Hungry Murt Is Not Disgusted
Home is different, or perhaps I’m different. The jostling stagecoach brought me to the biggest town in Ramsfeldshire late yesterday, and a smaller wagon got me to Lower Splott this morning, and now I crest the final hill and view my family’s farm for the first time in months.
Strange, how I spent nearly twenty years here and only a few months away, and yet it already feels so foreign.
Of course, the fire might have something to do with that. The grand old sty Dad built before I was born is nothing more than a square of charred earth, and dingy blankets flap in the breeze where two of the cottage’s walls were. The sun shines down, at least, and the herd seems happy enough to roam the yard and graze on coarse clumps of dying grass while Mum works on a new sty.
A lump rises in my throat, and I stop on top of the hill for a moment to watch her. Mum’s faded skirts blow in the wind, her long braid—grayer than I remembered—coiled around her head. She frowns in concentration. Dad is nowhere to be seen.
A tear slips down my cheek. I let out a yell, and Mum turns and looks up the hill, surprise and then joy lighting her face. I wave, then dash down the road, more tears escaping as I go.
I trip over a loose stone at the bottom of the hill, but Mum catches me with strong arms, and I’m not the only one crying.
“Hester!” Mum sobs, crushing me to her boney chest. “Oh, Hester! You’re here!”
“I came as quickly as I could. Dad—?”
“Inside.” We hurry into the cottage, pushing aside a blanket to enter instead of going through the scorched doorway.
I can barely breathe in here, choked by memories as much as by the lingering scent of smoke. Is this still my childhood home, little more than two walls and a sagging roof? The meager furnishings—or what’s left of them, anyhow—are smudged with soot and dust. Across the room, Dad lies in bed, his left leg propped up on a pile of hoghides. His trousers are spotted with rusty bloodstains, and bandages wind around his right arm.
“Oh, Dad.” I rush to him, falling to my knees at his side and kissing his forehead. My tears drop on his hair.
“My lovely girl,” he murmurs. “I told your Mum we could manage. Don’t want you losing your job.”
“Don’t be silly.” I sniff. “What happened?”
“Folk mischief,” Mum spits. She limps over to the basin—I hadn’t noticed the limp before, so worried about Dad—and fetches a cup of water. “Must’ve been.”
I take the cup from her and tip it to Dad’s lips. “Did you see them?” For all the time we’ve spent putting up warding charms and cursing the Folk, they’ve never appeared to me. It never struck me as odd before, but I’ve been mulling over Lucas’ accusation …
Mum grunts. “Heard their laughter, loud and clear, and I don’t have to see them to recognize their handiwork.” Her scowl melting when she meets my gaze. “You must be hungry.” She rummages in the cupboards, finding a crusty loaf of bread. “I wish I had some of that fig preserve you like.”
“I don’t need anything. I ate on the coach.” Mum and Dad look half-starved, and I can see that the bread is the only thing in that cupboard. I’ll have to walk back to Lower Splott later and purchase more food. “But Dad, are you—”
“I’m all right,” he says. He takes my hand in his uninjured one. “It’s your Mum who needs looking after. The woman won’t sit still.”
They exchange a glance. How had I never noticed that tenderness before? And why do I ache witnessing it now? How nice it must be, to have someone to look at like that—
I gulp around the lump in my throat. “But what happened?” I press.
“Your father woke up when the hogs started squealing. Tried to get them all out—”
“I was too late for Gad Brem,” Dad interrupts mournfully. “I’ll put up a stone for her, once we’ve got everything else fixed. Poor old girl didn’t deserve that.”
Gad Brem was one of my favorite hogs; I named her when I was just a tot. “I’ll put up the stone,” I say. “But what about your leg?”
“Sty collapsed.” Dad’s never been one to talk about himself much, so I look to Mum.
“He was pinned under a beam.” Mum sniffs and turns away. “We’re fortunate that I was able to get him out before—”
I squeeze Dad’s hand. “What did the doctor say?” Dad stares absently at the sooty ceiling, while Mum saws at the bread. My eyes widen as the silence lingers. “The doctor’s come out, hasn’t he?”
“There hasn’t been much extra money this fall,” Dad finally says, trying to smile. “Mum’s taken fine care of my leg.”
I stand, brushing ashes from my skirt. Once I’ve fetched the doctor, and bought some food, and rebuilt the sty, and patched the cottage walls, and put up a stone for Gad Brem, I’ll give everything in here a good scrubbing. Sounds achievable.
“I’ll get the doctor.”
“We can’t pay, Hester,” Mum objects.
“I have my savings.”
“You’ll have other uses for that.” Dad reaches for my hand again. “ Don’t waste it on your old man.”
I blink back a tear. “I saved it for you .” Every meal I skipped, every extra chore I took on, every little luxury I denied myself—every sacrifice was worth it, if I can get Dad comfortable. “I’ll fetch the doctor.”
