The Cold Is in Her Bones

by Peternelle van Arsdale

  What would her father have said to that? A question that shouldn’t be asked doesn’t deserve an answer.

  After she’d eaten, she wrapped the shawl more thoroughly around her and curled up between the roots that hugged her on either side. She lay her head on the moss and closed her eyes. She felt her snake sway in the air over her, occasionally snapping up the beetles and other creatures that nudged their way into her hair or trekked across her shoulder.

  She wiggled her fingers between fallen leaves and dug them into the cool, damp moss and soil, felt both accumulate under her fingernails. She imagined the dark crescents that would form there. She dug her fingers deeper. Her snake curled around her ear and rested its head on her cheek. She felt its tongue like a whisper. Like the stroke of one who loved her, but she had no memory to match with it. This was something new and restful and soothing. She felt her limbs and muscles relax into the earth. She slept.

  Milla shifted, sleeping but not sleeping. She knew morning was coming, and she wasn’t ready to wake. Morning should wait just a little longer, she thought, and yet some discomfort roused her. She felt as if one of her limbs were caught beneath her, but that made no sense because her arms were folded in front of her. Finally Milla gave in to wakefulness and sat up. The air was still cool and wet with dew. The bit of sky she saw through the trees overhead was a deep lavender.

  Milla’s first realization was that her snake was now fully grown—long enough that she could see the snake’s lovely leaf-greenness where it rested its head on her shoulder. Her second realization was that another snake grew from a parallel spot just over her right ear—the side of her head that had been pressed to the ground. It was this new snake that had felt restless and stuck beneath her. Just as her first snake had done, this tiny new snake curled itself around Milla’s finger when she placed her hand there—as if to say to her hello, I’m with you, and I will never leave.

  Milla needed the comfort, because when she recalled what she was about to do, her gut clenched and she thought she might be sick. She felt a nip on her left shoulder, two sharp little teeth belonging to her fully grown snake, and then it hissed at her. Not a sweet, calming hiss. It was a hiss of anger—her anger. All right, she said to herself. All right. I remember. I’m angry. Her anger made her brave, forced her to her feet.

  As she continued her walk to the village, Milla felt herself growing ever angrier. And the angrier she felt, the more her green snake lifted from her head, eager and urging her forward.

  Her gut no longer clenched. It coiled and writhed. She should have been thinking of poor Iris, she thought. Or worrying for her brother. But instead she could only think of the wrongs she’d suffered. Of the lifetime she’d spent feeling never-enough and never-right.

  Never-enough and never-right for her father, who mostly looked past her. On the rare occasions when she forced herself in front of him by speaking words, or spilling something, he looked at her as if flummoxed. Or worse: annoyed that such a problem should have intruded on his otherwise controllable life. Milla’s value to him was like that of a tool he used on the farm. He didn’t think of the axe’s usefulness while he chopped wood. He only thought of the axe’s failure if it dulled.

  She had never been the pretty, compliant child her mother wanted, either. Oh, she’d tried. So hard. But always with Milla there would be an errant strand of hair that wouldn’t bend to her mother’s will. A hem that would drag. An off-kilter observation of Milla’s that would cause Gitta to get that look in her eye—that look of fear. Now Milla knew why: because she was terrified that Milla would become like her sister. All her life Milla had been forced to suffer for a sin her own mother had committed: the sin of betraying Hulda. Was Milla any less strange than Hulda had been? Perhaps Milla was just better at hiding her strangeness, at pretending to be clean and free of voices. Well, she could hide and pretend no more. Her green snake hissed in agreement. Her new snake kissed her ear with its tongue. She wondered if it was as brilliant green as the other.

  Then she thought of Niklas. A lifetime of resentment heated her from the inside out. She felt feverish with it. She was jealous that all their lives he was their mother’s sunshine while Milla was their mother’s dark cloud. She was bitter that for years he’d sat by and let Milla be the least loved in the family. He’d rested in the sure knowledge that he pleased their father and mother, that his mere presence on this earth was enough. And without a word of contradiction on his part, he’d allowed her to be less, even encouraged it. Because in contrast with her not-enoughness and not-rightness, he was always-enough and always-right. Silly Milla.

