The basket of muffins is making my left arm ache, so I switch it to my right arm and tuck the checkered cloth more tightly around the baked goods.
When I look up again, something darts through the trees beside the path.
My heart jolts, but I don’t stop walking. These woods are full of the creatures I’ve summoned over the years. Despite the confusion they always seem to experience when they’re pulled into this world, none of them have ever harmed me or my family. It’s as if, by virtue of being their summoner, I’m immune to anyviolent instincts they might have, and their courtesy appears to extend to my loved ones as well.
Occasionally one or two of the creatures will emerge from the woods to pester a flock of sheep, bore holes in a barn, devour some vegetables, or wreck a fence. The demons are an annoyance, not a real danger. Our neighbors usually manage the incidents without a fuss, but a few times someone has come by our house to rail at Mama for property damage. In such cases, she has quietly given them a bit of money, whatever we could spare at the time.
“Get that daughter of yours under control,” Mr. Bezier warned Mama once. To which she responded pertly, “Get yourtemperunder control, and then we’ll talk.”
I don’t fear the demons any more than I would fear a rabbit or a squirrel, but it unsettles me to see them in the wild. Guilt gnaws at me whenever I spot one, because it’s my fault that these creatures are stuck here, in this world, without any hope of returning to their home, wherever that is.
A crunching thud shakes the ground in the forest to my right, and a sick thrill passes through my stomach. Whatever made that sound is much larger and heavier than most things I’ve summoned.
Halting on the path, I peer into the forest. The bigger, leafier trees tend to grow along the border of the forest, but in this area, the trees are tall and bare, with naked branches studding their trunks like the spokes of a wheel, all the way up to the forest canopy, where their living leaves are. Despite the absence of bushes and leaves, it’s amazing how quickly the bare trunks become an impenetrable wall, hindering my line of sight in every direction. I can’t see anything that might have made that ponderous thud.
“There’s nothing out there,” I tell myself aloud. “Stay calm, or you’ll end up summoning something else.”
I continue along the path, walking briskly.
Halfway between the edge of Wormsloe Wood and Grandmother Riquet’s house, near the center of the forest, a rocky hill surges up like the stone breast of a sleeping goddess. Locals call it “the Barrow.” With the exception of the occasional hunting party, people tend to avoid the woods in general and the Barrow in particular. Most hunting is done in the other local forests, because Wormsloe has a reputation that precedes my existence. People and animals tend to go missing here.
Grandmother Riquet used to warn me to avoid the Barrow, though she would never say why. Nor did she ever tell me who or what she thought might be buried beneath the hill. To me, it’s just a lump of rock cloaked with earth and grass. The path goes around it, but clambering over the mound is faster and provides a better view of the surrounding forest. I’ve done it a hundred times, despite Grandmother’s warning. It’s a straight shot over the hill and down to the path on the other side.
When I come to the Barrow I struggle up its steep slope, holding my basket against my side and extending my left arm for balance. At the top I pause and turn in a slow circle, enjoying the view while the autumn breeze whips my red cloak around me and tosses my hair. My cheeks burn from the walk and the climb.
Something immense catches my eye. A towering shape, moving among the spruce and pines. My heart lurches into my throat.
The figure is nearly as tall as the trees that partially conceal it from my view. It walks on impossibly long, slender legs, thin and tall as tree trunks, with knobby joints. Its coat is shaggy, and its aspect is wolflike, I think, though it’s difficult to make out its body or head amid the forest canopy. Its feet resemble a cow’s hooves, huge and cloven, falling with slow, ponderous purpose.
I don’t recognize this demon… unless… Could it be the spindly shadow-creature I chased out of our house last winter? It seems unlikely. That demon was much smaller and more skeletal, practically a shadow of this one, and it resembled a cat more than a wolf.
Gods, this demon is huge. If there had been a sighting of such a monster, surely I would have heard about it. How has no one seen it before now?
The creature scents the air, then makes a garbled grunting sound. With slow, heavy steps, it weaves its way through the trees and disappears from my view.
Nothing about the demon seemed aggressive, but my heart is pounding wildly and my palms are clammy with nervous sweat. I set down my basket long enough to take off my cloak and drape it over my arm. Then I continue down the Barrow and along the path toward Grandmother Riquet’s house.
I haven’t been to her cottage in almost a year, so when I round the bend and see it again, I stop short. Things have changed dramatically.
She has taken down the fence that used to divide her property from the woods, and the entire clearing around her cottage is dotted with wooden hutches and various small shelters, rather like doghouses—although some of them are more akin to birdhouses, propped on tall, crooked poles.
There are creatures everywhere, ducking in and out of the shelters, munching on vegetables, hopping and tumbling in the grass. I recognize them. They’re all demons I’ve summoned over the years, and they’ve clustered here, forming a motley menagerie around Grandmother Riquet’s cottage.
For a second I wonder if they drove her out and took over the clearing, but I immediately dismiss the thought. They couldn’t have built the little houses themselves. Someone created those dwellings for their benefit. Someone is feeding them and providing them with shelter.
As I advance, the creatures pause what they’re doing to stare at me. There’s such variety in their forms and colors, so many unique textures of their skin, scales and fur. Some of themare an unexpected combination of one or more recognizable animals, fused with elements that those animals shouldn’t have, like tiny goat’s horns on a mouse, feathered wings on a lizard, a fox with eight eyes and a prehensile tail, or a six-legged rabbit with the claws of a badger. Yet many of the demons include parts of animals I’ve never seen before, species that don’t exist in this realm.
My lungs tighten and my pulse kicks up even higher, partly with excitement and partly with apprehension. I’ve never witnessed this many of the demons in a group, and although they seem passive, I’m unsure how they feel about me.
A year ago, Grandmother Riquet would never have allowed the “beasties,” as she calls them, to remain very long on her property. They disturbed her. She wanted nothing to do with them; in fact, she seemed to think that their very presence would pollute my mind and my energy, undoing the work she was trying to do with me. The farther I stayed from the demons, the better it would be for everyone, or so she said.
Now, by all appearances, she’s living with them. Treating them like pets or companions.
I head up the path, past the tool shed, and stand before the cottage. A few things haven’t changed, like the runes and symbols Grandmother carved into the logs when she first came to live in the old woodcutter’s cottage. She marked every outer and inner wall of her house with the same dozen signs. My favorite is the serpent devouring itself, with a sunburst at the center of its circular body. Another symbol looks like two capital P’s turned back to back. She once told me it symbolizes protection, while a similar symbol, like a mirrored capital R, indicates courage.
I place my fingers in the grooves of a weblike symbol, nine lines intersecting in groups of three. The Web of Wyrd, she called it. For some reason, that mark has always frightened me a little, and yet I always feel drawn to touch it. I used to feel a faintbuzz in my fingertips when I traced its shape, but this time there’s nothing.
Frowning slightly, I knock on the front door. “Grandmother?”
