Chapter 22
At first light élisabeth got up and dressed.
By the grace of the newly built, solid wooden floors, she padded silently across the room and slipped outside before her husband awoke.
The air was crisp and the woods silent, but for birdsong and the river lapping against the shore.
She could see where Francoeur had cleared some trees, but still felt surrounded by menacing giants, as if a maple or oak might bend down and grab her with a rough limb.
She pushed the lower branches away from her face as she stole through the woods.
She had listened carefully to Francoeur’s description of the c?te and knew Jeanne Roy’s home would be along the forest path to the east. Though the settlers talked of bears and the Iroquois with equal dread, she told herself that Marcosi the wolf could rip the flesh off anything that tried to attack her, be it man, bear, or tree.
Before long, the cabin appeared. It was made entirely of birch with a tangle of thatched branches and moss for its roof.
Clay and sod had been stuffed into the gaps between the logs; smoke rose from a makeshift chimney.
élisabeth stopped. It was a fairy-tale witch’s hut, something her mother might have warned her about.
She approached with caution and knocked on the door.
After a moment Jeanne Roy appeared. She raised her eyebrows when she saw élisabeth.
“You.”
The witch’s hair fell loose down her back; it did not look as if she had combed it in the two months since they had last met.
Her velvet dress was covered in dirt and twigs and herbs, as if she had been rolling in the autumn leaves.
Despite this, the arch of her eyebrow and the set of her jaw told élisabeth that Jeanne Roy had lost none of her pride.
“I have come to pay my respects to you.” élisabeth bowed her head and sunk into a deep curtsey.
“All the way from Ville-Marie?”
“No, from next door. I married your neighbour, Francoeur.”
The witch looked at her with such curiosity that élisabeth felt as if she were a frog trapped in a wishing well, while an inquisitive child poked her with sticks.
“He said he was going off to be married. He did not say to whom. Come in.”
The cabin was small and warm, like an animal’s den.
On the walls were more furs than élisabeth had ever seen in her life; beaver, certainly, but also other creatures she recognized as marten, mink, and perhaps weasel.
Two stools squatted in front of a stone fireplace held loosely together with wattle and daub.
A black cauldron hung from a hook over the flame.
There was no other furniture save a long table placed against the back wall.
Upon it was a mess of branches and dried herbs and a very thick book.
On top sat Jeanne Roy’s strange doll, staring at them with dead eyes.
élisabeth avoided looking at it and stared instead at the feeble hearth.
“How will you keep warm, if it’s as cold as they say it will be in the winter?”
“I have been invited to stay with a friend.” Jeanne Roy sat down on one of the stools, gesturing for her to do the same. “Though I expect I will be able to manage for some weeks yet. I do love the cold.”
“Which friend?” élisabeth knew Jeanne Roy had barely spoken to any of the other brides.
“My friend Wari. She’s Agnier, but she lives in the Jesuit mission village across the river at La Prairie. When the ice and snow set in, she will come to fetch me.”
“She’s what?” élisabeth balked.
“Agnier is the French name for her people. I believe others call them the Mohawk.”
élisabeth stared blankly.
“One of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy.” Jeanne gave her a defiant look, then let out a deep sigh. “She’s Iroquois, élisabeth.”
“Iroquois! You… you will spend the winter with… the Iroquois?”
Jeanne Roy tipped her head back to laugh. “Why should I not?”
“Because they are our enemies! Sister Gagnon says they—”
“I’m not in the least bit interested in what that nun says.”
“But are you not frightened of them?”
“No. I am intrigued by them. Wari says in her village grandmothers have the final say in all matters. They decide what crops shall be planted, what punishment the guilty deserve, who shall marry whom. Just think what we could learn from the Haudenosaunee! Had we French half their sense, I might not have been saddled with either of my husbands.” Jeanne Roy folded her hands and looked suddenly chagrined, as if she regretted speaking so freely.
“You’ve been married before?”
“Yes, élisabeth. I am not the first widow to take a ship to the New World in search of a better life.”
“Forgive me,” élisabeth said quickly. She knew she must not pry; Marthe said she must flatter and encourage the witch to look well upon her so that she would grant the wish she’d promised. “What a burden to have been widowed so young.”
“I am not in need of your pity.”
