by Ben Galley
“Good day, Babcha Masha,” I greeted her.
The old woman chuckled with delight. “Oh, good day to you, young lady! You look so pretty with your headscarf, Jelena. Like the Red Hood Maiden who fell in with the company of wolves. But you’re not afraid, are you? A proper little woman, isn’t she?” Babcha waited a moment. Then spoke louder. “I said she looks a proper little woman, doesn’t she, Ekaterina?”
“Eh? You must speak up, Masha. I can’t understand you when you mumble so.” Nanna turned to me. “She’s half gone, you know? And her memory is …” She waved a hand in front of her brow.
“Don’t be so mean, Nanna. She’s your only neighbor.”
“Ha! That’s your mother speaking, through and through. Don’t you start, lyubasha. You’re much smarter than that. Come in, come in. And take that thing off your head.”
“Can I come in, too, Ekaterina?” Babcha asked, her eyes like slits in the wrinkles of her smile. Her hearing seemed just fine, though Nanna hadn’t spoken loudly. “We can comfort little Jelena with songs and tales just like in the old days?”
“No.” Nanna scowled and slammed the door.
“There’s no need to be rude, Nanna.” I loosed the knot and shook my hair free.
“Rude? I’m not being rude. She’s being rude. If she wants company she can go back with you and stay in that village your father is building. This, however, is my home. I decide here.” She tilted her head and peered down at me, down her long nose. “Did you pass by the ruins? Did you dance with the wights?”
“No, Nanna.”
She grunted in disappointment. “Why not?”
“Mother says it’s dangerous to go into the ruins.”
“Your mother says ﹘” Nanna made a disgusted clicking sound with her tongue as she set a kettle on the small stove. “Life is dangerous. There was a time we knew it. Knew it in our bones, in our blood, borne from the water of the lake. You would have been proud to be chosen to dance with the wights.”
“They’re just stories, Nanna.”
“No, don’t say that.” She shook her head and made to sit in her favorite chair. “Stories are what we’re made of, too. Bone, blood, salt water, lake water. The fire that burns in our hearts, and the stories that kindle it. Why did your mother send you here?”
“I started bleeding this morning.” I drew myself up to my full height. Just a hand breadth shorter than Nanna. “I am a woman.” I announced.
She laughed a whooping ee, ee, ee. Like the cry of the birds that lived out on the islands.
“Getting your monthly blood doesn’t make you a woman. No, she wanted you out of the way, and so she sends you to me. Do you know why?”
“It’s custom that﹘”
“Bah! Custom!” Nanna spat the word along with her pipeweed. “She’s forgotten our customs from of old. No. It’s because she thinks I’ve got nothing better to do than tell you stories on how you’re a woman now, how you’re special. But you’re not special, lyubasha. None of us are. If you were, the wights would return and take you with them. But pour the tea, and I’ll tell you a story,” she added in reconciliation.
I did so, carefully, and settled down on a cushion at her feet. The heat of the tea ran down my throat, and the warmth smoothed away the churning of my belly.
Nanna took a large sip and smacked her lips appreciatively. She drew long from her pipe, and let the smoke blow out of her nose, nostrils flaring. Her blue eyes reflected the glow of the pipe in the darkness around us, and they fixed on me for a long time.
“What story though?” She murmured more to herself. “The harpy who stole the winter bear’s eye? The bride of the werewolf? The man who stole the gjalp’s scales and took her as wife?”
I stayed silent. She puffed away, until smoke rolled around her like an enchantment.
“Very well,” she said finally. “I will tell you a story of change.”
“Listen. In the old days, lyubasha, when I was still young like you, there was a man who had torched his longboat in his fury. You must know, in those days we humans lived on our boats, sailing in families from island to island on the sacred sea, and in winter we would seek harbor from the storms in one of the wight cities on the coast, and be welcome. It was here in this courtyard that we would all mingle, long before the division of the two kinds, and on these flagstones news would be exchanged, matches made between merchants and traders, and matches made between wary parents and their flighty children, too.
