The Prophecy and the Familiar

SEVEN

The farmer's wife is a plump, pretty human in an incongruously bright red coverall. Her husband has explicitly forbidden her to enter the woods beyond the farm. Most of the time, she humors him and his superstitious ways—fancy thinking that funny woman Isabella is a witch!—but this morning he has gone to town for nails and wire, and what he doesn't know won't hurt him.

The storm the night before had been a terror. In years to come it will be remembered as the Midsummer's Gale. The cows have torn through the fence, trampled a swath of corn into oblivion, then disappeared toward the neighboring farm with five of the six sheep. The neighbor will keep them safe until the fence is repaired.

It takes her half an hour to free the last sheep, one of the spring lambs, from the tangled fence nearest the woods. The wooly little creature totters back toward the barn, bleating ungratefully, but it seems uninjured. The farmer's wife is relieved. Four of her chickens are missing, the cows have trampled part of their winter feed, and all that's bad enough.

And Willow is gone.

The farmer's wife gazes into the woods. She has seen Willow slip away into the trees often enough. Last year she discovered that the cat likes to visit their other neighbor, the mysterious and intriguing Alastair, who is quite the object of interest amongst the ladies at the town church. Nearly as much gossip revolves around him as does Isabella the Supposed Witch. One afternoon, when Willow had been gone a full four days, the farmer's wife had gone looking for her. Alastair had met her halfway there, carrying the cat, and apologized for delaying her. She was good company, the polite man had said.

So strange, that. Willow likes strangers at a distance.

Surely, the farmer's wife thinks, the cat wouldn't have run through the storm to Alastair's. She saw her in the barn before the storm started, gazing with speculative green cat-eyes at the gathering blackness of the clouds.

"You stay here, lovey," the farmer's wife had told her, and Willow seemed to agree, going back to a warm pile of straw in Bernard's stall.

So strange, she thinks again, and tries not to worry. She has been calling the cat's name all morning while she works.

Then she hears the kitten crying.

*     *     *

The kitten is curled up at the foot of a gravestone, a gray monolith so worn and ivy-covered that the inscription is impossible to read. The little creature—old enough to be away from its mother, but not by more than a few months—doesn't move as the farmer's wife approaches, only tries to burrow farther into the ivy.

Nearby, a small leather collar rests in a pile of singed black fur.

The woman's hand flies to her mouth. "Oh, Willow," she whispers.

She reaches down with trembling hands and lifts the kitten up. The kitten—all black save for a locket of white on her throat, just like Willow—hisses feebly and then wails again.

"Shh, little one." The woman tucks it under her arm, and the cat quiets.

Next, the woman bends and picks up Willow's collar, then drops it quickly. An unnatural chill runs down her back as she straightens, fully realizing where she is.

The Standing Stones have been here forever, or for so long it might as well be an eternity. The farmer's wife has never felt anything unusual here, but this morning is different. She senses distant dread and fire, quite apart from the obvious carnage that....something...has wrought in the woods.

The downed branches can be attributed to the storm. But what has trampled all the grass and undergrowth? What knocked over two of the Standing Stones, ones that even Bernard couldn't possibly budge? What has uprooted an entire young oak tree beyond the stone circle? And what, in heaven's name, could have burned dark slashes into the trees and grass nearest the stone circle? She still smells a hint of smoke.

Lightning? There had been very little lightning, only a few distant flashes.

Her feet want to run, but the farmer's wife is made of sterner stuff than that. Her wide eyes scan the ground under the trampled vegetation, taking in a patchwork quilt of footprints. Some are wee paw prints, those of poor Willow and her kitten. Others are larger, likely a man's sturdy shoes. Yet others are smaller—maybe the high-heeled boots favored by Isabella the Supposed Witch?

And then there are minuscule, bare-footed human tracks. Her mind tries to rebel, but there is not a doubt in her mind: these are the footprints of a child, no more than a toddler.

The farmer's wife doesn't want to know, but she is compelled to follow the child's trail. They lead her directly into the circle of stones and toward the two tallest. These stones have kept their shape, more or less, through the untold centuries, and can still be identified as obelisks.

The child's tracks head straight between the obelisks and disappear.

They picked up the babe, the farmer's wife thinks furiously. For heaven's sake, they scooped up their child and ran. Don't be foolish, woman!

The kitten in the crook of her arm hisses. The woman's eye falls upon a stream of dry, dark blood on the southern obelisk.

She spins on her heel and flees. She never enters the woods again.