The Crimson Brand (40 page)

Michael frowned, hesitated, trying to decide if this was a necessary confrontation or if he should just try to forget the weirdness his little sister seemed to be mixed up in.  He didn’t notice Penny, hidden behind the door to the hallway.  She pushed it closed as he resumed his grim stride to the closet door. 

He swung the closet door open, lifted his foot to take his first step inside, and froze in place.

Behind him, Penny latched and locked Katie’s bedroom door.

Michael stood on the threshold between his little sister’s bedroom, and something that was most definitely not her closet.

“Well, what are you waiting for?”  Katie asked, and had to bite her lips against a burst of nervous laughter.  She stood at the creek’s edge, Zoe and Ellen on either side of her.  Zoe was looking at her feet.  Ellen covered a smile with one hand.

“What …?”  Michael poked his head through the doorway and looked up, as if hoping to see the ceiling of Katie’s walk-in closet.  What he saw was a canopy of interlaced willow whips forming an imperfect green roof through which he could see flashes of blue sky.  Beneath his still-raised foot was not the carpet of Katie’s bedroom, but dirt, grass, and fallen leaves.

Katie rushed to him, concern on her face.  She snapped her fingers beneath his nose, and he tore his gaze from the creekside country clearing he had not expected to find inside his sister’s closet.  He stared down at her, chagrin and disbelief fighting for room on his face.

“What did you do with your closet?”  He looked around again.  “How did this get inside your closet?”

“Come in and have a seat,” Katie motioned to one of the boulders arranged around the fire pit, “and we’ll explain it all.”

Penny stood close behind him, her hands raised and ready to give him a push through the open door if his nerves failed him.

Michael put his raised foot down, on the carpet of Katie’s room instead of the ground in the hollow, and took a step back, almost bumping into Penny.  Then he took a deep breath, and walked through into the hollow.

Penny followed him through, meeting Katie’s smile with one of her own, and closed the door behind them.

Friday evening in Dogwood was chaotic, even with a block of Main Street still cordoned off and half of the businesses closed.  The park was overrun with families returning from vacation to witness firsthand the devastation they’d only seen on the local news or heard about from family and friends.  The townspeople watched the demolition and cleanup of the ruined building, one of Dogwood’s oldest, with morbid fascination.  The bakery’s mobile cart did a roaring trade in doughnuts, coffee, and—Penny’s favorite—Elephant Ears, serving the workers and watchers alike. 

The people of Dogwood watched the workmen loading construction dumpsters with rubble, speculated on which of the businesses would return and which would close for good, and retold the story of Susan and Michael’s capture of the villain Morgan Duke a hundred times over, casting speculative and admiring glances at where Susan sat with Markus, Lynne, and Michael West.

Michael was handling the revelation about his sister and the
Dogwood Witches
better than expected.  He had honored Katie’s wish that he keep the knowledge to himself, but insisted they come to him first before engaging in any more dangerous forays against horror-movie monsters.  Katie had reluctantly agreed to tell him next time something mad and scaly tried to kill them, but Penny had seen her cross her fingers behind her back.

Penny didn’t think Michael was going to let it go that easily.

“You’re only fourteen,” he reminded Katie when her obstinacy continued.  “It’s not up to you to save the world.  You’re not some comic-book superhero.”

“Well,” Ellen interjected, perhaps unwisely given the mood of the exchange, “she can fly.”

“Don’t remind me,” he’d said, rubbing his forehead as if staving off a headache.

In the two days since Michael’s inclusion in their secret, he made a habit of checking up on them almost constantly.  It drove Katie nuts, but Penny thought that Zoe was secretly enjoying the extra attention.

As if reminding Penny that he hadn’t forgotten about them, Michael cast her a dark, meaningful look from his seat between Susan and his father.  His attention was stolen away a moment later by the arrival of Ellen’s parents.

Mr. Kelly, tall, dark-haired and bespectacled, stopped to clap Michael on the shoulder and shake his hand.  To Penny he looked more like a politician than a computer geek, which is how Zoe referred to him.

