Broken Earth

by C M Blackwood

  “We would be very obliged, Princess,” said David Misaria.

  “Very much so,” agreed Dera Black.

  “Might you wait outside the North Doors for a little? I shall return shortly with your things.”

  The travellers nodded, and started on their way towards those doors. Yet Heidi jumped off of her horse at the last moment, and requested that Dera lead it away for her, so that she might walk on with the Princess.

  She and Lila stood quite still for a moment, watching as the others started off. Yet soon they shook themselves, smiled uncertainly at one another, and struck off across the grounds.

  “And would you really have left,” said Lila, “without saying goodbye?”

  “Not because I did not wish to,” said Heidi. “I only thought it for the best.”

  “Why would any such thing be better than a simple farewell?”

  Heidi looked to her seriously; and somewhat surprised her, by taking her hand. “I think you do understand,” she said, “why it would have been better. Don’t you?”

  “Perhaps,” said Lila. “Or, rather – why it would have been for you.”

  “Do be just, Lila. You know what I have suffered.”

  Lila sighed heavily, most in the attempt to disguise the small hitch that started up in her breath, when Heidi’s hand pressed hers. Without having thought about it, she perhaps would have said one thing; but as she did think, she said quite another, and never was certain, in those days which followed, whether she acted rightly.

  “I know very well,” she said. “And I offer you my utmost condolences. I truly am sorry – for everything that happened, while you lived in my castle.”

  “It was no fault of your own, Lila.”

  “Ah,” said Lila; “but I must disagree with you there, at least to a certain extent. But what matter now? It has been what it has been – and I can do nothing for it.”

  “Nor can any of us,” said Heidi.

  “Quite right.”

  Instead of making for the South Door, Lila led Heidi instead towards the doors to the kitchens; for no soldiers stood there, and the area was quite empty. One door, in fact, stood open to the warm spring air, as the steams and vapours of the fare of the feast wafted out into the grounds. The day was growing late, and was at the head of its concession to the night, with a beautiful array of colours painted across the Western sky.

  Lila pulled back on Heidi’s hand, so that she might stop her feet for a moment. “I only wonder,” she said, “if I might write you? Unless, of course, you do not wish me to – and then I shall not argue.”

  Heidi smiled. “Of course I wish you to. And yet I suspect that I shall be travelling for some time; and I know not whether I shall settle straightaway at home. Only let me write to you – all right? I promise that I shall.”

  “All right,” agreed Lila; though as she spoke, she only nodded rather hopelessly, and fought against another fit of tears which welled up in her eyes.

  “Ah, but don’t!” begged Heidi, putting her hand for a moment to Lila’s face. “Only bid me farewell, and give me a smile to remember you by.”

  “I had hoped,” said Lila, “that I might be able to look forward to seeing you again someday. Yet I suppose it would be better, too, if I did not?”

  “I would not say that. I shall hope for the same thing – though at a very different time, dear Lila, than this one.”

  “Quite right,” repeated Lila. She cleared her throat, and turned from Heidi; and led her briskly into the kitchens.

  Half an hour later, the travellers were assembled before the steps of Eredor, with a significant amount of provisions strapped to their horses, and a liberal amount of money jingling in their pockets. Antony, Thomas Henry and Rilga had come to bid the companions farewell; and stood with Lila below the steps. Dera, David and Helena all said their goodbyes, and offered their last thanks (with Dera, in respect to Lila, offering perhaps something of a wordless apology, as well, for any of her own behaviour which had resulted poorly in their acquaintance). Henry and Rilga then returned to the castle; and the travellers made to mount their horses.

  Lila smiled once more upon Heidi, and was prepared to watch her go without another word; yet was both pleased and pained at the last thing which she offered. She turned for a moment from her horse, and, in seeming forgetfulness of anything she may have already said, she rushed to Lila, and wrapped her in a strong embrace. The maintenance of composure required more than Lila possessed; and she was forced to give over to her tears, which came in plenty as she held Heidi Bastian tight in her arms.

