And the Trees Crept In
Page 22
stumbling,
almost as though
“… please…”
he knows
“… no…”
what he is going
“—Silla—”
to find.
The room is dark, but he can smell… the rot. The death. The emptiness is horrifying.
He s
t
a
g
g
e
r
s
falls
to his knees.
“Silla—”
Chokes on her name.
Retches.
Vomits.
Screams.
“SILLA!”
He rushes
SillaSillaSillaSillaSilla—
to the bed
Nonononononononono—
falls upon her.
Gathers her into his arms, even though something is
dripping
from her hair.
He shakes her. Slaps her. Cries her name. Begs her to undo her demise.
Nori, so small, lies in the bed, still and gray. A husk, sunken eyes, not Nori anymore.
He hugs Silla for a long time, even though there are maggots and she is stiff and the smell…
He strokes her hair, his lips close to her ear. “Please. Silla.” He tenses, every sinew straining against the roaring pain of her loss. “I’m sorry—I’m sorry, I’m sorry…”
And he bares his teeth because there is nothing else he can do; the pain is ripping inside.
“I promise you,” he says, whispering low, echoing words from long ago, “I will love you forever.” His head falls onto her corpse. “Every night. I’ll be saving you in my dreams every night.”
And he sobs and he screams and the house listens and groans.
“Thank you.”
Gowan is crying now, his hands pressed over his eyes. I gently remove them.
“You helped me to free myself. Helped me to forgive myself and dispel my guilt. Now you need to know that I forgive you.”
“For letting you die?” He chokes and balls up his hands, shaking. The dark thing hanging on to him darkens. “For leaving you all alone?”
“For doing everything you could. Twice.”
I kiss him, pushing my deepest hope and love and light into the kiss. “Now you have to forgive yourself.”
He shakes his head, his eyes full of the wordless remorse that’s been growing and eating at him for more than seven decades. “I… I can’t, Silla. I was too late—I should have—”
“Please.” I lean close to his ear. “Forgive yourself. I forgive you.”
He sighs.
Gathers me into his arms.
All this time…
“Silla… I have you. After so long. I have you again.”
“We have each other. Gowan… I don’t feel it.” I breathe into his neck.
“What?”
“Sadness. Guilt. Anger.”
“What do you feel?”
I laugh. “I feel alive!”
epilogue
I am sobbing, if ghosts can sob, and we are clinging to each other and shaking with the wounds we have both suffered, apart and together. “I’m sorry,” I say, over and over. “Oh, Gowan. I’m so sorry I couldn’t wait for you. That you had to see—”
He kisses me—hundreds of kisses on my face, in my hair, on my forehead, on my lips. He is kissing my existence, holding my face like I’m the most beautiful miracle he has ever seen. And I’m not much better myself.
At last, he says, breathless, “I… forgive myself.”
I laugh and we kiss, and the grass is there to meet us when we lie back under a beautiful sun. “Good, you stupid boy! Good!”
I sigh. “All that time, I was just walking around thinking, This is my life. How many other people are walking around in their own purgatory?”
“Probably more than I’d like to think about.”
“And they don’t even know it.” Something occurs to me. “You know… Cath and Pamela, my mother, turned the Creeper Man into a villain after Anne was killed in the woods. I still don’t know the story there, and I guess I never will now. But, it just occurred to me. When I made myself the Creeper Man… I made myself a murderer.”
He touches my cheek. “Yes, dear Silla. That’s what you thought you were.”
“And the creaking was always her rope. And my hunger was…”
“You starved. You wouldn’t leave Nori.”
I sigh. “I thought… I thought I was anorexic or something. Or that the house had infected me somehow.”
Gowan smiles, and there is no happiness in it now. “When in reality, you were infecting everything.”
“But you came in,” I whisper, and I lean my face into his hand and smile. “Into my hell. You rescued me.”
“You rescued yourself.”
“What happens now?”
“Now… we move on.”
“I don’t want to. I want another chance.”
He looks at me, and I see the fear in his eyes.
“I didn’t get enough time with you. Enough time with life. It was bad, Gowan. So much of it was so bad. And the good—with you and with Nori and with Cath, before… it didn’t last long. I want more.”
He squeezes my hand. “Anything is possible.”
“We could go back and have another try, you know.”
“We might end up continents away from each other.”
“I would find you. I know it.”
I kiss him and the rest of my painful past rushes away on the raging river of joy inside me.
“Meet you on earth,” he whispers,
and we are gone.
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Acknowledgments
Thank you first to my husband, who believed in this story even when I had my doubts, and who believed in my ability to pull it off.
To my mother, my endless source of pride and light, I love you more than I can ever express. You listened to all the terrible stories I came up with since the moment I could talk—thank you for never once putting me down. You protected a little girl’s ego, and made all the difference.
To Proff. S, Proff. O’G, Ngosi, Andrew, Diane, and all the staff at Kings—forever thank you. My donor and hero, I will thank forever. This is because of you. I never forget. Never.
