Nettle Blackthorn and the Three Wicked Sisters (6 page)

It
began to unnerve Nettle how still her cousin stood, her
gaze narrowing on something… on her. Nettle shifted uneasily, her
cousin stared like a predator, following every slight movement.
“Jazz?”

Jazz’s
hands were on her hips, rosy lips drawing into a smug smile. “I
want compensation.”

“
Huh?” said Bram and Nettle together.

Jazz pointed
to the bracelet around Nettle’s wrist. The simple bracelet was
crafted from three thin bands of silver with tiny thorns, twisting
around each other like blackberry briars.

Jazz stepped forward, reaching for Nettle’s
hand
. “Give
me that.”

Nettle’s
brow furrowed and she involuntarily stepped away cradling her wrist
protectively. The bracelet was obviously inferior to the stolen
earrings, but Jazz wanted it anyway. “No. I wouldn’t give it to you
even if I could. Dad and Mum gave me this when I was born. Besides,
I can’t even get it off my wrist, it fits too snugly.”

Jazz drew short, eyeing her cousin with a beady
glare.
“What
do you mean, you got that when you were just born? How stupid do
you think I am.”

No, not
stupid,
Nettle thought,
insensitive, spoilt, callous…
she could go on and on,
but not
stupid.

“Do you really expect me, to believe, you were able to
wear
that
bracelet
when you were a tiny little baby? It was either far too big
for you to wear then, or it’s far too small for you to wear now.
You’re like twelve.”

“Thirteen, next week,” Nettle jousted petulantly. It was a
stupid comeback, she knew, but she refused to let her cousin know
she’d hit a mark. The bracelet had always been there, on her wrist,
an unconscious extension of herself.

Jazz heaved an annoyed sigh
. “Never mind, keep the stupid thing. It’s
obviously not real silver.” She flounced off. But before she left
Bessie, she turned to give Nettle a malevolent glare. “You better
pray my earrings turn up. Both of you.”

Nettle held up her hand, the bracelet slid slightly down
her forearm.
What did she mean, not real silver?
It’d certainly always looked
silver to her. Her thick brows rose in surprise. Jazz was right,
the metal bands were tarnished leaving a blackened stain on her
wrist. But what’s more, the bracelet was corroding and a thin layer
of metal was beginning to chip and flake.

CHAPTER SIX

A
Circle of Boulders

Jazz had left them with a bit tidying up
to do after her
rampage.
She
really is a spoilt brat,
Nettle thought,
but at least she’s not sticking around to
annoy us
.
Bram cleaned the spilt porridge from the floor. He looked forlornly
at his empty bowl and his stomach rumbled in commiseration. Nettle
tossed him a spoon, offering half of her porridge. “Thanks,” he
grinned gratefully, tucking in.

A
s
Nettle washed the breakfast dishes she held her hand aloft. Soapy
suds reflected mauve and lavender on their surface as she allowed a
cluster of bubbles to dangle from her fingers, forming crude
stalactites. As the bubbles gently elongated to drop and burst upon
the countertop, she smiled in delight. Her smile slowly faded. She
looked sideways at Bram. He was busy munching on a nut bar, still
hungry after the porridge, and fidgeting with his spoon, clinking
it upon the dinette’s table-top.

She had
to know, “So, these rats..?”

Bram
stopped tapping the spoon, but didn’t look up at her
either. “The rats took Jazz’s stupid earrings, they must of. I know
it sounds crazy, but I know what I heard.” He hunched down,
frowning. “They were in the walls, dragging something, and then I’m
sure one of them says something like, “we’re lost.” Then there was
some sort of scrap and a whole lot of squealing.” He shrugged. “I
couldn’t make out anything else, I just ran.”

Nettle
didn’t know what to make of it all. Bram was adamant, and it seemed
her father believed him. As to how disturbed her father was to hear
about the talking rats, she wasn’t completely sure. It felt to her,
at the time, that it was a relief of sorts for Fred to know of the
rats, one way or the other.