“And so when it became known what he had done, and why, the young man fled into the forest, seeking to escape the customs and justice of men and wights.”
“Do you know why he burned down his home, Nanna?”
“I do, lyubasha, but hush now and listen on.
“The young man fled into the forest. He ran between the first trees and the wood closed in around him, swallowing him. Have you been into the woods, lyubasha? You are guided by marks and signs you recognize, but this young man was cursed by his deed and carried the seed of the Dark Queen of the Grave deep within him. And whatever mark and sign he knew and chose to guide him further, he would come upon again and again. The lightning split tree surrounded by its silent fir tree guards, the standing stone in the clearing among the birches ﹘ you know the stone I speak of?
“Mist tangled in the thickets, following the young man, and lichen like old men’s beards hung limply from the intertwined branches overhead. And in the shifting forest, that house of woven twigs, he’d stumble yet again onto the birch tree clearing and yet suddenly the godstone wasn’t there, its tip no longer caught in the slanted, sulphur colored light of the choked sun. He ran left, he ran right. He ran the middle way, lyubasha, but wherever he ran there was no way through the forest anymore. He was trapped.
“He crawled into the split of the lightning tree when the rains came, and he ate the withered blackberries that dangled on the brambles. He ate the bitter green leaves of dandelions and nettles, and drank rainwater from the cusp of leaves, and grew wild himself. He shed his clothes like a tree sheds its leaves, the woods stripped him bare to the bone.
“He grew so wild that one day, when a harpy, half-crow half-wight, came to settle on the broken limb of the lightning tree, the young man understood all the words she cawed to herself while cleaning her feathers.
“‘A tasty morsel,’ she said, one black eye on the young man. ‘Winter is at the doorstep, and this one does not know of the Summer House in the middle of the woods. So I will wait and watch him die, and will then feast on his juicy flesh.’
“Well, when the young man heard that, he nearly despaired and knew he must press on and find either shelter in this Summer House the crow had mentioned, or a way out of the woods before the winter came.
“So on he went, round and round and in convoluted pathways, following the tracks of the antlered mink and the Isegrim, searching for an escape from the tight hold the forest had on him, but always twisting and turning and enthralling, it lead him to dead ends; the white bones of a collapsed ribcage from an animal none had ever seen before by a pool with black water; or a fairy ring of Purple Coats, standing tall, their heads heavy with spores. And still the crow followed him, jeering all the way, and her sisters joined her, the ever silent owl, the chattering jay, the sorrowful magpies calling for the children they themselves had given away.
“He ran on until his feet failed him and he fell headfirst into the thorn thicket, the roots of ancient rose brambles clutching at him, and the forest closed upon him like a pair of jaws.”
“Did he die, Nanna?” I asked in the pause that followed.
She drew from her pipe once more, deeply.
“No,” she answered. “He did not die then, though the forest had become his grave. For the man he was had died within him, and so he lay, a wild man, wrapped beneath the briars, for a long time, waiting for love’s true kiss to wake him.”
/> I chuckled, and she frowned. “I think you’re telling the story wrong,” I said. “The briar rose is a young woman, not a man.”
“Am I telling it wrong, lyubasha? My own story?”
Now it was my turn to frown. “But Nanna, if he slept for such a long time, surely the harpies would have begun to eat him just as the crow said she would.”
“You are thinking right, but unknown to the young man, he had stumbled across an invisible threshold, and had finally entered the gardens of the Summer House, and he lay amongst the sleeping roses the lady of the house loved dearly. And the harpies sat on the branches of the tall pines, and could hunt him no more.”
“So he was safe?”
“In the forest, lyubasha, nothing is safe.”
“The lady of the Summer House came to the young man’s resting place under the briars in the twilight.
“She entered her protected gardens, moving silently, nearly floating across the wet grass; the rustle of her long white dress, laced at the edges, brushing against her bare skin was the only sound. She saw him lieing there, sleeping, his lashes gracing his ruddy cheeks, and carefully, slowly, she knelt beside him. One pale hand on his naked chest, she bent over him as she had over so many others, and touched his lips with her own.
