by a house near a stream
The winter is hard and bleak, and a part of Beatrice fears that it will never end.
It's a ridiculous fear, she knows. Day turns to night, autumn turns to winter, winter turns to spring. It's been that way since the dawn of the world, and it will be that way until the world ends. Besides, it isn't like the winter has lasted overlong—it's still February—and her fear is probably just caused by her worry that they won't have enough to eat. After all, her family hadn't had the opportunity to stockpile supplies this fall.
(She thought, when Wirt snipped away her wings, that it would be over, that everything would right itself. Now, though… if they starve, it will be her fault, because she's the one who got them turned into bluebirds that couldn't get supplies, she's the one who didn't sell herself to Adelaide right away, she's the one who ruined everything.)
Yet the foreboding has crept into her family as well, the foreboding and the other, harder-to-define sense that something is… wrong. The sense that something deep and essential went out of the world when Wirt of all people slew the Beast. The forest is… hollow, and wrong, and dead, now. She can't explain it, that bone-creeping sensation of brokenness.
Beatrice tells herself that the world just needs to adjust. After all, the Beast was evil. He devoured the souls of the lost, for Pete's sake. The world doesn't need him; it is, in fact, better off without him.
And yet….
No, she tells herself, staring out at the howling blizzard. Spring will come.
It has to.
Of all her family, Beatrice is the only one awake when it happens. She's in the kitchen petting Rusty, trying and failing to banish her nightmare about a dead, broken forest, when the world seems to suck in a deep breath of anticipation. Rusty's ears prick up. Beatrice jerks, her fingers digging into the dog's scalp. Then everything is different, somehow, alive in a way it hasn't been for months. It's like something injected hope and animation and lightness into the atmosphere, and she can breathe in a way she never has before.
The wrongness is gone.
Rusty wags his tail.
Whatever it is, it wakes her family, too. They all congregate in the kitchen, Mom and Dad and her twelve siblings, demanding to know if anyone else felt it—and of course they all have. It takes Mom's whistle to restore order, startling her well-trained children into silence.
That's when they hear it.
The singing is low and rich and heartbreakingly beautiful, distant though it may be. It's too faint to hear the words, especially through the walls, but it fills the night air with a familiar melody, permeating forest and shadow. When Beatrice steps outside with a few of the braver members of her family, she feels the song sink into her bones.
It's a beautiful winter night, one of the loveliest Beatrice has ever experienced. The stars have never been brighter, and the wind and the stream and the trees are completely silent as they listen to that magical far-off song.
"That's the Beast," she says quietly, incredulously. The Beast is dead, but she knows what she's hearing. "That's one of his songs."
Peggy and Patrick usher their children back inside, locking the door behind them. They know to take their daughter's word for it, for Beatrice is the only one of them to have actually seen—even met—the old black shadow of the woods. If anyone among them could recognize his singing, it's her.
But it isn't quite the same, she admits to herself, curled up in her bed and trying too hard to sleep. The Beast is different somehow, or at least his songs are. They don't inspire the same sort of spine-tingling dread as before.
She lays there for the rest of the night, listening to the Beast's muffled far-off singing and wondering what it means.
Dad is the only one who goes outside the next day, and he stays within a minute's run of the door. One hand keeps a white-knuckled grip on his shotgun, the other is tight around Rusty's hastily assembled new leash. Nothing happens. No shadows come rushing from the trees to strike him down.
Beatrice spends the day retelling the tale of her Great Adventure, as Hiram and Lucy have taken to calling it. She recounts the entire story at least twice, but the most-requested tale is that of Wirt's victory (albeit, it would seem, temporary) over the Beast.
"He almost did it, you know," she recounts. "He walked towards him and even put the Dark Lantern down in the snow. He'd nearly let go of it entirely when the realization hit. 'Wait,' he said, 'that's dumb.' The Beast was starting to get mad, but Wirt said that he wasn't just going to spend the rest of his life wandering around in the forest. He said that the Beast wasn't trying to help him, he just had some weird obsession with keeping the Lantern lit… almost like it was his soul inside."
Beatrice pauses, partly to gather her breath and partly to heighten the anticipation. It doesn't matter that her siblings must have heard this dozens of times before. They still lean forward eagerly, their eyes bright.
"The Beast was furious," Beatrice continues. "He made the shadows twist and hiss, and his voice was like thunder. I wouldn't have blamed Wirt if he passed out, but he didn't. He realized that the Beast couldn't actually do anything. Wirt held his immortal soul in his hands, and he knew it, too."
