The Moon Child

by Mark Lucek

  Table of Contents

  title page

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  The Moon Child

  by

  MARK LUCEK

  Chapter One

  Her dreams were filled with blood and fire and death. In a dark corner of the tent Iwa turned, reindeer skins wrapped tightly around her as if to draw in the warm sleepy smells of sweat and hides. Still she could not shake the dreams. Ill-formed visions crowded round as she slept fitfully, half-glimpsedfigures that melted into the night.

  Am I a child to be so frightened by the dark? She scolded herself as, still only half-awake, she watched the breeze pick its way across the tent. Outside the air was cold, a wind cutting in from across the great river to ruffle the flames of the clan fire built in the ritual place along the shore. All was quiet, except for the occasional laughter of the last hunters gathered around the flames and the chatter of the reeds.

  By her side, baby Tomaz kicked. ‘Hush now,’ she whispered as she cradled him. ‘There’s not long to go before we reach the summer camp and you will watch the sun dance across the great river and there’ll be fish to eat.’

  Carefully she tucked the furs about him, remembering the taste of fresh-caught carp and loganberries. All winter long there’d been little more than smoked meat and roots. The hunters should have caught more meat but the herds were skittish, not keeping to their usual grazing places. Now the thaw had come and, with that, the clan turned from the deep forest and began their ritual journey as they followed the herds down through the forest to the great river.

  Not that there was much in the way of fish, not yet. That would come when the clan moved further along the shore to the summer camp, where the best of the fishing would be had. If only the herds would hurry, but it would take more than a moon’s passing before they were ready to move along the shore.

  If there are any herds, she thought gloomily, as she remembered how the hunters had returned. It was as if the animals had fled. They’d laid their traps well, hidden in ambush along the trails, but there was hardly a sign of a badger or a fox, let alone anything larger.

  ‘The Leszy have not been kind,’ Godek, the hunt master, muttered as he led the hunters into the camp, his spear dragging behind him and his quiver still full. ‘If the forest spirits do not cast their favours upon us then not even the fastest arrow or the strongest spear will avail.’ At least he’d managed something. Across his shoulders hung a deer, a mere winter buck of gristle and bone. Few of the other hunters had made even a single kill.

  ‘Always you blame the woodland spirits,’ old Katchka was quick to scold. ‘And the Leszy who looks over this place,’ she paused to make the ritual gesture of supplication, ‘has always been good to us. I glimpsed him in the wind as I dug for roots.’

  ‘Then you have been blessed with a vision,’ Godek said as he handed his spear to a waiting boy and pulled the deer from his shoulders. ‘But other Leszy have driven the herds from their paths. We cannot hunt what is not there. Animals are not roots and berries to keep to their place and wait for you to pick them.

  ‘Marzanna, the mistress of winter, keeps her hold over the earth still and,’ he pointed to the river and the fingers of ice still gathered in the centre, ‘the waters do not seem to keep to the season. Perhaps Kostroma has forgotten us. We should sacrifice to her again so that she will breathe the thaw into the earth and bring the herds to the river. Tonight, I will offer her the best meat of my kill wrapped in fat so that she will be pleased with us once more.’

  But the women were not impressed. ‘Why is it that the animals have gone?’ they muttered as they began to skin the carcasses and decide which meagre strips of meat to dry on the branches. ‘We have not even heard a bird sing. Marzanna has silenced them with her cold and Kostroma will not come to breathe spring into the earth.’

  By Iwa’s side Tomaz shifted, his legs digging into her through hides and furs. ‘Are you hungry, little one? Do not worry,’ she continued as she remembered Godek’s words, ‘the first of the kill does not make the season.’

  ‘Can’t you leave an old woman to her rest?’ From the other side of the tent Katchka stirred, her deerskin blankets drawn thickly around her. ‘Isn’t it enough that these old bones have had to scamper across forest paths still thick with snow and ice?’

  ‘He could do with a walk outside to settle him,’ Iwa said, hoping the baby wouldn’t start to cry.

  ‘Go if you must. What am I, a newborn goat with fur to keep the chill from my bones?’

  ‘Hush now.’ Iwa hugged the baby to her. She could still feel the last traces of the cold etched into the furs. It hadn’t been the worst of winters, with only a thin film of snow so that the herds were easy to follow as they drew deeper into the forest and skirted the base of the mountains. But it’d been a long trek all the same.

  At first the animals, elk and deer, had kept to their well-worn paths so that the hunters were able to keep close to the camp. Iwa had been able to sneak out and follow them almost to the hunting grounds before she’d been caught, a stray footfall marking her out as the hunters stalked close. Katchka had beaten her raw, but it’d been worth it to get so far. Who would want to stay around the camp when the herds were about? But such things were reserved for the men. Women were too weak for the hunt. Not that she’d ever believed that, though her feet had ached for days after.

  The forest tracks were easy enough to trek along. All but the youngest, or oldest, could move from camp to camp easily enough that way, but the herds often kept deeper into the forest where the trees grew thicker and the tracks were muddier and far harder to follow.

