by Avi
Yet once I came round that screening wall, I saw that the living space was not so different from the poor dwellings I knew in my own village of Stromford. Matted leaves and crumbling rushes covered a dirt floor while two heaps of straw appeared to serve as sleeping places. A smoldering fire burned within a ring of soot-blackened stones. From the crude roof hung drying plants and herbs. Among them I spied mistletoe, which alarmed me for I knew it was used in magic spells.
On the ground were two rusty iron pots that looked to be old soldiers’helmets. Three chipped wooden cups lay nearby. There were mazers, too, plus a few closed linen sacks. If I had seen skulls, I would not have been surprised.
The old woman made a motion with her hand, which I took to be telling us she wanted Bear placed on one of the straw pallets. The girl and I did what she asked, though Bear mostly tumbled into a heap.
Making a rolling motion of her hand, the woman said, “Over.”
On my knees, grunting with effort, I turned Bear so he lay upon his back.
The woman, hovering near, made another gesture, turning her hand so the palm faced down, then lowering it slightly.
Were these gestures a casting of spells?
But the girl seemed to make sense of them. She took Bear’s good arm and straightened it. Moving his wounded arm caused him to moan. She did the same with his legs. Then she covered Bear to his neck with his robe as well as a tattered blanket they had, leaving his wounded arm exposed. In all of this, the girl worked with a slow, practiced touch.
The hag stood over Bear, staring down. Then she reached out and fingered his cap. Abruptly, she turned her good eye to me. “Who wounded him with an arrow?” she asked in a voice so broken it was all but indistinct.
“How … how did you know?”
“Though Aude has only one good eye she can see,” she said. “What befell him?” Her gaze was hard on me. “He was also beaten, many times.” She pulled Bear’s blanket back and pointed to red marks across his chest. “Burn marks. Who did these things?”
“I’m … not certain,” I said, uneasy about how much of our history I should reveal.
After staring at Bear for a long moment, she suddenly rasped, “Nerthus wants life to live. Aude will try to help.” A nod and the girl covered Bear again.
Who this Nerthus was, I had no idea.
Again the old woman faced the girl, opened her hand—palm up—and lifted it slightly. Then she moved that same right hand as if she were squeezing something, only to put the hand to her own cheek. Finally, she pointed to the branches hanging from the roof.
“Sorrel,” she muttered. “Marigold. Bark. Barley.” At the last she pointed to a sack and rubbed her hands together as if washing.
Troth plucked some leaves from the branches that hung above. She crumpled brittle bits into one of the iron helmets, then added pieces of bark. From one of the bags she took up a handful of barley and threw it in, too. That done, she carried the helmet outside.
“Where’s she going?” I asked. Everything they did made me fearful.
“Water.”
“Why doesn’t she speak?”
The old woman shifted round to look at me with her one good eye. “Troth was born with a broken mouth,” she muttered. “People fear her. So Troth speaks little. Besides,” she added, peering up at me in her twisted way, “Aude’s gods say: The less that’s said, the more that’s understood.”
“Can she hear?” I asked, staring after the girl.
“Troth listens to Aude’s hands,” was the crone’s grudging reply.
The woman stuck her bony fingers into a small clay pot, which was filled with what appeared to be some kind of grease along with the smell of honey.
Clutching me for support, Aude went on her knees, and began to apply the ointment to Bear’s wound, his limbs, neck, and face. Hearing her mumble under her breath, I wondered if she were conjuring magic.
Alarmed, I gazed about in search of a cross, something, anything Christian.
I saw none.
“Good dame,” I blurted out, “are you … a Christian?”
My question made the hag pause in her work. She drew back on her haunches. Her frowning silence made me regret my question. After a while she said, “Why do you ask?”
“I … I fear for his soul.”
She fixed me fiercely with her eye. “Nay, it’s Aude … you fear.”
My face grew hot. “A … little,” I allowed.
