No current hastened them. Their progress had to be at Merrigutt’s discretion, and to Oona the old woman looked intent on slowness, on careful and delicate appreciation of everything. When Merrigutt allowed paddle to touch water it was only momentary, barely moving them on.
And then Oona said, ‘This place is where you came from.’
Merrigutt said, ‘Is indeed.’ She suddenly half-rose from sitting and said in words so slow they had to be sighed, ‘Here. I suppose we’ll leave the river here.’
The boat eased towards the bank, to a wooden set of steps hanging.
Oona half-stood, then thought of her possessions, then realised – all she had left was the Loam Stone. No cloak of her mother’s making, no satchel, no food packed inside, no knife. She found the other sack that’d been used to hold her body, plucked the Loam Stone from the bottom of the boat and dropped it in.
Slowly, the pair of them helped each other from the boat.
Oona climbed the short steep bank and was stopped, caught sudden by a coupling of anguish and happiness: the touch of grass beneath her feet was a joy she hadn’t realised she missed, so used to it in her Drumbroken life. She found herself smiling.
‘Keep going there,’ Merrigutt told her.
At the top of the bank Oona looked out over a portion of land not flattened and not Blackened but torn across by wind. Low hills were lurking, a shallow rippling still holding some shade of green. She saw trees with pale bark and slim trunks and skinny boughs, tender leaves casting a flurry of turquoise shadows. What she saw was familiar, so she said: ‘My mother was here sometime. Must’ve been. I know this place from a painting she did.’
Oona turned for Merrigutt, but the old woman was already a little ahead.
‘This way here,’ she called to Oona.
They followed a path that feet might’ve walked along in the past, but was almost concealed, so overgrown. Its meander took them between low rise and hollow. Oona saw no houses at all, not a person about, but enough modest life anyway to cheer: a patch of damp snowdrops, flags of winter sun like stepping stones across grass, and then a simple sight that warmed – a single swallow scissoring across sky. They walked. And walked the path all the way to a taste of salt on the tongue, to the sound of distant sounds – a strong sigh in every other moment.
‘The sea,’ said Merrigutt, and she stopped for a moment. Then she continued.
Only a minute more of walking and Oona saw a small cottage settled in a hollow. It was one-windowed, walls white-washed, and had a tough roof on it of what looked like driftwood. Not grand but neat, and simple. And simple was good enough for Oona after all the homes she’d endured in the North. It had a dark door, and some signal was offered of life inside: pale scrolls of smoke straying from a narrow chimney.
Merrigutt said, ‘Let’s go,’ and started to walk down the slope.
‘Who lives here?’ asked Oona.
‘Someone who might help,’ said Merrigutt. Her feet slowed, each step held hovering by uncertainty. ‘Someone who I once relied on more than anything.’
When they reached the cottage, Merrigutt was again full of pause, and when she eventually knocked it was with knuckles so gentle they could hardly have wanted an answer. It took a long time for anything inside to respond. When someone did appear it was two someones – an old woman leaning on a rough driftwood cane, eyes in her head of no colour at all that had to squint and search out her guests, and a young girl.
Oona was suddenly very aware of herself – standing in just her thin dress, hair damp and face mucky, bare-footed, sack hanging from her hand that held the Loam Stone. Her shame increased the more this old woman and young girl looked and looked. Then the old woman’s mouth worked hard to expel a word: ‘What?’
‘It’s me,’ said Merrigutt, her voice small.
‘I know it’s you!’ said the old woman in the doorway, and her jaw shook like a tray seeking spare change. ‘I’m not that far gone! And what do you want coming back here like this, disturbing us?’
Merrigutt had no answer.
The young girl stayed silent, half-hidden behind the old woman.
‘We aren’t asking for much,’ said Merrigutt, voice still soft. ‘Just some food, somewhere to stay even. Bit of rest.’
Silence, and then Oona’s stomach took its chance to growl. They all looked at her.
‘Sorry,’ said Oona. ‘Bloody starving!’
The young girl gasped and slapped a hand to her mouth. It annoyed Oona, this attitude. Irritated her, the whole situation of them standing on the doorstep, so she said, ‘Look: you heard Merrigutt, can we come in or not?’
