A Grave Tree (2 page)

She opened the door to the sound of the loud beep from the alarm system. Ocean, Mark’s cat, strolled over to the door and marched out, but stopped immediately and shook her now-soaked paws in surprise before turning around and galloping back inside. Farley took off like a shot into the trees, his brown form only barely visible in the deepening afternoon gloom. The dampness assaulted Abbey as soon as she stepped outside; raindrops ran in rivulets off her hood and somehow found their way down her neck and into her hair.

She jumped when the cabin door opened and closed again behind her.

“Daily exercise is important for good health,” Mark announced as he joined Abbey on the stoop. Abbey wasn’t sure whether it was the daily Farley walks, their previous adventures, or Mark’s trepidation regarding Sylvain’s cooking, but Mark had grown leaner and more muscular in the last few weeks. A few months ago, being alone with Mark would have scared Abbey a bit—with his Asperger’s, he could be unpredictable and aloof—but now she found it comforting.

She wondered if he planned to provide more thoughts with regard to isogons, but he remained silent as they trudged down the muddy path following Farley. The rain was apparently not a deterrent for small forest critters, or Farley, and soon the Chesapeake Bay retriever was barreling back and forth on the path in front of them, barking and stalking birds and squirrels.

Cold seeped through Abbey’s rain jacket, and her sneaker-clad feet were soon soaked. They had reached what Abbey judged to be the hundred-meter mark on the trail, and she was about to call Farley back when Mark cried out behind her.

She spun around to see Mark’s bulky body hurtling the last few feet toward her. For a moment she was certain he would launch up into her arms and cling there as if the forest floor were covered with snakes; she checked quickly to make sure it was not.

“Something,” he said and then stopped, his arms raised and open palms hovering over his ears. He seemed about to drop into one of his protective crouches with his hands pressed against the sides of his head. He stood there frozen for a few seconds, like a paused movie, or a record player with the needle caught in a groove, then evidently having fought the urge to fall to his knees, he let out a giant exhale and started talking in a jerky monotone. “There’s something in the trees back there. Something white… I don’t believe in ghosts. I don’t believe in ghosts.” He said this last as if it was a mantra that would vanquish any potential lingering phantoms.

“What are you saying, Mark? Did you see a ghost?”

“I don’t believe in ghosts. I don’t believe in ghosts.” Mark rocked back and forth on his feet and flailed his hands around near his ears.

Rain pattered on the leaves, and Farley still thundered through the bushes several meters away, apparently oblivious to their spectral visitor, if indeed there was a spectral visitor. But the birds, which had been trilling despite the downpour just a few seconds before, had gone strangely silent.

Did
she
believe in ghosts? Scientifically, there was no evidence to support the existence of ghosts. But the existence of black holes hadn’t been definitively proven either, and she believed in them. There was also the fact that every hair on the back of her neck was standing up, and it was taking all her will not to scream and abandon Mark and Farley while she bolted back to the cabin—except that would take her in the direction of the ghost, even though she didn’t believe in ghosts.

She reached one hand up, grasped Mark’s fist, and pulled his arm down, so they were standing with their shoulders pressed together facing the path that would lead them back to the cabin. Mark stiffened but stopped rocking.

“Are you sure you saw a ghost?” she said.

Mark nodded vigorously with his eyes closed. Rivers of rain flowed down his face, and his brown hair was caked onto his cheeks. “Just… back… there,” he said.

“Farley,” she called. “Farley! Come this instant.”

The dog, not keen on having his romp cut short, turned and eyeballed her as if to assess the likelihood that she would enforce her command. She must have appeared suitably fierce and threatening because he began to saunter toward them slowly, wearing only a mildly obstinate look and stopping to sniff a tuft of grass or two on his way. A meter away from them, he lurched to attention, started to growl, and shot past them into the trees, barking, the whites of his teeth stark against his dark brown muzzle. The sea of green shrubbery vibrated and swayed as he ran through it.

“Farley! No!” Abbey yelled.

The dog ignored her and plunged on. Then Abbey saw it: a filmy white figure walking determinedly through the trees away from them. Farley leapt, growling with furious determination, and sailed right through the apparition. A second ghost appeared several meters away from the first, and the two shapes met, their transparent edges coalescing and then separating as they moved farther off into the trees with Farley in hot pursuit.

