The Mirk and Midnight Hour

by Jane Nickerson

  I could have added that it removed all agency, joy, and character as well, but arguing would not persuade her to help. Neither would threatening her with burning the carvings. I searched my mind for something to say, something that might touch her heart. It was touchable—I could tell from her expression. From somewhere, words shot into my mind, and then were on my tongue. “You had a cousin who died in your old country—Ekon. What happened to him?”

  Her face fell as she turned away. “I do not wish to think of it.”

  “Please tell me. It’s important. Was he your sweetheart?” Again I didn’t know how I guessed this, but as soon as I did, I knew it to be true.

  She blinked rapidly. “Yes. We—he—he offered himself as the sacrifice. He was so good, you see, and knew it was right that I should be Raphtah’s wife, even though he himself loved me. But the sacrifice did not work. My grandmother Cyrah said it had not been the right time. I—I miss Ekon still.”

  “Maybe Cyrah can’t ever know the right time. You’ve offered two sacrifices and neither worked. Maybe it will never work and Thomas’s death will be a waste as well. Not a regretted, necessary loss, but murder.”

  She seemed not to hear. “The last thing I remember is Ekon telling me not to weep, that what he was doing would make everything better. Then I drank and danced and knew nothing until the next day, when I saw his beloved body lying there, his blood all soaked into the dust. For nothing.”

  A tear slid down her nose. I took her hand.

  “Amenze,” I said gently, “we are friends. Please. Please don’t let the same thing happen to Thomas and me.”

  She made a strangled sound in her throat and closed her eyes, her shoulders hunched and head bowed. I waited. There were no more words to say.

  When she opened her eyes, a new spark of determination shone in them. She gripped my upper arm with sharp, tight fingers. “It shall not. I cannot help you take him away now, but I can tell you what you must do.” She set down the flask beside the snake case. “I will not give this dose to the soldier, so the effects should fade in a few hours. Father VanZeldt believes the sign will come tonight, and that is when the ceremony will take place.

  “Listen closely. Tonight, when Cyrah raises the knife, she will ask, ‘Mesu yamga sil?’ In your tongue, this means ‘Who claims this man?’ Hide away in the bushes beside the clearing. When you hear those words, leap out and say, ‘I claim him.’ You must reach the soldier without anyone stopping you. I can do nothing to help. The spirit will be inside me, and that which is Amenze will not be present. Uwa and Ahigbe and my grandmother will be possessed also, so no one but Father VanZeldt will remember you exist and no one will be prepared for the interruption. Put your arms around the soldier and hold on tight. No matter what happens, do not drop your hold. That is the only way to break the binding. We will be forced to release you both then. It is a law. And no one in the family will ever be allowed to touch either of you again. Go now and watch for the sign. Then you will know to come to the clearing.”

  “I can’t leave Thomas.”

  “You must. If they know you have been here, they will tie you up and lock you away so you cannot interfere in the ceremony. I could not stop them. I will not try to stop them.” She paused for effect. “And they will give you to Uwa first.” She gave me a shove toward the door. “Go!”

  Tears streamed freely down her cheeks now. She covered her face with her hands and sobbed, “I have betrayed my family! Oh, I have betrayed them all.”

  I paused and tried to hug her.

  “Go!” she whispered, soft but intense.

  I took one last, fearful look at Thomas, peeked into the yard to be sure no one was there, then scuttled around the shed and into the forest.

  The fog had disappeared and I could feel a waiting, an oppressive expectation in the muggy air, in the stillness of the close boughs, even rising from the hard, quiet earth. The day would not end without dire dealings. The ceremony would indeed be tonight.

  At the clearing of the silk cotton tree, the two straw thrones, Ahigbe’s drums, and an enormous pile of logs and brush already waited. I found a little, flower-soft dell a distance away, but still within earshot, and made myself a nest in the center. The wild blossoms were white, with veined petals like wings, and gave off a sweet fragrance as I settled myself upon them.

