Daughter of the Forest

  I reckoned without Red. That was a mistake. That evening I was sewing in my room by lamplight, and there was a knock on the outer door. I could not call out “Who’s there?” and after everything, I would not open it blindly. Then I heard his voice.

  “Open the door, Jenny.”

  I went to the door with my work in my hands, and slipped the bolt. What was he doing there anyway? It was supposed to be Ben’s night on guard duty.

  “Come out,” said Red. “I want to see your face.” For I had my back to the lamp. Leaving the door open, I stepped out into the garden, where the moon spread a soft, cool light over the blue-gray foliage of lavender and wormwood.

  “Now look at me,” he said. “Look at me properly.”

  I met his gaze, thinking he seemed tired; they had been long days in the fields, but the grooves around nose and mouth showed something more than the good weariness of the body after labor, and he looked thinner.

  “All right,” he said. “Now tell me what’s wrong.”

  I knew him well enough by now to be aware I had no choice but to tell him. As he said, he did not play games. So I showed him dog—go away. Me, looking, searching—worried. I used my hand to show the passage of sun across sky, all day. Then I had to take his sleeve, and lead him indoors, where Alys had reclaimed her spot on the pallet and was nearly asleep, curled in blankets. She growled deeply as we came close, and the shivering started again.

  Red looked at the mark on her back and said nothing; but the lines on his face were very clear in the lamplight, and his lips tightened. We went back outside, and he gestured to me to sit on the doorstep, while he leaned his long frame against the wall beside me. We were silent for a while.

  “You weren’t going to tell me about this,” he observed eventually. “Why not?”

  I shrugged. Why would I tell you? What could you do?

  Red was frowning as he watched me. He did not speak for a while; by moonlight his eyes looked the clear, pale color of our first meeting, morning blue, and there were memories in their depths.

  “I want to ask you something,” he said at length, and now he was studying his hands as if unwilling to meet my gaze. “That night—that time in the caves, before we came across the water. It was a strange time. I have wondered—I have thought, perhaps, that I ran a fever that night from damaging my leg. And yet, the memories are—” he broke off, scuffing his boot in the soil, failing miserably to say what he wanted. I could have found the words for him, had I not been schooled to silence. After a while, glancing at me quickly and looking away, he tried again.

  “I wake at night sometimes,” he said, “from a dream so vivid it seems that dark world is real, and this one a fantasy. Of late, this has happened many times. It disturbs me, to feel I have so little control of my own mind. Have you ever felt this?” I shook my head. The Fair Folk played with your thoughts, there was no doubt of that. What about that man from our village, Fergal, who lost his wits altogether, after they took him and teased him and spat him out again? But they had never taken over my mind, though I had come close to losing it to my own fears. I signed to Red. Speak. Tell me the rest.

  “That night—” he said hesitantly. “That was the most vivid of all. And afterward, I thought for a moment—but no, that could not be. I suppose those images were the product of a fever, a sickness brought on by shock and exhaustion. I am not usually so weak. But at the time, I thought—tell me, is it possible you shared something of this dream? Is it possible you know what—what was said to me? There was a candle, I still have it. But how could there be a candle? And why do I still hear their voices in my sleep? Am I losing my mind? I have heard that rumored, among other things. Yet I feel saner than ever before in my life.” He sighed. “Sorry, Jenny. But who else could I speak to of such things? Who else would listen, and not call me a fool?”

  That made me smile. Who else but a crazy girl, to understand crazy thoughts? I wondered if I would be able to explain it to him. My hands moved, and he spoke quietly as he tried to interpret my gestures. Two hands, each lightly cupped, separate, one weighed against the other, like the halves of a sea shell.

  “Two things. Two worlds?”

  I nodded. Brought the hands together. Showed above, below.

  “Two worlds, one above, one beneath? One mirrors the other. Two worlds that join, and touch? Then where do you belong? Are you, too, some creature of this other world, the realm of dreams and fantasies? Will you vanish one day, as they did that night, leaving me in the dark?”