élisabeth could not put a foot right. She shut her mouth and thought of how to put the witch in a generous mood.
Jeanne Roy stood to reach for a pitcher of water, pouring it into the cauldron hanging above the fire.
As it hit the hot iron, the water hissed and the steam rose, drawing out the dank animal smell of the cabin.
Jeanne Roy pinched leaves off bundles of herbs lying on the stone hearth and added them to the cauldron.
“I have not talked about my life in France for many months. Francoeur warned me I would want for company alone here in the woods. Perhaps he was right.”
“You may confide in me,” élisabeth offered, seeing her chance. “I too have a past I do not speak of. And a very grave problem. Though I believe you can help me.”
The witch looked up from stirring the cauldron. “What makes you think I can help you?”
“I… I… it was my sister’s idea. Marthe suggested it. Without your help a fate worse than anything you can imagine awaits me.”
“I can imagine a great many terrible things,” Jeanne Roy said softly.
“I doubt your fate is worse than any of them.” She gave élisabeth a long look.
“It is true that I have helped many women in my time, though I am curious how your sister came to know it.” She paused and spoke in a low voice.
“Are you worried about bearing a child?”
“Yes. I am. Can you see it just by looking at me? Can you tell that I am barren?”
“Barren?”
“I cannot bear children.”
“I… I thought you were concerned about being with child.”
“No!” élisabeth recoiled, realizing the witch’s meaning. “Quite the opposite. I am barren. Cursed to be childless forevermore.”
Jeanne Roy narrowed her eyes. “How do you know that you cannot bear children?”
“I will tell you my entire story willingly, if you promise to help me.”
“Of course I will help you,” Jeanne Roy said, placing her hand on élisabeth’s shoulder. The witch’s touch made the demon Marcosi twist in a circle and whine, knowing his end was near. “It is what I have trained to do.”
élisabeth realized then the breadth of Jeanne Roy’s power: not just a witch of forest and fable, but a sorceress with training, with knowledge that could surely defeat the rustic spells of the Winter Witch, a hag of no standing compared to her.
élisabeth felt a wave of relief wash over her.
She laid her hands in her lap and cleared her throat.
“Shortly after my two brothers died, my father grew ill. To pay for his treatment I went into service. The eldest son in the family favoured me with his affection and soon we were in love.”
Jeanne Roy made an indistinct sound. élisabeth studied the witch but she continued to stir her potion without comment.
“My family was poor, and I had no dowry. Rémy’s parents thought more of themselves than they ought to have done and would have never consented to our marriage. So Rémy came up with a scheme that would force his mother’s hand.”
élisabeth grew warmer as she spoke. She parsed her words when describing their passion on the clifftop, leaving out their continued meetings in the orchard and cellar, or wherever Rémy found to press himself upon her.
She explained his plot to conceive a child and then announce it to his parents so that they could not refuse the match.
She made sure the witch understood how alone they were, how they had not a single ally in the household, how even Old Geneviève, the cook, muttered dour warnings.
Jeanne Roy listened intently while pouring the brew she’d made into a tin cup and handing it to élisabeth.
She took a tentative sip. The potion slid down her throat, scalding Marcosi and causing the demon to dance on his hind legs and whimper with pain.
élisabeth glowed at this proof of the witch’s powers. She leaned in closer.
“So you see, on Saint Agnes’s Eve I was not obliged to eat dumb cake and walk backwards up the stairs to know whom I would marry. My dreams were already assured. Then, they turned into a nightmare.”
A slight frown formed across the witch’s face. “Go on.”
“Nine months ago, in February, I was with Rémy in the tavern by the mill.” élisabeth found her words slowly, remembering the night that the household had gone out to celebrate Shrove Tuesday.
While the others dallied behind, Rémy had accompanied her down the hill, walking beside her, so it had felt like they were walking out together, just the two of them, though he’d been careful not to touch her elbow.
“We were about to tell his parents, knowing that my condition was certain. We were perfectly content, united in our joy. But no sooner had we settled at a table than a powerful witch stormed into the tavern, ablaze with fury. She pointed her finger—”
“Stop.” Jeanne Roy’s face turned dark. “What do you mean?”
“A witch came into the tavern. She pointed her finger and laid a curse upon me. I lost the child that very night.”