In the Land of Tea and Ravens (5 page)

Grayson placed his back between her and the storefront. “I’m thinking the days of tarring and
feathering are
long gone.”

She
straightened,
her lips quirked. “Tell that to the town. I’ve been told there’s no room at the hotel.” She nodded at the sleeping bags. “I’m not planning to stay long, and I’ve roughed it before.”

Grayson studied her. “Why stay at all?”

“There are things left undone here,” she answered carefully. Grabbing a red sleeping bag, she attempted to move past him.

His arm blocked her, his hand resting suddenly between her and the aisle beyond. “Tell me about last night, Lyric,” he whispered.

Her gaze flashed to his, the startling fear in them almost more than he could bear. Maybe she
was
a witch. This pity and curiosity he felt
had
to be unnatural.

“There was no last night,” she hissed.

His eyes narrowed. “Do you take me for a fool?”

She inhaled, her gaze falling to the tribal tattoo on his bicep. “You don’t want to do this.”

There was something incredibly lonely about her words, as if she were both warning him away and begging him to stay.

“You’ve heard what they’re saying, haven’t you?” she asked, her eyes finding his. “They’re right, you know. They’re absolutely right.”

If she was confessing to murder, she was confessing to the wrong person.

He leaned close, his face near hers. “Then we’re both guilty of the same sin,” he whispered. “Maybe neither one of us is safe.”

Surprise trapped her, tying her in place, her eyes glued to his. “I’ll suck your spirit dry,” she breathed.

She was throwing Bridget’s words in his face.

Grayson’s lips twisted. “What if I don’t have a soul?”

Lyric frowned. “Oh, you have one.”

“How would you know?”

Her breath fanned his neck when she murmured, “Because only people with souls can hurt the way you do.”

Taken aback, his arm fell. His gaze followed Lyric when she ducked past him, her skirt swaying. Its patchwork design clashed with the camouflage surrounding her and set her apart from the denim wearing customers milling around the store.

Curious eyes met his and then slid away.

Time stopped.

Grayson was still standing next to the sleeping bags when Daniel found him later.

“Staring at people isn’t going to help anything,” Daniel pointed out.

Grayson scowled at the prying eyes and whispering gossips. “They need something better to do with their time.”

Daniel laughed. “You’ve got to admit, it’s not every day there’s two people with so much suspicion surrounding them in the same town. Hell, it’s not every day those
same
two people are spied
talkin
’ like they’ve known each other for years.”

Grayson’s gaze slid to Daniel’s face, to the hard glint of suspicion deep in the young man’s eyes.

“I don’t know her,” Grayson murmured.

Why he felt the need to defend himself, he didn’t know. The night before had changed him, the spontaneous tea party with the dead having tied him somehow to the girl from the old Miller house.
The tea girl.

He swallowed, his hand rubbing the faint claw mark on the back of his neck. “We need to get back.”

Daniel shrugged and moved past
him,
leaving Grayson standing in the middle of the aisle surrounded by Lyric’s fading floral scent—honeysuckle and azalea combined with a hint of cinnamon.

~6~

The day came when the merchant’s daughters were brought before the king. His eldest daughter, in her best white gown, enchanted the ruler with her voice, her singing like nothing he’d ever heard before. “Come,” the king commanded, “tell me your name.” The girl’s twinkling eyes met his. “Melody,” the girl replied …

~The Tea Girl~

Death often leaves its mark on things, throwing shadows and pain and memories out into the world to settle like fallen leaves amidst the living. Each day, people walk amongst these leaves, stirring them up, and watching in wonder as they settle again. Each time they settle, they are different.
More brittle.
Thinner somehow.

Old
Ma’am’s
house was like a brittle memory, having resettled again and again until there was nothing left but a leaf ready to turn to dust.

Lyric Mason ambled through her grandmother’s home, her fingers trailing along old wood and decaying furniture. Everywhere there was death, its presence eating away at her spirit.

