Jolene Read online

  Jolene had on an expression of amusement again, but Anna was too pleased to see the Little People to take any offense at the fact that Jolene found her funny.

  “You came!” she said joyfully in Cherokee, surprising shy smiles out of them. “Thank you for coming—” her mouth seemed to know the right honorific, even if her head didn’t, “—grandfathers. I hope I was not rude in calling you.”

  “All was as it should be,” the one that had tugged her sleeve said. “What is it that you need, granddaughter?”

  And they waited patiently while she gathered her thoughts, and considered each word carefully.

  “I have just come into my power,” she told him. “I am unlearned, and I have many questions. Some of them my aunt does not know the answers to. I know that I may call upon the spirits of the earth, but I do not know which ones. May I call upon the spirits of the earth known to the Cherokee?”

  “You may, if you call, and not summon,” the little man said, with a gravity worthy of Elder Raven. “Your best ally at most times will be Bear, and if you cannot think upon whom to call, call Bear. For every forest animal, there is a clan of Spirit Animals that can speak to you and aid you. Grandmother Spider will tell you about all of them; she is the wisest of us all, and the best teacher. You may summon the ordinary animals of the forest, as your aunt does, but they may not come when you call upon them unless your summons is very strong. Grandmother Spider can teach you about all that may be taught to you. Some, you may not learn, because you are not of the Cherokee People.”

  Anna cast a glance over to Jolene, who nodded slightly, as if all of this was completely expected. But—Grandmother Spider? She didn’t much care for the sound of that; she didn’t like spiders at the best of times. And at the worst, like the times she had run into webs on the way to the privy? Ugh! Ugh! Ugh! It made her skin want to crawl right off her body!

  But she wasn’t given a chance to object, as suddenly, right before her horrified eyes, a gigantic spider came sliding down out of the tree above on a strand of silk, to dangle mere inches in front of her nose!

  “There is Grandmother Spider now,” the Little Person said conversationally. “She is ready to instruct you.”

  All that Anna could do was stare at the thing, rigid with fear.

  “Let us tell you why Grandmother Spider is such a great teacher,” the tiny man continued. “It is because she is clever, she thinks things through carefully, and she always does what she sets out to do. My grandfathers told me this story when I was a boy, so it must be true. In the Before Times, this world was covered in darkness, and all the Peoples of this world kept getting hurt because they bumped into each other in the dark. Fox, who had been everywhere, looking and spying with his long, sharp nose, said, ‘I know where there is light all the time, but the people over in that place won’t share it because they are greedy.’ He was speaking of the world of the Thunders, who had the Sun all to themselves. Raven said he would go and steal some of the light and bring it back. And everyone thought he would do it because he is so strong. But he got too near the Sun—because that is what it was—and his feathers were burned black and he got frightened and flew home. Possum said, ‘I have a big bushy tail, I can hide a piece of the Sun in my tail and the people over there won’t see me take it.’ So Possum went, and stole a piece of the Sun and hid it in his tail. But the Sun was so hot, it burned off all his beautiful tail fur, and the Thunders saw it shining and took the piece of the Sun back. And that is why Possum has a bare tail now. And Vulture said, ‘I will go and steal it, and fly high with the piece of the Sun on my head so I can see where I am going.’ And he took the piece of the Sun and did that, and it burned all the feathers off his head, and he dropped it, and this is why his head is bald now. But Grandmother Spider had been studying and watching, and she said, ‘I think I know how to bring back a piece of the Sun.’ And she made a little pot of her web, lined with clay, and she went to the place where the Sun was, spinning web behind her all the time so that she could make her way home in the dark, until she saw the Sun hanging in a tree. And she stole a piece, and put it in her pot and closed the lid. And the clay kept the Sun from burning up her web, and the lid kept the Thunders from seeing that she had stolen it. And she followed her web through the darkness back to this place, where she hung the Sun in the sky for all the Peoples to see by. And this is why she is the wisest of us all, and meant to be a teacher. The old men told me this story when I was a boy, so it must be true.”