“Oh, yes,” she said, gnawing on her toothless gums, “Aude is old. Aude is ugly. Aude … and Troth … live apart. Do you fear such things, boy?”
“Y … yes.
“Know then,” she said, “that Aude is of the old religion.”
“Old religion?” I cried, taken aback. “What do you mean?”
“The old gods—it’s they Aude worships.”
Shocked, for I had never ever heard anyone speak of “old gods,” I hardly knew what to say.
Her single eye remained sharp on me. “Do you still want Aude’s help?”
“In Jesus’s name,” I whispered, “I want him well.”
“Nerthus—my god—gives life,” she said. “What can you give?”
“What … do you … want?” I stammered, fearful that she might request my soul.
“It’s for you to offer.”
“I have … very little,” I said. “A few pennies.”
The crone held out a clawlike hand.
I went to Bear’s sack, scraped up our few remaining coins, and dropped them in her withered palm. She curled crumpled fingers over them and put them in a little bag tied round her waist with a leather thong.
“Old Aude shall try for life,” she muttered, and resumed daubing her grease mix on Bear’s limbs.
Afraid to press her further, my mouth dry with apprehension, I watched in silence. The dimness of the bower; the ruby-colored fire-glow; her ancient, tangled look; her multi-hued rags; her broken posture—all made the crone appear like some deep-wood demon, and the girl, with her disfigured face, an ill-begotten familiar.
Silently, I made urgent prayers, begging my all-powerful Lord that though this woman was not Christian, she might help my Bear.
8
TROTH CAME and set the heated helmet down next to the old woman. Spiraling vapors—like drifting spirits—curled up. “Lift his head,” Aude whispered.
I did as she bid. The old woman squeezed Bear’s cheeks so hard his mouth gaped opened. Troth, using the mazer, poured in some liquid. Bear gagged, coughed, but swallowed. This was repeated a few times.
“He must rest,” said Aude.
In the dim light we sat in silence watching Bear. Then the crone abruptly shifted round, leaned toward me and said, “You must tell Aude who you are.”
Alarmed, I managed to say, “What do you mean?”
“You are fleeing.”
“What … what makes you think so?”
“You are alone in the forest with nothing save your fear. He wears a juggler’s cap, but here you cannot sing and dance for coins. An arrow has wounded him. He has been abused. You were hiding. You must tell of these things to Aude and Troth.”
I was afraid to say I didn’t trust her.
“It will help,” Aude said.
“How?”
“To know how a man suffers, is to know how he lives … or dies.”
I glanced at Troth. The girl was staring at me, her dark brown eyes unfathomable. As for her covered mouth—why should it so trouble me?
Then I remembered: in my village of Stromford it was said that if, before a babe was born, the Devil came and touched the mother’s swollen belly, the babe’s limb or hand or face—like Troth’s—would bear the Devil’s evil mark. Even as I stared at her, that knowledge chilled my heart.
A tap on my leg startled me. It was the woman. “You must speak.”
I felt trapped. Not knowing what else to do, I took a deep breath and told my tale.
I revealed how, not long ago, I, a new-made orphan, fled my
little village because I’d been proclaimed a wolf’s head—meaning anyone was free to kill me.
How a kind God led me to Bear, a juggler, who became in turn, master, teacher, protector, and then, as I would have it, the father I never knew.
How we traveled together until we came to the city of Great Wexly, where I discovered I was the illegitimate son of one Lord Furnival, a knight of the realm. There, I also discovered Bear was a spy for John Ball’s brotherhood.
How my enemies captured Bear, and tortured him in hopes of making him to reveal where I was.
How I, to ransom Bear’s liberty, renounced any claim to my noble name, and by doing so, Bear and I were able to pass out of Great Wexly to our freedom.
How, finally, Bear was wounded by a man who believed he had betrayed Ball’s brotherhood.
At first I told all this haltingly. But as I went on, it ran from me like water from a broken bowl. When done I was in tears. For I, in a manner of speaking, was a listener too. How extraordinary that I, who but a short time ago never knew a life beyond the passing of repetitious days, could tell a tale of being, doing, and becoming.
