The Deep Wood (Sunshine Walkingstick Book 2)

by Celia Roman

  She led me inside her tiny log home, built, rumor had it, by her grandpappy after he was freed. He come up this way from down along the coast searching for his wife, she what was sold away from him before the war brought slavery to an end in the States.

  Too bad it weren’t brought to the same deserved end elsewhere.

  Whether he found his wife or not, nobody knowed, or nobody was telling, which amounted to the same thing. Aunt Sadie’s grandpappy settled here with one of his young’uns and built this farm with his own two hands. That young’un growed up to be Aunt Sadie’s daddy, and when his wife passed on and he got too old to take care of himself, Aunt Sadie moved back home with him and took right good care of him ‘til he died some two decades back.

  Mama used to bring me out ever once in a while when I was knee high to a grasshopper. Never figured out how she knowed Aunt Sadie, ‘cept the county was too small and the locals too few in number for ever soul not to know ever other soul.

  I followed Aunt Sadie into her home and shut the door behind myself while she shuffled to one corner of the room what served as both kitchen, dining room, and living area. She stooped down some few feet away from the cast iron barrel stove opposite the wood cook stove and yanked an old sheet off a dented wire birdcage.

  I crossed the room and knelt down beside it, and examined the critter contained inside. It was small, not much bigger’n a kitten, and wrinkled as a raisin under too much sun. A large, bulbous nose dominated its face and strips of random cloth was wrapped around its spindly limbs under a neatly sewn jacket and pants, both mud brown. Its huge eyes was wide and, ‘less I was sore mistaken, scared.

  Aunt Sadie tapped the end of her wooden rake against the worn, plank flooring. “This be the critter what et my pumpkins.”

  I sat back on my haunches and give the runt another once over. No weapons, no sharp nails. Couldn’t tell what kinda teeth it owned. I was nigh on certain this weren’t the culprit, but what this was escaped me.

  “Where’d you find it?” I asked.

  “Put out some bait. Found this the next morning.”

  “How long ago?”

  “Two days back.”

  I swiveled around and fixed a stern look on her. “You shoulda called me, Aunt Sadie, soon as you spotted it.”

  She waved an arthritic hand at me. “I was getting to it, little missy.”

  “Next time, get to it a little faster.” I rebalanced, picked up the cage, and stood. “This goes home with me ‘til I figure out what it is.”

  Some of the glee melted out of Aunt Sadie’s expression. “You don’t know?”

  I shook my head. “Never seen one before.”

  “Well, lawsy be.” She heaved a great sigh, lifting her shoulders high under the flannel shirt draped over her workday dress. “You holler soon as you find out, ya hear?”

  “Will do.” I leaned forward and pressed a kiss to her wrinkled cheek, careful to keep the critter well away from her. “Make me a fresh apple cake and we’ll call it even.”

  “An apple cake don’t pay the bills, Sunny.”

  I grinned. “Yeah, but it keeps my feller happy.”

  I wandered outside, Aunt Sadie hot on my trail, and tucked the caged critter into the car in the passenger’s side floorboard, wedging it in good so it wouldn’t roll around through the curves. Me and her chatted a while longer and I endured some good-natured teasing about Riley, then we said our goodbyes and I headed off to run the rest of my errands.

  Ingles was next. I throwed that old towel over the critter’s cage, left the car windows rolled down a coupla inches each, and scurried through finding Billy a card, a chore what best needed more time’n I owned to give it. Ten minutes later, I slid back into the IROC, card in hand, and lifted the towel.

  The critter was curled up on the cage’s bare metal floor. Dagnabbit. Had the bitty thing croaked on me while I was in Ingles?

  I tapped the backs of my fingers against the top of the cage. It lifted its head and slit its huge eyes open at me.

  “You ok?” I asked, then about kicked myself for the sheer stupidity of the question. ‘Course, it weren’t all right. What critter liked being shoved into a cage?

  It closed its eyes and laid back down, not much of an answer a’tall. Looked like it was the only one I was gonna get. I left the towel off and drove to the library, and repeated my haste there as with Ingles.