  I shook my head. Pointed to myself, then to the hand still held higher, cupped downward. I am of this world. Gestured again. Like you. The next part was harder. I tried to show that there was a link, a bond between one world and the other. But careful; there were some things I might not tell, even in signs. Red nodded slowly.

  “I heard their voices,” he said. “I understood them, though I could not tell in what tongue they spoke. Who were they, Jenny? And how did they understand you, how could they hear you when you have no voice?”

  I showed the lower world again. Two. Two people, very tall. I drew a circle around my head, tried to indicate a crown. This was the nearest I could get to what I was trying to tell him.

  “A king and queen of that other realm?” I nodded. It was close enough. I must be getting better at signs, or he at understanding. Then I tried to answer the next question. Mouth, words—no. Mind, thoughts—ear, hearing. Hearing with no words.

  “Then why can’t I hear you?”

  I looked at him soberly, then I pointed to him and swept my hand around me, showing the place where he belonged. The place which belonged to him. You’re a Briton. I gave a shrug. What do you expect?

  I think I offended him. The mouth tightened just a bit further, if that were possible, and the eyes became a little chillier. Whatever answer he had wanted from me, it was not that one. It was a while before he spoke again. “If I believe this,” he said, “everything changes. Everything.” He moved to sit on the bottom step, his back to me, staring at his linked hands. I had to move so that he could see what I was trying to say.

  No. It need not. You, here; all around you. Your trees; your people. Everything right. I—go away. Far away, across the water. Gone home. You—forget.

  He just looked at me.

  “Nothing’s that simple,” he said, “you know it as well as I. How could I forget? I told you, their voices are in my dreams, that world is close, it is part of me, whether I wish it or no. Whether I believe it or no. And you are here.”

  I—go away. I pointed to him, crossed my hands over my heart. You promised. I—over the sea, go home.

  “I haven’t forgotten,” said Red softly. “I don’t forget, and I will keep this promise, and any other I make. Tell me about my brother, and I will see you return home safely. Whatever it costs me. But—things will never go back to the way they were before. They cannot. That’s the one thing that becomes more certain every day.”

  His words disturbed me. I knew already that my being here at Harrowfield had disrupted a household hitherto orderly and content. I regretted that, and wished I could change it. More than that, it disquieted me when I heard the folk speak of sorcery and enchantments that had ensnared their lord. For I supposed they felt much as I did when I watched the lady Oonagh come to Sevenwaters, and cast her net over my father. Only here, I was the witch. But I was driven by the need to complete the task, and to save my brothers. Nothing mattered as much as that did. And to do it, I must remain here under Red’s protection. I had thought that when it was over, I would go, and the calm pool would settle again as if I had never been here to ruffle its tranquillity. I had never thought about how Red might feel. Perhaps that was because it was too hard to imagine telling him about his brother, as one day I must if he were ever to let me go.

  I moved around to kneel in front of him, so that he had to look at me. Showed him a mirror of his own face. You—tired. You—sad, worried. This provoked a sort of mirthless grimace. He did not like
the talk to turn to his own feelings.

  “Somewhat lacking in sleep, yes. It happens when you wake at night with demons whispering in your ear. But how could you know how that feels?” He threw this remark away, but stopped short when he saw my face change. For a moment, my own particular night demons came back to me and I must have turned suddenly white.

  “I’m sorry,” he said in a different voice, so different it might have been another man’s. “I’m sorry. What did I say?” His hand came out, very gently, toward my cheek; but I moved back a little, just out of reach. I shook my head, moved a hand across dismissively. Nothing. It’s nothing.

  “You’re still afraid of me,” he said very softly. “Can’t you see that I would never hurt you?”

  But you have, I thought. With your hands, and with your words. I crossed my arms over my chest, my hands touching the places where he had bruised me before. When he was so angry, angrier than I had ever seen him.

