Suddenly, a blue egg fell from the tree’s branches, bounced off a moss-covered rock with a faint crack, rolled down and bumped against Miriat’s boot. For a moment, the baby stopped crying, and Miriat and Maladia both looked on as a featherless creature squeaked weakly from inside the broken shell. To their surprise, it had survived the fall, the cold air waking it as it strove to free itself from what remained of the egg.
“A cuckoo hatchling must have pushed the poor thing out of the nest,” Maladia said, looking up at the branches. “I’ve never seen a chick survive a fall like that. Must be an omen,” she said, turning to Miriat. She cocked her head to the side and said, “It won’t survive though. It’d be a mercy to kill it.”
She stood without a smile and for a chilling moment, Miriat wasn’t sure if Maladia was talking about the bird.
Miriat reached out to the chick and picked it up, and cradled it gently within the palm of her hand. The creature hopped and turned its open beak towards Miriat. At that moment, Salka stirred again, and looked at her mother.
“It will die anyway,” Maladia said again, watching Miriat with interest.
“No, it won’t,” Miriat said. “There is enough of me for them both.”
After Salka had been fed, and a grub had been dropped down the hungry chick’s mouth, the three continued their slow climb towards the striga village. Maladia offered to carry Salka once, but the look Miriat gave her taught her not to repeat the offer. So, she carried the chick instead, and allowed Miriat to stop frequently. As the day wore on, they finally came up to a large wooden gate, which, if looked at from any other direction but the one they were approaching from, would have seemed a mere scattering of twigs and dry logs.
Maladia knocked. A raspy voice from above said, “So they kicked another one out, did they?” They both looked up and a plump face looked back from between the branches of a large tree growing on the other side of the gate.
“Stop your chattering and open the gate, calf-brain! We’re tired and cold! Have you no shame?” Maladia called out with a broad smile on her face.
“Not much, goat-voice, not much. Shame doesn’t pay. And it doesn’t satisfy curiosity, either,” the child said, slipping down the tree. Moments later the tall gate swung open.
The new girl was pleasant-looking, roughly the same age as Maladia, with a cheerful wide face, and warm brown eyes. The girls embraced. Maladia’s friend had more meat on her bones and a soft look which spoke of an easier life. No fewer than three leather pouches were tied to her belt, all painted with colorful patterns, and her tunic had a small picture of embroidered thistle around the collar. Her clothing made her seem familiar, though Miriat was sure she’d never seen her face before.
“Are you a striga?” Miriat asked, carefully.
“Hah!” Maladia laughed. “She’s a Dola. Can’t you tell by the airs she gives herself?” Maladia said, her skinny arms crossed. Her friend made a pretense of kicking her.
“Dola?” Confusion crossed Miriat’s face “But… you’re so young? All the Dolas I’ve ever seen were old women.”
“Some of us are old, but we don’t exactly leave our mothers’ wombs that way.” Dola said with a laugh which made her cheeks shake. “My work tends to be on the other side of the mountain, so you wouldn’t have seen me in Heyne Town.”
“Your work…” Miriat turned her head to the side. She couldn’t help but feel skeptical.
“‘Work’ she calls it” Maladia scoffed. “Don’t believe a word she says. She’s barely an apprentice.” The Dola gave her a dirty look.
“And what do they call you? I mean, what’s your name?” Miriat asked. The lighthearted banter between the two girls raised her spirit a bit. There was comfort in the everyday.
“They’re all called ‘Dola,’” Maladia said, rolling her eyes. “And they all tell the future. Some with less competence than others…”
“‘There is one fate and so one name is enough for those who read it,’” Dola said with mock solemnity. “Anyway, you’re in luck. The West Stream Dola is inside, attending a sick child so she can see you after. Saves us a trip down and up the mountain!”
Miriat shifted uncomfortably, casting a look at the tall gate in front of them. She tried to peek over Dola’s shoulder to catch a glimpse of her new home.