“A breath, a sigh, he woke, lyubasha. A strange woman stroked his brow, her white dress and pale skin contrasted by the glossy black of her long hair that fell down over her shoulders, by her huge glossy black eyes, her wight eyes. And was he afraid? No, he was in love. He was disturbed by her mouth, her wide, full lips the only color in her waiflike face, the crimson red of roses, of drops of blood on snow. He shivered, as she bade him rise, her light touch cool, her hand seemed translucent on his tanned skin.
“He thought he heard her singing, though he didn’t understand the words. He felt he didn’t need to - he felt their essence, the nature of her quiet, piercing song which flowed through his veins with heat. She held his hands in her own, and they stood in her garden, him lost in the pools of her dark eyes, and took each other in. And after some time, though he couldn’t say how long, she guided him through her garden, and led him into her house, where she bathed him, and gave him to eat and drink as much as his heart wanted.”
“Was she beautiful, Nanna?”
“Very beautiful, lyubasha. She was so beautiful she was unnatural, uncanny. Her beauty was an abnormality, a symptom of a love the two kinds once shared, a perfect connecting piece ﹘ for her every feature was heightened by the frailty of mankind, by the lushness of a life cut short, and yet her beauty was also radiant, like starlight, eternal, with none of the imperfections that mar the beauty of human women over time. She was the embodiment of eternal summer, and just as unnatural as desired, her garden tended to most diligently, and empty of animal life except for the bees in their hives to whom she was queen.
“Her realm was sheltered from the forest by a wall of thickets, bristling with thorns and luxurious blossoms. Whenever the wind stirred the dark wood, it would blow through those bushes, the heavy scent of sensuous red, rich, and faintly corrupt swept around the flowers and fruits of summer.
“The lady lived by herself, all alone in the heart of the wood in a house which had only one room. There to one side was the hearth, a well-scoured pot and pan of copper secured on the side. Over it, she hung bunches of drying mushrooms, wreaths of garlic, the leg of a black-hooved pig, and herbs ﹘ bundles of herbs from her plentiful garden, mint, vervain, sage, rosemary and thyme. Baskets of wild strawberries overflowed with their produce, the tart red budded fruits flashing underneath the green, an invitation. And there was always a wood fire crackling in the grate, a sweet, acrid smoke rising from it.
“On the other side of the room stood her bed ﹘ the candles around that altar burned low ﹘ a four poster bed, beautifully carved, small and narrow, canopied and curtained with faded red velvet, though its sheets were crisp and white, and he bled on them, an inverted virgin marriage, when she sank her teeth into his skin, breaking him ever so gently, as his blood welled high and his heart throbbed with lust and fear. And through her kiss she kept him enthralled, though she was heavy with child from another.”
I squirmed on the cushion, and cleared my throat. “Are you sure this is the right story you’re telling, Nanna? It sounds like a strange mixture of stories to me.”
Her mouth stretched into a wide smile that never quite reached her eyes.
“I’m sure,” she said, her voice hoarse from smoking and talking. She sat on her chair, opposite her own small bed, canopied and curtained in russet brown, the longboat house one long room which used to house an entire family, but now was empty save us two.
“Does it scare you, lyubasha?”
“No,” I scoffed, a little too easily, my cheeks hot.
“Then listen on, for our young man had gone from one trap into the next, and while he was yet happy, he still felt disturbed all the same though he had no name for it.
“One night, as he lay half-sleeping, half-watching through lowered lashes by the low burning embers, she climbed onto the bed, onto him, wrapping her thighs around him. She leaned forward and kissed him gently, her long hair curtaining off the world around them, and he suckled on her ripe, dark nipples, until she straightened, straddling him, the bulge of her swollen belly resting on his hollow stomach. She took his hands and placed them on her smooth, cool skin, and he could feel the life inside her move.
“‘Soon he will be born,’ she sighed, rocking the young man gently, keeping his hands on her. ‘He must be born soon, for my brother is coming.’
