Wildwing (5 page)

Her Ladyship Has a Taste

M
y eyes are still squeezed shut. I hardly dare open them. What kind of a mess has that banging and rattling made? I take a deep breath. Instead of dust, I smell fresh air. A breeze brushes my arm.

Oh, Lord, I’ve broken the windows. How long will it take me to earn enough to replace them? I’ll need to sweep up the shards, get someone to fix the panes, look for a new position… .

Something rustles in the breeze, probably the papers on the desk, and then—
chirrup!

My eyes fly open at the unexpected sound. But when I see what’s around me, I squeeze them shut again, and my heart starts beating like a drum corps on parade.

It can’t be! It’s impossible!

Just slow down
, Mum is always telling me. So that’s what I’ll do. I’ll begin again, slow as can be, and when I open my eyes this time, everything will be normal. I take a few seconds to breathe deep, and then, looking straight down, I open my eyes the smallest bit. There are my feet in their sturdy black shoes, the same as ever. I lift my gaze inch by inch. The solid lower walls of the lift need a polishing, just like before. Thank God. Another few inches and I’ll be looking out through the filigree at the dusty library. One more inch—

But going slow hasn’t helped at all. Outside the lift, there’s no broken glass to clean up; there isn’t even a window, or walls to set a window in: just a field of waving grass, long and autumn gold. Around the field, trees dance in gowns of crimson and orange and green. Morning sun filters through the ironwork in bright patterns, splashing my skin with gold. Like I’m in a church painting.

Like I’m in paradise.

Now there’s no slowing my breath, or my heart. Paradise? All those times I said I hated my life, that I wanted something different, I never meant this! I’m not ready to be dead! And what kind of way is this to die? I run a finger up and down the curving strips of metal. Whoever heard of a lift to heaven?

As if in answer to my question, that warm
chirrup
comes again from above and behind me. An angel, calling me out.

As I push down the handle, a message flips into place over the door:
RETURN PRECISELY AT SUNDOWN
. Paradise seems to come with instructions. What does that mean, “return”?

Oh, but the air smells bright and alive! The grass is dry and springy underfoot, and so long it tickles my ankles.

Chirrup!

I turn. There, not ten paces behind the lift, towers a dead tree, and at the end of a long, bare branch perches not an angel, but the most magnificent bird I’ve ever seen. It must be as tall as my forearm is long. It has a rosy tan breast stippled with black, and a warrior’s broad shoulders; the head is steel-gray, so it looks like it’s wearing a helmet. Huge black eyes seem to take in the entire world at once.

Now it tilts its head with an inquiring look, as if eyeing me bird to bird.

That look fills me, and suddenly I don’t feel confused anymore. Why, this is a dream, is all! A hallucination. I conked my head good and proper, and I’ll wake up soon enough, with a huge mess to clean up, and Mr. Greenwood and Mum staring at me all disapproving and disappointed, shaking their heads. I’ll be miserable enough then. I might as well enjoy my dream while I can.

The bird nods approvingly, spreads its wings out wondrous wide, and all at once it’s soaring. How did it get so high, so quickly? It circles the field a few times and then flaps off over the trees. Almost as if it wants to lead me on. All right then, I think, not even stopping to put down the tablecloth. And I follow.

The forest welcomes me in. Soon thick branches are rustling overhead, dimming the light and hushing sounds, so it’s almost like being underwater. I can’t see the bird, so I stop, hoping to catch the sound of its cry. Instead I hear a soft burbling. Another minute brings me to a stream, and now I let it be my guide as I walk along the bank and, when it narrows, leap from stone to stone. The trees grow thinner.

A voice calls out from somewhere up ahead. There must be people in my dream.

I peek around the trunk of a wide oak. The stream banks climb to a bridge, and in the middle of the bridge stands an old horse, resting in front of an even older wagon, and in the back of the wagon there’s a large crate of clucking chickens.

