The Light of the Midnight Stars

by Rena Rossner

  I pause in the forest and listen, drawing the tallit tighter around me. The wind whispers but I don’t know what it says. I close my eyes and try to sense everything around me. Guvriel once told me that I was stronger than I thought I was. I try to listen, to understand what I hear. To practice some of the things he taught me. I feel a pulse. Like the throb of another heart. Guvriel? My heart calls. I reach out with my senses, searching for him, for the pattering heart of a fox in the underbrush, but then it’s gone and I’m alone wrapped in the white shawl.

  I open my eyes and I see movement in the trees. Something’s here, making its way to me. My heart skips a beat. I take a step back, search the forest floor for a branch I could use to defend myself.

  Then Theodor steps into the clearing.

  My eyes grow wide. I wonder how long he’s been here, watching me wrapped in what must look like a shroud.

  “Sir.” I bow my head.

  “Stanna.” He smiles. “Are you alone this time?”

  He is giving me a choice. My sisters have wandered far away from here, but they are still prey in the forest if he is hunting again.

  “My sisters are here,” I say. “A ways off, looking for berries and bark.”

  He offers me his hand.

  I take it. The fate of my family is at stake.

  “What are you doing here if your sisters are elsewhere?” he asks.

  I pull the shawl tighter around me. “Just taking in some silence.”

  “I like silence too,” he says. “I never get it though—there’s always a guard nearby.” He gestures to the left and I see that one of his guards is indeed waiting beyond some trees. “That’s a beautiful shawl you’re wearing. Very fine craftsmanship.”

  I feel as if the wool is burning me. “I made it myself.”

  “Pretty and talented? That’s quite a combination.”

  I know my cheeks should flush at his compliment, but I see my sisters coming into view and I panic. What is about to happen has been set in motion. There is nothing I can do to stop it.

  “I’ll introduce you to my sisters,” I say.

  He looks at me and cocks his head as if he’s considering what I’ve said. “I would like that very much,” he says.

  I smile—I can’t help myself. It’s genuine, and then I feel sad, like I’ve betrayed Guvriel. What is wrong with me? Am I so faithless? I turn my head away and blush, embarrassed by my own disloyalty. He promised he would come for me. I said I would wait until the end of time for him.

  I see Anna’s head lift like a rabbit on alert. My eyes meet hers and I see the moment when it registers on her face that I’m not alone. She places herself in front of Laptitza.

  “Anna, it’s okay,” I call to her.

  “Theodor,” I say as they approach us, “this is my sister, Anna, and my other sister, Laptitza, behind her.”

  “A pleasure to meet you both,” he says and reaches out his hand to kiss theirs. “I am Theodor,” he says, “son of Basarab the First.”

  I gasp, but try to hide it with a cough. I knew he was someone important, but it never occurred to me that we’d happened upon the son of the Voivode of Wallachia. I see Anna glance over her shoulder at the guard. I’m sure she must be as anxious as I am. Nothing good will come of this.

  “Why don’t you join us for a picnic?” Theodor asks me. “I’m here with my men.”

  “Oh no.” Anna looks down. Her cheeks flush and her breath hitches. “We couldn’t possibly.”

  “Of course we can,” Laptitza says boldly, surprising us. “We would be delighted.” She steps forward.

  Anna looks at me, then at Laptitza. I can tell she thinks this is not a good idea. Do we have a choice? I try to say back with a look.

  We follow Theodor out into the clearing. There are about a dozen men there with their horses. His guard lays out a blanket, and Theodor takes my hand and helps me to sit down. I’m uncomfortable with this casual contact, but I can’t say anything. I worry that acting strange about it will only draw more attention to me.

  The guard then steps over to Anna and takes off his helmet. He is tall and blond and broad. His smile is wide. He reaches out his hand. “I’m Constantin.” He bows before her.

  “Anna,” she says, and I hear the tremble in her voice.

  “It is lovely to meet you, Anna… of the Forest.” His eyes are serious, but kind.