All heads but Oona’s went into an embarrassed bow.
‘Don’t leave the door open or you’ll let the heat out,’ said the old woman, suddenly, mouth snapping shut on each word. She turned and took herself away from Oona and Merrigutt, followed so close by the young girl.
Oona looked to Merrigutt and asked, ‘Is that us being asked in?’
‘It’s the best we’ll get,’ said Merrigutt.
‘Who are these people anyway?’ asked Oona.
‘The woman,’ whispered Merrigutt, settling one foot on the threshold, ‘is my mother. And the young girl trying to hide herself is my daughter.’
73
One room, and it hadn’t much to make it worthy of the word ‘home’. Only the essential things were in sight: Oona saw two chairs sitting at a scrubbed table, and a tall dresser. A third chair, bit softer, was backed into a corner on its own. Nothing on display, except a large and lurid-looking shrine for the Sorrowful Lady. The flames in their hearth had to make do with a single twist of driftwood to cling to.
Oona held tight to the sack with the Loam Stone in it, and took one of the two chairs going at the table. Everyone gave her a look.
‘I’m tired,’ she said, but it was no attempt at apology.
‘There’s a bit of bread about I suppose,’ said the old woman, sinking onto the soft seat in the corner and turning to face the wall. ‘And the kettle’s only just boiled.’
Merrigutt was the one who went to find food, leaving the room, leaving Oona feeling alone. The young girl stood by the dresser, the old woman kept her face to the wall. Neither spoke. And this was supposed to be Evelyn Merrigutt’s mother and daughter? These two quiet creatures? Mischief made Oona look to the young girl and ask, ‘So you’re not gonna say hello?’
‘Oona,’ said Merrigutt, returning. It was all she said – the look she gave was enough. Oona sighed, and sat silent too.
Merrigutt poured tay the colour of vinegar from a stone crock, and had found a solid loaf of black bread and a earthen dish of butter. Oona wanted something to do (something to eat): she stood and sliced the bread, buttered it thick and was the first to start eating. She’d have liked something more – something heartier and warm – but it would have to do. Roughened wanderer she’d become, Oona crammed as much into her mouth as it would hold, only half-heartedly holding a hand under her mouth to catch any crumb.
Merrigutt gave her mother a small plate with a heel of bread, a tumbler of tay, and asked, ‘Any Invaders, Mammy? Been any trouble?’
‘No,’ said her mother. The old woman took her bread between two fingers and took a large wet mouthful, made wetter by slurps of tea. ‘Not that I’ve got the sight to see anything any more! I’ve not long left, you know. Like the Isle itself – I might not live to see tomorrow!’
‘What about you?’ Oona asked the young girl. ‘Seen any Invaders?’
The girl shook her head, then nodded, then didn’t seem to know what she knew. They ate on in silence.
‘We’ll rest now,’ said Merrigutt, after a while. Oona almost marvelled: so outspoken at all other times, and here was Evelyn Merrigutt shuffling about with head bowed and saying with a horrible sense of sorry, ‘We’ll just have a sleep and then be on our way.’
Merrigutt twitched her head towards the door, and Oona understood it was time to leave the room. But Oona couldn’t stop herse
lf from asking the old woman, ‘Do you not care that your daughter’s back to see you, missus? Do you not care that the whole Isle is going to blazes and she’s doing something to help stop it?’
The old woman turned her old head, colourless eyes quivering on Oona.
‘You don’t know,’ she said. Her mouth went in for another sloppy bite of butter and black bread, tucking it all into the left side of her face to fill out a hollow cheek. ‘You don’t know what my daughter did, do you?’
‘Let’s go,’ said Merrigutt, hand on Oona’s shoulder, moving her towards the door. ‘Please, just leave it all be.’
‘Should be ashamed!’ called the old woman from her soft chair. ‘Should be ashamed coming back here!’
Oona wanted to ask more, but Merrigutt was so keen to steer her from the room. Shoulder to shoulder they walked a short, bare, narrow hall.
‘What’s going on?’ asked Oona. ‘Why’s your own mam treating you like you’ve turned up and flung dirt at her door?’
Merrigutt said nothing.
