Black Spring

by Alison Croggon

  Damek arrived as usual after breakfast. Before showing him to Lina’s room, I took him aside and told him of Ezra’s visit that morning. He looked at me narrowly, and then showed me a silver ring, very like the one you wear, which he bore on his middle finger.

  “I care that for a petty village wizard,” he said. “Don’t think I didn’t come here without protection.”

  “It’s not you I fear for,” I answered tartly. “It’s Lina. She’s close to her time, and what with you and Mr Tibor squabbling over her like a couple of dogs she’s beside herself. The last thing she needs is the Wizard Ezra sticking his nose in.”

  This made him thoughtful. He studied my face, as if he were seeing me for the first time.

  “A dog? Is that what you think I am, Anna?”

  “You might as well be,” I said. “It’s not like you ever think about the position Lina is in. She’s a married woman, and you are bringing scandal to her name when even she says she’s finally happy! If you knew what was good for her, you’d just go back where you came from.”

  “I’ll wager if you said as much to her, she would tell you to go to hell,” he said.

  I couldn’t deny that, after what Lina had said the night before, but I had had enough. “All the more reason for you to leave, if she can’t make the right decision on her own. You might take some pity on her, Damek.”

  Damek laughed. “Pity Lina? You should know her better than that! You should tell her to pity me.”

  If I had dared, I would have slapped him for his selfishness. He must have seen it in my face, for his expression changed, and he took my arm, holding it so tightly that I cried out.

  “If you knew what I suffer! I live under a curse, and she is the witch that has cursed me – my heart is in a red-hot vice, and every day it is jabbed and rent by demons, every day the wounds bite deeper. And they will not heal – no, not as long as I draw breath. I know that you despise me because I do not believe in God, Anna. But believe me, I know that hell exists. I know, because I live there. And Lina knows it, she knows it in her bones. She sent me there when she betrayed her own heart. No, I won’t pity her. She doesn’t deserve it.”

  All this was said in a low, urgent voice, with such rapidity and passion that I scarce understood what he said. I pulled my arm away, and at last he let me go, and I stepped back from him.

  He laughed again at my white face, although there was no mirth in it. “I know you think me a monster. Maybe you always have,” he said. “But I tell you, I am not so inhuman. I wish I were. With all my soul, I wish I were.” And he brushed past me and went upstairs, where Lina awaited him in her bedchamber.

  XXXII

  I returned to the kitchen and tried to gather my scattered wits together by chopping vegetables and gutting a chicken and other sundry tasks, but my hands were shaking so badly I could hardly hold a knife. Finally I poured myself a nip of plum brandy, and that helped with the shakiness. I had poked up the fire and set myself to stuffing the chicken when a scream echoed through the house. I knew at once it was Lina, even before she called my name. Then I heard Damek running down the stairs and shouting for me.

  I have no recollection of moving from the kitchen to Lina’s room: it just seemed that suddenly I was there. Lina was curled up on the bed, panting like a wild animal at bay; her hair was disordered and her bodice was ripped. I thought that they must have been making love and my heart plummeted at the scandal that must surely follow, but I didn’t have time to reflect on this. Lina groaned and lifted herself on her hands and knees, and I saw that blood was seeping through her skirts.

  I turned, wondering whether to run for the doctor or to stay with her, and saw that Damek was just behind me. He looked panic-stricken, the only time I have ever seen the like in him: all the blood had drained from his face, and his knuckles were white. In my distraction, I grabbed his shoulders and shook him.

  “What have you done? What have you done to her?”

  He didn’t deign to answer me; instead he asked in a shaken voice what was wrong with her.

  “It’s her time, you fool!” I was beyond caring what I said. I didn’t know anything about childbirth, but it looked wrong to me, and I didn’t know what to do. “What do you think is wrong?”

