The Grimm Dossier

Chapter 41 - The Red Feather

England, West Coast
Devonshire, Dartmoor
St. George, house of the Jäger family
5 November 1898, 9:12 p.m.

"Benjamin." came Kyle's voice out of the blue with a harshness between the other two that made the doctor turn his head in alarm. The mage was still standing beside the girl's bed. The little light that fell through the open door into the interior of the child's room drew a shadow play of dark spots in the features of his face and his cloak distorted his shadow on the wall above the bed. The play between light and shadow, with the expression emblazoned on it, made Kyle's facial expression seem even more opaque and severe.

Kyle's shadowy figure cast a dark stain on a small spruce nightstand that stood there beside the bed on thin legs. One had probably been broken once because it had been repaired with a slightly different coloured wood. The little girl had painted the replaced and broken area with lots of colourful paint, put flowers on it and painted green vines twined around the leg, winding upwards. Although it could have been simply glued, the child had gone to a lot of trouble to paint over the crack with something beautiful and colourful. Dr Archer wondered for a second if she had done it because she had somehow recognised something of herself in the damaged piece of furniture and therefore wanted to give it special care. How deep-set was the child's hurt, so obviously beyond the burn on her face? What desperation for a more beautiful world lay behind all those images of sunshine and wildflowers?

But Kyle grabbed his attention before he could continue the thought. The mage for he rustlingly pulled out a crumpled and stained paper from the open drawer. A small wooden spinning top rolled to one side and bumped against the barriers of his tiny, angular world. Kyle's fingers on his right hand trembled again and if the doctor had had more time, he would have worried more extensively about the latter's health too. As it was, however, he took the papers and looked at the pictures that drew the disturbing deathly bleach on Kyle's face.

There were childish scribbles on the yellowish paper. There were five or six of them, some simply colourful and without any particular flare. The forest could be seen in each of the little works of art. Brown stripes with green jags painted the image of the forest, and yellow sun or blue strokes drew rain and sunshine. But that was not what made the mage's blood run cold. Kyle showed the doctor one of the pictures, also emblazoned with numerous trees. A cave placed its darkness in the middle of the picture like a wide open mouth. A little further down, however, the childlike, carefree scrawl showed what made both men's hearts slip into their toes: a hulking black figure towering over the little girl to his right, holding her hand. Since it was the drawing of a child, too little could be made out accordingly. But what made Kyle's heartbeat race, and now Dr Archer's chest vibrates under the violent beating, was the red line that had been drawn on the head of this figure.

"A flame... or a feather..." the doctor murmured and Kyle nodded. He opened and closed his right-hand several times as if he could dispel the trembling with it. "I saw a figure like that in the forest before I came across the dead animals. And also at the graveyard on the edge of the forest." Kyle said, wrinkling his nose in surging annoyance. "I thought it was just my imagination. A delusion due to my strained nerves." He confessed meekly and pressed.

"Before I found you in the forest, I also thought I saw something like that standing very close to you." Dr Archer now remembered. It was as if they were pulling something buried under all the other events out of the bottom drawer of their memory. Too many other clues and suspicions had easily displaced these memories that seemed so unimportant. Now they were going to pull their hair out! Viktor had also mentioned someone at the edge of the pond. They had assumed that it had been Elly or the old woman. Now, however, it all frighteningly made more sense.