My Swordhand is Singing

  Peter woke from his dream of the princess. The burial was over and he began to push through the crowd toward Agnes. He was cursed for his lack of manners, and pressed in on all sides by the crowd swarming through the graveyard. Looking to see where Agnes was, he saw with alarm that she was being led away by Anna and the other Elders.

  “Agnes!” he called, but it was no use. She was too far away, and the Elders were taking her straight to the hut. There she would begin her mourning. Peter, imagining her dread, watched her disappear. It was said that she should speak to no one while she was in mourning for her husband. In this way, after forty days, it would be understood that she had mourned her husband for a lifetime, and she could adopt the position of a young, unwed maiden once more.

  Desperately Peter made one last effort to push through the crowd. He managed to fight to within a few feet of Agnes, but here his way was barred. The Elders formed a procession around and behind Agnes, a cortege to guide her to the hut. Angry faces turned on him as he tried to force his way through.

  “Agnes!” he called, and at last she heard. He saw her turn and begin to pull at her veil, desperate to see him.

  “Get away from her, boy!” someone shouted sternly.

  “But she’s my—”

  “She’s nothing to you anymore. Not now! She’s married someone else!”

  Peter wrestled, trying to protest, but a fist struck him in the back, and then another in his side, near the kidney.

  He collapsed, gasping for air. As he fell he caught a single glimpse of Agnes. She had succeeded in wrenching the veil from her face, a face that was now wreathed in horror alone.

  18

  At the Threshold

  Peter limped wearily home from the wedding.

  He had decided that Sultan needed a rest, and had walked all the way, along the forest path that led home. The trees crowded in on him, silent but strong, and once again Peter had the sense of being watched. He shook his head free from the feeling; he had more pressing things to worry about. His side and back still hurt from the blows he’d taken.

  He staggered across the bridge, and let Sultan find his own way to his stable.

  As soon as he crossed the threshold he knew things were wrong. Tomas lay on the floor of the hut, his eyes open.

  “Father!”

  Peter rushed to him.

  “What happened?”

  He smelt the drink that clung to his father’s clothes, to his breath. A smashed stone jar of slivovitz lay nearby, its dregs oozing into the earthen floor.

  “I can’t move my arm,” Tomas said, “or my leg.”

  He nodded his head at his left side, on which he was lying. His eyes looked at Peter wildly, like those of a frightened dog.

  Peter was scared, and what scared him the most was seeing that his father was afraid. It was not something he had thought possible.

  “Help me up,” Tomas said.

  His father was very heavy, and his being a dead weight, unable to move two of his limbs, made it hard to lift him properly. Despite his strength, it was all Peter could manage to drag his father to his bed and haul him onto it.

  “The drink,” Peter said as gently as he could, though he felt angry inside. “The drink did that to you.”

  “Nonsense,” Tomas spluttered out. “I had a fall.”

  Peter said nothing. Tomas did not have falls. But then, his hands never used to shake either.

  He didn’t believe his father, but he didn’t want to fight him. He needed to keep things simple. Practical.

  “Are you in pain?” he asked.

  “A little,” Tomas said. “Nothing serious. Just can’t move my damn arm.”

  Peter pulled the covers from under his father, and put them over him. Then he went and stoked the stove, and made some soup. By the time he had done that, Tomas seemed slightly better.

  “I think I can move my fingers,” Tomas said. “Yes? Are they moving?”

  Peter wondered why Tomas couldn’t tell for himself. He didn’t want to think about what it meant. He looked at his father’s hands, but could see no movement at all.

  “Yes, Father,” he said, “I think they are moving.”

  With that, Tomas had exhausted himself. He fell asleep, but even in his sleep he tried to move his fingers, as if to close them around something, something like the hilt of a sword.

  Dreams rode like wild horses through Tomas’s sleep, dreams in which he himself was riding, and riding hard.

  Riding out for a reason, for a cause.

