Thornghost (4 page)

I
t turned out that Grandma Alma wanted Niklas for chopping wood, and fetching potatoes from the cellar, and peeling them after, and cleaning the oven while they boiled. Obviously he wasn't done making amends for letting the sheep out. Niklas didn't mind the work. He felt terrible about the death of Rag, too, so he fetched, chopped, peeled, and scrubbed until his arms ached. He had just come back from emptying a bucket of slop out back, when he heard something strange in the bird room. One sound that was always there had disappeared, replaced by another sound that did not belong.

The missing sound was the birds.

In Willodale, people thought caring for wild birds brought luck, so all farms had feeders. Birdhouses, they called them, because they usually looked like miniature farm buildings. But the Summerhill birdhouse, fastened
outside the eastern window of the bird room, was not just a house. It had spires and buttresses, a drawbridge and a tall, domed tower. It was no less than a bird castle, made by an unknown master carver.

All day, the castle teemed with sparrows and finches that nibbled at crumbs and pecked at the panes when they wanted more, so the bird room always rang with chirps and flutters.

But not now. The birds had gone quiet, and instead the sound that did not belong came floating out from behind the closed door.

A violin.

There had been no music in this house since his mother died.

Niklas opened the door carefully so it wouldn't creak. The music streamed through the sunlit room, sweet and melancholy. Outside, the birds sat quietly in their castle, one eye turned.

Uncle Anders stood in the middle of the floor, oblivious to the spilled water and broken glass around his feet. He hugged the black cup of the violin hard, and his usual remote expression had given way to a mask of squeeze-lidded pain. His dark sobs wove through the music as he played.

A coldness turned in Niklas's stomach. He hadn't seen his uncle this distressed in years. After Erika died, this was his usual way, but with time, the sadness had mostly
sunk back into his body. It only welled up if something particular caught him in the heart. Could he have heard Mr. Molyk's fiddler remark? Niklas was just about to slip away to get Grandma Alma, when Uncle Anders let his bow sink, opened his eyes, and looked straight at him. “Your mother used to sing you that song.”

Niklas froze. Whenever he asked about his mother, he got the same stories, as flat as the small stack of photos that existed of her. If he wanted more, a wall of silence always went up. But here was something new. A crack in that wall. Niklas couldn't help but poke at it, even if it might make his uncle's sadness worse. He tried to put on a bright face. “She did?”

“A lullaby. Made it herself.” Uncle Anders played another verse of the slow, twisting tune, watching Niklas closely. “I thought you might remember. She wrote words, too, but I've lost them.”

The music seemed too mournful for a lullaby, Niklas thought. Had he heard it before? Was that why his throat felt itchy? He tried to bring the memory out from hiding, but he couldn't. “No, I don't remember. Sorry.”

His uncle set the violin gently down on the table and rubbed his cheek. “We made a tape once, but I don't know where she put it, or if it even still exists.”

“What is the song about?” Niklas's words rushed out a little too quickly.

“Only Erika could tell you that,” Uncle Anders said.

That much Niklas knew already. His mother was all secrets and broken pieces. He had long since given up on fitting them together: The Willodalers' hints about her illness and dark twist. His mother showing him how to string bird bones. His mother dying in her bed. The nightmare.

He tried to swallow, but the itching had gotten worse. The music still turned in his head, no comfort at all. “You always say that. But it's a little too late for that now.”

“I suppose that's true.” Uncle Anders's gaze seemed heavier than usual. Warmer and more present. His head jerked in an odd mix between a tilt and a nod. “Did she ever tell you about Sebastifer?”

Niklas blinked. If his mother had secrets, his father was the best kept among them. Grandma Alma said no one but Erika knew anything about him, except that he had left the valley before Niklas was born. There were no photos, no stories, no sign that he had ever existed. Not even a name. “Is Sebastifer . . . ? Was he my . . . ?”

“He was her dog.”

The surprise almost drowned out the disappointment. “My mother had a dog?”

“When she was your age. She rescued him when he was little. Sebastifer was the result of the Molyk dog and the Ottem dog both escaping at a very inconvenient time. Wasn't exactly a welcome pup, and wasn't staying long, either, if you see what I mean.”

Niklas thought he did, and it made him curl his fists.

“Erika wouldn't have it,” Uncle Anders said. “She stomped down to the Molyk farm and declared that she was taking the pup to Summerhill.” A smirk crinkled his cheeks. “She was only nine, but so determined, even Old Molyk gave in without so much as a word. She carried Sebastifer home in triumph, with me and Peder trailing her up the hill. After that we would follow her anywhere. Not just Sebastifer, but us boys, too.”

“You mean you and Peder Molyk?” It had never occurred to Niklas to wonder what his mother was like as a kid, let alone that she could be someone Mr. Molyk would want to follow. She almost sounded like a hero. “You were all
friends?
”

“Oh yes. Peder was the one who told Erika what his father was about to do.” Anders plucked the strings of his violin. “Sebastifer was such a good dog. A real mutt, of course, part collie, part retriever. So Erika, being Erika, gave him a jumble of names.”