A shiver ran down Miriat’s back as she saw two quiet figures, observing her from the open gate. A middle-aged woman stood there with her hand on a dark-eyed boy’s head. The boy was looking at Miriat with unabashed curiosity, his very dark brown hair hanging low across his forehead. His mother’s hand tenderly swept it to the side. The woman locked eyes with Miriat, but she didn’t smile.
Instead, she just said, “If you’re bringing a new striga with you, Maladia, don’t you think you ought to report to me rather than just stand there gossiping?”
The two young girls squealed in surprise and looked towards their feet. “Yes, Alma. Sorry, Alma,” Maladia said, and gestured to Miriat to follow her. Dola trailed close behind. She leaned forward and whispered, “Maybe after you meet Alma and have the West Stream Dola look over you, you and I can have a talk? I’m a good talker. And a game of chance, perhaps?”
“Don’t,” Maladia said, rolling her eyes. “She cheats.”
“I do not!” Dola said, indignant. “Not my fault if I can predict the outcome.”
“Right. Knowing the extra bones you keep stashed in your sleeves must help with the predicting.” Maladia ignored her friend’s less than convincing show of outrage and nodded towards Miriat, “Take my word for it: with a Dola, even when you win, you lose.”
The first thing Miriat noticed were the goats.
They were everywhere: nibbling on drying clothes, unwillingly giving an insistent child a ride, and fouling up the path and the entries to the houses indiscriminately. They were all clearly well-tended, their long coats glossy from brushing. They gave the air a distinct sour milky aroma that made Miriat feel nauseous and very hungry at the same time.
She followed Maladia and the woman called Alma, cradling her daughter in her arms. She became aware of a pair of eyes staring at her intently. The boy she saw at the gate was trotting beside her, clearly trying to catch a glimpse of Salka. Miriat noticed the difficulty with which he walked, one of his feet seeming to give him pain, as it twisted inwards at an odd angle. As they walked through the village, they were watched by its inhabitants. One by one, the villagers all followed them in a small procession of solemn curiosity.
Miriat’s heart sank as she looked around at what was to be her new home. Though she’d expected hardship, nothing had prepared her for the squalor and the poverty now surrounding her.
The houses in the village were little more than round huts, and Alma led them to the largest one. Miriat spotted a small, raised vegetable garden and a few goats tied to a pole. The goats stared at the women impassively as they entered.
Inside the hut, herbs and dried cheese necklaces hung from the ceiling, and there were a couple of elevated pallet beds with a space underneath each for the livestock. The house was surprisingly organized and clean, though the smoke from the fire burning in the middle of the room made Miriat feel light-headed.
Alma called for everyone else to come inside, and she waited for the villagers to take their places along the walls before she spoke. Miriat looked at those around her, and a shiver ran down her spine as she saw a few once-familiar faces. She felt like she had crossed into the afterlife, with the ghosts of her past about to stand in judgement of her.
“So,” Alma said, sitting down in a leather-covered wooden chair. “Sit yourself down and tell me why I should let you stay.” The striga leader leaned back and steepled her fingers in front of her face. Alma had the lean wiry frame of someone who habitually worked harder and ate less than was good for them. Her face was pleasant enough to look at, though there were hard lines around her mouth and between her thin eyebrows, lines that spoke of hard choices made and much pain endured.
Miriat wasn
’t sure what was expected of her. She turned towards Maladia, but the girl avoided her eyes and busied herself stroking the bare head of the hatchling in her hand.
“What’s that? Give me this!” the dark-eyed boy demanded, with all the greed and tact of toddlerhood.
“Leave it!” Maladia said sharply, doing her best to shake the boy off as he pulled on her sleeve. “It’s Miriat’s! She found it and it’s hers!”
“Oh, indeed?” Alma chuckled, her sharp eyes taking everything in. “Looks to me like that bird will be dead soon. So, townswoman,” she turned towards Miriat. “You have nothing to say for yourself?”
“You know why I’m here,” Miriat said, inwardly berating herself for the quiver in her voice. “My daughter was born a striga. And I couldn’t let them take her from me. So, I came here. To join you.”
“Have you now?” Alma raised her eyebrows. “Oh, how very brave of you.” A few of the strigas in the room sniggered.
