Old Raven—and often, Grandmother Spider—also appeared from time to time to teach her the Cherokee Earth Magic, which could not have been more unlike Jolene’s, and yet sprang from the same power. It was a contradiction she finally just accepted, and kept the two separated in her mind.

And with the shortening daylight, Josh couldn’t work as late. So sometimes he came up to Jinny’s cabin to share supper, and afterward he would sit on the porch with his arm around her while they watched the night, and the magic in it.

Those hours made Anna so unspeakably happy she thought she might float up to heaven.

“And where are you going so fast, on this warm afternoon?” called a lazy voice from the side of the lane to Anna’s right.

Since Anna hadn’t been paying attention to anything except how quickly she could get to the Holcrofts’ farm, Jolene’s question, coming without any warning at all, startled her so much that she yelped and tripped, flailing to keep herself from falling.

Jolene laughed, and seemed to separate herself from the undergrowth, her green gown and apron had blended into it so well. Today she had three of those little jewel-like lizards arranged around her, one in an apron pocket, one on her shoulder, and one draped in her hair, like an unusual comb.

“Not only hurrying, but paying no heed to what is around you.” She tsked. “That is likely to get you into trouble. What if I had been a panther?”

“The Ravens done promised there ain’t no panthers ’tween here an’ the Holcrofts,” she replied, and could have bitten her tongue for revealing where she was going. She had, thus far, managed to keep the fact that Josh was courting her a secret from Jolene. Or at least, she thought she had. Certainly no one else knew about it but Aunt Jinny and the Holcrofts. Aunt Jinny wouldn’t tell Jolene anything if she could help it, and the Holcrofts wouldn’t have thought it something appropriate to tell a stranger.

“The Holcrofts?” Jolene’s eyes gleamed. “Let me see—you are traveling on swift feet, you are so preoccupied that you pay no attention to what is going on around you, and you are flushing with something other than the heat. I very much doubt that Susan Holcroft is the the cause of this. So—it must be Joshua!”

Anna felt her cheeks flushing violently, and Jolene clapped her hands in glee at having had her guess confirmed. “So it is Joshua!”

Anna did not ask How do you know the Holcrofts, because it was perfectly evident that Jolene knew just about everyone between here and Ducktown. It was perfectly evident at this point that everyone, in turn, “knew” Jolene. She was not the sort of creature to go overlooked.

And I still don’t know what she is. Aunt Jinny still just pursed up her lips when Anna asked. Powerful witch? Mythic being? Something else? The only thing that Anna was sure of was that Jolene was no ghost. No ghost could ever make the people in Ducktown react to her the way that Jolene could.