  Or hurried fast as I could. Somebody’d compiled an index to the Foxfire Magazine a while back and give a copy to the library. That didn’t mean a body could find the reference they needed quick like. I scanned through the index, searching for painter legends, backtracked and searched for just legends, and finally found the entries I needed. The library didn’t have all of the cited issues, but I took what they had, grabbed the Foxfire book containing tall tales, and started back toward the circulation desk.

  A display in the middle of the library caught my eye, in particular a book I was somewhat familiar with. James Mooney’s History, Myths, and Sacred Formulas of the Cherokees was stuck on the top tier of a multi-level table along with other compilations of mythology, folklore, and ghost tales. Daddy’s dog-eared copy of Mooney’s was resting in a special spot on my bookshelves. The spine was broke and some pages was missing, but I spent many an hour as a young’un poring over the text, searching for some clue as to who I was.

  That curiosity dimmed somewhat over time, ‘specially when I growed up enough to learn the truth about Daddy’s kin, but only a little. Meeting two of my kinfolk on that side reignited my curiosity, or maybe nostalgia had a hand in my sudden, impulsive need to revisit the past. I balanced the pile of magazines and books already accumulated, snagged Mooney’s off the table, and double timed it to the front.

  I fidgeted while the woman at the desk hand writ the magazine titles onto a plain white card, stamped ever issue, and checked my two books out. She was a new one on me, not that I cared one way or t’other. I was in here for one thing, learning. Didn’t need a friendly rapport with the staff to get that.

  After what felt like a coon’s age, the woman finally finished up and handed me my books, and I hurried out to the IROC, fumbling keys and books and my wallet in my hurry.

  The critter was right where I left it, huddled on the birdcage’s floor. I slumped into the driver’s seat, hands on the steering wheel. No way could I meet that forest ranger with this critter in the car. Sure, it might be a monster, but ‘til I knowed if or what, I had to take care of it, didn’t I? And no critter deserved sitting in a car for who knowed how long while I conducted business.

  Only one thing for it.

  I cranked the IROC’s engine and drove to Injun Bob’s, and about melted into a relieved puddle right then and there when I seen BobbiJean’s car parked around front. I picked up the cage, held the towel over it with the other hand, and went inside.

  BobbiJean was sitting behind the long counter stretched from wall to wall at the far end of the store. She looked up when my entry jingled the bell hung over the door and grinned. “Howdy, stranger. Long time no see.”

  I navigated the obstacle course of tires laid out in the middle aisle and tried not to knock any of the junk off the crowded shelves as I passed. “The wedding weren’t four days past, BobbiJean. Your memory ain’t that bad.”

  “It is after a night of Fame’s liquor.” She half stood on the stool she was perched on and peered over the counter at the birdcage in my hand. “Whatcha got there?”

  “Ain’t had time to figure out yet.” I hefted the cage onto the counter and pulled off the towel. “You wanna babysit?”

  BobbiJean sat back down real slow, her doe eyes glued to the critter staring back at her. “You want me to watch something you haven’t identified?”

  “It’s in a cage, BobbiJean,” I said real patient like, and earned a glare from her.

  “Oh, sure. That’s what they all say.”

  “C’mon, now. I’ll owe you big.”

  Her eyes narrowed into thin slits. “H
ow big?”

  “Big. You got one of them attachable water jugs for a hamster or something?”

  “I’ll round one up.”

  She shook her head slowly and her gaze drifted back to the critter, like she couldn’t help ogling it. I didn’t blame her none a’tall. The critter was like them Cabbage Patch dolls what was all the rage way back when: So ugly, it was cute.

  “I can’t believe I’m agreeing to this,” she said.

  “Believe it, sister.” I backed up a step and jerked a thumb over my shoulder. “Hate to run, but I got an appointment in a few minutes. You need me, just holler.”

  “Oh, you can count on that.”

  I left her there with the critter and tried to stamp out the guilt eating a hole in my innards. BobbiJean hadn’t never dealt with monsters before, what I knowed of, though she was familiar enough with tales of my shenanigans. The critter wouldn’t bother her none, long as she kept her fingers outta the cage, and BobbiJean was too sensible for that.

