Silver - By Kailin Gow Page 0,1

often disappearing into the woods for long stretches of time.

Did the Wickhams have anything to do with the lore of Wicked Woods? That the Woods was a magical place where those who were on the brink of death could go and be renewed? Lore had it that loved ones would carry their sick dying ones into the woods, lay them down and left them there through the night.

In the morning, when they came to see their sick ones, they would find them healed, radiant, and even ethereal beautiful. But their sick ones would only drink blood, blood kept them young and alive, wel and not sick.

They would offer them pheasant, animal blood, which would satisfy them at first, but after a while, these sick ones with bloodlust soon began preying on people. Some of the people of Wicked fought back, but many fel prey. Of the few that fought back, they found a precious weapon right in the woods itself on the highest slope, large quantities of silver ore. The people began making silver crucifixes with the silver, which seemed to drive al the “Undead” back into the woods. She had told him stranger stories too; of beasts that walked like men, and of odd guardian creatures from the legends of her homeland.

In amongst such nonsense, though, she had also said something that the doctor found himself latching onto.

Years back, close to the time the Wickhams had first come to town, people too sick to help had sometimes been left in the forest at night. They had apparently come back cured of al their il s, so healthy that they seemed younger and more beautiful. Even as a boy, the doctor remembered laughing at it, yet the old woman had claimed that it had been done with an aunt of hers, and that she had stayed looking young for years before disappearing one night. Had she been serious?

More to the point, was he real y getting desperate enough to trust to fables and stories for children? The doctor almost laughed as he realized that he was. He liked this town, and did not want to have to find somewhere else to ply his trade. Nor did he want to have to watch the mother’s face as her daughter slid down into darkness.

Nothing else he knew would help now, so why not try something that might? What was there to lose?

The doctor made up his mind. Yes, he would probably look stupid. Yes, the mayor would probably have him thrown out of the town just for suggesting it, yet he would not stand by without at least making the attempt. He cleared his throat.

“Sir, there might be one thing we can try…”

Winter 1865 - Wicked, Massachusetts

The doctor wrapped his greatcoat around him and braced himself against the cold as he waited, watching from the shadow of a doorway. The house he stood observing was quiet and dark, yet he knew he could not take his eyes from it. Too much had happened in recent days for him to let slip his vigil.

It had taken almost half an hour of talking to persuade the mayor to leave his only daughter in a forest overnight. Half an hour of the desperate pleas of his wife, and an admission that there was nothing that the doctor’s science could do for the girl. They had laid her down unseen by the edge of the trees, and forced themselves to walk away.

Of course, the doubts had set in almost as soon as they got back. The mayor had accused him of trickery, and had threatened to have him hanged if his daughter died from being left out there. Somehow, though, some spark of hope had made them wait, to keep from going back to where they had left Amelia.

She had walked into the mayor’s home in the morning as though nothing had happened. Her mother had been ecstatic, of course, while her father had given the doctor almost a hundred dol ars. A fortune for a single night’s work. What did it matter that the girl would not answer questions about what had happened, or that she refused to eat? She looked wel . In fact, she looked radiant.

Al had seemed wel . Amelia had married her suitor, and moved into the house that the doctor now stood watching. She had taken her place at the heart of Wicked’s society, and was said to be wel loved by al . Everything had seemed perfect. So much