  “Anna Simion.”

  Even I can see that his eyes carry the light of the skies in them. “Will you do me the honor of eating with me?” he asks her.

  Anna must feel as resigned as I do. There’s nothing we can do but be kind and gracious. She takes his arm and motions for Laptitza to join them, but Laptitza looks to me.

  I’m about to invite her to sit with me when another man, a young dark-haired nobleman, reaches out his arm for her to take. She curtsies, like this is all a game of make-believe, and follows him over to another laid-out blanket.

  What could possibly happen? We are outside under the open sky having a picnic in broad daylight. We have nothing to fear. We have nothing to hide.

  Anna

  10 Sivan 5122

  Today we had a picnic in the forest with the prince’s hunting party. I sat beside Constantin and he offered me an apple. I think he was trying to flirt with me, but I’ve forgotten how to behave—how to function in the presence of strangers—how to talk to a man. I know I’ll never love anyone the way I loved Jakob, but for the sake of my family, I must attempt to move on.

  He cut the apple and, when a slice was about to fall, I tried to catch it, but it dropped. I laughed and my hand brushed his and then I realized it was the first time I’d laughed with anyone but my sisters since Jakob left this world, and it felt like a cold rock turned over in my stomach. My hand fell from his as though he’d burned me.

  “Are you okay?” he said.

  “Sorry!” I said. “Yes, just clumsy. Here.” I picked up the apple. He took it from me and his fingers brushed up against mine again. This time it was deliberate.

  I’m not ready for this. Not yet. Maybe not ever. But I wonder if we might actually be free here to be whoever we want to be—to marry whoever we choose. I’m not sure it matters anymore. And if nothing matters anymore, then maybe the least I can do is sacrifice my happiness for the sake of my family’s safety.

  By my actions I denied to Stanna what was taken from me. And worse, I intimately know what she was denied.

  The weight of it sits inside me like a stone I’ll never be able to dislodge.

  Perhaps I do have the ability to repent for what I’ve done.

  I looked back at Laptitza and saw her pick up a piece of bread. She paused before it hit her lips. She was about to make a blessing, her lips about to move silently, but then she looked up at me. I shook my head, almost imperceptibly, my pulse rising. And Laptitza nodded back, the slightest of movements.

  I watched her take a bite with no blessing as if it was the most natural thing in the world, and the burden of the path we’ve chosen smothered me like a wet blanket. Suddenly it was hard to breathe. I put my hand to my chest and Constantin looked at me with concern, but I coughed a bit and recovered quickly. It’s not the first time she’s had to stop herself, but we must break our old habits if we are to move on. And I must find a way out of my grief if I’m to help my sisters.

  It all felt so clear to me in that moment—as clear and crisp as the bite of the apple I took. I had the power to save us all.

  Constantin offered me a strip of meat. I knew it wasn’t kosher, but this wasn’t the first time I’d eaten treif. I put it in my mouth, unafraid, and chewed. We make choices every minute of every day, but that doesn’t mean that we forget the cost of those choices. I hoped that I never stopped remembering what it was like to be a Jew. But I had to make this choice now. I was Anna Simion, not Hannah Solomonar anymore.

  “Are you new here?” Constantin asked.

  “Yes, very,” I said, forcing myself not to think of Jakob. I took another bit
e of the tough meat. “Our father wanted to seek his fortune in a new land, and when we heard that the Voivode—”

  “Theodor’s father,” Constantin said.

  I paused. “Yes,” I said, then swallowed hard, remembering the predicament we were in. But what choice do any of us have if we want to survive? Did I have a choice with Jakob? Or was that too fated by the stars?

  “When we heard what Theodor’s father had done, the battles he’d fought and won, the type of utopia he wants to build in Wallachia, with freedom of faith and equality for all… we started walking in this direction,” I said.

  “I’m glad you came,” he said.

  I thought, He doesn’t know me at all. He couldn’t possibly be glad if he knew me.

  “Me too,” I whispered.