  Anna could only stare at the spider dangling in front of her face. And then—it—she?—chuckled. She had a lovely voice, deep and kind, and Anna relaxed a very little.

  “That is a good story. You may go now,” the spider said. “I shall undertake to teach my granddaughter.”

  “Thank you, Grandmother,” chorused all three of the Little People. And then they slipped into the reeds beside the crick, and were gone.

  “Look at me, child,” the spider ordered. “Put your fear aside. Try to imagine that you have never seen a spider before and look at me. Look at me as if I were one of Jolene’s pretty baubles. Imagine that I am a beautiful brooch.”

  Somehow the spider seemed to grow until she filled Anna’s entire range of vision . . . and the first thing that she realized was how delicate and elegant the legs were, each one tipped with a neat little claw. Then, as her mind calmed, she actually paid attention to the beautiful red and black patterns on Grandmother Spider’s body, and lastly, she gazed into the four black, black eyes of Grandmother Spider, two big and two little. They were like four beautiful black beads, and even though they looked nothing at all like human eyes, Anna sensed that there was kindness behind them. And Grandmother Spider gazed back at her, and said, “Now, you see.”

  And she did. The spider was a beautiful, elegant creature, and nothing to be afraid of. In fact, there was much to be grateful to her for, because she ate insects that really could bring harm to people in the form of sickness.

  She blinked, and the spider no longer filled her eyes; she held out her hand, no longer full of fear, and the spider spun down her strand of silk and landed gently on the back of it, her touch lighter than a feather.

  “I will teach you first about Bear,” Grandmother Spider said. “For as the Little People told you, Bear is the spirit that you are most likely to need if you are in danger. Bear can run, and swim, and climb, and fight; Bear is fearless when that is called for, but does not lose himself in rage and will run when that is needed. And Bear is near to the Cherokee peoples. This is how you call Bear, and how you summon the lesser bears.”

  With Jolene looking on in approval, Grandmother Spider taught her about Bear, and Deer, and Badger, and Panther. “And that is enough for today,” she concluded. And that was when Anna realized that they had been sitting there all afternoon, it was getting late, and she hadn’t actually gathered any ingredients for potions—

  As Grandmother Spider reeled herself back up into the tree above, Anna looked frantically for her basket.

  And that was when she saw the little green lizards; she had been listening so hard to Grandmother Spider, and the lizards were so quiet, that she hadn’t even noticed them until that moment.

  There must have been two dozen of them, scurrying around the basket, bringing neatly cut-off stems of the plants she had been asked to gather, carrying them in their mouths, dropping them in the basket, and scurrying off again. They were beautiful little things, with scales that glimmered like polished gems and copper-colored eyes. She’d never seen lizards like these before in her entire life.

  And she had certainly never seen lizards working together like this.

  As she raised her eyes to Jolene’s amused face, she knew without asking that this was Jolene’s doing. “Don’t think to summon these, ever,” Jolene admonished her, with a lizard on each shoulder and one being stroked by those beautiful, white hands. “These are mine, and mine alone.”


  “I niver would!” Anna promised. “How did y’all know I was worritin’ ’bout not gitting Aunt Jinny’s her-ubs? How did y’all know which ones I was s’posed t’git?”

  “I have eyes everywhere,” Jolene replied, with a slightly mocking smile. “And ears too. I couldn’t let you go back to Virginia empty-handed. Not—” she added, “—that Virginia would fault you for neglecting her task in order to get a lesson from Grandmother Spider. But you did promise her that you would bring the things she needed, and I don’t like to be the cause of you breaking a promise. You both need these plants for your cures, they were easy to find, and my pets didn’t mind. And now that you don’t need to tell Virginia why you didn’t have what you set out to gather, you needn’t say we met unless you choose to.”

  Anna hesitated a moment, then asked one of the questions she’d been worrying over in her head. “What’s Aunt Jinny got ’gainst y’all?”

  “Ah . . . partly that goes back to things her Grandmother told her, I think,” Jolene replied, thoughtfully. “And partly that she misunderstood something I told her. And mostly that she does not understand what I am. Everything is black or white with her. Good or evil.”