(Not yet, thought Oona. Not just now).
Short hall ended in another short room: barren but for a tiny window showing green, a narrow bed draped with a quilted bedspread, narrower wardrobe, and a rush-mat on the floor. When the door was shut Oona said again, ‘What’s going on?’ Then she somehow felt the right question would’ve been: What happened here?
Merrigutt sank onto the bed.
‘She’s not had it easy,’ said Merrigutt. ‘You shouldn’t be too hard on her.’
‘You sound like me when I was saying about my granny,’ said Oona. She stood by the wall, arms folded, sack containing the Loam Stone hanging from a hand. ‘And you know what else you said to me then – that people have a choice how to be behaving, no excuse for anything. Remember?’
‘Did I say that?’ said Merrigutt. Her hands held tight to the edge of the bed, like it might suddenly try to tip her off. ‘Sorrowful Lady – don’t I talk some amount of rubbish sometimes?’
‘No,’ said Oona. She sat down on the bed by Merrigutt. ‘You were saying the truth. Now do the same for me – tell.’
Merrigutt nodded, and then asked something Oona couldn’t have expected: ‘You said the Stone was showing things to do with your mother?’
‘Yes,’ said Oona. ‘But why do you –?’
‘Do you remember your mother well?’ asked Merrigutt. She’d turned to face the window. After a moment Oona said, ‘A wee bit, but not much.’ She didn’t say that any memories of her mother had been almost eclipsed by what she’d seen in the Stone.
‘And was she a happy enough woman, or sad?’ asked Merrigutt.
Oona opened her mouth, then realised she had no swift answer, no certainty. So she said, ‘Don’t know. A bit of both. She never did much about the house – that was Granny, and there were rows about it. Bad arguments.’ Oona thought more, and then said, ‘I never even spoke to her much. I was out in the forest with Morris most of the time. It was like … like she was hardly even there.’
Then Merrigutt turned – she was crying.
‘Please,’ said Oona, and her own voice quivered. ‘Tell me what you know.’
‘No,’ said Merrigutt, ‘I’ll not tell you, my girl: I’ll show.’
74
Merrigutt settled a hand on Oona’s and said, ‘Now: see all the nightmares I have in me.’
Slowly, Oona took the Loam Stone from the sack. The warmth of it was a low throb – steady heartbeat, deep breathing. Oona allowed a moment, and then let herself see –
In her mind she saw Merrigutt: girl about to become a woman, standing in the same living room they’d left minutes earlier. Merrigutt’s mother was there too – younger, brighter, smiling. The pair of them were pacing. Barefoot, they wandered the room together. From their fingers fell scarlet – powder being sown slowly like bright seed on every surface. And magic made flowers sprout, sudden spring – daffodil and tulip and rose and crocus, brightest colours bursting from tabletop and floor and dresser and sill and hearth …
Merrigutt and her mother stopped – such smiles, such laughter, no bitter silence.
Oona heard Merrigutt’s mother say, ‘You see now, my girl – see what wonders we can do. We don’t need your father or any other man.’ She linked an arm with Merrigutt, clung to her. ‘So let them stay where they are at the Burren, and we’ll be happy enough here. We’ll always have home as long as we have each other.’
Things began to fade, colour draining from the scene. Merrigutt’s mother was lost. Not gone, if Oona looked close enough, but not as clear as she was. The mother was, Oona understood, suddenly less important. And what grew clearer, what meant more: a boy standing in the living-room. Tall, pale, dark curls, dark-eyed. He was holding Merrigutt’s hand. And Oona felt for the first time that she shouldn’t be seeing, wasn’t decent to be watching … there might’ve been only these two in the world, in this one bright room. So close, they were passing words in whispers that Oona couldn’t hear. Then some sound, some low song from someone approaching on the same path Oona had walked with Merrigutt. Was it Merrigutt’s mother returning? Quickly from his belt the boy plucked a single snowdrop and slipped it into Merrigutt’s hair. Oona heard words this time. He said soft, ‘I would do anything at all for you, Evelyn. Would you do the same?’
Merrigutt nodded.
‘Good,’ said he. ‘Then meet me by the river at dark. Make sure you come just yourself.’
