Chapter 19
‘Mehrab? Mehrab. Someone’s here.’ Rhea’s peering out the window, careful to not tweak the curtains aside but simply looking through the lace as I showed her.
‘What?’ No one should be wandering – everyone should be preparing for tonight.
I’m exhausted. We’re all exhausted; even Arlo seems to slump on the seat Rhea’s set him at after our final harvest day.
Summer’s last day, our last harvest, and soon the cold will begin nipping at our heels.
This morning, I hitched Rosie to the cart (such indignity!) and hauled the sacks of wheat to the village, left them with Sanne for her attention over the next week, scheduled in with everyone else’s harvest. And instead of returning Rosie to her owner as I surely promised, I turned the cart right around and came home because I couldn’t bear the thought of answering questions as to why I would not attend the harvest-messe.
So, I bathed and scrubbed every skerrick of sweat and dirt from my skin, from under my nails, washed my hair, rubbed the roughness from my feet, slathered lavender cream on myself to put some moisture back in, then went to sleep for long luxurious hours and left Rhea to her own devices.
Late in the afternoon, I woke and slipped on a pretty dress which sits in the back of the wardrobe most of the year and went down to begin preparing our own little feast. Harvest homes, these last years, have been spent just myself and the summer husband of the moment, a sweet night because it’s one of their last, though they don’t know it.
This evening on the village green all of Berhta’s Forge will be gathering for their harvest-messe, eating and drinking and toasting each other, giving wishes and blessings to be safely brought through to spring, burning the finest first fruits and vegetables and selected meats, gifted back to the earth in gratitude, in fervent hopes of warding off any ill will from the old gods.
Harvest home, a signal for those born here that they belong – they participate in the life of Berhta’s Forge, till its earth, grow its food, husband its livestock.
They can rely on the protection of the community.
The one and only time I attended, my first year here, I watched the dancing, the flirting, the feasting, and for the first time in a very long while I felt lonely.
Where I’d come from, after the high sorceress found me, took me in, I had belonged.
She’d given me a place, and I grew there until, almost twenty-five years to that very day, the very night, I had to flee, enemies at the gates, the city burning, and my final act as her creature…
‘Mehrab, it’s a handsome someone.’ Her gloating tone annoys me.
‘Confine your lechery to men of wood, child,’ I snap, then step outside, shutting the door firmly behind me, and take long strides to where my visitor waits by the barn.
‘Good evening, Mehrab.’ The blacksmith, dressed in fine green linen trews and a shirt white enough to almost glow in the dusk, is mounted on a tall ebony stallion, so comfortable-looking it’s as if he’s grown there.
Behind him, an even larger horse, a young bay feather-foot, tethered to the rail of the enclosure where Rosie is nuzzling him as if checking his bona fides.
And… and Faolan appears to have red flowers woven through his beard. ‘You’re a vision.’
‘And you’re a long way from home this eve, Faolan.’
He nods gravely. ‘Drawn to this den of iniquity by a vile crime. A horse thief resides here. I saw her this very day drive her cart to the mill, then depart the long way around so she did not pass by the smithy.’
I resist grinning. ‘Could hardly have got a cart home without a horse to pull it, blacksmith.’
‘Aye, that’s true. True.’ He grins. ‘Still, a thief.’
Which isn’t the first time such an accusation’s been flung at me, but I don’t react because for all my other sins, that’s not one of mine. I nod towards the bay. ‘Hard to give her up, that Rosie-girl. But I note you’ve brought a friend?’
‘This is Eadig, out of the Beck Stables’ finest mare.’
‘He is very handsome.’
‘And well-trained. Biddable.’
‘Expensive, no doubt.’
‘Very.’
‘Faolan…’
‘I’m willing to negotiate.’ He raises his eyebrows.
‘Gods forfend, I’ll get my purse.’
‘Ah, don’t be so obdurate, old woman! The horse is yours! Both the horses are yours – Rosie would have run home first chance she got if she didn’t like you.’ He holds out a hand. ‘Only come with me to the harvest-messe, it’s all I ask, so small a thing.’