Though Aude and Troth had listened to me closely, neither spoke, nor asked questions, nor made so much as one remark, hearing my words in solemn silence.
By the time I finished the day was gone. Shadow filled the bower. The air was cool and hushed. I was weary in heart and bone. With Bear sleeping easier than before, I could not help myself—and nodded off.
I woke with a start. A dim, ruddy light suffused the bower. My first sensation was fear, thinking I’d fallen into the place of damnation that all true Christians fear. Then I realized the redness was naught but the shimmering embers of the bower fire.
I swung round and bent over Bear. He was asleep, barely breathing. I put a hand to his face. Still hot. I touched his arm. He pulled it away as though stung.
Looking round, I searched for the old woman and the girl. I did not see them, but saw that the front of the bower was bathed in soft, white light. I gazed at it, puzzled, until I realized it was moonlight.
As I listened I caught a faint sound from beyond. On hands and knees I crept to the walled-in entrance of the bower and peeked out.
Aude stood before the bower in an open space that was dappled by moonlight. Kneeling by her side was Troth. A teasing breeze tossed their tangled garments. Tree leaves stirred as though sifting secrets.
Aude had one raised hand and was dangling a branch of mistletoe. The other hand gripped the girl’s shoulder, as if for support.
In a slow, broken voice, the hag was chanting:
There flowed a spring
Beneath a hawthorn tree
That once had a cure for sorrow.
Beside the spring and the tree
Now stands a young girl
Who’s full of love, this girl,
Held fast by love, this girl.
So whoever seeks true love
Will not find it in the spring,
But in this girl,
This girl,
Who stands by the hawthorn tree.
As I watched and listened, I had no doubt it was some kind of enchantment. Were they trying to steal Bear’s soul? My own? If these people were indeed spirit folk, if the crone was a true witch, we should not, must not stay. Yet how could we go if Bear was so ill? Once again came the questions: What should I do if he died? How would I be able to stay free?
I asked this of myself so often it all but became a plain-song chant, to which I provided the only answer I could summon: I must think and act as a man.
But how?
9
MORNING’s DULL LIGHT nudged me into wakefulness. I opened my eyes but lay still, listening, trying to take measure of where I was, of what was happening. What I heard was a steady shhhh sound, which I gradually recognized as rain. I recalled my sighting of the old woman and the girl during the night—chanting in the moon glow. I felt a chill.
Easing up one elbow, I peered about. Rainwater dripped down through the leafy roof, making a constant, pat pat pat. The bower floor had turned muddy in spots while rocks to either side glistened wetly. The fire was cold, the ashes white. The constant dripping sounds made me tense.
Across the way from me, on the other pile of straw, the old woman lay asleep, her toothless mouth agape. Her breath was raspy. Troth was curled by her side—cat and kitten.
On my knees I studied Bear’s face. He seemed to be in peace, breathing with greater regularity. No sweat was on his brow. The redness on his wound had abated somewhat. But when I touched fingers to his brow it was still too warm.
Hearing a sound, I swung about. The girl had woken. She was staring at me. When I returned the look she pulled her hair across her face in that gesture that hid her disfigurement—her Devil’s mark. Our eyes held.
“Can you speak?” I said.
No reply.
“Can you?”
“Ugah,” she said, or some such sound.
I pointed to one of my ears. “Hear?”
She nodded yes.
“And your name is … Troth.”
“Oth.”
A hand to my chest. “My name is Crispin.”
“Ispin.”
I pointed at the old woman. “Aude.”
Another nod.
“Mother?”
No response.
“Is she your mother?” I tried.
The girl shook her head.
“And … your father?”
No reply. Her face was like an empty mask.
“Are you … Christian?”
Again no reply. Then I recalled what people said, that demons and witches recoiled from a visible sign of the cross. I held up my hands and made one with my fingers.
