“Enjoy the spring, Gytha, while there are no new commissions,” he tells me and looks away, staring resolutely out the window at the garden, but not, I feel, seeing it. His voice halts me at the door. “Gytha, all you need to know is that your work has paid a debt that will plague me no more. Never think me ungrateful, daughter, but never ask me about her again.”
From the blanket box at the foot of my bed, I lift out several coverlets, folded winter dresses and shawls. At the bottom is the original Murcianus grimoire, its text and diagrams re-inked each day before I copied it. Each page has been dusted with a setting powder of my own devising. I run my fingers across the cover and wonder how long it will take me to learn the language of witches, to take the knowledge I need for my purpose. I wonder if Larcwide might be prepared to teach me. I wonder if I have any of my mother’s blood in me to help.
I notice a four-legged absence. I look around for the badger. He is not in his usual spot, the rug by the hearth, but then as the days have grown longer he has been roaming about the house more, seemingly restless. Perhaps he is in the kitchen, begging food from Aelfrith. He will be so fat soon.
My sister is rolling out dough; a dozen apples sit on the bench, waiting to be peeled. Beside them, a bucket of blackberries, lush and dark. But there is no sign of the badger.
“Where is he? Where is Brock?”
Aelfrith looks at me in surprise. “He wanted to go out.”
The kitchen door stands open. From the threshold I survey the green grass and the plants, growing thickly in the house-garden.
There is no sign of him.
No track, no trail, no hint.
I run out, to the stables. Edda has a curry comb and is grooming Hengroen.
“Have you seen him? Have you seen the badger?” I ask, uncaring that my voice is breaking.
She shakes her head, and tuts. “You knew he would go, Gytha. I know you’re fond of him, but he’s a wild creature. It’s not as if he’s a dog or a horse.”
I knew the spell would end. I knew he would change back, but I thought he would stay. I thought he would wait. I thought I could find something in the grimoire, some means to make him transform for good, to keep him with me.
A breeze starts up but the dancing air does nothing to lift my spirits. I did not think his badgerish instincts would lead him away from me so soon. The itching of my punctured finger is all I have left.
It is only three days later that I see the client again.
I thought I would have longer. I had planned to leave when he’d collected his finished product, when I had both book and badger. I had planned to run and find another life, but with my love departed, I had fallen into a funk. I had lost the will to move. I lost any care that the golden-haired man might try one of his new spells and find it did not work. That he would try another and it, too, would not work. And another and another until he realised that I had copied each and every enchantment, each and every curse, incorrectly. Just a tiny detail in each, a line missing, an ingredient changed, a direction left out, an instrument added.
Sitting on the window seat in my room, I see the man breaking out of the woods, his long knife catching the sun, and I finally rediscover the will to move. I bundle the grimoire into a satchel and drape the bag’s strap across my chest. I clatter down the stairs, run into Edda, who protests, until I put a hand over her mouth, the bandage still on the finger that will not heal.
“Sister, if you never listen to me again, listen now. Lock the doors. Do not let anyone in, especially not that man, the handsome man. Don’t let him in, Edda, no matter what. Keep all the doors locked. I am sorry for whatever I may have brought down upon you.”
I flee before she can answer. I tear out the door, creep around the corner of the house, then make sure the client catches sight of me. He gives a sound somewhere between a yell and a scream, but all rage, and pounds after me. It’s the only thing I can do, to draw him away from my family. As I run, I feel myself pulled onward, my direction not as haphazard as I planned. My feet seem to have a plan of their own.
I know these woodlands far better than he. I know the paths both seen and hidden, I dart between trees, under hanging mosses, I hurdle over rocks and stiles and rills, but still he keeps on my trail. I think of the words I’ve practised these past weeks.
Then, all is silence. I stop, wait, turning, turning, turning, trying to see if he is anywhere in sight. From behind a huge oak, he lunges, the knife preceding him and slicing across my left side, not enough to kill, but to wound, to hurt. I swing the heavy satchel up at him and catch him in the face. He goes down like a sack of potatoes. I run.
