Chapter Thirty
Winter in Prousa had been an inconvenience. I was not particularly fond of the season, where vegetables were sparse and meat sinewy, but I did not despise it. Unlike Morsimus.
His temper was always shorter in the winter, as if the cold froze what little humanity he maintained. He would ache and groan like an old man as he moved about the house and spend more hours drinking. But the cold in Prousa was nothing compared to that first winter in Ninniya.
The first snow fell while I was at the river with Aina and Iphinone.
As always, Aina was riding Myrina, while Erebus and I were walking side by side.
That day was the first time that he had come to me.
Like Myrina, he had sensed us coming, and rather than staying in the center of the herd as he commonly did, he walked out to the edge of the group and made himself available for me to stroke.
“This is something special.” I rubbed my hand on his head. “It is almost as if you are pleased to see me.”
He snorted, a plume of steam rising from his nostrils.
Across the way, Iphinone called to Aina. “Come, we should return. Hirtus is leaving in the morning, and you will be sad if you do not say goodbye. Besides, we need to get the house ready for your brother’s return.”
The hint was meant for myself as much as Aina, so I bade Erebus goodbye and joined Iphinone.
“Hirtus is leaving, you say? He is going to trade?”
“No, he is leaving for the winter.”
“The entire winter?”
She looked at me quizzically before her expression cleared.
“Honestly, it feels as though I have known you a lifetime. Sometimes it is difficult to believe this will be your first winter here.” She squeezed my hands, and I felt the warmth of our friendship, yet I was still no closer to understanding her comment.
I repeated myself. “Hirtus leaves for the entire season?”
“He does, when the boys return with their herds.”
“But why?” I pressed.
“Why else? For the warmer weather.”
I still struggled to comprehend what she was telling me. He simply left the village, just as more men arrived? It made no sense.
“What about Phile? Does she leave too?”
Iphinone scrunched up her nose. “No. No, I do not know how far he goes, but she would rather stay inside and light the fires than make those journeys.”
“And yet he returns?”
“Before the first buds of spring have blossomed, he will be back. Around the same time as the boys and goats leave.”
“And Phile does not fear for him? Miss him?”
“I am certain she does,” Iphinone answered, “but I assume it is something he is passionate about. Come, we should leave now.”
As I turned back, I saw those first flakes flutter from the sky. Winter had arrived.
Just as Iphinone had predicted, the young men returned with the herds the very next day.
We heard them before we saw them, the chimes of goat bells echoing off the hillsides.
The boys’ laughter, deep and sonorous, rang out above them.
Work was immediately cut short as mothers and sisters rushed out to meet their loved ones.
I stayed back. None of these young men meant anything to me, though I found joy in the happiness of my friends.
It was later in the day that Phile found me in the courtyard.
“You are lost in thought,” she said to me.
Only then did I realize that the skins were dripping onto my feet as I listened to the laughter that drifted up from the village.
“Does it change?” I asked.
“Does what change?”
“The village, now that the young men and boys have returned for the winter. Does it change? Does it get worse?”
“I thought you did not think such a thing was possible?” she said, her eyebrow arched.
“Do they take after their fathers or their mothers?” I rephrased my question.
Phile’s gaze shifted from me to the wall as though she could see through the bricks.
“They are like all children. Some take after their mothers, some their fathers. But no, the village does not change so deeply. Winter is not so long as people fear. The young men will be gone as soon as the spring arrives.”
“And is it short for you too? Without Hirtus here?”
At this, her smile tightened.
“I find peace knowing that he is in a place that brings him the deepest joy,” she replied diplomatically.
I did not press further.
* * *
As much as I’d assumed otherwise, Phile’s words proved true.
The young men had little impact on my life, although the goats’ bleating at night took some adjusting to.
When work at the tannery ceased due to the freezing weather, I still went up there to run, to carry things, to train.
I was determined that when Hirtus returned, I would be so strong that he would barely recognize me.
Initially, I feared Morsimus would say something about my daytime absences, though he was barely home.
He preferred enjoying the warmth of the tavern and racking up a debt with the landlord to the company of his wife.
Some nights, he slept there or somewhere other than home, blaming the ice and snow for his inability to make the journey back, but I smiled and said I understood.
I was glad for his absences, for the hours Melitta and I spent together alone, fixing meals from dried meat, stretching it as far as we could so it would last long enough for the lambs to arrive and the fruit to fill the trees and bushes.
Collecting wood became an opportunity for the women to gather, if only for a few brief, chilly hours, although I went more often than most. It was my opportunity to test my limits, test my endurance, and grow stronger.
Each day, I challenged myself to chop more, carry more and farther.
When I heard that someone was sick, I took it upon myself to make extra journeys to chop and take them all they needed, not out of altruism but determination to work my body harder than ever.
“You know it would not harm you to rest, mistress,” Melitta said to me one day.
Other than the name she offered me, always “Mistress” and never Otrera, there was now no boundary between me and my servant. The food she made, the clothes she sewed, they kept me as alive as the shelter I provided her.
“I will rest if I need to,” I replied.
“It will do you no good to make yourself sick from the cold,” she continued. “You can lose your life in such weather.”
“I will take care of myself, I promise,” I assured her and kissed her softly on the cheek, the way a woman would kiss her doting mother.
I dropped my head onto her shoulder and sighed deeply.
Maybe one day, we’ll do more than just survive.