Epilogue
Carrie
The Following Autumn, as the Frost Forms . . .
She was easy to love, easy to laugh with. Her soul shone like that full moon under which she was born.
—Cora Morgan, February 1, 2013
I get up with the dawn. The frost has formed overnight, weaving lace and ice over the fields. I throw on an extra jumper, pull my hair up into a bun, and stretch, feeling the spaces between my ribs fill with light. I walk downstairs, flick on the kettle in the kitchen, and eye the looming giants through the back window as Kep stirs at my feet. It feels as though they’re waiting.
I drink my tea quickly, after letting it cool just to a temperature that burns but doesn’t scald. I feel the hot liquid trickling down my throat, into my chest. Taking a breath, I welcome the winter. Remembering the winters that have gone before, I know that this winter will be all mine.
My breath fogs out before me as I walk, boots crunching, like treading on glass. I thrust my hands into my pockets, tip my head back, and breathe in the air. It’s cold and sweet like the first taste of winter. I drink and drink it in, smiling as the sun dances through the sky, as Kep barks, haring off into the grass to stretch her legs in all the frost.
There’s only one place I want to go this morning. Only one place I can go to greet the frost and the change in the season. I whistle to Kep and she stalks over, staying at my heels. The trail leading up the mountain is still overgrown with the remnants of summer. Autumn beat back a little of it, but only enough to change the color of the foliage. Bronze and gold and scarlet leaves litter the ground, leaving the limbs of the trees bare and expectant. Waiting for winter. Waiting for the snow and ice to cover their naked forms.
I walk slowly, swaying with each step as my feet get used to the new boots I’m breaking in. Once I decided to stay, I knew I had to match my wardrobe to the seasons. Dresses in the summer, and wide-brimmed straw hats. In autumn, layers of long-sleeved shirts and woolen jumpers, with boots sturdy enough for the mud coating the trails. I kept my old shirts to paint in. I’d set up an easel in the back room, just as I’d pictured. And now, at the beginning of winter, I’m wearing a coat that’s thick enough to turn away the cold. One I chose with Jess a couple of weeks ago as she cuddled the new baby into her chest.
Elodie has been the biggest surprise. When I look at her, all I see is springtime. She’s an unexpected anchor here, a tie I can’t just cut loose and sail away from. I pick her up from school so Jess can stay at home instead of bundling up the baby to make the school run twice a day. Elodie and I thread daisy chains and play hopscotch, and I carry a bag of penny sweets just for her. When I told Jess that I was definitely staying, that I had no plans to leave with the summer sun, she turned to Elodie and said, “Isn’t that wonderful? Auntie Carrie isn’t going anywhere.”
And I had to turn away, sniffling as my eyes quickly misted with tears.
Auntie Carrie.
Just those two words, twined together. That is the greatest gift of all.
Pausing at the fork in the trail, I turn to the lookout. The view steals my breath, even now. The view over Woodsmoke, and beyond it, growing indistinct, the endless horizon. All the lives in those little houses, their chimneys freshly lit with the arrival of winter.
My gaze roves over the tapestry of houses, the market square, the cobblestone heart of the town, and lands on the crooked shop off the town center. Ivy’s shop. My shop. Or rather, my art gallery. Cora left the property to me in her will, so all I have to do is pay the scant bills. It’s the perfect space to fill with my sketches and prints, with a couple of bolder pieces I’ve tentatively placed on the walls to sell. The tourists seemed to like them this summer. They flocked through Woodsmoke in their hikers’ boots, binoculars slung around their necks, and some came in to ask after Ivy. Finding no candles to purchase, they bought a print or a postcard instead. I couldn’t help thinking of Matthieu and his brother, though, when I saw those hikers and heard their plans.
Cora would have loved what the shop has become. Ivy would have snuck in after I turned the sign to closed and stuffed her candles into every little bit of spare space. But they both would have handed me the old iron key, patted my hand, and wanted me to keep going. The fair sister and the bitter sister.
The Morgan women who came before me.
A whisper stirs at my back, and I close my eyes, imagining it’s him. Just for a moment, I picture his face, the way his eyes crinkle at the corners. The way last winter he tucked a smile away, just for me, as we grew to know each other. The way the trail of his kisses lit me on fire. I still love you, I whisper back, wondering if he’ll hear it, wherever he is now. Whether my words will carry across continents, a whisper on the wind in his ear.
I could make a bargain with the mountains. I could pull him to me, hand over pieces of myself as a trade. But I’ve seen the other side of that coin, experienced it for myself. The mountains may give, but they ask so much in return. An eye for an eye. A life for a life.
A love . . . for a love.
I sigh and turn back toward home, not looking at the trail that peels upward to the Vickers cabin. I heard that it was sold not long ago. That it’s been empty all this time.
I walk down the mountain as I walked up, slowly and ponderously, with Kep at my side, greeting winter with my head held high. I no longer fear this place and the tricks it can play. I’ve read all the stories in the book, and for me there’s no longer any mystery about them. Only sadness at all the curses, all the downfalls. All the fools who lusted after more than their share. The mountains are so ancient, so soaked in blood and stories, that they’re almost alive. Almost sentient. And I know never to cross them again.
As I reach the field, I feel the press of their eyes against my spine. The unseeing kind, the hungry kind. But I know better than to offer blood in the silver moonlight. I know better than to pass on the book to anyone who thirsts for more.
There’s something on my doorstep. A tiny bundle, tied with a green ribbon. My breath hitches as I bend down to pick it up. The posy of wildflowers casts warmth up my wrist. There’s yarrow, aster, dahlias . . .
“Matthieu . . .”
I say, swallowing down the ache in my chest. It can’t be him. He’s somewhere far away, surely—
“Carrie.”
I whip around and see him standing there.
My heart explodes.
The posy drops from my fingers as I go to him, closing the distance between us. One step, two, and his arms come around me. “You’re here, you’re really here—”
“Yes. I’ve had . . . time. Time I needed.”
I lift my face to his, feel a blaze of heat as his mouth finds mine. The world drops away, leaving only us, only this. I kiss him harder, deeper, pulling him into me. When I come up for air, he’s watching, waiting.
“What are you doing back?”
He knows what I’m asking of him. Whether he’s found some peace over the past few months. Whether he’s confronted Henri’s ghost and found a way to let his brother go. “I bought the cabin. It—it felt right somehow. I won’t go searching for Henri, but he’ll know I’m here. This feels right, being here.”
Tears catch in my throat, clawing up from my chest. “If you’re sure, if you’re sure you don’t need more time—”
“I’m sure. I want to be here with you, Carrie.”
I laugh, my lips finding his, pressing the joy between us.
“I realized this past summer what I was giving up by staying in the past. I’ve never met anyone like you, Carrie. There’s never been a single soul like you. I love you. I shouldn’t have left, I should have tried—”
“It’s all right,”
I say. “It’s all right. You needed to leave. But you came back.”
Then I feel it.
The curse recorded in the book, the curse that has lingered far too long in this place, curling around the frost, squatting like a toad in the mountains. I feel how fragile it is, how frail it has become. As I lean back, I feel the roots and shoots weaving around us, binding us, and I lock my gaze with his. Then I say the words that I know will finally break the curse.
“I love you too, Matthieu. I’m not going anywhere either.”
And the lingering, lonely curse shatters, splintering all around us.
With the frost.