Mum’s scraped a translucent layer of butter over two fat slices of bread, and she forces them into my hands. “You’ll eat before you go,” she says.
Perhaps home has not changed so much, after all.
The doctor isn’t pleased that Mum and Dad waited so long before calling him. His face is grave when he finishes his examination; his proclamation, graver still.
“You’ll walk again,” Mum sniffs, after the doctor has left us in a cloud of soot and dismay. “I know you will.” She squeezes Dad’s hand so tightly her knuckles turn white.
Dad doesn’t say anything. I wonder if he’d already guessed at the doctor’s diagnosis, and that’s why he hadn’t wanted to call him at all.
“I’ll get back to work on the sty,” I say quietly. Mum bites her lip and makes a half-hearted attempt at rising, but I shake my head. “You get some rest.” I push through the makeshift wall again, leaving Mum and Dad to murmur inside.
I fill my lungs with the afternoon air. A faint scent of smoke still lingers, but it’s much better than the burnt odor in the cottage. A curious hoglet noses over to me and squeals. “I’ll get your supper in a bit,” I say, reaching down to scratch his woolly ears. “Let me fix your home first.” The hoglet prances around my feet and rustles through my skirt until I pick it up and carry it with me to the sty. I smile. Lucas really would be amused by—
My smile vanishes. I won’t talk to Lucas anymore.
I work in silence for a long while. It’s strange, the silence. I’ve gotten used to the chatter of Wellington-upon-Chesbury. No hooves clopping down cobblestones, no merchants hawking their wares, no Chemmy to giggle with, no Mistress to scold—although I don’t miss that noise too much.
I wipe sweat from my forehead, and realize my cheeks are wet too, but with tears. I’m thankful, so thankful, that Dad survived, and that it wasn’t worse—but the idea that he may never walk again! Never stroll over the hills, whistling; never work in his fields; never swing Mum in a dance or two at the village festivals …
I’ve always thought that death is preferable to dependence; that to accept help is the sign of a weak fool, and to ask for help is worse still. But the thought of Dad being confined to a hard chair in an isolated one-room cottage is enough to make me consider it.
I’d given the physician a large chunk of the money I’d saved, and he’ll require more on his next visit; I’d bought a basket of food, for Mum and Dad look as if they haven’t had a good meal in a week. Working on this sty, I realize we’ll need more supplies, too. There won’t be anything left for my return fare to the city, let alone enough to move Mum and Dad. We’ll all have to stay here, unless—
Mum’s slow footsteps sound behind me. “Dad’s asleep,” she says, voice weary. “He’s a bit broken up, though he’ll never say it.”
I dash a tear from my eye. “Why are you limping?”
“Turned my ankle in a rabbit hole this morning.” She snorts. “Of all the silly things! Hand me that hammer, will you?”
I oblige.
Mum forces cheeriness into her voice. “But all this time you’ve been home, and you’ve barely said a word about your city life! I want to hear all about your job, and your friends, and if you’ve got a beau yet.”
I breathe a laugh. “No beaus, though that’s just as well. I doubt anyone would care to follow me out here.”
“You’ll be back, though.” When I don’t reply, Mum stops her hammering to look at me. “Won’t you?”
“I can’t leave with Dad—” I swallow.
“Do you have enough to get us all to the city?” Mum asks quietly. “If we sell the farm, or what’s left of it?”
“Not after the doctor.”
Mum sucks in a breath and looks at the half-done sty. “I see.”
“I tried, Mum! And I was so close! Just a few more weeks, and I think I would have had enough.” I fish a nail out of the bucket and drive it into the wall. “I would have done it before now, if I were still working for Mistress Hardinge. She paid more.”
“Whyever did you leave Mistress Hardinge’s, then?” Mum asks. “Your letter wasn’t clear.”
A humorless smile creases my face. “I wasn’t sure how to explain it. Hold this plank, please.”
“Hester!” Mum scolds. “You didn’t get in trouble?”
“It wasn’t my fault! Hugh—that is, there was a man—”
“Hester! You never mentioned a man !”
“He was no one—well, no one to me! But he came to call while I was at work, and—well, Mistress Hardinge let me go!”
“ Hester! ”
“Please stop saying my name like that, Mum!” I plead.
“Why didn’t you tell me about it?”
“I didn’t want you to worry.” In my agitation, I work too quickly, and end up with a splinter in my left thumb. I try to pick it out while Mum keeps scolding.
“Didn’t want me to worry! Hester Flanders! What nonsense! Here, let me.” She takes my hand in hers and pulls out the splinter, squeezing my hand tightly before she lets go. “I worried about you anyhow, you know.”
“I know.” I sigh. “But I thought if you knew about everything that you’d be flustered.”
“ Everything ? Was there more?”