He laughed, and he was right. That name did sound like a joke. Niklas frowned. Except for the time with the skull, his mother never smiled in his memories. The closest she came was a faint quirk of the lip in some of the early photos.

“She didn't used to be so serious, you know.” Uncle Anders wiped his nose. “Not before the thing.”

“Before she got sick, you mean.”

“Oh no, long before that.” Uncle Anders's sad mask returned. “When she almost died. The summer we were twelve.”

Niklas was too stunned to think of a reply.

But Uncle Anders didn't need prodding anymore. He turned away, toward the path that cut up the mountainside, and when he continued his tale, his voice was half whisper. “We tried to cross Sorrowdeep at night, Peder, Erika, and me. Up to no good as usual. But the boat foundered and we had to swim for shore. I don't know why we didn't notice that Erika had slipped under.” Niklas couldn't see his uncle's face now, but his hands trembled. “Sebastifer noticed, though. He dove back in after her and pushed her to the surface, but his paw must have gotten caught in some root or other at the bottom of the pond. By the time Peder and I got Erika out of the water, Sebastifer was already dead.”

So that's how it was.

Niklas had always wondered why Grandma Alma told him the story of Sorrowdeep over and over, even before he was old enough for that kind of creepiness. Here was the reason: She wanted him to stay away from the water. But that reason also made the nightmare more real. His mother
had
gone to Sorrowdeep. She
had
died there, or almost. He said, “I thought we didn't keep dogs at Summerhill.”

“Erika didn't want another after that. No one could replace Sebastifer, she said. We still honor her wishes.”

“Why? Mom's been gone for seven years. She won't know.”

At that, his uncle stiffened, and Niklas winced. But it just didn't seem fair that the person who had left him to fend for himself still got to decide he couldn't have a dog.

Uncle Anders turned to him with an odd look; a little hurt, but also scared. His lips quivered as he glanced out the east window, where the birds still watched in silence. “Niklas, have you . . . heard . . . anything lately?”

“What do you mean?” The coldness was back in Niklas's stomach. His uncle did not look well.

“Down by the stream. I've been hearing this . . .” Uncle Anders took a step toward the castle, and a shard crunched under his shoe. His eyebrows flew up, as if he only now noticed the broken glass. The bewildered expression grew into place, and just like that, the crack in the wall of silence closed up. “Oh, look at this mess! My favorite glass and all. I'd better clean it up.”

As Niklas went to fetch the broom, his head spun with all the truths about his mother they had withheld from him. She wrote songs. She rescued a dog and kept him for her own. She used to smile, and then she stopped.

She almost drowned in Sorrowdeep.

N
o one spoke much over dinner. Niklas's tongue burned with questions, but he didn't ask them. If Grandma Alma found out that Uncle Anders had told him things, he might clam up for good.

The kitchen clock broke the silence, striking five with brassy confidence. But it was almost seven thirty.

“I thought you fixed that,” Grandma Alma said.

Uncle Anders scratched his head. “I thought so, too.”

Niklas stood up quickly. “I'm going to the stream to find a stone for Rag's grave.”

Grandma Alma pursed her lips, but he headed her off. “I'll be back before dark,” he promised.

Of course, he told himself, it never got dark in summer.

He fetched his empty school satchel and added in a measuring tape and a looking glass. He was going to find
a stone for Rag's grave eventually, but first he had business in the woods.

• • •

M
r. Molyk hadn't gotten around to telling him about the strange thing they found at Oak Bridge, but Niklas had an idea what it might be. Sure enough, on the stream bank, he found it: a footprint, sunk into the dirt that had been sheltered by the junipers. Mr. Molyk had told it true. The print was impossible.

It had a long sole and five toes, like a human foot. But not even Uncle Anders's feet were that big. It measured sixty-seven centimeters from heel to toe, more than two feet. That didn't even include the mark that jutted out between the second and the third toe, where a cut sliced into the ground.

A giant claw mark.

The slash was almost as long as the foot itself. Niklas couldn't think of a single animal that had one huge claw like this. At least he had been right about one thing: This print did not belong to the lynx. He felt a rush of relief. Maybe the rest was true, too.

Thank you.

He looked up into the oak tree. It had filled with black beneath a pink sky. The evening had slipped by fast. Niklas searched for cat eyes among the branches, but saw none. Did the lynx come here often? Was she close now?

He wished he could climb into the tree and watch for
her, but on this particular day it might be best not to argue with Grandma Alma about the meaning of “before dark.” More than likely, the hunters would be out again tonight. He put his things in the satchel and headed home.

He made it to the first bend in the trail before he heard the screeches go up. Birds flew out of the woods behind him, black flecks against a bright orange flicker.

Fire.

