Kyra shook her head but didn’t say anything.
I didn’t think Piper meant it literally. Maybe she did.
But the next Sunday, when Luke and Tobias went hiking in the woods, they returned carrying a kestrel with a broken wing. Tobias held the bird in his hands, while Luke ran ahead to find a box and call the wildlife center.
Kyra had all but forgotten about the painting. She’d gone through countless sketches and paintings since that one, and afterward, she tore them all up. But I’d liberated this painting from her sketchbook before she got to it. It was neatly pressed between my schoolbooks at home. I hadn’t forgotten it.
And by the way Piper stared at us the next time we went into town, neither had she.
A Shrine of Blossoms
I pause at the bottom of the stairs and reach for the closest petals. The flowers that appeared in my bedroom were soft, almost like silk. These petals crumble between my fingers.
It’s like this place is suspended in time, untouched since Kyra left it, or perhaps longer than that. It seems so fragile that a whisper could bring it down. It’s not a chapel, but a house of cards.
I touch one of the ribbons the same way Piper did when I first arrived. Reverently.
On the mantel, there are more salmonberry blossoms in different shapes and forms. Some are dried flowers, others are painted onto the marble, even crocheted from yarn. A small brown bottle with a cork sits among the flowers. Salmonberry perfume? I don’t smell it. It’s hard enough to breathe.
Scattered between the flowers—real flowers, fake flowers—lie bits of burned paper. Some still bear the faint traces of words. Please. I implore you. Help me. None of them are in Kyra’s handwriting.
It’s as if the distorted focus of these last two days shifts—and clears.
She foresaw. She foretold.
Lost didn’t just assign meaning to Kyra’s paintings, they made requests of her. They placed her in this house of pilgrimage and, by the looks of all the offerings, revered her.
We found meaning together, Sheriff Flynn told me. I’d assumed he meant Kyra and the town had found a way to understand each other. But now I can’t help but wonder if he meant the town had found a purpose for Kyra, a meaning for the girl they’d decided was meaningless after she was diagnosed.
Corey?
I turn toward the whisper, but the room is empty. All I can hear is the pounding of my own heart.
I walk toward the large table and carefully open one of the sketchbooks. A saucer with dried ink stands next to it. Neither disappear when I touch them, although it wouldn’t have surprised me if they had. This place seems enchanted.
The sketchbook is filled with inked drawings. In fact, all the sketchbooks are. They’re rougher and courser than Kyra’s paintings, with haphazard colors and harsh pen strokes. Flowers. Mountains. Faces. Some I recognize, some I don’t. The spa. The hot springs. White Wolf Lake, this time—thank goodness—without Kyra in it.
When I flip to the final page of one of the sketchbooks, I pause. The drawing is coarse, the ink blotched. But I recognize myself, and the charred skeleton of my house in front of me. The scene is exactly as it was last night, as if she had been present to observe me.
We bonded over art.
I’ve only been gone for seven months, and Kyra only used to paint to burn off the energy of her manic episodes. But judging by the evidence around town, Kyra had painted enough to last a lifetime.
No star can burn forever, they said.
Kyra burned so brightly. Until she had nothing left to give.
I’m surrounded by countless paintings, but where are Kyra’s books? Her stories? Her studies?
The only words here are questions, pleas.
And whispers.
Corey?
Keeper of the Spa
Aaron stands in the doorway. Although he’s over seventy years old, he’s a tall, imposing man who worked in one of Mr. H’s mines before the town asked him to become keeper of the spa, to mind the monumental building, to keep the wildlife out and the hot springs clean. His hair and skin have gone gray, but his arms and shoulders are still broad, and he always appears to squint in the light.
“Corey? Are you okay?”
I don’t know what to say. I sit down at the bottom of the stairs. There’s so much to take in. More flowers. More notes—or are they prayers?—from visitors. Black ribbons woven through the banister and the balustrade.
I gesture around me. “I wanted to see where Kyra had been living. But this… All of this…”
Aaron’s gaze strays behind me. His mouth sets. “It’s overwhelming, isn’t it? The last few days, people have been visiting to pay their respects and to remember her.”
“And before that? This is from more than a few days.”
He nods. “Before that too.”
A thousand questions tumble through my mind. How long did Kyra live here? Was she on her own? Why was she here and not in Fairbanks? Why didn’t she get help? “What happened?”
Aaron’s gaze strays past my shoulder again, as if someone were there, observing our conversation. It’s unnerving. He shakes his head as he comes over and sits down on the step next to me, elbows on knees. “Kyra was a good girl,” he says. “She should’ve had a long life ahead of her. But no one in Lost wished her any harm.”
I want to object, but he shakes his head.
“I know it wasn’t always like that, kid.” His grimace softens to a smile. “Lost and Kyra learned to understand each other. They came to her, and they came to care for her too. I wish you’d been here to see it.”
“They came to her with prayers and requests? She was bipolar, not a prophet.”
My throat burns and my hands clench, wanting to hit something. I laugh because it’s the only thing I can do. Kyra once told me about Sága, a protector in Norse mythology. A storyteller. A seeress. A goddess.
My voice is tight when I say, “What did you all turn Kyra into? A miracle? An oracle? What do you want to call her?”
He shakes his head at my outburst. “I’m not comfortable with those titles. But whether it was through art or observations, she brought wonder to Lost Creek. And with it, a future. Can you imagine? She painted a bright, prosperous town and the next thing we know, investors show up. This town has struggled against the elements for so long, but now it has hope again. Kyra brought that future to us. She changed us.”
I blink. I try to wrap my mind around his words. “How?”
“She saw a future that none of us could see yet. She believed in a future, and for that, we believed in her.”
Four words, but they carry the weight of lifetimes. We believed in her.
“She was a bright star, and she burned herself out. All we have left is the truth, and maybe that’s nothing more than a story too.” He shakes his head. “You know how much she liked stories.”
I laugh again, and it comes out bitter and broken. This room is too small. The air is too stale. Kyra’s art is everywhere, but none of her books. “This wasn’t her story.”
“Sorry?”
I shake my head. “Did she like being here?” I ask. “Was it her choice?”
Aaron gets to his feet and brushes off his pants. Again, he glances behind me, and he hesitates before giving me a forced smile. “Of course she did. She belonged here.”
Writing on the Wall
Aaron doesn’t want to leave me on my own, but when I tell him I need a moment to myself, he gives me that time. I grab the drawings Kyra made of me and stuff them in my pocket.
Lost Creek is full of stories too, Kyra had said. Stories of love and secrets. Of friendship and survival. Of hate.
I can’t breathe. I want to scream. I want to claw through my skin.
And I need to get out, out, out. Away from this shrine. Three steps at a time, I bound up the stairs. Outside, a storm cloud must pass by, because the little sunlight that filters in through the windows disappears. I’m suddenly surrounded by shadows.
When light seeps in again, it’s different, dimmer.