Merrigutt nodded again.
More sound closer, and the boy’s lips pressed a soft kiss to Merrigutt’s cheek and then he was gone.
Oona waited.
The scene in the living room shivered, changed, darkened. Oona heard words familiar, same cry and same kind of pleading she’d heard from her father but from Merrigutt’s mouth –
‘What’s happening to me, Mammy? How can we stop this?’
New sight, same living room: white easing through black outside the window, delicate shreds of snow. Spring was long-gone, a lost season. And Merrigutt was standing, staring down at her mother who was in her softer seat in the corner, facing the wall. Merrigutt was showing her mother her arm, sleeve folded back to the elbow – a grey-whiteness was creeping upwards, ashen stain, fingers as though they could fall away if shown a strong enough breeze.
‘Please!’ said Merrigutt. ‘Do something to stop this, Mammy!’
‘I can’t,’ said Merrigutt’s mother, and still she didn’t look at her daughter. ‘It’s sin that’s made this come upon you. And serves you right! Deceiving me the way you did and getting yourself into this mess. Trust you to let something like this happen, and a grandchild on the way too.’
I’m so slow, thought Oona. So slow to see things clearly.
‘It’s not sin,’ said Merrigutt, and her unaffected hand went to the bold curve of her belly. ‘Not just me. Same thing is happening to all the girls. We’re all changing, even girls married and decent and with daughters of their own. They say it’s that thing out to sea – that darkness as sharp as a Briar-Witch’s claw.’
‘Nonsense,’ said Merrigutt’s mother, but with little passion, little care.
‘I’ll not just let this happen,’ said Merrigutt, and Oona heard some shade of the Evelyn Merrigutt she knew: ‘I won’t just stay and let this change keep coming. Not me and not the other girls either.’
Then Merrigutt’s mother said, ‘You’ve no choice – this is home, my girl. And there’s no getting away from the place you belong to.’
A darkening and no sight, only sound: a screaming, agony that was black and blood-red and weeping crimson. Silence, and then a single voice – Merrigutt’s mother saying, ‘It’s a girl. And let’s pray to the Sorrowful Lady that she’s nothing like her mother.’
Another change, new truth: not the living room then but the sight of Merrigutt alone in darkness. Look closer – on the coast, but the sea showing no white and making no sound. Oona could tell that Merrigutt was waiting. And it wasn’t long before another figure stepped i
nto sight: she wore a hood, was breathless and was quick to take Merrigutt’s hands and said, ‘You got away all right?’
‘Did,’ said Merrigutt. ‘You? Anyone see?’
‘No,’ said this other girl. ‘How’s the child?’
‘Well,’ was all Merrigutt said.
‘Why’d you ask me here, Evelyn?’ said the woman.
‘Say nothing,’ said Merrigutt. ‘Just listen.’
They stopped. And in their silence Oona heard – whispers, words that she couldn’t recognise but drifting in host from across the sea. Both Merrigutt and her companion stood hand-in-hand for long minutes.
Then Merrigutt said, ‘The Echoes.’
‘You think that’s doing it?’ asked the woman. ‘That whispering is the reason we’re all going the way we are? All changing?’
Merrigutt nodded, then said, ‘We have to leave. We have to get away or else we’ll change completely.’
‘Your little one,’ said the woman. ‘She –’
‘Won’t have a mother anyway if I stay,’ said Merrigutt.
No warning, and the other woman whipped her hand from Merrigutt’s and Oona thought the gesture meant disagreement. But it was only so the woman could drag her hood from her face, show how far her transformation had gone. And even in such dark Oona could tell two things quick: that the woman had been almost overcome by the Echoes, and that this woman was her mother.
‘Almost gone,’ said Oona’s mother. Her face was almost covered with the same ashen mark as Oona had seen on her father’s arm, on Merrigutt. ‘Almost taken me. I’ll be nearly nothing now soon.’
‘Caithleen,’ said Merrigutt, and she settled a hand on the cheek of Oona’s mother. ‘It must be tonight, or Sorrowful-Lady-knows I don’t think I’ll wake in the morning at all. We’ll be only dust. We have to be telling the others, and quick.’
The Black North Page 23
