by Sophie Jaff
I drugged him. I left him alone and defenseless. I did that. Because I had to get away. I had to get away from that thing and I have, for the moment, but now I am as helpless as Sael.
You have an hour.
I don’t have a watch. With no means of knowing the time, minutes or hours could have passed. It isn’t a big lake. We should soon be on the other side. The moment we reach land I can run, find someone with a phone, get help.
It’s like we’re pushing through the clouds. Maybe we’re in the clouds, we’re sailing through the clouds, we’re floating in the sky, we’re skimming in the sky, we’re drifting over the moon, we’re—
I realize that the canoe has stopped. “We’re here?”
There is no answer swirling in the dense bank of fog and mist. But it’s the silence that scares me. A country night is not silent. There’s a chorus of crickets and frogs and nightjars, the whisper of the rustled leaves, all adding to the rich, full night hymn. Not this utter silence.
“Where are we?”
A shrouded arm is slowly extended, and emerging comes a waxen blue finger with its thick black nail. It points an unremitting needle of a compass, outward.
“Do I get off?”
Nothing.
“Where do I go for help?”
In my head, I hear it.
You have an hour.
I feel a wetness on my face and realize that I’m crying.
Sael, I will find help. I promise.
I cannot see the small stones and pebbles under my naked feet but I feel no pain, as if the earth is covered by a thin veil of cloth. Blind in the drifting, dreaming white, my senses smothered, I spin around helpless and lost.
Then it happens.
A tug.
I gasp but my gasp is silent. I am voiceless in this voiceless world. The ring brooch is rising up, out. It strains against the silver chain like a dog strains against its leash, pulling me forward.
There is nothing to do but follow.
I cannot see anything. I cannot hear anything. I cannot feel anything except the pull and so I yield, one step in front of the other into the cloud of soft nothingness.
I do not know how long I walk like this but at last the mist begins to dissipate. I peer into the gloom, desperate for something real and solid, desperate for anything at all, and as the tendrils thin I see it.
It looms up before me. I gape.
An ancient castle. Huge and dark and monstrous. The walls of rough stone rise endless and impenetrable. I look upwards. If I squint I can just make out crumbling turrets, jagged like an ogre’s rotten teeth, impossibly high, the very tops of the towers are lost in the mist.
It is insane. It is mad. It is a place built for death.
I don’t know how long I stand there staring but gradually I become aware of a thin, stinging pain tight at the back of my neck; the chain digs into my skin. The ring brooch is pulling me onward. I clutch at it, trying to pull it off, but my hands jerk away. The ring brooch is freezing, so freezing that it burns. I cannot take it off.
Please, I beg it, please don’t make me go in there, but it is merciless.
I stumble on the path, but the brooch drags me forward, through the arched stone doorway onto the cobbled stone of an empty courtyard and farther still into the forgotten and desolate darkness.
There is no clop of horses’ hooves, no clank of cauldrons or men’s voices calling to one another. There is no warmth of cooking fires, or women’s laughter. This place is empty of even its own past life. I am led on and on across a great and silent stone hall and down the dim dusk of a smaller passage and some worn steps finely carved at first but more roughly hewn the lower I descend. Down and down, the light growing fainter and fainter, through massive arches, past thick stone columns, underneath sightless angels and crumbling gargoyles grinning through dust. It’s a cavernous vault crisscrossed with stone beams. There are torches high up emitting a blue glow, no real warmth or brightness, and then I am pulled past one and then another; these cold stone beds have lain silent for hundreds of years, waiting.
I know what this place must be. I am yanked, in horror and in terror, tripping, stumbling, on through the crypt.
Abruptly the ring brooch slackens against my chest. And I stop. I double over, sucking in great gulps of airless air. At first I focus only on breathing, and then it slowly dawns on me. There should be some smell here of dank stone, of rot; I should be cold down here in the catacombs or hot because no fresh air circulates. With every breath I take I should be choking on mouthfuls of dust. But there is nothing. No heat, or cold, or taste, or smell. Then I look up to see where I have been led. In the faint blue light, I see my destination.