“He’s not a
geek
,” Ellen had said.  “He’s a computer systems analyst.” 

Mrs. Kelly, tall and blonde, looked more like a model than a town-hall clerk.  She caught sight of the girls and waved to Ellen before clasping her husband by the arm and dragging him away from Michael.

As if to balance out the ugliness of the ruin across the street, the Dogwood trees in the park were finally, and all too briefly Penny knew, in furious bloom.  Bright pink and dazzling white, adding more life to the park than Penny could have imagined.  In three weeks the park, the sidewalks, and even the street beyond, would be covered in their petals.

Penny, Zoe, Katie and Ellen sat apart from the rest of the Friday evening throng, under the big oak near the gazebo, Zoe’s old reading tree, and the very spot where Penny had first seen her.  None of them had seen Ronan since the night of his unexpected return, but they figured he was holed up in that cave, healing.  At least that was what they hoped.

The industrious bustle of demolition didn’t interest her, nor she suspected, did it interest Susan.  She had lost an important part of her life the night it burned down; it was not a spectator sport for her. 

They were there for Zoe.

Zoe watched the road winding out of town with an anticipation that was almost painful to witness.  Her parents, whom she had not seen in over a year, would arrive soon. 

Penny watched too, with dread and growing anger.

She hated Zoe’s parents, not because they had left her here with a grandmother who didn’t seem to like her much, but because they were coming back.

Katie and Ellen whispered among themselves, idly passing the time with talk about nothing important.  They seemed to be aware of Penny’s distress and decided that the best way to help her cope was to not help her.

Penny appreciated that.

Zoe’s interest perked momentarily when a familiar car, James Price’s black Charger, rolled to a stop at the yellow tape cordoning off the demolition zone.  For a moment it sat, idling, then the passenger door opened and Ernest Price climbed out, looking dirty and disheveled.  His clothes looked slept in, his Stetson bent out of shape and crooked on his head.  He stumbled as he slammed the car door shut and walked a crooked path toward the activity.

“He’s drunk,” Katie said. 

“As a skunk,” Ellen agreed.

A man with a bright yellow vest and hardhat rushed to intercept Mr. Price before he could cross the barrier, and the ensuing argument was inaudible but animated. 

Zoe leapt up suddenly, bracing herself against the trunk of the tree, and seemed unable to breath.

Penny saw the truck a second later, pulling to the far curb in front of the church.  It was big and white and somehow strange without the long trailer that should have been following it.  Penny thought it looked like a giant head without a body.  She heard the distant chuff of air brakes, then the headlights went dark and the low and mellow rumble of its engine died.

Penny, Katie and Ellen stood too, the whispered conversation stopping.

For a few long moments they could only see the silhouettes of the passengers.  Zoe’s anxiety grew, became almost tangible.  Then both doors swung open at once, and two people climbed from the high cab of the semi: a short, dark-haired woman who descended slowly down from the passenger side; and a tall, muscular man who leapt down from the driver’s side.  They swept the doors shut, and Zoe’s hurried breathing stopped for a second.

“Mom … Dad.”  Just a whisper at first, breathless, almost inaudible.  “Mom!  Dad!”

Heads turned from all around at the outburst, but Zoe was blind to them.  She sprinted toward the approaching figures, clumsy in her excitement, almost tripping as she vaulted the curb to the street.  She didn’t notice Penny and the others rushing to keep up, didn’t see Susan and the Wests abandon their spot—marked by a half-circle of folding chairs and a cooler—to follow.

The approaching figures, the short, pixyish dark-haired woman and the tall, muscular man, never altered their pace.  They approached their daughter at an easy, almost lazy pace, but when she reached them at last, the man bent down and opened his arms wide.

Zoe threw herself into his open arms, and Penny marveled that he remained upright.  He enclosed her in a spirited embrace and swung her from the ground, spinning her through the air.

Zoe’s exhilarated laughter overwhelmed the low drone of machinery and the babble of the onlookers. 

For a terrible moment, Penny was insanely jealous. 

Then she saw Zoe’s face as her father lifted her high, as if she were no more than a toddler and not a budding young Amazon, and Penny’s jealousy vanished in a bright, hot blush of shame.

