It’s late in the evening
When I hear a tapping,
A murmurous sound in my room.
The flutter and mutter
Of one of the murder
Of crows that circle the moon.

He sits at my window,
Inviting me onward
With just a slight tilt of his head
As if to say, “No one
Will know if you wander
While everyone else is abed.”

In her finest black gown, Branwen stood and surveyed the place where The Game would be played. The flat stone sat at the peak of the hill that rose out of the bog, its edges worn soft by time. Two large mushrooms (grown by herself, thank-you-very-much) faced each other on opposite sides of the stone, ready seats for tonight’s encounter. Around the hillock Branwen had lit an army of candles, their flames giving a flickering, unsettling light to the darkness of the bog.

I was staring up, waiting for my Lady’s eye to become visible, when a shadow peeked over the rim of my prison. I blinked, wondering if I was seeing things, but when my eyes opened, the shadow remained, resolving itself into a head with a pair of pointed ears. A pair of eyes, green as glittering emeralds, stared down at me from high above.

Why languish you there, moon sister?

“Would you just come and look?”

Grumbling, Leah came up behind Claire’s shoulder. “What?”

The waitress tapped the page she was on. “It was in lost and found. It’s been there for, like, a week. Charlie pulled it out earlier.” She turned and grinned at Leah. “It’s a spellbook.”

In hindsight, Robbie should have been more nervous about going up to the old Marshway place. It was the kind of house kids would ding-dong-ditch on Halloween, daring each other to set foot on the porch. Three stories tall, with iron railings along the roof, it looked a little bit like the Addams Family mansion.

The knock comes after the sun has set, a steady beat against the wood of her door.

Thump…thump…thump.