Abbey screamed.

The thud of footsteps echoed down the path, and Sylvain, still in his white apron, materialized, followed by a concerned-looking Caleb.

“Sorry. We saw something in the woods,” Abbey said. “We thought it was a ghost. Two ghosts.”

Farley scrambled around in the bushes, still barking.

Sylvain and Caleb whirled to look in the direction Abbey pointed, but the ghosts had vanished. Sylvain stopped running, his long legs slowly losing their momentum. “Are you sure? The fog can play tricks on you, the way it gathers and rises in the trees when it rains.”

Abbey scowled, her courage returning now that she and Mark were no longer alone in the woods. Maybe the togetherness thing wasn’t such a bad idea after all. Mark’s body, still touching hers, had started to tremble almost violently.

“I’m sure,” she said. “They’re gone now. But they were white and ghostly and human-formed, and Farley jumped right through one of them. Maybe they weren’t ghosts, but they weren’t normal, and they certainly weren’t fog, unless fog can walk around now.”

Sylvain scanned the woods, his brow furrowed in confusion. At first Abbey had thought that maybe the ghosts were some form of witchcraft the adults had yet to share with them, but Sylvain seemed just as baffled as she did. Caleb had already started to wade through the undergrowth in the direction of Farley, calling out to him. The almost wild dog ran around in a few more circles, baying his displeasure before finally submitting to Caleb’s orders to come.

Sylvain shook his head. “I don’t know, but we’d better go inside.”

“Was it…?” Abbey hesitated.

“Witchcraft?” Sylvain said. “Possibly. But I don’t know. Either way, we’d best get inside.” Sylvain turned and headed down the path, and Mark followed so closely that he was nearly on Sylvain’s back.

Caleb looked at Abbey and shrugged, then hooked his fingers into Farley’s collar and started to drag him back through the woods to the path. The dog continued to stare and lob growls in the direction the ghosts had gone.

Abbey shuddered and beat a hasty retreat herself. No need to be out in the rain with specters.

Sylvain tried to be chipper over a dinner of beef stroganoff with a sherry demi-glaze and filo-wrapped asparagus, but the visitors had obviously spooked him. Farley lay across the threshold of the door and, aside from scarfing down his dinner with his usual gusto, refused to move from the spot, even to take up his usual place by the fire. Mark ate only small amounts of his plain noodles and sauce-free meat. The rain continued to pound on the cabin roof, and Abbey rather wondered if they might end up careening down the mountainside in an avalanche of mud and trees.

“So what was it?” Caleb said finally, bluntly breaking up Sylvain’s talk of the weather and of repairs to his old stone mansion, which Selena, Nate, and Damian had blown up a few weeks before.

Sylvain shook his head. “I don’t know. There are many in the non-witching world who believe in ghosts. Maybe they do exist and have nothing to do with us.”

“Maybe,” Abbey said.

“I may have to go and retrieve some of the old texts I keep stored in the vault in my library and see if there are any references,” Sylvain said with a careful smile. “I’m sure it’s all fine.”

“Right. That’s why we’re holed up in the woods and our parents and Mrs. Forrester have vanished. Why aren’t we even looking for them?” Abbey said.

The smile slipped from Sylvain’s lips. “Your parents were quite clear. They don’t want you getting involved. More salad?”

Abbey ignored the butter lettuce and crumbled blue cheese that Sylvain proffered, his long thin fingers wrapped around the cheery ceramic bowl. “Right, instead they want us to live a normal life in a little cabin away from all suggestion of civilization?”

“I’m sure this is only temporary,” Sylvain said. “Until they…”

“Until they what? Come back?” Abbey spat the words. “What if they
don’t
come back?” Her eyes flooded with tears, which she blinked back ferociously.

“Abbey’s right,” Caleb said. “We have a right to know what’s going on.”

Sylvain set down the salad bowl. “If your parents don’t return, your mother has made arrangements for you. There is a trust fund, and you are to go live with her cousin Monica in California. I believe she is your Great-Aunt Marge’s daughter. I will deliver you there myself. Mark will stay…” Sylvain paused and then continued, “with me. But I assure you, your parents will return. They are very capable, and I have the utmost faith in them.”

