The Adventures of Pigeon and Sukie
“Are you sure this is a good idea?”, Sukie asks as she sets down the bag of supplies and Pigeon jumps from her shoulder.
“Of course! This is why I hitched a ride out here in the first place.” Sukie furrows her brow. This does not reassure her. She looks down at the tombstone in front of her: the face of the black marble is carved with the name Elwyn Brooks White.
“Wait, is this the EB White? Like Charlotte’s Web EB White?” Pigeon looks up at her with confusion. “Well, yeah. Talking cat here; EB White is like a god to talking animals.”
Sukie sighs and opens up the bag. She knows she shouldn’t listen to Pigeon, but sometimes she just can’t help herself. Which is slightly worrying, but she can worry about that later; they have work to do now.
She lifts out the black velvet cloth, candles, and white chalk powder that they had bought that morning at Deadwick’s, before heading up the Maine coast. She had refused to buy all of it, at first, but then Pigeon reminded her of the gold chains they had gotten from the “kings”, and she caved, as usual.
“So, what do we do with all this then?”, she says, gesturing to the pile of occult supplies. “Lay out the cloth on the ground here, and then hand me the bag of chalk.”
She tosses the bag of chalk to Pigeon, grabs the square of velvet, and starts laying it out over the snowy ground, asking Pigeon “And where did you learn how to do this?”
Jumping up onto the tombstone with the bag of chalk, Pigeon shrugs. “Remember those geese from this morning, down by the waterfront?”
“What, the six hellspawn that chased me out of the park?”
“I don’t know about hellspawn, I thought they were nice.”
“NICE? One of them had a knife!” Sukie pauses, and looks up from where she was adjusting the cloth. “Wait. You didn’t learn this from them, did you?”
“Oh, no, they just reminded me of some of the particulars.” Pigeon gracefully leaps down from the gravestone onto the cloth, and slices a small hole in the bottom of the bag. As the chalk dust starts pouring out, she traces out a five pointed star by walking over the fabric, carrying the bag in her mouth. It is shockingly perfect.
“Are you sure you should trust them? I thought I heard them cackling to themselves as I ran away.”
“I was just telling them jokes, don’t worry about it. Would you help me set these candles at the intersections?” Pigeon requests, nodding toward the black wax candles from the bag.
Sukie grabs them, and places them on the cloth at the intersections where the chalk lines cross each other. She really has a bad feeling about this. She frowns, and glares at Pigeon. Pigeon licks her paw, and rubs her ears, not looking back at her. Neither says anything for 30 seconds.
Sukie breaks first, sighing: “What’s next?”
“Grab the matches, and light the candles, I’ll start the incantation.”
Sukie gets up, rolling her eyes, and does as Pigeon instructs. As she lights the last candle, Pigeon’s chanting gets louder, and increases in speed. The candles light up like road flares briefly, and then extinguish all at once, as wind rushes to the center of the pentacle, then stops. Everything is silent and dark, as Sukie and Pigeon stare at each other in the light of the waxing moon. Silent except for … honking?
Pigeon tilts her head to the side. “Does that sound like a swan to you?”, she asks quietly.
Sukie deflates, muttering, “Never trust geese, Pigeon, they always lie.
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