“‘Your brother?’ Our young man asked, because this was the first time she had ever spoken of family.
“‘My twin brother,’ the lady answered, her eyes huge and dark, the movement of her hips demanding a response. ‘He comes when summer fades, we change our set places, and he must reign supreme in my absence. The child will be born by then, you must be gone by then, and I will go with you, my love.’
“‘We must leave?’ The young man, distracted, enchanted, didn’t understand what his radiant lover was telling him. He knew no place to take her, or her child, except out of their shelter, back into the forest with its wild things. And there, they would all surely die.
“‘He isn’t like me, my love,’ she whispered between her kisses. ‘Nor is he like you. He is cold and fearsome. His bite is terrible and fatal. He is a most violent half-wight, possessing the strength and hardiness of ten men. He will punish me. He is jealous.’
“‘Jealous?’
“‘He will not suffer a mortal to even look upon me, his twin sister. He has imprisoned me in this enchantment, in this - his house.’
“And the young man grew very fearful, lyubasha, very, very fearful.”
Nanna fell silent for a while. Her pipe was long smoked, and we sat in the half-dark of her longboat house, listening to the wind rattle against the boards, seeking entry.
I scrunched up my forehead.
“It’s like the tale of the seasons, Nanna. The summer lady must leave her house and the lord of winter moves in; that’s what the story means, doesn’t it?”
“It’s a story about loss, lyubasha.”
The furrow on my brow deepened. “I thought you said it’s about change?”
Nanna shrugged.
“Did I say that? Fine. That too,” she conceded. “How are your cramps?”
I grimaced, one hand on my aching loins. “It hurts,” I said.
She shrugged with one shoulder. “You’ll get used to it. More tea?”
I nodded, and this time she poured, rising from her chair, wincing, one hand held on her hip. She made us a light meal to go with the tea, a creamy stew with leek and barley. She fussed that I shouldn’t help her, at all, so I went to the outhouse, to change the clothrag of my first menses, carefully rolling and tucking it into my apron pocket like my m
other had told me to, so we could throw it to the flames of our hearthfire as an offering. The old gods were dead, my mother said, and the Lords and Ladies were gone, vanished from our lands, but nothing was a greater protection than the blood that had power.
When I came back, Nanna had arranged a new seating place for me, a bed of cushions to lie back on, and her thick woolly blanket to pull over me. She returned to her chair, and inhaled the steam rising from her cup. Her ice blue eyes pierced into mine.
“Where were we?”
“The summer lady has a twin brother.” I snuggled into the heap of cushions and blankets. “And he’s coming to kill the young man.”
“Right,” Nanna said. She slurped a sip of tea, and smacked her lips before she continued. “Here is an important thing you need to know about fear, lyubasha, and it is this: often we fear what is not there more than we fear something that is. And so it was with the young man ﹘ the season in the Summer House changed slightly, from the rich banquets of summer to the full laden fruits of the harvest. And he trembled when the wind blew in from the forest. He shook when the lady rubbed her back, her belly protruding grossly, the imprint of tiny feet pressing out of her luminous skin. When she groaned, he twitched in fear. When she rose in the night to relieve herself, he grasped the heavy skillet, ready to smash it down on her twin’s head.
“Everywhere he looked, he felt black eyes like hers watching him silently from under the choking ivy, among the bushes, among the thorns ﹘ and in his mind he saw her brother everywhere, but especially in her face. And doubt crippled him suddenly, lancing sharply into his breaking heart. What had happened to the absent father of the child? Had her twin killed him? Had she lured the young man into her house to take the blame for her trespassing? To be beaten to death? These and darker thoughts he had as he watched her shuffle across the room, heavier and heavier by the day. And as the days grew cooler, so did his love.
“‘How will we know that your twin is coming, my love?’ He asked her late one afternoon. ‘Will he announce himself in some way? Will the briar bushes part for him? Will he be heralded by the first frost on the dew in the morning?’
