by Iris Anthony
He broke off the heel and handed it to me.
It was very good. Quite good, in fact, though not quite so fine as the bread my father made. I waved the man into the line and stepped back to survey the crowds.
I wondered that day and the next and the one after it whether I ought to have left Signy at all. There were benefits to being a baker.
A hot oven to warm the home. Bread without end for the children.
There had been ten of us at my father’s house. A brood of brothers and sisters. And there had been cousins, as well. My family had flowed along with the river from Signy-sur-vaux out to l’Abbaye and even unto Dommery.
Why had I ever left the place?
I’d had bread in abundance and a fire that had rarely ever gone out…though in the summer, with the fires roaring, I might as well have lived in the pit of hell.
My father had never understood why I could not be content. “You want to be the only Boulanger who makes no bread?” That’s what he’d asked me when I told him I was leaving for the army.
And that’s when I’d had to tell him the truth. “It’s not what I want to do,” I’d said. I didn’t mind the fires in the winter. Or the fall or the spring. I liked the smell of bread rising. I didn’t even mind kneading it. I just didn’t want to become known as the man who made bread.
He’d thrown up his flour-drenched hands, loosing a fine, dusty cloud that settled upon his shoulders as he spoke. “What does that have to do with anything? You’re a Boulanger! And boulangers make bread.”
It had everything to do with it in my opinion. That’s why I’d joined the army. Once he’d gotten used to the idea, my father had claimed it as his own. And when I was posted to the border, he’d told everyone in town I would soon make my fortune catching smugglers.
And I might have. Had I caught any of them.
So how was I supposed to write him and tell him I’d failed? Again. At something that was supposed to be so simple to do? I couldn’t decide which would be worse: working for the lieutenant who expected so very much, or working for my father who was content with so very little.
Chapter 11
The Dog
Rural Flanders
Hunger had gnawed a hole right through my belly and come out on the other side. I knew it, because I did not hunger anymore. Neither did I sleep. Neither did I hear.
I did nothing.
I was nothing.
There was nothing.
Nothing but the box.
I woke, though I had not been sleeping. I woke to the scent of something sweet. Something clean. I was out of the box, and the bad master was in front of me. I could see his feet.
“Drink.”
In front of his feet was a bowl.
“Drink, Chiant!”
I wanted to drink from it, but I couldn’t get my head to move.
He reached out, grabbed one of my ears, and jerked on it to lift my head. Then he slid the bowl beneath my chin with his foot and let go my ear.
My head fell into the bowl.
“Drink!”
I wished I could drink. I opened my mouth enough to let my tongue fall out. The liquid was sweet, but I could manage only one lick.
“Do I have to feed you myself?”
He grabbed my head, hooked a finger between my jaws, and forced them open. Then he took up the bowl and poured it down my throat.
I could not swallow fast enough, and most of it ran down my muzzle to my paws.
“Emmerdeur!”
Kicking the bowl away, he shoved me back into the box and sealed it up. I licked my paws where the liquid had spilled, and I did not stop until I had consumed it all. After a while, I began to hear the birds again. And the squirrels. And soon, I felt my strength returning.
With the bowl had come a memory. The sweetness of the liquid had served as a reminder. I remembered everything now. That bowl would be followed by another. And another. And finally, I would be freed.
I turned onto my side, rolled into myself, and at long last, I slept. I dreamt the memory of a hushed whisper and a hand that stroked my fur. Moncherargent.
Moncher, Moncher, Moncher.
•••
When I woke, it was to the sound of footsteps approaching my box.
I curled into a ball and hid my nose beneath my paws.
A nail pulled through wood, and then a wall came off my box.
I blinked at the sudden invasion of light. Slunk back into a shadow.
Something struck the top of the box.
I flung myself against the back wall.
“Come out!” The box shuddered.
I curled back up into a ball.
“Chiant! I give you something to drink. That’s all. See? Here.”
I heard the sound of something sliding along the ground and lifted my face so I could see. It was a bowl. I raised my nose and took a sniff.
It was a bowl of something sweet.
I raised an ear.
Listened.
“Are you coming out?”
I let my ear drop, pressing it tight against my head.
The bad master’s face appeared in front of the bowl. “Drink, damn you!”
He shoved the bowl toward me with his foot.
The smell of it flooded my nostrils and brought hunger creeping back into my belly. I put forward one foot, stepping out from the shadow.
“Oui. That’s it. Drink.” His face disappeared.
I waited a moment to make sure it would not return. Then I stepped forward. Raised my nose. Sniffed.
The bad master was nearby. I could smell the sour scent of him. I took another sniff. He was not too near. Perhaps if I drank quickly…I put my head into the bowl and lapped it up as fast as I could. But I was too slow.
The wall hit me on the snout as it came down.