  “And—” Anna dared to prompt.

  “And that is a very simple way to think of—those like me.” Jolene shrugged. “Too simple. And really, Virginia should know by this time that nothing is ever that simple. Your Great-Grandfather knew better than that.”

  That seemed to be all that Anna was going to get out of Jolene, because with a wave of her hands, Jolene sent her lizards scattering into the underbrush and rose. Anna did the same, stooping to pick up her basket.

  And when she rose again, Jolene was gone.

  * * *

  Aunt Jinny was so pleased with the quality of the cuttings Anna had brought back that she didn’t even comment on the fact that Anna was a little late, and Jinny had already fed the pigs by the time she climbed over the fence and headed for the cabin. Over supper of bean soup, she decided to tell part of the truth. “I done seed the Little People, an’ Granny Spider is a-larnin’ me now,” she said.

  Aunt Jinny looked up at that. “That so! Wall, good. What I cain’t larn y’all, Granny Spider shore can. Mind yore manners with her, she ain’t t’be trifled with.”

  Which was almost exactly the same thing that Aunt Jinny had said about Jolene . . .

  “Granny Spider ain’t ’xactly a Earth Spirit, is she?” Anna hazarded.

  “Not ’xactly,” her aunt agreed. “Y’all don’ call or summon her, y’all arst perlite, an’ iffen she don’t come, say thenkee anyway. She’s what my Granpappy called a Great Elemental. Did she tell y’all ’bout Bear? Not just any ol’ bear, but Bear?”

  Anna nodded.

  “Bear, an’ Wolf, an’ Fox, an’ all o’ them, they’s Great Elementals too, by Granpappy’s reckonin’. Critters what might he’p y’all, an’ might not. An’ don’t go gettin’ hoity toity an’ thinkin’ y’all c’n boss ’em around, or—well iffen y’all’s lucky y’all might get a mighty set-down an’ th’ wust day of yore life, an’ iffen y’all ain’t lucky, they might be a-pickin’ pieces of y’all outen th’ crick.” Aunt Jinny finished her tea and picked up her dishes to take them to the sink. “I ain’t niver seed nobody what was thet stupid, so—” She shrugged.

  “Yes’m,” Anna agreed, taking her own dishes to the sink. As usual, Aunt Jinny washed, and Anna dried.

  Aunt Jinny immediately set to work sorting and bundling Anna’s harvest and hanging it to dry. Since her aunt didn’t give her any directions, Anna got the cut-out pieces for the corset cover and set to work on them on the front porch, with her Great-Granpappy’s book open on her knee. The sun still hung over the mountains to the west, and the light was the same color as the Glory. The hens were still out, but gathered up at the henhouse, ready to be shut in for the night, scratching away at the feed Anna had scattered up there for them. A few birds twittered sleepily under the eaves where they had a nest, and swallows swooped and darted everywhere, catching the ’skeeters that were injudicious enough to come out early. In a little more time, they’d be joined by, then replaced by, the bats.

  She was impatient to get to the part where Pavel and Sally arrived here, and first met Eagle Sight, and made their home—but she got the sense that it would be a much better idea if she kept reading steadily and didn’t skip ahead. Reckon maybe the reason Aunt Jinny don’t know some things is because she just skipped around, and didn’t read the whole book. Since this book and the receipt book were the only two books in the entire household, she was beginning to think that her aunt was one of those people who just didn’t like reading.

  It was a good thing that she did just that, too, because it was in the parts about the sea voyage that Pavel revealed the trick of scrying someone that you didn’t personally know.

  You used a map.

  A map is an example of how the ancient laws of imitation and correspondence operate. A map is an imitation of a place. Spots on the map correspond to the actual places. If there is a Master known to be in a particular place, having a map of that place and putting one’s hand on it will link one closer to any Masters in that place and make the connection with them surer.

  But what iffen I ain’t got a map? she thought with frustration, feeling as far from the answer now as she had been before she began to read. She was just about to close the book and put all her mind to her sewing, but there was still good light—so she carried on.

