by Jane Yolen
The twin thing, Jennifer thought, and smiled. Maybe they hadn’t moved so very far apart after all.
Then Jennifer heard the raw croaking of a raven from a long way away. And closer in, the cooing of a dove.
The sound of wings circled overhead, and then both birds floated down closer and closer to the table where the ashes lay.
Just then a flash of white leaped onto the tabletop and the cat stood, straddling the handkerchief. It swatted at the circling birds and hissed at them till they both flew off.
“So what does that mean?” asked Peter.
“It means that Gran is a greater wizard than Michael Scot,” said Jennifer. “The cat is hers, after all”
Gran laughed. “I’m nae wizard at all. I thought you kenned that.”
The dog sat up, looking warily at the white cat. “The cat be a dead giveaway,’ he said.
“Aye—that she be.”
“What do you mean?” Peter asked.
It was Jennifer who understood. “Gran’s not a wizard, Peter. She’s a witch.”
“Aye, that I be,” said Gran. She wrapped the white linen back over the ashes, tied the ends in a knot, and slipped the handkerchief into her pocket. “A white witch. The best in Fife. And who better to keep an eye on Michael Scot’s ashes?”
Peter looked at Jennifer and winked. “And I suppose I’m a warlock?”
“Maybe ye are, and maybe yer nae,” said Gran. “It’ll take practice—and patience—to find out.”
“We’ve got the patience,” said Jennifer.
“Ye surely do noo,” said Gran. “Ye surely do.”
A Scottish Glossary
avaunt—away
bairn—a young child
biscuits—cookies
blether—nonsense
blirt—a sudden burst of grief or anger, or to weep and sob
braw—fine, splendid
canna—cannot, or can’t
cantrip—a charm, spell, or mischievous trick
corn—wheat
daft—crazy
de’il—devil
dinna—do not, or don’t
doited—stupid, bewildered
dowp—hind end or bottom
dreech—a grey downpour of rain
elevenses—an 11:00 A.M. snack
fank—a noose or coil or tangle
fash—to bother, to worry, or to distress
gomeril—loud-talking fool
greeting—crying, lamenting
jute—a weak, worthless woman
ken—to know
kilt—a garment, originally worn by a Highland man, that looks like a knee-length pleated skirt
laddie—boy, young man
lass—girl, young woman
libbit—gelding
mair—more
mak—make
minikin—derisive term for a small man or woman
nae—not
noo—now
porridge—oatmeal
pudding—dessert
snagging—taunting, reproving, or scolding
sprack—alert, lively
tak—take
tea—dinner
torch—flashlight
toustie—quarrelsome, contentious
tronie—a tedious story that bores the listener who has heard it before
wee—little, very little
TURN THE PAGE FOR AN EXCITING PEEK AT
The Pictish Child
THE SECOND BOOK OF
TARTAN MAGIC
Lost Stone
Gran, Jennifer, and Molly turned right on Burial Brae, onto the cobblestones, and Molly pulled her hand from Gran’s. She skipped ahead on the sidewalk, throwing her stone talisman straight up into the air and catching it two times out of the first three throws.
“Be careful, child,” Gran called out as a car passed by on the cobbled road. Molly was scrabbling at the curb for her little stone after the one missed throw.
But whether Molly heard Gran and ignored her or simply misunderstood was not clear, for she threw the talisman up again and this time it went too high, hitting a tree branch and ricocheting over the stone wall into the cemetery.
For a stunned moment no one said anything. Then Molly wailed. “My tallyman!”
“Talisman” Jennifer muttered through clenched teeth.
Gran said, “Guide us!” fervently.
And the dog sat on his hind end and howled.
“Gran, Gran,” Molly cried, running back to them. “Do something. Mrs. McGregor gave it to me. I can’t lose it. I can’t.” She was close to hysterics.
“Oh, for goodness’ sakes,” Jennifer said, “it’s just a stupid stone.”
“It’s a talisman,” wailed Molly, this time saying it correctly.
“I’m afraid she is right,” said Gran. “It would be a terrible thing to lose that stone. I feel that in my bones. Will ye go in and look for it, Jennifer, dear? The gate’s by the side there.”
“In the cemetery?” Jennifer didn’t know why that should so appall her. There was a cemetery called Willowbrook near their home in Connecticut, and she and her friends played in it all the time. But this cemetery was centuries older than the one back home, and something just felt strange about it. She had that same feeling of foreboding she’d had inside the Eventide Home. Only stronger. She wished Peter hadn’t left. She needed him. He was always braver about tilings than she was.