  A good cause.

  19

  Turnings

  The days passed.

  Tomas recovered, slowly at first. He had taken soup from Peter after waking from the accident, and had seemed more lucid. Peter was surprised that though Tomas had refused to attend the Nunta Mortului, he had asked about the wedding, and how Agnes was.

  On the third day, Tomas got out of bed for an hour or so, moving his arm and leg freely once more. He even went out to talk to Sultan for a while.

  Peter was worn out, for it fell to him to do all the work he could, as well as nurse his father and make two trips into Chust to deliver logs, collect money, and buy food. In the village he tried to inquire after Agnes, but no one would even meet his eye, let alone talk to him. But then, what was there to say? Apart from a basket of food that was left silently on the windowsill of the hut every morning, no one went near her. No one had spoken to her, no one was willing to talk about her; no one was allowed close.

  There was an ominous mood in Chust. Something had changed, and a place that was dour at the best of times had become even more cold and unwelcoming. Peter knew why: fear. More cattle had been attacked—two were found with dried blood caked on their forequarters—and a couple of ewes had been killed, drained of blood. It was not the work of wolves, but no one would say more than that.

  When he went to talk to Agnes’s neighbors to see how her mother was, they refused to speak to him at all, merely indicating that they would look after everything. Peter felt the village excluding him, felt barriers that he couldn’t break. One shrewish old woman bluntly told him that he and Tomas weren’t wanted. They had always been outsiders, Peter knew that. Now that darkness had descended on the village, anything strange, anyone foreign was a target.

  Had Agnes’s mother received more visits in the night from Agnes’s father? Again, no one would tell him.

  As time wore on, Peter grew anxious and restless. Tomas, as he got better, needed his son’s help less and less, so Peter was free to worry about other things.

  Agnes had been shut up in the hut for six days. The hut lay beyond the little thatched fence, beyond the threshold, beyond the safety of the village, and was no place for a young woman even in normal times. And now something evil was happening around Chust. Tomas dismissed all talk of the Shadow Queen as nonsense, but the villagers believed in her, and whether or not she was real, the result was the same: fear and suspicion had crept into Chust like an outbreak of plague. Soon everyone would be infected, and Tomas and Peter would have to move on again, back to their old nomadic life. Running, always running, though Peter still didn’t know what it was they were running from.

  By the time Tomas swung an axe again, Peter had made up his mind.

  He couldn’t go near the hut in daylight—it was just visible through the trees from the edge of the village, and he knew he couldn’t take that risk. If he got caught, the very least that would happen would be that Agnes would have to start her mourning all over again. But he was going to visit Agnes.

  On that first day out with Tomas he worked hard enough, but reserved his energy as much as he could. Tomas didn’t seem to notice. Peter had sensed a change in his father: he seemed to have retreated into himself. He was quieter than usual, and was even drinking a little less. Peter wondered how much, if anything, it had to do with the accident, or with the visit from the Gypsies, but Tomas wasn’t telling.

  That evening, Tomas drank and Peter ate stew, and they both sta
red into the fire in the potbellied stove, thinking their own fireside thoughts. Then they went to bed, and while Tomas was soon snoring heavily, Peter lay awake, thinking, and waiting.

  When he was sure Tomas was sound asleep, Peter swung his legs out of bed, and by the faint glow coming from the stove, slipped his boots on and left the hut. Outside, he pulled the door to again and waited for a moment, listening; but he need not have worried, his father was still snoring just as loudly as before.

  Once again, he left Sultan where he was; the noise of getting the horse from the stable might be enough to wake Tomas.

  The bridge lay picked out by faint starlight, and Peter cautiously slipped across the planks, the pure water gurgling past underneath.