  On the other hand, she done married Jazz, crazy, artistic feller that he was, and if that weren’t a mite insensible, nothing was.

  I arrived at my appointment at the Tallulah Ranger District station a scant five minutes early. The forest ranger was waiting for me in the main lobby and I recognized him right off. Was the same man what’d told Riley he couldn’t find sign of the painter me and David found dead. When I saw him, the name Dori give me clicked with his face and I about kicked myself for not remembering sooner.

  Dean Whittaker was maybe five ten and had the lean build of a through hiker. His sandy blond hair was cut short and stylish, and his thin, sunkissed face carried the faintest hint of laugh lines. He held out his hand as I approached and grinned. “Hey, Sunshine. Good to see you again.”

  I shook his hand long enough to satisfy propriety, then let go and stuffed my hands in the back pockets of my jeans. Lordy, I’d about had enough of shaking folks hands here of late. “You, too.”

  “Come on back. I marked the spot where I found the Kildares’ dog on a topo for you.” He shook his head and pivoted away from me, toward the far side of the lobby. “Good thing it was wearing tags or I wouldn’t have known who to call.”

  Billy loved that dog with ever ounce of his little boy heart. ‘Course he put tags on Ol’ Blue.

  I shoved away the automatic pang of sorrow and followed Dean into his office, a spacious room filled from one end to the other with clutter. Two desks was shoved into the space, each holding a newish laptop and the sorts of paper and binders I associated with official office work. Maps of every size, shape, and kind hung on the walls, nigh on obscuring the eggshell white color. A row of double-doored cabinets took up one wall, their doors locked tight.

  Dean stopped beside one of the desks and riffled through a stack of loose papers, then pulled out a topographical map from the middle and spread it flat as he could across his desk. His finger run along the surface and tapped a spot, then slid a little farther away and tapped again. “This is where I found the Kildares’ dog, and this is where you found the panther, from what I could gather.”

  I stepped up close and eyed the curvy line representing Patterson Gap Road. “That’s about right.”

  “Too bad we couldn’t find it. Big cats are so rare here.” He sighed as he rolled the map up. “You see any more, let me know. We’ve got a tagging program going.”

  “Sure thing.” I took the map from him and tapped it against my thigh. “Say, you hear about any unusual painter activity around here? Cats stalking humans or some such?”

  He leaned a hip against the edge of his desk and shrugged. “Riley told me you and BobbiJean were attacked by a panther the night of the wedding.”

  “Not attacked. Just scared outta our breeches.”

  “Wish I’d been there.”

  A laugh sputtered outta me. “What for?”

  “So I could’ve seen the famous Sunshine Walkingstick in action.”

  His grin was loose and friendly, not condescending a’tall, so I matched it with a rueful one of my own. “You been hearing tales what ain’t true, more’n likely.”

  “Small town gossip,” he said, and I had to agree. Rumor run thick through the Georgia pine, faster’n the wind when a juicy story cropped up.

  I thanked Dean kindly and said my goodbyes, then hotfooted it over to Injun Bob’s and picked up the critter from BobbiJean. Sure enough, she rounded up an old water bottle whilst I was gone and affixed it to the side of the cage.

  “It drink any of that?” I asked.

  She shook her head and pursed her bow lips into a moue. “I think it’s dying.”

  I looked at it sharp like. “What makes you say that?”

  “It hasn’t moved an inch since you left.”

  “Maybe it’s just shy.” Or maybe it was waiting for the right moment to strike. I took the towel from her and throwed it over the cage. “When’s the honeymoon?”

  A dreamy smile pushed the concern off her face. “Next week. I can’t wait, either. This’ll be my first cruise.”

  For once, not a drop of envy pricked me. “You need anything beforehand, holler.”

  Her doe eyes went wide. “Why, that’s right. You owe me a big favor.”

  I laughed and teased with her a bit more, then grabbed up my caged critter and went home. There was only so much human contact I could handle in one day, even for friends, and I about reached my limit for today.

  Chapter Twelve

  Old Mother was standing on the porch when I pulled up next to the trailer, wearing a filmy white dress. No shoes. Was that a seer thing or did she just like to wander around barefoot?

