Backwards Moon Read online

  The children climbed in, jostling and yelling. A door slid shut. Then with a roar, the children were gone.

  Nettle looked out at human houses, huge and square, each one standing next to the other in its own patch of short grass. She put her face close to the window and peered first one way then the other, but the street (for so it was, she knew from the pictures in the Cyclopedia) seemed to go on and on and on.

  chapter nine

  “Fool!” screeched Toadflax. She slammed her fist on the table. “Little ninny!”

  Bracken gaped at the place where Nettle had been a moment before. “What happened?”

  “All that magic,” groaned Toadflax. “Wasted!”

  “Where’s Nettle?” cried Bracken. “What happened?”

  “She’s in a city. On the Great River,” Toadflax snapped. “And it should have been you. But now . . . Curse the little fool. She’ll never find it. Not by herself.”

  “Find what?” said Bracken through clenched teeth.

  “The Door. The Door to the other world, so we can get out of this wretched valley. There’s a Safehouse near it. I sent her there.”

  “She’s where?” said Bracken numbly.

  “She’s in a Safehouse. In a human city.”

  “You sent Nettle all by herself to a human city?”

  “Not on purpose!” Toadflax glared. “You were the one I meant to send. You at least would have had a fighting chance. Oh, she would have gone along. But not because I thought she’d be much use finding the Door.”

  “Why couldn’t you go?” said Bracken, glaring back. “If you want to find this Door so much? You with all your magic, what was stopping you?”

  Toadflax laughed. “Me? Go myself? To a Safehouse in a gigantic human city? Child, I am four hundred years old! I wouldn’t last a minute there, not a minute.”

  “So you thought you’d send us, and instead you sent Nettle all by herself,” said Bracken. Her face was pale with anger.

  “Listen, you,” said Toadflax in a voice like acid. “I gathered more magic than you can ever hope for, with more trouble than you can even imagine, to send you while you were still young enough to resist the Fading. While you still had some chance of finding the Door.” She glowered at Bracken. “We had one chance, and now it’s gone. Gone.” Toadflax stared. “Don’t you see? Without that Door we are doomed! That’s why your mothers went looking for it. They were still young, but not young enough!”

  Bracken felt a sudden chill. “Our mothers! You know what happened to our mothers?”

  “Possibly,” said Toadflax.

  “They went looking for the Door? I thought . . . I thought they went looking for our fathers.”

  “They believed your fathers went through the Door.” Toadflax sighed impatiently. “So naturally they went looking for it.”

  “But then the Fading got them?” cried Bracken.

  “All we know is they never came back.” Toadflax shrugged. “Some who lose their powers turn to dust. But others just sink into forgetfulness. They become witches who are not witches. Lost, pitiful creatures. I myself would prefer dust. And you?” she said suddenly. “Which will you prefer when the humans invade the valley?”

  Bracken could not speak.

  “You were both supposed to touch it, when I told you to,” said Toadflax. “When I’d explained everything! But she reached out her silly little hand. Without listening! Without waiting.”

  “Nettle never listens! Don’t you even know that?” yelled Bracken. “And don’t call her stupid.”

  “Pah!” spat Toadflax. They glared at each other, then a change seemed to pass over Toadflax’s face. “But wait,” she said slowly. “Wait.”

  She stood up, went to the cupboard, and rummaged for a long time. When she came back, she held a yellowed roll of paper tied with a green ribbon.

  She untied the ribbon and spread the paper out on the table.

  “A guide to the Safehouses of the new country,” someone had written across the top in ink now faded to brown. “You could still get there,” said Toadflax. “With this map, you could fly there. And if you hurry, you might still have a chance of finding the Door.”

  On the eastern edge of the map, there was a scattering of human cities. Boston Town, read one. New Amsterdam, read another. To the west there was a region marked Prairies, then a spine of vaguely drawn mountains. And west of that, there was only blank space on which was written Terra Incognita.

  Bracken looked up, frowning.