My wonderwomen—I mean, editors—Alvina Ling and Helen Thomas. Thank you for seeing my story, what I’m trying to do, where I’m trying to go, and for bringing it out of me to the absolute fullest. I am so grateful you ladies are with me on this amazing journey. I will always edit smiling, knowing you are there, too!
A special thank-you to Maggie Edkins for her beautiful and elegant design. She brought this little book visual life.
Polly Nolan and Sarah Davies of Greenhouse Literary Agency—my advocates and agents—I adore you both. Thank you for taking this little bud of a writer into your care and letting me grow and bloom.
To my in-laws, for being so happy to see The Dead House out in the world, and for singing my praises. To my family for always showing love and support: Mel, Josephine, Billy, Ross, Rebecca, Annie, Jesse, and Jason. Special mention to Jose Manual, who has been on my mind through the writing and editing of this book. Wishing you full recovery and happiest of days with Loli and the family!
To Aunt Isabel, for allowing me to use the manor as inspiration in this book, even though I have yet to visit! I hope I do it proud.
A big thank-you to my twin, Stacey, who always inspires stories and good chatter, and is, forever, my little chop. Bigger thank
s to Isabel Sterling and David Purse for always being there for me. You two are my shining stars.
To Patti, once again, for her honesty, truth, and banging sense of humor. To Ley Saulnier, Colleen Mulhall, Kimia Ahmadi, Natasha Ellis, and Jenn Faughnan, for always bringing smiles and support. I love you girls.
To Kat Ellis for the above and much more—kindred spirits happen seldom, but when they happen, they happen true. I will be your friend, yes, but also your biggest fan. You are the yin to my writerly yang.
To the bloggers who have supported The Dead House and my work as a whole, Luna’s Little Library, Jim @yayeahyeah, and so many more, thank you endlessly. The UKYA community is amazing, and I am so glad to be a part of it.
Thank you to the authors whose works inspire me always: Juliet Marillier, Marcus Sedgwick, David Almond, Jacqueline Carey, Mark Z. Danielewski, Margaret Atwood, Courtney Summers, and more. Your words breed my own and ignite my imagination. THANK YOU.
To the authors I have met, who have welcomed me so warmly: Michael Grant (who led me down this writerly path when I was a wee thing, along with his brilliant wife, Kath Applegate), Victoria Schwab (my little evil unicorn), Carrie Ryan (who holds all the world at her brilliant fingertips!), Renée Ahdieh (the most beautiful lady I have seen, maybe ever—and whose lipstick choices are brilliant), James Dashner (hands down the second-funniest, second-nicest man I have met—the first being my hubby, of course!), Shaun David Hutchinson (best guy ever to have a hug from! Plus awesome taste in tattoos), and all the other fabulous authors I met in Chicago.
To the Little, Brown and Orion teams: I love being in the family—you are all so brilliant and have supported me and my little books beyond anything I could have imagined.
To those who have read and loved The Dead House—thank you so much! You’ve made a timid little writer very proud and happy. I hope that you love Silla as much as you did Kaitlyn. I certainly do.
Thank you, always.
Dawn Kurtagich
February 2016
North Wales
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Welcome
Dedication
Epigraph
There is a Reason for Everything THREE LITTLE GIRLS IN THE WOOD
Book 1: Sanguinem Terrae PRETTY LITTLE TRAP
1. la baume
2. under the table
3. birthday cake
Book 2: Earthen Sky OLD MAN IN HIS CHAIR
1. beautiful disposition
2. crazy is just a word
THE KIND MADE FROM LOVE
3. he’s already here
4. too stupid to see
5. edge of reason
UNNOTICED BY ALL
6. i had loved her
THAT ONE TIME IN THE WOODS
7. chew chew chew
8. food infiltration
9. daddy
10. liar liar liar
THEY COME
Book 3: Sky Roots 11. bloody creepo
12. the sane never come, the crazy always do
SOON
13. long memory
14. see your shrink
GIGGLES
15. all about the poison
16. the mad always are
WITHOUT WARNING
Book 4: Meat Prison 17. no. no, no, no
18. jesus, god
19. we made a man
Book 5: Rooted Fire 20. kansas
A STORY: CAUSE AND EFFECT
21. young and stupid
22. between trees, a tinkle
23. fool, alone
24. obscurantism
25. dare you
26. told you i was crazy
27. —. — — —
Book 6: Flaming Stone 28. do you see?
29. anne
30. s i n k i n g
31. story
A STORY: GOWAN RETURNS
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Copyright
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © 2016 by Dawn Kurtagich
Cover art by Howard Huang, title page trees: Shutterstock.com
Art here by A.J. Kurtagich
Cover design by Maggie Edkins and Sammy Yuen
Cover © 2016 Hachette Book Group, Inc.
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.
Little, Brown and Company
Hachette Book Group
1290 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10104
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Little, Brown and Company is a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc.
The Little, Brown name and logo are trademarks of Hachette Book Group, Inc.
The publisher is not responsible for websites (or their content) that are not owned by the publisher.
First ebook edition: September 2016
ISBN 978-0-316-29869-8
E3-20160806-JV-PC