by Emmett Swan
Although she looked real, there was something ethereal about her. Light passed through her slim fingers and folds of cloth. Her face had a kind expression and radiated a pleasant, soft light. It was one of the most beautiful faces Jessica had ever seen.
Yet, around her, the flitting, indistinct shadows continued to move in jerky, agitated patterns, remaining unresolved and in the background.
The lady smiled at them.
“Ah, two travelers have paid me a visit. Welcome to my swamp.” She gestured with an ethereal hand at the landscape around them.
Jessica wasn’t sure what to do, so she curtsied. “Thank you for answering our call.”
“I am Keeva. Why, may I ask, have you beckoned me?”
Jessica was hesitant to ask for help from a supernatural being, but her beautiful face and friendly smile gave her strength.
“Um,” said Jessica, clearing her throat. “We request your assistance.” Then she added, “Please,” and half-curtsied again.
“I see,” said Keeva. She glanced toward the little plunge pool below the fountain. “Your trinket is small.”
“Sorry,” said Jessica. “We don’t have much gold.”
“Perhaps it is worth a favor. What is your request?”
Jessica looked at her feet and let out a breath. “We understand you have magical powers,” she said. “We believe magic will be required to reverse a curse placed upon friends of ours.”
“No, my dear,” said Keeva. “I am not magical. Magic is not something that people have. It is found in certain elements of the world around us. What I do have is knowledge of those elements. I can distill elixirs from them and use their powers as I deem appropriate.”
“I see,” said Jessica, thinking. She looked over at Riley for support, but his wide eyes were locked on the floating apparition in front of him. She would have to do all the talking.
“Um, okay,” she stammered while searching for the words. “Do you have an elixir that can break a curse? A tree curse?” she asked.
“I don’t know. Tell me more.” Keeva sounded intrigued, which encouraged Jessica.
“In a little forest not far from here are three trees that we discovered were boys at one time. Humans,” she corrected. “They had been chasing someone named Thallach when they were cursed and transformed.”
Keeva tapped her finger on her chin. “Three boys, you say. Pursuing Thallach? I believe I remember them. They came to me for help long ago.” She started counting, using her fingers. “Yes, very long. According to your earthly calendar, that would be the year 1774, I believe.”
“Seventeen seventy-four!” cried Riley, speaking for the first time. “Those tree guys are over two hundred years old? And you too?”
“Just so,” said Keeva. “They were local boys, of the house of Kyne. An invisible thief had been stealing gold from their estate and they requested my assistance in capturing him. I identified the thief as Thallach and anointed them with an elixir of true seeing and sent them on their way.”
“I’m afraid they didn’t succeed,” said Jessica. “This Thallach must have turned them into trees. Last night, with the moon full, the spell weakened just enough for them to be able to speak and request our help. They sent us to you.”
Keeva nodded. “Thallach is an evil and powerful being. How cruel to ensnare those young lads in his magical trap. To live as trees for so long, away from family and friends.” She peered at Jessica and Riley. “So you want to free them from the curse?”
“Yes, we do.”
“Such a request requires more than this gold chain. I require a more significant payment.”
“You require more gold?” asked Jessica. She wasn’t sure she wanted to part with Curtis’s pendant. Her reluctance must have shown on her face.
“You may pay me in another way, if you choose to do so. In return for my help reversing Thallach’s magic, I ask that you bring to me a vial of red fluid that he has in his possession. If you do this, I will consider myself adequately compensated. Do you agree?”
“Well, okay,” replied Jessica, nodding. “But how do we get it?”
“I have the power to temporarily lift the curse on the Kyne brothers. I can also assist them in finding Thallach’s lair. But they would have only a short amount of time before they returned to their tree form. The only way to permanently break Thallach’s curse is to destroy him. Once that is done, simply retrieve the red vial from his lair and bring it to me.”
“By ‘destroy,’ do you mean kill?”
“I do,” replied Keeva. The thought of homicide did not seem to trouble the Lady of the Mist. Jessica glanced at Riley and turned back to Keeva. “We want to help break the curse, but I’m not sure about killing anyone, no matter how evil.”
“I suggest you leave that up to the Kyne brothers. After all, it is their plight.”
Jessica frowned but nodded. “Okay. We’ll let them decide. But how would this work? How do we make them boys again?”
Keeva reached into the folds of her dress and brought forth a tiny glass vial containing several drops of a pale blue fluid. She looked fondly at the vial, smiled, and turned to Jessica. “My powers lie entirely within my elixirs. As I said, my elixir is not powerful enough to fully counter Thallach’s evil magic. I cannot simply reverse his curse. But if you apply this elixir to the Kyne brothers, it will ward off the curse for two full days. If Thallach is not destroyed by then, then wherever they may be, they will return to tree form.”
Jessica nodded and thought over Keeva’s proposal. Living as a tree was almost the same as death. If Conall and the other Kyne brothers decided to take Thallach’s life to have their lives returned, then maybe it was justified. At least they would have two days to decide for themselves. And she and Riley wouldn’t actually have to kill anyone or be directly responsible.
“Okay. And how do we use the elixir?”
