Stork Read online

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or, if real, are used fictitiously.

  Copyright © 2010 by Wendy Delsol

  Cover photographs: copyright © 2010 by Karen Moskowitz/Getty Images (young woman); copyright © 2010 by Milous/iStockphoto (ice); copyright © 2010 by Gyro Photography/Getty Images (lights)

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in an information retrieval system in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, taping, and recording, without prior written permission from the publisher.

  First electronic edition 2010

  The Library of Congress has cataloged the hardcover edition as follows:

  Delsol, Wendy.

  Stork / Wendy Delsol. — 1st ed.

  p. cm.

  Summary: After her parents’ divorce, Katla and her mother move from Los Angeles to Norse Falls, Minnesota, where Kat immediately alienates two boys at her high school and, improbably, discovers a kinship with a mysterious group of elderly women — the Icelandic Stork Society — who “deliver souls.”

  ISBN 978-0-7636-4844-2 (hardcover)

  [1. Supernatural — Fiction. 2. High schools — Fiction. 3. Schools — Fiction. 4. Minnesota — Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.D3875St 2010

  [Fic] — dc22 2009051357

  ISBN 978-0-7636-5422-1 (electronic)

  Candlewick Press

  99 Dover Street

  Somerville, Massachusetts 02144

  visit us at www.candlewick.com

  One moment I was fine, and the next it felt like an army of fire ants was marching across my head. Seriously. Fire ants wearing combat boots — heavy, cleated combat boots. I’d never experienced anything like it. I scratched at my scalp until my hand cramped. It didn’t help. I turned, and the mirror behind the cash register confirmed my suspicions: along with the crazy rash creeping from under my hairline, I also had claw marks. Any other head of hair would conceal such blemishes. Not mine. My towheaded, sun-fearing ancestors had seen to that.

  I opened the cupboard under the register. Where was that woolen beret I’d seen? Crimson red with a small loop on top. A bit of a fashion stretch, even for me. Oh, well. This town already thought I was odd, the suspicious package dropped at their door. I shrugged the hat over my head. It provided no relief, but at least it covered the damage.

  Where the heck was that delivery? My afi — my grandfather — had told me I could close as soon as Snjosson Farms delivered the apples. I looked at the old clock above the candy counter. Nine o’clock. Afi had said the bushels would arrive at seven.

  Hoping to see headlights barreling down Main, I looked outside. Across the street, a light in Hulda’s Fabric and Notions caught my eye. No way. I’d been waiting for a sign of life in the place for weeks. The going-out-of-business sign and unclaimed bolts of fabric, glorious pristine fabric, had been taunting me as a bargain opportunity. I quickly scribbled Back in five on a piece of paper and taped it to the door. Snjosson Farms and their golden pippins could wait.

  Clutching my Juicy Couture velour jacket to my throat, I hurried across the road. Dang, it was cold. Mid-September and already something the Minnesota yokels called an Alberta Clipper was bearing down from the north. In California I’d still be in shorts, spaghetti straps, and flip-flops.

  A chime tinkled above my head as I stepped over the threshold.

  Holy crap. It smelled worse than my grandfather’s store, something I hadn’t thought possible. Like something died. No. Worse. Like something got caught in the act of dying — some long, lingering, putrefying fade. I knew the feeling. For me it was junior year at Norse Falls High School. Exile High, as I liked to call it.

  “Who’s there?” The voice sounded cracked with age.

  I looked up to see an old ball of a woman with skin more crushed and textured than the bolts of velvet she stood over. Tufts of charcoal gray hair escaped from under an orange hat with floral trim. She looked like a shriveled root dangling under a flowerpot.

  “I saw the light,” I said. “I’ve wanted to look at your shop for weeks now.” I took a hesitant step farther into the store.

  The old lady, dressed in a drab gray skirt and dull gray cardigan, checked the time. “No. Is too late. You come back again.”

  “But when?” The scalp condition grew worse. “I’ve been working at my grandfather’s store for a couple of months now.” I wanted so badly to scratch my head. “I’ve never seen you open before.” What would the woman think if I dropped to the floor and started rolling like some flea-bitten mongrel? And no wonder they called them boils. My whole head felt like it was churning with hot foaming bubbles.