God. Please. No.
It waits as the others did. Pale gray, almost white, the lid is slightly open, a lip of darkness.
“No!” I scream aloud.
“No!” I scream, but I make no noise—is no one in this lost, dead place to hear me?
The chain tautens again as the brooch pulls me again toward the open coffin. I trip over my feet and fall forward.
“No, please no, please, please, please no, I can’t, I can’t, no!”
I am on my knees but the searing chain drags me along. I fall facedown but still I am dragged. My cheek scrapes against the black packed earth of the crypt floor. I open my mouth in pain and my teeth rasp against the coffin’s stone edge as it begins to haul me up against the side. I am going to be hauled in headfirst.
“Okay!” I sob. “Enough!”
My throat burns in agony, yet for a moment the brooch stops pulling. I clamber to my feet, leaning against the coffin, my bruised face smeared with dirt and dust.
My chest heaves. I’ll do it. I surrender soundlessly to the possessed thing around my neck, the thing that is determined to bury me alive.
Weeping, I put one trembling leg inside the coffin and then the other, perching on the edge as if I were easing myself into a pool for a swim. I can feel something give way, crumbling and crunching under the pressure of my toes and heels. For the first time I am grateful that there is no scent or sound. I crouch and slowly lower myself, feeling the small bits and pieces break under my weight. I take one final look around knowing this forgotten tomb will probably be the last thing I ever see. Then I ease backward into the coffin.
I lie back. My shoulders and arms are constricted by its narrow sides. I can feel the grit of scraps of cloth and mealy fragments underneath my bare skin. I stare upwards. The lid begins to slide silently shut, darkness slipping over like an eclipse. Sealing me off.
I have to get out—
Involuntarily I jerk up, bumping my head hard against the stone.
I fall back into bright spots and pain. There is no room to move. This space was not built for a living body. I try to touch my forehead, feeling for the damage in the claustrophobic darkness. My fingers come away wet. A warm drop of blood trickles down my nose, my cheek. I push my hands against the lid, pushing for all my worth, for my life.
Nothing.
The darkness is total. I will die in this coffin.
I will die here, I will die here, I will die here, I will die here, I will die . . .
My chest heaves and heaves and then a voice in my head, clear and cold, says:
You don’t want to use up all your air hyperventilating. Breathe slowly.
I force myself to breathe slowly.
Breathe in.
I inhale.
Breathe out.
I exhale.
Then I wait for further instructions but there is only silence. I close my eyes.
Then there is a memory, bright and strange.
We have gone out early to look for mushrooms—look, Maggie—Maggie and I look and Mother is pointing and there are the mushrooms, small, dark, deep in the grass. I jump up and down clapping my hands and Mother laughs and—
I open my eyes to total blackness. I don’t know what that was. I don’t know who that was. I close them and I’m—
—h
iding along the monastery wall where the long grass tickles my feet, hiding because I must wait till the boys are gone until I can come inside and learn my letters, it must be a secret because I am only a girl, only a girl, but the priest says I can read as well as any scholar and I—
I’m dying.
—walking through the market square, they are watching me, the villagers, with their hateful eyes, muttering and murmuring, they hear the stories and they spread them, poisonous as belladonna, and the words will grow into actions, but not yet because the worst has not been said aloud, but it is only a matter of time before they call me a—
Trapped.
—in the belly of the kitchen where I labor over the great cast-iron pot, my hair drawn back under the cloth, my cheeks shiny with sweat, waiting for tonight, when I will silently climb the stairs, my heart is pounding, and there is the candle that he has placed for me on the seventh step, leading me on and up, my beloved waits for me at the top of the tower, no longer a lord nor I a servant but lovers together, he has said so and—
Hard to breathe.
