“Here was where the final part of a witch’s trial took place.” Ms. Grimmaar pointed to the water. “The accused woman was tied and thrown into the depths of the water. If she managed to untie herself and float to the top, the townspeople then weighted her down with heavier chains because they believed her escape proved she was a powerful witch.”
I gawked at the gray thrashing waves, thinking how they were nothing but a watery graveyard for the accused women. “What made the townspeople think a person was a witch?” I broke the silence.
“Those were superstitious times. People didn’t have science to explain the events around them,” Ms. Grimmaar explained. Ms. Dreeble nodded weakly in agreement.
I couldn’t help notice a few of the Swedish students bristled at that. A voice from the crowd spoke out. “My grandfather told me that the witches caused crops to fail and livestock and children to get sick.”
“Who said that?” asked the headmistress. Sookie singled the boy out from the other students.
Ms. Grimmaar smiled kindly and it made her more attractive – as if a calming light shone inside her. With a patient voice she said, “People in those times didn’t understand that malnourishment and illness were a result of the failed crops.”
“Well, yeah …” said the boy. “But my grandfather said –”
Ms. Grimmaar had already turned and walked away. Then several students, two boys and a girl, crouched down beside Sookie and whispered something. I noticed my sister’s eyes grow huge, and when they brimmed with tears, I hurried to check on her.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, glaring at the girl who’d slinked back to the middle of the group.
“They said that I’d better step away from the water because water trolls love to eat little children, especially a nasty little witch like me.” Sookie sniffed as a tear trailed down her cheek.
“They were only teasing,” I said. “It’s best to pretend you don’t care.” Way better than telling on them all the time. It was the only way to get Sookie to stop angering the older students. What they had said to her was mean, but I was sure they didn’t understand that the fairy world was not imaginary for my sister. I wanted to reassure Sookie that witches and trolls weren’t real, but how could I when I was beginning to be unsure myself?
Sookie wiped the tear from her face, and I had to hand it to her for fastening the older students with a fierce look. “They’re despicable,” she said menacingly.
Jasper and Clive had come over to see what was wrong, and surprisingly, Clive took it upon himself to go over to those students who’d threatened Sookie. “You want to scare someone?” he shouted. “Try and scare me.”
Even though the boys were taller, they backed off. I shook my head in disbelief when Clive walked back. “I thought you said Sookie was a brat, but now you’re defending her.”
“It’s wrong to pick on someone who isn’t able to fight back,” Clive said. Clive did have good principles. The problem was that he expected everyone to live up to them.
Ms. Grimmaar rejoined our group. “Perhaps we’ve had enough gloomy tales for the day.” She waved her arm at the sun, which was determined to shed a bit of warmth and light into the shroud of shadows. “Ah, children, it is turning into a bright and beautiful day. Go and enjoy the rest of the afternoon sightseeing.”
We took off like a shot before Mr. Morrows or Ms. Dreeble begged to differ. I looked back only once to see Sookie engaged in a deep and rather earnest-looking conversation with the headmistress. I almost had to laugh at how serious my little sister appeared. But Ms. Grimmaar had crouched down and was listening intently to her. She made a shooing motion with her hand, granting me a gift – permission to hang out with my friends while Sookie stayed with the teachers.
As we rounded the town square, and Amarjeet, Mia, and the others ducked into a tourist shop, I held Jasper back. “Check this out with me,” I said moving toward the witch statue. Pointing to the inscription at the base of the monument, I asked several bystanders, “Ursakta mig, but could you please, I mean snälla, tell me what those words mean?”
“Certainly,” said a townsman in clear English. “This statue was built in the Middle Ages during the witching years that plagued our town. It’s a warning: Fair is foul, and foul is fair. Beware the reek of mystic air.”
Jasper quickly said, “Tack.”
The townsman smiled and said, “Varsagod.” After saying “you’re welcome,” he mentioned something curious. “These mists that have been creeping in from the lake especially at night and early in the morning …” he let out an uneasy laugh, “my grandmother would have said it’s a bad sign that the witches are returning.”
