Giles’s next visit came and went, and though Charlotte was thrilled to have seen him, she had no news to report.
“And how goes the practice?” I asked, arching an eyebrow.
She laughed. “Quite well,” she said. “I now know that pleasure of which so many speak.”
I grinned. “I am glad to hear it, and glad to hear Giles is as skilled and considerate a lover as Ichab—as his cousin is. Was.”
“I’m sorry. I know it must be difficult to speak of him,” she said.
“It gets more so every day,” I confessed. “Oh Charlotte, I am sorry. I do not wish to overshadow your happiness. That is the last thing I want.”
She patted my hand. “I understand. I understand how it must be difficult for you, too, to hear me speak of his cousin in such a way.”
It was, but I told myself that that mattered not, not in the face of my dearest friend’s happiness.
* * *
That night Brom turned to me in bed, and I acquiesced willingly enough. Yet I was surprised when he found himself once again unable, even though he had not consumed much drink that night; just a glass of beer with our meal. Not that I was complaining.
“Damn it all,” Brom swore, shoving me away as he finally gave up on his attempts to rouse himself. “Damn it all to hell.” Yet he slid a hand between my legs all the same and put two fingers inside me. “Yet perhaps my wife might still know pleasure this night,” he whispered in my ear, kissing my neck.
I opened my mouth to protest, but the words died in my throat as his fingers thrust and stroked. My breathing came faster, and my heartbeat increased. All thoughts were banished by the pleasure radiating up from my core, and soon I gasped aloud as it tore through me—not the almost unbearable ecstasy I had known before, but it felt good all the same.
Brom’s breathing hitched as he watched me arch my back in pleasure, and this sight sufficiently roused him. Removing his hand, he thrust himself into me, and I moved with him, this time pleasure coming to both of us.
As he withdrew, the shame began again to burn me, but this time I pushed back against it. Brom had treated me well thus far, and more importantly, he was good to Anneke, loved her with all his heart. I married him out of desperation, yes, but that did not mean I must be miserable all my life, did it? My true love had left me, so was I not allowed to find some pleasure with my husband?
Surely I was, but guilt still dogged me.
“Perhaps soon we shall have a son,” he said, as he lay next to me, spent. “Perhaps we have already conceived him.” The hope in his voice made me feel ever guiltier as I crept downstairs while he slept and drank my herbal mixture.
* * *
Spring came, and Brom was home in Sleepy Hollow for most of it, assisting his father with the planting on the Van Brunt farm, and helping my father oversee the planting of the Van Tassel farm as well. He was quite busy, and usually left the house before dawn only to return after dark, too tired to do more than bolt down a hearty meal, give Anneke a kiss, and collapse into bed, only to rise and do it all over again the next day. The only break in his routine was Sundays, when all work must cease and we went to church as a family, and dined with either my parents or his father or both after the service.
I continued my forays into divination, sometimes with Charlotte, sometimes without. The more time that passed, the more frustrated and upset I felt, yet there was no escaping that both of our lives had grown busier, different: mine with Anneke, who began to crawl and then walk and so needed constant watching, and Charlotte with Giles, who came to visit more and more now that they had become lovers. They continued to be happy and to delight in each other’s company, yet no betrothal came to pass. Though I raged at her hesitance to take the very thing I had wanted more than anything else, I was selfishly glad that she was not planning to leave Sleepy Hollow with him.
I had little more success with my visions. Sometimes I would see a scrap of something not seen before: the coat Ichabod had been wearing that night, or the flash of a blade, a large dagger, no longer just the sound of it being pulled from its sheath. That shook me a great deal, but still it told me nothing I did not already know from that first vision, almost two years ago now.
One night in May, I finally asked Charlotte to give me the potion to help bring on visions again. She paused before rising reluctantly and heading for the stillroom. “I suppose it can’t hurt,” she said. “I had been wondering when you were going to ask again.”
“I wanted to, but wasn’t sure if it was wise,” I said, following her. “But perhaps it will grant me something new, now that I have been practicing.”
I watched closely as she gathered the herbs, committing to memory the labels on those jars—nightshade, nutmeg, valerian, and eyebright—as well as the amounts of each that she used. As she made the tea, I quietly excused myself and went back into the sitting room, where my book waited. Opening to a page in the back, I wrote down the recipe for the concoction.
She returned with the mug of steaming tea, and I eagerly drank down the bitter mixture. Then I positioned myself in front of the candle at her table and went through the ritual that was, by now, second nature: deep breaths, eyes closed, then opening them slowly and gazing into the heart of the flame.
At first, I saw nothing. Then, slowly, the flame seemed to expand around me, and I fell into its center, and this time the vision was different …
I saw Gunpowder again, with a rider astride him, and beside him—close behind him—was a rider on a dark horse. My breath caught in my throat, but I did not move or make a sound, fearful of disrupting the vision.