  What choice did we have?

  What choice do any of us have?

  Laptitza

  I help Mama hang the laundry up to dry. When I go back under the cover of night to meet my star-man again, I will take some of the clothes off the line and bring them to him. Just like the girl in my story. Perhaps if I bring him clothes this time, he will agree to put them on, and then he will come with me.

  I don’t know what Mama and Papa will think of him; he doesn’t even speak—at least not in words that they can hear. But maybe I can find a way to convince him to stay.

  What would I do if he asked me to join him. Would I go?

  What I felt the other night was unlike anything I knew it was possible to feel.

  Something tells me that if I had the choice, I don’t think I’d be able to resist becoming a part of the dance of the stars in the sky.

  Later, I pick some clothes and sneak a pair of Papa’s shoes beneath my coat. I tiptoe into the kitchen and take bread and cheese and fruit. I grab a pillow from my bed and a blanket from the chest, and hide it all under my bed until I’m certain everyone is asleep. I place the blanket over my shoulder like a satchel and I creep out. Then I run, as quietly as I can, all the way to the forest.

  But when I get there, and I lay the blanket out on the ground, and I take off my clothes and wrap myself in the blanket and reach my hand up to the sky—I wait for hours.

  No matter how hard I reach for him—I can see his star in the sky—he doesn’t come.

  I get dressed and go back home, dragging the blanket behind me. I try to pretend that nothing happened; he must have been busy doing important things that stars do—like shine.

  But inside, my heart hurts. My stomach hurts. And the tears that fall from my eyes look like tiny diamond stars.

  Neither fire, nor wind, nor the swift air, nor the circle of the stars, nor the violent water, nor the lights of heaven are the gods which govern the world. Only the Holy One, Blessed Be He.

  —The Book of the Solomonars, page 43, verse 7

  Theodora was the firstborn of her family and she felt that meant that she could decide who and what she wanted to be. She saw no reason why she couldn’t ride and hunt with men. People liked to call her Princess Theodor, and she didn’t care one bit because she knew, as sure as there were stars above her head, that she was destined for something greater than herself. Theodora dreamed of a different kind of world—like her father. A world where women and men could act as they wished to, and not as they were expected to.

  What Theodora didn’t know was that, as the Black Mist traveled through the Satu Mare forest all the way to Şinca Veche, and then down the Arges River that split the city of Curtea de Argeş in two, that she would fall for Stanna, hard and fast and besotted completely. Because sometimes, even in the darkest of times, love blooms.

  Stanna

  I’m doing everything I can to be a dutiful daughter. I help Mama make bread and I work with Papa out in the fields. Once, I would have given anything to get the attention he gives me now. Everything has changed so quickly.

  There is no talk of God or wisdom—no stories shared or lessons learned. He pushes a rusty plow through the earth and I follow him, scattering seeds. It is almost like being a son. It’s everything I once wanted—but I never wanted it like this. Instead of formulas to access the divine, the only words he speaks to me relate to crops and temperature, weather and wind—of the mundane kind. He’s stripped himself of the things that made him special. We are at the mercy of the elements, not at their command.

  My father used to ride a dragon—and this is what he’s been reduced to. A laborer in the fields. A horse that pulls a plow.

  Maybe if I can find a way to heal him, to bring him back, he can be the one who saves us all. But he tried that once. He tried and it didn’t work, a voice says.

  I shudder, thinking of how disrespectful I once was. Stubborn like earth that refuses the blade of a plow. I didn’t want anyone to form me into something I wasn’t—and look where that led me. Why was I so proud? Why did I refuse the hand that only tried to guide me?

  “Hold this,” Papa says—my new father with his new name who thinks we can outrun our past. I hold the plow up, heavy as it is, so that he can drink water from the jug I carry. The burden of disobedience weighs heavy upon me. It is in these small ways that I’m trying to find my way back.

