Chapter Text
PROLOGUE
Harbor Springs, Michigan
May 6, 1915
She was sitting on the edge of the school’s property because that was the only place she could see the lake. She wasn’t really supposed to be out there-curfew was in ten minutes, and the nuns didn’t like it when students came back in right at 7:00, but the nuns didn’t like her anyway, so she did not give it another thought. The lake centered her; made her feel right in the chest and between the eyes, and feeling right wasn’t something that happened to Eleanor Blackbird very often.
Of course, her name wasn’t really Eleanor.
With a pang, she thought of her family. Her aunts. Of the birch bark and quill boxes her grandmother made, so beautiful and rich with color and meaning. She missed running her fingers along the tops, the bumps of the quills so smooth and straight. Sometimes her grandmother sold them to visiting white tourists, but the most beautiful ones she kept for Eleanor.
Eleanor missed her family desperately. She was beginning to forget them. She was beginning to forget herself.
The snap of a twig off to her right caught her attention, and she turned to see two local girls step off the path and up to the edge of the property. They were her age, she thought, wearing fine white dresses with lace trim. Their knee socks looked almost new, like they’d never been darned, and the blonde girl had a pretty pink bow in her hair.
“Hello,” said the one with darker hair.
Eleanor nodded at them but didn’t say anything back. The girls who lived in town could be mean, and she had enough experience with them to be wary.
When Eleanor didn’t respond, the girls traded a look and took a step closer to her.
“What’s your name?” said the blonde girl kindly. “I’m Gladys Murphy. This is Marjorie Holland.”
“I’m Eleanor,” she said cautiously. “Eleanor Blackbird.”
The blonde girl squinted at her.
“What’s your real name?” she said. Her voice was amiable, but she said it like she was owed an answer. The locals knew the Indian kids were often renamed when they arrived at the school.
“Dakaasin,” Eleanor said, putting her shoulders back straight. She was proud of her name, and two little white girls wouldn’t take that away from her.
“What does it mean?” asked Gladys.
“A cool wind,” Eleanor replied, rising to her feet. Fists at her side, she was ready to fight. But the girls didn’t sneer at her. They merely looked.
Eleanor studied them curiously. “What are you doing here?”
Gladys looked to Marjorie.
“We’re going to the Dreaming Tree,” Marjorie said. “You have to walk past the school to get there.”
The Dreaming Tree. It sounded like something her ancestors might talk about. Definitely something the nuns would beat a student for even mentioning.
Eleanor stole a look back at the school. It stood a silent sentry on the bluff over the town. There were no nuns about that she could see, no one with a pocket watch and a bell, a willow switch tucked into the folds of their habit.
“What’s the Dreaming Tree?” Eleanor asked, turning back to the two girls.
“It’s the place where wishes come true,” said Marjorie simply. “Come along, Gladys.”
The girls took several steps toward the edge of the ridge and Eleanor held out a hand. “Wait!” she said.
Marjorie and Gladys turned back to her expectantly.
“Can I come with you?” Eleanor asked.
Gladys shrugged. “You won’t get in trouble?” she said.
Eleanor shot one more look at the school. “No.”
“Come along then,” said Gladys.
All three girls were silent as they trudged along the top of the bluff away from the school. The ground underfoot was mealy with sand and leaf detritus, pine needles and scrub. A cool breeze buffeted off the lake and Eleanor thought that’s me .
Was there really a tree that made wishes come true? Eleanor thought of quill boxes and maple syrup, her aunts chanting words she couldn’t remember. She thought of her jingle dress, packed away in a cedar trunk. It would no longer fit her.
In the distance behind them, Eleanor heard the sharp peal of the curfew bell. Distracted, she stumbled over a tree root. She caught herself before falling completely, and wiped her hands on her dress. She would be whipped anyway at this point; what was a little dirt on the unadorned grey frock?
“Is it far?” she asked the two girls, who were walking ahead of her, the skirts on their dresses swishing like the white froth of waves on the big lake.
Marjorie looked over her shoulder at Eleanor. “Not too far,” she said, and she and Gladys exchanged another look.
“It can’t be too close to town, can it?” Gladys said, and they swung off the trail and into the woods. This part of the forest hadn’t yet been logged so there was very little undergrowth, just a carpet of leaves and the occasional wind throw. Stately beech trees and maple, chestnuts and hemlock rose out of the ground and reached toward the heavens where the nuns said Jesus sat on his throne.
Their shoes crunched through the duff, up and over a rise, and then the girls stopped.
“There it is,” Marjorie said, pointing to a mammoth white pine that grew out of the top of a slope.
“That’s the Dreaming Tree?” Eleanor said skeptically. “How does it work?”
“You have to climb it,” said Gladys.
“As high as you can,” added Marjorie.
“Then you cross your fingers, lean your head on the trunk and make your wish,” Gladys finished.
“And you have to stay in the tree for ten minutes after or your wish won’t come true,” Marjorie said quickly. “That’s part of it.”
Eleanor was beginning to regret asking to join them. She didn’t ever remember her grandmother telling her of a Dreaming Tree, and her grandmother would have known about them.
“Do you want to go first?” Marjorie asked her.
Eleanor shook her head, a cold tingling beginning at the base of her spine. Oh no, she thought, not now. She needed to see the lake, she needed to center herself.
Gladys shrugged. “I’ll go first,” she said.
She and Marjorie approached the tree, Eleanor standing dumbly where she was, watching the girls with curiosity and distrust.
The tree, being a white pine, was great for climbing-it had lots of straight sturdy branches, but they didn’t start close to the ground. There were a couple of broken off branches about six feet up, just little spikes jutting out from the tree, but they would work well enough as foot and handholds to get to the first big branch. However, you’d need a step up to reach them.