I grimace. “A bit. Do you know, people in the capital are so cavalier about favors and bargains—offering help and loans all the time! It was as much as I could do to not become hopelessly entangled.”
Mum makes an appropriately indignant hmph. “Don’t they respect the Folk?”
“Not at all,” I say, finishing my current section of siding and scooting over to the left. “Pass me the nails, please.” I wait until she hands them over, carefully not looking at her. “One … friend … would just send me baskets of cheese, completely heedless of repayment.”
“Who would?” Mum asks. “The man who visited?”
“No—his brother.”
“His brother! What? You had two young men after you?”
“Lucas wasn’t after me,” I protest.
“ Lucas ! Was he the one sending the cheese?”
“Yes. But don’t say his name like that, Mum! And don’t scowl! He is—he was a very kind man!”
Mum snorts. “He was a fool, sending you gifts. I hope you didn’t fall in love with him just because he gave you cheese!”
I skim a hand over my aching heart. “Of course not.”
We work until the sun is tucking itself in for the night and my muscles are begging for the same. Apparently, I’ve gotten soft in the last few months. I’d push on, but Mum looks haggard, and I know she won’t stop until I do. I yawn.
“All this sewing’s made me weak,” I say, brushing a sweaty curl off my forehead. “Can’t work like I used to, I guess.”
After washing up at the well—I’d forgotten how cold the water is!—we trudge inside. Dad’s awake, and Mum goes over to him while I rummage through the foodstuffs I’d bought earlier.
“Hester’s been telling me all about her time in the capital,” Mum says, too brightly. I suppose she’s trying to get Dad’s mind off everything. “Apparently, she had two young men chasing her.”
“Of course she did.” Dad sounds proud. “Why wouldn’t she? Any man would be lucky to have her.” He snakes an arm around Mum’s waist as she bends over him. “So you’ll be going back and getting married, eh?”
I flush. “Oh, no. I’ve had enough of cobblestones and fishmongers. It’s time for me to be back with the hogs.”
“A fishmonger, was he?” Dad says. “Did you quarrel before you left?”
I suppose I quarreled with a fishmonger before I left, but that’s not what Dad means.
“He sent her gifts of cheese,” Mum tells Dad. “Foolish boy.”
“We’re all fools in love,” Dad says. “What’s his name, then?”
I fill the teakettle. “No one was in love with me.” I knew I shouldn’t have said anything. Now I’ll never hear the end of it!
“What? Giving you cheese without being in love? I’ve never heard such things,” Dad says.
Mum pats his arm. “I suppose people in the city are different .”
“Very,” I laugh. “I wish you could meet my friend Chemmy, though. She’s probably getting married in the spring.”
“Did her young man give her cheese?” Dad asks.
“No,” I say. “But he did buy her a pastry after a dance once.”
“A dance!” Mum’s voice catches. “Did you go to any dances, Hester?”
“I did,” I answer carefully, chopping potatoes. “A few.”
Dad smiles. “That’s when I first noticed your mum, you know. She was a-twirling and a-whirling in a blue dress. Never could keep my eyes off her.”
Mum blushes prettily, and I am glad to see some of the haggard lines disappearing. I hope they’ll continue, but the kettle whistles and Mum gives herself a little shake. “I’ll fetch your tea, dear.”
We keep up a too-cheerful stream of chatter. Mum relays all the gossip from Lower Splott, and I share as many stories as I can without revealing the particular identities of the young men who were after me , in Dad’s opinion. It would be too much of a shock—plus, Mum would never respect our monarchy if she knew how liberally they gave away their cheese !
Mum’s still worried about Folk mischief, so once the tea and fried potatoes are gone and the dishes are scrubbed, I kiss Dad’s cheek, take a heap of folkbane and drag myself back outside to keep watch over the hogs. They’ve already huddled together in their makeshift pen. I sit down in the entrance and lean my head against the wobbling post. One of the hogs—Hungry Murt, if I’m not mistaken—noses up against me in the darkness and nibbles on my skirt.
“That’s disgusting, you know,” I say to Hungry Murt, swatting him away. “There’s probably still pickle brine in there somewhere!”
Hungry Murt is not disgusted, and I huff a soft laugh into the still night.
A million tiny stars twinkle down at me. I never saw them so clearly in Wellington-upon-Chesbury. I trace familiar constellations: the One-Eyed Dragon, the Snake of the Heavens, the Boot. A thin crescent moon rises, giving me enough light to count the hogs and see if any of the Folk approach. I reach inside my dress and pull out my warding necklace. I’d let it hang out, visible, but Hungry Murt begins sniffing at it, so I stuff it back in again before he can eat it up. “Get off, rascal,” I say, but it’s with laughter. “Go to sleep.”
I sit and look at the stars for a long, long time, and I don’t sleep at all.