  As the sun moved across the sky, my panic mounted. I rehearsed over and over the words Amenze had told me to recognize—the woman would say, “Mesu yamga sil?” My heart was pounding against my chest and I broke out in a sweat. I needed to do something. Perhaps I should race back to the farm and begin to torture the carvings. But one of them was Amenze. I could not hurt Amenze.

  A few slanting sunbeams pierced the interlaced boughs above. Five bees, perhaps the same that had led me to Thomas, flew in from the trees. They hovered and revolved in the light, turning slowly around and around as if they were soaking themselves in the gold. They hummed low and soft. There in the pool of white blossoms, a peace grew in me. “Fear not: for they that be with us are more than they that be with them.” The VanZeldts might have dreadful intentions, but opposing them was the strength and virtue of so many others, including all those I could no longer see. My mother. Rush. Amazingly, I slept.

  Sharp white light awoke me. For a moment I didn’t know where I was. It was a dream. It had to be, because above me, beyond the treetops, against a background of black night, stars fell like rain, streaks of dazzling white. Everywhere was nearly bright as day. The brilliant light seemed to explode in pain in my head. I began to shake. This was the sign from the heavens the VanZeldts had awaited.

  It lasted only a few moments, but it was as if the world came to life during that time. A breeze stirred and rustled the leaves. An owl swooped ghostly not far from where I huddled.

  A fingernail sliver of moon now shone. I listened breathlessly until I heard the faint crackles, crunches, and swishes of people moving toward the clearing. Softly I slipped to a new hiding place behind a wide trunk opposite the silk cotton tree.

  Uwa and Ahigbe led the way, each carrying a torch, which they threw on the pile of scrub and branches. The wood must have been soaked in some accelerant because it burst instantly into brilliant flames, soaring, sparkling, twisting white and gold and red-orange. Dr. VanZeldt and the old woman—Cyrah—seated themselves. Amenze led Thomas by the arm. He shuffled along, head bowed. She pushed down on his shoulders to make him kneel in front of the thrones, facing the bonfire.

  The doctor wore his white suit, but all the others were naked save for loincloths. Even Thomas. With his swollen face, unkempt hair, and beard, he appeared brutish among the exquisite, exotic VanZeldts. The necklace of leaves he wore covered his torn and bloody chest. At first I thought the undulating, intricate lines of silver on their skin was the moonlight, but I soon realized their bodies were painted, the mottled glimmers running over them like rings of silver water—or perhaps scales.

  Uwa threw a handful of leaves in the center of the fire. Almost immediately a sharp, acrid odor burned my eyes and nostrils and the air felt harsh in my throat. I swallowed with difficulty. My head swam.

  Ahigbe drew the coils of a long yellow-and-black snake from a basket and held it looped before the old woman. She took a slender knife and made a slit—probably through some artery—to drain the serpent’s blood into a carved wooden bowl. They passed it between them. Each took a sip. Uwa smacked his lips as though it were a most delicious drink.

  Just then Thomas’s blind, drugged gaze turned my way, and a greater fear than I had yet known washed over me. My feet seemed suddenly not to meet the ground, and the interwoven trees, the fire, the people all blurred and slid together. I caught at the tree trunk and clung to it.

  The drumming began and the dancers burst again into vision. They had donned tall wooden masks that made them tower like giants, the faces of nightmares, with grimacing mouths and fierce, slanting eyes. They leaped, wheeled and stamped, crouched and sprang. Whereas the other danc
e I had witnessed seemed joyous, this was a scene from Dante’s Inferno. The roaring conflagration before them and the flickering black shadows behind them wavered and reached.

  The old woman joined them now, her movements slow, serpentine, lewd. She sang a low, hissing chant and wielded a wicked blade, which she flashed before Thomas. He did not flinch or blink.

  Dr. VanZeldt stood. His body quivered with excitement. A trickle of crimson blood oozed from his nostrils.

  The drums beat faster and faster and the dancing built in intensity until the dancers tore off their masks. I gasped, for they were altered.

  Golden eyes with black slits for pupils, flat gashes for noses, lipless, their skin glittering scales of ruby and gold.

  I sank, tremulous, to the ground, huddled in a heap, no longer hidden by the tree. Luckily they were too involved in what they were doing to notice.

