Page 15 of Wind Valley

“I’ve never been to the edge of a cliff, at least not with Maura.”

“Well, sometimes I see things that haven’t happened yet. Warnings.” She lowered her voice even further. “Back in high school, I knew there was going to be a shooting at a track meet, and I made all my friends stay home. I couldn’t warn anyone else because they wouldn’t have believed me. But it was real.”

He stared down at her, goosebumps rising on his skin. “So I should avoid cliffs with Maura?”

“Maybe, but it could also be symbolic. This is why I don’t normally tell people about the things I see. It’s not easy to translate into reality.”

He nodded, though his insides were churning. No matter what they meant, the images she talked about were striking. The edge of a cliff. Maura’s despair. Lila being invisible and tongue-tied. Maura pushing him away.

“There was another odd thing,” Lila said. “Maura’s hair wasn’t black. It was a more of a rich deep brown color, an earthy color.”

He didn’t know what to make of that detail. But then something else occurred to him. “Let me ask you something. Have you had any of these dreams?—”

“Blips.”

“Blips.” He accepted her correction with a smile. “Have you had any blips about our local wildlife?”

She drew in a sharp breath and drilled him with her violet-eyed gaze. “What do you mean exactly?”

“Sorry, I didn’t—” He broke off, confused by the strength of her reaction.

“No, it’s okay.” She collected herself. “I haven’t, not exactly. It’s more like, a warning.”

“What kind of warning?”

“That there’s some kind of threat. But I don’t know what it is. I can’t even put it into words or images.”

Behind him, people were coming in and out of the kitchen, chattering and filling their bowls. The aroma of chili filled the room. Outside the window, over Lila’s shoulder, the spill of light from the kitchen picked up the glitter of drifting snowflakes.

“But you made the connection as soon as I mentioned wildlife. What came to mind?”

She closed her eyes, as if trying to summon the memory. “It’s just…energy. That’s the only way I can put it. I pick up on various kinds of energy. Lately, every time I ski through the woods, I sense that something is off. It’s more quiet than it should be.”

“The winter is always more quiet than the summer.”

“I know. I thought that was the reason. But it’s more than that. It’s…uneasiness. As if something has changed and the wild creatures are trying to work with it.”

Lachlan wondered what could possibly change that the animals would notice, but not the humans. Not him. He always paid close attention to micro-changes in the environment.

And he knew that human ways of knowing were not the only ways. Plants and animals were able to sense things in a way the human brain couldn’t. Various species had chemical, light, odor and geographical sensors that were far more developed than those of humans. Why else would dogs be trained to sniff out prey, or pigs to unearth truffles? How else could migrating birds navigate across thousands of miles?

Bear appeared next to Lila and put a protective arm over her shoulders. “Everything okay over here?”

“Yes,” Lila assured him as she snuggled close to him. “Better now, of course.”

Bear was so much taller than Lila that he had to hunch his shoulders in order to rest his chin on the top of her head. Even so, they were perfect for each other. The happiness that hummed between them was so powerful it was almost visible.

“Are you both ready to Come Sail Away?” Bear held up the bottle Lachlan had brought. “We’re going to drink and play charades and hope it doesn’t snow so much that everyone’s stuck here for the night.”

“It’s fine if you are,” Lachlan told him. “We have sleeping bags and Therm-A-Rests for all.”

A grin split Bear’s coppery face. “A Firelight Ridge slumber party. Wouldn’t be the first time.”

9

In the absence of any kind of schoolhouse, Maura’s new “school” was set up in the historic boarding house in the heart of town. The two-story structure had originally been built as a brothel during the 1930s, then morphed into lodging for service workers for the copper mine. In the nineties it had reopened to cater to tourists, at which point it was renamed Granny Apple’s Boarding House. Now it was hosting a school. Quite the long journey toward respectability.

Every morning when Maura arrived, she found the woodstove already stoked and cheerfully radiating heat. That was thanks to Steve Birdie, the caretaker of the property, who lived in a room off the kitchen, where the cook used to live in the old days.

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