  Silly Milla was dead. She died when her mother crushed her first tiny green snake under her heel. No one would do that to her again, or to her snakes. Milla touched each, and promised them aloud, “No one. Never again.”

  12

  MILLA HAD NO IDEA WHAT to expect from the village; all she had were fantasies. She knew there would be many more people than she’d ever seen before. She imagined a hubbub, the fuss and activity of a beehive. Everyone working and moving and talking. She supposed that as she got closer, she’d first notice the noise: the sound of all those people. But Milla walked and walked, and there was no such sound. There were only the trees, which were still and stolid on this already hot morning. Her boots were loud under her feet.

  Then the trees changed. No longer broad and reaching, they seemed to give up, to give in. They drooped as if too tired, too discouraged to continue standing much longer. Milla passed through an orchard, and the trees were wizened, the apples gnarled and blighted. The air buzzed with insects and the trees crawled with them. The joints of branches were shrouded in webbing. Downy moth nests wrapped around leaves. Ants marched purposefully up every tree from neatly constructed anthills. Huge, threatening wasp nests hung high in branches. Milla had never been afraid of the creatures that occupied her world, but now she was. Everything was out of balance and trees that should be able to repel the assault of such tiny things were overrun with their number and losing the battle.

  Black flies landed on Milla’s hands and cheeks and stung, and landed again and stung again. Her snakes madly snapped back at the flies but there were too many. Milla reached for one of the small, twisted apples on a low branch, and as she pulled, it collapsed in her hand. It was the shape of an apple, but inside, it was soft and rippling with worms. Milla dropped the awful thing and wiped her hand on her skirt. She thought of the crisp apple she’d eaten just last night—hard in her hand and juicy when her teeth sank into it. It bore no resemblance to this. Ants swarmed the apple, worms and all, the moment it touched the dirt, and in seconds the pale apple flesh was black with them. Milla backed away, horrified. Then she walked on, waving her hands around her head, helpless to drive away the flies.

  Still there was no sound other than the buzzing of the insects. So it was a surprise to Milla when the road widened, and there it was: the village.

  And it was so . . . sad.

  The village was laid out along a main street, just as Trude had described it. The houses crouched alongside it the same way the trees had—as if it was all they could do to stand up. They were tidy enough. But the green of the trees and kitchen gardens and sod roofs was less green than it should be. As if the whole place needed a good dusting.

  The dreariness of the place seeped into her bones and made her feel hopeless. The fearful look she so often saw on her mother’s face was everywhere here, and in every face. The town reeked of fear, like a rot. She’d so often dreamed of coming here, and part of her wanted to greedily take in all these new faces. They were all ages and sizes and complexions. All hair lengths and colors. Some round faced and some narrow, some thick browed and others thin lipped. But really, they were all the same. Each one regarded her not with curiosity but with suspicion.

  Milla’s snakes clung close to her scalp, hidden well beneath her hair. There was nothing outwardly strange about her, and yet each man, woman, and child stared hard at her as she walked toward
them, then turned their heads to stare at her longer as she walked by them. She felt their eyes still needling her once she was past. She paused once to look behind, and she found that everyone she’d passed had stopped walking and was looking at her, eyebrows lowered, lips drawn tight. Milla told herself not to look back again. She supposed she shouldn’t be surprised by their unfriendliness. It was a cursed village, after all. A village doomed to watch its sisters, daughters, friends, and cousins taken by a demon. A demon who was her aunt. Milla felt a cramp in her bowels.

  These people couldn’t possibly know who she was, she told herself. They’d never seen her before. But what if some family resemblance gave her away? She looked nothing like Jakob or Gitta, or even Niklas. Maybe, she thought, she looked just like Hulda. Right down to the snakes on her head. A slick of sweat formed along her hairline and ran down her sides under her shift. Oh, the many things she hadn’t thought through before she set out on this journey. It was too late to think of them now.

