Cloud and Ashes: Three Winter's Tales (13 page)

Split the stick, and I am in it,
sang the wren.
I rise.

I crack the stone,
said the starry flower.
I will crack where I take root.

He slept.

And so I waked that night, and whispered secrets with my sister moon. With Malykorne, that is my lady Annis’ other face and elder: light and dark of one moon. Her cradling and my crescent self, still turning from my mother into light. And thou within me, braiding blood. A clasp of witches.

I had no heart for thy undoing.

I am stone,
said I.
My lady's eidolon. How came I by this flaw?

Thy soul?
The green witch laughed.
Her glass were clouded.

Did you—?

Stir fire up? Not I.

I thought on thy begetting.
Brock? Did she meddle?

Bloodroot i’ thy lady's cauldron. Ashes i’ thy cup.
The green witch drank.
What's done is done. Yet being kindled, thou might leave thy spill.

Kit slept beside us. Why did I not leave him sleeping, let him grieve and live?

I tell thee, I could not, remembering how coldly I had culled him, out of all the bloodborn kenneled in my lady's dark. All in silver, I'd come down to view my prey, I'd held the candle to his dazzled face. Yes. He would do, I'd thought; yet stilled the triumph in my glance. My lady and her crow did watch. They'd uses for his soul and seed, designs of thrift and sorcery for bone, blood, fell and eyes. Ah, make no paragon of me—myself had marked him for my own false ends. His fiddle for a ship to bear me from that nighted isle; his cock to crow away her spell. ‘Twould do, I judged. So one might heft a stick, a sling of stones, at need: to use, to cast away. He bowed; and as my lady bade, I offered drowsy wine to him, a draught amazing to the mortal sense. We'd toy with him before we slew.

Is this the moon?
said he, and gazed about the hall. Awe and mischief in his face.
I've seen her owl and her ivy bush, but never tasted of her cup.

I bit my lip, so not to laugh. All solemn then, alight with love, he drank to me. I saw him: tousled, sleepless, downy. He had brushed his twice-turned coat, as if he went not to his death but to a dance.
Poor fool,
thought I. And all unknowing, I was changed by him. His innocence his spell.

And so that green Unhallows eve, I waked by Malykorne and chose: to stay with Kit, to bear thee, for what end might come.

O Margaret, I was stark afraid. Of travailing, of birth. Of dying—ah, most bitterly; but more than death, I dreaded Annis in myself. Her stone I had averted; but the dark witch was in grain. I'd seen her in my lady's glass: bloodnailed and insatiate, the blind hag on the road. I was afraid of being her, of slaying what was not myself. Of whoring. Not the act—for I was schooled to that—but the devouring. Cold fire, turning sticks to Ashes, Ashes into Annis, endlessly: herself herself engendering.

Yet where thou wast, there Annis could not be. That secret did the green witch tell me, softly in mine ear: thou wouldst keep hallows in that place of blood, that O thine everywhere, thy keep; though I went naked to my lady's sky. And so I brooded thee, as doth a child its candle, lighting her the way to bed. Yet all about there lay the shadows of thine inward fire, the fears that winced and flickered in my brain. Of need and frailty and lumpishness. Of losing Kit, the fear of losing him. Of love.

"Craw's hanged!” cried the grey cock.

Kit woke.
Gone?
A something slipped from him, a ghost returning at the pale of night. It will not stay, that tide. The pale boat rides the mirk and shiver of that burning flood; it slips the moorings. Gone. Yet curled against him, Thea slept. Cap and acorn. They were lying by a scanty thicket, on the open hills. Not day yet, neither moon nor sun.

He heard a thump and twitter in the wood, a wild free scuffling and calling. Out from the greenwood burst a rout of guisers, clad in tattercoats and leaves.

"Hey is down!” they cried.

Children.

Thea hid her face, but she was laughing; Kit caught up their scattered clothes to lap her.

They'd a girl to play small music—hop and twitter, like a small bird on a briar—all but lost amid their charm. She'd a wheedling pipe and dowly drum. Another, a long lad, bore a garland of whitethorn with a dead crow swung from it, wryneck and agape. It dangled, claws upward, wings clapped wide and stark. Round it, in and out, there ran a thrang of boys and girls. One, crowned in oakleaves, clashed horns with another clad in holly. Lagman and tangling, walking in his sleep, a small boy gaped and swayed and staggered under all their jackets.

"Brant!” they cried. “Come in, here's game."