  “Next time. You come next time.” Once more, the old lady checked her watch.

  I heard the creak of a rear door, a howl of wind, and then footsteps descending stairs, but I didn’t see anyone. Kinda creepy. Then again, the old lady probably had more friends on the other side than on this one.

  She pointed to the front door. “So sorry. You go now.”

  On a low shelf, I spied a tartan wool that would be perfect for the cape I was designing. I leaned down for a better look, and the red beret tumbled to the floor. I scooped it up and quickly replaced it on my head. I heard a gasp.

  “You have the cap,” the old lady said, wagging a trembling finger in my face. Her eyes bulged as she stared at my head.

  I tugged the beret over my ears. “Not really mine. Just borrowed it.” The itching got worse. It felt like fingers of angry red streaks were escaping down my forehead and across my neck. I fought the urge to reach under the hat and yank my hair out, handful by miserable handful.

  The old lady looked at me as if I had jabbered in some long-lost Icelandic dialect. Of course, that was probably her native tongue. Half the town, my mom’s family included, had descended from the same band of Vikings blown off their little iceberg of an island.

  “Not borrowed. Cap is a sign. Follow me.” The old lady started shuffling toward the back of the store.

  Definitely creepy now.

  “I really just wanted to look at the fabric. I sew, and I’m into design, but I could come back another time.” My head was screaming with pain. I wondered if scalping was ever medically prescribed. I would do it in a heartbeat, just lop the whole thing off, no anesthesia necessary.

  “Time is now. Follow me.”

  I obeyed like some sort of heeled dog, though how this little old lady could conjure such authority was beyond me. My mom couldn’t even get me to pour milk into a glass. I just hoped there was Dupioni silk or pebbled crepe for which the “time is now” phrase was intended.

  “Is there something back here you wanted to show me? Mrs. Hulda, is it?” Common sense told me to make like the yards of fabric and bolt — still, I followed.

  “Is Huldabrun Vigarthursdottir. You call me Fru Hulda.”

  And I thought my name was bad. Plus Fru? I shook my head in wonder. Fru, I knew from my mother, was Icelandic for Mrs., but seriously, who else would know that? In addition to the English word for Mrs., maybe Fru Hulda should learn the word assimilation. Though I supposed the melting pot theory didn’t apply when you came from one frozen climate to another. And as for the rest of the name, what a load to carry through life. No wonder the old betty was bent in two.

  The back of the store was a maze of low shelves holding boxes of gleaming buttons, skeins of lace, and spools of ribbon. The quantity and quality of fringe, rickrack, sequins, and trims was unlike anything I’d ever seen — not even in the garment district of downtown LA. And such a riot of colors. My eyes glistened with delight. Then again, it might just have been smoke clouding my vision from the whole head-on-fire thing.

&
nbsp; Hulda stopped at a battered old door. Faded letters spelled out OFFICE on a paint surface so crackled I could have scraped the whole thing away with one swipe of a spatula. She opened the door. A step or two of warped wooden stairs were visible, after which there was nothing but black. Hulda pulled on a simple metal chain, and a bare bulb illuminated the descent.

  “Now we go down,” she said.

  Hulda looked at me expectantly.

  No way was I going down there. Nothing good happened below the earth’s crust. Just poll the local residents of any cemetery on that one. I raked my left hand deep into my scalp.

  “Quick. Is time,” she said, squinting at her watch.

  Not only was I expected to head into the heart of darkness — I was urged to go first. She nudged me with a sharp knuckle to the small of my back. Though my head said “Don’t,” my legs said “No,” and my stomach said “Up, if anything,” I descended.

  The staircase was narrow and turned three times before opening into a dark corridor. Hulda stepped forward and beckoned me with a nod of her head, motioning to the only door off the wide hallway. Clutching at my arm with surprising force, she pushed the door open.