  Her heartbeat fluttered unevenly in her chest when she came to the smithy and saw a large, brown-skinned man, his shoulder-length black hair streaked with gray, holding a horseshoe with tongs. He must be Tomas, Milla thought. She raised a hand as if to wave, but then let it fall again. He watched her pass, and continued watching her as she knocked on the door of the very next house, where Trude had told Milla she would find Hanna. It was a modest place, at once clean and dismal, with a meager vegetable garden clinging to one side.

  The door was opened by a woman who looked both like and unlike Iris. Like her in slim, graceful build and rust-red hair. Unlike her in that she seemed drained of the life that glowed from Iris like a flame. Where Iris’s eyes were like candles, Hanna’s were ash. Those eyes went round now and she grasped Milla by one shoulder and pulled her inside.

  Light shone harshly through the closed windows, and inside the house, like out, was tidy but dreary. The air in the room was hot and stale. Milla felt breathless, and the more air she tried to pull into her lungs the less there seemed to be.

  “Milla,” Hanna said. “You’re Milla, aren’t you?”

  “I am,” Milla said.

  “What’s happened? Why are you here?” Hanna hadn’t let go of Milla’s shoulder once they were inside, and Milla felt nails digging into her flesh.

  “It’s Iris. Your father and mine have taken her to The Place.”

  Hanna pulled her hand away now and put both hands to her own mouth. “No,” she said. “No, no. We kept her safe for so long.” Then Hanna’s eyes lost focus and her knees buckled, and Milla feared she might fall. She wrapped an arm around Hanna and led her to a wooden chair.

  “I’m so sorry,” Milla said. Milla had been distraught when Iris had been taken; she could do nothing but weep. Hanna was Iris’s mother—how would she ever bear it? How had Trude borne it when her oldest was taken?

  Hanna grabbed Milla by the wrist. “She was supposed to be safe with you. The way you’ve always been safe. Mamma and Pappa promised.” Hanna squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head as if trying to banish a thought. “Now she’s lost to us, just like Leah.”

  Hanna squeezed Milla’s wrist so tightly it hurt, but Milla didn’t pull away. Instead she put her other hand over Hanna’s and held it gently. “I don’t believe Iris is lost to us. She doesn’t belong in The Place.”

  Hanna opened her eyes and Milla saw a bit of hope rise in them. “What do you mean? Wasn’t she showing the signs?”

  Milla hesitated, and Hanna’s eyes turned hopeless again.

  “She was . . . different,” Milla said. “But still herself. And that’s the important thing. She was still herself. Not lost. She was still Iris. And she shouldn’t be locked away someplace awful. That’s not where she belongs.”

  Hanna pulled her hand away from Milla and shook her head. “Oh, Milla. You don’t understand. Gitta and Jakob have kept you so far from it, you don’t know what it’s like when the girls are taken. There’s no making them better. The sooner you put them away and cease to think of them, the less your heart will ache from the loss.”

  The door opened, and a shaft of light scissored the room. Tomas. He closed the door behind him. Milla saw none of Iris in his face, but it wasn’t a bad face. There was warmth there, and a desire to understand. Tomas’s eyes searched Milla’s now, but before Milla could speak, Hanna did. “Our girl has been taken.” She said it blunt like that, as if there was no point in stepping up to it slowly or trying to make it any less awful than it was.

  “When?” Tomas said.

  Milla had to think for a moment. “Three days ago.”

  “Signs?” he said.

  “Tomas,” Hanna said. “You know the signs. Don’t make me listen to them. Don’t make me hear what our child has become.” She put her face in her hands.

  Tomas walked to Hanna where she sat and pulled her to her feet. Then he wrapped his arms around her and she sobbed into his chest. It was a moment so tender that Milla turned away from it. She had never seen anything like it—a man reaching out to a woman. A gesture meant to comfort, not to subdue. Her mother would occasionally touch her father, but only to placate a mood, to beg for calm. Not like this. And she couldn’t remember her father ever reaching out to anyone—not even Niklas—with affection.