I keep running, fleeing into the darkest, deepest part of the wood, bleeding, weakening, aching, my lungs burning, my legs shaking. Silently I mouth the spell, the spell on which I pinned my last hopes, try to feel it taking effect but there is nothing. In a green hollow, a spot dotted with mounds and slopes, I trip over a fallen branch and the breath whumps out of me. I hit my chin and bite my tongue and taste iron. Behind me I can hear the crashing, the swearing, the inexorable rampaging of the golden-haired man.
My injured finger tingles, twinges, burns. I hear a chittering, a squeak, a growl close by. Searching, I find the mouth of a hole and in that mouth a creature of black and white, a fine well-fed badger, who calls to me. At last I think Make a noise, make a sound, if it cannot be heard it cannot be made! and I finally I speak aloud the couplet Larcwide pointed out that day at the abbey. With a shaking voice I speak through blood that spatters the ground. I scramble up, try to stand, but my entire body convulses, arcs in on itself. The hand with the injured finger curls beyond my will, as does the other. They turn ebony with fur, the nails elongating, becoming hard horn. I drop on all fours and shudder as the transformation completes.
The boar’s call changes, the noise more urgent. With the strap of the satchel still around my new shoulders, I scamper up the hillock, and follow my love down the tunnel and into the sett. The book is dragged along behind, getting caught now and then, but the corridors are wide enough for it to get through with a tug or two. We come to a large chamber filled with clean straw; the strap slips from me, the book’s progress halting, pushing up a wave of the dry yellow covering that will eventually settle over it.
I can no longer hear the sounds aboveground of a man thwarted and driven beyond his patience. I cannot hear the raging and the cries of loss. I lie still and my mate snuffles at the wound in my side, licking it clean. He curves around me, our black and white fur a chessboard match. Even as I hope my family will be safe, I begin to forget Fox Hollow House. Ideas about books and inks and pages and covers all subside into a dim memory place. I begin to think of worms and beetles, of windfall apples, blackberries, and wild cherries. I begin to think badgerish thoughts.
The Tallow-Wife
Cordelia does not think about the things she has lost.
She does not think on the children, or her husband, or the fine house in Lodellan. She does not think on the jewellery, or the dresses, or the shoes. She does not think on her former status, on the Sunday afternoon teas, the Saturday morning bruncheons, or the Friday night balls. She does not think of her sister, or her friends, or the shades of her dead parents who surely grow even paler with shame. Nor of all the handkerchiefs with knots tied in them to ensure good luck, every one of which failed dismally to do its allotted task.
No, Cordelia thinks only of the lengths she must cut with the dull knife. Of the quantities she must measure so carefully to ensure neither wastage, nor excess. The turnkeys who appear daily at the barred window only ever hand out the precise amounts needed to create three dozen candles at a time.
Any less and there will be trouble. Any more will be an equal calamity, for it means she’s skimped on the quality and girth, that the women who want these things will know they are lesser . . . women like she once was . . . and they will not buy them. Or, worse still, they will buy them, find them wanting, and return them, demanding their good gold back. E
ither way Cordelia will be punished.
She wishes the candles were of a much different sort.
But at night, after she extinguishes the tiny ceramic stove where she melts the wax, when she closes her eyes, when sleep will no longer be denied, when the groans of other inmates and creaks of the old prison ship recede, when the rock and pitch of the hulk is gentle as a cradle, then she dreams. When she fingers the raised edges of the scar on her shoulder, traces the rough petals, the scabby stem. When she curls herself into a cold ball, settles her hands on the concave stomach that should by now have been convex, then she dreams of all she has lost. She dreams and it feels so real that she prays not to wake up. She prays that sleep will take her and hold her and keep her. She prays death will come while she slumbers so the memories she carries with her into darkness are those of life before.
The front parlour is cold when Cordelia enters, and she glances immediately at the hearth, which is stacked full with logs, none alight. She rolls her eyes; the tweeny cannot take instruction, or refuses to do so. Not enough lightwood, again. Not enough care or attention paid when Cordelia has gone to the trouble of crouching beside her and showing her how to do it properly. The girl is sullen, or has been noticeably so for a sennight. Cordelia refrains from thinking stupid, for it seems unfair—she’s seen Merry embroider some exquisite kerchiefs and shawls, make cutwork and bobbin lace finer than anything they’ve ever imported, sew the most sublime dresses and frockcoats. Not stupid, no, but perhaps merely resentful of things that do not revolve around her talents.