“To activate the elixir, the proper symbol must be drawn on the bark of the tree. It is in the shape of an L.” She drew the shape of the letter in the air with her finger. “Then place three dots along the inside of its main stem.” Her finger pierced the air three times. “Once the rune is in place, drip one drop of this elixir directly onto the symbol. The Kyne brothers will revert to human form.”
She handed the blue vial to Jessica. “But you understand? I give you this blue vial and in return you bring me the red. Yes?”
“I understand.” Jessica gazed at the vial, intrigued by its radiant blue light. She had never seen anything like it.
“How do we find Thallach?” asked Riley.
“His lair is invisible. It is hidden in a canyon in the Donny Hills. The Kyne brothers know which one, since they tracked him there before they came to me. Light a torch made of wet reeds and walk along the canyon wall, holding the torch near the cliff face. The thick smoke will reveal the outline of his entrance.”
“Cool,” said Riley.
“Thank you,” said Jessica. She gently inserted the vial into her pocket.
“But I warn you, Thallach’s power lies in his words. You must destroy him without letting him speak. Otherwise, all is lost. Farewell!”
Without further comment, the oval of light returned and Keeva stepped into it. It collapsed back into a point and vanished. The whispering black shadows filled the space Keeva had occupied. Jessica wasn’t sure, but she thought she detected frightening faces in the blackness. Then, in an instant, all was clear.
“She’s gone,” said Riley. “Just like that.”
Jessica turned to her brother and tugged his arm, looking about. “Let’s get out of here. I don’t like this place.”
Twenty-Six
Jessica and Riley retraced their tracks back down the path. Jessica was flush with excitement, with conflicting emotions swirling in her head. Helping the Kyne brothers break their curse was a good thing, and though she had never laid eyes on their human form, she was willing to risk a lot to help them. On the other hand, this Thallach person seemed dangerous. W
hat kind of person was he? He had to be pretty damn old. At least two hundred years.
The more details she knew, the better off she would be. She was getting more involved, more invested. And by helping the Kyne brothers, she would be putting not just herself but Riley at risk. Should she do that? Was that a responsible thing to do? Was she even capable of helping?
Since Curtis died, she had been painfully aware of a general lack of confidence. If she were forced to make a decision, a little voice kept planting a seed of doubt that grew until it felt like something awful was going to happen. Major decisions could be really agonizing. And regret. What she knew of regret. Why hadn’t she done things differently on that boat?
“Stop it, Jessica! Snap out of it!” she reprimanded herself.
“What?” asked Riley.
“Nothing,” Jessica said, realizing she’d said that aloud. “Just thinking.”
“Yeah, me too.”
Jessica stopped and turned to her brother. “Riley, I don’t know if we should do this.” As she said the words, she knew she was lying. What she really should have said was “I don’t know if I can do this.”
“I don’t know, Jess. I think we’re committed at this point.”
“Exactly what are we committed to, I wonder. To help kill someone?” She fingered the outlines of the vial in her pocket. Riley noticed what she was doing.
“Don’t lose that shit,” he said.
“No way.”
“So what now?”
“Well, once we get out of this stinking swamp, we’ve got that dinner party over at Shelly and Grace’s house, remember?”
“Oh no,” groaned Riley. “But what about the tree people?”
“Don’t call them tree people!” said Jessica. “They’re just regular people who were cursed. And they have names.”
“All right,” said Riley, rolling his eyes. “Whatever. But when are we going to the forest to use that stuff?” He nodded toward her pocket.
“Tonight. After everyone is asleep. We’ll sneak out again.”
Riley inserted his hands in his pockets and walked on quietly, a little ahead of her. She wondered what he was thinking.
She didn’t want to say anything to make him feel more apprehensive, and she also wanted to appear to be in control. She wanted to be an adult role model for him, so she should start behaving as such.
She stood a little straighter and her legs picked up speed. She felt the muscles in her thighs and they felt strong. She went over the details in her head.
Okay, so we’re going to bring these guys back to life to take revenge on this Thallach dude, and possibly destroy him, then take the red stuff to the female apparition in the woods. No big deal. We got this. Once they come to life, we make five. Against one.
This new attitude of confidence made her stride stronger. She strode up to Riley and looked at him in silent assurance.
“Are we really going to help them kill that Thallach guy?” Riley asked after a few minutes.
“I’m not going to kill anyone. But it sounds like Thallach is a bad man, or being, or whatever he is. We use this vial to turn the brothers back into boys, and what they choose to do with their two days is their call. But I wouldn’t blame them for doing what was necessary, would you?”
Riley shrugged. “It all makes me nervous.”
“Yeah, me too. But like I said, it’s their call. They seem like good people. I think they’ll do the right thing.”
“I don’t know how you can tell that, but okay.”
“I don’t really know either, except that I know it’s gonna be okay, Riles.” She spoke confidently and really felt it. She looked ahead as they neared the edge of the swamp. The light was brighter, and it gave her even more optimism. She quickened her pace, anxious to get back and start planning their next move.
Bringing cursed tree dudes back to life. Now that was exciting.
What if they’re playing you, Jessica? You don’t even know them, their character. Riley’s right. They are strangers. Why trust them? Why get involved? Sure you want to do this?