  ‘You’d never have the patience for the hunt,’ Godek scoffed. ‘You women are skittish like summer bees. And you especially.’ He laughed as he prodded her in the direction of the camp with a hard jab of his spear butt. ‘Even the winds could not be so restless or the leaves so chatty.The hunter had to be ready to run too, even in the deeper parts of the forest where the roots grew thickly and sometimes all but smothered the trails. For all its size, an elk buck or deer could run fast and deep, and a boar more so. The men often talked about the great chases through the woods and the hardness of the kill. But most of the time they lay in wait, hardly moving, sometimes hidden in the undergrowth or the trees for days as they watched for the first signs of prey.

  Under the skins, baby Tomaz kicked again and she held him close, not wanting to leave the warmth of the tent as she cast anxious glances to the sleeping form of old Katchka. She was too young to see that the woman had suffered more than most through the long winter. Not that Katchka would ever admit to it, and Iwa was too young to see past the woman’s scolding tongue. In fact to most of the clan she had seemed as she ever was, hobbling through the snows after some healing root or muttering her prayers as the clan made their way past the grizzled pine where a Leszy lived. Only Katchka was able to see the forest spirit, though many of the women prayed to it, for it was said that you could foretell the future in the pattern of the bark, or the way that the moss grew across the wood.

  Some
times the Leszy would weave a spell into the branches, still thick with ice, and there were those who’d hear the spirit’s laughter when the wind hummed through the tree and the Leszy dropped sodden lumps of snow on those below. The Leszy would often behave like that, and Katchka was one of the few who could hear its merriment as a thick clod fell on someone’s head. But, whenever the clan came across the tree, they would know that the herds had turned towards the river and the cold was about to wane.

  Few of the clan bothered Katchka on the long march, except when they were sick. Nobody could mix hawthorn and ivy like her and she could sing more of the healing songs and chants than any of the other women. Even old Stefina didn’t know half as many, for all her age and pride.

  At first it’d been cold, hard enough to freeze the breath on your lips, so that the women ached as they set up the hide tents in the gully where the clan kept their winter camp. Katchka was about then, scrabbling for roots, working their flesh into a thick paste with her mortar and pestle. She’d even managed to go into the forest for days looking for raskovnik, though that magical herb eluded her no matter how hard she searched.

  Then the cold had lessened and the snows subsided a little, but the winds turned and, instead of the dry cold that blew down from the mountains, the air was filled with a hard, wet cold that seeped from the river into the women’s clothing and deep into their bones. Katchka felt it reach into the bottom of her spleen and her breath became laboured. Her limbs did not move as they once did and, after a while, she found that her legs had begun to ache though she still insisted on keeping up with the younger women. ‘The winter will claim me soon enough.’ She’d pause to arch her back and look over at the great snow-crusted spine of the mountains. ‘Who then will be there to remember the old ways once I am gone?’

  No, not even Stefina could do that. So Katchka kept on with hardly a murmur and only a few of the sharp-eyed women ever guessed at the agony that dogged her steps. Yet, no matter how she tried, the pain seeped out, souring her temper and quickening her anger.

  Even Iwa was more weary than usual. Katchka had often been rough with her and the old woman had always said that she only allowed the girl in her tent out of respect for her father. Everyone always looked to Yaroslav even though he was not a hunter, and being his daughter had always made Iwa feel special. However, he was often distant with her, so different to the man who sat and joked long around the fire.

  Maybe he remembers my mother. Iwa was quick to stifle the thought. There were times when she saw a different side to him, warmer and more caring, but recently he’d become withdrawn whenever she was near, as if always too caught up with his own thoughts. Under the skins she felt baby Tomaz kick once again and, much against her will, she cradled him to her. If only the thing could keep quiet. ‘Soon we will be at the summer camp and I’ll bring you the prize of the catch, roasted over the fire with loganberries. But you must not be angry if I get hungry and pick at the sides.’

  But it was no good. Tomaz began to cry, his tiny body shivering with tears. ‘Be still, or you’ll bring Katchka down upon us. The thaw hasn’t driven itself into her kicking toe or…’ she paused to draw him close and whisper in his ear, ‘her scolding tongue. There is not such a thaw or frost to dare that.’

  She placed Tomaz back amongst the furs and drew out a piece of silk that she’d filched from one of the traders at the great clan meet. ‘See, this comes all the way from the Arab lands, where they have no trees and the sun beats down hot enough to break rocks at noonday.’

  ‘Thirteen summers old,’ Katchka mumbled, as she pulled her sleeping skins over her, ‘and still she wears her hair unbraided like a child.’

  Iwa gave the old woman a hard look but didn’t bother to reply. She’d always liked the traders’ stories about the snowy Lappish wastes, where strange mages communed with dreadful deities who came to them in the shape of birds with wings of fire that burned green across the sky so that night became bright as day. Or the Saxon lands where people talked in strange tongues so that none could understand their gibberish. The traders called them ‘the nemcy’, which in the language of the clans meant ‘the mute’.

  But it was the tales of far-flung Byzantium, where the god-emperor sat on a golden throne that could see into the hearts and minds of men that she loved the most and, at the clan meet, she was always careful to seek out any who looked like they had a tale or two to tell.