“You mean people are still superstitious?” Jasper asked.
“It’s common folklore, especially this time of year,” the man said. “Many grandmothers might say, ‘Keep a close eye on old Blakulla, especially on Walpurgis Night.’”
The man raised the collar of his jacket, wrapping the scarf tighter around his neck, and hurried away.
“I wonder what Walpurgis Night is?”
Jasper said quietly, “I guess we’ve got some investigating to do.”
I knew Jasper was right. We needed to find out what Walpurgis Night and witches had in common.
Whatever the connection was, it was already giving me a bad feeling.
CHAPTER 18 - A Perilous Plague
WE’D SPENT ANOTHER afternoon researching but hadn’t found a thing. I wished I could just ask my aunt what superstitions she’d heard about; she’d lived near this town all her life. The problem was I got this uneasy sense that my aunt wasn’t exactly what she appeared to be – and neither was her creepy reindeer herder.
“What’s going on?” Clive asked as Jasper and I slipped out of the Svartberg library.
“What do you mean?” I asked, making my face as innocent as possible.
“You and Jasper have been sneaking off from our language classes this whole week,” he said. “And on field trips into town, you two always disappear at some point.”
As I wondered what to say, Jasper dropped the ball. “We’re researching.”
It’s not exactly subterfuge, I thought, when a person blurts the truth.
“Researching what?” Clive asked.
“Witches,” Jasper said directly, ignoring my shaking head.
Interesting – I rarely saw Clive speechless. But he totally surprised me with a minute of silence.
“There is something wrong here, isn’t there?” Clive’s eyes darted around the empty white corridor. Except for the three of us, every other student was inside their morning class, and the silence was oppressive.
Again, I responded cautiously. “What do you mean?”
“First,” Clive held up a finger, “this is the weirdest town. Whenever we go on a field trip – it doesn’t matter where we go, either to study the geography or to learn about Vikings – a strange fog rolls in from the water. Then everyone begins talking about medieval witch trials. Even our teachers!”
“I guess that’s sort of unusual,” I said. “But you have to admit, Mr. Morrows likes anything historical, and I have known Ms. Dreeble to care very deeply about injustice to women back in the old days.”
Clive held up finger number two. “Okay, but there’s something not right about a lot of the townspeople. It’s as if every day they look more and more frightened. I bet if we go into town after the field trip this afternoon, there will be scarcely a soul in the streets, especially after dusk.”
“Okay, we’ve noticed that too.” Although not quite the way Clive had. We were noticing the way our feathers glowed, and how we too sensed a growing uneasiness. Clive was actually pretty observant.
“And number three,” Clive struck his third finger, “I’ve felt this way before, and I think it means trouble.” His face grew puzzled. “Like real life and dreams get mixed up, and I can’t tell which is which.”
Jasper and I looked at each other. “Well,” Jasper said, “for what it’
s worth, there have been strange things that have happened before in our town, and most people think it’s just a dream. And we both think that something peculiar is going on now.”
Clive stared at us and then at the empty white corridor. He wasn’t the type to just let it go. “What do you think is happening?”
I shook my head. “We have no idea, except I do know that fog has a bad feel to it. A man on the street warned us about it, and I’ve seen the way people in town avoid it – going in their houses or shops until it passes. Also, I’ve been seeing strange, creepy things at my aunt’s farm. Like a face in our window at night that had the same witch eyes as the statue in the center of town.” I shuddered. I barely slept through the weekend because I got the feeling someone had been staring in our window again. Even though I always made sure the curtains were closed, I still felt watched. “We’re thinking there is something going on, and it has to do with witches.”
“That’s impossible,” Clive said dismissively. Then he grew a shade paler. “Um, why do I think I’ve said that before?” He shook his head as if to dislodge a distant memory.