“Come on, then! We haven’t all day!” calls the driver.

At first I think he’s talking to me, or even the chickens, but then I see there are more people coming up the dusty road. And it’s the most wonderful thing: they look likethey’ve stepped from the pages of
Robin Hood
. There are men and a boy in earth-colored tunics, belted at the waist, with leggings snugged to their calves and funny little nightcap hats. A handful of women chatter along in browns and greens, their headdresses strapped like bandages across their foreheads and under their chins, hiding all their hair, so their faces shine out like the centers of daisies. A straggle of children brings up the rear. Once they reach the bridge, the old horse jerks back into motion, the chickens squawk in complaint, and the parade winds its way on down the road.

As the last person passes, I clamber up the bank, staring after them. I take a step to follow. But then I glance down and see my apron, a maid’s apron, and I’ve a maid’s cap perched on top of my head, and I’m clutching a smudged tablecloth. I don’t look right at all. Unless…

I give the tablecloth a good shake, sending a last flurry of dust flying, turn the smudged side inward, and toss it around my shoulders. The sun blazes the cloth into a beautiful field of red roses. I pull off my cap and shove it in my pocket, only to be pricked by a pin. That will be the brooch for my crimson cloak. Finally, I pull off my apron and wrap it around my head, looping the ties under my chin. Now I look as if I belong.

I hurry down the road. My feet seem to know whichdirection to take before I even see the turns, almost as if I’ve been here before.

But when I round the bend, I gasp at what’s before me: a perfect little walled town, its gate open wide, colorful pennants flapping in the breeze. The wagon has just passed through the gate, and I run to catch up with the crowd flowing in its wake.

Half-timbered houses crowd the narrow street, their upper stories jutting out overhead. I’m in a river of people, surging past shop fronts and whitewashed walls, past shutters thrown open to display bread or cloth or meat inside. The street spills out into a marketplace crowded with carts and stalls, laughter and music, people in homespun and others in silks. A fair! And me with nothing to do but enjoy myself.

Oh, the air sings to my senses, with the scent of meat pies wafting from laden trays, a rainbow of fabrics spilling out across tables, the lilting strains of a flute! A man looks at me and gives a little bow as he calls, “Keep those fine fingers warm in my soft fur-lined gloves!” Dogs growl and tug over a stolen bone; a peddler holds up a dangling ribbon strung with charms; a man walks about with a monkey on his shoulder, and the monkey proudly sports a red embroidered cap. Ahead of me there’s a bright tune and a circleof onlookers. As I come closer, they part, making way, and there in the middle is a bear galumphing about on its hind legs! People clap at the awkward dance, and a boy passes a hat for coins.

An old woman with a basket of apples gives me a gap-toothed smile. “Would your ladyship care for a taste? The best you’ll ever eat.” She cuts a fat slice, handing it to me with a nod and a deferential smile.

A lady? Me? Well, then! I try to look noble as I bite into a fruit almost as sweet as her respectful gaze. A few drops of juice land on my rose-covered cloak, the one that’s convinced her I’m worth her while. But as grand as I look, I’ve no money for more, so I thank her and wander on.

My steps lead me to a stone church with a short, squat tower. There’s something oddly familiar about its shape and that big wooden door, the stone arch carved with triangles. I walk closer. Like a blurry cinema reel coming into focus, the triangles sharpen, and all of a sudden I realize what they are: three rows of birds’ heads, their beaks pointing worshipers inside. And there, along the doorjamb, stands a familiar dragon, a bold knight on his horse—why, it’s my church, the one I pass every day on my way to Mr. Greenwood’s house! But here in my dream, each bird’s beak ends in a fine point, and each eye is bright, as if they were carved only yesterday.

My church. And so this is my town, but as it might have been in the Middle Ages. Now I know why my feet knew every turn of the road. I might as well have been walking from Mr. Greenwood’s to the grocer’s!

