's face softened as he looked down at hers.

“I'd like that,” he admitted quietly. “I wish you could have. If things had only been different.”

“If things had been different,” she echoed miserably, staring at the ground.

“Good-bye, Madeleine. I'll not forget you.”

Maddie didn't know what to say. “Good-bye, Paul,” she whispered.

“And you'll be careful for my sake?” he asked earnestly. “On the full-moon nights? And sometimes, when you're praying for Ned, maybe you could pray for me.”

Maddie nodded, and Paul walked off down the path by the shore of the quiet loch. She stood and watched him until he was out of sight. Then, dull and dreary with grief, she went home to tell her mother.

Fair Sarah took the news very hard and shed tears over her poor boy. She fretted and worried that night as stars shone down in the black sky and bitter frost gripped the empty fields. He still wasn't well. He wasn't strong. Where would he go in such weather, and with hardly a blanket to cover him?

Maddie's own sorrow left her bad-tempered and out of sorts. Many times a day, as she was doing her chores, she looked for Paul and missed him. Somehow, he would try to manage his ghastly illness without her. Somewhere as far from her as he could possibly be.

As the next few days passed, her mood didn't lighten. She should at least feel glad that the town was free of that hellish creature, the shadow that lived inside Paul, but as she ran her errands, she couldn't help seeing the dark brown smear across the castle doorway. It had appeared right out of her nightmare, like a promise of evil to come.

The old Traveler made things far worse for the girl. His head still dangled from the castle beam, and no predators came near it. It exerted an influence that Maddie could feel even from far away, a raising of the hair on the back of her neck and a prickling along her skin. It seemed to be watching her. Wherever she went, she could feel the force of that gaze, and she couldn't stop herself from looking back. And every time she looked, no matter where she was standing, the head was facing her.

“It's just my fancy,” decided the girl, with an attempt at her habitual good sense. “The wind shakes the dead thing around, that's all, and I happen to look up at the wrong moment.”

Stopping on the loch shore, she deliberately stared at the head, hanging from its long hair, and received in return the full force of those sunken, opaque eyes. She walked past it over to the path through the bog, watching all the while. The head swiveled slowly as she went by.

Terrified, Maddie raced up the path to the houses and threw herself into a group of startled townspeople. Father Mac was there, and she caught him by the hands.

“The Traveler's head is watching me, Father!” she sobbed to the priest. “It never lets me out of its sight!”

Father Mac immediately stormed off to find Black Ewan. “Get that head down from there so we can bury it properly!” he ordered. “It's doing the devil's work.”

The next morning, Fair Sarah reached into the salt box and found it empty. “Maddie, do you go down to the salt barrel in the castle and fill this up again.”

The girl started off with a willing spirit down the path through the bog. She slowed as she reached the castle doorway. No creature screamed from within the gloomy space, but there was the brown stain across the stone step where Ned had been dragged out, and there in the dust was a cross where his blood had fallen. Above was the hook where his head had hung. She glanced up at the beam.

A force seemed to strike her and run through her, setting the blood singing in her ears. The head still dangled from the beam. It wasn't gone after all. It didn't look like it had before. It looked very much alive. It gazed down at her with those faded blue eyes, and it wore a broad grin.

Maddie couldn't move. She felt as if she were floating. “You aren't supposed to be here,” she whispered to the head. “You're supposed to be gone from here.”

The Traveler's head seemed to be listening. It looked as if it could speak. It grinned cheerfully down at her and gave a conspiratorial wink.

With a shriek, Maddie turned and ran down the shoreline away from the ghastly thing. She found Little Ian mending sails beside his boat and collapsed next to him, hiding behind the keel.

“The Traveler's head!” she exclaimed when she could talk. “It looked at me again!”

Little Ian pulled the yarn through his torn sail and glanced up at the castle critically. “That old thing was buried yesterday,” he said.

Maddie sat trembling, thinking about this. “That's just what I told it,” she answered. Cautiously, she raised herself until she could see the castle beam. Nothing hung there now.

“I'm telling you, it was there!” she declared breathlessly, sitting back down. “I saw it just like I'm seeing you.”

“I'm not saying you didn't,” remarked Little Ian calmly. “Don't be so upset. Heads, now, they're not such a bad thing. It's good luck to have a head about.”

Maddie rubbed her hands together to stop their shaking. “It is?” she ventured faintly.

“Oh, aye,” said the fisherman, a gleam in his dark little eyes. “A head looks after a place. It guards it, you might say. And don't forget, that old man's the Churchyard Watcher till someone else gets buried. He has a job to do, for once in his life.”

Maddie remembered the stories about the Churchyard Watcher. When someone died, his soul stayed in the churchyard to guard it until he could call his replacement, the next one to die. If no one died for a long time, people felt sorry for the last one buried, who had to keep such a long watch before going off to his reward.

“Did he say anything?” Little Ian wanted to know. “They say heads can be powerfully wise.”

“No. He looked like he might, but he just grinned and winked.”

Little Ian grew glum and put down his needle. “Well, that's a bad thing,” he sighed. “There's only one reason that lazy criminal would be so pleased, and that's because his time as Watcher is already up. There's going to be a death soon.”

“Then I'll be next!” gasped Maddie. “Why else would he show himself to me?”