“Take care of him, Katherine. I give him to you.”
Lucas.
My eyes spring open.
Remember Lucas. I have to stay awake. I can’t give in. I must wake myself up. I will shock myself awake.
I force my hand to close over the ring brooch. It will burn me and the pain will keep me awake, but now it is only warm so I push the pad of my thumb into the tip of the little spearlike clasp and the stabbing, sharp and clear and—
He keeps it in his chamber in the little gilded vault. I remember it fastened on his cloak, his beautiful woolen cloak now puddled upon the floor. It has been in my family for time out of mind, it is from a Celtic tribe and very old—he told me this when I lay with him in the dark, high in the highest tower, before he covered my body with his.
Now I hold it up. It shines in the light of the moon, and here in the sweet night air of the garden it will serve my purpose well before I replace it. Then I take the knife. I say the ancient words over it and slide the blade against my wrists, savoring the pain—
The circle of metal grows almost hot in my palm, I must be dying, must be dying, my mind is slipping away and Oh God I don’t want to die I don’t want to die I—
—am walking past the great hall. The feast still rages. They are all sodden with drink. The wooden table drenched with spilled mead. Bones on the floor amid the rushes, the dogs snarling, the nobility unraveling. The music is bawdy, the revelers raucous. No one sees me. Hooded, silent. They would not see me anyway. They do not see servants. Even ones who leave a thin trail of red behind them. I do not hurry. A toast! someone cries. The words are stones. They hail against my back. I halt. A toast! The ones who still can raise their chalices do. They have been toasting all night. They look toward the lord and lady. The lord’s face is flushed. His eyes shine. He laughs. He takes his lady’s hand. He is soaked with mead and triumph. He kisses his lady’s hand. A great shout from the guests. A toast! I walk on. Still I can hear the words: May you bear many sons! I smile.
But my eyelids are so heavy, if I could just rest for a moment and I’ll wake up from this, I’ll—
—go down to the crypt. It is quiet here in the place of the dead. There is no warmth. There is no noise. A few torches flicker high above me in their iron brackets. I walk past the great stone coffins; I walk underneath the angels with their dead stone eyes. I walk toward the thing that waits for me in the farthest corner, my own stone bed. It will serve me well. It houses another but I know she will not mind.
I push against the lid. The grating sound of stone across stone, giant’s teeth grinding together. I push until there is just enough room to slide in. I shed my garments, but my wrists remain wreathed in red. From dust have ye come, and to dust ye shall return. Easing in, limb by limb, first one leg and then the other. Down into the fetid dark. There are bones in here. I know the previous owner will not protest. I am only a servant and not a person, after all. Lying on my back in my final bed, I use almost all of my remaining strength to pull the lid back across. My will has been seeping out from my veins, leaving a line of life, leaving my mark. My fingers slip and scrape on the stone. I bite at my lip, my fingers are bloody bits, my arms scream protest, and finally, finally with a snarl of grit, the lid slowly begins to give till there is only a lip of air, my breaths are few and shallow, the knife did its work well, the ring brooch is safe back in his chamber and soon I shall pass, they shall not find me once the fire has started. I cannot breathe, I cannot breathe . . .
I am I am I am
28
The woman opens her eyes.
Her eyes are open in the darkness. It is too dark in here. There is not enough air.
Her arms stretch up as her palms press against the stone. The woman begins to push, to exert pressure. The lid is heavy and it should not be possible for someone on her back to move it, and yet, and yet it is moving slowly up and back.
And then one hand emerges from its enclosure, its fingers gripping the side of the lid, and the other continues to push against and out and—
The woman slowly sits up, one vertebrae stacking up upon another until she is still and sitting, and then she pushes farther, exerting her weight. One foot down upon the floor and then the other. Muscles, tendons, tissues, fibers, bones. She moves as if she has not moved for a very long time.