“So, tell me now, girl. What else is there to recommend you to us than the minimum of a mother’s feeling?” Alma raised her hand and the room fell silent again. “You haven’t abandoned your child, which is all very well, but why should we take you on? As you see, we have plenty of mouths to feed as it is.”
Miriat looked around. The men and women lining the walls were watching her. The room felt oppressive, the air was thick with the smell of these people, with the shadows dancing strangely on the walls.
“I have nowhere else to go,” she whispered, her head down. They will send us away, she thought, they will send us away to starve in the woods. The courage of the morning had now left her, and hot tears fill her eyes. She wiped them with the back of her hand. “I don’t know what I need to do for my daughter, but you do. I’ve no kin now, no friends to help or shelter me. So, I’ve come here. And if it’s my blood and flesh you want as payment, you may have it. But my child won’t survive Heyne winter unless you take us in.”
“Your ‘blood and flesh’?” a man standing in the corner scoffed. “Because what else would dirty stigois want, right?” Miriat shrunk as he used the word. “Who do you think we are, girl?” The other strigas in the room tensed. Clearly the taint of the word had power over them still, even in their own home.
“Mordat, show some manners.” Alma looked upon the man fondly, though her words silenced him. “Our guest seems unaware of our customs. Which is not her fault, I’m sure,” she added, though she gave Miriat a look as if to note that last point was yet to be decided. “Girl, we have no designs on your life. You’ll find no striga here who’d follow the dark impulses of their second heart.”
The strigas in the room all nodded and made small gestures by their chests, as if to ward off evil.
Alma rubbed her temple and paused before announcing, “You can stay.” The crowd of strigas visibly relaxed, with some smiles exchanged shyly across the room. Alma raised her finger. “But one thing must be made clear. You’re no hero. How many children have you seen left at the forest’s edge? How many women did you see make that lonely journey into the night, with never so much as a ‘fare thee well’? What did you do then, what did you say?” She paused, allowing her words to sink in, but expecting no reply. “I’m sure there are some among us who could answer that for you, if they so wished.” Miriat shrunk within herself. Alma sighed and said, not unkindly, “But you have given your child a chance, and so we can do no less.” She continued, “I see the chick in Maladia’s hand. See it survives.” Alma looked Miriat in the eyes and gave a curt nod. “That will be the right thing to do.”
Miriat was ushered into a small hut no larger than her tool shed back in Heyne Town, with the young Dola she’d met by the wall trailing behind her. The woman referred to as the West Stream Dola was waiting for her inside and gestured towards an elevated straw and moss mattress, positioned by the back wall of the tiny room. “Come in, come in,” she said with a smile as Miriat sat down.
“Pass me my bag, child,” the older woman said to the younger Dola. The midwife rummaged through it and took out a small glass phial. She pulled out the cork with her teeth and poured a few drops into her palm. She passed the phial back to her young apprentice, without looking in her direction and rubbed her palms together. A sharp smell filled the room. Though not unpleasant, it was strong enough to make Miriat’s eyes water.
“I see you’ve met my young friend here.” The West Stream Dola pointed to the young girl who winked at Miriat. “She will observe, if you don’t mind. I need to check the state of you.”
Miriat nodded and allowed the older woman to place her hands on her stomach. “Not much more than two or three days since the little one came, I’d say,” the old midwife said, gently kneading Miriat’s flesh with her plump fingers. She shook her head. “Their love didn’t hold out long enough for you to heal, did it?”
“They hoped mine wouldn’t either,” Miriat said, looking squarely into the old Dola’s face.
The older woman nodded and placed a reassuring hand on Miriat’s shoulder. “Well, you’re safe now, at least. Though I’ll have a talk with my fellow Dolas. The Heyne Town folk seem more and more impatient with their own. I’m not sure we’ll be able to achieve much with the council, but perhaps the next time they throw a young mother out, they will wait for her wounds to heal at least. Lean back for me please.”