  And then he said, “I wish you would talk to me.” His voice had gone even quieter, as it did sometimes when he was keeping a tight control. Somehow I had upset him. No doubt you do wish that, I thought. As soon as I talk, you can get rid of me, and get on with your life. One less thing to worry about. Back to normal, whatever you may think now. For you will forget, as men do.

  “I want to hear your voice,” he said. “I want—but what does that matter?” It was as if he took a grip on his words, and channeled them back where he thought they should be. Back onto safe ground. Control. Say not what you feel, but only what must be said. I imagined he would regret, later, speaking so freely tonight. “Your safety, that’s of concern,” he said. It was Lord Hugh of Harrowfield talking now. “I can do more. I think. First, I’ll speak to my mother. She would frown on such tricks, and can seek out the culprit and ensure there is no repetition. In the longer turn—there may be a solution. One course of action is obvious to me, but it would not be to your taste.”

  What? What solution? Now he was worrying me. He would not send me to Northwoods? Would he?

  “It may not be necessary,” said Red, getting up. “Let us simply be on our guard. If there’s a need to do more, we will. But my uncle is away, and I know of no other who might be a serious threat to you.” He looked at me questioningly. I shrugged. It was too frightening to think the lady Oonagh might search me out, even at Harrowfield. I refused to believe it. “For now, you should be safe in my house. If I cannot promise this, I am not much of a protector.”

  My hands moved quickly. Don’t. Don’t swear what you cannot be sure of. Don’t make a promise you cannot keep. I don’t know if he understood.

  “It’s getting cold,” he said. “You’d better go in. Bolt your door, get some sleep. I’ll keep watch tonight.”

  It seemed I was dismissed. I got up, went in, reached back to pull the door to.

  “Jenny,” he said. He stood at the foot of the steps, and such was the difference in our heights that he looked me straight in the eye. I raised my brows in question.

  “Talk to me next time. Tell me right away. Don’t keep it to yourself. However small, however trivial, you must tell me.” He might have appeared to dismiss the threat to my safety, but underneath he was worried. Deeply worried.

  I gave a nod, and closed the door. But, as it happened, there was no need to tell him, next time. For next time, it was no child’s trick, no mischievous prank that my unknown enemy played on me. It was something far worse, and it led to a tragic turn of events that woke a deep terror of the spirit, that brought the force of evil down on the tranquil valley and scarred the household of Harrowfield. And it was I who caused it.

  It happened in two stages. The first was hard to bear, for me at least; but it paled in comparison with the second. The first was trickery, cruel trickery. The second was murder.

  Spring was advancing, and suddenly May Day was close, and the wedding a reality. Activity hummed around me in the long room, women sewing fine fabrics and chattering of dancing and feasting and of certain other aspects of the impending marriage that I would sooner not have heard discussed. I tried to block out their talk. I wove and sewed my starwort, and fashioned Finbar’s shirt. As I worked I imagined my brother perched on the roof slates at Sevenwaters, with the west wind tangling his dark locks, and his clear eyes full of dreams. I pictured the two of us running through the forest on a bright spring day, and Finbar waiting for me to catch up. Then, sitting by him in the fork of an oak, listening in silence as the forest breathed around us. I thought of Finbar as I had last seen him, after he had given me so much of his strength that there was none left over for himself. I sewed my love for my brother into his shirt with every painful stitch. I worked hard, and the shirt grew quickly.

  I tried not to hear the women whispering over their work, as they did when Lady Anne was absent. But I could not shut them out entirely. So I heard a lot of opinions about Lord Hugh, including how all the village girls made cow’s eyes at him—him being such a big strong man, and bonny with it—and all in proportion, if you knew what she meant. Besides, you knew what they said about redheads. A shame, really, that he didn’t—you know, that he kept himself to himself the way he did. There was talk, at least she had a friend of a friend who had a cousin who’d once—and she said, any girl that spent a night with him would soon know how lucky she was. Once you’d lain with such a man, you’d never want to look at another.

  “Hung like an ox, gentle as a lamb,” chuckled one of the older women. “Every girl’s dream. His brother was the same, even at sixteen. Poor lad.”