  Some of the oldest women I had ever laid eyes on were seated at an oval table. And if not the oldest, then definitely the oddest. Hardly the horror pic that’d been looping through my head, although the room itself was dank: low ceiling, stone walls, and lit only by thick white candles of varying heights surrounded by what could only be described as straw and twigs in the center of a massive table. The women all turned as Hulda pulled me into the room. It must be some sort of costume party, I thought. One of those crazy red-hatter clubs like my grams in Santa Monica belonged to. And hats off to this bunch: the assortment of bonnets, and beanies, and pillboxes — and one which could only be described as a horned wimple — was impressive, though oddly enough not a one was red.

  I suddenly remembered my own hat, probably the mistaken passkey that had gotten me into this Knights of the Round Table meets Golden Girls Reunion. I was about to excuse myself, politely, when one of the women stood, scraping a heavy chair across the flagged floor. She was tall and dour, with a mouth that gathered in angry folds. She looked at Hulda as she spoke. “What is the meaning of this?”

  Hulda pointed to one of the chairs, which, I now noticed, faced backward and away from the table. “The second chair can be seated now.”

  A chorus of gasps rebounded off the damp walls, as every one of the old women reacted to this statement.

  “I can’t stay,” I said.

  They all stared at me with wide eyes and open mouths.

  Tall-and-Dour was clearly not pleased by Hulda’s announcement, or invitation, or whatever it was. She slapped her hand to the table, causing the candles to flicker and the room to fall silent. “Have you no respect, Fru Hulda? You know the statutes. Youth is strictly forbidden. You risk exposure. And certainly not the second chair.”

  Talk about reverse age discrimination.

  “I really gotta go,” I said. “I’m waiting for a delivery.” I pointed in what I thought was the right direction, though all the crazy turns of the staircase had me disoriented. “Across the street at my afi’s store.”

  “She has the cap,” Hulda said in a voice as flat as the prairie.

  Again with the cap. Double the trouble at this point: its musty wool was probably teeming with vermin, and it seemed to somehow be my ticket into this masquerade. I yanked it off and balled it in my hand. Another round of gasps, pointing, and nervous twitters circled the room. These old women seriously needed to get out more. Sure the skin condition was a nasty, festering mess, but wasn’t it rude to gawk?

  Another woman stood. “It is the cap.”

  Tall-and-Dour shook her head. “Impossible. She’s just a child.”

  I’d had enough. I gave Tall-and-Dour the most adultlike look I could muster. “I’m sixteen, hardly a child.” I turned and held the hat out to Hulda. “But anyway, you guys can keep the cap. It belonged to my amma, but she’s dead now. I’m sure my afi wouldn’t mind.” I shoved the hat into Hulda’s hand. “Like I said, I gotta get going.”

  “Is not the hat,” Hulda said. “Is the cap.” With this she removed her own hat, and I was shocked to see the same raging red rash afflicting her scalp, visible under thin wisps of gray twisted hair. One by one, the others in the room, except Tall-and-Dour, removed their hats. They were all suffering from the same mottled skin condition.

  “Is this thing contagious?” I asked, a hand flying to my hairline.

  Hulda shook her head. “Is not contagious. Is a sign. As is your youth. As is your arrival this night, the final night, of a three-year deadline to appoint a second chair.”

  All of a sudden my whole head started aching. Not just the scalp. Pain radiated from the base of my neck to my eyebrows. I’d had headaches before, but nothing like this. The room spun like a carnival ride, and I needed to sit down or drop to the floor. Hulda must have sensed this, as she quickly put a hand below my elbow and inched me into the room. I sat with a thud and put my head to my knees. Many minutes passed before I recovered enough to sit up and take stock of the situation. I was in the empty chair, which had been turned to face the table. The women looked at me expectantly.

  On top of everything else, I thought I might hurl. “I don’t feel well.” I clutched my stomach. “And I don’t understand what’s going on.”

  Hulda, who was seated to my right, stuck a white bowl of what looked like dried leaves under my nose. “Breathe deeply,” she said.

  It smelled sharp, and the tip of my nose went numb, but I felt better. Both the headache and nausea were instantly gone.

  “Where am I?” I was disoriented and momentarily wondered if I was hugging another type of bowl.

