Red Mantle

by Maria Turtschaninoff

  I remember the way the soldiers’ captain looked at me. They can come and take whatever they want, Sister Eostre. They can claim people like livestock. They can argue that Father is still in debt to them, and my sacrifice will be in vain. I braid and bind and pray to the three aspects of the First Mother for her protection. Please would you add your prayers to mine?

  Respectfully,

  SUMMER

  Dearest Jai,

  I sent the first bundle of letters to you shortly after writing one final letter to Sister Eostre a moon ago, and I am already starting a new batch. I have tried to restrain myself, but I need to feel close to you all, even if it is a waste of precious paper.

  I wonder whether we will ever sit together again under the lemon tree in the Knowledge Yard, you and I and Ennike the Rose? Drinking cool spring water and watching seabirds fly as we talk of everything and nothing. When I close my eyes I can imagine being there with you. It is strange: I can see it all as clearly as if I were there. The walls of my parents’ house melt away, and I am caressed by salty breezes and shaded by the glossy, dark leaves of the lemon tree, and I rest my cheek on the smooth grain of its tough bark. I can hear the bleats of the goats grazing on the mountain slopes, and the patter of sandals running across the stone-paved courtyard. A cat lies asleep in my lap. You are there, and Ennike, and we have just eaten, and the taste of nirnberry sauce lingers in my mouth.

  How I miss nirnberry sauce!

  The letters cannot possibly have reached you yet, but I like to think about them making their journey closer and closer to Menos. The donkey convoy came winding past from the north just before the summer solstice, with bales of wool stacked high on the donkeys’ bony backs. They had traveled through the mountain pass and stopped very close to Sáru for an afternoon to rest and water their animals. As soon as I heard tell of them, I dropped what I was doing and rushed to gather my letters, not forgetting a small coin I had set aside for precisely this purpose. I ran so fast that I lost my headscarf, my hair was flying in my face and my heart was pounding. I was afraid that I had missed them. But they had set up camp for the night in a dell, and when I found them I was met by the smoke of many fires, and talk and song. Having traveled in a similar convoy myself, I searched for a solitary woman among the multitudes. I saw no familiar faces, but I did find a woman tending to three hinnies at the edge of the camp. Her hair was bound in many tight braids that she had then tied together into a knot on her crown. She wore a necklace of coral, amber and bluestone wound several times around her neck. Her animals looked well kept, which encouraged me to approach her. She was from Devenland, and spoke an almost unintelligible dialect of the coastal language, but with gestures and repetition we managed to understand each other. When I mentioned Ajanie, she became instantly more amicable, realizing that we had a mutual friend. She promised to take my letters as far as Masson, where she would find someone reliable to carry them farther to Muerio and send them on a boat bound for Menos. When she heard the letters’ destination she became very serious and looked at me intently, as if to figure out whether I was telling the truth. She examined my clothes and my unbound hair. I held up my hand to show her Sister O’s snake ring, and then she smiled and nodded.

  “The symbols of the Goddess: rose, apple, snake.”

  If I understood her correctly, her grandmother had spent her childhood on Menos. Have you ever heard the elder sisters speak of a novice by the name of Dakila? The tradeswoman refused payment for taking the letters, but she allowed me to buy some of the wares she had not been able to sell to the Akkade people: cinnamon bark, which is delicious in food but also helpful against infections; ginger, one of the most useful plants Sister Nar taught me about; and ink, because my supply had nearly run out. Then I bought a little candied ginger for Maressa and Dúlan. Now one silver coin and a few copper coins is all that remains from the money the Mother Abbess gave me.

  By the time you read this letter I suppose she will have told you what happened to the rest. The whole Abbey surely knows of my failure. I feel profound shame when I think of it, so I try not to think of it at all.

  Now my letters are moving south in the travel pack of a Devenian merchant. When I lie in my bed at night, I follow their journey in my mind’s eye. I recall a small lake where convoys often stop, so perhaps this convoy will stop there too. I remember a bridge across the rapid river there, and how frightened I was to cross it. Perhaps they have reached Masson already and the tradeswoman has already passed the letters on to another. I have asked Sister O to pay a handsome sum to the fishermen who deliver them to Menos in the hope that word will spread: it pays to bring letters from this little place in the far north to the solitary mountainous island in the south.

