Between the Spark and the Burn by April Genevieve Tucholke

arms straight down at his sides. “Vi, I have a bad feeling about this town. This—” He nodded his chin at the dead birds, their feathers ruffling in the chill wind. “I don’t like it, sister. We should leave. Now.”
    Sunshine turned around in a circle, saying nothing. So far she and Luke had flirted and kissed and been in love and acting like this trip was all good fun.
    But now I saw it in her eyes. Fear. Raw and rotten and deep as winter is cold.
    A door opened. One of the white houses at the far end of the street. It opened and then slammed closed again. The attached cluster of dead, black feathers swung back with it and hit the wood with a thud.
    A girl stood on the steps.
    She saw us just as we saw her. She jumped back a few inches, her mouth wide open.
    Two heartbeats.
    And then she started walking toward us, her eyes on Luke and his red-brown hair.
    â€œWho are you?” she asked, her voice small and hesitant like it was afraid to be heard. “Where did you come from? We don’t get strangers here.” She paused. “At least, we didn’t use to.”
    I thought she was about fourteen, but slight and small, which might be making her look younger. She had white-blond hair, straight down her back, no bangs. She wore a green dress, a bit old-fashioned in a home-sewn way, plain with a tight waist, thick black boots, and a gray homemade sweater—one thread was coming loose and had opened a quarter-sized hole on her shoulder. In her right arm she held a large white bowl of something. Something thick and red that had sloshed over the side and stained the front of her dress.
    She was looking at Luke but Neely answered her. “We heard about your town, about what was happening here. The devil-boy, with the ravens. We came to investigate.”
    â€œNo, Neely, don’t tell her,” I whispered, too late. I’d read mysteries. I’d read Agatha Christie. You never tell people what you’re up to. It’s the golden rule. If people know you’re looking for answers, they clam up and refuse to talk.
    But Neely just winked at me, and then at her, as if we were all just a bunch of kids flirting with each other at the town carnival or something, our hands sticky from cotton candy and our hearts on our sleeves.
    How did he do that? Make a hidden mountain town full of dead birds feel like a Norman Rockwell painting?
    The girl nodded, as if what Neely said made sense and nothing could surprise her much anymore anyway.
    â€œWhat’s in the bowl?” Sunshine had a hand to her mouth, and suddenly I knew why. The winter wind lifted the copper smell to my nose.
    â€œBlood,” the girl said, simply. “For the churchyard. We killed the pig today.”
    Luke turned his head to look back at the church, then turned it forward again. “Why are you bringing pig’s blood to the church?”
    His voice got loud at the end, and it worried me. I wrapped my fingers around his arm and he leaned into me.
    The girl shrugged. “To pour on the gravestones.”
    â€œWhy would you pour pig’s blood on the gravestones?” I didn’t really want to know the answer, and yet the question came out of my mouth anyway.
    The girl shifted her hip and put the bowl in her other arm, more of it spilling onto her dress in the process.
    A sound came from Sunshine’s opened lips. A . . . sigh. A soft sigh. Usually Sunshine shrieked loudly when she was scared, or pretending to be scared. But she was quiet now. Sighs, not screams.
    The girl looked at Sunshine, and then looked back at the blood staining her home-sewn dress. A flush started creeping over her cheeks, as if she hadn’t thought to be embarrassed about the spilled blood before now.
    â€œIt’s an offering to our ancestors, to help capture the boy,” she said, in answer to my question. The girl paused, looked toward her house, quick, and then looked back at us again.