Ingathering

by Zenna Henderson

  Nathan snatched the lantern and turned to the door. He felt cold flooding back all round him. Then he turned from the door and reached for Eliada. Then turned back—panic squeezed his breath. He crouched on the floor beside Eliada and closed his eyes as tightly as he could, fighting against running and screaming and—

  A sudden blast of cold air on his back whirled him around. Papa was leaning back against the push of the door, getting it shut.

  “What’s keeping you?” Papa asked, thumping snow off his boots. “Your mother—” He broke off as Nathan’s shift to hide Eliada pushed her out between them. She straightened out as she floated, and her hair spilled darkly bright, longer than the distance to the floor.

  “It’s—it’s Eliada,” Nathan said, his eyes intent on Papa’s face as he gathered the inert body into his arms. “The girl I gave the milk to. She came for help. They’re starving in this storm.”

  “She’ll freeze in this storm if you stay out here,” said Papa. “Give her to me.”

  Nathan stood up, lifting Eliada with him. He looked at his father, his eyes wide with wonder. “She is less heavy—like she said she’d make the milk.”

  “You’re wasting time,” said Papa and took Eliada. His arms jerked upward at the lack of expected weight. Nathan caught the limpness of a trailing hand and kept Eliada from leaving Papa’s grasp. Papa took a firmer hold, one arm over and one under, turning Eliada so her face pressed against his shoulder.

  “The door,” he said, and Nathan slipped around him and opened the door to the blast of the storm.

  After endlessly struggling with wind and the stinging slap of driven snow, Nathan, clinging to the stretched rope with one hand and the darkened lantern with the other, stopped to gasp for breath. Papa stopped close behind him, pushing Eliada against him to provide some small, brief shelter. Nathan felt a movement against his back and felt Eliada say something. He turned and groped to touch her to—to warn her?

  “Cold,” said Eliada, stirring. “Cold.”

  And the howl and shove of the storm slowly muted. The sting and slap of the snow-laden wind swirled, hesitated, and was stilled. And slowly, slowly warmth wrapped them about. Slowly? It was all in the space of a started in-breathing and an astonished out-breathing.

  Nathan clung to the rope, trying to see Papa. It was too dark. Papa muttered something and pushed Eliada against Nathan’s back. Nathan stumbled on toward the house, his troubled face seeking for the wind and snow that should be punishing him.

  Then he saw the lighted doorway ahead, with Mama anxiously peering out, a quilt clutched around her for warmth. As they moved into the lightened darkness of the doorway, Nathan glanced up. He saw the snow driving, swirling down, but it never reached them. It curved and slid away as if—as if there were something between them and the night. Then Eliada stirred again, lifting her pale face to look up. And, with a doubled roar and chill, the storm smote them again.

  Then they were in and the door was shut and the unbelievable warmth and comfort of the house enveloped them.

  “It is so good.” Eliada looked up from the bowl of bread-and-milk—hard crusts of bread broken into a bowl of milk—hot milk, this time, because of the cold.

  “Best not eat anything else now,” said Mama, who glowed with having a guest to feed. “What with being hungry so long—”

  “Else?” said Eliada, her eyes widening. “More to eat than this?” She lifted a white spoonful. “At the same eating? In this world?”

  “Eggs,” said Mama, her worried look sliding to Papa.

  “From our hens. Before the storm began, they were laying pretty good—”

  “Eggs?” Eliada slid back into some place in her head that she seemed to have to go to often, for some reason.

  “Oh, eggs!” Her eyes shone again. “The bird ones were so small. But they all went away when the cold came. Did your birds not go away?” she asked Lucas, who had followed her like a clumsy, quilt-wrapped shadow ever since she had come in. He leaned on the table opposite her, his eyes feeding even more hungrily than her mouth did.

  “Yes,” he said hoarsely. “The birds went away, but our hens—” He wrapped his arms tightly around himself and coughed until he gagged. He sat swiping at the cough-driven tears with the worn quilt over his arm, and sniffed and shook with the cold that shook anyone if they left the reach of the fireplace. Everyone except Eliada.

