Wisp of a Thing: A Novel of the Tufa (Tufa Novels)

by Alex Bledsoe

  She nodded.

  He wished the girl’s eyes were more normal; their opaque blackness unnerved him. “They’ll see us if we try to go to the graveyard right now. We’ll have to wait until they go inside.”

  She reached to his face and touched her fingertips to his cheek. In the moonlight her expression was so tender, it made something ache deep inside him. She leaned toward him, but he gently pulled her hand away. “Not now, Curnen, okay? We’ll talk about this later.”

  Her expression turned eloquently sad, and he felt like a jerk. Whatever the reality, she clearly believed in the curse, and behaved accordingly. All she wanted from him was basic human kindness. And like everyone else, he was denying her.

  “I’m sorry,” Rob said gently. “Look, you know I’m your friend, right? Do you have any other friends?”

  She shook her head.

  “See? Then I’ll be your friend, and that makes me special, okay?”

  She tilted her head a little. If she tried, would she be able to make him feel as aroused as she had in the clearing? Or was her ability to manipulate him shattered now that he knew its source?

  He shivered. The night was cool, and sweat soaked his clothes. Curnen silently piled leaves around them, forming a crude nest. Then she lay down beside him and scooted as close as she dared.

  A guitar rang out from the Gwinn cabin. Someone yelled, “Awright, now,” and began to clap along. Feet stomped on the porch, the thud accompanied by an occasional cracking sound.

  Rob smiled as he recognized the song, although he never imagined it played so harshly. He pulled Curnen close, and she nestled against him. He wondered if anyone had ever treated her like this before, or if everyone, including her own family, was either scared or desirous of her?

  As loud as he dared, he sang to her:

  Down in some lone valley,

  In a lonesome place

  Where the wild birds do whistle,

  And their notes do increase

  Farewell pretty Saro,

  I bid you adieu,

  But I’ll dream of pretty Saro

  Wherever I go.…

  By the time he reached the second verse, he could tell by her breathing that she was asleep.

  26

  Bliss stood on her patio looking out at the lake in the moonlight. She felt the soft breeze as something flew behind her, then heard the faint, delicate tap as feet lightly touched the wood.

  When she turned, Mandalay Harris stood there, dressed in a Fresh Beat Band pajama top and a pair of cut-off shorts.

  The girl made a gesture of welcome, and Bliss replied with the appropriate hand signal. “It must be important if you’re calling me over here in the middle of the night,” Mandalay said. “What’s up?”

  “Something happened that I can’t explain,” Bliss said. “And it is important.”

  Mandalay hopped up on the patio rail. “Tell me about it, then.”

  Bliss related Rob’s story of being accosted by the younger Rockhouse Hicks. Mandalay listened without interrupting. When she finished, Bliss said, “And I don’t know what to do now.”

  “Wow,” Mandalay said.

  “I could use something a little more concrete.”

  “It wasn’t a real haint, obviously. Rockhouse ain’t dead. So…” She looked up at the sky, where a lone cloud scudded across the moon. “The night winds must have sent it.”

  Bliss’s heart almost stopped. “You can’t be serious, Mandalay.”

  The girl shrugged, as if what she’d suggested meant nothing. “You know another explanation, you throw it on out here and we’ll see if it runs around.”

  “But they don’t … They’ve never … They don’t get involved that way.”

  “They never have before,” she agreed.

  “But why would they do it now?” Bliss almost shouted.

  As if it were the simplest thing in the world, she said, “They want your friend Rob to come here and do something none of the Tufa can or will do.”

  “So the night winds brought him here by telling him some bullshit story about a magic song, and once he got here, they made Tiffany Gwinn smack him so hard that even though he has no Tufa in him, he can see things that should be visible only to us?”

  “Well, duh,” Mandalay said. “Look, it’s pretty plain. None of us would have anything to do with ‘The Fate of the Tyrant Fae.’ We know what it is, and what it does, which is why Rockhouse keeps hiding it. But the night winds clearly want it found, and sung. They made sure it got put on tombstones, stuck in the back of that book in Cricket, even put it on the cover of one of Rockhouse’s albums. They’ve basically rubbed our noses in it forever. But we haven’t done anything with it, and they’re tired of waiting.”