  “You could save Nettle from the Fading,” added Toadflax quickly. “She is young, the youngest of all. She can hold out a good long while before it takes her. And the door is somewhere near the Safehouse on the Great River. Very near. Everyone knows that.” She gazed at Bracken with an expression that was perhaps meant to be pleasant. “Look here,” she said, running a crooked finger across the map. “Each Safehouse is marked with a lantern. The Safehouse on the Great River is the last of them, the farthest one west. Here.”

  Toadflax put her finger on a line that wavered down the page somewhat east of the mountains. “This is the Great River, of course. The Safehouse you want is on the northern end of it. Right about, oh, here.”

  Toadflax shifted her finger back across the map, to the mountains. “We’re here, of course. So all you have to do is fly due east and a little north, and you’ll hit the Great River, I’m quite sure.”

  Bracken stared at the map, her heartbeat drumming in her ears.

  “What’s the matter?” asked Toadflax. “Surely, you don’t want to let your cousin die?”

  “Stop it,” said Bracken. She put her face in her hands.

  “I know you do not like me, but think about this. You are our very last chance. Look up, child,” Toadflax said. “Look here.” She stretched her hands toward Bracken, and between them appeared a necklace of bone and beads and mother-of-pearl, glinting in the lantern light. “Woodfolk made them,” said Toadflax, dangling the necklace.

  “Woodfolk beads! You have Woodfolk beads!”

  “If you go, I’ll give them to you. Forever,” said Toadflax. “And if you don’t go, think of this: Their magic will be lost, gone, swept away with everything else that’s ever mattered to you. . . .”

  “Stop,” said Bracken. “I’m going,” she whispered. “I would have gone anyway.”

  “Splendid,” said Toadflax. “Splendid. Now listen. These beads hold a strong enchantment, with one spell to unlock it. Use them only in dire need, for they will work just three times. No more. And that, too, is only if you use them wisely.” She fastened the beads around Bracken’s neck and whispered the spell in her ear. “You understand,” she said intently. “Three times only, if your wishes are wise.”

  Bracken nodded.

  “You must leave quickly. Now, before the others find out.” Toadflax strode toward the door.

  “But . . .” It seemed so terrible to leave them all—Aunt Iris and Rose and everybody—without saying a word.

  “Don’t be a fool,” snapped Toadflax, seeing her face. “You can’t tell them. You know they would never let you go. You have journey bread with you? Apples?”

  “Yes,” said Bracken, dazed. (She always kept some in her pocket.) Slowly, she followed Toadflax out the door and down the rock path.

  They stopped at the brink of the ledge and gazed out over the valley. “Look there,” Toadflax said suddenly, pointing.

  On the moonlit slopes that led up to the pass, dim shapes were flowing, fluid as water. Then as Bracken watched, they slipped back into the trees.

  “The wolves are out,” said Toadflax. “A good omen.” She mounted her broomstick. “Follow me.”

  They landed near the trees. “Quiet now,” said Toadflax. “And don’t stare. Wolves don’t like being stared at.”

  A minute later, six dark forms slipped out of the forest, their ears pricked forward. Six pairs of yellow eyes gleamed.

  “The Veil . . .” said the largest wolf.

  “Ruined,” said Toadflax
.

  “Ah,” said the wolf, nodding slowly. “A pity. A great pity. This valley has been a good sanctuary for us. From their guns. Their traps.”

  “Our kind and your kind have always been allies,” said Toadflax. “This witchling is going on a journey. We ask for your help.”

  The wolf glanced at Bracken, then away into the distance. “Granted.”

  “Guide her to the edge of the territory you know,” said Toadflax. “The eastern edge.”

  “The eastern edge?” said a third wolf, one with a graying muzzle. “But that is where the settled lands begin. The human world.” He paused, puzzled. “You would send one so young alone to the human world?”

  “It’s the only way. There is no other hope for us,” said Toadflax.

  “These are dark days indeed,” said the first wolf.

  “Indeed,” said Toadflax shortly. “Merry part,” she said to Bracken. “I wish you well. I mean that.” A waver in the air, and she was gone.

