Ingathering - The Complete People Stories

by Zenna Henderson

  “I think I’ll go check the stock,” he said, trying to sound like Papa.

  “Little early for that,” said Papa, glancing up.

  “I need to stretch my legs,” Nathan said, reaching for his coat. He lighted the small lantern with a splinter blazed from the fire, and turned to the door. Lucas was ahead of him, coughing in his hurry, hacking at the frozen lumps at the bottom of the door with the crowbar.

  “Don’t let go of the rope,” said Mama, anxious because of the wilderness out of doors.

  The call caught Nathan as he opened the door, and he stumbled a little on the uneven floor. What was it? What was urging him? Not out, he realized, just—just listen. No—he wrestled with the problem as he wrestled with closing the door. No—not listen. It was there’s need! Who called?

  He got the door shut and clung firmly to the rope stretched from house to barn, while he caught his balance against the howling fury of the wind and the knifing of the snow against the exposed parts of his face. He hugged the lantern to him, under his coat, to keep it from being blown out—and away.

  ~ * ~

  It seemed like a hundred miles and a hundred years before he half stumbled, half fell into the barn. The animals swung drowsy faces to look at him, their eyes catching, with unexpected brightness, what little light came from the lantern that flared smokily, then settled to its small glow.

  The snow had housed the animals completely against the wind. Their own bodies had warmed the place and melted some of the snow that had sifted in at the top of the rough walls. The moisture had run down the logs to freeze smoothly again near the floor. The water trough was partly frozen, and Nathan hacked at the thin ice with his heel.

  There’s need! It was words now, that came so shocking loud inside his head that Nathan whirled, his elbow going up defensively. No one was in the half-light of the chilly stillness except the huddled animals who rippled across with small movement. Then they swung about to stare at the wall opposite the door. Nathan went to the wall and rested his hands against it, his eyes fanning a scared look over the rough logs.

  There’s need! There’s need! The soundless words sobbed into the silence.

  “El—” His voice wouldn’t work. He tried again. “Eliada?”

  Nathan! Nathan! Relief cried in every syllable.

  “You can’t get in that way,” Nathan called foolishly to the rough wall and the quiet stock. “The door is around two corners from you.”

  The animals blinked their eyes and came apart from their concerted staring, and swung slowly away from each other, unpatterned. There was a thud on the door, and Nathan moved to it quickly, pushing out against the frantic pushing in, and Eliada fell into the barn.

  “Nathan! Nathan!” she cried from the floor, reaching blindly.

  Nathan knelt and reached a hand to help her up. His fingertips rapped and his fingers bent and slid away with no touch of Eliada.

  “Oh!” She drew a sobbing breath. “I’m shielding.” Then she reached out for Nathan’s hand and clung. “Oh, Nathan,” she cried as he pulled her, shivering, to her feet. She sagged and almost fell before he caught and held her. “We’re dying! There is nothing to eat! Not anything! And no small creatures in the forest because of the—the falling whiteness.”

  “Snow,” said Nathan, wondering that his face was slowly warming to a tingle and that water on the walls was sliding liquidly down to the floor.

  “You don’t have a coat,” he said blankly.

  “A—a coat?” Eliada sank down on a hump of hay near the wall. “Oh—oh. No—no coat. I can warm without, and my— Oh, but, Nathan! You don’t understand? We are being Called. We are—dying of—of hunger! There is nothing. Oh, Nathan, to have nothing! To put out your hand and there is nothing to fill it. To swallow nothing and hurt and hurt—!” She curled herself down on the hay and cried.

  Nathan looked around at the dim animals, their eyes taking turns at catching the light as their jaws crunched, wondering what on earth he could do.

  “Come on,” he said. “Come to the house. We’ll tell Mama and Papa. How—how many people? I mean, how big a family do you have?” He helped Eliada up from the hay.

  “We are only six—now,” she said, a great sorrow filling the room. “All the others—all those I could see from my slip—went in flicks of brightness—back to the Presence. But what was left—we finally found each other, and we are six. But soon our bodies will not be able to contain us—unless we can find food—” She sagged down against his holding hand.

  “We can share,” said Nathan. “But for how long—” He used two hands trying to hold the weight.

  “Only until the—the snow goes,” she said. “We found roots to eat and food even inside the hard round black things under the trees—”

  “Walnuts,” said Nathan. “Why didn’t you gather them last fall? Not much meat for a lot of work but—”

  “But we didn’t know!” cried Eliada. “We don’t know this new world. We came so far— And now to die—” Her eyes closed and she floated, slowly down—not quite to the floor—and hovered there in a small unconscious heap. Nathan grabbed clumsily for her, rapping his knuckles against her shoulder. And she slid slowly—inches above the barn floor— away from him to bump softly against Kelly Cow’s winter shaggy legs. Kelly Cow backed up a step, and went on chewing her cud, her eyes large and luminous in the half dark.

  Nathan snatched the lantern and turned to the door. He felt cold flooding back all round him. Then he turned from the door and reached for Eliada. Then turned back—panic squeezed his breath. He crouched on the floor beside Eliada and closed his eyes as tightly as he could, fighting against running and screaming and—

  A sudden blast of cold air on his back whirled him around. Papa was leaning back against the push of the door, getting it shut.