  “Why?”

  “Why are they tired of waiting, or why do they want something done?”

  “Both.”

  She hopped down off the rail. “Rockhouse’s time is over, I’d guess.”

  “And Curnen?”

  “Curnen’s a lost cause, Bliss. I’m sorry to say it, but you know it’s true. Every time I see her, there’s a little more gone. My stepmom doesn’t even remember her anymore. It’s sad and it’s awful, but it’s beyond our control.”

  Bliss clenched her fists. She forced herself to stay focused on the bigger picture. “Rockhouse is what holds us together. He may not lead both tribes, but he’s the reason we’re here. If he loses his power—”

  Mandalay smiled. “You remember what Bronwyn Hyatt said when she got back from Iraq, don’t you? We have to change and evolve, we can’t keep hiding from the world.”

  “If Rockhouse loses his power, Mandalay, we don’t know who will step in.”

  She sighed. “Tell me about it. I’d be lying if I said that didn’t scare the pee out of me. But if it’s what the winds want, I’ll just have to suck it up. Put on my big-girl panties, like my stepmom says.”

  “So if all that’s true … why did I play that Kate Campbell song for him? That song had the lyrics that the haint of Rockhouse told him in Atlanta. Why am I in the middle of this?”

  She moved close to Bliss and took the older woman’s hands. “Nothing lasts forever. Not Rockhouse, not us. Bronwyn had it right: Everything living has to change, or die. You’re part of the change.”

  Bliss felt the absurdity of being lectured by a ten-year-old. “And what about Rob?”

  “When he got the ability to see our reality, he also got tied to it.”

  “Did the winds kill his girlfriend?”

  “I don’t know. I’d like to think not. But whatever got him here, he’s doing what the winds want now. That means we have to help him.”

  “We. You mean me.”

  “Okay, you. That’s why they gave you the Kate Campbell song.”

  Now things fell into place, but it did not reassure her. Not at all. “I’m supposed to help him take down Rockhouse?”

  Mandalay nodded.

  “How?”

  The girl smiled and shrugged. “Wait and see which way the winds blow.”

  * * *

  Rob lay awake, listening. The player wasn’t very good, skipping whole chords and apparently unconcerned with meter, and the singing was atrocious. Unlike what he’d experienced at the barn dance, this music was ugly. When it finally stopped, he disentangled himself from Curnen and peeked over the log.

  Dawn began to lighten the sky. Mourning doves called from the woods. The oil lamps in the windows had either gone out or been extinguished. Only two people remained on the porch, and just when he thought they were asleep, one of them leaned over and spit into the grass. Two big, lethargic dogs under the porch raised their heads.

  “Curnen,” he whispered. She awoke with a start. He placed a hand gently over her mouth. “We have to go check this now, if we’re going to. It’ll be daylight soon. But there’s still people on the porch.”

  She nodded and carefully looked over the log. He heard her make a low growling sound, barely audible even to him.


  The nearest dog’s ears perked up, and it crawled out to stand beside the porch. It was some mongrel beast with a head like a hyena, all teeth and jaw muscles. It looked around the yard, past their hiding spot, then turned to rejoin its compatriot.

  Curnen growled again. The dog froze, looked up at the sky, and howled. Curnen continued to growl, and the beast cried out three more times. Then she fell silent, and the dog went back under the porch.

  “You hear that?” one of the men from the porch said. “That sum’bitch howled four times and quit.”

  “So?” the other man said with a yawn.

  “Daddy always said if a dog howls four times and stops, means somebody in the house is going to die soon.”

  “That’s horseshit,” the second man said.

  “Yeah, well, it happened to the Potters down by Jonesborough. Their dog did that, lightning hit the house the next day, and it plumb blowed up.”

  “That’s because they had a meth lab in the basement, dumb-ass.”

  “So what you want us to do?” a third man demanded, annoyed. “Go kiss the dog’s ass or something?”

