“Terra, are you okay?” she asked.
I was too weak to answer.
She built a fire and laid me close to warm me. She watched over me throughout the night. In the morning, I woke as she was turning a trout on a stick over the fire. She took off pieces and fed them to me. I could feel my strength returning.
We finished the fish. I sat up and studied her. I had never met a shape-shifter before. Elizabeth had told me of the ancient days when they walked with witches. Not quite friends but not enemies. They had a mutual respect for each other’s magic. Somewhere in our great history we might actually have shared the same bloodline. The magic we had woken in Asheville roused her from whatever slumber she had kept.
“That’s right, Terra, I was drawn to your magic,” she said, putting out the fire.
“You can read my thoughts. I wasn’t speaking to you.”
“Yes, Terra. When Abigail Oakhaven found her spirit tree, it awoke white and black magic. It woke the Dullahan which lay dormant after Agatha Hollows took his flesh.” She threw water on the fire, poked at the embers. “It joined the gray coats to hunt witches to drain their light. When it found Agatha Hollows, it made its way to the eternal light. Now we’re both searching for the same thing to reach the next level of our powers, to follow Agatha Hollows into the light. We can’t let him do that, can we?”
“That’s why you contacted Mrs. Loblolly. You knew her ancestor, the colonel, was tasked with finding supernatural powers to fight the war. You knew that if you followed her you would find the lieutenant.”
“The colonel was sent a message from a private under the lieutenant’s command. The message read they found a witch with great powers and that they had followed her to Poinsett Bridge,” Mrs. Lund said. “When the colonel and his men arrived at the bridge, they found the lieutenant and his men reduced to ashes, their uniforms intact. The colonel kept the uniforms and the ashes and locked them away, thinking they were killed by magic, which they were. Agatha Hollows reached out from the portal just long enough to destroy them, but the Dullahan did not die a true death. The spirit lived on trapped in the ashes, dormant until you woke it. You woke me also, and I’ve been hunting the hunter. I contacted Mrs. Loblolly, and she told me she had the colonel’s collection of Civil War uniforms. When I found the lieutenant’s uniform, it still had remnants of his ashes. I placed it on the mannequin in the Biltmore along with the colonel’s sword to draw him to me. It thought it killed me before I could kill it. It doesn’t know the limitations of witches and shape-shifters. It doesn’t know how to kill me. Your friends aren’t safe. You need to go back and warn them.” With that, she turned into a great horned owl and lifted me up gently in her talons. She could have made me take her to Dark Corner to the portal, but instead she brought me back to Asheville. For now, I believed she was a good being, a kind being, and that’s the way I would proceed with her.
She dropped me at the doorstep of the Tangledwood Estate. “Save your friends, Terra,” she said before flying up over the mountain ridge.
“Terra back.” Pixel flew on top of me. “You keep promise, Terra. Good Terra.” He was so excited to see me he didn’t notice Mrs. Lund. For now, I would keep that secret to myself.
Mrs. Twiggs, Abigail, and Charlotte came out and joined the celebration. Even Tracker acted glad to see me as he cleaned my fur. Albert stood quietly on the corner of the great steps.
“Thank you, Terra, for bringing Albert back. But what about the lieutenant? What happened?” Mrs. Twiggs asked.
“He’ll be back, but we’ll be ready. Gather the ladies. I have a story to tell.”
Chapter 31
Get a Clue
I woke with a start. Abigail peered into my room. “Did you hear that scream, Terra?”
I nodded as we ran down the long hallway of the second floor of the Tangledwood Estate. The ladies gathered in the hallway outside their bedroom doors. The late-night story of my adventures had kept the ladies up all night. They had agreed to stay at the estate. There is safety in numbers, and I felt evil brewing, so I knew we needed to rely on each other.
We ran down the long, spiral staircase. Abigail stumbled at the bottom of the stairs as we heard another scream. Mrs. Twiggs flipped on the foyer light. We followed the echo of the scream into the library. We found Charlotte standing over the lifeless body of Miss Hartwell. A stream of blood flowed from her head wound, and a silver candlestick lay next to her, covered in blood. Mrs. Twiggs felt for a pulse but shook her head. Miss Hartwell was gone.
The ladies gathered around in a circle, all talking at once. I saw Mr. Tangledwood puffing his pipe from the easy chair by the wall of bookcases. He uncrossed his legs, stood up, and floated off through the wall. Mrs. Twiggs grabbed an afghan off the couch and placed it respectively over Miss Hartwell.
Charlotte shook uncontrollably. Unlike the rest of us she had never seen a dead body. Abigail took her into the kitchen. I walked around the body slowly, sniffing for clues. The rug was well traveled by the rest of the ladies leaving their scent. I looked up at their faces. They had become hardened war-torn warriors. Not from lack of compassion but because they knew the big picture and what was coming. I heard their thoughts. Who did this? Who’s next? How do we stop this? And most importantly, why?
The paramedics arrived before the police. A short while later Detective Willows came in, notepad in hand. He lifted the afghan off Miss Hartwell and peeled it back slowly so he could examine the wound. He motioned to the young officers to rope off the area. “Please all of you wait in the next room.” He motioned to us.
The crime scene team crawled around the library like a bunch of angry ants, rubber gloved, lifting, examining, taking pictures. Detective Willows donned his reassuring smile. We all sat in the sitting room, silent. We noticed Charlotte crying and shaking. Detective Willows sat down next to her and put his arm around her. “Are you okay, dear? Do you need medical attention?”
She shook her head.
Mrs. Twiggs spoke. “Detective, her screams woke us. We were all asleep on the second floor.”
“Did anybody see anything? Or anyone?”
“No,” the ladies answered in unison.
“Charlotte, why were you in the library?” Detective Willows asked.
“I couldn’t sleep. I came down to get something to read. That’s when I… I found her.”
The detective stepped over to the front door, examining the lock and the catch plate. I followed him to take a closer look. I had noticed the door had been slightly ajar when we found Miss Hartwell. He thought the same as I did that it was forced open, not an easy feat. He ran his gloved finger along the edge of the door, catching it on a sliver. A young officer came up behind him. Mrs. Twiggs walked over.
“Butch, what’s going on?”
“Beatrice, the door was forced open. Is there anything missing in the house?”
“I don’t know. We didn’t think to check.”
I searched the house for anything out of place. Mrs. Tangledwood kept a tidy home. The estate sale left the house with the essentials, bedding, and furniture. All items to help stage the home for sale. Mrs. Twiggs joined me taking inventory using the ledger from the estate sale.
“All here, Terra,” she said. “Maybe the robber was interrupted by Miss Hartwell before he could steal anything.”
I thought for a moment. “We didn’t check the Not For Sale room, Mrs. Twiggs.” We hurried to the den behind the library. We found family photo albums and other boxes of personal items.