Caw, caw
, a bird called

Her gaze swept up the living room wall to the ceiling. A row of ravens watched her.

Caw, caw
.

More ravens perched in the trees beyond the house; their wings rustling and their angry chatter full of accusation as they fluttered from one branch to another. Still others nested in the empty bedrooms above, their movements loud in the tomb-like residence.
So many ravens.
So many years.

Caw, caw
.

Trailing fingers ... lingering
memories ...

Lyric’s journey soon found her on the front porch, her gaze on the overgrown field separating the property from the Kramer residence. The blades of grass were swaying in the hot breeze. Blue skies stretched for miles, thin clouds touched by grey scurrying across the earth.
Rain.
There was rain on the air, the feel of it like thick hot water on the skin, leaving beads of condensation on the flesh before sinking into the bones.

The rocking chair on the porch moved.
Creak
, the chair said.
Creak
.

Lyric never spared it a glance.

“You were never a subtle woman, Ma’am,” Lyric breathed.

Creak
, the chair answered.
Creak
.

The spirits only spoke when offered tea. Otherwise, they simply hovered, their presence an eerie reminder of a time long forgotten.

Sing to me, called the maid.

Smile for me, replied the raven.

But I cannot smile, the maid wept.

Then I cannot sing, the raven replied.

To the sky, to the mountain, to the sea.

The bird
flew
.

To the planes, to the future, to the past.

The maid withdrew

A cup, a cup, a cup.

A cup of tea, the raven called.

A cup of tea, my maiden dear.

A cup, a cup, a cup.

A cup of tea.
A cup of fear.

Lyric sang, keeping her voice low, the tune dancing from her throat to the late afternoon sky. The ravens stilled.

“Like a pied piper,” a voice hailed from the tree line. “Only you calm birds rather than entice mice.”

Lyric froze, the song dying on her tongue. Grayson Kramer. The man was like an illness, an irritating tickle at the back of the throat that became a full-blown cough she couldn’t get rid of. She’d seen him just that morning, and yet here he was … again.

“Come for more tea?” she asked. She didn’t have to see him to know he shuddered. A smile played with the corners of her lips.

“Too hot for tea,” he answered.

Ravens danced restlessly as he moved past them, his boots snapping over limbs and grass, their beady eyes trailing him to the bottom of the porch.

He watched the birds, his eyes full of apprehension. “We can’t keep meeting this way, Ms. Mason,” Grayson teased.

Her gaze fell to his. “Isn’t there work you need to be doing?” she prompted.

He studied her, his blue eyes sharp and searching. They saw too much, those eyes.

“Curiosity,” he said, “is like a disease, like leprosy. It eats away at the flesh until it leaves nothing but bone.”

She snorted. “Funny, I was just thinking you were like a cold I don’t have a remedy for. Stubborn and put here to make me miserable.”

His brows rose. “Well now, I’ve been described as a lot of things by women. Miserable
ain’t
one of them.”

The chair on the porch creaked. Back and forth, it moved.
Creak
, the chair said.
Creak
. And then it stopped. The wind wasn’t strong enough to move it.

Grayson eyed the wooden rocker. “Your ma’am?” he asked.

Lyric’s gaze followed his. “Come now, don’t tell me you believe in ghosts?”

The laugh that followed was low, his rumbling chuckle climbing up the back of Lyric’s spine to the hairs lining her neck. He had a nice laugh.

“If you’d asked me that yesterday, I would have told you I didn’t.”

“And now?” she queried.

He didn’t answer her, his gaze traveling from her face to the house, his eyes finding the darkened interior and dancing birds.

“You’ve got some strange pets ...” His words trailed off, the statement as much a question as it was a declaration.

Lyric exhaled. “If I told you the ravens were family ...” Like his, her words trailed off.

Again, the chair on the porch creaked.