  “I don’t know, I’ll have to go ask Momma.” He went inside, and after a moment the other two followed.

  At the instant the door closed, Curnen slithered over the log and dashed to the graveyard. The tattered dress flapped behind her as she ran. Rob expected the two dogs to bark and bring the Gwinns running, but the animals did not stir.

  Curnen threw herself to the ground behind one of the grave shelters. Next to it rose a seven-foot tombstone carved in the shape of a cloth-draped pylon. It tilted awkwardly on the slope, and Rob was afraid it might tumble down on top of her. But it remained solid, and she motioned for him to join her.

  Rob crouched low as he ran and slid to the ground beside her. An awesomely repulsive smell swamped the whole area, originating at the three outhouses just up the hill. He gagged, blinked back tears of nausea; then he looked up at the tombstone, eager to find the missing verse in the dim morning light.

  The surface read only, KATE OVERBAY GWINN, BELOVED WIFE AND MOTHER, 1882–1922. So this was the grave of Great Kate, the bootlegger too fat to arrest. And her maiden name was Overbay. Bliss had called Tiffany her cousin, so he shouldn’t be surprised.

  He checked the two other sides he could see from his position, but those were completely blank. Could it be on the side facing the house? That would be just his luck. He turned to Curnen and whispered, “Where is it?”

  But the wild girl had vanished.

  Oh, shit, he thought. Even crouched behind the grave shelter, it was light enough that he’d be spotted by the first Gwinn who looked out the window. They’d torture him, then kill him, and his body would never be found. Tiffany would use his testicles for castanets.

  He heard movement near the house, and watched one of the dogs walk out into the open, stretch, and hike its leg at a corner of the foundation. Someone moved inside, big feet thudding on old, creaking wood.

  He glanced at the woods behind him. He’d have to make a break for it and hope he could lose himself in the trees. He had no idea which way led to Needsville, or even the nearest road; but with the sunrise to mark east, he could at least ensure he was running in a straight line away from the Gwinns.

  Then, something wriggled under him, beneath the ground.

  Startled, he moved aside. Was it a mole? Then he realized it wasn’t moving horizontally under the surface, it was burrowing its way up through the soil, from inside the grave of Great Kate Gwinn.

  He stared and almost screamed when a corpse-pale, dirt-encrusted hand clawed up into the air.

  27

  The hand waved at him. This hillbilly zombie knew he was there.

  Then it curled and dug its fingertips into the dirt. Rob’s heart threatened to rip its way out through his ribs and flee on its own.

  Another hand burrowed out beside the first, only this hand clutched a letter-sized envelope. Then the two hands spread the ground between them, widening it into a opening big enough for a dark-haired head to emerge.

  Curnen peeked out, only her eyes above ground level.

  Rob sagged against the tombstone, shaking as the adrenaline burned itself out. “God dammit, Curnen,” he breathed.

  She saw Rob and waved the envelope at him. He grabbed it, and she ducked back down the hole.

  He turned the envelope over in his trembling fingers. It was age-tarnished and sealed with wax. He felt a single small piece of thick paper inside. He folded the envelope and stuffed it into his pants pocket, figuring this wasn’t the best place to examine it. It was almost full daylight now.

  Ten yards down the slope, almost to the forest, Curnen emerged from a hole hidden behind a clump of weeds. He wondered if she had burrows in graveyards all over the area. Before he could dwell on that creepy thought, she waved for him to follow as she dashed down the slope into the trees.

  He needed no extra encouragement. He ran as hard as he could down the hill. Just as he reached the tree line and safety, a voice behind him yelled “Hey!” followed by a dog’s furious barking.

  “Wait for me!” he cried to Curnen, barely able to see her ahead of him. She flitted gracefully through underbrush that threatened to snag and trip him. Within moments, she was gone, and he could only continue straight down the hill away from the Gwinns, hoping he’d catch up with her somewhere ahead.

  He just barely cleared a log directly in his path. When he landed on the other side, the wet leaves slid out from under his feet and he tumbled out of control. He grabbed at every tree and branch he rolled past, until suddenly the ground was gone and he fell through the air.

