In the Forest of Light and Dark (20 page)

,
that’s still a pretty fucked up story.” I said leaving things at that.
     “Yes, it is. And the real fucked up thing is, it’s
true
.
” Katelyn then said, sounding as if now that she’d told me the story my opinion of witchcraft had suddenly changed somehow.
     “That’s debatable.” I then told her, still not willing to concede my position on the subject.
     After having heard Katelyn's account of the Abellona Abbott story, the two of us just continued to sit there on the banks of the river for a bit longer allowing our intoxication to let us feel good while we began soaking our feet down in the cool water. After a while though, I began to feel myself come down off my high while simultaneously beginning to get a little warm. So, I suggested to Katelyn that maybe we should head off for a little hike through the forest where we could be within the shade of the forest canopy.
     The sun was just about hitting its peak right above us, and I knew from my time drinking with my friends back in Alabama that when it was this hot outside, it’s always best to get somewhere within the shade. Because there was nothing worse than coming down from a beer buzz in the punishing sun. I mean, it would make you hurt worse than a dog’s peter after humping a porcupine.

A Lesson in Witchcraft
 

I had grabbed my bag, and we began making our way through the Pine Barrens. When we had first entered the trees I had found myself listening to the hum of the sibilant branches as they gently swayed in the breeze. It was right then that I had realized that Katelyn had never told me about how she, the bitches, and my grandmother were all tied into the story of Abellona Abbott. So as we moved on up the gently, ascending hillside, I had asked her about it. And as we began dredging through the ferns and prickly nettles that had raked me up something awful the last time I was there in the forest. She began telling me about it.
     Katelyn had started off by telling me about how after the last sickness had ended (The weird influenza that the doctors could never figure out what it truly was.) and how the villagers had all gone off and gotten their pitchforks and torches to chase my grandmother out of village after having blamed it all on her. (Figuratively speaking, of course,) Then that was when Harlin, Donnie, Erik, along with the three bitches had all decided that they would be the ones to teach my grandmother a lesson and hopefully end up driving her out of Mount Harrison forever in doing so. Katelyn told me that they had wanted her to help them in their plan, but she had refused saying that what they were planning on doing just wasn’t right.
     What the boys had cooked up was something that they had reckoned they would’ve had no problems at all with getting away with because my grandmother was all alone, alienated, and nobody was going to believe her anyway.
     The boys had surmised that if they succeeded in their plan they would've also had the backing along with the gratitude of all the other people in the village. So, in their tiny minds, they would’ve been regarded as heroes instead of the criminals which they really were.
     Katelyn went on telling me that by that point—the end of the influenza—my grandmother hadn’t really ventured out of her house much, if at all
,
anymore. Mostly on account of every time she did. Somebody from the village would confront her by getting up in her face about either their children being sick, or the bad luck they’d been experiencing lately, or about
whatever
bullshit they could come up with to blame on her. Hysteria amongst the villagers had grown to the point that my grandmother’s very existence in the village became the origin of everybody’s woes.
     So, it was on a Saturday night in early autumn that the bitches along with their meatheads had decided to exact their genius scheme. They had planned to steal a bunch of chickens from one of the neighboring farms that was not too far outside of the village limits. After abducting the birds’ they would then bring them over to my grandmother’s house where they would then cut the birds throats, so that they would bleed out. They’d then hang the carcasses upside down from the trees scattered throughout the property while also nailing one to the front door of the house. Harlin Tapp had gotten the idea to do this after reading some hogwash on the internet that said it would work to drive away witches. It had been sixteenth century hokum.
     Katelyn who was already a vegetarian and a lover of animals (Not in the sick way you're thinking of. Get your perverted little mind out of the gutter.) of course not only flat-out refused to take any part in what they were planning to do, but had also said she had pleaded with them not to go through with it at all. The bitches and the meatheads had then shunned her for her refusal to help
,
and commenced in giving her grief about it for days, saying she was a coward and a traitor. They had told her that she should keep her witch loving ass
at home, to wait for the next sickness that would surely strike the village again soon, hopefully taking her out first. Keri Mahan had even told Katelyn that she hoped that Abellona Abbott came to collect her soul next.