  Eliada looked around at the rest of the family, her cheeks becoming faintly pink. “You are all cold,” she said. “I’m sorry. I forgot you are not my People.” She broke off, then turned to Papa. “I am not strong enough or skilled enough in that Persuasion, since it is not my gift, but if you have a metal—something—I can make it give heat for you for a while.”

  Papa looked at her, his eyes too deep in shadows to show any glint. Nathan rushed into the moment of silence. “Like the little one she gave me. You know, you thought it was a rock, but it was metal and it was warm.”

  Before Papa could say anything, Lucas darted for the door, shedding his outer layer as he went, and got there at the same moment as Adina, and both snatched up the heavy metal crowbar that, at this season, was the tool for breaking the ice from the door when the drifts froze too hard to kick aside. It was a short, stout metal bar, bent into a hook at one end and flattened to a stubbly blade at the other.

  Together, the two children wrestled the bar back to Eliada.

  “Yes,” she smiled. “Put it with the fire.”

  “Aw, heating it in the fire’s no good. The pots get cold right away when you take them off.” Lucas was disappointed.

  “Do what she says,” said Adina, tugging at the bar. “Give it to me and I’ll—”

  The two, tugging against each other, managed to plop the bar into the front of the ashes.

  It raised a small grimy snow from the feathery ashes. “It is better in front,” said Eliada. “In the fire, the warmness would go up the opening to outside. It is odd—” Her cheeks pinked-up and she moved to the fireplace.

  Eliada knelt in front of the bar, little puffs of ashes stirring around her as she knelt. She made a quick sign with one hand; then she reached a finger to touch the end of the bar. She glanced back at the absorbed faces. “I’m not practiced,” she said. “I must touch first.”

  There was a brief silence during which the sound of the wind filled the house as completely as though it were empty of life. Then Eliada lifted her finger from the bar and sat back sideways, but still looking at the bar. She lifted herself a little to pull her dress free from where it had twisted under her, and sat again.

  Slowly, wonderfully, warmth began. And flowed into the chilly room like a warming stream, loosening muscles that were unconsciously tightened against the cold, making cheeks and ears start to tingle.

  Eliada came to her feet. “I cannot make it more than warm,” she said. “Some can make it glow dull red, but—”

  “Gollee!” Adina’s eyes were wide. “That’s magic! Where did you learn that?”

  “At Home,” said Eliada. She seemed suddenly unsteady and held tightly to the edge of the table with white fingertips. “Before our Crossing. Before we fell here—” Then she straightened and managed a smile. “But we learn here also,” she said. “We have learned to make mush from corn—”

  “Mush!” Lucas’ scorn was large again. “How to make mush!”

  “It fed us,” said Eliada. “And the bar—it warms you. Why is one more wonderful than the other?”

  Nathan shook his head. Maybe so. But to compare something like making mush to this miracle—and yet—he shook his head again.

  “Feeding,” said Papa suddenly. “Your people. They’re still hungry?”

  “Yes.” Eliada’s face sobered. “They were so hungered that I was the only one who could come. The others are in protective sleep until I come with food. And, if I could not find food, or if I should be Called while I am away, they will sleep until their Calling.”

  “Oh,” said Mama, clutching the side of her a
pron. “We’ll have to—” Her eyes went to Papa, but he was going back to his rocking chair, hitching it to an angle to put the fireplace out of his sight. “Well,” said Mama, hesitantly. Then she smiled and turned to Eliada, her face alight with the pleasure of being able to share.

  “And these?” Eliada touched one finger to the rosy brown curve of an egg.

  “Eggs,” said Lucas, torn between scorn for her ignorance and his fascination with her.

  “So big!” said Eliada. “The bird one, so small! So small to hold all that feathers and singing! Do your—do your hens sing, too?”

  “They might call it singing,” said Nathan smiling. “On warm summer days, all lazy in the sun—” Tears bit suddenly at the back of his eyes at the remote memory.