  It took him a while to reach the village, but he wasn’t going in tonight. Instead he chose a path that ran along the eastern edge of Chust, and set off around it. As the boundary fence curved here and there, so did the path, and Peter didn’t hesitate. It wouldn’t do to hesitate. If he had stopped to think who or what might be out in the night forest, he would never have left the safety of the hut. In the last few days there had been two murders, and wolves were the least terrifying of the possible culprits. Peter hurried on, and pushed thoughts of anything and anyone else to the back of his mind.

  Another few minutes and he saw the shape of the church hunkered in the darkness. He went on past it, and then slowed. Somewhere soon, he knew, he would meet another, smaller path running out from the village and up to the hut where Agnes had been left.

  As his pace slowed, he began to wonder if there was something wrong with his eyes, because suddenly it seemed he could see much less than before in the dark. He lifted his face to the sky, trying to see what light there was, and felt snowflakes brush his face. Snow clouds had moved in, taking almost all the light away.

  Just as he began to doubt he would be able to find the path, he heard the crunch of grit and pebbles underfoot.

  He turned to the left and hurried up the path, which rose steeply, toward the edge of the trees. There, a stone’s throw back inside the forest, was the hut.

  20

  Hands in the Dark

  “Agnes,” Peter called, as loudly as he dared.

  Nothing.

  Peter stood at the door of the hut and wondered if he should try to open it and go in. But maybe better not; it might startle her.

  “Agnes,” he tried again, a fraction louder this time.

  “Peter? Is that you?”

  She was awake.

  “Agnes, it’s me, Peter,” he said, feeling stupid. “Can I come in?”

  He heard movement inside and felt the door shift slightly as Agnes leant against it on the other side.

  “I can’t let you in, Peter,” she said. She sounded miserable. “You know I have to stay here by myself. And anyway, the door’s locked. They locked me in.”

  He tried the door. Shut tight.

  “Come around to the window, Peter. We can talk there.”

  He crept around the side of the hut, feeling his way by running his hand along the rough wall. He heard the creak of a wooden hinge as she opened the shutter. Suddenly her voice was right above him.

  “Peter! Here!”

  The window was small and quite high up, about head height. It had a wide windowsill, where Agnes’s baskets of food were left. With an effort, she could have climbed out of the window and escaped, but the Elders knew what they were doing. Locking the door was merely symbolic; they knew she could not escape even if it stood wide open. She had nowhere to go, and would not be allowed to return to village life until she had completed her mourning properly.

  “Peter,” Agnes said, sounding a little calmer. “Can you feel my hand?”

  He felt around in the darkness, and there was her arm. He slipped his fingers along her sleeve until he felt her hand.

  “Agnes, let me in. I can’t stand the thought of you alone in there. It’s not safe.”

  “No, Peter,” Agnes said, but her voice wavered. “You know what will happen if we’re caught. And I’ll have to begin all over again.”

  “But it’s not fair. Why did you have to marry Stefan? Why not someone else?”

  “Because Anna chose me. When you’ve lived here a bit longer, you’ll understand that that’s how it is.”

  Peter said nothing. He had lived in Chust long enough to understand that the old woman’s word was as good as law.

  “At least you feel a little warmer tonight,” Agnes said.

  He froze.

  “What did you say?”

  “Your hand,” Agnes said, innocently. “It feels warmer than last night.”

  Peter suddenly let Agnes’s hand drop from his, as if it were something dangerous.

  “Peter, what is it?”

  He hesitated, then spoke quickly, his words catching in his throat.

  “Are you saying I came here to see you, last night?”

  “Yes, you did. You asked me to—Oh, Peter! It wasn’t you?”

  Suddenly he felt behind his back the huge darkness of the forest, in which myriad horrors might be tracking him. It surrounded him with almost unbearable menace, a vast world that ruled and ran his life, seeing everything that passed beneath its branches, yet giving away no secrets.

  “Agnes. You have to let me in.”

  He spoke with a quiet strength, but with fear mingled in, and it scared her into agreement.

  “Yes,” she said. “Oh God! Yes. It wasn’t you? Yes. But the door, the door!”

