Free Forest of Whispers by Jennifer Murgia Page B

“She’s all you’ve given me!”
    Matilde stands, white as a sheet, her mouth open as her hair whips about her face. Before either of us can speak, the wind stops and everything flying through the air falls to the floor with a clatter. It is followed by a deafening silence that steals our breath.
    Somehow, the upturned stone that is Poison lies between us on the debris-scattered floor.
    “That is your mother, Schätzchen.” Matilde points to our feet. “She is the poison that threatens to destroy us all.”
    I open my hand, for there is something I have been holding, yet I do not remember what it is or how it has come to be in my grasp. I uncurl my fingers and suck in a deep breath seeing the single rune stone in my palm, its black-stabbed triangle smeared with my own blood. It is the symbol of Woman and I have no recollection of how it’s come to be in my hand.
    “Will you tell me now? Will you tell me who I am?” I ask, helping Matilde sink into the chair I’ve turned upright at the table’s edge.
    “You remember the stories, don’t you, Schätzchen? Not just the ones I’ve told you, but the others?”
    “Everyone knows those stories, Mutti, but they aren’t true. They’re make-believe.”
    “No, Rune, they are very real, especially one in particular—a story no one knows.”
    “And which one is that, Mutti?” I whisper against my will. The stone in my hand begins to wiggle and I hold it tight, confining it to a small space against my skin. My stomach clenches, as if knowing deep inside what she is about to say.
    “The one about the witch from the forest,” she gauges my reaction, “and the daughter she had.”
    At first I think the silence left behind by the wind is warping her words. I am not sure if I can trust my ears, because all along I’ve thought my mother to be a lost soul, someone worthy of pity. I’ve been saddened by the fact that she had to give me away as her life was cut short.
    Matilde takes my hand and holds it steady.
    “No she isn’t, she wasn’t.” I’m not .
    “Yes. It’s all true,” she nods slowly. “You, my dear, are the daughter of a great and powerful witch.”

Chapter 11
Laurentz
    I am relieved to find my horse still tethered outside the old woman’s house. Dusk has fallen upon the village and the bleak square is a dark and dreary gray. The forest, as I see it, is blacker and more sinister still, and I am anxious to be on my way. I step over the crumbling stone threshold of the ailing house I’ve been inside for the last hour, glad I chose to do the unthinkable and intervene, for tonight could have ended very badly for the two women inside. Only now I am left feeling twisted and confused—about Rune, about what she did for my arm, and about what lies beyond the hedge, deep beneath the veil of the Black Forest.
    “Hedge Witch,” I say to myself. I’d never heard the term before. Aren’t witches old, scraggly hags who spent their time concocting potions and spells? That’s what I’d grown up to believe. Yet the girl I’d met today was young and beautiful, and yes, I was most pleasantly bewitched by her. Still, there is no explanation to what she did with my arm. A mossy bandage seems innocent enough, but healing the cut completely? It certainly seemed magickal.
    I have no proof she is indeed the girl who lives with the old crone called Matilde; I am simply venturing a guess based on the word of an old woman from the village. I lead my horse to the far edge of the market square, near the wild growth that rises alongside the forest. The mushroom is in my pocket where it can do no harm, and I intend to throw the miserable thing into the trees, but something prevents me from going through with that plan. Instead, I leave it there and find myself staring off into the dark foliage, wondering about Rune and wanting to know more about who she is.
    It will be dark soon and I know I should set out for Eltz now. Even on the brightest of days, the forest is like