  “We can let you have these,” said Mother. “When they are gone, there will be others.” She gathered them, with a practiced outspreading of her fingers, lifting them from the bowl. “But how—they’ll break—”

  “I can carry them,” assured Eliada. And Mama, hesitating for a moment, put them down on the table. One egg began a slow, flopping roll to the edge, but Eliada looked at it, and it reversed itself and hid itself in the middle of the small cluster.

  “And to eat them?” Eliada’s cheeks were less white now, and her eyes were losing their hooded look of suffering.

  “If you were hungry enough, raw would do,” said Nathan with a grimace. “But, cooked—? You have fire to cook with?”

  “We have to cook with,” said Eliada, her eyes going to the bar on the hearth.

  “But how can you carry all this by yourself?” Nathan shivered. Even Eliada’s magic didn’t operate very well on the far side of the room. Eliada’s eyes were on the little heaps of food, as if her eyes were still hungry. Then her smile, fed and comfortable, said, “I can carry it. We—we can carry much. I will show you.”

  She folded the rough piece of canvas Nathan had found up in the loft up around the food; then, stepping back a little from the table, she looked at the lumpy package. It suddenly quivered through, then lifted a little from the table and slid toward Eliada. She took hold of one loose corner of the canvas and moved over to the door. The bundle followed her, obedient to the tug of her fingertips.

  Eliada smiled, her eyes touching each person, like a warm hand. “And, see? One whole hand left to carry the container of milk!” The lard can, with its tightly fitted cover, lifted up at a gesture of her hand and hung itself on her fingers.

  “How are you going to get home?” asked Adina, anxiously. “It’s so cold and dark.”

  “I can always find home,” said Eliada, smiling at her. “And I can shield against the storm.” Her glance gathered them together again, her eyes glowing in the twilight of the room. “Truly the Presence, the Name, and the Power are here with you. From your little, you have given us abundance. Even here—so far from Home. So the Old Ones assured us, but—but—” Nathan felt her spasm of grief and sorrow, and then she smiled a little. “It is so much easier to doubt than to believe.”

  She glanced at the fireplace, where the heavy length of the crowbar sent out almost visible waves of warmth. “It will cool,” she reminded. “A day or two days. Or, if gratitude counts, maybe many more days.” She made a farewell sign with her hand. “Dwell comforted in the Presence.” And then she was gone, the door stubbing back on the chunks of ice and snow that had fallen against the threshold.

  There was a silence, broken only by the vast rush of the wind. Surely not so loudly now that warmth was in the room.

  Then Papa moved to the fireplace and kicked thoughtfully at the crowbar. “I’m not sure I want to be warmed by this warmth,” he said, his voice rolling deep through the unaccustomed length of his sentence. “It may be of evil. This will take some thinking out.”

  “Papa,” Nathan’s voice was urgent. “It can’t be evil. She knew Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, only she said they called them something else. Other languages—”

  “And yet,” said Papa, “the Devil can quote Scriptures for his purposes. This will take some thinking out.” And he sat again in his chair, the Bible on his lap again, his eyes deep-shadowed by his heavy brows, and stared into the almost visible warmth of the bar.

  “Too easy,” he muttered. “By the sweat of thy brow—”

  The storm cleared from the skies and the crackling cold came. It lay heavily on the land, so heavily that it crushed every vestige of color from everything so that, in a black and white world, Nathan’s red cap was like a sudden shout.

  He had walked over the crispness of the frozen world to the thicket where even Kelly Cow had sense enough not to venture this day. He stood on the other side of the thicket, his hands in his pockets, his shoulders hunched against the cold, and looked across the smooth, stumpless, sunless field beyond, wondering how those people were doing.

  Then he heard a dear call and the sound of laughter, and shrank back, startled, into the shadow of the thicket.

  A streak of color shot across the smoothness of the field, dark hair streaming free, bright blue clothes an exclamation point against the white. Eliada? It seemed of a size.

  Then came the others, staying in a little duster, a small child piggy-back on one of them. Brightly, laughingly, they followed Eliada, skimming the snow as if—

  Nathan clutched a limb for something solid to hang on to. Eliada swung by him, dose enough for him almost to touch. And was gone before he could blink. But she couldn’t have! No one—Then the duster swirled past, the laughing child dinging to the hair of the laughing man. Then they were all at the far side of the field again.