  She listened to Tomas murmuring to Hanna. When there was silence, Milla turned toward them again.

  “I came not only to tell you about Iris, but to ask you if you’d show me to The Place. And help me get her out.”

  Tomas looked at Milla, one large palm cradling his wife’s head. “You don’t know what you’re asking. No one comes out of The Place. No one. And you wouldn’t want them to. Our girl isn’t our girl anymore. She belongs to the demon now.” Hanna let out a whimper.

  “But that’s not true,” Milla said. “She’s still Iris. She talked to me. I know she’s still herself.”

  “She talked to you? What did she say?”

  Milla could tell that she’d surprised Tomas, sensed that he might be persuadable, so she kept talking in a rush. “She asked me not to let them take her there. She was frightened. She told me she was still herself. Does that sound like the talk of a demon?”

  Hanna jerked her head away from Tomas. “It sounds exactly like the talk of a demon. The demon lies.”

  “Iris was Iris. And she never lies. I know it.”

  “Don’t you think I want to believe you?” Hanna said. “Don’t you think I want my girl back? I want my sister back, too. And my friends. All taken by the demon. All pretty and sweet one day, and the next screaming nastiness at me. Telling me they hate me. I won’t see my child like that, do you hear me? Now you must leave. Get out of my sight.”

  “Hanna,” Tomas said. “What if it’s true what Milla says?”

  “Tomas, ask yourself this. Why is it Milla standing here? Why is our child cursed and not this one, whose own aunt brought the curse upon us all? Why do you trust her? What if it’s the demon talking through her?”

  Hanna gripped Tomas’s shirt in her hands while she spoke, looking him in the eyes, pleading with him. Then she looked at Milla, and Milla saw something in Hanna’s face that she did not like. Not at all. Milla’s snakes squirmed on her head. She felt their fear, imagined what would happen to her and to them if the suspicion she’d seen in the villagers’ faces turned to accusation. She looked at Tomas. “I’ll go,” she said.

  “Best,” Tomas said.

  The sun was high overhead outside, and Milla looked left and right. Then she felt a hand on her shoulder and she flinched before turning around.

  It was Hanna, her face tear strewn. She pointed to her left. “Follow the road out of town. You’ll pass through farmland and woods and then you’ll come to a cottage. That’s where the midwife lives. You’ll have to talk your way past her. Or sneak around, through the forest. But I don’t recommend that. Those woods are deep and once you’re just feet from the road you won’t know which way you’ve come from. Better to stick to the road and start think
ing of your excuses. The Place isn’t far from the cottage. There’s no mistaking it.”

  Milla nodded the whole while Hanna talked, barely breathing. Now she didn’t smile so much as open her face to Hanna. “Thank you,” she said.

  Hanna nodded. “You won’t find Iris there. Not the Iris you know.”

  “But what if I do?” Milla said.

  Hanna sucked air in, then out. “You think we’re heartless, sending our girls to The Place. And maybe it’s so. But if we are, then it’s because our hearts have been taken from us. Look around this village and you’ll know exactly who’s lost a sister or a child or a dear friend to the curse. We all look the same, feel the same. Like we’ll never be whole and happy again. When Tomas asked me to marry him I said no at first. I told him I wouldn’t, because I couldn’t bear to have a daughter taken from me. But. Well. I love him, and I relented. And then we had Iris, and there wasn’t a day after that I woke up anything but terrified.”

  Milla thought of Gitta, always watching her, waiting for her to change.

  “So I told Tomas, no more. I couldn’t bear to have more children, not if the next might also be girl. When your father asked my father to work for him, and he and Mamma went to live there, I felt abandoned. My own mother and father leaving me for somewhere better. But they told me it was for Iris’s good. That someday they’d bring her there to live with them, where the crops were always healthy and the trees still grew tall. And then Iris would be safe.”