Gladys turned to Eleanor expectantly.
“I need a boost,” she said.
Eleanor moved over silently, and she and Marjorie laced their hands together, brown and white. Gladys stepped up onto them and they lifted her up, their little bodies heaving her until she grabbed onto a conveniently placed broken stump and got her foot on another. After that, she climbed up with relative ease, her foot only slipping once, which elicited a shriek from Marjorie. She got to the first big branch and then it was easy. She climbed and climbed and climbed, and Eleanor felt butterflies in her stomach the higher Gladys got, the cold tingling in her spine spreading slowly up and down her back. Eleanor shifted on her feet, trying to control it.
Finally, almost as high as she could go, Gladys gingerly lowered herself until she was sitting on a branch, made a show of crossing her fingers to the two girls below her and leaned her forehead against the trunk of the tree. After a moment she leaned back and called down “I’ve done it! I’ve made my wish!”
Marjorie nodded at her solemnly.
“Are you sure I must stay up here ten minutes, Marjorie?” she called down.
Marjorie looked at Eleanor and then put her hands on her waist, and called back up, “Yes! You must!”
Gladys seemed to roll her eyes, but settled into the tree, waiting.
After a few minutes, her skin prickling, Eleanor decided to speak.
“What do you see up there?” she called out.
“Oh, you can see the whole town!” Gladys called down, “And Lake Michigan beyond it! There’s a steamer heading out of the bay!”
The lake. She could see the lake.
“I’ll go next,” Eleanor said to Marjorie, who smiled at her, cat-like.
Marjorie picked up a stick and started poking the tree with an air of boredom. Eleanor looked to the west-the sun was glowing orange and getting close to setting. She needed to get back to the school.
“All right, Gladys!” Marjorie called, startling Eleanor. “You can come down now!”
Gladys descended without issue, swinging down onto the lowest big branch until she caught her shoe on one of the broken stumps, which cracked under her weight. She paused for a moment, her face going pale, but it seemed to hold her, so she continued her ginger descent, and then hopped down, landing hard. She grunted, but stood, brushing leaves from her white skirts.
“How will you know when your wish comes true?” Eleanor asked.
“Why, it already has,” Gladys said brightly, smiling at Eleanor for the first time. “I wished to make a new friend, and here you are.”
Eleanor gave her a small smile back and Marjorie laced her hands together, looking to Gladys.
“Eleanor would like to go next,” she said.
Gladys moved with Marjorie, and they hoisted Eleanor as high as they could. Eleanor was able to wedge her foot onto the small bit of broken branch and worked her way up slowly, the tingle in her back growing stronger. Up, up, she needed to get up . She needed to see the lake . Just as she grabbed onto the first large branch, the stump her foot was resting on gave a mighty crack and fell away from the tree, leaving Eleanor swinging from her handhold. She was able to pull herself up enough to swing her leg over the branch, heaving her body onto it with her heart in her throat, breathing hard.
“My dear, are you all right?” Gladys asked, though she didn’t sound as concerned as Eleanor felt.
“Yes, I-” Eleanor started, then looked down to where she would need to descend-the broken branch had fallen away, leaving her nothing to hold onto. Still cleaving to the tree, she felt tears start to form in her eyes, the cold tingling beginning to spread to the backs of her legs. “How will I get down?” she cried.
“Why, we’ll catch you of course,” Marjorie said, taking a step closer to the tree. “Go on up and make your wish, Eleanor, the sun is setting!”
Thinking of the lake, Eleanor propped herself up on shaky limbs and began the slow work of climbing up the tree. Gladys had made it look easy. It was not. Every time she looked down her heart leapt into her throat and the cool tingling would spread further. The lake, she needed to see the lake.
Finally, when she was more or less as high as Gladys had been, she stopped, hugging the trunk of the tree, breathing hard. The tingle was spreading to her arms as well, leaving little pinpricks of feeling along her skin. She turned her head trying to see the lake, but felt vertigo set in when she did, and so she pressed her face into the tree.
“Make your wish, Eleanor!” Marjorie called from below. “We will need to get home soon!”
Swallowing past the lump in her throat, Eleanor crossed her fingers where they hugged the tree close and moved to press her forehead to the trunk. My family. I wish to see my family. I wish to go home, she thought, as loudly in her mind as she could.
She heard a giggle from below and cracked an eye to look at Gladys and Marjorie far below her. They were laughing and backing away from the tree.
“Majorie?” she called down. “Gladys?”
The giggles turned into peals of vicious laughter, and the girls continued to back away from the tree, pointing and laughing at Eleanor. Eleanor didn’t want to believe this was happening.
“Is this really a Dreaming Tree?” Eleanor whimpered into the trunk.
Marjorie heard her.
“No,” she called up coldly. “There is no such thing. It is only a pine. And an ugly one at that.” With that, they turned and began walking away.
The cold tingling had reached Eleanor’s hands and toes. She could feel a volt of power begin to surge through her, running fissures through her bones.
“Wait!” she called out desperately. “How will I get down?!”
Marjorie turned back toward the tree, her face canted up to look at Eleanor, all humor gone from it.
“Fly down,” Majorie shouted viciously. “You’re a blackbird, aren’t you?”
Gladys laughed. “Perhaps a cool wind will carry you!” she said and she and Marjorie both turned and ran back toward the bluff, their laughter carrying through the air as they disappeared over the rise.
Eleanor cleaved to the tree as the cold power within her turned hot. Colubrine and powerful, it coiled around her heart.