“It’s not impossible,” Jasper said. “Although, I can’t say either way what’s going on here. Our research has hit a serious snag. All the books in the library are in Swedish. And we haven’t been given a password to use the school computers.” At that moment, the bell rang and the corridor grew thunderous as students spilled from the classrooms.
We dropped our conversation and followed the Darkmont crowd into the crisp afternoon sunshine as a school bus pulled up for the field trip to the lake. There was no point worrying about anything until we got back to school. Like clockwork, my aunt pulled up in her battered truck and let Sookie out on the curb.
Sookie had been attending all our field trips in the afternoon. And I was no longer furious about her tagging along – I didn’t like her at the farm if I wasn’t there. Besides, the first thing Sookie always did was glom onto our teachers, so it wasn’t as if she was clinging to me. And since that first day in town, she’d learned to stop tattling on the other students, and they kept away from her.
We piled in the bus first. The Swedish students always hung back because they made it clear they preferred not to be associated with us. My mouth gaped when a few of the students sullenly walked past us to the back of the bus.
“Wow, what happened to them?” I twisted my head around, even though I knew better than to stare.
“Ugh,” said Mia. “Is it contagious?”
“Maybe they binged on junk food,” suggested Amarjeet.
“Then I’m never eating sugar again,” said Mitch.
Somehow I thought whatever had splattered their faces in huge, crusty, weeping pustules had nothing to do with zits. I saw a picture of smallpox once that had terrified me, but these students didn’t seem desperately ill in that way – just miserable. It wasn’t lost on me that these were the students who had picked on Sookie, or that she had a smug look as they walked past her.
This wasn’t good. I hunkered down on the worn leather seat of the bus and stared silently out the window as we drove to the lake. The black forests of Sweden closed in on me, smothering the light and leaving me buried in the dark. Was Sookie practicing magic again? I felt guilty at the thought. Just because she didn’t feel sorry for those pox-infested students didn’t mean she caused their trouble. After all, the havoc Sookie brought with her magic was always accidental.
When we arrived at the lake, I looked out onto the sparkling water and let the brisk freshwater air lighten my heart. Several wooden boats with tall masts and dark sails bobbed on the crystal lake. Red summer cottages dotted the shore, making this place look peaceful and inviting.
That is, until Mia asked, “What’s that?”
We looked to where Mia was pointing, and across the water thick white fog swirled toward the shore. The mists took the forms of wraiths, twisting like tormented ghosts.
Even the guys did a double take, and a few people gasped. We stepped back from the lake’s edge as the eerie fog stretched its ghostly arms toward us. Shivers crept along my spine and hair prickled on the nape of my neck. My feather glowed hot against my skin, which didn’t surprise me at all.
“What’s that sound?” Amarjeet said uneasily.
We listened. A strange thrum rippled along the lakeshore and then from behind in the blackened forest. The thrumming began growing louder, as if we were standing on top of a giant heart that was waking beneath our feet. Brumm, brumm. The rhythm grew and the ground began to shake.
The ferns near the lake started rustling. Brumm, brumm. Together we all backed away from the lakeshore when the tall lake grass began shaking. Brumm, brumm.
Looking left and right, we couldn’t see what was making the noise, but still it grew. A popping sound exploded from the rushes and again behind us from the thick ferns that carpeted the edge of the woods. Mia shrieked.
We stared wildly as an army of slimy toads hopped out from the forest and the lakeshore, and we were caught right in the middle! They were all sizes, from tiny green frogs that could leap shoulder high to the biggest, ugliest toads I’d ever seen – and I didn’t mind amphibians. But they came in thousands, and they began dropping from trees onto our heads and shoulders. Everyone raced toward the bus and most of us were screaming. We had frogs plopping on top of our heads, frogs tangling in our hair, and frogs squirming down the front of our shirts …
One cold frog landed inside the collar of my jacket and began scrambling down my back. But no one heard my scream since all of us were shouting and trying to shake toads out of our clothes. As I ran, a plump toad landed on my scalp and began a slimy slide down my cheek. Would I get warts? Lots of people began tripping and falling over the frogs and toads, and I stopped and helped Amarjeet back up on her feet. Mostly, though, I just wanted to keep running.
