Catherine Knutsson - Shadows Cast by Stars

Paul spots it first. “There!” he says as we whiz by the granite boulder jutting out from the forest.

A cloud of dust surrounds us as my father slams on the brakes, throws the truck into reverse, and parks by a driveway running downhill into the trees. “You two wait here for a minute,” he says between coughs. “I’m going to check things out.” He hops out and marches off.

I slide out to stare at the rock. The petroglyph is a raven, carved deep into the granite, with outspread wings and an open beak reaching toward a circle that I think must be the moon. With my eyes closed, I set my hand on the raven and trace its ridges with my fingertips. Memory threatens to wash over me. Ravens, always ravens. They follow me everywhere, laughing at the girl who has no shade, no spirit animal, taunting me, whispering that if I follow, they can show me where my soul is hidden.

Paul’s raven is the lone exception. He has never spoken to me, but to Paul? Yes, I think my brother has heard the trickster’s lies.

Paul pulls my hand away from the granite. “Not now. Not with Dad around.”

He’s right, but it would be so easy just to slip away, surrounded by the thick, dark forest of fir. I open my eyes. Beyond the trees, the lake is a sheet of quicksilver, so bright it blinds me. Surely I would be safe here. Surely I could cross and find my way back.

But a breeze ruffles the hair at the base of my neck, reminding me that I’m only a moment away from spirit taking hold of me and using me as it chooses, so I hold tight to my brother’s hand until the raven releases its grasp on me.

It’s not long before my father returns and we pile into the truck again. Neither Paul nor I mention the raven.

The truck lumbers down the steep driveway, and when the house comes into view, I wince. It’s in shambles. Glass is missing from several of the upstairs windows and the roof is blanketed with a thick coat of fir needles. Who knows what lurks underneath? Paul eyes it, knowing that my father will have him up there tomorrow to see what needs to be repaired.

Paul jumps out once the truck groans to a halt, and pushes open the door to the woodshed. A raccoon darts past him, skittering away into the bush. Paul laughs, but then the acrid scent left behind by the raccoon wafts out. This is my home , it says. Trespassers will not be tolerated .

Paul’s laughter fades. My family doesn’t take omens lightly.

My father draws a deep breath, then nudges me. “Go see what we’re dealing with inside, Cass,” he says. “Paul and I will start unloading.”

A path runs around one side of the house, leading to a door that’s stuck fast, its hinges rusted shut long ago. I find another path, but it leads down the steeply sloping hill toward the lake, where a boathouse sits in the shadows, its dock extending out like a crabbed finger.

Next I try the sundeck that runs across the front of the house, hoping to find a window ajar, but instead I end up standing at the railing, staring down at the water. Sometimes the beauty of the earth is so profound, it steals my breath away. In the Corridor, there’s not much of the natural world left amid the concrete and the asphalt and the steel, but here? Here I almost feel like I belong, high above the firs and the bracken and the salal.

“What’s the matter?” my father asks as he sets a box down next to the door.

“The door’s rusted shut.” Which is true, but the real problem is that I can’t seem to take my eyes off the silvered lake. Reluctantly, I turn away.

“Only one way to fix that.” He shoves his shoulder into the door, cursing when the door doesn’t move. After a bit of discussion, Paul attacks the door with an ax. Doors are replaceable, but broken shoulders aren’t easily mended, no matter how much my mother taught me about healing.

I go back to the truck while Paul hacks away. A spark of light passes through my field of vision as I pick my way up the path, forcing me to shake my head. Please, let it just be a speck of dust , I think, but no, it’s there, just in the corner of my eye. “Stop it,” I murmur. “Just stop it. I’m not going, and that’s that.”

The spark sits there a moment longer, and then vanishes. I slide a box from the truck and return to the house, blinking, hoping that the spark is truly gone. Paul is pulling pieces of the door from its hinges, but stops what he’s doing to peer at me. “You okay?” he says.

“Yeah.” I force myself to look at him. “Just not feeling quite right.”

“I know.” He looks around. “It’s almost like this place isn’t fully here. I feel it too.”

We both shiver, and then laugh just as our father approaches. “What are you two up to?” he says, grinning. “Must be nice, standing around while I do all the work around here. Come on, back at it.”

I’m still laughing as I make my way back to the truck, but for some reason I glance over my shoulder. Paul’s still standing there, motionless, staring at the shadows in the trees. My laughter dies.

By the time I return, the last of the door has been cleared away. My father’s inside, already sizing up a broken window. “Put that down over there,” he says, nodding at the box in my arms, “and then take a look upstairs. There’s a bedroom up there with a good view of the lake.”

“How do you know that?” I ask.

My father rubs his forehead with the back of his hand. “I’ve been here before, back when I was about your age.” He motions to the stairs. “Go on. You’d better go claim that bedroom before your brother does.”

Paul would never claim a room for himself, but still, I go upstairs, knowing that my father hasn’t told me the whole truth of this place.

Pinecones and skeletal leaves cover the floor, but my father was right. In this room, I am high above the lake, closer to the sky than the earth. My old bedroom only had a view of the apple tree, but this? This is a view that sings to my soul, and instantly I feel guilty, as if I have betrayed our old house and our life there. That apple tree is where my mother rests. Am I ready to exchange her for the view of this lake so quickly?

No , I decide as I throw open the window and let the wind rush in. Not just yet, though I can’t help wondering what my mother would think of all this. She worked so hard to make sure we had a home at the Corridor. She didn’t want me here. She wanted me in a place where I would have a future that didn’t involve marrying a warrior and bearing him babies, a future that didn’t condemn me to working my fingers to the bone and aging far before my time. That’s what she told me, at least, but then, she didn’t live to see what happened with the searches. Would she still have made the same choice if she knew what we know now?

On the far shore, several cottages nestle into the trees. Just beyond them, a plume of smoke rises from the forest, a smudge of gray against the expanse of green. The house creaks around me, its bones shifting in the afternoon sun, as on the lake, a single canoe breaks the watery mirror in two. It’s heading this way.

“We’ve got company,” I call out the window to where Paul has taken over the job of unloading boxes from the truck.

My father rounds the corner of the house and peers up at me. “Company?”

“There’s someone in a canoe down there.”

“Hmm.” He scratches his head and frowns. “Well, you might as well go down and see what they want.”

I don’t like the look of that frown, but I try not to think about it as I make my way out of the house and down the hill, out onto the dock, where I stop short. The canoe is tied to it, bobbing in the gentle rhythm of the waves as the boy from the store, the one with the auburn hair, lifts a cage holding three fretful chickens. His kingfisher shade flutters at his shoulder, and now that I’m closer to it I can see that some of the feathers are new, as if they’re just growing in over recently healed wounds.