  Lina heard me, and twisted on the bed, calling my name, so that I ran to her and took her hand. She grasped it blindly; her eyelids were shut tight, although tears escaped from beneath them and coursed down her face. “Anna, it hurts! It hurts so! Ah, I’ve never felt anything like that…” Her heart was pounding so fast I could see its pulse in her breast, and her hand was cold as ice and slick with sweat. I murmured some words of comfort and wiped her forehead, and she grimaced, and then sighed.

  “It’s gone now,” she said. She opened her eyes and looked up at me, and I cried out and almost snatched back my hand in my shock: for the eyes that blazed out of her white face were the violet eyes of a witch. In that moment I thought that she wasn’t Lina at all, but some hellish apparition sent to torment me. Then I recollected myself, and tried to think what to do.

  “You’re bleeding, Lina,” I said, as firmly as I was able. “I am going to get the doctor.”

  She gripped my hand even tighter. “Don’t leave me!” she said. “Don’t go away!”

  I stroked her hair and told her to be calm, but she wouldn’t let go of my hand until I promised that I would stay with her. I gave my promise, and then persuaded her that I had to organize some help.

  Damek was standing still as stone by the door, watching us. I went up and talked to him in an undertone, because I did not wish Lina to overhear.

  “God rot that man in hell,” he said. “He’s killing her with his brat.”

  “No, it’s you killing her,” I said. “I told you she was near her time! I told you to take care! What have you done? Her eyes…”

  “She is Lina again, Anna.” He grasped my shoulders and stared intently into my face. “She is herself at last. Do you not see? I could burst with the joy of it! But now…”

  “But now she will die, if you do not help. Get out of here – this is no place for you. If you value Lina’s life, you will ride for the doctor this instant.”

  He stared at me a moment longer, then thrust me aside and rushed to Lina’s bedside, and snatched her violently in his arms, kissing her wildly all over her face. She wound her arms around his neck, and I saw that she was sobbing.

  “It has stopped hurting, my dear,” she said. “My dear, dear Damek.”

  Damek did not answer; he gathered her greedily in his arms, and I saw that his shoulders were shaking. Then he mastered himself, and raised himself up so he could see her face.

  “By God, Lina, how could you do this to us?” he said in a low voice. “How could you? What if you die? What would I do without you?”

  Lina laughed shakily, but it was a poor imitation of her usual mockery. “Dying? Who’s talking about dying? I told you I would live for ever… I’m only having a baby. Life, not death…”

  “But you’re so pale,” he whispered. “And why all this blood, Lina?”

  “There’s always blood,” she said.

  “So much?” he said, lifting her sodden gown. “Surely not so much?” He kissed the cloth, and then kissed her face, so that her mouth and cheeks were smudged with the bloody prints of his lips.

  I stood irresolute – I felt I should stop them, but didn’t know how. Then there was a timid knock on the door. It was Irli, who was come to see what the fuss was about. She craned her neck to see into the room, but I would not let her look, and shut the door behind me; then I hurriedly gave her instructions, telling her to send for the doctor and the midwife, as quickly as she was able, if she valued the life of her mistress.

  I paused on the landing a short time, to catch my breath, and then returned to the chamber. Lina and Damek were no longer embracing; Lina lay on her side, her hair scattered over her pillow. Her belly seemed enormous, almost as if it were not part of her body. Damek was seated next
to her on the bed, stroking her face. Even as I neared them, Lina’s belly rippled, like the earth during a quake, and she groaned, and her back arched violently, so that Damek was pushed off the bed. I saw that she was still clutching his hand, but by then she was in such a state she knew not what she was doing.

  I wrenched their hands apart, and she clutched at mine instead, as if she were drowning. Damek stood like a man stunned, until I screamed at him that he had done harm enough, and that he should go. I was then too busy dealing with Lina to see what he did: but when I next was able to look, he was gone.