For a second, Niklas hesitated. How much time would he waste if he ran home to fetch Uncle Anders? Two minutes if he could fly, ten minutes with the way the path looped. But if he could get up there before the fire truly caught, he might be able to put it out. He decided to try. He yelled through the woods, “Help! Uncle Anders! Someone! There's a fire!” Then he turned and ran back up the trail. As he neared the bridge, he filled with horror.

The oak tree was burning.

The flames hadn't reached the canopy yet, but yellow tongues licked up the trunk, reaching higher with every second. How could it be burning? Healthy, green wood like this, alone on the lip of a cliff?

Niklas sprinted past the fire to fill his satchel with water from the Summerchild. He hurried back up the bank and sloshed it against the base of the trunk. The bark sputtered, but it still burned. He fetched satchelful after satchelful, but he couldn't keep the flames from eating their way into the branches.

Niklas didn't stop. The oak tree was his and Lin's, and now it belonged to the lynx, too. He refused to give up on it.

The fire crackled so loudly that Niklas didn't hear the snapping noises until they were close. Uncle Anders at last! Except he should be coming up the trail, not down from the mountain. Niklas peered in between the trees. Someone wove through the underbrush with muted flashlights. The hunting party, then. They must have cut through the woods.

“Mr. Fale! Mrs. Ottem! It's the oak tree! Quick, get over here!” A puff of smoke caught him, and Niklas bent over coughing. “Why are you just standing there?” he croaked. “Come and help me!”

No one came out of the bushes.

“Mr. Molyk?” Niklas rubbed his eyes. “Uncle Anders?”

The rotten stench from last night blasted toward him.

The beast.

This time, he couldn't run. The beast was closer to the trail. It would cut him off no matter which way he tried to bolt. And he couldn't climb into the oak tree. Niklas was caught on a strip of land with nowhere to go.

He dropped the satchel and picked up a fallen branch that had caught fire at one end. The green eyes blinked.

“Oh, you don't like this?” Niklas held the branch like a sword. A host of twigs snapped as the beast moved back. It feared the flames.

Niklas took a step forward. The beast backed farther into the underbrush, until its eyes resembled dim jellyfish in the darkness under the trees.

Sparks whipped past Niklas's face, but he didn't care. He was already on fire, on the inside. “You killed Rag!” he shouted, and pushed on across the path.

Something heavy hit his shoulders and slammed him to the ground. A shape outlined against the blaze from the fire crouched over him, pinning his arms and hips down so he couldn't move. Niklas squirmed and fought, but it did no good. A circle of needle-like teeth opened over his face as the creature snarled.

“Stupid cub! Can't you see that's what it wants?”

Niklas stopped thrashing. The creature had cat eyes, not beast eyes.

The lynx eased off him. “Stand up,” she hissed at him. “Get back to the oak!”

Niklas bolted to his feet. The anger had been knocked out of him, and now he felt dizzy. The lynx had taken up position in front of him, right by the burning branch that lay on the ground. Niklas could be mistaken, but it looked like she was barring the way between him and the beast.

In the underbrush, the green eyes narrowed.

The lynx tucked in her stubby tail. “Do you want to die? Back to the oak!”

Niklas stumbled backward until he felt the heat from the fire. The beast let out a piercing double-pitched howl
and lunged forward, but the lynx twisted out of the way and leaped across the path with Niklas.

Over them, the entire tree burned. Most of the heat rose upward, but embers dropped down from the canopy and the ground smoldered. “We can't stay here,” Niklas coughed.

“We have to.” The lynx paced in circles, keeping her distance. “It's the only place it won't go.”

“We can fight it off with torches,” Niklas said. “It fears the fire.”

The lynx flattened her ears. “It started the fire. Threw a rock at the tree and then it burned.”

Which must be wrong, of course, because rocks couldn't start fires, and Niklas had seen the beast shrink away from flames himself.

“What it fears is this tree,” the lynx said, skipping smoothly to the side to dodge a falling patch of bark. “It won't go near it.”

The beast lurked just beyond the forest edge, but Niklas's eyes watered from the smoke, and he couldn't see clearly. “Is it a bear?”

“No bear,” the lynx said.

“Then what?”

The lynx bared her teeth. “I don't know. It doesn't belong here.”

Niklas squinted. Through the branches he glimpsed massive shoulders, patches of bark. A claw slid out, black
and curved like a scythe, and the beast cut the underbrush in one quick sweep. It sneered at them with a mouthful of saw teeth.

Niklas's heart kicked against his ribs. The beast had a
mouth.
A slavering mouth in a face that was too angled and leathery for a human, but which definitely wasn't a muzzle. And it had three ears. The third stuck out from its neck, folding and unfolding.

He felt his limbs go limp.

“What is it?” the lynx growled. “Do you know it?”

He did.

And he understood, now, why the beast had stopped chasing him when he climbed into the tree last night, why it wouldn't cross the path now, why it had left the lamb on the screaming stone of all places. The lynx was right. This creature didn't belong here, or in any other place that was real.

It belonged in a game.

“Yeah.” Niklas opened his shirt pocket and scooped out the acorns. “It's a troll.”