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“Good question.” Frank nodded. “Many cultures, of course, have believed in all kinds of supernatural creatures populating the world—both divine and mischievous. Faeries, for example.”
“Tinker Bell and her ilk?”
Frank tsked at me. “You come from a Celtic background—you should know better. Our ancestors took messing with the fae very seriously. Of course, once they’d decided to mess with you, there’s little recourse.”
For no reason, a hot chill washed over me, goose bumps pricking in vestigial response. “I don’t believe in any of that.”
Frank shrugged. “You don’t have to.”
I left Frank’s, fully intending to get back on the highway, get home and start dealing with my life in a rational way. He hadn’t conceded the argument, I realized. Frank had wished me luck in a knowing way, like people do when they think you’ll need it.
When I got to the end of his road, I turned left, back to the tower parking lot. I’d come this far, I could at least walk around Devils Tower once. It had nothing to do with facing fear or reconstructing my life, what I did or did not believe in. Or looking for whatever I didn’t find last night.
A sprinkling of cars occupied the lot now. Mostly Wyoming plates and a few from nearby South Dakota and Colorado. Locals, more or less, out to see the sights before the serious tourist season began. The immense rock loomed above me.
The blacktop path, bordered by some gray government railings, led up into the trees and brush that surged up against the mountain in a slowly greening tide. If I could stand for three hours in my heels at one of Clive’s events, I could walk the advertised 1.3 miles around the tower in them.
I locked my old Honda by pulling out the handle and flipping the lock, a lazy trick that bypassed the key and never failed to annoy Clive, who predicted horrific locked-out-of-my-car predicaments. In deference to the spring morning chill, I took the fork to the southern side first, walking as briskly as the slick spots and granite outcroppings allowed. The sunny face of the mountain beamed warmth down on me. The air smelled of melting snow over warming pine needles. Swallows swirled in dizzy patterns overhead, their repetitive chimes ringing against the stark granite. A flicker answered, russet tail feathers flashing.
Then I rounded the north side to increasing shadows and snowy patches. Now the tower’s dark face brooded down on me. The calls of birds and rustling of squirrels gave way to grave quiet. A two-faced mountain, indeed.
A cold breeze sifted through the pines, making the needles rattle. The small hairs lifted on the back of my neck. I shivered, fighting the urge to glance over my shoulder.
The Dog is not behind me. The Dog is not real.
I walked faster. Moldy leaves covered the asphalt trail, so my footsteps made no sound. Around an outcropping of house-sized boulders, a cluster of aspen stood in a hollow between the path and the tower. Fetishes and bits of ribbon hung from the limbs. This had to be where they came, the local tribes, to make their petitions to the dark gods, whoever they might be.
Fear trilled over me.
Okay, fine, I’d face it then. I stepped off the path. The air thickened as I approached the aspen grove, seeming to promise something. Their luminous trunks gleamed through the damp air, buds thick on their fairy-thin limbs.
Aspens’ white bark with jagged scars always looked to me as if lovers had long ago carved their initials into them, careful hearts drawn around, to seal the two together. Silly, romantic and something else I’d never done. The tears that had been rising since I left Frank’s pricked at my eyes.
Impatient with myself, I set my purse down on a sharp granite outcropping, pulled off my gloves and dug out a pocket knife. I traced a black pattern that could be my initials, digging in to make them really mine. My blade caught on a stubborn bit, hesitated and bit in.
Bemused by dull pain, I stared at the bright blood welling on my finger where the sharp edge had nicked me. An idea popped into my head, like a bubble bursting.
I swept the fall of my hair around and found a lock from the back of my neck, from the underside, where it wouldn’t show, and sawed off a piece about half as big around as my pinky and as long as my forearm. I painted the hair with the blood from my finger.
No, of course I’d never done anything like that before.
Let’s not even discuss that the blade wasn’t disinfected. Logic and I had parted company when I walked out of Clive’s party.
As with that precipitous exit, this felt right. Liberating.
Flipping the knife closed, I tossed it back into my purse, reached up and tied the lock of hair around one fine limb above my initials, so that the ends fluttered free. I stared at it for a moment. Watching its trancelike flutter.
That was the last thing I remembered—the ribbon of bloodstained dirty-blond hair waving from the tree limb, my red Coach purse on the boulder, my leather gloves crumpled next to it, like the discarded skin of a snake.
Chapter 2
In Which I Fall Through the Rabbit Hole
‡
Iawoke onsoft grass.
This surprised me because I didn’t recall falling asleep. As with general anesthesia, when the doctor had you count backward while the fluid flowed into your arm…and then you awoke without ever having been aware of losing consciousness.