Then I saw something that struck terror in my heart.
CHAPTER 19 - A Little Witchcraft
SOOKIE’S FACE WAS a mask of wickedness and she laughed uproariously as fleeing students clamored to get into the school bus. She blocked their way until the bus driver lifted her up and carried her to a seat. Then she pasted her face to the bus window and kept on laughing.
Sookie, what have you done? I thought in a panic. Maybe she thought we looked funny scrambling and ricocheting off each other trying to jam into the bus. That’s what I hoped. Except Sookie didn’t have a single frog on her!
We made our way inside the bus and collapsed gratefully onto the seats. It was a long ride back, and by the time we arrived at the school, our nerves were shot. For the whole trip, the bus driver kept pulling to the side of the road as yet another series of shrieks echoed through the bus, and we’d dump the latest hitchhiking toads into the grass.
“Will you look at that,” Mia whispered ominously when we finally stood outside the school.
The Swedish students filed off the bus, and I noticed more faces had broken out in seeping pustules. Red patches of bumps blotched their skin as if they’d smeared pizza all over their faces.
“No one said it was contagious,” Zach said, alarmed.
“Shouldn’t they be quarantined?” asked Mitch. Then more hopefully, “And the school closed?”
Clive leaned toward me, his face full of worry. “It doesn’t take a genius to link frogs and pox to witchcraft. I’d still say it’s all impossible, but we’ve got to find out what’s going on. And I have a feeling it’s not going to be anything I’d call logical.”
He was right about that. I rubbed a hand over my face, but my skin still felt smooth under my fingertips.
“Don’t worry, Cat,” Sookie chirped as she scooted past me. With a nasty smirk she continued, “Only mean students will get the pox.”
Relief did not pour into me. As a matter of fact, my stomach became a wretched twist of knots. I didn’t need to hear what I already knew to be true, when Jasper turned to me and whispered, “Sookie is up to magic.”
And this time it was e
ven worse. The magic she was performing was meant to cause harm. She’d never done that before. Oh, Sookie, I thought miserably, what’s going on?
One thing I knew, Sookie wouldn’t be up to this on her own. She was being taught these things. I flashed back to the farm and remembered how Sookie would stare out at the lake all the time and seem so distant. What exactly was going on when I wasn’t there?
Then it occurred to me. Sookie always seemed relieved to hang out with my teachers when she got here, as if she was trying to break away from my aunt’s influence, so I was relieved when Ms. Grimmaar dismissed school early. Ms. Dreeble and her left with Sookie to go into town and keep her occupied until our aunt showed up. This would buy me some time to find out as much as I could before I questioned my sister.
Mr. Morrows rubbed his forehead and told us his head was splitting, and he went to his hotel room to sleep. The rest of the exchange students scattered, eager to clear away from the school before they caught the pox. That left Jasper, Clive, and me standing outside the school.
“I’ll talk to Sookie later,” I said quietly to Jasper. Clive didn’t need to be in on everything, such as my sister having a stake in his witchcraft suspicions. “Right now, we’ve got to find out more about witchcraft in this town.”
Clive, in his typical arrogant fashion, began taking charge. “Not every answer is in books, you know,” he said to Jasper. “We should just go into town and start interviewing people. We should –”
I held up my hand to shut him down. As the other students inside the school began flooding out of their classrooms, I realized this was our opportunity to find some answers.
Seizing the chaotic moment, I said to Jasper and Clive, “Let’s get inside the school before they lock up. There are no students or teachers, and I want to check out the classroom where we were working. Ms. Dreeble was sitting at the teacher’s desk, and she always keeps a daybook.”
Grim Hill: The Family Secret Page 9