  Now the traders had begun to tell other stories, of the peoples of the fields and the Polish lords who feasted in high halls and fought each other with axes and swords. She’d never had much time for those. Who wants to hear of war and death when there are stories about birds of fire, or veiled women who dance around a golden throne? And anyway, who had ever heard of a land without trees? It was as strange as the Moorish sands or the Lappish snow. The forest extended forever, right to the very ends of the earth, everyone knew that. There was no such thing as the steppe, such things could not exist.

  Except that it was harder to hear any of the good stories now. The reach of the Polish lords had surrounded the mountains and the traders could talk of little else. They all spoke the same language and most of the goods the traders bought were from the towns of the Poles, though they paid in Arab coin and sometimes brought things from farther off. Katchka even had a pot decorated in far off Chola, the land that lay at the far edges of the world. She’d kept that for the most dangerous herbs, banewort cut with a silvered blade at the height of the full moon or foxglove from the deepest forest.

  Not that Iwa was allowed near it all that often. The light gleamed from the polished bronze so that the figures carved around it shimmered and appeared to dance. It must have been ancient, old as the great oaks by the river, there were so many dents and scrapes but that only added to its power. ‘This is a lucky pot,’ the old woman would mutter to herself as she crushed the herbs into it. ‘But be careful, for I do not think it takes to the touch of strangers. Only those who have earned its trust can use it and it does not give its trust easily.’ Then she’d wipe the side with the hem of her gown before pouring out the mixture. ‘She is not to be used lightly and if you do not show the proper respect. Perhaps some spirit lives in it. I’ve glimpsed something in the light of the noonday sun.’

  ‘If only the traders could tell some good stories,’ Iwa murmured to herself. She’d always liked the great clan meet, when the traders would paddle their way up the great river. All the clans would gather in their camps along the shore. There were the Fox Cub and the Salmon. From deeper in the forest would come the Bear Claw and the Eagle clan, though they often left early to hunt in the mountains. Her people were the Bison Grass clan. Since the beginning of all things they’d followed the herds through the forest, hunting elk and deer. They had their god, Karnobog, who lived in the body of a dead bison, which the clan would carry through the forest on a giant litter. Sometimes the god would need a new body to live in and a great feast would be had. That was the only time the clan hunted bison.

  ‘There now,’ Iwa said, as Tomaz reached for the silk. At first she’d hated the child. ‘What do I know about babies?’ she’d pleaded as Katchka handed him over, a tiny pink bundle wrapped in otter skin.

  ‘His mother died in childbirth same as yours,’ Katchka replied stiffly as she made the sign to ward off evil. Already the runes of protection had been dyed across his forehead and woven into the skins, lest some Boginki would come in the night and swap him for an Odmieńce or one of the other changelings.

  But, over the months, the baby had grown on Iwa. Now she whispered a lullaby and saw him giggle. Around her the pictures on the tent shimmered, the sacred runes dyed deep into the fabric. The form of the bison danced amongst the figures of men and the images of flowers and the sacred bison grass.

  Then she froze, the song dead on her lips. A shadow moved across the skins as the wind picked up. ‘Something’s wrong,’ she gasped, as she held the baby to her. But all outside was still, even the voices of the hunters had die
d away.

  Painted deep across the fabric of their tent the outline of a thin blade of bison grass shimmered as the wind rippled across the tent, the colours iridescent in the gloom. Then she knew what was wrong. ‘Wake up, the camp is on fire!’

  ‘What’s this?’ Katchka raised herself on her elbows. ‘These bones are too old to be wasted on your foolishness, girl.’

  But the screaming had already begun. It was as if the entire camp had begun to yell all at once, the noise swelling about her so that Iwa dug her fingers deep into Tomaz’s shoulder.

  ‘Go see what it is, child,’ Katchka snapped, but Iwa could only sit there trembling. Across the skins the shadow grew, the shape of a horned demon with a hand of fire. She could see it, black against the dyed leather, its other hand raised like a hooked claw.

  ‘Have the men gone mad?’ Katchka snapped, but Iwa could only draw away, her eyes blank as she clutched Tomaz to her. She couldn’t breathe, all thought driven from her. This was the thing from the dream. ‘Have they taken too much of the traders’ vodka, or eaten bad roots?’

  But Iwa could only watch as the shadow demon filled the whole side of the tent, her fingers digging so deep that she felt the baby cry out. With a savage lunge the talon tore through the hides, scattering them easily as autumn leaves.

  Suddenly she could move as, once again, the claw tore into the tent, the poles cracking as the hides gave way. Snatching up Tomaz, Iwa screamed and tried to kick herself free of the skins. Too late: the thing was upon her, the single hooked claw reaching for her as the other hand blazed.

  ‘Back to whatever darkness spawned you!’ Katchka raised a dried sprig of purple loosestrife as she began the prayer that would bind the demon to her bidding. The words died in her throat, and the sacred chant was nothing more than a croak.

  But it had been enough to distract the demon, if only for a second. Still clutching the baby, Iwa sprung up. Her one hope was to somehow dodge the thing and make for the tear in the tent. With a roar the flamed hand plunged down, tongues of fire licking past her face.