He shook his head at me in disgust and went back to sit in his chair. “For her, it’s not a metaphor. It’s reality. She truly believes that we are connected to one another and that in some way we are all part of one big…something.”

“Some big what?”

“We don’t have a word for it. She’s told me about it a hundred times, but her truth is in a place where our words don’t reach. It’s like disease. Our children get sick, we try to find out why, and we try to make them better.

We cover them up with blankets to try to sweat the fever out or we give them willow bark tea. Because we think sickness means something is wrong with a child.”

“And Specks don’t think something is wrong when a child gets sick?”

“No. Do you think something is wrong when a boy’s voice changes or he sprouts whiskers out of his face? They think children are supposed to get sick. Some get better and live, and that’s fine with them. And some die, and that’s fine with them in a different way.”

“Do you see her often?”

“Who?

“Your Speck woman!”

“Yes. In a way.”

“I’d like to meet her,” I said quietly.

He seemed to think about that for a long time. “Maybe you can, if she wants. In spring.”

“Why not sooner?”

“Because it’s winter. No one sees Specks in the winter.”

“Why not?”

“Are you playing with me, Never? You are so damn frustrating. How can you have Speck magic all through you and not know a thing about them?

Specks don’t come around in winter. They just don’t.”

“Why not?”

“Well—I don’t know. They just don’t. They’re gone in winter.”

“Where? Do they migrate? Do they hibernate?” I was getting as impatient with Hitch as he was with me. He’d come here, full of mystical hints and warnings, and told me next to nothing.

“I just told you, I don’t know. They keep to themselves in winter. No one will see a Speck around here until spring.”

“I saw a Speck woman here, but it was only a dream.” I think I threw the words out just to see what he would say.

He gave a huff of displeasure. “I like how you say ‘only,’ Never. Are you that comfortable with it? Speck comes walking around in my dreams, it still puts the wind up my back. Of course, to them it’s nothing; they go journeying by dream all the time. Noselaca, she can’t understand why I make such a fuss about it.”

“So you dream of your woman—Noselaca?”

“She’s not my woman, Never.” He spoke quietly, as if sharing a dangerous secret with me. “Never talk about a Speck woman that way. She could put you in a bad way over something like that. And I don’t dream about her.

She comes into my dreams.”

“What’s the difference?”

“In the world you and I grew up in, nothing at all. In her world, well, in her world she walks into a dream like you walk into a different room.”