I hug my cloak about me in the gathering chill. Those fur-lined gloves would feel wonderful now. I turn to look for the glove seller, but he’s nowhere in sight. The crowd has thinned. How long was I standing staring at the church? Shutters are closing; people are packing up their stalls; the bear, on all fours, disappears around a corner. The sun slips behind the rooftops, casting the square into shadow.

And then I remember the sign in the lift:
RETURN PRECISELY AT SUNDOWN
. With that sense of absolute certainty that comes in dreams, I know I must do as the sign says and reach the lift before night falls.

I follow a few stragglers back between the houses, out the gate. The town doors slam shut behind me. There’s still a wash of sun on the treetops, but it’s fading. I hurry down the road, feeling more anxious with every step, and when the last people are far behind me, I break into a run. I’m filled with a growing sense of dread, an eerie feeling that if I don’t get to the lift in time, I’ll never see my own world again.

The sun is a mere sliver on the horizon when I reach the bridge. I swerve off the path at full tilt. But the bank issteeper than I expected, and I trip, tumbling down, rolling over and over until I crash up against a tree. Dazed, I look up at the same massive oak that hid me before.

My knee throbs, my head spins, but I can’t stop—the light is almost gone! I jump up and dash along the stream, trying to remember my way, terrified I’ve taken a wrong turn. I want to wake up one day! I want to live more than a dream! Finally, the trees open onto the field—thank God! The lift is there where I left it, shining in the last long rays of sun, and I leap in, slamming the door behind me. The sun sinks, the light dims, and something clicks. The floor numbers start flipping, faster and faster, until they’re blurring together, swirling into the colors of golden grass and green metal until everything turns a rattling, shaking shade of black.

For My Own Good

I
come to in the library, exactly where I started. The door to the lift is slightly ajar. I look around, steeling myself to face whatever disaster I’ve created with all that whirling and shaking.

Except there isn’t one. The windows are intact. Books still line the shelves, papers still litter the desk. There’s only one difference: a clear circle surrounds the lift, as if a tornado had blown the dust outward and away.

I raise my hand to see how big a bump I’ve given my head and if there’s any blood. My hand touches not hair but my apron. And the tablecloth is pinned at my neck.

I sink down on the little bench. I must have been delusional, swaddling my head in an apron, acting out my dream like a sleepwalker! It’s a wonder I didn’t go stumblingblindly about the house, falling down stairs or setting the kitchen afire. In a daze, I take off the tablecloth. Imagine, using a tablecloth for a cloak! Quite the grand lady
I’ve
been. I unwrap the apron from my head and then, slowly, in case I’m still dizzy, stand to tie it back on.

How long was I dead to the world? Hours and hours, most likely, to have a dream like that. And today my day off early, and Mr. Greenwood probably about to walk right through that door and find me here! How long do I have to set things straight before he’s home? I jerk the metal door open and run into the hall, down to the drawing room, to look at the clock.

At first I think it’s stopped, because the hands have barely moved since I glanced in before. I reach down to wind the key, only to hear the familiar
tick, tick, tick
. I step back, staring; if the time on the clock is right, I can’t have been unconscious more than a few minutes. Stranger and stranger.

At least I have plenty of time to vacuum the dust from the hall and finish the rest of my work before I leave. I walk slowly into the kitchen, but instead of pulling out the vacuum, I find myself sinking down on the stool and leaning back against the wall. There’s a tune in my head—ah! It’s the one that played for the dancing bear! And then I’m lost in my dream, trying to remember everything before it fades. The smell of the meat pies, the church with its sharp newcarvings, the sounds of the harp and calling voices—I want to keep it all inside me forever. And the glove maker bowing his head as he offered me his wares, the old woman calling me “your ladyship,” people making way for me everywhere I walked … I close my eyes, trying to recall the embroidery on the little red hat the monkey wore… .