  XXXIII

  That was the first childbed I attended. If it had been my last, I would say that childbirth was the worst thing that could ever happen to a woman, and bless my childless state. Since then I have seen many women in travail and learned that, while birth is a great labour for every woman and never without pain, for most it is not the ordeal that it was for Lina. I have sometimes marvelled at the strength of women, whom men so lightly claim are the weaker sex: they only can claim so, who have never seen how stoically women endure the toil and anguish of their bodies, and with what gladness, when at last they hold in their arms the child they have given to the world.

  Lina was not one of those women. It seemed that her body was at war with itself: she thrashed about in her pain and panic, crying out that she had never suffered such agony, that she was being ripped by a monster, that claws and teeth were rending her in two. I thought she must be right, for I could not stop the blood: I had soaked a blanket before the doctor arrived, and he arrived quickly, for by luck he was in the village. He assessed her condition swiftly, and immediately administered a tincture, which took the edge off her suffering and stemmed the bleeding. I lost all sense of time, and in truth do not remember the following hours very well; I just did what I was told, and prayed. The child was born just as the sun set. As the doctor took the tiny scrap in his arms and cut the cord, a ray of the westering sun shafted through the window and gilded the scene with an unreal brilliance. I remember being surprised: if anyone had asked me, I would have said it was deepest night. All that day seemed like a dark tunnel.

  In no time at all, or so it seemed, the midwife had bathed the baby, and Lina was washed, and the bloodied sheets tidied away for the laundry and new linen brought, so the room no longer looked like a slaughterhouse. Lina, dressed in a fresh nightgown, lay back on her pillow. She was white to her lips, like a corpse: the only part of her that seemed alive was her eyes, and they blazed unnaturally, like giant violet orbs in her haggard face.

  I showed her the swaddled babe, and she smiled faintly. “Is that mine?” she whispered.

  “It’s a little girl,” I said.

  “Lina,” she said. “A little Lina. Damek should be pleased.”

  Even in my exhaustion, I was disturbed by what she said. “What has this to do with Mr Damek?” I said. “He’s not the babe’s father. I should think that Mr Tibor is the one most nearly concerned.”

  “Tibor?” she said, as if she didn’t know whom I meant. She shut her eyes, and turned her face to the wall. When I offered her the child and told her it needed to be fed, she shook her head irritably and waved me away.

  The doctor drew me aside, and said that we would need a wet nurse, since he didn’t believe that my mistress would be able to suckle the babe. I stared at him, and asked him straight out if Lina was going to die. Now she had had the baby, I had thought in my innocence that the worst was over. He looked grave, and told me that she was weakened by the birth and had lost a lot of blood, and that much depended on the next few days.

  Tibor was finally permitted to see his wife and child. I was conscience-stricken that he was the last person I had thought of alerting, but perhaps it had been as well that no one had remembered to get him until Damek was out of the house. He timidly entered the chamber, as if he were not sure that he was allowed in. His face was almost as white as Lina’s; I realized that he must have been sitting downstairs for hours, listening to Lina’s screams and the bustle of people running up and down with bowls of water and cloths. God alone knows what he had been imagining.

  I handed him his daughter, and he looked down at her wrinkled, red face with speechless astonishment, as if a babe were the last thing he expected. He smiled crookedly, and then looked anxiously towards his wife.

  “Mistress Lina is very tired,” I said.

  “It was a hard birth,” said the doctor, who was wiping his hands. “I suggest you ask in the village for a wet nurse.”

  Tibor nodded – though I’m not sure he had heard a word either of us said – and went to Lina. She stirred when he perched on the edge of her bed, and rolled over towards him. He flinched when he saw how her eyes had changed, but he said nothing. Lina frowned slightly, as if attempting to remember who he was, and then she smiled.

  “It’s all over,” she said. “I’m so glad.”

  She spoke so softly that he had to lean close to hear what she said.

  “Do you like her?” asked Lina.

  “Like her?” Tibor glanced down at the baby. “I – I suppose I do.”

  “She’s a little Lina. Look, she has black hair, like me.”