Cordelia sighs and kneels, removes the excess wood, replaces it with extra kindling: twigs, shreds of old broadsheet, and the tiniest length of char cloth. She breathes the prayer Mrs Bell taught her when she was little, an invocation to the hearth-sprites. She finds the flint and steel where Merry has discarded them, and strikes, once, twice, then the tinder takes. Soon delicate golden flames are licking at the larger pieces, seducing them, convincing them to burn. Cordelia smiles. This is her favourite task, though it’s beneath her nowadays. She loves the simple ritual with all its power and import. So elementary, yet so essential.
She gives the blaze a last nod, a grateful thanks whispered, then stands, her palms rubbing against each other to remove any dirt or dust, finally smoothing out the cream and blue skirts of her dress, making sure no soot has impressed itself on the fine fabric. She won’t speak to Merry, no, but she will tell the housekeeper, Mrs Bell—the tweeny’s aunt—to tend to this chore herself. They have an understanding: Mrs B had worked for Cordelia’s parents, tended the girl from her cradle, then accompanied her when she’d come to Lodellan to marry. Sometimes Mrs B still called her “dearling” when no one else can hear. Cordelia does not wish Merry removed or harshly berated—gods know she wishes the girl some happiness!—but she would like on winter days to come down in the mornings to warmth and a fire crackling sweetly.
Out in the hallway, there is a breeze, colder even than the unlit parlour was, and Cordelia frowns. She soon finds the source. One panel of the front double-doors with its frosted and etched crystal panes is wide open, chill pouring in and bringing with it the smell of newly baked bread wafting up from Bakers’ Lane. She makes an exasperated noise—not a curse for that would be ill-bred—and bustles forward. Merry is too careless; with the recent robberies in their neighbourhood this is utterly reprehensible! Despite Cordelia’s weakness for lame ducks and a belief that better human nature can always spring forth, given the right encouragement, she does have her limits. But when she steps onto the black marble stoop (which gleams—for all her faults, Merry keeps it brilliant, as well as rubbing coarse salt into it once a month to keep away ill luck), she loses impetus.
The clamour of carriages and horses masks Cordelia’s footfalls, and Merry, whose attention is focused on the lad at the bottom of the stairs, does not hear her. The youth is tall, flame-haired, sapphire-eyed, milk-skinned. Cordelia recognises him only because she’s seen him at Belladonna Considine’s home. A footman Bella had apprenticed to the aging valet whose service was coming to an end. The boy would learn from and care for the old man at the same time, ensuring that the House of Considine was always tended by loyal staff. Cordelia had hoped for something similar with Mrs B and Merry, which is why Annie, the parlour maid, has been freed of several of her duties: so Merry might learn by doing. Cordelia believes strongly that managing can only be done when you understand a task fully through experience, and if Merry is to replace Mrs B in the fullness of time, she must be properly prepared.
This young man is certainly pretty to look at, definitely prettier than their own footman whose plainness of face is quite astonishing. But this one, oh this one! the breadth of his shoulders, the slenderness of his waist and hips, the length of his legs in the fitted trews, demand attention. Pretty, yes, but oh! Now Cordelia notices that Merry is shivering in her mint-green brocade frock with white lace at the collar and wrists. No, worse, more than shivering, this is a tremor, the girl is shaking from head to toe as if in the throes of a fever. Cordelia raises a hand, opens her mouth—
—the boy spies her and the shift in his gaze makes Merry turn. Cordelia feels all her annoyance drain away. The girl’s face is deathly pale, her eyes red-rimmed, and tears have drifted down her rounded cheeks. Her dirty-blond hair is untidy as if she’s run troubled fingers through it, and her bottom lip trembles. Cordelia is face-to-face with another’s agony and it makes her throat seize up. And Merry, poor Merry does not wish to be seen like this. Her gaze at first burns with hatred and resentment to be found thus, then it softens as pain comes to the fore, overwhelms her pride.
At last Cordelia swallows, once, twice.
“Don’t forget to lock the door when you come in, it’s cold,” she says quietly and Merry nods, as if grateful to have an excuse to cut short whatever is passing between her and the pretty boy at the bottom of the stairs.