She returned a look absent of emotion or any hint of knowing. Still—I noted—she had not cringed. And though yet uncertain what she was, I reminded myself that she had helped Bear.
“May Jesus,” I said, “grant you a blessing for being kind to my friend.”
She continued to fix her gaze on me. But this time, she shifted her hair so it was no longer covering her disfigured mouth: as if she wanted me to see, dared me to see. That confused me. Was she showing me her evilness? I made myself hold my gaze while inwardly saying protective prayers.
Then, to break the moment, I pointed to my mouth. “Hungry,” I said and patted my stomach.
She made another guttural sound, got up and leaned over the fire, blowing on the coals till they flamed. She put some wood on. The fire blazed. She set a helmet on it and added a handful of something. Now and again she stirred.
Frustrated by my inability to make any clear sense of her, I kept watch over Bear. Tell me what to do! I kept thinking. As God’s mercy would have it, his eyes fluttered open.
“Crispin,” he whispered, “where are you?”
I leaned over him. “Here.”
“What … is this place?”
“Deep in the forest. Where a crone and a girl live. They’re tending to you.” Then I bent down and whispered into his ear. “Bear, I don’t know who or what they are. Except, they aren’t Christians.”
He made a feeble effort to get up only to fall back. His eyes closed. He slept.
Ill at ease, I looked over my shoulder. Troth was stirring her pot, but I sensed she’d been watching me. Had she heard my words?
She scooped up what she had been cooking, put it in a bowl, and offered it to me. It appeared to be cooked oats. Was it safe to eat? I wondered.
Troth made an impatient gesture to her mouth—as if urging me to eat.
Though fearful of her food, my stomach begged. The last time I had eaten was when I took that morsel of hare I’d cooked for Bear. Unable to resist, I closed my eyes, made a prayer for my safety, used my fingers to scoop up the food, and shoved it into my mouth.
Nothing untoward happened.
All that damp, warm day Bear remained asleep on the straw, though now and again he tossed about. I had hopes that he was mendi
ng, but being so uneasy, I remained by his side, on guard, keeping a wary eye on Troth and Aude.
The rain continued, a steady, sopping rain. At times thunder rolled, and crackling lightning sucked all color from the air, turning the world a ghostly white. Humid air was thick with the sweet smells of wood and decaying leaves, mingling with the pungent herbs that hung within the bower.
Once, while I looked on, and the old woman worked on Bear, she suddenly squeezed where the arrow had entered Bear’s arm. A spurt of dark blood and yellow pus erupted, and with it a splinter of wood. I gagged with disgust. But Aude snatched up the splinter and, muttering incomprehensibly, flung it in the fire, then went back and salved Bear’s wound anew.
I felt gratitude that she took from him something that was ill. In truth, I was finding it increasingly difficult to deny that no matter what or who these people were, they were not acting wickedly.
Dare I show them gratitude?
10
BEAR SLEPT ON.
As time passed, Aude and Troth seemed to do very little. The girl plucked leaves from the herbs and ground them into powder in a stone pestle. Once she went into the woods and foraged food. Once, she returned with toadstools, which I knew were unfit for humans. She ate them nonetheless. I was shocked.
The hag sat mostly by the fire as if looking into it, communing with it. Sometime I heard her croon as she rocked back and forth. Now and again she attended Bear. Then she and Troth—with a little help from me—fed him their brew and salved his wound.
By dusk, the rain had slackened. Daylight faded. Everything felt strange, ill-measured, and misplaced. A corpse-gray mist wormed among the knobby roots of trees. Now and again a bird called, its sharp trill weaving through the dim gray light like a lost thread of silver. A fox appeared at the bower entryway, its fur a wet and mottled rusty hue. It stood without apparent fear, sharp nose sniffing quizzically, ears erect, one foot up. Aude took no notice. Troth did. She went to the beast, knelt, and rubbed its ears, after which the fox trotted off. A few times birds flew into the bower, hopped about and pecked.