“Do you
believe me?” Bram stared at her behind thick lenses, looking at her
with his big round eyes, needing her to.

“
Dad believes you.”

“
You think?”

“Yeah.”
But what about me?
She certainly didn’t give any credence to talking
rats - how preposterous. But Bram was certain of what he’d heard.
Finally, she gave a decisive nod. “I believe you heard something…
odd.” Though it wasn’t exactly an admission of belief, it was
enough for Bram. He broke into a sunny smile. Nettle continued,
“But, I wonder…
why
does Dad believe you? Talking rats aren’t exactly
commonplace.”
In fact, they don’t even exist,
she added to herself. Nettle let the
dishwater out of the sink. The water swirled and burbled as it ran
down the hole. She gave a slight shrug of a shoulder. “Oh well,
we’ve plenty of time to figure that out.” She turned to swoop up
the jar of worms, thankfully unharmed from Jazz’s berserk attack.
“In the meantime, we’d better find Willoughby. He must be
starving”.

The
siblings reached the front porch and found the birdcage hanging
from a rusty hook, swaying in the crisp morning breeze. The cage
was empty.

“Where
do you think he is?” Bram’s bottom lip wobbled. “You don’t think
he’s…”

“No,”
Nettle said quickly, knowing exactly where her little brother’s
thoughts had gone. “Willoughby isn’t dead. Dad’s probably found him
a brand new birdcage, bigger than this.” Bram looked doubtful.
“Come on,” she urged, guiding him toward the front door. “You get
started on the kitchen, I’ll find Dad, then Willoughby.”

Bram went inside and Nettle headed toward the backyard,
skirting the outside of the cottage. In truth, it was the perfect
excuse to explore the yard and perhaps if she wasn’t caught, do a
little foraging in the fringes of the forest. She waded through the
wet grass and tussock, her boots kept her calves warm and dry,
heading toward the periphery of the forest. Saplings of pine and
hazel and
pittosporum
encroached upon the yard as the Wilds sought to expand upon
the cottage’s grounds.

Nettle
took her time creeping beside the border of the forest which hugged
the west side of the ivy clad cottage. Her keen hearing
disentangled the sounds of birds, creaking branches and rustling of
dead leaves, to hone in on a bubbling noise, a brook. If she
remembered correctly, further north was a large stream that forked,
and the two ensuing brooks encircled the entire property before
rejoining to flow out into the marshlands. Her father had improved
the cottage, not quite modernized it with electricity, but amongst
other refinements, he’d created an aqueduct system which used
gravity to feed the cottage fresh water from the brook.

There
was something else about the brook, something other than providing
them with running water… the thought was slippery, fragmented and
it niggled and nipped at her. The brook was important for another
reason entirely, but for the moment, she couldn’t quite remember
why.

She’d
reached the corner of the cottage where a great oak with red tinged
leaves held in its majestic boughs an old tree hut. Nettle
approached, the smile on her lips growing wider as she ducked
beneath the oak’s foliage, to press herself against the tree. She
briefly closed her eyes and gently rubbed her cheek against the
rough bark of the grey trunk, soaking up the familiar smell of
faint smoke.

An old rope ladder was d
angling from a branch. Nettle reached out
to pull it closer. The rope, now frayed and dried with age, was
used to gain entrance to her own private little tree house, a basic
construction spanning the breadth of several low branches. Over the
years, the elements had rusted nails and rotted boards from the
little hut, so its lichen-studded walls had gaps and the roof had
collapsed upon itself.