“Now, I'm not so sure of that,” mused Little Ian, looking at her thoughtfully. “They do say the Watcher is supposed to tap you on the shoulder if you're next. Of course,” he added reluctantly, “a foreigner like him might not know the right way to go about it.”

Forgetting her mother's salt box by the shore, Maddie ran to find Father Mac. He was standing on the low step of the stone church, looking out over his little domain. Torn racks of clouds huddled over the town, and the blue-gray smoke percolating out of the humped houses drifted up to join them. “The weather's breaking up,” announced the big priest cheerfully. “We'll have a fine, warm day for this time of year.”

“Father, I'm going to die!” said Maddie. “I need the Last Rites of the Church.”

The priest listened to her story about the head and its unwelcome interest. “By rights, he ought to tap me on the shoulder,” she concluded anxiously. “But Little Ian says maybe he doesn't know that since he's ignorant of our ways.”

Father Mac peered thoughtfully up at the tattered clouds. “I don't know everything about the world,” he remarked, “but I do know that no one stays behind in the churchyard after he dies. We go before God to be judged as soon as our souls leave our bodies. It's the demons that try to keep these old notions alive. There's been evil here, and strange doings lately. I think the demons are playing tricks.”

“You mean a demon grinned at me?” she demanded. “But surely that's even worse!” She had had a certain amount of experience recently with such creatures, and she could imagine what would make a demon look pleased.

“I'm just saying that we don't know what it means,” countered Father Mac. “Maybe it's only trying to scare you. I'll come bless the place and exorcise the demon, and I'll give you my blessing, too. But I certainly don't think you need the Last Rites.” He went into the church and returned with his book, a candle, and a flask of holy water.

“Do you see that?” he demanded triumphantly, pointing at the clouds with one thick finger. “There's the very first patch of blue sky. You watch, young Madeleine, we'll have clear skies today, and a fine view of the full moon tonight.”

“Tonight's the full moon!” breathed Maddie in horror. “Oh, no! I am going to die!”

All day long, as the weather turned warm and the clouds broke up, Maddie thought about the full moon. Be careful, Paul had said. And the old Traveler, giving her that friendly wink, as if they had shared a joke. You know what's going to happen, the head had told her.

Maddie looked down at the lengthening shadows, remembering the black thing before her door. Out of the whole town of people, it had come to kill her. Maybe she wasn't supposed to be the next Churchyard Watcher. Then again, maybe she was. She had little chance against demons and shadows, but she could do one thing. When they came looking for her, she could make herself a little harder to find.

“Bess,” she said to her cousin, “let's stay in the barn tonight.”

Bess was wild at the idea of getting out of her crowded house. The proper permissions were quickly sought and given. Dusk fell, and their chores were over. They unlatched one wickerwork door of the grain barn and pulled it shut behind them.

The barn was made of lattice panels on three sides. Maddie had chosen it for her hiding place because she could see anything that was coming and because it had two doors. It was stuffed full of oat straw left over from the threshing. The girls made cozy nests for themselves, disrupting several families of mice that had done the same, and settled down to an evening of gossip.

“I brought a sieve,” announced Bess, “so we can tell our fortunes.”

“Father Mac says that's nonsense,” observed Maddie.

“Old Peggy told me she did it, and she saw her future husband first thing in the morning.” Bess giggled. “He'd been waiting all night by the door because she told him she was trying the sieve.”

When the moon rose and the time was right, Bess produced that object and chanted over it the rhyme that promised her a sight of the man she would marry. “Now you do it,” she directed, passing the sieve to Maddie.

“I don't want to,” replied the girl. Father Mac frowned on such things, so it might jeopardize her soul. She wanted to be prepared for death if it came that night. Besides, she had become pessimistic recently on the subject of marriage.

“Oh, please,” begged her cousin. “I want to see what happens. I've always wondered if it would really work.”

“How is it supposed to work?” demanded Maddie reasonably. “We're both right here, so we'll see the same man first thing in the morning. We can't both marry the same man, can we? Father Mac would knock our heads together.”

“We'll have a footrace, and whoever tags him first gets him,” proposed Bess. “I always could run faster than you.”

Maddie sighed and worked the little charm, sieving three sieves full of nothing. “I did it,” she grumbled, passing it back. “But I didn't want to.”

“Now, you have to tell me faithfully who you see first in the morning,” said her cousin. “No matter how awful it is. Maybe it'll be Black Ewan. He's never been married, you know.”

“Ugh,” muttered Maddie. “I'd not marry him.” She remembered the farmer washing old Ned's blood from his hands.

“I hope I see Thomas,” said Bess dreamily, combing out her black hair and peering through the latticework wall to watch the rising moon. “Last year he was just bones, but not anymore.”

“He's looked worse,” agreed Maddie, watching her. She had always admired Bess's hair.

“I'm thinking Gillies has his eye on you,” Bess continued. “And him such a good worker, he could have a house of his own if he wanted.”

Maddie sighed, braiding her hair to keep it from tangling while she slept.

Bess turned to look at her, black stripes falling across her face as the moon rose on the other side of the wickerwork. “I'm thinking you lost your heart to that carver boy,” she remarked critically. “He's worked a spell over you.”

“He has,” agreed Maddie unhappily. “It's a shame I couldn't return the favor.”

She fell asleep at last, watching the bright clouds through the wickerwork and wondering where Paul was. When she woke up, she knew where he was: standing outside in the moonlight. He had come back to her. But he hadn't come back as Paul.