Beatrice lowers her voice into a growl. "'Are you ready to see true darkness?' the Beast asked him. Wirt's knees were shaking and his voice cracked, but he didn't give up the Lantern. He said—"
"Are you?!" Oscar yells.
"That's right. 'Are you?' And before the Beast could say anything else, Wirt opened the latch and blew the Dark Lantern right out, defeating the Beast and saving Greg in one fell swoop!"
Oscar and Lucy whoop. Hiram applauds.
"So how'd the Beast un-die?" Wallace asks. "I mean, if his soul got blown out. How'd he get better?"
"I don't know," Beatrice confesses, more quietly than before. "I don't have any idea."
When they're all still alive on the second day, Beatrice's parents decide to risk consulting the birds. They approach the edge of the woods cautiously, each gripping a weapon—the rifle for Patrick, an ax for Peggy. Beatrice isn't certain that either weapon would have much effect on the Beast, but they're all still so spooked that she bites her tongue. No need to scare anyone even more when she doesn't know. Still, her heart is in her mouth as she watches them near the trees.
For once, she is glad that the bluebird curse left them with the ability to understand all things avian. Any news is better than no knowledge at all.
There's a gossipy chickadee who lives in a nearby oak. Her siblings are fond of the creature; they've gone and named it Chit-chat. Beatrice is less fond, but if the dumb animal knows what happened, why the Beast came back, how he's different, where he is, she might reconsider her opinion.
Her parents consult the chickadee for several long moments. When they return, it is with identical expressions of perplexity.
"What did she say?" demands Carol.
"That we don't need to fear," replies Peggy. She glances out at the looming forest before returning her attention to the children. "She says that the Caretaker has come home."
There are other non-migratory birds that live nearby, just within a couple minutes of the house, and as the week progresses, Beatrice's parents consult all of them. So do their children. The birds all have one thing to say: The Caretaker has come home.
Birds, it turns out, are frustratingly terrible sources of information.
"So what exactly is 'the Caretaker'?" Beatrice asks a woodpecker, hoping against hope that this interrogation will be more fruitful than her other attempts.
"The Caretaker is the Caretaker," the woodpecker replies.
"…that is the opposite of helpful. You're going to have to be more specific."
"He takes care of the forest," the woodpecker elaborates. "He's the forest's heart, the warden of the woods."
Beatrice grits her teeth. "What's he got to do with the Beast?" Because there's no way that this Caretaker, who they know from previous interviews appeared the same night as the Beast, isn't somehow connected to that monster.
The woodpecker stares, clearly thinking. Beatrice uncharitably wonders if the mental effort hurts. Then, "He was a bad Caretaker. The new one will be better. He's kindlier. He fed me a blackberry!"
That was new information. "You've met him?" Beatrice exclaims.
"He fed me a blackberry!"
"Yeah, good for you."
"It was! It was a good blackberry."
Beatrice frowns, suddenly realizing something. "Blackberries are out of season. When did he—" No, that is a terrible question. Birds are awful at keeping time. "Was it winter when this happened? The cold time?"
"It was the cold time," the bird confirms. "I've never had a blackberry in the cold time until the Caretaker fed me a blackberry during the cold time. It was a good blackberry."
Beatrice weighs her options and decides to change the subject. "The bad Caretaker you mentioned, was he the Beast?"
"He was the bad Caretaker who came before the good one we have now. He never fed me a blackberry."
Beatrice's eye twitches slightly. "So if the Beast was the bad Caretaker, this good one is his replacement?"
"He's the Caretaker," the woodpecker repeats.
"Uh-huh. This replacement Beast, is he dangerous?"
"Yes," the woodpecker chirps.
She hadn't expected that. She'd thought that the bird would say something about how the nice new Caretaker had fed him a blackberry, so clearly Beatrice doesn't need to worry about him coming after her family and turning them into edelwood trees. She'd sort of been hoping for that response, honestly.
"He is dangerous?"
"He's the Caretaker."
Beatrice reminds herself just why throwing rocks at dumb birds is a bad idea. "So we need to be worried about him."
"No."
"He's dangerous, but we don't need to be worried about him?"
"Yes." The woodpecker fluffs his feathers and looks at her like she's the dumb one.
Maybe if she just chucked a snowball at him… no, no still a bad idea. "You're going to have to explain that."
"He's the Caretaker," the bird says one last time, then spreads his wings and flies away.