  Oh Jai, I am rattling on. Please forgive me! Nothing I have written in this letter is of any consequence. A waste of ink and paper, not to mention your time spent reading it. I can imagine where you are now—in your favorite spot in the Knowledge Garden, surrounded by Sister Nar’s fragrant herbs? I picture your head bent over my pages, your squinting eyes in the bright light, your already fair hair lightened in the summer sun until it is as white as snow. Butterflies and Sister Mareane’s bees are fluttering around you, aren’t they? Tell me they are!

  Writing this letter has let me feel close to you. I hope that is enough of an excuse.

  Now I can hear Father snoring. That is my signal to set aside my writing implements and let myself be enveloped by the night. Akios is mumbling in his sleep. He sleeps in front of the fireplace and not on the ledge above it now that it is too warm. A mild summer breeze is whispering in the apple trees, which have already shed their blossoms.

  It is not only nirnberry sauce that I miss, Jai, my friend.

  Venerable Sister O,

  I have no silver left. How will I found my school now? I could work to earn more, but that would leave me no time to help at home. Besides, I am a grown woman; I cannot expect Mother and Father to provide for me. My days are filled with hard labor, and I have no time or energy left for anything else. How disappointed you must be in me! All my plans have amounted to nothing. Nobody here wants to send their children to my school. It is summertime now and everybody has to pitch in with the farm work, young and old alike. Perhaps they were right: education has no place here.

  Your novice,

  My dear Ennike Rose,

  Yesterday we celebrated one of the biggest festivals in Rovas: midsummer’s eve. It is the shortest night of the year, which here we call the summer offering, when Rovasians dance through the evening in their sacred offering groves, light fires to chase evil spirits away, and praise the fruitfulness of the earth with offerings and rituals.

  I am currently sitting beneath the apple trees to write this, though it is so dark that I can barely see my own words. I hope you can read my writing. If indeed you ever get the opportunity to read this. I am not sure whether I will send these letters. I am not writing about what is truly important. I touch upon the important things, but dare not go further. I have no silver and have become little more than a farm girl. I have accomplished nothing with all that I learned at the Abbey. I am wasting the knowledge that all the good sisters worked so hard to impart, and that I worked so hard to learn. Now only my body works, not my mind.

  Indeed, it is my body that has stories to tell you this evening—things I can tell no one but you, my friend, because you are the Rose. Writing does not do it justice. I wish we could talk about this. I wish I could visit you in the Temple of the Rose and address you formally in your role as the Rose, all the while knowing that you are also Ennike, my friend with the chestnut curls.

  Something is pulsating inside me, something new and strange that I do not understand.

  We gathered in the circular central yard early in the morning of midsummer’s eve. The whole village, old and young. Náraes was there with her family, and Mother and Father and Akios, and Árvan, who was carefully avoiding looking at me, and everybody else. I saw Marget too, with gaze downcast. E
ven she could not stay indoors on a day such as this. Everyone was dressed in their finest clothes. The women wore beautiful aprons with elaborate embroidery, with their hair freshly braided and flower wreaths on their heads. The men wore embroidered waistcoats over clean shirts, and gleaming, well-polished shoes. The children ran around barefoot, squealing with impatience and excitement. Everyone was carrying sacks of food. I had attached Gray Lady to a cart, which was beautifully decorated with leaves in honor of the day, and we loaded it with much of the village’s food, along with barrels of malt drink and soured skim milk. There is still a food shortage in the village from last winter, and the grain is nowhere near ready to be harvested yet, but we had plenty of eggs, and fresh vegetables from the kitchen gardens, and wild strawberries and waterberries the children had gathered from the ditch banks. Akios, Jannarl and Máros had gone out on several morning hunts for the summer offering and come home with birds and hares from the forest. Father and I had also ventured all the way to the river, where we managed to catch some great shining salmon. Árvan contributed several round yellow cheeses his mother had prepared. We could hold our heads up high as Sáru made its contribution to the shared feast. Of course, it is nothing compared to nadum bread and the flaky pies Sister Ers makes for Moon Dance and the other festivals at the Abbey.