  I heaved a sigh. First I got a new pet in the critter huddling in the bottom of the birdcage, and now this. What was next? Teus showing up claiming I killed another one of his pets? Or maybe I’d be lucky enough to have one of them painters jump outta the woods at me.

  Hey, ever day was a barrel of surprises at the Walkingstick homestead.

  I left the critter where he was and climbed outta the IROC. Old Mother’d stand there all day, needs be, and I weren’t anxious to tick her off, seeing as how the last time she was here she painted hex signs up and down the front door. Dear Lord, please let her not do that again. I was still trying to scrub off the last’uns.

  “Howdy, there,” I called as I jogged across the parking area. “You want some tea or something?”

  She fixed them midnight eyes on me, unblinking. “The warnings have been given. Why do they go unheeded?”

  I bit back another sigh. So it was gonna be like that, was it? “I ain’t got no warnings lately, ‘less you count Fame’s.”

  “Famous Carson, the justice bringer.” Her eyes took on that far off look and her next words were deep and ancient and not in her voice at all. “His time will come, Sunshine Walkingstick.”

  A shiver snaked down my spine. I heard that voice and similar words before, just not in the here and now. Your time has come. Was that the warning Old Mother said I got?

  Her arms raised up ‘til they was parallel to the ground and her head rolled back on her shoulders, like she was a puppet controlled by some unseen force, possessing no will of her own. “She came to the mother of the spirit as she was born, she of two worlds.”

  Uh-oh. I knowed what this was leading to. “You want me to understand, Old Mother, you can’t use no hoodoo speak.”

  Her body swayed under the force of an unseen wind and her arms yanked higher in the air. “One natural, one learned. It is within the light, hiding itself from she who snuffed the light’s spirit.”

  I hooked my hands on my hips and rolled my own head back, fixing my gaze on the cloudless sky hanging serene and blue above us. The woods was silent around the trailer, like the forest was holding its breath. Me, I knowed better’n to send my lungs on vacation. No telling how long Old Mother’d go on like this. Could be holding my breath might just make me pass out, and if I did, how was I gonna reap the benefit of her visit?

  Assuming
I could interpret her words this time. Last time, I paid no never mind and look what happened. A catfish tried to drag me to Teus’ home under the lake and I had the tattoos to remind me of my folly ever single time I stripped to bare skin.

  A thump drawed my attention back to the porch. Old Mother was on her knees, her hands straight up in the air, her body rocking back and forth. “She stole what can only be given. She claimed what can never be bought. The dream speaks in the holy of holies. Beware the two. Beware the two.”

  Old Mother collapsed onto the porch, her chest heaving under ragged breaths. I vaulted up the steps two at a time and knelt beside her. “You ok?”

  “The light approaches,” she murmured.

  “The light you was speaking on?”

  “Light is everywhere, Sunshine. We make our own and receive it as well, until the dark consumes us in its eternal quest to quench its thirst.”

  Well, that was clear as mud. I filed the words away for later study, what good it’d do, and patted her back tentative like. Never knowed how a seer like Old Mother’d react to being touched. Seemed right smart to use caution.

  She pushed herself upright. Her willowy arms trembled under her slight weight. I straightened the neckline of her dress over a shoulder the color of the richest ebony. Her head swung toward mine and her midnight eyes focused on me for the barest second.

  “Mama?” she whispered in a familiar voice, and the hairs on the back of my neck stood straight up.

  “Henry?” I said, my own voice hoarse and thin. “Is that you, baby?”

  “Mama?” she said, only deeper, then she said it again and again, and ever time she repeated the word, her voice got lower and stranger, ‘til the final mama was croaked out like nails scraping across a chalkboard.

  Her eyes filmed over and rolled back in her head, and in that demon filled voice, she spoke long and hard in a language I never heard before, some guttural mix of hisses and bites what lashed out at me, pressing the breath outta my lungs, squeezing my heart tight in its grip. Blood welled into my head, heating my skin, and my tongue lolled outta my mouth, and my fingers fumbled with that unseen hand choking the very life outta me, searching for a way to end the pain.