On the fifth day, Beatrice snaps. She slips out of the house, steals their ax, and makes her way to the grove where the Beast died.
If the woodpecker was right, this 'Caretaker' wasn't the Beast but had somehow taken his place. The voice Beatrice had heard singing would have belonged to someone else, though why this unknown person would sing the Beast's songs she has no idea. If the Caretaker had been the singer, though, the clearing would be unchanged. The Dark Lantern would lie untouched beneath a layer of snow, and the hideous tree that the Beast had become upon his death would still be there.
Beatrice had gone to the copse once since Wirt snipped away her wings. She'd brought her parents and her two eldest siblings, wanting to show them proof that the Beast really was dead. They'd gone close enough to see the corpse-tree, more twisted and hideous than even the ugliest edelwood, but they hadn't been able to make themselves actually enter the clearing. The sense of wrongness had been particularly powerful there, sinking into them like seepage from a wound, and there had been a sort of sense of presence around the corpse-tree.
The grove isn't too far from their house, just a couple miles. It doesn't take Beatrice long to reach it, to see that the Beast's final tree is still there. The sight makes her heave a sigh of relief, a tiny smile on her lips.
The sense of wrongness is almost entirely gone. There's still something otherworldly about this place that she can't put her finger on, and it still feels a little cursed, but it's nowhere near as bad as it was before. That's what gives Beatrice the courage to actually enter the clearing in search of the Dark Lantern.
She doesn't find it.
There are footprints in the clearing, various species of animal and something that might be human but is partially hidden under yesterday's fresh layer of snow. There are dainty white snowdrops, the first flowers she's seen in a very long time. But even though she searches until her ears go numb, she can't find any sign of the red lantern that had once held the Beast's soul. It's gone.
For a brief moment, Beatrice wonders if it somehow disappeared when the Beast died. Then she chides herself for her stupidity; she distinctly remembers Wirt flinging it away a few moments after its light went out, remembers the soft sound of it landing in the first snow of the season. It had outlasted its master, and there's no reason it would have just vanished into the ether between then and now.
Someone's taken it.
It must be the Caretaker, she reasons. If he is some kind of replacement Beast, then it makes sense that he'd be soul-bound to the Dark Lantern like his predecessor was. Of course, this only makes her wonder more than ever what the hell this person is. Were there other tree-creatures like the Beast, and whichever of them held the Dark Lantern was supposed to take care of the forest? If so, how had the successor been chosen? Were the Caretaker and the Beast related somehow? Had the Beast had a family? (She sincerely hopes not. The thought is extremely disturbing.) Or maybe his corpse-tree had produced some kind of seed that had grown into the Caretaker; no one in Beatrice's family had visited this place, so they wouldn't have noticed.
It feels like every answer she gets just leaves her with more questions.
March is almost over, and the O'Sialias have long concluded that they aren't in any danger from this Caretaker fellow. (Probably. He is a Beast, after all. They're just reasonably certain that he's not going to go out of his way to murder them.) They are, however, running uncomfortably low on food, so they set up snares for rabbits and squirrels and any other unfortunate woodland creature that might wander their way.
Beatrice is checking the last snare and lamenting its emptiness when a bird cries out in joy. "Caretaker, Caretaker! The Caretaker is here!"
She whips around.
It's sunset, and the shadows of the trees stretch out long and black. The woods are quiet save for the ragged rhythm of her breath and the echoes of the bird's call.
A pair of great white eyes are staring at her, wide and round and glowing softly, their owner hidden by the shadows of the forest and the thick tree-trunk he's peering around.
For a long moment they stare at each other, girl and Beast. One lit by the dimming sunset, one hidden by the first fingers of night. One panting from the day's long walks, one quiet as the shadow he so resembles. Both frozen.
Then the other's eyes seem to dim. The narrow dark shape turns away, disappearing rapidly into the trees.
It's dusk. Beatrice is the first to admit she can be a bit reckless, but she's not nearly dumb enough to go chasing after some kind of Beast-thing at nightfall when she's alone and doesn't even have a lantern or a weapon. She's not an idiot.
Her family locks all their doors that night.
Come morning, there is a huge pile of blackberries on their doorstep.
Blackberries are not in season. They will not be in season for months; right now, blackberry bushes have yet to even bud, much less fruit. Nonetheless, there is an enormous pile of juicy, perfectly ripe blackberries waiting for them when they open up the door.
None of them have any idea what to make of that.