     Katelyn then told me that she couldn't, in good conscience just sit idly by while doing nothing to stop them as they slaughter those innocent birds and tormented an old woman. She had felt that she had to tell someone, or do something,
anything,
not only for the sake of the helpless chickens—which I had figured were going to eventually meet their demise by the steely blade of a butcher’s knife anyhow—but also because she felt terrible for my grandmother, a woman who, up to that point, she had never even met.
     Katelyn told me that, at the time she was just like me in her beliefs, and had never even heard of Wicca. She certainly didn’t believe in witchcraft being real, and she had even thought that the story of Abellona Abbott and of my family’s involvement with her was, just that, a story.
     Katelyn said that she had figured out (After having done her own internet research.) that the animal sacrifice that her former friends were planning to partake in would have to be done at the place where the witch was known to reside. So not having a clue about what she could really do to stop them. Katelyn first elected to tell her parents about the impending crime. Her parents had pretty much just shrugged it off saying that they really just didn’t want to get involved with such matters, that it was none of their business, and therefore not their concern. She then said she had thought about going to the police to report it, but she knew that the police were just like everyone else in the village, and were more than likely willing to turn a blind eye to any acts of mischief or vandalism that were either aimed at, or related to my grandmother.
     So, after not finding any help down either of the two most obvious avenues she had thought to go down. Katelyn then decided that her only other recourse was to go over to my Grandmother Lyanna’s house and warn her herself of what her friends were planning to do.
     Katelyn told me that after she had gotten to my grandmother's house and had knocked on the front door several times, she had gotten no reply. She then tried the bell several times, but still nobody answered. So, she then peered around trying to look in a few windows for movement, but when she had seen none, she’d figured that she was out of luck with giving my grandmother any advanced noticed of what the bitches and their meatheads had planned on doing that evening.
     Katelyn was all set to leave when she said she had noticed that my grandmother's car—which at the time was a red Ford sedan, not the kick-ass black Caddy that my mama now drives—was still parked in the driveway. So, she elected to snoop around and head into the backyard. Because with the property being as big as it is, given the six acres we have, if anybody was actually home, but currently in either the side yard or in the back, there was a good chance they’d not have heard anybody knocking at the front door or ring its bell.
     As Katelyn crept around back, she said the first thing she saw was all the weird garden sculptures that my grandmother had made. They were sitting like monuments in between the sections of roses, black-eyed Susans, and other colorful perennials my grandmother had planted throughout the yard.
     Then, when she had made her way further back, she saw a woman whom she had assumed must have been my Grandmother Lyanna, kneeling in front of a weird alcove looking structure made out of porcelain. She said that it had looked to her like a cast-iron bathtub that’d been stood upright and half buried in the ground.
     In it, dangling from strings, were a few symbols that Katelyn would later come to know as being magic seals. My grandmother would eventually tell Katelyn, she had made them from copper and brass, which allowed them to give off soothing tones like a wind-chime when the breeze knocked them into one another.
     Just below the seals, at the center of the alcove, stood a statue of a woman on a plinth. She was beautiful, with long, flowing hair, and a well-defined face.
     Katelyn watched as my grandmother lit several candles that flickered in the light breeze, but didn't go out. My grandmother then lowered her head in silence to the base of the statue where another plinth lay that had a pentagram fastened to it which Katelyn had thought been crafted from silver.
     Next, Katelyn said that she saw my grandmother hold up what had looked like to her a large bone, possibly even the femur from a deer. It was thick and long, and almost coral white. My grandmother then spoke in a language Katelyn had never heard anyone ever speak before. She then raised the bone up to the sky before lowering it back down to her face. Where she then kissed it before slamming it down upon the silver plinth, using both of her hands to do so, and causing the bone to shatter into dozens of pieces upon impact. Katelyn said that she had thought that given the size of the bone, she could not have ever imagined anyone, even the largest of men, being able to do such a thing. Make such a strong, harden instrument, like the leg bone of a deer burst asunder under the small, delicate hands of which were my grandmother's.
     My grandmother then peered though the marrow and shattered pieces of bone as if reading a message that had been spelled out. She then pulled from her pocket a black velvet satchel, reaching deep into it and pulling forth what looked like a white, grainy substance, much like kosher salt. She then sprinkled it on the bone marrow and had used a large, black feather to mix the salt and marrow cocktail while bending down close as if to read words that had suddenly appeared underneath it on the plinth.
