Page 7 of The Poison Season

“This is awful,” Leelo sobbed, turning her head away, but Aunt Ketty was right beside her.

She grabbed Leelo’s jaw and forced her to look at the water. “You must bear witness to their foolishness,” she insisted. “See what happens when we don’t put the island above all else?”

Pieter resurfaced for a moment, but Leelo knew it was hopeless. Once the lake took hold of its victims, there was no turning back. As he disappeared again, the islanders spread out along the bank, linking arms with each other. Leelo found herself between her aunt and cousin, who had already closed their eyes and bowed their heads.

It was still winter, but every sacrifice deserved a song. This one didn’t lure creatures like the hunting song, or pacify them like the killing song. Her mother said it was for the lake, to ask it to be gentle with its victims. Though not truly a part of the Forest—the lake had been here before the Wandering Forest and would remain should it ever leave—it was nevertheless their protector.But there is nothing gentle about this death, Leelo thought as she remembered the swan. She only hoped it was swift.

The first note was so low that Leelo barely heard it. One by one, the others joined in, the mournful dirge echoing in her ears as her own lips formed the notes of the drowning song. As much as she hated the drownings, feared the poison of the lake and the hunger of the woods around her, she couldn’t stop her magic any more than she could stop the changing of the seasons. Once again, she felt that insistent press against her throat: the music and the magic, desperate to be free.

Across the lake, the villagers thrust their hands over their ears and fled like a herd of deer.

Leelo watched the spot where Pieter had disappeared, wondering if his bones would wash up on this shore or the other, if they ever made it out of the water at all. She wondered if his parents were singing, if they had known he’d returned, or if he’d kept the secret from everyone but Isola.

It seemed so unfair, to be first punished by being born without magic, and then again by being forced to leave. But the incantu weren’t safe on Endla. Because the islanders would sing again, and those without magic would no sooner be able to resist it than a moth could resist a flame.

Leelo knew then that the only thing worse than her brother leaving would be to find herself here, standing on the lakeshore, singing the drowning song for Tate.

Chapter Four

That night, Fiona gently brushed Leelo’s long hair while Ketty pulled Sage’s auburn strands into something resembling a plait. Tate was already asleep, and the living room was silent save for Sage’s muttered protests and the crackling of the fire.

All day, Leelo had been trying to make sense of what they had witnessed. She’d always believed there would be no contact with Tate once he was gone and that anyone who knew what the Forest was capable of would run as far from it as possible so they would never be tempted to return.

As a child, Leelo had doted on her little brother, before she understood that he would be leaving by his twelfth birthday—only weeks away now—if his magic didn’t come. It was generally assumed that if it hadn’t appeared by then, an Endlan was well and truly incantu, and while they may not immediately fall prey to Endla’s music, they would eventually. It was a far better fate to leave early than to stay until it was too late.

Around his tenth birthday, Tate gave up on singing his prayers to the Forest and began speaking them instead, knowing there was no magic in his voice. Leelo did her best to distance herself from him then, but it quickly became clear that the separation would be as painful as severing a limb, whether they did it now or when it came time for him to leave. He still tried to crawl into her side of the bed on cold nights, and sometimes she didn’t have the heart to kick him out. Sleeping next to him, his face still bearing the slightest traces of baby fat, she couldn’t imagine him alone in the world.

“Why do we send them away?” Leelo whispered, even though she knew the answer.

“Those without magic aren’t strong enough to resist it,” Fiona said, her voice so soft it made Leelo’s eyelids heavy. “That’s why we can’t allow them to stay on Endla.”

Leelo sighed. “But surely we could protect them somehow.”

“You know that’s impossible. They would run straight into our traps the moment we sang the hunting song,” Ketty answered, her voice as sharp as her gaze in the firelight.

Sage scrambled away from her mother’s rough hands and picked up a set of small antlers, still covered in soft velvet. The young buck she’d taken them from had died of natural causes; hunting wouldn’t resume on the island until after the festival. Sage had strung holly berries on a thread earlier and now proceeded to wind them around the antlers, fashioning her crown for the spring festival.

“So what if a few incantu are caught,” she said. “At least the Forest would be sated.”

Leelo frowned at her cousin. “How can you say that? Just because someone doesn’t have magic doesn’t mean they deserve to die.”

“Which is precisely why we send them away,” Ketty said. “It’s a kindness, not a punishment. Pieter knew the consequences of coming back.”

“What about the consequences of harboring an incantu?” Sage asked.

Ketty cleaned her daughter’s hair out of the comb and tossed it into the fire, where it was quickly reduced to ash. “Isola’s family will be shunned. For a time, anyhow. I’ll speak with the council on Rosalie and Gant’s behalf. They are too much a part of this community to be outcasts forever, and it doesn’t seem as if they knew about Pieter until today.”

“And Isola herself?” Sage pressed.

“That poor girl will be dealing with the consequences for the rest of her life,” Fiona said quietly.

Sage rolled her eyes, unsatisfied with this response. “No one will marry her now, I bet.”

“Isola is ruined,” Ketty agreed. “If her parents are smart, they’ll turn her out sooner rather than later. There’s no reason they have to be pulled down by her mistake.”

Leelo’s heart ached for Isola. She couldn’t imagine being turned out by her own family. “But Pieter was one of us, and he wasn’t harming anyone. We didn’t even know he was here until today.”

Ketty scowled. “Once an incantu leaves, they’re an outsider, and outsiders are forbidden on Endla. Why must we go over this a thousand times, Leelo?”

---