Not last but alone went a dark and clustering girl in torn russet and green crown; she bore a staff, and wore a fox tail jauncing behind.

"Craw's hanged!” she cried. “Get up!"

A stripling in petticoats swept round the lovers, whirling light and away. His skirts were singed with leaping fires. His broom was budded out, as if he'd swept stars with it. “Here's nest on ‘em,” he said. He poked at them and kittled them, left smears of pollen and of ashes.

"Hey!” cried Kit, sneezing, laughing all at once.

The others thronged. “We's late. They's been and done."

Undone.

The girl with the music played
Cuckoo!
On her little pipe

"My bout at broom? Yer said I could."

"Sneck up, thou mardy, or I's leave thee here for bears."

"Clartarse."

"Neshcock. Tell our dad of thee."

"Gi's a box,” said another. “And we'll gang away."

Kit fumbled in his pockets, found a halfpenny. “Here's to your fires."

Brant bit, she pursed it. “And to yers. Where's riddle?"

"Here,” said another. “In my apron."

They'd a round loaf of barley bread, with a face baked into it: a leafy glazy green man, scored and bossed on it, with clove-nailed eyes. Brant broke and shared it out with all. Kit took, and Thea. All tore it from within, the soft warm crumb; they left the crust of the green man, his face, for the last. At his end, a small boy took the heel, he pinched the raisins from the eyes. Round he went, guising in his mask of crust. Now crouching, now on tiptoe, peering round. A solemn mischief.

"I see you,” he said to Kit. “You don't see me."

Then that, too, was devoured.

Whin tugged at Kit's long cotted hair; she eyed his salt-rimed straggling beard. “Time you was clipped."

"Day,” said the woman. The sheep leapt, yellow-eyed and glaring, from between her knees. The fleece fell, the light sheep staggered giddily away. “Where yer bound?"

Kit said, “Thwaite. Is this the road?"

"We's all up here,” said the woman with the shears, broad-backed, rosy, swathed in sacking. In the fold, the penned sheep blared and jostled.

"Oh,” said Kit, looking round at the row of clippers kneeling or bending to their work, at the lappers and catchers, and the boy at the gate. Beyond them, it was cloudy, the hills hooded in morning.

"Way!” Behind him, a gangling lad brought on another ewe to clip, half-riding her. He threw her in the woman's lap. Her shears bit deep in the heathery wool; they scrunched and sang. “Walking on?"

Kit said, “Anywhere."

"If's a bite and a sup yer after, there's work. Can yer catch ‘em? Can yer whet?"

"I'd think so. But..."

The woman peered at Thea. A dishevelled girl, and silent. Like a tinker out sleepwalking. Hair like flakes of fire. The gown had been good, was tattered as lichen. It was undone at the waist. “Not so lish as yer were, is't? Can yer lap?"

"She's lapped,” said a clipper.

Another sheep sprang away, a vengeful crone. Kit shielded Thea. “'S all right, she's been down afore,” called a man. “Rigged ower."

"Pay ‘em no mind,” said the woman. “Fourpence and all found?"

"Done.” Kit laid by his pack and jacket, and plunged into the throng of clamorous sheep.

"Hey up! Gi's a slipped ‘un."

"Hey! Mind awd Sukey. She's gone on yer, like."

"Lovesick."

"Hod on, lad."

An old ewe cannoned into Kit. Down he went, embracing her for dear life, slathered, laughing. He got her somehow to a shepherd's lap. The man knelt on her head, grinning.

Kit felt his bones. “By, she's a brave ‘un.” He grinned at Thea, but she stood, looking out at the hills.

"Come on, then,” said a lapper.

Thea gathered wool. There were loose locks everywhere. Two women stood at a board and hurdles, lapping fleeces. They plucked away the clarty bits—odds, bobs, and daggles by the tail—and threw them in a sack. They spread each fleece out, dark side up. Then they folded in the legs and rolled it up, dark outward inward, with a twist of the neck-wool drawn out and wrapped round. As they worked, they gossiped; but at every fleece, they said, “A soul, a sark. Out light, in dark."

Thea packed the fleeces in creels. Kit wrestled with the crones. The shears crunched on, inexorable; the light sheep skipped away. The lappers set riddles. “What rive at one another allt day, and lie in one another's arms all night?"

"I give up,” said Thea. “Moon and her dark?"

"Wool combs."

From below, a long way off, came a girl, knitting beside a laden pony. A shepherd and a brisk black dog brought new sheep, down from the summer moors. They shone, brightdark and heavy as the thunderbreeding clouds.