I look at his enormous hand, at its calluses and scars, think of how it feels to be held and lifted and caressed; then quietly I reply, ‘Not afraid of your wife’s unhappy ghost, Faolan?’
The hand does not waver although his expression shifts to pain. ‘Mehrab, she’s been gone all these months. I cannot imagine she’d remain here after escaping, not even to punish me.’
How unhappy were they; why did no one tell me?
Not even Reynald? But I know. This is precisely the sort of gossip no one would share with me.
The habit of not speaking to me of my once-upon-a-time lover too ingrained, something I, after all, have trained them in over the years.
So my tone is sadder than I would like when I ask a question I wish I’d swallowed, ‘Why didn’t you come to me sooner? ’
He speaks softly, with neither heat nor hurt.
‘And say what? How could I come to you after all that had happened between us? After what I did? I regretted it the moment I tried to manipulate you into marriage – I felt sure you would change your mind and live happily ever after.’ He snorts.
‘But I’d not thought you’d be so stubborn. ’
‘Had you even met me, Faolan Alderson?’
‘I was sorry and knew what I did – marrying Helvis out of spite – and while I wasn’t the worst husband, I wasn’t the best. Felt guilty all the time at what I’d done.
Not sure I was any better as a father. And I miss her, I do, after so many years together, and she tried her best. She loved me in spite of myself.
’ He shakes his head. ‘But I have years left to live. If you would try again? If you’d find it in you to forgive me?
I offer no chains, I will take whatever crumb you’re prepared to give.
’ He grins. ‘And even if you can’t bear the thought of me for longer than a day, would you give me this one night, if I beg?
C’mon, for the cost of two horses, surely it’s a bargain. ’
There’s no thought in my mind when I take the hand he’s held out all this time, and he’s so strong, the horse so sturdy, that he swings me up behind him without effort.
I wrap my arms around his waist, press myself against his broad back and hold on for dear life as the horse takes off at ridiculous speed.
Briefly I curse myself for giving in – it’s the second time in my life I’ve made such an impetuous choice – then I embrace it.
The wildness, the recklessness, the moment when my heartbeat begins to hammer in time with the horse’s hooves and every so often I think I see sparks fly up from where they strike the earth.
A sense of danger, yes; a sense of threat, no.
No fear of falling, of the beast losing his footing.
Utter, headlong certainty of my safety in this at least.
When at last we slow, I can’t help but feel disappointment rising; I’d have gleefully continued on in this fashion for hours, perhaps days if it were possible.
But the horse is lathered in sweat and breathing heavily.
Through the trees is the green, laid out for the harvest-messe, meal and ritual, the villagers laughing, mingling, children playing – Faolan’s lad talking to Tieve by one of the trestle tables; I smile at their awkwardness, cannot imagine myself like that, not when the high sorceress taught me how much power lay in me.
No sign of Anselm or Gida or Ari, but they might be anywhere in the milling of bodies; the Peppergills are at the head table, young Matthias in his mother’s arms being fussed over, the child’s stare a little blank. Tiredness, no doubt, shyness.
Suddenly the thought of all eyes upon me (us), of anyone staring, sniggering that I’m stepping into a dead woman’s bed is too much – and I’m as nervous as those youngsters I just grinned about.
Madness to think I’d move easily among these people who seek me only when they need to, who show respect out of fear, who tolerate me for the memory of Yrse who was one of them.
No, I’d not given it a thought to this moment, but now…
now it’s all I can think about and, as he makes to dismount, I lean forward and whisper, ‘Not yet. Wait.’ He obeys, obedient as the beast beneath us, unmoving.
The sun is sinking behind the trees, leaving a golden corona of fire splashed against the clouds.
The giant corn-doll waits at one end of the green, a ring of offerings at her feet.
In the hands of children I see the miniatures, awaiting their fiery fate.
Thaddeus Peppergill strides forward, a lit torch in hand; I spy Reynald in the crowd, watching anxiously – it’s his accelerant that will ensure a perfect and thorough blaze.
The brand touches the kindling at the feet of the wheat-wife.
The villagers take up a chant and their voices rise and rise with the flames.
Children, encouraged by hands on shoulders, gentle pushes, dart forward to throw their own corn-dolls onto the fire.