Page 28 of Welcome to Blackbird Hollow
I set my jaw against the loud music and cross the threshold into the stuccoed building. He reaches past me, pulling the door closed tight. I blink, looking around the large, vaulted room and trying to get my bearings. Pale morning light pours through three arched windows at either end of the space. The floors areold, battered pine in a herringbone pattern, creaking with every movement. A rich, earthy, herbaceous scent fills the air—like a bunch of fresh plants mixed together. I would normally find it pleasant, but my stomach still feels queasy.
Even worse is the thumping bass of someone’s boombox blasting the oldies—“Zombie” by the Cranberries, I think. My mom loves that band, even though they were old news by the time she first heard ’em on the radio.
Long folding tables are lined up with military precision across the floor, heaped with petals and leaves and nails and salt and things I can’t identify. A pretty Black woman in jeans and a delightful cardigan with candy corn appliques stands at the head of the tables with a small throng of folks around her. She’s holding a clipboard and gesturing, so I assume she’s in charge.
“That’s Wanda,” Wyatt tells me, following my gaze. “She’s the Foxglove Coven’s leader.”
“So she’s actually a witch?” I ask with delight. Much like Them, the mere thought of witchcraft—or hedgeriding, for that matter—is brushed off as utter nonsense in academic circles. To be honest, I brushed it all off, too, but I guess I still always hoped. Because a world with magic is just better than one without, even if that magic is wild and strange and dangerous—just like it seems to be here in Blackbird Hollow.
Wyatt nods, watching me closely. “Witches are human, like us, but they’ve got Changeling blood,” he explains, raising a hand in greeting to an older woman with incredible bone structure. She’s dressed in jeans, boots, and a field coat like everybody else, but somehow she looks like she stepped off a magazine spread. It’s exactly the way the tourists herewishedthey looked in their brand-new gear.
“Wait, humans with Changeling blood? And Changelings are Fey?” I demand over the music as my mind catches up, dragging my gaze away from the attention-commanding woman to lookat him with wide eyes. He just nods solemnly. “So that means somebodydidfuck one of The?—”
“But we don’t do that anymore!” Wyatt protests, though I can see he’s holding back a laugh. It must be the dim lamplight of the room that makes me think he’s blushing. “Besides, there’s a lot of older hedgerider texts that indicate Changelings are something more complicated than just the ol’ switcheroo you see in folklore.”
I don’t know why I find a six-foot-two man who looks like he does a lot of manual labor blushing and saying things like “ol’ switcheroo” so delightful, but I absolutely do.
“Is everybody here a witch?” I want to know, not trying to sound too excited but definitely failing. Wyatt scans the room, and it’s at that moment I notice quite a few people are glancing my way with lingering interest. That’s normal, I guess—I am an outsider, after all.
“Most of the coven’s here,” he answers, shoving his hands in his pocket and leaning closer to me so I can hear him over the music. “But the table with the nails? That’s just townsfolk.”
“And this is preparation for the Hunt?” I ask, itching to wander closer and examine everything. I have to remind myself that I’m actually here to help, to participate—not just to observe. For once, I’m actually part of something.
“We’re usually pretty prepared for this time of year,” he replies, his shoulder bumping mine. Heat floods my entire body. “But with hellhounds in the woods and the Hunt coming right for us, we’re taking extra precautions.”
He explains that most of the town’s little ones have iron sewn into their coats and backpacks year-round. Everybody’s got rosemary at their garden gate and rowan near their back door. What I’m looking at is extra, drawing from the town’s collective reserves, to make sure everybody’s safe.
I nod, wishing I’d brought a notebook or something. He’s just finishing up his explanation when the striking older woman I saw earlier makes her way over. “Morning, Wyatt,” she says as she draws closer. “Who’s this you’ve got here?”
Her playful, singsong voice tells me she knowsexactlywho I am. I mean, I saw enough of Fallon’s phone tree action to assume that everyone in this building probably has my full name and birth date, plus a snapshot of my spiritual weaknesses.
“You know damn well, Harkness,” Wyatt shoots back without any venom, a kind of worn-in, well-practiced teasing—like he has with Fallon. “Or is that memory of yours starting to fail?”
Harkness cackles. Like, actually cackles. “Sharp as ever,” she replies, tapping her temple with one slightly bowed finger. Her gaze moves to mine, and I’m unprepared. Meeting her eyes feels like peering into the cosmos or the night itself. Her attention makes me slightly woozy, and the air seems to throb for a long moment.
“Lovely to meet you, Alice Blythe,” she says with a feline grin. There’s something about this woman that makes me love her immediately, even though she’s also kind of terrifying. “Wyatt doesn’t bring many beaus around, you see. Thanks for taking one for the team.”
Wyatt turns red, which makes me blush in turn. “And this is precisely why,” he protests. “You all can’t let a man justlive.”
Harkness winks at me and levels her gaze at Wyatt. She’s tall, I realize—probably only a little shorter than Wyatt. “You two up for distributing iron reserves and making sure all the kids’ coats are ready to go trick-or-treating?” she asks with a sly little smile.
“Alice was looking forward to getting to see the coven work,” Wyatt replies, rubbing the back of his neck. I bite the inside of my cheek, trying to stop myself from wondering if he’s just trying to avoid being alone with me. If it’s painfully obvious that I’m developing a hell of a crush and he doesn’t want toencourage something like that with a city girl who doesn’t know the first thing about actually dealing with Them.
“Willa Proctor and Sally Laveau’ll be out doing the garlands,” Harkness says with a wave of her hand. “Besides, with the Hunt on its way, there won’t be any shortage of getting to see what we’re up to here.”
“That okay with you?” Wyatt asks, turning toward me. I will my face not to flush further when I meet his gaze, tilting my chin up to look at him.
“Sure,” I say with a shrug. “Might be easier to ask some folks about the missing hikers, anyways.” I wouldn’t normally be so loose-tongued, but Harkness practically oozes authority, so I think it’s alright.
“Nikhil waited on the two that went missing most recently,” she offers like a consolation prize. From a nearby table, she scoops up a burlap sack and hands it to Wyatt. His shoulders unpin from his ears as they exchange a long glance.
“Fine,” he relents with a heavy, theatrical sigh. Then he turns to me and gestures toward the front of the building. “Let’s go out the front door.”
I make my way across the antique hardwoods, taking in the gleaming wood paneling. Wyatt leads me through an impressive set of double doors, which are held open by a very large garden gnome and a children’s wagon, and into a smaller chamber. Two hallways branch off from either side, the cream-colored walls covered in framed art. I glance closer at one as we walk by, intrigued when I realize I’m looking at scientific sketches of the region’s flora and fauna.
We reach a plain vestibule with plastic chairs and fliers about things to do in Blackbird Hollow, and then we’re back out on the street. The sun’s starting to burn through the mist and rain. At the base of the hill, the valleys spill out like an embroideredtapestry, accented with silver threads of dew. I pull in a deep breath of damp leaves, wet pavement, and woodsmoke.
“What are you gonna do with all the tourists?” I ask, thinking about the fliers we just passed. “I mean, it seems like the full-time residents…understand what it’s like out here. But what about the leaf peepers?”