  We sang in procession out of the village and along the fields toward the forest. We left our homes behind us, scrubbed spotless from threshold to rafters, with clean bedclothes, new straw on the floor, and all the fireplaces freshly polished. Old grandmother Kild stayed at home. She is recovering from her injury, but she will never walk as she did before.

  It was a beautiful day with a clear-blue sky, and already warm when we set out early in the morning. Still, I wore my red woolen cloak. I wanted to be well dressed too. Mother watched as I hung it over my shoulders, and then looked away. I cannot imagine what problem she has with my cloak!

  In Rovas they do not believe in any god or goddess, but the forest and earth and sky are divine in their own right and venerated and worshipped as such. There are also animals attributed with godlike qualities: the bear is the guardian of the forest and hunters; the waterbird Kalma spans three territories—earth, air and sea—and is therefore sacred; the black fox outwits the other animals time and time again when they attempt to kill her.

  We arrived at the offering grove after midday. The grove is in a valley where ancient trees grow—all the broad-leaved trees that exist in Rovas are to be found there, except the silverwood, of course. Giant lindens, birches, maples and oaks reach for the heavens, their vast canopies creating a dappled-green ceiling. The ground is strewn with fallen leaves, and few plants grow but the arctic starflower. Another village was already there when we arrived, and everybody was greeting relatives, comparing sowing experiences and exchanging news of this and that, while a long table was set up at the edge of the grove. We did not venture too far in to where the elder oak stands. Another two villages joined us in the grove, one of which was Jóla. I saw Tauer with his children and grandchildren, but supposed his elderly father could not manage the journey.

  Once everything was set up and several fires were blazing away, the village elders gathered by the elder oak to perform the rites and whisper the holy words into the tree bark. Then finally they sacrificed a river duck, slitting its throat and letting the blood drip into the black soil at the base of the oak’s trunk.

  I stood close to my family as we watched the ceremony, and under my breath I muttered the Abbey’s words of thanks to the Mother aspect of the Goddess for the blessing of her summer bounty. And Rose, do you know something? For a moment I thought I felt her respond in the vibrations beneath the soles of my feet and the wind caressing my unbound hair. I looked up, surprised, and met my mother’s inscrutable gaze. I quickly looked down again. She must have heard me, and I know that she does not like it when I continue with the traditions and rites of Menos.

  Once the sacrifice was complete the women took down the pots that had been hanging over the many fires, and it was time to eat! We sat on benches at the long table and helped ourselves to all the delicious things on offer: cheeses, sweet bread, sausages, pots of tender spring cabbage, and smoked wild salmon served whole and topped with boiled eggs, fresh berries, newly sprouted peas and soured skim milk. One of the villages had even brought a barrel of beer. We all ate and ate until the little ones fell asleep and the rest of us leaned back-to-back and stretched out our legs. It was the most satisfied my appetite has been since coming here. The men lit pipes stuffed with homegrown tobacco, and the women cleared away slowly, chatting amiably and carrying all the bowls and pots down to a nearby stream to be washed. I helped, and washed in silence beside Marget. Then I spread my cloak out under a birch tree and invited her to join me, and together we slept away the rest of the afternoon, with Marget between me and the tree so that she might feel safe.

  Many others slept also. When we awoke it was early evening, but still daylight, as is always the case in northern Rovas at midsummer. I walked down to the stream to drink the cold water and splash my face to wake up properly. With stream water dripping from my hair, I returned to the grove, where the musicians were gathering in the middle, though still at a respectful distance from the elder oak. Someone had mounted two old bear skulls onto stakes on either side of the musicians. They dated back to the times when we were still allowed to hunt large game in the forest. The children had picked starflowers and other blossoms to make wreaths to adorn their heads, the trees and stakes, so the whole grove appeared as though in full bloom.