  “Thank you for everything,” Heidi whispered into her ear. “You have been, and ever shall be, a great friend to me.”

  She then turned her face to kiss Lila’s cheek; and was the next moment upon her horse, and making for the gate alongside her companions.

  As Lila stood staring after her, feeling rather confused and displaced, Antony put his arm through hers, and leaned his head down to her shoulder.

  “It will be all right, Lila,” he said. “It is not the end. It is only the end of the beginning!”

  Lila kissed his forehead. “I know it, Antony,” she said. “But I do have a certain idea, which I think you might like.”

  “And what is that?”

  “How would you favour accompanying me to Húnama? You did miss the last visit I put to the place – and I am sure that Aponé would like to see you.”

  “Oh, would I!” he exclaimed. “When shall we go?”

  “What do you think of today?”

  “I think that there would be no day better, Queen Lila.”

  She laughed, and turned to walk with him up the steps. Together they passed into the entrance hall; and with a last glance backwards, at the diminishing forms of Heidi Bastian and her companions, the doors swung shut behind them.

  ~

  Heidi paid little attention to the time which it took to complete the journey. Indeed, the miles seemed only to fall away; and she noticed little else, save for a few memories of that road which she and Dera had trod some time ago. But her awareness sharpened somewhat, when they pulled for a night into the lot of the Brass Knuckle, at which she sought out immediately her old friend Billy, and found him well, and in good health. She sat long with him in his cabin, laughing and crying over the very same map that he had once helped her to interpret.

  “I thought not ever to see you again, little miss!” said he. “It’s a mighty welcome surprise, I’ll tell you.”

  “No less for me, Billy.”

  “You’ll be going home, then?”

  He had seen the casket in the wagon; and indeed, had locked it up safe in the stable. Yet he had said nothing of it.

  “In one way or another,” answered Heidi.

  “Well, little miss – I suppose it’s the best that any of us can do.”

  Heidi then shared with him the story of her stay in Onssgaard; and derived a good deal of pleasure, at the pleasure that was his, when he learnt of the earthly absence of those creatures that had once taken from him his dear Lea.

  Heidi took her leave of him next day, and followed on with her companions the road home. Over the mountains they went, much more easily this time; and wound down to Sitagrata, where she insisted upon stopping to greet Doulo and Noulo. Helena and David, who had not yet ever lain eyes upon those brothers, seemed pleasantly amused at them. They all shared a breakfast of bacon in glasses, and purple wumpkin juice. Each of them took their eggs in their hands; and Heidi kept Doulo from correcting Noulo in the matter.

  “You come back and see us, now!” said Doulo, waving after them as they made to depart.

  “Come back you, and us you see!” exclaimed Noulo to Heidi. “Ready I keep the wumpkin juice for you.”

  “Thank you, Noulo,” said Heidi. “I think it will be a long while till I see you – but someday we shall meet again!”

  “Noulo knows! Goodbye, now – goodbye!”

  Through Portentia they travelled on, till they had reached
the farmland of Lormar. With great sighs of exhaustion, they rode onto the Misaria farm; and with great amounts of anxiety and sorrow in their hearts, they made their way into the house, to deliver the news to Jum of his beloved daughter.

  Jade was laid to rest beside her mother, in the small, fenced plot behind the farm. Jum held one hand of David, and the other of Mrs Gylthie, while Heidi gave him the message which Jade had supplied her with, the very last time she saw her. Her love she reminded him of; and kissed his cheek, before her heart became too full of Jade, and she needed escape into the house.