  But what if one does not have a map? Pavel wrote, startling her with how that echoed her thoughts. Then one uses the scrying bowl to attain the view from above like that of the eagle, and moves that view steadily in the direction of the person that one wishes to scry. The landscape will roll beneath at a fearful pace, until the view is that of the place where the Master resides. Then one makes one’s own map. From there, one can even use a pendulum to pinpoint the Master’s location on the new map down to the actual house. From that, contact is but a trifle.

  By this time her head was spinning. But a trifle—! First Pavel said to somehow make the mirror show you everything from the air, like a bird. Then you were supposed to know what direction to “go” in to find the place where the person you wanted to see lived. How did you do that? And then you were supposed to draw your own map—she didn’t even really know how to draw!—and then you could, maybe, use that map with a pendulum—what was a pendulum?—and—and—and—

  Now she truly got some idea of the scope of her Great-Granpappy’s knowledge. All these things were second nature to him! And as easy as making a neat line of stitches was for her!

  Now she shut the book, and devoted the remaining light to finishing her corset cover, trying not to feel absolute despair. Today had been a good one, after all. She’d managed to call to the Little People. And the Little People had introduced her to Granny Spider. And Granny Spider was willing to teach her. So, maybe she couldn’t learn all of Great-Granpappy Pavel’s ways, but she could at least learn some of the ways of the Cherokee along with what Aunt Jinny, and maybe even Jolene, could teach her.

  So that wasn’t so bad.

  She set the last stitch just as the light went all blue, and it became too dim to see anything. She carefully set the needle in her needle-book and went to put the hens up.

  When she came back, Aunt Jinny was done with the basket of cuttings. “Y’all gonna set a spell an’ watch them fireflies?” her aunt asked her from the door.

  “C’n y’all larn me what them liddle Earth critters that y’all know are? An’ mebbe how t’call ’em?” she countered. “All I knowed so far is what Granny Spider showed me. Please?”

  Aunt Jinny laughed. “They’s a powerful lot o’ ’em!” she exclaimed. “But y’all don’ need t’call each one separate, gen’rally, lessen y’all wants a particular one. Y’all jest call. Like this—”

  Anna sat down on the stool, putting aside t
he corset cover with the book on top of it and the needle-book inside of the front cover. Aunt Jinny sat down in her chair on the porch. As she watched, Jinny sketched a glowing glyph in the air between them, then let the sign dissolve into little motes of Glory and drift off. “Now, iffen they’s any critters close by, they’ll know I’d admire t’see ’em—wall, see, there they is—” She pointed at the edge of the porch, and there were some little faces peering up at them. “Now, that there’s what m’Granny called a gnome.” This was a little wizened old man with an odd red cap that flopped over to one side, and a beard. “That one’s a piskie.” This was one of the creatures that seemed to be made out of leaves and twigs. “That one’s a hob. His name’s Coby. Me’n him’s old friends. He come with my Granny, an’—wall, tell ’er, Coby, y’all c’n speak fer yore own self.”

  This was another wizened little old man, without a cap, who hopped up on the porch and looked up at Anna from beneath enormous, shaggy eyebrows.

  “I be a Hob, right enow,” he said, in an accent so strange she had trouble understanding him. “And Hobs be crathurs what tends to housen, mostly. Thy Great-Grandam’s Papa asked me t’come along of her and see to her house. But thy Great-Grandsire had yon Domovoy wi’ ’im, sure he did, an’ there weren’t no room for two housen-minders in th’ same house. So, bein’ as the Domovoy don’t tend t’farmyards, an’ Hobs do, I do be tendin’ t’yard.”

  “This here’s why I weren’t worrit iffen I got sick or hurt,” her aunt said with a sly smile. “Domovoy’d tend th’ house, Coby here’d put the hens up an’ let ’em out, muck th’ pigs and feed ’em till I got better. Not that I ever needed ’em t’ do’it, but they was there iffen I needed ’em.”