Chronicles of The Craft - vol 3 [COMPLETE]

The Boundary Brook

Looking at it, there in the twilight, it seemed so insignificant. So unimportant. After all, it was only a little brook that ran dry for most of the year. You could skip over it without too much effort; it was neither wide nor the banks down to it particularly steep.

At that moment it was bubbling and gurgling, its flow fast and hurried. Impatient. And yet, there was a warning here too. You could just about hear it in the splashes as the water struck the larger stones protruding from the bed of pebbles that lined the tiny watercourse. But then I knew how to listen to the stream's song – I had been doing it all my life.

What songs do streams sing? What warnings do they give? I cannot, of course, answer for all brooks, streams and rivers but I can tell you about this one that flows up in the hills, between the forest and the meadow.

It says, think carefully before you cross me. You know what lies on the near side, but what do you know of the far bank? Do you know what lingers there in the morning mists? And what of that which haunts the stretch between brook and forest's edge? Do you dare leap across and find out or do you fear being trapped there and unable to return?

I have often sat on this near side and pondered the song of the stream, wondering if I should cross the short distance and seek out the answers to its riddle. For I have never seen another soul on the other side of the brook, and my grandmother says, I never will. She says:

"But they are there, waiting. Always waiting. For the brook marks the boundary between this world and the next and you are not blessed with the sight to see through The Veil."

I ask her how she could know this if one must be gifted to see, but she remains silent, except for the repetition of her warning:

"Keep clear of the brook. Do not touch its waters."

I ask once again about how she is so sure of what she says, but she turns her face away from me and her frail and aged mind wanders once more as she talks to my long dead grandfather and all those she knew as a small girl, nearly fourscore years before.

As if they have not died.

As if they have not crossed over.