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It’s been a little too long since I posted any of my fiction here, I think. Here’s the first scene from my YA fantasy novel-in-progress. (I’m going to the BYU Writing and Illustrating for Young Readers Workshop in a couple weeks and had to submit this to my writing group.) Anyways, keep in mind that this is still just a draft and is very subject to change. :)

Chapter One

Charlotte made another notch in the doorframe: Will Tupper was the seventh child gone missing. Seven in one month. Charlotte swallowed and stepped out the door, almost losing her balance on the wooden step. Good thing she didn’t, because Mrs. Tupper sat curled up in a ball at the foot of the step, swaying back and forth, tracing circles in the dirt with her index finger as her gasps and sniffles muffled the air.

“Ma’am?” Of all the places for Mrs. Tupper to come, why here? Charlotte wouldn’t have expected her house to even make the list.

“Last night, girl, I watched him. Fixed my eyes on him all night long, every last minute. Didn’t even blink.” Mrs. Tupper wiped her nose on her sleeve. “I tucked him in tight. Come morning, I pull back the covers to wake him up. Stones! That’s what was left of my boy.”

In all of Charlotte’s fifteen years, she’d never heard of boys turning into stones, especially not when their mama was watching them sleep. Some boys spread stories that they’d given their parents the slip, leaving bundles of straw under the covers so they could steal out to climb down the cliffs in the moonlight, but stones? Too heavy. And yet Will was gone, vanished plain out of sight. Charlotte wanted to ask if Mrs. Tupper had looked under the bed, but when she saw the blue-black wrinkly circles under the old woman’s eyes, she figured silence might be better.

“Magic,” Mrs. Tupper said. “In the air. I smell it.”

All Charlotte could catch was a faint sooty smell from the ashes Mrs. Tupper had trailed in under her boots. She must’ve walked straight through the firepits on her way here.

“I…I’m sorry, ma’am.”

“I hear him whisper, Charlotte girl. Whispers. He’s out there, his soul’s on the wind even though his body’s a pile of stones. He’s alive.”

Charlotte opened her mouth to say that she didn’t think the pile of stones actually was Will, but she thought twice and decided to keep her lips shut. Better for Mrs. Tupper to think she had her son safe inside the house, even if he was only a bunch of rocks. The other six families had it harder, not knowing where their children were — dead or worse. At least rocks were something you could see and hold. Charlotte pulled her hair back into a ponytail with a loose ribbon she found in her pocket.

Mrs. Tupper must’ve seen the twitch in her fingers, because she said, “You don’t believe me. I see it in your eyes. You think I’m a crazy old woman, don’t you. Well, you know what, Charlotte girl? You tell your mama and papa that I’m going to bring back my boy if it’s the last thing I do.” Mrs. Tupper stood up and squeezed Charlotte’s hand. “Just watch.”

What Charlotte said — “Yes, ma’am” — wasn’t at all what she wanted to say. What are you thinking? Crazy is right, if you’re going to march into Tanglewood like it’s your own kitchen. Sit yourself back at home, ma’am, and let the parson do what he does best. And what was that? Finding lost children? Nobody’d had any training on that, not least her papa. All he was good at was finding and saving lost souls. Can’t do much good for the soul if you can’t find the body, though. And so far there weren’t any bodies.

“Thanks.” With that, Mrs. Tupper turned around and stomped back down the path to the village, flexing her fingers as she went. Charlotte didn’t particularly like the woman, but still she hoped it wouldn’t be the last time she saw her. They didn’t need anyone else going missing. Especially not any of the adults.

Shaking her head, Charlotte got up and went back into the house. “Stuart! Get yourself in here, boy.”

She heard the tap-tap of his crutch on the wood floor before she saw him round the corner, stuffing something into those pockets of his. Something round and shiny.

“Stuart, what’ve you got in your pockets? Out. Let me see it.”

“I don’t think so,” Stuart said, scowling. “Just because you’re older doesn’t mean you’re the boss.”

Charlotte folded her arms. “Whatever. Will’s mama was just here. He went missing last night.”

“Serves him right.”

“Don’t talk like that, you’ll be next.”

“Will is worse than a beetle.”

“Stuart, you let Papa hear you talking like that and you’re going to be a beetle yourself.” She rubbed her temples. Why was talking with this child like beating her head against a stone wall? He was only nine. Nine was too young to be goat-stubborn, wasn’t it? “You know anything about it?”

“About beetles? Nope.”

“Very funny, boy. About Will. His mama found a pile of stones in his bed when the sun came up. You boys playing at something?”

Stuart fingered whatever it was in his pockets, then shook his head. “I don’t even like him.”

“I know,” Charlotte said. “That’s the problem.”

“I didn’t do anything. Leave me alone.”

“You don’t know anything about it? Like where he went?”

“How should I know?” He turned around and hobbled back towards the kitchen. “But if I did, you’d be the last person I’d tell.”