And as I pulled back away from the bowl, as I retreated into the box to the safety of darkness, the wall was pounded back into place. The next time he came, I would be ready. The next time, I would not cower in the box. I would not creep out to drink. The next time he came, I would jump right over the bowl, take to the forest, and run straight to my other master. That is what I would do.
I would do everything right this time.
And I would never be sent away again.
•••
I woke to the sound of a door opening. I raised an ear.
It was the door to the house.
I crouched. Tensed.
The wall came off my box, and a bowl was placed in front of me.
Ignoring it, I made ready my escape.
But then…
My nose picked up the scent of the liquid…so sweet. I could not keep hunger from rallying inside me.
No. All I had to do was run. I would run and run and run and not stop until I came to the good master’s house. And he would feed me all I wanted and just a little bit more.
I looked out beyond the bowl to the forest. It waited for me.
The wind blew a breeze into my box, and it brought with it the scent of the bowl. It smelled so good.
Perhaps…just a little sip. Just one.
I crept forward, looking at the bowl.
Just one sip. What could it hurt?
I put my head out of the box. I looked around, but I could not see the master. I could smell him, I could hear him breathing, but I could not see him.
Just one sip.
One quick sip, and then I would run. I would run so fast he would not catch me.
I lowered my snout to the bowl and thrust out my tongue for a quick sip. It tasted so good. And as it went down my throat, it warmed everything inside. Just one sip more. What harm could it do?
I stuck my snout down deepe
r into the bowl…let my tongue linger in the liquid.
What was I doing!
Quickly, I lapped up another sip. And then another. And one sip more.
The wall caught my paw as it came crashing down.
I drew it out from underneath the wood with a yelp. By the time I had finished licking it, finished tending to it, I was trapped.
Again.
•••
I slept. But I did not dream of cream. I dreamed a memory, one of whips and muzzles.
In my dreams, the bad master carried me into his house.
I hated being in his house. It smelled stale and sour. But being in his house meant the time was near. It meant my wounds would be treated, and my belly would be given food.
All I had to do before being freed was endure one thing more.
In my dream, I whined at the memory of that one thing.
The bad master laid me on a pile of straw, but he kept hold of my feet, wrapping a cord about them and pulling it tight. Then he took a pair of shears and started to work on my fur. Beneath the bite of the blades, it fell from my skin in clumps.
After he finished clipping me, he drew a pot of water from the fire and dipped a piece of cloth into it. Then he rubbed it over what was left of my fur.
Even in my dream, I was thirsty. I leaned my head over and tried to lick up the water.
He cuffed me on the nose.
“It’s for cleaning, not for drinking. You will have enough to drink, more than enough, when you get to my cousin’s.” The master finished cleaning me, and then he took up a razor. Like always, it got caught on my skin.
I yelped, turning to try to lick at it.
“Connard! Stop moving!” He tried once more.
Again the razor bit into me.
“Chiard! You’re bleeding all over!”
He dropped the razor and stalked to a cupboard. Came back with a bottle, which he raised to his lips.
I was still thirsty. I licked my nose. I wished he would let me have a drink from his bottle.
“Perhaps I should give you some too, Chiant. To send you faster through the forest?” He laughed. “Non. This drink is too good for you.” He took another sip and then set the bottle down. When he picked up the razor, it went better that time.
“Here, Chiant.” He tossed a blanket over me. I curled into myself beneath it, trying to hide from what I knew was coming.
He used it to dry my skin, turning me this way and that beneath it. After he uncovered me, he unwound the cord that bound my feet and set me on a table. And then he placed a piece of fabric across my back.
“Silk. How do you like that? Nothing but the best for the best. That’s what we’re paid for.”
I liked this part of the dream. The fabric was soft against my bare skin, and it kept me warm.
“So. What do you think of that?” He held out a long length of a white web. I could see the fire’s light through it.
I stood, completely still, as he wound it around my body. To move even one muscle would mean…I whined at the thought of what he would do to me as a nightmare began to nibble at the edges of my dream.
“Don’t even think about it, Chiant!”
Around and around and around the web went. And then another piece of fabric was placed atop it. The next part was the worst. I cowered as I saw him pick up the hide.
“Come, Chiant. Don’t you wish to see your brother?”
I wanted to back away from him, but I wouldn’t. I couldn’t.
The first time he’d done this to me, I had squatted on the table with the web wound around my body, and I had pissed into it just for spite.
He had pulled out the nails from one of my back paws. Only the thought of fires and laps and cream had pushed me through the forest that night to the good master’s house.
I heard myself whine, but though I tried to rouse myself from the dream, I couldn’t.
This part was the worst. It brought back memories of a time when my brother and I wrestled in front of the fire at the good master’s house. Memories of a time when we slept entwined, his head resting on my belly. Legrand he was called. He was bigger than me. But somehow, whenever we played, he always ended up on the bottom.