  ~

  While staying still at the farmhouse, Heidi wrote to the man in Nanik, and put an order for two headstones, one for Jade, and one for Josephine. In the time before their finishing, she planned to ride to Delvare, and complete a piece of business there; for which, however, she needed obtain David’s permission to begin. It was her way of thinking (and Dera did agree) that they were quite unable to live again in that house on Bridgewater Street. It was too crowded with the presences of those two who had once dwelt there, but could dwell there no more; and there seemed no way to wash it clean enough, so that there might be a continuation of life there, in the face of such death. Yet there could be no others to live there, either: for it was the place made sacred for Josephine’s rest.

  It took David many minutes of contemplation, and a great screwing up of his countenance, before he finally agreed to what Heidi proposed. Heidi thanked him heartily, when he had given his consent; and went directly with Dera and Helena to Bridgewater Street. The three women cleared the house of what furniture and possessions were fit to be saved (which, indeed, were precious few) and hired a man with a wagon to transfer them to the farmhouse. Then, Heidi ordered the others to clear for a while off of the premises; and took to the task which she had assigned herself. She raised her hands up above her head, and in a matter of seconds, the entire house was razed to the ground, lying in many broken pieces upon the lot. She turned then to the stable, and levelled that structure, as well. The Power seemed, now, only to flow from her hands, with little urging from herself; and the sensation was both wonderful and fearsome.

  They had collected the headstones on the way to Delvare. After Heidi finished with the house, they took it up, and affixed it painstakingly to Josephine’s grave, in the place where previously had stood the iron stake. Heidi sent the word around, that the folks of the neighbourhood might take up the wood of the broken house and stable, and carry it away for their own uses. (Quite naturally, it was all gone within two days.)

  After the wood had been cleared away, Heidi put to the others that one must leave with Jade’s headstone, and take it to the farmhouse.

  “Why only one of us?” asked Dera. “Are we not all leaving together?”

  “There are things that I would like to do here,” said Heidi, “before I leave. I shall need someone’s help – and therefore only one must go.”

  “I would like to stay with you,” said Helena. “That is, Heidi, if you have no objection.”

  “Of course I have none,” said Heidi. “And that settles it, then. Dera shall return to the farm, and await us there. We shall remain behind.”

  “But what do you plan to do?” asked Dera.

  “One day you will see.”

  And so, Dera bid the others farewell, and kissed their cheeks. She then took her leave of Bridgewater Street, with a small wagon pulled behind Dillyn what held the headstone. Heidi and Helena set up a small tent where the stable had stood, and slept inside it each night, after many a long day of labour. For Heidi had got it in mind to plant a grove of trees round Josephine’s grave, some distance about it, so that one day it might lie in the cool green shade of a small wood. Then she made a kind of garden all around it, filled with colourful flowers what bloomed in the spring and summer. It was long and tedious work; yet she and Helena set to it gladly, with a vigour that yielded, after some weeks, the completion of Heidi’s vision. It was, as of that time, no great sight to be seen, but Heidi smiled on the fact that it would someday be.

  On the day of their departure, she stood for some time before the grave, looking upon the headstone with watering eyes. She knelt down before it, and kissed it reverently.

  Josephine Gregory

  Beloved sister to three

  Ever in our memory and thought.

  ~

  Before returning to Lormar, Heidi and Helena stopped at the stable of Quik Willoughby, where they exchanged Helena’s nameless horse for Jedediah, who was looking very strong and well with the care of old Willoughby. Helena took possession of him; and they took again to their road, which found them soon again at the farm, where David had already positioned very neatly the stone atop Jade’s grave. One night they slept there, and on the following morn, Heidi went out to the grave, to sit for a while in talk with Jade. Yet the grief was so recent, she could not speak without weeping; and so sat and wept a long while, before finally she rose, and laid a kiss upon the stone.

  Jade Misaria

  Darling daughter, sister and friend

  Never forgotten.

  ~

  As Heidi and Helena made ready to leave, Dera announced to them that she would not be their accompaniment. On the farm, she said, she would stay with David and Jum.