Abbey rose from the table, bristling with frustration, and was about to say something scathing when Farley erupted into barks and began running back and forth maniacally in front of the door.

A sharp knock cut through Farley’s agitated noise. Sylvain leapt up from the table and peered through the curtain onto the front stoop. Then he let the curtain fall and reached over Farley to open the door.

Ian stood on the threshold, his hands thrust deep into his pockets and his beret sodden and a deep shade of tan.

Farley stopped his crazed barking and ran at Ian, his tail wagging euphorically, no doubt looking for Digby the rat. Farley had shown a great interest in Digby, and although Ian believed this heralded the start of a great friendship, Abbey rather suspected Farley actually wanted to toss Digby in the air and shake him like a beach ball.

“Glorious evening for a stroll,” Ian announced. “I don’t suppose I could trouble you for a spot of coffee and a sit by the fire.”

After hanging his wet things near the cozy glow of the fireplace, Ian dug into his serving of stroganoff, asparagus, and butter lettuce salad with relish.

“I haven’t been able to find her,” he said without warning after he had taken several bites. Abbey leaned forward. Who was he talking about? Her mother? Mrs. Forrester? Selena?

“Not surprising,” Sylvain growled, after a glance at Abbey, Caleb, and Mark, likely assessing the desirability of having them in the room during this conversation. “She’s powerful. We’d best be on our guard. The question is which side she’ll be on. She’s already managed to meddle in some of my business interests.”

Ian flipped his fingers in the air, as if to imply that this last did not concern him, and took a generous bite of asparagus, the filo pastry crumbling onto his vertically striped, blue polyester shirt.

Abbey watched Ian warily. The last time they had seen him, he had been charging at them with a gun, yelling that he couldn’t believe that one of them had done something and that someone—a her—needed to be stopped. Then Jake got shot, quite possibly
by
Ian. And afterward, when they were in the tunnels, Sandy had said—repeatedly—that Ian could not be trusted. But they became separated when the tunnels caved in, so Abbey hadn’t been able to ask Sandy
why
Ian was not trustworthy.

Then again, Abbey wasn’t completely sure if she trusted Sandy either. But her mother and Sandy were clearly friends, and cuteness should not be a reason to distrust.

“The others are moving in on Jake again,” Ian said. “We’re going to have to get him to safety.”

Abbey jolted in her chair. Jake. She’d been so obsessed with her missing parents and her own virtual incarceration that she almost forgot about her note to herself about saving Jake.

It was already March 7. Two days before she had to save Jake… again, somehow, according to the note. What did Ian mean? Was someone—Selena, Nate, or Damian, Abbey assumed—trying to kill Jake, or just use him again like they had before?

Sylvain sighed and bent his head, his long silver locks falling over his eyes. “I’ll go get Jake tomorrow and bring him here. His parents trust me. I’ll have one of my employees at Salvador Systems make up a baseball camp and a scholarship story to make them happy.”

Ian nodded, and Abbey tried to control the quiet lurch in her gut—or was it her heart?—at the prospect of Jake coming to join them. She extinguished it quickly; she was going to marry Sam, apparently, and have his baby.

Change the future, but don’t change too much
, her future self had told her. Her future self likely loved Sam and wanted to keep her baby, and if Abbey changed something—by dating Jake, say—would that baby cease to exist? Was that akin to killing a baby? The potential butterfly effect of time travel sometimes seemed more like an elephant effect; the massive beast careened haphazardly through her life on giant feet, making her question every decision.

She tried to organize and control her spiraling thoughts. She idolized Sam. She had idolized him forever, since meeting him at science camp. Surely she would be very happy married to him. But he was ten years older than she was, and somehow, right now, her current feelings for Jake seemed more real than her past and expected future feelings for Sam.

Sometimes knowing the future kind of sucked. How on earth was she going to save Jake? Again?

“I’ve had no luck looking for Francis or any of the other missing ancients,” Ian said.

Abbey turned her attention back to Ian sharply. Was he talking about Mrs. Forrester, who was named Francis, or one of the two Franks, who were also named Francis? Ian had mentioned that the ancients had disappeared a few weeks ago. At the time, she hadn’t thought much of it—after all, they were adults, and witches. Surely they could look after themselves. Maybe they had wanted to disappear.