Under the burning torches, rays of light reflected. Rays of light pass through her corneas, her pupils. The iris widens, shrinks, widens again and regulates. The light is malleable; it bends back and back it flies to where it is scooped up and processed by millions upon millions upon millions of cones and rods, rods and cones carrying colors, fine details, shapes in the dim and the dark, primary and secondary and peripheral and straight, and all, all, all is sensed, all is converted into impulses sent up to her mind, her mind where an image is produced.
The woman takes one step. She takes another and now another. Her feet in front of each other. Faster and now she is striding and now she is running.
Up the stone stairs and through the passageway to the great hall, looking neither to the left nor to the right. There is nothing left to see, no lords or ladies in their fine clothes, no servants running errands, no fires burning in the hearths, no tapestries against the walls or rushes upon the floor. And through and out of the arched doorway the woman feels the air against her nakedness and there is a breeze that blows against her skin. The breeze is light, a breath of night. Each cell reacts; each miniscule hair stiffens with joy. She breathes in, aware. Air into her lungs, air that carries all that is good and nourishing to her blood; her blood is rich and bright with all the good things from the air. Her back, her breasts, all exposed to the full, dark world. And life.
She shivers, and delights in her body making its objections known. Her skin is chilled by her own cooling drops of sweat. She marvels at the smallest prickle upon her flesh. Flesh, soft and sensitive. Naked in the night. The stars, icy points above her, and the pull of the earth holding her in one place. Her feet, bare. She hears with ears that cup the sound of the wind through the trees, of the things that wake after dark. Beyond that she hears more and knows that out there she will find what she has been waiting for.
The woman begins to run toward the dark water, toward the small boat, half pulled up upon the sand, sure in her purpose and ready.
29
You are waiting for your love. You watched her white face float away; she looked back as you told her the time you expected her to return.
You have an hour.
But the moon is rapidly sinking and there’s no sight of your beloved. Her hour is almost up. Where is she? There’s nowhere for her to go, and anyway, you would have sensed it, you are so connected with her now. You know what she’s thinking, what she’s feeling, you know her fears and hopes and secrets, her dreams and delights, you would know if she had gone too far, she’s close, you’re sure. Still, a promise is a promise and Katherine shoul
d know you mean what you say. It’s important to be true to your word. You look at this man who lies sleeping. You sigh; you nod.
You select a long slim blade from the knife block in the kitchen—there is no need to use your knife yet, which waits for you up on the deck. You’re saving it for your special someone, your darling. Happy knife, happy wife, and Katherine is soon to be your bride in blood, in death, in red, a consummation and a marriage of fate. You’ll baptize her among the remains of her mortal lover.
You walk up the stairs, outside to the deck to where he lies motionless. You take a moment to inhale the night air, to see the stars shine, the moon swimming pale in the sky. Look over toward where he sleeps. Your heart of hearts did well. It was so thoughtful of her and made your task so much easier. Your Ride loved this man. As for you, he has merely served his purpose. And so you pick up the knife.
“Thank you,” you say to the man. Sleeping oblivious below its point, he cannot hear you but it’s the thought that counts. Thank you.
Then—
—you, who are never surprised, you who know the desires and fantasies and all and everything, the darkest perversions and highest ideals, all the wonderful, brilliant thoughts—
—you don’t see her waiting in the dark.
You don’t sense her at all, don’t smell her redness or sense her many fine and distinctive parts, the cloud of love and doubt and fear and joy and guilt and anxiety and confidence and hope and a thousand other things that make Katherine Katherine, make her her.
She grips your sacred knife, the knife of the infinite, the knife of the harvest, the knife that only you should ever wield, the knife that you left upon the deck. You who read minds, hear thoughts, consume emotions, who bend an ear to the intimate secrets of the world, you who see in the blackness and who listen to the high, sweet, crystal music of the stars, you did not sense her, at all. Now, for the first time in your existence, you feel the prickle of alarm.