(The next day, it's pears, then apples, then blackberries again, each pile of fruit almost as tall as Beatrice. They eat as many as their stomachs can hold, then Patrick goes into the nearest town—not Pottsfield, where Beatrice and her siblings have always been forbidden to venture, but the nearest living human town—and sells the remainder for a tidy profit. He brings home enough food for the rest of the lean season.)
"You think it's some kind of apology for scaring you in the woods?" Carol asks.
"I wasn't scared, I was startled," Beatrice sniffs.
Carol valiantly refrains from rolling her eyes. "Okay, sure. You think it's some sort of apology for startling you in the woods?"
"…I honestly have no idea."
Spring is in full bloom when Andrew bursts into the kitchen babbling about edelwood trees.
It takes them awhile to calm him down, but finally he manages to spit it out: "That edelwood, you know the one a couple miles away from here, it's got flowers on it."
"Some weirdo puts flowers on it?" Beatrice asks, confused.
Her brother glares. "No," he snaps. "It's sprouting flowers. Look." And he places a small bloom, white petals fringed with blue, on the table.
"Andrew," their mother points out, "edelwoods don't do that."
"This one does," Andrew insists.
Beatrice picks up the blossom. She's never seen anything like it, and the heady sweet scent is unfamiliar but not.
"This was growing on an edelwood?" Peggy asks slowly, disbelievingly.
"Yes," Andrew insists.
This, of course, merits a full-fledged expedition, with half the family traipsing out to the only edelwood in the vicinity that had survived the Woodsman's sojourn in their home. Sure enough, it's covered in flowers: sweet white blossoms whose petals are tipped in blue, yellow, and pink.
Once again, Beatrice has no idea what to make of this latest development. Neither does anyone else.
The seasons turn again. Petals fall from the trees, including, now, the edelwoods, replaced by green summer leaves. The migratory birds have long since returned, and their offspring are just starting to peek out of their nests. Plants shoot up in the family's garden, and the wild blackberry bushes down the stream are heavy with their first batch of fruit.
(There have never been so many berries on that bush. Beatrice isn't complaining—blackberries are her favorite food in the world—but it's something she can't help but notice.
She had been near the blackberry bush when she'd encountered the Caretaker.)
It's strange to think that she once feared winter would never end, not when the summer is so vigorous and alive.
(When her father's parents come to visit, Grandpa comments that while he's seen his fair share of springs, none of them have ever felt like this one. Grandma nods her agreement.)
Still, although she's still a bit wary, a bit watchful, she doesn't really expect anything significant to happen. She does her chores and watches her siblings and changes the subject whenever her parents make comments about potential suitors.
Then, in the first week of June, the traveler arrives.
Beatrice is supervising her youngest siblings as they play in the yard when he bounds out of the trees. He's a bit taller, a bit older, and his clothing is different, but she recognizes him immediately. How could she not?
"Greg?" she says incredulously.
"Beatrice!" the boy yells. He runs towards her, wraps her in a hug.
She grins and hugs him back, relishing the feeling. He'd been too weak to do this last autumn, barely conscious enough to lay eyes on her human form. She doesn't even care that Jason Funderberker (assuming that's still his name) the frog is crouched atop Greg's teapot, the only part of his attire she recognizes, and that the amphibian is a bit too close to her face. Honestly, she'd sort of missed the frog, too, sometimes (but only sometimes, she swears it).
"I thought that the Woodsman lived here, but this is even better," Greg exclaims. His smile is as bright as the summer sun above them, and Beatrice is reasonably certain that hers rivals his in intensity. "Oh, wow, is that your dog?"
"Yeah, that's Rusty." Beatrice releases him from her hold, straightens, scans the woods for the other visitor who must surely be here. She doesn't see him. "Say, where's Wirt?"
The smile melts from Greg's face, leaving him with a solemn expression that greatly heightens his resemblance to his brother. "I don't know."
Jason croaks mournfully.
"You don't know?" Beatrice repeats.
"He disappeared months ago," Greg tells her, and Beatrice's eyes go wide in horror. "I think he came back to the Unknown. That's why I'm here, Beatrice. I'm going to find him and bring him home."
Hey, look, plot.
The names "O'Sialia" and "Rusty" come from Kirjavi's "Long-Forgotten Stories." Patrick is in honor of Patrick McHale, but the rest of Beatrice's family just has various old-fashioned names that I kind of liked. The association between Beast!Wirt and blackberries and the O'Sialias being able to talk to birds comes from Whiggity's fantastic "World of Beasts."