  Something slapped at his palm and he clutched it with both hands. It was a thick, old grapevine and it held his weight, but now he dangled off the edge of a gully, twenty feet above the creek they’d earlier crossed.

  He shifted his grip and wrapped one leg around the vine as well. He was five feet below the edge, which curved out over the creek. He’d be seen if he pulled himself back up, and the drop would land him painfully atop a jumble of smooth, slick river stones.

  Dogs barked in the woods above, and men shouted instructions and curses. The overhang hid him from view, and the vine seemed solidly anchored to a tree above him.

  He stayed as still as he could and listened. The dogs were much closer, and now he could make out words.

  “… some gubment sum’bitch…”

  “… cut his balls off and feed ’em to him…”

  “… let the dogs rip him up…”

  Rob spotted several thick, knobby tree roots protruding from the bank. He could use them to descend, but not with his pursuers nearby. Now the dogs were so close, he heard their paws crunch on the leaves overhead, along with the much heavier steps of their masters. They barked right above him, but could not see him beneath the overhang.

  “God-dang it,” someone said, “he must’ve jumped down there and run off.”

  “Ain’t nobody going to make that jump, ya dumb-ass,” another voice responded. “These stupid dogs lost him.” One of the dogs yelped as it received a solid smack of disapproval. “He must be hid up around here somewhere, maybe up in a tree or something.”

  Rob’s shoulder muscles seemed about to rip loose from the bones, and the bruise across his back felt like a hot metal strip against his skin. He gritted his teeth so hard, he could barely breathe.

  “Hey!” the first voice said. “Look!”

  “Aw, shit.”

  Rob carefully turned his head. Curnen crouched on the other side of the creek, drinking water from her cupped hands. She ignored both Rob and the men above him.

  “God-dang it, it’s that wisp of a thing again,” one of the men said. The braggadocio left his voice. “Poppa Rockhouse said we shouldn’t have no truck with her.”

  “Gimme that rifle.”

  Curnen stood and raised her arms over her head, her palms upward. Her face was pink in the dawn. She kept her eyes on the Gwinns, opened her mouth,
and emitted a soft throaty hiss that grew louder until it was almost a roar. As she did, a breeze rustled the trees above her.

  “Put that gun down, she’s going to call up a storm on us.”

  She whistled sharply three times, and the wind grew stronger. One of the dogs resumed barking. Rob heard another smack, and the dog yelped and softly whimpered.

  “Stop that, man!” one of the Gwinns said, his voice trembling.

  “What’s wrong with you? You’re shivering like a dog shitting peach pits.”

  “I’m still thinking about the way that one howled this morning. And now we run up on this bitch, it’s just too much.”

  “Hey!” a new voice called from farther away. Rob again recognized Tiffany Gwinn. “Momma says for y’all to quit fooling around and get your asses back home. Now!”

  The wind continued to rise, and now the tops of the trees creaked and groaned under it. Some squealed as they rubbed together. Brown and red leaves ripped free of their branches.

  “Some gubment man was poking around the house,” one of the men responded. “We chased him down here.”

  “Momma don’t care! She says if she has to get off the porch, she’s going to tan all of your hides, she don’t care how old you are!”

  “Hell, come on,” the first man said, resigned. “We ain’t going to find him with that girl running around. It must’ve been her, anyway.”

  Their voices faded as they tramped back up the hill. The wind died down as well. Curnen motioned that it was all clear.

  Rob awkwardly climbed down the tree roots until he reached the ground. He fell against the muddy rise, gasping, his arms burning. Curnen splashed across the stream and knelt beside him.

  He could not remember ever being in so much physical pain. His back and shoulders hurt so much, it brought tears to his eyes. She stroked his hand, making little sympathetic whimpers. It was so touching, it made him smile, and gradually the pain faded.

  “That was … fun,” he gasped.

  She smiled, then impulsively kissed him. He didn’t resist. Then she helped him sit up, and he pulled the envelope from his pocket.