Nettle’s smile grew broader as a long-forgotten memory
flitted through her mind. She was almost six, helping her father
build the tree hut while her mother sat in a swing below, cradling
Bram as he gurgled and burbled nonsense. She carefully handed her
father a nail from the pail sitting in her lap, his warm worn
fingers, brushing against hers, just as an abrupt noise from baby
Bram captured her attention. He’d laughed in his babyish way, a
gurgling gummy grin of spittle. She’d glanced below, and for a
brief moment, Briar turned to smile up at her, sharing her delight.
Brilliant sunlight struck Briar’s hair bouncing off the masses of
messy golden hair surrounding her slight frame; hair so long, it
cascaded over her shoulders down to her waist. Briar never wore her
hair up, nor braided it. It was always long and loose, an extension
of herself,
like another pair of arms for cuddling.
The intense halo of bright
light hid her mother’s features behind a blinding shimmer of white,
all except her extraordinarily wide mouth, smiling up at
her.

Nettle broke from her reverie with a start.
What’s wrong with
me?

She felt sick with want, a sad longing for the sense of
loss. It more than confused her, it angered her. She should detest
her mother, yet…
I want her back…

She
lurched away from the old oak, refusing to look back at the
tree hut and pushed forward into the backyard. Everything connected
with this house was connected to her mother.
How am I supposed to deal with
something like that?
She wanted to shirk off the remnants of her
mother’s memory, slough it off like dead skin… but another part of
her, a smaller part with a tiny voice straining to be heard,
refused to let go. Like the bubbling brook encircling the property,
it niggled at her, forcing her to confront the memories she so
easily suppressed in Bessie, out on the open road, far, far away
from Blackthorn Cottage.

She let out a low growl of annoyance and pushed into the
shadowy outskirts of the Forgotten Wilds, keeping low.
Briar doesn’t
deserve any more of my time.
She was the one who left us. She didn’t want
us!

The
backyard was large and, like the rest of the property, thigh-high
with weeds and tussock grasses. The vegetable patch had gone wild
and broken free from the neat little wooden fence her father had
erected to keep the roaming chickens out. This morning, she’d
awoken to roosters crowing and the clucking of hens. They were
somewhere close, hidden in the depth of the grass as they scratched
for bugs. She wondered if they were the off-spring of Hetty Hen and
her gang of Marsh Daisy’s.

She could see her father labouring away near the old stone
well. The well had been sealed up with wooden planks, no longer
needed since the invention of her father’s aqueduct system.
Nettle’s left eyebrow arched, along with the corner of her mouth,
pulling into a smirk as she witnessed her father’s peculiar
behaviour.
What is he up to now?

He was
levering something out of the long grass. Whatever it was, it had
to be large and heavy as he was using a crowbar. She heard him
talking, so low she couldn’t make out what he was saying, but
instantly recognized his angry tone. He stepped back gasping for
breath, then bent over stretching his back. Whatever it was, he was
giving it a thorough telling off, glaring and poking his crowbar
about. He even paused to lean forward in a manner that suggested he
was listening before erupting into another angry tirade, waving the
crowbar above his head.

Giving up, he flung his arms up in defeat and stomped away.
Nettle watched him search through the scrub until he found
what he was looking
for. He worked the crowbar underneath and began to lever it out
from its buried position, all the while mumbling
angrily.

Nettle shook her head slightly,
he is seriously losing it.

As she
walked up behind her father, she saw he was trying to move a huge
gray rock studded with moss, from where it lay half buried in the
ground. Glancing around the rest of the backyard, she saw there
were several of the same sort of rock, placed about the cottage in
a rough sort of circle. “Dad, what are you up to with those
rocks?”

Fred flinched and spun around, holding the crowbar much
like Jazz held her hockey stick
, only a little while ago.

“Woah, Dad,” Nettle waved her hands before her.
Is he crazy?
“It’s
me.”

He let out a puff of breath and visibly
relaxed
.
“Sorry, you startled me.” He lowered the crowbar to the ground to
lean against. “I’m just tidying up. They were something, your
mother put around the cottage. I just thought, I’d better herd them
back into place.”

“
Herd?”

“Oh,”
Fred’s olive eyes looked like they were going to pop from his
skull. “Ah, you know,” he flexed a rather pitiful muscle in his
forearm, giving her a wink, “Move back.”