“Go,” Gran said. “Now. I have my hands full here.” And indeed she did, with Molly and the dog making equal rackets.
So Jennifer looked where Gran was pointing.
Down a tiny lane that was much too narrow for a car, she saw a small ironwork gate. Taking a deep breath, she gave Gran her umbrella and went along till she reached the gate. Then she pushed on it with both hands.
It made an awful creaking noise, like something out of a bad horror movie, but moved less than an inch. She wondered if it had been opened in years. But then, when she pushed on it again, shoving with her shoulder, it opened slowly, protesting all the way.
She went in.
There was a kind of hushed reverence inside the cemetery, made more intense by the fact that both Molly and the dog had suddenly and without explanation fallen silent beyond the wall.
The cemetery was small, about the size of their backyard at home, and easily contained within the high stone walls. There was another ironwork gate on the other side, which led to the Eventide Home’s lawn. Jennifer could see a patch of green.
The grass inside the cemetery had recently been cut and rolled flat. However, the forty or so gravestones were not so well tended. They seemed ancient, the inscriptions on them mostly obscured by moss or rubbed flat by the passing years. Jennifer could hardly read a word or date on each: “Drowned... 1745 ...lost at sea ... invictus... 1567 ...salvation ..." None of the stones stood up straight. They leaned like drunken old men.
Jennifer went over to the wall that paralleled Burial Brae Road. A huge oak shaded the area, and several of its limbs overhung the wall. The comer was dark—much too dark for the time of day—and she looked around.
A sea mist—which Gran called a haar—had come in sudden and thick and fast and was flowing over the wall. It was an odd grey, the color of stew left three days in the pot.
The silence that Jennifer had noticed was suddenly muddied by a muffled roar, like a radio broadcast of a battle, not quite tuned in. She thought she heard faraway shouts, cries, and she turned around to see where the sound was coming from. But she was all alone in the grey mist in the graveyard.
She kicked at the sparse vegetation under the oak with her wellies—and suddenly her foot must have connected with the little stone, for it skipped across some long slabs of rock that were laid out inside shallow depressions like four open graves beneath the tree. At that very moment the mist lifted and the radio was turned off.
She chased after the talisman and found it lying—incised side down—in the smallest of the open depressions, which looked about the right size f
or a child to be buried in.
When she picked up the stone she heard a voice gabbling at her in an unknown language. Looking up, she saw a girl not much taller than Molly but clearly twice Molly’s age.
Sun browned and black haired, dark eyed and wiry, the girl had on a scraped leather skirt like Native Americans once wore. Jennifer had studied Native Americans in school, not once but many times, and this girl had the haunted, hunted look of some of the tribal photographs in the textbooks. Instead of a shirt or blouse, the girl had on a woven cloak held together in the front by a large silver brooch. Jennifer had seen that same kind of pin in the tourist shops on Fairburn’s High Street.
The oddest thing about the girl, though, was that her hands and arms were covered with blue tattoos. Real tattoos, Jennifer thought, not the paste-on, wash-off type. Not so odd, perhaps, if the dark girl had been a teenager, some sort of runaway, living rough on the streets. But she didn’t look as if she were any older than seven or eight, and surely that wasn’t allowed—not in America and not in Scotland, either.
She had not an ounce of fat on her, either. As if, Jennifer thought suddenly, she was only an ounce away from starving.
The girl stood imperiously, hands on her hips, still speaking in her strange tongue.
“You frightened me!” Jennifer said, but in a joking way. “I didn’t see you come in.”
The girl was obviously in no mood for jokes. She held her hand out toward Jennifer and gestured at the talisman. Then she spoke a quick, sharp command. Jennifer didn’t know the words, but it was clear what the girl meant.
Give me the stone.
Lost Child
A howl made them both turn around. The dog was sitting at the gate but would not come in.
“Dark!” he was howling. “Dark!”
Gran pushed past him, holding Molly by the hand. “Have ye got it?” she said, coming to stand next to Jennifer. “Have ye found the blessed thing?”
The dog continued to howl.
“I want my talisman,” Molly cried.
“So does she,” said Jennifer, pointing to the dark-haired girl glowering under the tree.