  The biggest wolf nodded at Bracken. For the barest second, she gazed into his slanted yellow eyes. Then with one graceful movement he was off. The other wolves followed, loping in single file. Bracken flew low behind them.

  An owl circled above the pass as one by one, the wolves slipped between the rock walls and threaded their way down the boulder-strewn slopes. The gray-muzzled wolf ran last, limping slightly. Eastward, far down the valley, the scattering of small, hard lights shone as brightly as they had the night before. Bracken felt her heart tighten in her chest, but the wolves kept to the high country, far back from the lights.

  In time, the wolves climbed a dark ridge, crested its summit, then followed the slopes down and down and down. The air smelled drier now, like sage. As the night ended and the sky lightened, the wolves trotted along a canyon, following a sandy creek bed. They halted by a grove of aspen trees.

  “Beyond this lie the foothills, then the flatlands begin,” said the biggest wolf. “We wish you luck, witchling.”

  “Take care,” said the gray-muzzled wolf. “Watch for traps.”

  The pack turned as one and loped back up the canyon.

  Bracken tied her hammock in the very center of the aspen grove and climbed in, exhausted. Above her, aspen leaves fluttered against the early morning sky. She set her hat down over her face, but now, in the way that sometimes happens when you are very, very tired, sleep would not come. She scrunched her eyes so tight that colors floated, and then, in the picture-dreams that come just before you go to sleep, Toadflax’s face appeared. She was looking straight at Bracken, but it was impossible to tell what she was thinking.

  chapter ten

  On the very top floor of the human house, Nettle stood at a small dusty window, her face pressed close to the glass. The rows of houses seemed to spread to the end of the world. No mountains rose behind them.

  She turned and ran back down the hall. She found another room, another window, but there were no mountains. She ran to another room, then another and another until she knew she had looked in every direction. And still there were no mountains.

  The sun was low over the housetops now. Maybe when night came, the stars would give her some clue as to where home was. Though Bracken had always been better at stars. . . . Nettle pushed the thought away.

  Below her lay the walled garden, the one she’d seen through the glass doors in the big room. Asters and goldenrod bloomed amid graceful tall grasses. An ancient-looking oak tree spread its branches above a circle of rowan trees laden with their red berries. The long garden beds seemed to be planted with herbs, though from a distance Nettle could not tell what kind. In a far corner, she could see a little stone roof poking above a thicket of hazel bushes.

  She leaned her face against the windowpane, trying not to think about home, about Bracken, about anything. But it didn’t work.

  She thought about Scabiosa and Rose who were always there, steady and comforting. She thought about Aunt Iris, who loved her so in her scatterbrained way, always. She remembered Sedge and Reed with their merry eyes and quiet jokes. She pictured the cosy circle of cottages and her own empty bed, and Bracken there in the sleeping loft alone, and her heart hurt so she could barely stand it.

  Then she drifted back down the hall, from room to empty room. She padded softly down the big staircase, around and around on the wide stairs, until she found herself again in the big room with the chandelier. She was looking toward the doors that opened on the garden when she noticed something along one wall.

  It was a row of glass-topped, glass-fronted boxes, set on wooden legs. Nettle walked toward them. Inside the boxes were carved stone figures, wooden masks, pottery bowls, and many other strange and intriguing things. Beside each one sat a small white card. Indonesia. Collection of W. A. Atkinson, read one. Papua, New Guinea, read another. Collection of W. A. Atkinson.

  Nettle went from one to the next, looking at everything. Then suddenly she stopped.

  For there, resting on a soft brown cloth embroidered with oak leaves and acorns, was a stone about the size of a loaf of bread. It was blue-green, veined with deeper green.

  A seeking stone, she realized, hardly breathing.

  The paper beside the stone read, Collection of W. A. Atkinson.

  “What?” said Nettle, outraged. It was a witch’s stone. How could it belong to a human?

  She raised her finger and shot out a thin blue spark. Then, swiftly, she cut a hole in the glass. The cut circle dropped onto the stone below and shattered into several pieces. Nettle reached in and nudged the broken glass aside. Then she lifted out the seeking stone and slipped it into her pocket. It wasn’t stealing, she told herself. Humans had no right to a seeking stone. Or to the cloth—the Woodfolk cloth—she thought, snatching it up.