  There were a few sharp glances in my direction, and whispers with them.

  “Her?” scoffed one of them. “Hardly. Why would he look at her, when he could have Elaine? When he could have any girl he wanted for the asking?”

  “Who’d want one of them, anyway?” said another. “Besides, she’s such a scrawny, washed-out little thing, like a child almost. Nothing a man could get hold of there. Breasts like green apples, hips like a bird’s. What would a real man like him want with a little runt like that? And with those great ugly hands on her.”

  “Sshh!” Lady Anne was returning, and the talk turned suddenly to the relative merits of honey confits and crystallized violets. I felt my lips compressing into a thin line, and for a little while my sight blurred, but I did not allow any tears to fall. I hated to hear them talk thus, for the idea of Red and some woman lying together, and doing—doing that, made me feel sick. How could these women talk so of the coupling of man and woman as if—as if it were something joyous, something to be longed for and laughed over? I knew it as brutal, painful, an experience that dirtied and shamed and terrified. Yet, in my heart, I had to recognize that it was more than that, for I had seen John and Margery look at each other, and touch hands, and I had witnessed the same wordless, breathless message passing between my brother Liam and his betrothed. But this was not for me. I would never look into a man’s eyes as Eilis had into Liam’s, with a shining ardor that brought a blush to the cheek. I could never run my hand softly down a man’s neck as Margery did her husband’s, when she thought nobody was looking. I was damaged; soiled goods. It occurred to me that if there were a future for me and my brothers, this could prove to be a problem. My father, no doubt, would wish me to marry to advantage, in order to strengthen the strategic position of Sevenwaters. But he’d have a hard time finding any takers. Besides, I would never agree. Instead, it would be as I had once said to Diarmid, so long ago I could scarce remember it. I would become an old woman, muttering and mumbling over her herbs, mixing possets for what ails you. Wasn’t that what I had always wanted? Somehow, now, it no longer seemed enough.

  My fingers worked on steadily, as the barbs of the plant turned them red and blistered and hard. The women were right. They were very ugly hands. As I worked, I told myself a story about such a pair of hands. In my tale, the girl had to toil in the kitchens of a great house for seven years, to win back her sweetheart. Seven years of scrubbing floors, and scouring pots and
pans, made her fingers swollen and her palms callused and rough. At the end of this tale, the faithful girl was at last reunited with her dear one. When he held her close, and lifted her hands to his lips, and his tears fell on them, behold, her fingers were at once slender and small again, and when she reached up to touch his face, it was with palms as white and fine as those of a queen. But her lover looked at her in amazement when she told him her story, how she had toiled at witches’ work, and made her hands ugly and horrible. For when he had found her again at last, had gathered her close and pressed his lips to her roughened palms, these had been to him the most beautiful hands in the world.

  One afternoon, Margery took me up to her quarters and presented me with a gift. From her and John, she said, for they wished to tell me yet again how grateful they were for the gift of life I had given to her and their child. She had made me a new gown; more fit for the wedding than my shapeless homespun. It was a lovely piece of work, plain enough but fashioned to fit most perfectly, in a soft light wool of a shade somewhere between blue and lavender, like the first dusk on a summer evening. Around the neckline and hem was a fine tracery of vines and leaves and little winged creatures embroidered in a deeper blue. It was a gift of love, and I put my arms around my friend and hugged her. I did not tell her I had no wish to wear such a dress, which would show off my figure and draw the eyes of men. I was more comfortable, safer, in the old homespun, which might as well have been a sack, so ill did it fit. But this was still a precious gift, which must be worn with a smile. So I tried it on for her, and she fussed and took a tuck here, and a stitch there, until she pronounced herself satisfied. Johnny watched us from the rug, round-eyed. He was working hard to roll himself over from his stomach to his back. He had not quite mastered this skill, but judging by his purposeful grunts, it would not be long.

  Margery plaited my hair down my back, weaving lavender ribbons into it. This was good practice for the wedding, she explained.