He always let me win…until that day.
Until the day when the bad master came and took him into the good master’s barn.
I followed, because I did not know then how my life was to be. I did not have any knowledge of switches or boxes, of hunger or thirst. I only knew sleep was for dreams and life was for play. I followed to see what new game there might be.
But I followed too late.
By the time I reached the barn, the bad master had already plunged the knife into Legrand’s throat. His blood had already spilled out upon the ground, and his tongue hung, motionless, from his mouth.
The smell, that odor of un-life, had filled my nose and stilled my legs. I could not breathe. I could not move. I could do nothing but watch.
I watched as the bad master shoved a hook through Legrand’s leg and hung him from the ceiling. I watched as all Legrand’s blood drained out into a pail. I watched as the bad master took a knife and began to separate Legrand’s skin from his body. I heard the tear of skin from flesh, the rasping of knife against bone. And I watched him peel the fur back from my brother’s body in one big piece.
And then he turned, and he came at me, just like he was doing now. “And now, Chiant, it is you who are Legrand.” He said those words that day just the same way he said them in my dream.
I cowered at the horror of it, but I dared not move. If only I could close up my nose. If only the scent of Legrand’s hide were not mixed with the odor of death.
The master came at me from behind.
Even in my dream I closed my eyes, for I did not wish to see what I could not help but feel.
He lifted first one back leg, then the other, threading them through Legrand’s hide and pulling it up over my back the way I’d seen the good master pull on his clothes. He pulled Legrand all the way up to my neck.
I shrunk from the feel of him. From the scent of him.
Coming forward, he lifted my front foot, tugging it through the place where Legrand’s front leg used to go. Then he did the same with the other.
I was bound up with, I was shrouded in, Legrand. The weight of him, the feel of him set me to shivering. The memory of him made me whine.
“Hello, Legrand. It has been a long time since we see you! Ey—no crying, Chiant. He was such a good brother to grow so big for you. Such a good brother to let you borrow his coat.” He put his hands around my padded body, picked me up, and set me on the ground.
I woke with a bark. And then I sat there in the dark of the box, and I shivered.
Chapter 12
Lisette Lefort
Château of Souboscq
The province of Gascogne, France
The Count of Montreau rumbled into our courtyard one afternoon at the beginning of October. His carriage raised a cloud of dust that rained down upon the outbuildings and the courtyard.
Though he retained his striking beauty, he seemed to have grown thinner. He possessed a feral grace that reminded me of the fox that lived in the wood lining the estate. There was both refinement and menace in each of his steps. And his clothes served only to heighten that impression. Even veiled by the settling cloud of dust, the colors shone. I knew, from regrettable experience, they were made from only the finest materials. They would have put my own gown to shame three years ago when it had been new.
As the count disappeared into the château, Alexandre came toward the barn, as if he knew where I was hiding. His gaze raked the gloom as he stood at the threshold. Between us, a ray of light had pierced the stone walls, slashing through the darkness. In its shimmer, dust floated in
the musty air, glistening like gold.
I clung, even more desperately, to my shadow.
“I know you’re here, Lisette.”
He always seemed to know where to find me.
“If you wish to remain veiled by shadows, you should not wear so pale a color.”
I looked down at my worn and faded brocade that glowed even in the near absence of light. “It’s the only gown I have.” Least the only one that did not require me to pull in my shoulders, tighten my fraying laces, and flatten my bosom to don it. It was a difficult task to maintain the outer aspect of a viscount’s daughter, when that viscount’s monies had been so drastically reduced.
But worse than that, in my deepest heart I desired all of those things I had made certain we would never have. All of those things we had possessed when Maman had still been living. I craved the silks and the jewels and all of the comforts I had been born to. All of the luxuries we had sold to repay our debt. Was that not fruitless and vain? Perhaps it was the thorn in my flesh: to be always aware of what I might have been. Of what I might have had.
An eternal penance.
That’s why I so often walked the ridge of an evening. There was beauty enough in the hill and in those mists for the taking. Though it often made me wonder what my mother would think of me now.
I tried to be like her; I tried to be good. I tried to ask for nothing more than what was needed. And most of all, I tried to damp my desires. ’Twas my impulses that had betrayed me. Everyone thought me kind and meek and unfailingly mild. I hoped it was only I who knew the truth.
Alexandre’s eyes had darkened as he looked at me. “You should have trunks filled with gowns. And slippers in abundance.”
It brought to mind the words he had spoken at dusk on the hillside, and an uncharacteristic blush burned my cheeks. Perhaps I should have. But it was my own fault I would never possess them. I considered burrowing my bare feet into the straw, but he could not see them from where he was standing. What did it matter in any case? I saved my slippers for only the most special of occasions. There were precious few of those to be had anymore.