The girl tied her pony, unlading hoggins, frails, and creels. She brought round a tray of cheesecakes, round and golden. “Noon."

Gooseberries and news. “Grey mare's foaled. A lad, and he's piebald. Mistress? Yer Bet's been and thrawn one o yer good siller spoons i't beck, and me and Doll has fished it up. Young termagant.” She sleeved her rosy face. “Oh, and a stranger come, asking at one Lightwood. Said he were an Outlune fellow, brown and beggarly, and ganging with a whey-faced breeding wench. A vixen.” She stared at Thea. “There now! And that clotpoll of a crow lad sent him on up Houlsyke way. Will I fetch him back?"

"No,” said Kit. “I thank you."

A blue-eyed shepherd looked to westward. Thunder. “Doubt he'll have tumbled i't hag by now."

Thea bit her seedcake. “Well done, my little page."

Whin's duckstone skipped and slapped across the waves. “Eight.” She turned grinning. “That caps."

"You've nimmed all the smooth stones whilst I lay and slept.” Kit's flicked once and sank. Still clumsy.

Whin turned out her pockets with a clattering flourish. “Halves.” Stoop and flick. Three. “Yer still won't beat. I's worked at it.” Still with her back to him, looking out at the bare green sea, she said, “Bairn's father."

"Ah?” Kit sorted through the stones.

"It were guising. I never see'd his face.” Five. “So I see'd him a'where."

"A stranger.” One with a leaf in it, too fair to cast away. And this ill-shapen. Ah, this would do. Four. “Yellow hair?"

"As chimneysweepers.” A lad at leap fires. A thief at the gallows. Had he smiled, remembering her cries? A false love. A fiddler. A stranger with a scythe.

Sweetness of green hay. Midsummer. Endless dusk. And still the mowers, mothpale in their shirts, strode on. Kit watched the coil, recoiling of their backs, the long sweep of their scythes, in unison, and so enlaced that not a blade of grass between them stood. They struck and strode, advancing like the white edge of a wave: whish and tumble and the intricating arcs of edge. A long wave, standing with the sun. It stood; the flowers fell and withered with the grass. No sea, but slow green fire, kindled by the sun his kiss.

And after came the bending girls, to strow the grass. They'd not take rake to it, still green in bride-bed, bleeding from the scythe. Rakes to the lapcocks; but straw girls to the swath, to shake and strew the hay in handfuls, east and west. Lay lighter that way.

The hay's the dance.

In Kit's long row, they raked and turned the fading flowers: matrons of a day, and sunburnt. Tossed and tumbled, all their brightness turned to breath of summer. Sweets compacted. He'd made hay since he could walk. He knew the dance. Scythe it and strow it, then to rakes. And turn and turn. Lapcocks to the hobs to windrows; windrows to the sledges. Crisp and blue.

And in among the cocks of hay, the lovers courted, striplings and hoydens, clip and cuff, like hares. Boys battled, whirling hay. And one to another, the straw girls sang: the grey-eyed girl behind him, tall and soldierly and brown; the elfin brat before.

Kit turned and gazed at Thea, in among the girls. Ah, lovelier than ever, fading. Inward turned, to sweet. His lass was growing thin and heavy. Bending to the grass, she strowed it, sun and moon. Skirts dovetailed, and her bare legs scratched. Her bright hair tumbled on her neck. Still white as thorn, her throat, her brow; no sun could burn them. Thea tossed her wraiths of flowers in the air, looked up and round within their falling. Whorl within whirlwind, slow and fast.
Move still, still so.
O my heart. Let it be
now
ever, at the solstice of my love. The blade but newly struck; my heart still standing. Yet will fall. Her blade's herself.

The long wave slowed, against the steepening shingle of the dark. And now the grass was ocean; slow and slower lagged their wading steps, their oars, against that tide. The lads cried challenges, lashed on their fellows, flagging, flagging with the sun; the lasses raked and sang:

One voice above the rest rang out, triumphant, hoarse:

The scythes struck on, against that tide of dark. Against the quenchless lap of earth, the grass that stood and shivered. Stood.

Up from Imber Beck came Kit, not spilling what he held. Deep pools and dappling, the rush and plunge of bright quick water on the stones. He'd washed him clean as dawn, walked naked in his old clean shirt. Grass at his ankles, wind stirring in his wet-combed hair, already lifting from its douse. A sparkling dancing day, a drying day. A day for playing hob. Wild thyme and trout, he thought: he'd lie and tickle.