  “They can’t!” Nathan whispered indignantly. “They can’t skate with no skates on. And without moving their feet! They can’t.”

  And a thin, sweet memory stabbed back to him from Back Home. A red sled, and a very high hill, and the delightful terror of letting go at the top—and collecting your breath again at the bottom. But you had to have a hill—and a sled—

  He looked across the flatness of the field. The people had stopped now and were clustered together. Then one slid away from the others, and Eliada was skimming the snow, back across the field. Toward him? He shrank farther back in the thicket, suddenly afraid.

  Eliada came slower and slower and stopped. “Nathan?” she called. “Nathan?”

  Nathan crunched snow to face her. “Yeah,” he said.

  “Oh, Nathan!” Eliada took his two hands and pulled him out of the thicket. “I sensed you as we went by! But I wasn’t sure, so I came—Isn’t it a beautiful day?” She whirled lightly around Nathan, making him feel heavy-footed and as awkward as a hub. Then she shot away from him—not even touching—but, yes, because, as she turned, a skiff of snow sprayed briefly—and again when she returned to him and stopped, laughing and panting.

  “You’re all right now?” he asked. “You have plenty to eat?” Her glowing face told him how unnecessary was the question.

  “Oh, Nathan!” she laughed. “It would be all funny, if we hadn’t so nearly been Called because of hunger.”

  “What happened?” Nathan hunched and shivered. Standing still, the cold flowed into you fast.

  “Oh, I forgot,” said Eliada. “Here, I’ll extend.”

  And a motion came between Nathan and the cold, a motion that circled him completely and closed him into warmth with Eliada.

  “How do you do that!” he asked, unhappily.

  Eliada’s face sobered. “Does it offend you?” she asked. “It is more comfortable, merely.”

  Nathan rubbed his nose, which had started to tingle. “What was funny?” he asked.

  Eliada’s face brightened. “After we ate your food—and, Nathan, nothing, not even the festival foods we had to leave behind on The Home, ever tasted so good. We cried for its goodness as we ate. And laughed because we cried. But the food didn’t last very long. And we thought to sleep again to our Calling rather than to take food again from your family. But one morning I received a directive to go dig in the little hill behind
the house. Such a silly thing to do! But a directive! So two of us went. I could hardly lift the digging thing, but Roth was stronger. He has no sight because of the Crossing, but he is strong. So we tried to dig—and blocks fell away and there was a door! And we opened it—and food! Food!”

  “The root cellar,” said Nathan. “The people before you put the food by for the winter. How come they didn’t tell you before they left?”

  Eliada’s face saddened. “There was only one, and he did not leave. He was Called the day we arrived. One of the life slips shattered and his body was too broken to hold him more. So he was Called. With my brother. It was his slip that shattered.” She tightened her lips and a tear slid from the corner of one eye. “How joyfully he went Other side, but how lonely for us who are still this side.”

  “Your brother—” Nathan swallowed with an effort that didn’t get rid of the heavy lump choking him. “My—my—” He watched his toe kick against a skeletal bush until he could stop his lips.

  “It’s too bad you didn’t get the directive before you got that hungry,” he said, still not looking at her. “Whatever a directive is.”

  “A directive?” asked Eliada. “But surely—I mean, maybe you have another name for it. For when the Power says to you, Do, unless you are too far separated from the Presence, you do for that is what must be done, when it must be done.”

  “No,” said Nathan. “At least, I don’t know. Still think it could have passed the word—”

  “We sometimes wonder,” said Eliada, “but we never question. If the directive had come sooner, I would not have gone to you. And I would not now be saying, how can I help loose you from the burden you bear of sorrow and—and evil, Nathan? Evil?”

  Nathan turned his face away, biting his lip to hold his face straight. Eliada moved to where she could see his face again. “And evil? Oh, Nathan!”

  “My father killed my brother!” Nathan’s voice grated his throat with its suppressed intensity. “I hate him!”

  “Killed?” Eliada touched Nathan’s arm. “You mean, sent him ahead of his time, back into the Presence? Oh, surely not! Not really so?”