  As I hunched there, somehow I became aware of a new movement, very slight but very important, coming from Thomas. He blinked when Uwa whirled close to him. His head drew back slightly. He was coming out of his trance.

  The creature who was Cyrah stood behind him now. With one hand she held up his head by the hair; with the other she raised the knife. “Mesu yamga sil?”

  The words.

  I leaped up and dashed around the fire, moving as fast as I could, but still with nightmare slowness. I threw myself on Thomas, knocking him backward, flat to the ground. “I do!” I cried. “I claim him!”

  His body beneath me changed, hardened, and suddenly was burning hot. My clothing smoked. He had turned into red-hot iron. I forced myself not to scream or jump away. I concentrated on sensing my amulet, and this time it felt cool against my chest. The searing pain in my hands was less acute. His body sank beneath me. I now lay in a pool of molten lead, but only momentarily. It swelled and solidified, and inches from my face were the sharp and snarling fangs of a lion. It blurred and changed even as it formed, and next came the rasping, dry, scaly feel of a great, golden snake. The muscles rippled and undulated beneath me, and its jaws opened wide. I did scream then, and closed my eyes tightly. But I held on, held on, held on.

  A boom like crashing thunder sounded and the earth shook. From someone—I think it was the doctor—came a heartbroken cry.

  The form shifted beneath me. I opened my eyes to see that I was holding my own Thomas once again. His breath cooled my cheeks. He stirred and blinked, confused.

  “It’s over,” I whispered. “I think it’s all over.” I slid off him, still clutching with scorched, blistered hands.

  He pulled me against him tightly. We clung together as if we would save each other from falling over the edge of a chasm. I buried my face in his chest, waiting for either another trick or more violence from the VanZeldts.

  Neither came. Slowly, I drew away. Dr. VanZeldt had sunk to his throne, head in hands. All of the VanZeldts had reverted back to their normal features. The old woman seemed to have shrunk. She who had not looked ancient now looked ancient, her skin beneath the paint dull and ashen, lips puckered over toothless gums. Amenze, Uwa, and Ahigbe all watched, eerily impassive and motionless.

  “Let’s go,” I whispered to Thomas. We rose. Thomas put his arm across my shoulders, and we awkwardly hobbled away, unhindered.

  Someone was watching me.

  We were all cozily assembled in the sitting room four nights after Thomas and I had dragged ourselves, spent but triumphant, back to the farm. Thomas lingered here; he had taken this time to heal and to make the acquaintance of everyone at Scuppernong, although his presence was still hidden from the rest of the world. During the previous days, we had all talked and talked and laughed often together as people do after shared ordeals have ended happily. And Thomas and I had been memorizing each other so we would have something to hold close during the lonely days, months, years until the war ended.

  Now, though, we were quietly busy with our separate diversions. I was perched on the stool before my harp. I could not play because my hands were mere knobs of bandages, pain still shooting through from the burns I had sustained that night, but I was composing a new song and it helped if I could look at the strings.

  I was pulled out of my concentration by the feeling of eyes on me. I glanced quickly about.

  Thomas was scratching away on his latest Heath Blackstock novel—the one about snake people. Seeley was playing with his horses and occasionally offering suggestions to Thomas. Sunny was ripping seams from an old dress, and Miss Elsa was nervously pacing. She was holding true to her vow to use less laudanum, and suffering for it. Michael had spent the day laboring out in the forest, doing I knew not what; he had returned after suppertime, the worse for wear. He, Laney, and Cubby had retired to their cabin early. None of them were watching me.

  There was a gap between the curtains. Someone was out there in the blackness. I closed the gap and tried to disregard the tug that pulled me toward the door and out into the night. Finally I could ignore it no longer. I abruptly stood and left the room. I lit a lantern and held it before me so that it made a puddle of light out below the porch.

  Just outside the glow loomed five shadows. One of them moved forward and into the brightness. It was him—Dr. VanZeldt. I would have turned on my heels and run back inside, but whatever had called me out kept me bound.

  The doctor held his hat in his hands and made a little bow. “Miss Violet Dancey. So happy you were kind enough to listen to the summons to come out and hear our goodbyes.”