  Heidi looked upon her questioningly, wondering how ever she came to such a decision – for surely, she was not the sort of woman whom one would expect to find living upon a farm. Yet she only smiled and nodded, and assured Heidi that her decision was a right one. Heidi felt some pain at parting from her, and had indeed wished that she might join her upon her road; but even as that was not to be, she declined David’s invitation to remain with them. So they followed her out of the house, and walked with her to the road, where she and Helena mounted upon Eriah and Jedediah. David pressed their hands, and wished them a safe journey.

  “I shall miss you, Heidi,” said Dera. “I do wish that you would stay.”

  “Ah, Dera, I cannot,” answered Heidi. “But we shall see one another soon! Only be a good help to David, and look after old Jum.”

  So Dera nodded, with a few tears trickling down her cheeks. Yet Heidi looked to Helena, and smiled; and together they started out upon the road, looking back ever and anon, until Dera and David had become nothing but dark specks in the distance.

  ~

  “Do you think you might like to come with me to Remás?” asked Helena.

  “If that is where you intend to go, my sister – then I shall follow.”

  Helena smiled; but grimly, with the memory of her departure from home. It seemed that, in going to tend to her unfinished business, she had made a deal more for herself.

  “I don’t like to think how much the boys have grown, in the time I’ve been gone,” she said. “And I don’t like to think what they have thought of me, all of these months.”

  “You are their mother, Helena. They shall forgive you, and they shall love you just the same.”

  “I suppose it would be nice for you to see them, as well. They are your nephews, after all.”

  Heidi took a moment to think of that; but it seemed such a very large thing, she suspected that she needed wait for its arrival, to appreciate it properly.

  “But perhaps we can go on a bit farther, before we stop there?” she asked. “All of these years – and I have never had the courage to go to the graves of Mother and Eriah. Do you think you might accompany me there?”

  “If that is where you intend to go, my sister – then I shall follow.”

  XLVII: The Last Memory

  With this, we leave for now the travels of Heidi and Helena. We leave Dera to David and Jum; and we leave Lila to Antony and the noble Captain Henry, both of whom will be integral to the reparation of Onssgaard – which will take place in earnest, after Lila does make this trip to Húnama, essential to the organisation of her currently shuffled and roiling thoughts and emotions.

  Yet we shall tell, in the leaving, of a final memory; only one of many in the gr
eat arsenal of Heidi’s heart, all of which will for a great while serve only to wound her more deeply. But she smiles, also, when she thinks of this; and understands that she would not alter a single piece of it, even with the promise that in the altering, her soul would not suffer to be torn asunder. For in this moment, as she rides beside her sister on the road to Morsheyd, that soul has been rent into halves, and then into quarters. Yet she delves only deeper into these memories; and imagines that, somewhere in the glimmer of the sunlight up ahead, she again can see the brightness of that smile which she came so much to need and to love.

  ~

  The night had long fallen down outside the window, and the house was filled with darkness. Yet several candles burnt atop the table, and Heidi and Jade huddled close together in their chairs, bent over a scrap of paper onto which Jade was scribbling several unfamiliar words.

  “The language is called Énaloh,” she said. “It was the first tongue of this land, and is used by most practised Aurens, in mastering the Power. I would have never known any of this, you see – but I had a neighbour when I was a girl, a little old woman she was. She saw my Power, and helped me to shape it. She taught me all these words you see here.”

  “Will it not work properly, if I speak the words in Doshél?” asked Heidi, somewhat despairingly. She was no great speaker of foreign tongues; and in her own experience, when she did try to give them voice, the words came mostly as things incomprehensible.

  “Not nearly so well,” said Jade. “But you will do just fine! This one here is that which you speak, when you wish for light.” She turned the paper towards Heidi. “Here, now. You speak it. You have heard me say it, after all.”

  Heidi squinted long at the word; for the truth of the matter was that she was rather reluctant to attempt it. She wanted not to make a fool of herself, by speaking to no result.