Miriat couldn’t help but feel reassured by the old midwife’s quietly competent demeanor. It brought a sense of normality to the day which had been anything but. The young Dola gently took Salka from Miriat’s arms so that she could lie down. The West Stream Dola hitched up Miriat’s skirt and waved at her apprentice to watch what she was doing.
“This hut is not much, but at least it’s a dry place to sleep,” the old woman said. She noticed Miriat’s expression. “It’s nothing to what you had, I know…” Clearly nobody had lived in this hut for a long time, and the mud walls were crumbling, revealing the support branches underneath. The door was a half-rotten animal skin, stretched out and hooked on the sides of the doorframe to keep out the cold. But there was a lit fire pit in the middle of the room, with a stack of wood and peat for fuel in the corner. While Miriat was being interrogated by Alma, somebody had hung half a dozen or so of the cheese necklaces she’d seen before from the ceiling. Their dried squares glistened white in the firelight. In the corner there was a single clay pot with a roughly carved wooden spoon, and a single cup and a bowl, similarly fashioned out of wood. The floor had been swept and some kind hand had sought to fill the holes in the walls with moss. Either the hut had been kept ready or, more likely, the villagers knew Alma wouldn’t turn Miriat away and, while their leader was putting her through the wringer, they had furnished her with the basic necessities quietly, without ceremony. Something stuck in Miriat’s throat. Those people, strangers to her, would not allow their first kindness to be a debt.
“It’s more than I expected,” she said.
The midwife nodded with approval. “I’m glad you feel so. I had told Alma to prepare for your arrival. The bones told me you’d be coming, and a young mother needs a safe place to sleep.” She watched Miriat carefully. “And to mourn, I suppose.”
Miriat realized she was crying. She wiped the tears with the side of her hand, not trusting herself to speak.
The old Dola finished her examination. She pulled out a couple of sealed clay jars from her bag and put them on the mattress. “For your wounds and the bruising,” she said.
Miriat’s eyes opened wide. “But I have nothing to pay you with…”
“When you do, you’ll pay me.” The old woman raised her hand. “You will have to rely on others’ help in the coming months. And in time, you will repay it. Make sure you do so. The strigas look after each other… to a point. But they will watch you too. Just because you can’t see the tally, doesn’t mean it’s not kept.
“Now, for your child, make sure to keep her warm,” the midwife said, gently passing the infant from her apprentice back to her mother’s arms. “The c
hild will learn to control the other heart in time, but you must stay vigilant as well. An infant cannot be expected to have any self-control. You must give the other heart no reason to assert itself.”
The old woman smiled at Miriat and left the hut. Her young apprentice lingered for a moment and surprised Miriat with a quick hug before, she too, left.
Miriat looked around her new home. Salka gave a content sigh, wriggling in her mother’s arms.
“We can make this work,” Miriat said, smiling at Salka. “I can make this work.”
CHAPTER 2
19 years later
Salka listened to the steady rhythm of her feet pounding the ground. The cool autumn sun was barely filtering through the trees to the moss-covered ground. Above Salka, her falcon Munu screeched. She couldn’t see him, so she just followed the sound, slowing down as the wet roots became a slippery tangle under her feet. It wouldn’t do to slip and make a noise.
She paused to tighten the scarf tied around her head, keeping her black curls out of her eyes. Her hand rummaged blindly in her leather bag till it found the cord of her sling.
The loud rumbling in her belly sent a reminder of the missed breakfast, still carefully wrapped in her bag. She ignored it. If she didn’t catch anything today, the small acorn-flour and hog-fat patty would have to last her till tomorrow. Miriat always made sure to set aside food for her daughter, no matter how barren their stores, but it’d been a long while since Salka had wisened up to the fact her bowl was often filled with her mother’s dinner. Neither of them ever mentioned it, both making secret efforts to trick the other into satisfying their hunger first.
She leaned forward, her hands hovering over a freshly-nibbled sapling top. A tuft of soft grey fur blew onto a dry branch. The rabbits of the Heyne Mountains were changing their summer coats and left behind a trail a skilled hunter had no trouble following.
The Second Bell Page 2