Grayson started, his hand finding the claw mark at the back of his neck.
“Family?”
His voice rang with disbelief, his gaze going to the ravens. “I’d say you have some strange relations.”

She shrugged. “We all have our family skeletons.”

Grayson’s gaze fell to hers. “They’re birds, Lyric.”

Her lips twitched. “Yes, well … try telling them that.” Her smile
grew,
her finger lifting. “That one is Aunt Maude. She once had a thing for peanut butter.
Ate a spoonful of it every night before she went to bed.
Went straight to her hips.
All of it.
She still has a nasty obsession with it.”

Grayson eyed the bird.
“Peanut butter?”

“
Mmmm
hmmm,” Lyric answered. Her finger drifted to another raven, a smaller one. “That one is Aunt Harriet. She has a flare for the dramatic, our Harriet. She was a vaudeville actress, beautiful and funny. Her act involved a boa, the feathered kind, and a broom, I think.”

Grayson stared.
“Vaudeville?”
His gaze drifted to hers, his eyes full of sorrow. “Grief does strange things to people, Lyric,” he murmured.

She laughed. “Ah, yes. Well, there’s a certain freedom to insanity. You should try it.”

His eyes widened. “Do that again.”

She froze. “What?”

“Laugh.”

Her gaze locked with his. “You think I’m insane, and you want me to laugh?”

His eyes twinkled. “It didn’t stop you before.” He took a step toward her, his work boot landing heavily on the porch stairs. “I don’t think you’re insane. I think you’re a good storyteller with a raven problem. This house has been sitting empty too long.”

Her brows arched.
“A storyteller?”
She shook her head. “Well, then, I have quite a lot of stories I could tell. They’re more outlandish when they’re true.”

For a long moment he stared at her, his eyes searching hers. A shadow fell across his features, his gaze darting once more to the ravens.

“You truly believe you’re related to birds?”

She smiled sadly. “They’re not much to look at, true, but they have spirit.”

The ravens’ wings fluttered, each of them cawing. The rocking chair creaked forward and back again, a lonely, low laugh traveling through the dilapidated house behind her.

“Lyric—” Grayson began.

She held her shoulders back, her eyes going cold. “I’m insane, remember?”

The sun had begun to set, the clouds above gathering. The wind had picked up, the fading sun throwing beams of light in odd places.

Grayson swallowed. “You can’t sleep here.”

She stepped toward him. He should have backed away, but he didn’t.

“I’m surrounded by family,” she whispered.

His eyes rose to meet hers, the memory of the night before sweeping through him.
A dark kitchen, slamming doors, and a surprisingly addictive tea.
The ravens cawed.

“I’m going crazy,” he mumbled.

Lyric sighed. “We often have that effect on people.”

He took another step up. “You’re not good for me, then.”

She studied him. “You don’t know me well enough to know that.
And you?
Should I worry that you’ll murder me in the middle of the night?”

The question was unfair, and she knew it.

His eyes hardened. “I should go.”

Her hands found her skirt, her fingers clenching the fabric. “Go then.”

He didn’t leave.

“I think,” he said after a moment, “I think I wouldn’t mind another cup of tea.”

She stared. “You’re insane.”

He finished climbing the stairs, his blue eyes peering down into hers. “That makes two of us, sweetheart.”

The ravens screamed.

“They don’t like you,” she whispered.

His probing gaze sharpened. “I promised to come back.”

It was as simple as that.
A promise.

“They don’t like you,” she repeated.

He grinned. “It’s nothing compared to what I feel for them.”

One of the ravens flew at him, but he didn’t move; its claws came dangerously close to his cheek before it ducked away. A black feather drifted downward, catching the sleeve of Grayson’s shirt before floating to the porch below.

His eyes stayed locked on Lyric’s. “And that bird,” he asked, “who is he? Or she?”

Lyric blinked. “
She
…” Her gaze flew to the darkening trees beyond. “She is my mother.”