     My grandmother then slowly got up off her knees, whispered something inaudible to the shrine, and then said, “Hello, Katelyn.”
     Taken aback by having been seen, and even more so by my grandmother having already known her name though they’d never met. Katelyn said she felt her heart begin to pound in her chest. She didn't know whether she should stay, or turn around and run having at this point figured that my grandmother really was a witch, at least in practice anyway. But, before she had even the slightest of a chance to make up her mind on fight or flight, my grandmother turned to face her and said, “Come here child. I will not hurt you. I mean you no harm.”
     Katelyn said she stammered out her words when she tried to speak. “I... I’m s-s-sorry to have intruded li-like this, but—”
     “It is okay, my child.” My grandmother then said to her having cut her off mid-sentence. “I like having visitors, and I so rarely have any anymore. Come... Come in. Welcome to my home.”
     Katelyn moved forward cautiously, ready to hightail her ass out of there at the first sign of something amiss. But she told me that as she apprehensively approached my grandmother, she found a sense of well-being falling over her like a veil. She was suddenly cast into a sensation of warmth and security, like that of being held in her mother’s arms as a child, or a really good high.
     Katelyn then told me that she had then, for the first time, looked into my grandmother's eyes, and they were of a radiant green that she had never seen before. A shade that couldn't have been matched if you took all the green in Ireland, magnified it by a thousand, and condensed it back down into two perfect spheres. Katelyn said that my grandmother's eyes appeared more vibrant and full of life than all the world's oceans put together in one tea-cup.
     “You are not the only visitor I will be receiving tonight, are you?”
my grandmother had asked her.
     “No. I'm afraid not.” Katelyn told her, albeit still apprehensive. “Some of the other local kids are planning to—”
     “
Hush,
child. There’s nothing to be afraid of, especially here. This is my home. And, this is my land. I already know what the other children from your school are planning.” My grandmother had said this to Katelyn as if she had firsthand knowledge of the future.
     “You, do?” Katelyn asked her bewildered. Her head still in a whirlwind of what was real, not real, fantasy, delusion, dream, and hallucination all rolled into one.
     “Yes, I do, Katelyn.” my grandmother assured her in a soothing tone. “They cannot hurt me, or my home, or anyone whom my home protects. Those poor chickens on the
other
hand, may need a little help though. But I will not let any harm come to them either.”
     “What are you going to do?” Katelyn then asked her.
     “I have my ways of handling hoodlums.” My grandmother then said. “But, for the time being, why don’t we go inside the house and have some tea while we wait for our pranksters.”
     It was the first time that Katelyn had ever been inside my grandmother’s house and she said that she was still a little fearful to enter, not yet having felt truly comfortable with my grandmother’s intentions. But after she had entered the house and took the opportunity to look around. She said that she almost instantaneously began to feel more relaxed. After having noticed that the walls weren’t covered in blood and gore, and that the basement wasn’t a dungeon for holding teenage girls like her imprisoned. She had seen that the house was like any other home. A television sat in the living room, a microwave in the kitchen, pictures of the family hung on the walls, and the Devil was nowhere within sight.
     Katelyn told me that the two of them had then sat in the living room while my grandmother curiously inquired about her life and of her plans for when after she had graduated. Katelyn had asked my grandmother questions like what that weird shrine in the backyard was, and what was it that she’d been doing when she had kneeled before it. My grandmother went on confessing to her—much to Katelyn’s surprise—of being a witch, just not one of the flying around on a broomstick variety.
     My grandmother then told her all about being Wiccan, and in her beliefs.
     Katelyn told my grandmother all about Keri Mahan, Laurie Altman, Hallie Dune, and the jack-offs known as the meatheads.
     Katelyn then told me that it was during this time when she had told my grandmother all about how she had been, as of lately, falling out-of-place at school. As if she had felt herself drifting apart and separating from her friends. That was when my grandmother had mentioned to her my mama for the first time and all the troubles she had experienced while living in Mt. Harrison right around the same age Katelyn was then.