  Hulda’s voice was solemn. “You are at a meeting of the Aslendigas Storkur Society.”

  “The what?” I asked, realizing I was addressing my new best friend — the bowl.

  Tall-and-Dour interrupted. “No more. There has been some mistake. She should never have been seated. And certainly not in the second chair.”

  I crouched into a backbreaking pose, whereby I could keep both nostrils sucking in grass clippings while my eyes raked the surroundings.

  A short, plump woman said, “But Fru Grimilla, she was sick. Nearly fell over.”

  Tall-and-Dour, I thought, must have been born with that scowl; how else would her parents have known to name her Grimilla?

  Aha moment: I can lift the bowl, a clever maneuver that allowed me to stretch my neck and shoulders in relief.

  “Enough,” Grimilla said with a slash of her hand. “Too much has been said already.”

  Hulda stood. “Fru Grimilla!” she said with surprising ferocity. “Do I need to remind you that I occupy the first chair, the Owl’s chair, the Ugla’s chair?” On closer examination, Hulda’s chair was larger than the others and raised on a small platform. It had a large ornate owl carving, which made the bird appear to be perched atop the chairback. “We have waited three years for a new member to find us. And for it to be one so young is a sign.”

  I attempted to lower the herbs from my numbed nasals, make my apologies, and scram, but a mere inch of separation between my nose hairs and the weeds caused a relapse. I looked down and noticed that the arm of my chair was carved with perched birds, all kinds of birds.

  “Youth is forbidden,” Grimilla repeated. I noticed that everything about her sagged: her shoulders, her bottom lip; even the peacock feather of her teal-blue cloche hat drooped to her brow. “And Fru Hulda, second chair? You pass over many worthy of such an honor.”

  “We live to see many changes.” Hulda spoke with authority. “It is not for us to question. It is for us to accept.”

  I didn’t feel well enough to respond in any way to the madness surrounding me. I was rooted to the mysterious bowl by pain and nausea. I thought of fleeing, stealing their dinnerware and its contents, but my jeans had turned Judas on me. They just sat
there shaking uncontrollably. Traitors.

  Hulda turned to face me. “Velkominn, vinur. Welcome, friend.”

  A chorus of “Velkominn, vinur” was repeated.

  All eyes fell on me, and I felt cornered and scared. It was definitely time to go. I’d had enough of the secret society of yodel sisters, and Afi would kill me if I missed the apple guy. “Sorry, but I can’t stay. I’ll be late,” I managed to say, thinking if I could make it to the back door, away from the stink of those candles, the stares of these strange women, the fresh air might revive me.

  “No need to worry about time,” Hulda said. “Check your watch.”

  Weird. It had stopped at 9:03, the time just before I entered the shop. All the more reason to scat. I tried to leave; it took a great deal of effort, but as soon as I stood, my symptoms returned: blazing hot scalp, pounding head, and nausea. I sat back down, plunging my nose to the bowl.

  “What is wrong with me?”

  “Nothing is wrong. When the cap appears, you must come at nine o’clock to council. As for the other discomforts, your gifts are settling in. And always worse with the cap.” Hulda nodded to a woman across the table. “Fru Birta, our Lark, are you ready to record?”

  Birta, of the chartreuse wimple, opened a very large, very tattered leather book. “What is your name?”

  “Kat.”

  “Your full name?”

  “Katla Gudrun Leblanc.”

  Birta looked up from the book. “Katla Leblanc? That can’t be.”

  “Only my mother is Icelandic. My father’s side is French.” Again, the room echoed with murmurs. I looked at the woman to my left. The arms of her chair were carved with what looked like pelicans. Were they bird watchers? Mad-hatter bird watchers?

  Fru Hulda nodded to the room. “Yes. This is the granddaughter of Fru Valdis. And yes, this is the girl of the lake.”

  Huh? OK. These crazy ladies were driving me nuts. First I thought it was my non-Icelandic last name they were questioning. Now it seemed to have something to do with my poor dead amma. And what lake? Unless you considered the Pacific Ocean a lake.