  “What’s keeping you?” Papa asked, thumping snow off his boots. “Your mother—” He broke off as Nathan’s shift to hide Eliada pushed her out between them. She straightened out as she floated, and her hair spilled darkly bright, longer than the distance to the floor.

  “It’s—it’s Eliada,” Nathan said, his eyes intent on Papa’s face as he gathered the inert body into his arms. “The girl I gave the milk to. She came for help. They’re starving in this storm.”

  “She’ll freeze in this storm if you stay out here,” said Papa. “Give her to me.”

  Nathan stood up, lifting Eliada with him. He looked at his father, his eyes wide with wonder. “She is less heavy—like she said she’d make the milk.”

  “You’re wasting time,” said Papa and took Eliada. His arms jerked upward at the lack of expected weight. Nathan caught the limpness of a trailing hand and kept Eliada from leaving Papa’s grasp. Papa took a firmer hold, one arm over and one under, turning Eliada so her face pressed against his shoulder.

  “The door,” he said, and Nathan slipped around him and opened the door to the blast of the storm.

  After endlessly struggling with wind and the stinging slap of driven snow, Nathan, clinging to the stretched rope with one hand and the darkened lantern with the other, stopped to gasp for breath. Papa stopped close behind him, pushing Eliada against him to provide some small, brief shelter. Nathan felt a movement against his back and felt Eliada say something. He turned and groped to touch her to—to warn her?

  “Cold,” said Eliada, stirring. “Cold.”

  And the howl and shove of the storm slowly muted. The sting and slap of the snow-laden wind swirled, hesitated, and was stilled. And slowly, slowly warmth wrapped them about. Slowly? It was all in the space of a started in-breathing and an astonished out-breathing.

  Nathan clung to the rope, trying to see Papa. It was too dark. Papa muttered something and pushed Eliada against Nathan’s back. Nathan stumbled on toward the house, his troubled face seeking for the wind and snow that should be punishing him.

  Then he saw the lighted doorway ahead, with Mama anxiously peering out, a quilt clutched around her for warmth. As they move
d into the lightened darkness of the doorway, Nathan glanced up. He saw the snow driving, swirling down, but it never reached them. It curved and slid away as if—as if there were something between them and the night. Then Eliada stirred again, lifting her pale face to look up. And, with a doubled roar and chill, the storm smote them again.

  Then they were in and the door was shut and the unbelievable warmth and comfort of the house enveloped them.

  “It is so good.” Eliada looked up from the bowl of bread-and-milk— hard crusts of bread broken into a bowl of milk—hot milk, this time, because of the cold.

  “Best not eat anything else now,” said Mama, who glowed with having a guest to feed. “What with being hungry so long—”

  “Else?” said Eliada, her eyes widening. “More to eat than this?” She lifted a white spoonful. “At the same eating? In this world?”

  “Eggs,” said Mama, her worried look sliding to Papa.

  “From our hens. Before the storm began, they were laying pretty good—”

  “Eggs?” Eliada slid back into some place in her head that she seemed to have to go to often, for some reason.

  “Oh, eggs!” Her eyes shone again. “The bird ones were so small. But they all went away when the cold came. Did your birds not go away?” she asked Lucas, who had followed her like a clumsy, quilt-wrapped shadow ever since she had come in. He leaned on the table opposite her, his eyes feeding even more hungrily than her mouth did.

  “Yes,” he said hoarsely. “The birds went away, but our hens—” He wrapped his arms tightly around himself and coughed until he gagged. He sat swiping at the cough-driven tears with the worn quilt over his arm, and sniffed and shook with the cold that shook anyone if they left the reach of the fireplace. Everyone except Eliada.

  Eliada looked around at the rest of the family, her cheeks becoming faintly pink. “You are all cold,” she said. “I’m sorry. I forgot you are not my People.” She broke off, then turned to Papa. “I am not strong enough or skilled enough in that Persuasion, since it is not my gift, but if you have a metal—something—I can make it give heat for you for a while.”

  Papa looked at her, his eyes too deep in shadows to show any glint. Nathan rushed into the moment of silence. “Like the little one she gave me. You know, you thought it was a rock, but it was metal and it was warm.”

  Before Papa could say anything, Lucas darted for the door, shedding his outer layer as he went, and got there at the same moment as Adina, and both snatched up the heavy metal crowbar that, at this season, was the tool for breaking the ice from the door when the drifts froze too hard to kick aside. It was a short, stout metal bar, bent into a hook at one end and flattened to a stubbly blade at the other.

  Together, the two children wrestled the bar back to Eliada.

  “Yes,” she smiled. “Put it with the fire.”

  “Aw, heating it in the fire’s no good. The pots get cold right away when you take them off.” Lucas was disappointed.

  “Do what she says,” said Adina, tugging at the bar. “Give it to me and I’ll—”

  The two, tugging against each other, managed to plop the bar into the front of the ashes. It raised a small grimy snow from the feathery ashes.