It was as if they hadn’t seen the girl until Jennifer pointed her out. Then Molly shut her mouth and Gran’s mouth dropped open.
And the dog stopped howling.
The girl repeated the same unintelligible phrase to Gran that she’d said to Jennifer and held out her hand. As she did, the cloak fell away from her arm and Jennifer recognized one of the tattoos.
“Look!” Jennifer said. “Isn’t that tattoo the same bird and snake as on Molly’s stone?”
“It is indeed,” said Gran.
The dark girl repeated her demand.
“Is it the Gaelic, then?” called the dog from behind the gate. He was now pacing back and forth. “Is she speaking the old tongue?”
Gran turned and bade him enter the cemetery, her fingers shaping some kind of warding spell.
The dog came in slowly and reluctandy, making certain that he did not touch any part of the ironwork. His tail hung down between his legs.
When at last he got to Gran’s side, she answered him. “Not Gaelic. Not Scots. Not any language I ken. Is it something older, dog?”
The dog sniffed the air, then he shivered all over. “Older than ye think, carline. Older than even I can guess at.”
“I thought so,” said Gran, nodding her head. “A Ret, by the look of her.”
“Don’t give her my talisman,” wailed Molly. “Mrs. McGregor gave it to me”
“What’s a Pict?” asked Jennifer.
“One of the oldest races in Scotland,” said Gran.
“Is she like ... like a gypsy?”
“Nothing like,” said Gran. “There are still Travelers—gypsies, as ye call them—about in Scotland today.”
“Then what’s she doing here?”
“That’s what I do not ken, Jennifer,” said Gran, shaking her head. “There haven’t been Picts in Scotland for a thousand years or more.”
The Pictish girl had obviously gotten tired of waiting to be given the stone, and she made a rush at Jennifer to take it. But Jennifer was older and—if not quicker than the girl—at least a lot taller. She held the stone high over her head and the girl could not get at it, much as she screamed and spat. She aimed a kick at Jennifer’s knee, which—if it had landed—might have done some damage, but Jennifer quickly jumped aside. Her karate lessons hadn’t been in vain, then, she thought with satisfaction.
“Mind your manners!” Jennifer told the girl, which was something Mom often said to them.
Suddenly the dog began to howl again. It was a terrible sound, high and keening, that raised the little hairs on the back of Jennifer’s neck.
“Dark!” he howled. “Dark, dark, dark.”
Gran’s simultaneous intake of breath made Jennifer turn around.
Behind her, under the tree, the dark grey haar had returned, and the noise as well. It didn’t take a witch—-or a rocket scientist—to know that what was forming was not something good.
“Out!” shouted Gran, pointing to the gate they had come in. “Molly, Jennifer—out of this place right now!”
The dog needed no telling. Tail still firmly between his legs, he galloped through the gate.
Jennifer whirled, grabbed Molly by the hand, and raced after him.
Huffing, Gran followed.
“The gate!” Gran said as soon as she had gotten through it. “Pull the gate closed. Cold iron will keep it in—whatever it is. Fey things cannot stand cold iron.” She placed both hands on the gate and began to pull.
Jennifer helped and the gate, again protesting with a high squeal, began to swing shut slowly.
At the very last minute, the dark girl slipped past the gate as well, running just ahead of the dark mist. Screaming something none of them could understand, she put her own hands on the gate and pulled along with them.
With one last protesting squeak, the gate closed.
Behind it the dark formless mist swirled but could not get through.
“That was close,” said Jennifer.
“Much too close,” Gran agreed.
But then they heard someone sobbing. Turning, they saw it was the Pictish girl, her hands held up in front of her as if in some kind of supplication.
“Gran, she’s burned her hands,” cried Molly. “How did she get burned?”
But Jennifer knew without being told, because the burns cutting across the dark girl’s hands were the same shape as the bars on the gate.
“Iron,” she said to Molly. “Cold iron burned her, but she didn’t let go.”
“She helped save us all,” added Gran grimly. “Blessed be.”
Blessed be, indeed, Jennifer thought.
“Can I have my talisman now?” asked Molly, holding out her hand.
Wordlessly Jennifer handed the stone over, her thoughts at that moment not at all charitable toward her little sister.
But then Molly did something that surprised them all.
“Here,” she said, “this is really yours.” And she handed the talisman to th e Pictish girl, who closed her poor, burned right hand over it and held fast.