Free The Cats of Tanglewood Forest by Charles De Lint

“After her funeral you said, ‘It doesn’t have to be this way.’ What did you mean?”
    “I said those words?”
    Lillian nodded. “That’s why I came to see you.”
    “That’s strange,” Aunt Nancy told her. “I don’t remember that at all, and I remember everything. Unless…”
    Her voice trailed off.
    “Unless what?” Lillian asked.
    “Sometimes the spirits speak through me,” Aunt Nancy explained, “but unfortunately, only those around me can hear what they have to say. I don’t even know it’s happened unless someone tells me.” She gave Lillian a rueful smile. “And since most folks avoid me, they don’t think to mention it.”
    “The spirits,” Lillian repeated. “What would spirits want with
me
?”
    “I don’t know. But now you see that, clearly, whatever’s going on has something to do with you.”
    “There’s maybe one thing, but…”
    “Stop playing coy and tell me what happened.”
    “Well… would a dream count?” Lillian asked.
    Aunt Nancy gave her a considering look.
    “What kind of dream?”
    “A strange one. Sort of like a fairy tale or a… premonition.”
    “Tell me.”
    “But it was just a dream.”
    “Dreams can be potent,” Aunt Nancy said. “Tell me what you remember of it.”
    “I remember everything,” Lillian said.
    And she did, so it took a while to tell. She started with how she’d gone chasing after the deer, and finished up with the possum witch sending her back.
    “So I guess I was sleeprunning,” she finished, “though I’ve never heard of such a thing before. But I woke up running, and the next thing I knew, I came to that same beech tree in its glade, but there weren’t any cats there. No snake, neither—not that I could see. That didn’t come until later, when… whenI found Aunt in the corn patch. But you see what I mean about it feeling like a premonition?”
    Aunt Nancy nodded. But instead of commenting on the dream, she said, “I’ve heard there was a possum witch in these hills, but I didn’t know where.”
    Lillian stared at her with wide eyes.
    “You mean… Was it all
real
?”
    “Now, how would I possibly know a thing like that?” Aunt Nancy asked.
    “But if the possum witch is real…”
    “Hard to tell. Every dream doesn’t spell out a piece of the future. I just meant it was curious, is all.”
    “I don’t understand.”
    “Well, you said you’d never heard tell of a possum witch, but there you were, dreaming of one all the same.”
    “So what does it mean?”
    Aunt Nancy shook her head. “It feels like there’s something from the long ago sticking its nose here in our business, but it comes from so far back that I can’t get a proper fix on it. Just sit quiet for a spell. Let me try to hear what this old spirit is telling me.”
    Curious as she was, Lillian had been warned many times in her life that it was unwise to attract the attention of the spirits, so she looked anywhere butdirectly at Aunt Nancy, who’d fallen into a trance. Lillian glanced all around the cabin, but her gaze kept going to those huge cobwebs, which made her shudder. What were they doing there?
    Aunt Nancy made no sound, but her lips moved silently from time to time, as though in conversation. Finally, she opened her eyes and fixed her gaze on Lillian.
    “You’ve been through a lot, child, but your trials are not over.”
    Lillian took a big breath, then let it out. “I’m ready to do anything to make things go back to the way they were before Aunt died.”
    Aunt Nancy nodded. “As I said, your trials are not over. The spirits say you need to go to the bear people. Maybe they can help you sort this dream out.”
    Lillian didn’t like the sound of that. She’d come here hoping for a solution to her problems, not more mysteries.
    “What? I thought the spirits said they could help me.”
    “Do not disrespect me or the spirits, Lillian, or you will have more problems than you could ever bargain for. You must go to the bear people