  Tibor nodded, and sat in silence until Lina whispered that she wished to sleep. He kissed her brow and, handing the baby back to me, left the room. I didn’t know what to say to him: he looked dazed and ill. I think that somehow he already knew that, whatever happened, he had lost Lina.

  Twilight had now turned to deep night. Lina fell fast asleep, which eased my heart, and I told Irli to watch her while I had something to eat in the kitchen. I was ravenously hungry, although I was so tired that it was an effort to chew. The doctor had a private conference with Tibor, and then told me that he knew of a village woman who had lately given birth and who could be trusted to wet-nurse the baby. He took me down to the village in his carriage with the child. Once the proper arrangements had been made, we went to the Red House and asked my mother to come up to the manse to help with Lina’s care. Masko gave her reluctant permission; the doctor made it difficult for him to refuse. While my mother was packing some essentials, the doctor offered to drive me home. I declined, despite my exhaustion; it was a clear, moonlit night, and I knew the path well. I was longing, with all my soul, for some time to myself, away from the endless demands of other people.

  I don’t think I had a single thought as I walked home. I could hear the night birds crying in the distance and the occasional hoot of an owl, and the plains lay serene and still under the moonlight. I soaked the silence in through my very pores, wondering at this peace without when there had been such terrible struggle within. When I reached the pines near the manse, Damek stepped out of their shadows and accosted me. I was too tired to be startled, but I was annoyed that my precious solitude was broken, and by Damek, of all people.

  “Anna, tell me, is she dead?” he said.

  “No, and no thanks to you,” I said, snatching back my arm from his grasp. “She had a little girl.”

  Damek said nothing, but I heard his breath catch in a sob. Then he stepped into the moonlight and I saw his expression. Despite myself, I was moved to pity. I am not sure that I have ever pitied another human being more than I did Damek in that moment. He had told me that morning – was it really that morning? – that he lived in hell. I had thought that he was exaggerating, out of self-pity; but when I saw his face that night, I believed him.

  “Thank God,” he said. “I have been standing here these hours, since I can’t be with her, and when everything went quiet, and I saw you leaving in the carriage with the baby, I was sure she must have died. I could hear her screaming from here.”

  “It wasn’t an easy time,” I said, more gently. “She’s sleeping now. Damek, you should go home and sleep yourself. You look wretched.”

  “Nay, what if she died in her sleep, and I was not here?”

  “The doctor says she will be fine,” I said.

  He studied my face. “I know you’re lying.
What did the doctor really say?”

  I hesitated, and then told him what the doctor had told me. He was silent, and then took my hand.

  “You’re a good friend,” he said, with unexpected warmth. “You reassure me. God’s truth, I have been standing here since sundown, sure that she was dead, and not daring to ask a soul if it were true. You don’t know the demons in my head – I was making sure to hang myself. That would be a rebuke to her murderer, a corpse grinning from his tree, a gift from my broken life! But what would be the point? There would be no point even in that. Such blackness in my heart, Anna! Not one glimmer of light to guide me! Do you know, I prayed. I prayed to God. Me! And my prayer went out in the empty universe among all those dead stars, and nothing came back, nothing. There was nothing there. I’ve always known it, but I’ve never felt before how big that nothing is, and I alone in the darkness with nothing to comfort me…”

  I drew my hand away from his. His words frightened me, but his face frightened me more. His teeth flashed white in the moonlight as he spoke, and his eyes glared out of his harrowed face. I was sure that he was mad.

  “She is sleeping now,” I repeated. “And so should you.”

  He laughed shortly. “Sleep? If only I could. I cannot sleep. I thank you for caring, you alone of all creatures in this godforsaken world. No, I’ll stay here and watch over her. You needn’t fear, no one will see me. You go back to Lina.”

  I wished him God’s blessing, though I’m sure I didn’t know how it would do him any good, and walked slowly back to the house. When I reached the doorway, I looked back; if I searched, I could just see his dim figure standing straight against the trunk of the pine, holding his senseless vigil in the shadows.