  I remember Guvriel once telling me that the reason we refer to Torah as a yoke comes partly from Pirkei Avot—the ethics of our fathers. “Rabbi Nechunia son of Hakanah once said,” I hear Guvriel chant it in a sing-song voice in my head, spinning a tale, conjuring wonder, “anyone who accepts upon himself the yoke of Torah removes from himself the yoke of the way of the world.” He was explaining how what sometimes feels like a burden can often open up the way to shed the rules and laws of nature. Harnessing yourself to the spiritual world, like an ox pulling a plow, can help you leave the yoke of the physical world behind. My father, the great Reb Isaac, has traded in one kind of yoke for another.

  I miss him. It’s laughable because once all I wanted was to escape him and his ways that he kept forcing on me. But everything has changed. I have changed. And I would give anything to go back to the way things used to be. I would be kinder to my sisters. I would listen to my father and let him guide me. And most of all, I would be with Guvriel—arguing with him only for the sake of Torah—not for the sake of my own vanity and pride. I see it now. How vain and self-absorbed I was. How stubborn and stiff-necked—am kshei oref—like it says in The Book of Devarim. I need to find strength now in my stiffness, and a way to save my family and our future generations. But all the rules have changed, and nothing seems to apply the way it used to. The world is both full of possibility and empty of hope.

  We meet the hunting party again a few days later. We don’t tell our parents about it. It’s something that we sisters share—and that feels more important than anything. Mama and Papa go to town: they tell us of Mihai, the kind-hearted blacksmith they meet who helps repair the plow, and Sorina, wife of the baker, Emil, who gives us flour so we can make bread. Papa promises him grain and Mama promises her tinctures of herbs. My parents are imparting everything but their wisdom, and even I know that in our sacred book—in the text that Papa penned with his own hand—it says “an absence of wisdom paves the way to the land of the dead.” Perhaps we are already there—walking in the land of the dead.

  But what else can we do? If we meet Theodor and his men in the forest, we won’t be mistaken for prey. And that feels important too. To be seen, somehow.

  To remind ourselves that we exist—even though so much has been taken from us.

  I’m lost in my thoughts as we set out to meet them. Laptitza is prattling away to Anna about a frog she caught on the banks of the river and how she wants to go back to bathe in its crystal-clear waters and see if she can catch one again. I envy her innocence. But Anna just listens, and promises to take her there later.

  The men are already there when we arrive in the clearing. Theodor has eyes only for me, and his gaze makes me uncomfortable. I don’t know what I can give him. I left my heart back in Trnava—or maybe it’s lost in the woods somewhere, seeking and not finding
the fox I once loved. He reaches for my hand. His are soft, uncalloused, and warm. “Come for a ride with me into the forest.”

  I look back at my sisters. Anna is speaking to Constantin. Laptitza is laughing at something Nikolas said.

  “I very much want you to say yes.” Theodor pulls my attention back to him and I can see the earnestness in his eyes.

  Something in the air is waiting for me to make this choice. I agree, knowing that it will set something else in motion. It’s a strange sensation. Fear of the unknown presses against my chest. What does Theodor want from me? What if it’s something I can’t give? What if Guvriel is still alive and searching for me? What if he finds me, comes all this way only to see me riding a horse with another? I am playing with fire even though there is no flame in sight.

  There is nothing new under the sun, I hear the words from The Book of Kohelet in my head. Are we destined to repeat the same mistakes over and over again? Hannah went with Jakob and look where that led us. But I hear Guvriel quote from Pirkei Avot again, every word of his teachings seared into my brain whether I want them there or not: “It is not your duty to complete the work, not up to you to finish it, but neither are you free to avoid it.”

  There is work to be done here, even though I still don’t know the nature of it. I once thought that duty was a burden, but I was wrong. In duty there can also be a world of freedom. A world of love and compassion. I wish he was here to hear me say it. To see the understanding dawn in my eyes. But it’s too late. And I won’t let opportunity pass me by again. It is not my duty to say no to Theodor. God has brought him to me for a reason. This is a moment I must seize.