  “It is better in front,” said Eliada. “In the fire, the warmness would go up the opening to outside. It is odd—” Her cheeks pinked-up and she moved to the fireplace.

  Eliada knelt in front of the bar, little puffs of ashes stirring around her as she knelt. She made a quick sign with one hand; then she reached a finger to touch the end of the bar. She glanced back at the absorbed faces. “I’m not practiced,” she said. “I must touch first.”

  There was a brief silence during which the sound of the wind filled the house as completely as though it were empty of life. Then Eliada lifted her finger from the bar and sat back sideways, but still looking at the bar. She lifted herself a little to pull her dress free from where it had twisted under her, and sat again.

  Slowly, wonderfully, warmth began. And flowed into the chilly room like a warming stream, loosening muscles that were unconsciously tightened against the cold, making cheeks and ears start to tingle.

  Eliada came to her feet. “I cannot make it more than warm,” she said. “Some can make it glow dull red, but—”

  “Gollee!” Adina’s eyes were wide. “That’s magic! Where did you learn that?”

  “At Home,” said Eliada. She seemed suddenly unsteady and held tightly to the edge of the table with white fingertips. “Before our Crossing. Before we fell here—” Then she straightened and managed a smile. “But we learn here also,” she said. “We have learned to make mush from corn—”

  “Mush!” Lucas’ scorn was large again. “How to make mush!”

  “It fed us,” said Eliada. “And the bar—it warms you. Why is one more wonderful than the other?”

  Nathan shook his head. Maybe so. But to compare something like making mush to this miracle—and yet—he shook his head again.

  “Feeding,” said Papa suddenly. “Your people. They’re still hungry?”

  “Yes.” Eliada’s face sobered. “They were so hungered that I was the only one who could come. The others are in protective sleep until I come with food. And, if I could not find food, or if I should be Called while I am away, they will sleep until their Calling.”

  “Oh,” said Mama, clutching the side of her apron. “We’ll have to—” ‘ Her eyes went to Papa, but he was going back to his rocking chair, hitching it to an angle to put the fireplace out of his sight. “Well,” said Mama, hesitantly. Then she smiled and turned to Eliada, her face alight with the pleasure of being able to share.

  ~ * ~

  “And these?” Eliada touched one finger to the rosy brown curve of an egg.

  “Eggs,” said Lucas, torn between scorn for her ignorance and his fascination with her.

  “So big!” said Eliada. “The bird one, so small! So small to hold all that feathers and singing! Do your—do your hens sing, too?”

  “They might call it singing,” said Nathan smiling. “On warm summer days, all lazy in the sun—“Tears bit suddenly at the back of his eyes at the remote memory.

  “We can let you have these,” said Mother. “When they are gone, there will be others.” She gathered them, with a practiced outspreading of her fingers, lifting them from the bowl. “But how—they’ll break—”

  “I can carry them,” assured Eliada. And Mama, hesitating for a moment, put them down on the table. One egg began a slow, flopping roll to the edge, but Eliada looked at it, and it reversed itself and hid itself in the middle of the small cluster.

  “And to eat them?” Eliada’s cheeks were less white now, and her eyes were losing their hooded look of suffering.

  “If you were hungry enough, raw would do,” said Nathan with a grimace. “But, cooked—? You have fire to cook with?”

  “We have to cook with,” said Eliada, her eyes going to the bar on the hearth.

  “But how can you carry all this by yourself?” Nathan shivered. Even Eliada’s magic didn’t operate very well on the far side of the room. Eliada’s eyes were on the little heaps of food, as if her eyes were still hungry. Then her smile, fed and comfortable, said, “I can carry it. We—we can carry much. I will show you.”

  She folded the rough piece of canvas Nathan had found up in the loft up around the food; then, stepping back a little from the table, she looked at the lumpy package. It suddenly quivered through, then lifted a little from the table and slid toward Eliada. She took hold of one loose corner of the canvas and moved over to the door. The bundle followed her, obedient to the tug of her fingertips.

  Eliada smiled, her eyes touching each person, like a warm hand. “And, see? One whole hand left to carry the container of milk!” The lard can, with its tightly fitted cover, lifted up at a gesture of her hand and hung itself on her fingers.

  “How are you going to get home?” asked Adina, anxiously. “It’s so cold and dark.”

  “I can alway
s find home,” said Eliada, smiling at her. “And I can shield against the storm.” Her glance gathered them together again, her eyes glowing in the twilight of the room. “Truly the Presence, the Name, and the Power are here with you. From your little, you have given us abundance. Even here—so far from Home. So the Old Ones assured us, but— but—” Nathan felt her spasm of grief and sorrow, and then she smiled a little. “It is so much easier to doubt than to believe.”

  She glanced at the fireplace, where the heavy length of the crowbar sent out almost visible waves of warmth. “It will cool,” she reminded. “A day or two days. Or, if gratitude counts, maybe many more days.” She made a farewell sign with her hand. “Dwell comforted in the Presence.” And then she was gone, the door stubbing back on the chunks of ice and snow that had fallen against the threshold.