The possibilities played out in Jessica’s mind. Even if the tree boys were evil, what could they possibly do? After becoming humans again after two hundred years, would they harm the only people who were helping them?
Plus, the locals thought enough of their family to name Kyne Lane after them. And Keeva remembered them from two hundred years ago and didn’t seem to think they were evil. Plus, she had a feeling. They were straight-up tree boys.
“Okay,” she said. “I got it all covered. Gonna move forward with the plan.”
They finally passed out of the swamp and found Dottie and Grey Girl chewing contentedly on the thick grass growing around the edge of Turnbull’s pond.
Before remounting, Jessica grabbed Riley’s shoulders to face him toward her. “You cool, bro?” she asked. He nodded. She knew her brother. He trusted her.
“Look, I’ve been thinking. We came just to check things out, right?”
“Yeah,” he agreed, his head cocked to one side. “That’s what we said. So?”
“Well, that’s what we did. And everything is safely pointing us to proceed with the mission, which I’m calling—get this,” she announced dramatically, splaying her hands as if they were a marquis. “Operation Restore Life.” She looked at her brother. “What d’ya think?”
Riley smirked. “Sure Jess. Let’s roll with it.”
Jessica took a quick look at the flowers she had collected earlier. “Maybe I really will press some of these,” she said. She plucked a few more and the two of them mounted up.
They rode down Kyne Lane in silence. The closer they got to Connaree Manor, the more doubt ate at Jessica’s confidence. The thought of what Aunt Noreen and Uncle Basil would think about the craziness of their mission increased her doubts. She was only a seventeen-year-old girl in a foreign country who couldn’t keep her boyfriend alive. Why did she think she could ever restore life to three individuals from the eighteenth century, save the day, and keep herself and Riley safe?
As they approached, they saw Uncle Basil standing by a large rose bush that grew beside the fence encircling the back yard. He was spraying it with something. Two yard hens scurried away as the riders approached. Uncle Basil set down his tools and gave them a hand as they dismounted.
“You two were gone a pretty good while,” he said. “I was getting a wee bit concerned.”
“Sorry. But we were fine,” said Jessica. She showed him her bundle of flowers. “There were beautiful flowers everywhere around Turnbull’s pond and all along the lane.”
She held the flowers toward Uncle Basil and he took a sniff. “Ah, the smell of summer,” he said.
As they led Dottie and Grey Girl to the stable, Uncle Basil pointed to their shoes. “Looks like you two managed to pick up plenty of mud on your feet. I hope you stayed out of that dismal swamp. It’s not a healthy place.”
“Well,” said Jessica, “we saw it, but there weren’t any flowers growing back there.”
“I can smell the sulfur in the mud. You must have walked near it while collecting your flowers. Just make sure you clean off your shoes really well. Your aunt wouldn’t be too happy with you if you tracked up her floors with smelly mud.”
“We will,” promised Riley.
Uncle Basil looked at his watch. “In fact, you two should start getting cleaned up and ready for dinner right away. We leave for the Petersons’ place in an hour.”
There was no point in trying to get out of going. In fact, after making their aunt and uncle so angry the previous night, Jessica knew it was best to be accommodating.
Besides, they had a mission in the enchanted forest later in the evening. Looking forward to that would help the awkward evening pass quickly.
Twenty-Seven
Since the Peterson House was a mile away down a dirt lane, it was too far to walk in dinner attire. So Jessica, Riley, Uncle Basil, and Aunt Noreen piled into the car and drove. Jessica dreaded
the evening. She and Riley had not spoken to Shelly and Grace since their unpleasant breakfast encounter, so they’d had no chance to patch things up. Not that they would have tried very hard to do so.
But now that Jessica realized part of the problem was on her—that she hadn’t been trying to get along because she resented having to leave Louisville for the summer—she was inclined to make more of an effort to be friendly toward the Peterson girls, though she couldn’t see herself becoming true friends with them. They just weren’t her kind of people.
She was determined to play nice and be respectful and courteous. There would be nothing to gain by being surly or antagonistic. She knew that, after this summer, she would never see them again. Why make a big deal of it? Just be nice and silently disagree with everything they stood for.
She smiled. Easy!
Still, she couldn’t believe she had to spend the entire evening with them. Maybe, with the adults around, they wouldn’t be so obnoxious.
But what if the whole damn family is like that?
She would do her best. Plus, she didn’t want to stir up trouble and jeopardize her opportunity to make a break for the woods later in the night. That was her primary goal.
As they rode along the rustic dirt lane, bordered on both sides by dry-stone fences, Jessica looked at her brother. He hadn’t said much since returning from their horseback ride to the swamp, and now he stared out the window. She suspected he was dreading the dinner as much as she was. She knew, though, that if she tried to be nice, he would follow her lead. And once the dinner was over and everyone was back home and in their beds, they could climb out of her window and head to their little forest. If everything went according to plan, later that night the Kyne brothers would be free after living as trees for more than two centuries.
She tried to imagine what it would be like to be a tree. What if you have an itch? She snickered, and Riley glanced over at her. She shook her head and turned to her window.