  Collection of W. A. Atkinson, indeed!

  Near where the stone had been, she noticed a small book bound in faded green leather. There was something about it. . . . She hesitated only an instant before seizing it and slipping it into her pocket. She ran back up the stairs, heart beating hard, floor after floor, until she came to the highest window. She unlatched it, pushed it open, and climbed through onto the steep slate roof.

  Darkness lay over the glowing city. It was night, and yet not at all like night at home. The sky was not velvet black, but a dull, bruised purple. The Cat’s Highway and all but the very brightest constellations had vanished.

  Nettle crept to a chimney and sat down, shaking.

  Later—much later—Nettle sometimes wondered what would have happened if she had climbed on her broomstick right then and flown off into the not-dark night.

  But instead, she only sat, numbly. The city’s roar made a low and sinister drone. Then, below her, something came gliding down the street. It was the girl with the pale hair.

  She was riding a little frame set above two whirling wheels. The girl’s knees bobbing up and down seemed to make it go. The girl turned sharply and glided up a path that led to the house. The two-wheeled thing stopped. She swung her leg up and over—she was wearing trousers, like a Woodfolk man—and jumped off. Then she pushed the wheeled thing quickly over the grass, hid it in a clump of bushes, and ran toward the front steps.

  “Witch? Witch girl?” she called from below. “Are you there?”

  Nettle crouched by the chimney. From below came knocking and tapping.

  The girl went around to the side of the house and tapped on another window. “Hello?” she called. “Hello?”

  Nettle pulled out her broomstick. She stared down, wavering.

  The girl walked slowly back to the bushes. She stared up at the house for a moment more. Then she pulled out the wheeled thing. She set it upright and straddled it.

  “Wait!” cried Nettle, swooping down.

  The girl froze.

  “Who are you?” said Nettle, landing.

  “Elizabeth! Elizabeth Bowen. And I came to tell you, that kid Jason? I heard him on the bus. He said he’s going to bring his friends tomorrow to look for you in the Atkinson H
ouse, and he’s said he’s going to tell his dad to tell the police to go look for you too. And police have dogs, and dogs can smell. So I thought I should tell you. Warn you.”

  “I’ll be gone by morning!” said Nettle. “I have to get home. But the stars are gone, and I can’t see the mountains. . . .”

  “Can’t you just magic yourself home?”

  “It’s not that simple.”

  “You could come to my house,” said Elizabeth. “You could hide there. My parents wouldn’t be able to see you, would they?”

  “No,” Nettle said slowly.

  “It’s awesome, I have to say, that grown-ups can’t see you. The teachers, they looked right at you.” She laughed softly. “I mean, imagine the possibilities.”

  “Everybody else saw me.” Nettle frowned, remembering.

  Elizabeth frowned too. “It was terrible, everybody pointing and staring and screaming like that. Stupid! But there’s no one at my house but me and my parents. Jason and those others, you’d be safe from them. And the police, and dogs, and everyone.”

  Nettle bit her lip, hesitating.

  “Today, when you came, it was amazing.” Elizabeth paused. “I always, like, read about magic. You know? And then it happened!”

  “I guess I could hide at your house,” said Nettle.

  Elizabeth smiled widely. “All right!” she said. “Follow me. Stay high, though.”

  Nettle flew behind as Elizabeth glided away, her shadow flickering beneath the lanterns that lit each side of the street. They turned onto a new street, and then another. Each street seemed to be part of a network of many streets, all laid out in squares.

  After a time they turned onto a narrower street where the houses were smaller and made of wood instead of stone. Elizabeth stopped and waved Nettle down.

  “See that house there? The white one with the green roof and the big evergreen right next to it? That’s my house. My room is on the second floor, in the back there. Behind, see? I’m going to sneak in and, well, I’ve sort of missed dinner, and I’m going to be in trouble. Which is okay, really! Because they’ll just send me to my room. And then I can let you in the window.” She looked at Nettle earnestly. “Got that?”