Inside, Cordelia rests her head against the wood of the doorframe, listening carefully as if she might hear something from the mummers left on the stoop, but there is nothing, merely the noises of the street, strangely louder.
“What are you doing, Dellie?”
Cordelia jumps, pushes away, and moves down the hallway to where her sister waits at the entrance to the library. She doesn’t want Bethany to see Merry’s pain; she’s been aware for some time now that the two do not get along. Nor do they need to, she supposed, Bethany isn’t a servant and Merry is, but sometimes Bethany goes out of her way to be mean. Perhaps it is because they are closer in age, because Merry grew up in Cordelia’s house and Bethany came to it somewhat, although not much, later.
Bethany’s golden hair is several shades darker than Cordelia’s, and her eyes a paler shade of green, but there is no denying they are sisters. Bethany is taller, despite being the younger; where Cordelia is buxom, Bethany is a willow; where Cordelia will pour oil on troubled waters, Bethany will often put a match to the oil purely for the sport of watching things burn. But not all the time; only when she’s taken by a spirit of mischief. There’s no true harm in her sister, thinks Cordelia.
“What are you doing, Dellie?” repeats Bethany, a novel in one hand, her burgundy skirts bunched in the other as if they are an impediment to movement, though the young woman is quite still. “Is it Merry mooning over that boy again?”
Cordelia does her best not to show surprise, but of late her sister has been different. She wonders if it’s Bethany’s age, though she herself was married and a mother by the time she was eighteen. Once they shared everything, now it seems Bethany keeps secrets and lets them out only when it will embarrass others. Cordelia has often thought this behaviour stems from her sister feeling untethered in the household and their best efforts, hers and Edvard’s, to make it otherwise, appear to have failed. Or sometimes at least.
It’s not as if Bethany’s some penniless maid who must marry where she can for security. Cordelia and Edvard have always made it clear they plan to settle a considerable sum on her as w
ell as a house—not one in the Cathedral Quarter, no, but certainly a more than respectable merchant’s abode, something only Bethany will own—either upon her wedding or her eighteenth birthday, the latter event being but a few weeks away. The former is a different matter entirely: the marriage proposals, which once flew thick and fast, have become rarities. The bucks of the city initially thought Bethany a challenge, yet the sheer constancy, the unwavering tenor, of her refusals had beaten them down. Cordelia has heard her sister described as an unwedable, unbedable Atalanta, and worse, when the men who come to drink her husband’s brandy and smoke his cigars think she cannot hear. She wonders if Bethany has heard them, too.
“I thought I would take the children to the fair after lunch, Bethany. Will you come with us?”
“I’m otherwise occupied, Dellie, I’m sorry.” She smiles impishly, a child again. “But will you bring me a bag of sweeties? The hard sort, the rock that crunches between your teeth and makes your tongue fizz so! You know I love such confectionery.”
Cordelia laughs; her concerns melt.
“Of course! I—”
A clamour comes from the floor above, from Victoria’s bedroom by the sound of it. Cordelia’s only daughter is shrieking, a sound so high-pitched she can barely discern any words at all—her tone, and projection demonstrate the singing lessons have not been wasted. In response Torben shouts he didn’t take her precious brooch, and Victoria parries that he did, he did, he did. Whatever thoughts Cordelia might have expressed to her sister are lost, and she gently touches Bethany’s shoulder in apology, then picks up her pace, mounts the gold and black coloured wrought iron staircase, girding herself for the battle.
The travelling show comes to Lodellan once a year, and Cordelia is sure she recognises faces amongst the older members of the troupe. The children look forward to the event, although Henry’s expression is torn between excitement and embarrassment, as if he feels himself too told to enjoy such pastimes. But he did not refuse to accompany his siblings, and he has his arm linked with hers as they walk beneath the makeshift archway the travellers erect every year to claim their space outside the walls of the city. Merry, her expression serene and sweet as if nothing untoward occurred this morning, walks a little ahead with Victoria and Torben, one on each side, their hands in hers. Cordelia drops several coppers and one quarter-gold into the palm of the wizened woman at the entrance and her generosity is rewarded with a smile, no less genuine for its lack of dentition.
A Feast of Sorrows, Stories Page 22