Then the scene flickered and changed, and I saw before me the clearing in the woods, the Horseman’s clearing. The hoof beats of the two horses grew louder behind me; this was their ultimate destination.
Suddenly I was back to myself again, gasping in my chair at Charlotte’s table, trying to catch my breath as though I had been keeping pace with the two horses through the woods.
“Katrina!” At once, Charlotte was on her knees beside the chair, one hand on my forehead, the other grasping one of my hands. “Breathe,” she said, her voice low and soothing. “Calm yourself. All is well. You are safe.
“Tell me when you can,” she said, stroking my hand. “What did you see? Did you see…?”
I shook my head. “I did not see … everything,” I said. “But I saw more.” I quickly told her of the dark horse and its rider, and Ichabod and Gunpowder—how they had been heading for the clearing, for whatever reason. “Whatever happened, happened there,” I said. “Oh, Charlotte, he was being chased, or driven away, or some such. He did not leave, not of his own accord.”
Charlotte paused before speaking. “Perhaps,” she said neutrally.
I remembered the body that had been pulled from the Hudson, the corpse that had been stabbed or shot or its throat slit or all three, and shuddered. I no longer knew what to hope for.
“You must give me some more of that herbal potion,” I said. “Just a bit more. I’m sure that if you do, I’ll see the rest.”
Charlotte was shaking her head before I’d finished speaking. “It would be too much, Katrina, too much in one night. Too much for a week, even. I cannot.”
“Charlotte, please. I’ll see the rest, I can feel it, and then after tonight I won’t need it ever again—”
She rose to her feet. “No, Katrina. I will not. Do not ask me again. I know this is important to you, but it is not worth your well-being.”
“It has already cost me my well-being,” I all but shouted, but I could see that she was not to be moved. “The not knowing. Can you not see that?”
“Do not tear yourself apart over this, Katrina,” Charlotte said, an edge of iron in her voice. “You have your daughter to think of, if you will not think of yourself.”
“Very well, then,” I said petulantly. Suddenly, a new idea occurred to me. “If you will not give me any more of the potion, then will you do me another favor?”
Charlotte looked wary. “What is it?”
“Will you ask Giles to write to Ichabod’s mother again?” I asked. “That will no doubt let us know if Ichabod simply left, at least. If he had, he would not be hiding from his mother.”
Charlotte’s expression cleared. “Yes, I surely can. I wonder that we didn’t think of it sooner. I’ll have him write as soon as he may,” she promised. “You should go home and get some rest. You are no doubt very taxed by everything that has passed tonight. Best to sleep, and let the herbs pass through your body.”
That night my dreams were vivid and bloody, but thankfully I did not remember much of them when I woke.
* * *
Giles worked quickly—as he no doubt did with everything Charlotte asked him to do—and two weeks later we had an answer to our query.
“Ichabod’s mother has not heard from him,” Charlotte said, handing me the letter as she stepped into the house. “Not a word since before All Hallows’ Eve, the year before last. She has mourned him and given him up for dead, it seems.”
I scanned Giles’s letter; it said more or less what Charlotte had just told me. I had thought there were no intact surfaces remaining on my heart, but at this, I felt another crack splinter through it. “He is dead, then,” I said, my voice emotionless as I fought back tears. How did I still have any left to cry over this man? “He is dead, or in hell. Carried there by the Headless Horseman.” A tear splashed down onto the letter, blurring its ink even as it could not erase its message.
* * *
That evening, as dusk was falling, I left the house alone and walked to the old schoolhouse. Even now the villagers swore it was haunted by the ghost of Ichabod Crane. I did not know if this was true, but as I stepped into the worn-down building, the front door hanging precariously off of its hinges, I intended to find out.
“Please,” I whispered into the still room. A few broken desks and chairs littered the floor, but it was otherwise empty. I walked to the center of the room and began to speak louder, my voice echoing around me. “Please, Ichabod. If you are really here—if you really haunt this place—show yourself to me. To me, of all people. Your love and the mother of your child.” My voice wavered, thinking of Anneke and how she now walked so proudly, if unsteadily, on her chubby legs. “She is beautiful. And you are not here to see her. So let me know where you are. Please.” I fell silent, waiting, listening for a sign. A part of me thought if Ichabod’s ghost waited for me anywhere, it was surely at our clearing by the stream near the Van Tassel farmhouse. But I could not bear to go there. So I was here instead. “Please. Please!” I cried. I was shouting now. “Show yourself to me! Where are you!” I collapsed onto the rotting floorboards, sobs wracking my body.
Suddenly I thought I heard something, the strains of a familiar melody, a song perhaps. Could it be…? I froze, straining my ears to better hear it.
Perhaps it was in my head, for it was less certain, less real, than any of the visions I’d had. But I thought I heard a man’s voice, familiar as my own body yet hollow as an echo, singing the song of the lotus flower, the willow tree, and the star-crossed lovers.