Page 92 of Strange Grace
Lifting the charm in her cupped hands, Mair put her lips to the mouth of the whistle and blew gently.
It sang a sweet song, only one note.
Mairwen blew harder, all her breath, and again and again, in an even rhythm. Between the notes she whispered her father’s name:“Carey Morgan. Carey Morgan. Carey Morgan.”
There was no sensation of warmth or change, nothing to signify the charm worked, but that was the way of magic, her mother always said. It either succeeded or it did not. A witch needed to trust her power and her charm.
Haf touched her forehead against Mairwen’s back and slid her hands around Mairwen’s waist, huddling nearer. When Mairwen whispered her father’s name, Haf whispered it too.
The Devil’s Forest swayed. Fallen black leaves fluttered on the ground several feet inside it.
Spare thoughts invaded her concentration: Perhaps she should’ve used the charm at night, for ghosts prefer night, don’t they? She should step inside the forest, kneel in the shadows instead. Or maybe the blessing ribbon was too bound up in her feelings for Rhun Sayer to be the right thread here? Oh, but she wanted to see her father so badly, to ask him where his bones were laid, so she could find a way to gather them up.
A snap of wood deep in the forest startled Mairwen out of focus. The whistle faded. She stared wide-eyed into the layering shadows, at shifting light deep in the farthest reaches she could see.
Haf trembled, fingers digging into Mairwen’s sides.
Mairwen breathed carefully, but her hands were shaking too.
A figure appeared far away, only a shadow with bright eyes. Strong, like a saint. Mair leaped to her feet. “Dad!” she cried.
Haf scrambled away, gripping Mair’s skirt. “Mairwen,” she whispered.
The dark figure crouched. She saw the glint of teeth as it smiled or grimaced or growled. One clawed hand touched the tree beside it.
Mairwen’s small heart beat faster and faster, and she bared her teeth too. She was afraid and also refused to be afraid. This was not like the red-eyed squirrels and misshapen rabbits. It was not like the tiny birds flitting between the black branches, whispering songs with human words instead of trilling and chirps.
She knew it was not her father’s ghost.
Her charm had brought the devil.
Mairwen stepped back, and back again. “Come on, Haf,” she whispered, walking backward, never looking away from the devil’s eyes until she was far enough from the edge of the forest he blurred into the trees.
•••
SIX YEARS LATER, MAIRWEN DOESN’Thesitate to cross the threshold again, though this time she is alone, with no charms to protect her or even offer comfort.
The forest is quiet, refusing her its whisper, ignoring her as if she were so insignificant there’s no need to bother.
Mairwen clenches her teeth.
She is not nothing. She is a witch and the daughter of a—of a—
Between. She isn’t a god or a girl. She isn’t a saint or a witch, not only.
Mairwen runs. Her bare feet find easy footing, and she slips between the trees, just a girl in a tattered gray dress.
Her breathing is strong, her gaze focused ahead. Her heartbeat does not waver.
In no time at all she leaps over the creek, pushes through the hedges of red berries, vaults across flint, and into a marsh. She knows the way, because she remembers all of it. Directly to the heart of the forest.
On and on she runs, swift and sure as a deer.
The Bone Tree towers over its grove, and she steps quietly in, heart pounding, ears ringing. Exactly as she remembers.
And the ground is littered with tiny purple flowers. Viola blossoms.
Baeddan huddles against the altar, and atop it a person is stretched out, tangled in vines and flowers, dripping blood from wrist and ankle. She steps nearer the altar, fear tightening her throat. Strands of angry blond hair escape the vines, and she knows.