  “Never mind. Stand away from the window.”

  He reached up and groped around, swinging the shutter open and gauging how wide the window was. Small, but he could make it. Putting a foot against the irregular log wall of the hut, he found a foothold and half jumped, half pulled himself though the gap. Then he wriggled and pulled and fell headfirst into the hut, spraining his hand as he landed.

  “Oh!” cried Agnes. “Are you all right?”

  “Don’t you have any light?” asked Peter, standing up. He rubbed his hand, but it wasn’t bad.

  “No. I’m not allowed. Tell me you’re joking, Peter. That you just said that to get in here with me.”

  Peter said nothing in reply.

  “Who was it?” she whispered in horror. “He said he was you! He asked to come in.”

  “You didn’t—?”

  “No!” Agnes said quickly. “I wouldn’t let you…him…in.”

  “Thank God for that.”

  “But who is it?”

  Peter shook his head in the dark.

  “I don’t know.”

  He went back to the window. From the stillness outside he could sense that it was still snowing, though he couldn’t actually see it. The shutter was banging against the outside of the hut. Somewhere there was an iron handle to pull it shut. The last thing in the world he wanted to do was put his hand back out into the night, but he had no choice. Expecting his wrist to be grabbed at any moment, he felt out through the window, found the handle, and pulled the shutter inward, swinging the bolt into place. He turned to Agnes.

  “I don’t know,” he repeated, “but something is wrong around here. Tell me exactly what happened.”

  “I told you. You…someone came to the window last night. He asked to come in and I said no. He asked again and I said no again and…”

  She stopped.

  “Oh!” she said.

  “What, Agnes?” Peter felt for her in the dark and put his arms around her. “What?”

  “When I wouldn’t let him in, he asked for a kiss.”

  “You didn’t do it?”

  “Peter, I thought it was you. I’ve been so scared. Anyway I said no, but I let you…him kiss my hand.”

  Peter swore.

  “I thought it was you,” Agnes said.

  “I know. I know.”

  Peter felt her tense in his arms. Her head jerked up toward his in the blackness.

  “Oh God and the Forest!”

  “Agnes? Agnes?”

>   “He said he’d come back again tonight.”

  21

  Threads

  For a long time neither of them moved, as if expecting to hear a voice at the window at any time. When they were finally convinced they could hear nothing, they began to breathe again.

  “Sit down,” Agnes said, guiding Peter to the small bunk where she had been sleeping. They sat on the edge of the bed, neither willing to voice their fears.

  Peter cursed himself for being so naïve. He could have brought his axe with him. He had tried to believe Tomas, that this was all village superstition, but deep down he had known something evil was afoot.

  “Have you been all right here?”

  “Yes,” said Agnes simply. “But I’m worried about Mother. I’ve been thinking about her. And about Father.”

  “Your mother’s fine,” Peter said quickly. “I saw her yesterday. I spoke to the widow Caterina next door. She was very reassuring.”

  It was all lies, but Agnes didn’t need more to worry about, and as far as he knew, her mother was all right.

  “But what have you been doing? It’s been a week!” he said.

  “Spinning,” Agnes said. She laughed. “If you could see the floor of this place. There’s enough wool to dry up the river in here. They said I might as well make myself useful. And I started after a couple of days. I was too angry at first. But then I began to get bored and I was grateful for something to do. I must have spun a mile of it by now!”

  “And someone brings you food every day?”

  “Yes, one of the Elders, I think, but the person doesn’t speak. I just hear the basket being left on the windowsill. It’s such a small window. I can only see a few branches and a little bit of sky. But at night, I can see the stars in the heavens….” She sighed.

  “I’m going to find out what’s going on, Agnes. Trust me. I’ve got an idea.”

  “But what about…him? If he comes again. He said he would.”

  “That’s my idea. We’ll find out what’s happening. How much wool have you spun? Really?”