Page 65 of This Haunted Heart

Her brow wrinkled. “Witches sent you geese?”

“The witches protect women from dangerous men,” I told her. There were numerous tales of the witches which had been twisted to scare off American Civil War soldiers from fleeing into the woods. But weaver women had no interest in brothers slaying brothers, as long as they left mothers and daughters out of their violence.

“The weaver women stories I know make them sound like the wicked witches from the Grimm tales,” Rynn said.

“I’ve spent the last twenty years leaving them offerings, and I’ve come to know them in that time,” I said. “There’s nothing wicked about them, though they aren’t necessarily always good either. They’ll share wisdom with those who make an offering and are willing to listen. Gifts too sometimes.”

Rynn drew my attention back to the chopping block. The axe rose in the air, seemingly on its own, and another chunk of wood was cut in half, startling nearby geese into flight.

“Who’s down there?” she asked, knotting her hair in anelegant plait.

“Do you remember Boren?”

Her nose wrinkled. “Unfortunately.”

He’d been a brute, seeming to delight in my father’s abuse of us. Boren had learned early on that we were the perfect scapegoats when my father was angry. He’d thrown us to the wolves time and time again to spare himself.

“He wasn’t much older than us. I’m surprised he’s gone.” She pinned her braided hair just above the nape of her neck.

“Tuberculosis claimed him. He was one of the first ghosts to tether himself to me. I tried to make him leave, but then he set to work outside on the grounds. As long as I don’t feel him in the house, I let him carry on with his chores.”

“Serves him right,” Rynn muttered. “But I’m sad for Gertrude and Martha. Surely, they deserve some rest after all these years. I can’t imagine living a life of service only to have to continue it after death.”

“There’s nothing to be done about it. They’re doing it to themselves,” I said, an irritated edge sharpening my voice.

“How do you mean?” she asked, and that agitated me further. They didn’t deserve her protection. None of them did.

“Don’t you feel it? You’ve always been sensitive like me, Rynn. I think we got that from my father. He was sensitive, too. He didn’t pass it on with his blood, though. He passed it on with his wrath, with all those horrible things he did to us. Even before the ghosts came in numbers, I sensed them in the dark. I heard them whispering.” I had a theory that Father tormented us to distract the ghosts, to keep them away from him. He’d get us upset and then lock us away in the dark like a beacon for the spirits. “You feel them too, don’t you?”

She thought about it for a moment, watching the axe splitmore wood, fingers running absently down the spine of her comb. “Guilt,” she said softly. “They feel terribly guilty.”

“As they should.” My jaw clenched. “We were little. They were grown. They didn’t see everything, but they saw enough. Not once did they lift a finger to stop him. Boren especially. I think he enjoyed making it worse for us.”

“Oh, but . . . that’s not true. Poor Martha always comforted me. On my birthday, she’d make excuses to bake a cake. She told the baron it was because she had extra oil and flour that needed to be used up, but I always knew it was for me. She was lovely.”

“She should have protected you from him,” I said sternly.

Rynn shook her head. “What could she have done? She had no power in that house. And if she lost her job, who would comfort me? Gertude too. When I was little, I’d have accidents in bed after I’d spent too long locked in the dark. She helped me clean up and never said a word about it, even though I was adding to her workload. They were both kind.”

I crossed my arms over my middle, frowning at my faded reflection in the window glass. “Martha told you to keep away from me. Gertrude too.”

Rynn sighed. “They were just looking out for me. They’d seen how relationships between people with means and people with none usually ended.”

I rolled my eyes. “Come on,” I said, walking toward the door.

“Where are we going?” she called after me.

“To get your boots. We’re going mushroom hunting.” I stopped in front of the door, my hand resting on the knob. Over my shoulder, I added, “We’ll do it properly this time. No snakes.”

She grinned at me, the littlevixen. “No snakes.”

* * *

Rynn was mildly miffed when I explained that we would not be eating the mushrooms. We were gathering them as a gift to leave for Hulda.

“Will the witches speak to me after?” she asked, plucking a blonde bulb from near the roots of an ash tree.

“I don’t know,” I confessed. “They’re unpredictable.” The ground was littered with white feathers and goose droppings. I could hear the birds splashing in the water gardens, not far from us.

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