  The musicians struck up the “Grain Tramplers’ Song,” and all the old women took each other by the hand to form a circle in front of the musicians and started singing, as is our custom. They stamped their feet in measured rhythm, and sang about how the Old Lady in the sky sent grain to the people of Earth to cultivate and eat, then how Samarni the Foolish lost the grain but her sister Agarne found it again, and carried it in her mouth through the burning plains and the weeping caves and the forest of ice and mist.

  Then all the old men took each other by the hand and formed a circle around the old women. Father was among them, and I clapped to the rhythm and smiled as I saw his brown boots stamping in time with the other men as they sang the verse about Rókan, the youth who wanted the grain and made a number of attempts to steal it from Agarne’s mouth before finally succeeding through a kiss.

  As the shadows lengthened beneath the trees, many old songs were played and sung. They were the songs unique to this time of year, when summer is in full bloom and grain is ripening in the fields, when balance must be maintained and all important things must be remembered. When twilight came we lit the fires once more, as a sign to the earth and the sky that the villagers of Rovas still honor those to whom honor is due. And it also marked the beginning of the free dance.

  I took Maressa by the hand and led her in among the dancing couples. We danced “Maiden’s Kiss”—and it made me think of you, Ennike Rose—then we danced “The Merchant’s Silver Pitcher” and “Stream Hop” and “First Snow.” Then Maressa wanted to dance with her father, and I stepped to the side of the dancing crowd to catch my breath. Náraes passed me a jug of cool water and I drank gratefully. The summer evening was warm and mild, and the wind had calmed down. I was hot from dancing, and the air was heavy with sweat and the smoke of many fires. Akios came to find me and pulled me back up, and we danced so many dances that I lost count. Finally, we lay laughing in the grass, looking up into the tree branches.

  “Can we continue our lessons soon?” Akios asked quietly when no one else could hear. “I really do want to learn to read, Maresi. There must be more to life than Sáru. Tell me there’s something more?”

  I sat up, leaned back on my elbows and watched the people dancing. The fires cast a flickering red glow upon the swirling couples, and I was suddenly reminded of the Moon Dance. I reflected before answering.

  “There is more,” I said quietly. “But I do not know
whether I am the right person to show it to you, Akios.”

  The families with small children had set up camp around the grove, and the elder folk had also retired for the night. It was the young people’s turn to dance, and young men and women with flushed cheeks were holding hands and waists and necks, and smiling and laughing and dancing in a flutter of waistcoats and skirts. I saw Árvan dance past, stiff and serious, with a very young beauty who had thick brown braids and a richly embroidered skirt. Péra from Jóla ran over to pull Akios to his feet, and as he laughingly gave in, I saw Marget’s face darken and turn away. She did not dance at all. Everybody paired up, boy and girl, and perhaps those same pairs would get married and have children, or perhaps they would simply find a little happiness and comfort in each other’s arms that night.

  Suddenly I no longer felt happy. There was no part for me to play in this game. I stood up and picked up my cloak. It was time for me to go home to bed.

  Then a young man approached me. I hardly knew him, just that his name is Géros and he lives in the neighboring village, Jóla. Géros is a little younger than I, and I know that he and Akios played together when they were younger. He is tall and slim with distinctive dark eyebrows.

  “Why aren’t you dancing?” he asked.

  I glanced at him to see if he was mocking me, but his smile was friendly. His face was full of freckles.

  “I am already exhausted from dancing,” I said. “I think it is time I went home.”

  “Not yet, surely?” Then he took my hand.

  I was too surprised to protest. His hand was warm and dry. He pulled me into the ring of dancers. I saw raised eyebrows and meaningful glances, and my cheeks started burning, but then the music took hold of me and I no longer noticed anyone else. Géros is a good dancer. He is quick and nimble and never lost me among all the other dancing couples, even when we spun apart. My feet were moving at lightning speed, stomping and kicking, turning and jumping, and Géros’s hands kept spinning me around, catching me and spinning again. It was great fun, dear Ennike Rose, and soon I was breathless, and felt hot and wild.