She didn’t realize she had stopped until she saw Katie and Ellen join the happy reunion, Zoe’s father setting her back on her feet and her mother swooping in for her turn. 

Susan stopped behind her, put a hand on her shoulder, startling Penny.

“Worried?”  Susan asked almost casually, and Penny felt the heat rise in her cheeks as she blushed again.

Had she been that transparent?

“Yes,” she said simply, and hoped Susan would let the subject drop.

Susan did, and as the Wests joined them, Katie’s father in the lead and looking as uneasy as Penny felt, they walked to join the happy family reunion.

*   *   *

That night was Penny’s first night alone in a week, and though she missed Zoe, she welcomed the solitude.  She sat on her bed, wide awake, though it was late and she had a funeral to attend the following morning, looking through the old photo album again.  The Conjuring Glass sat at the end of her bed, the obscuring fog swirling expectantly it seemed, waiting for Penny to resume exploring the past.  Her small mirror sat on her nightstand.

Her table lamp threw a small, bright spot of light over her, glaring off the glossy plastic photograph sleeves.

She flipped the pages again, not knowing precisely what she was looking for until she found it, a photo of the mystery girl.  She slid it from the album and examined it.

“Who are you?”

“
Penny
?”

Penny almost screamed in shock, dropping the photo and tipping the album off her lap as she kicked her blankets aside.  One of these days she supposed she’d get used to being disturbed in the middle of the night by disembodied voices.

She tripped over her own feet sliding out of bed, landed hard on the floor, and cursed silently.  A snort of laughter sounded from the small mirror on her night stand.

Not bothering to get up, Penny reached blindly and grabbed at the mirror, bringing it close to her face. 

Ronan grinned at her.  “Fancy a chat?”

*   *   *

Penny stepped into the hollow, casting a fire into the stone ring even as she pulled the door closed behind her.  She searched for Ronan and found him peeking through the mouth of his cave.  When he stepped out, she saw that his fur had grown in to cover the singed spots, as thick as ever.  He looked healthy, strong.  A moment later he confirmed her assessment by bounding across the creek in a single leap, a leap that carried him straight into Penny. 

Unlike Zoe’s tall, muscular father, Penny didn’t have the size or strength to remain upright.  Ronan knocked her to the ground and sat on her chest, laughing with joy and sounding more like the Ronan she had met almost a year ago than he had in a long time.

“I am so very proud of you,” he said at last, bumping the furry crown of his head against Penny’s in a rare show of affection.  “You’ve all done so well.”

“We had some help,” Penny said, and returned Ronan’s head bump with one of her own.

Ronan grinned, gave a little bow, and jumped from Penny’s chest, allowing her to sit up.  He settled next to her and turned his head to regard her, and though a trace of his smile lingered, Penny could see he was becoming serious. 

“I imagine I missed a few things during my recuperation,” he said after a short pause.  “I would appreciate you bringing me up-to-date.”

He had missed a few things, important things, and Penny had every intention of filling him in, but first ….

“You go first,” Penny said, unable to suppress her grin.  She was determined to beat the hairy little nuisance at his own game for once.  She had been dying to know just how he’d come back after dying so convincingly in her arms.  “How did you come back?  We saw you die.  I
felt
you die.”

“Very well,” Ronan said, unperturbed.  “The body that died in your arms, the one you’re seeing now, is only a projection.”

“What?”  Penny’s ability to believe the strange and unusual had expanded considerably in the past year, but this was simply too much.  Projected images didn’t nip playfully at your pant legs or knock you to the ground when they jumped on you.  Projected images didn’t leave a wet streak across your cheek when they licked you.  “Are you trying to tell me you’re not real?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he said.  “Of course I’m
real
.”

“Then what are you ….”

“This,” Ronan said, indicating his restored body with a backward glance over his shoulder, “is only a physical projection into your world.”

“My world?”  Penny found her capacity for belief stretched a little more.  “How many worlds are there?”

“Countless,” Ronan said.  “Many worlds, and all connected.”