  “Goodbyes? You’re leaving, then?” I kept my voice steady.

  Some sort of spasm passed over his tight pink skin. “Today—I assume upon your orders—the silk cotton tree was hewn down. We cannot remain in a place so desecrated.”

  It must have been what Michael had been about earlier in the woods. In a flash I felt relieved, then slightly sorry, then relieved again. I said nothing.

  Another of the shadows moved forward. The old woman. She looked shriveled and diminished, but there was nothing weak about the contempt glittering in her eyes as she spat out a stream of (probably) curses in her language. I flinched.

  Dr. VanZeldt cleared his throat and said pleasantly, “Cyrah says that if she had known what you would do to us, she would have cut out the soldier’s eyes at the first so he would never have beheld your face.”

  I started to turn, but my feet were stuck firmly to the floorboards.

  “Oh,” Dr. VanZeldt hastened to assure me, “you need not worry. It is over. We bear you no ill will. You battled fairly and you won. We have mattered a great deal to one another these last months—more than you realize, even now. I have grown fond of you, from afar. It may be hard for you to believe, but I was actually quite proud of you as you held on. True, I would have struck you down and let the earth close over you had I been allowed, but still I was proud. I see your hands are wounded.” He snapped his fingers. “Ahigbe—the bag.”

  Ahigbe strode forward and held out a burlap sack. The doctor rummaged about and brought forth a little leather pouch. “Crush these leaves, my dear, mix them with lard, and spread it on the burns. Your skin will be healed in a matter of hours.”

  “Thank you,” I said, taking the pouch and vowing to throw it on the fire. “May I—may I speak to Amenze? Privately?”

  Dr. VanZeldt seemed to consider, then beckoned the girl forward. The others retired to a distance, where they could watch.

  In spite of the lines of strain that showed around Amenze’s mouth and eyes, there was something magnificent about her as she stood there, towering above me in a robe of black and bronze. Someday she might well be a queen of somewhere, someplace.

  I felt shy of her as I spoke. “Amenze, you don’t need to go with them. You could stay here. I know they could try to force you, but somehow we would fight them.”

  Her lips curved in a faint, knowing smile. “You cannot understand, can you?”

  “Understand what?”

  “That I love my people and choose to be with them. That I am a Child of R
aphtah and I still believe, however I decided to help you. You have only seen the disturbing things; you have not seen the glorious.”

  I remembered the joyous dancing and thought that perhaps I had glimpsed it. “Very well. I wish you happiness in your choice.” I paused. “Thomas—the soldier—is leaving tomorrow to return to the war.”

  “I am sorry to hear it,” she said. “But you know he will come back to you.”

  “If that’s what you sense, I do know it now,” I said, and managed a smile. “Where will y’all go?”

  “I do not know. Cyrah and Father VanZeldt know, but I do not.”

  I began to unpin the cameo brooch from my collar. “You gave me a wonderful gift in the amber amulet. Now may I give you something?”

  She nodded, and I handed her the brooch. “It belonged to my mother. Even though it has no magical powers, I hope it will remind you that you and I are true friends, no matter how far apart we are.”

  She reached out one long arm and rested a hand on my shoulder for a second, then dropped it.

  They left, melting back into the shadows, and I never saw them again.

  February 15, 1863

  Dearest Thomas,

  Imagine my surprise when the bedraggled, bewhiskered gentleman showed up at our door, bringing me such a treasure—a letter from my love. And he says he will wait while I scribble a reply, so Laney is feeding him in the kitchen.

  I am sorry you’re not as lithe and limber as you were before your injury, but I’m happy it’s keeping you safely in the office. How wonderful that your father came to visit you and that all is well there. “For this my son was dead, and is alive again; was lost and is found.”

  Much has happened here since you left. My father remains alive and well, although always there are reports of fallen acquaintances.

  I am a regular attendant at sewing circle. The girls know I am engaged to a soldier, as several of them are, but I fail to mention that you are a Union soldier. They will be mighty surprised someday. We share our worries and fears about our sweethearts and it is nice to speak of these things with others who understand.