The next thing I know the clock is chiming five and I wake with a start. I’ve never done that before, falling asleep at work! Never! Mum will be wondering where I am. I hurry to lock the library back up tight, praying the hall is dim enough to hide the dust. Quick as can be, I set things out for Mr. Greenwood’s supper and wash up a last few dishes in the sink.

What a strange day this has been, I think, pulling the gate shut behind me. And then, because I’m so late, I run down the road toward home.

I’m out of breath when I come in the door. Mum is setting the teapot on the table.

“What kept you so long?” she asks.

Well, I’m not about to tell her I fell asleep on the job, am I? “The stew needed attention,” I say, taking off my apron and hanging it from its hook on the wall.

I turn to the table. Mum is staring at me aghast, hereyes as wide as they’ll go, and then her brows slam down. “Adelaide!” It’s an accusation.

“What?” I say, bewildered. “What have I done?”

I follow her gaze to my skirt. There’s a great gaping rent down the middle of it, and streaks of dirt as wide as my hand. It looks just as if—

“Fighting again!” cries Mum.
“How could you?”

“But I haven’t! I don’t know where that rip is from. I haven’t been fighting, I swear!”

“Then you tell me what happened to your skirt,” she says bitterly, as if she knows I’m lying. I’m too stunned to answer.

I hear the medieval town gates closing behind me, feel the road under my shoes as I run in the last pink rays of the sun… .

“The best position in town and you’re throwing it away like rubbish!” Her eyes are somewhere between tears and rage, but rage has the upper hand.

The stream bank drops down before me, and I fall… .

“I was wrong to think you’d make an effort,” says Mum, almost shaking, as if it’s her life she sees in tatters before her. “Didn’t you hear a thing I’ve said? Keep up like this, and you’ll end up in jail, or”—she pauses—”or
worse!
Our livelihood! Your reputation! Your future! Don’t they mean anything to you?”

After all these years, after this strange day, it’s suddenlytoo much. Something snaps. “My reputation?” I shout. “What about
yours?’“
Her mouth drops open, her face goes ice-white, but the words keep pouring out of me.
“Or worse
?you can’t even say the word, can you?
Pregnant!
You’re the one got pregnant without bothering to get married first, not me! You’re the reason they call me
bastard
—”

I stop, but it’s too late. My words ring horribly in the room. I see every line on her face. The pain she’s always worked so hard to hide is laid bare.

She draws in a deep breath, and her eyes go hard. “Something has to change,” she says. “And soon, before your headstrong ways ruin your life. I’m finding you a place as a live-in.”

“A live-in! But Mr. Greenwood?”

“I’ll go with you tomorrow to give your two weeks’ notice.” She holds up a hand. I wish she were yelling; this cold anger is worse. “No! Not one more sound from you. Go to bed. I can’t even stand to talk to you right now.” The words catch in her throat. “Go. Go!”

Later, much later, I think I hear sobbing. Her bed stays empty all night.

I don’t sleep either. My head is awhirl, Mum’s words jumbling up with images from my strange dream. I reach for my skirt and finger the rip, run my palm along the broad streaks of dirt.

No
, I think again.
It’s impossible
. But how could I get stains like these inside a library? That’s not dust; it’s dirt, ground in like you’d get from tumbling down a stream bank.

What if it wasn’t a dream?

I see the tiny model of the lift in the drawing room, and the lift itself standing like an oversized packing crate in the middle of the library… .

And then, in spite of everything, I find myself gasping with amazement. He made a time machine, that’s what he did! Mr. Greenwood, who everyone thought was mad, invented a machine that took me right back to the Middle Ages! Why, if people knew, he’d be the most famous man in all of England. To think, all these weeks I’ve worked in a house that holds a time machine, chatting with its inventor over cake and tea.

But tomorrow Mum is coming to announce my two weeks’ notice. I’m leaving Mr. Greenwood and his magical house for good.

The brief excitement seeps away, leaving me hollow. When you’re a live-in, they don’t even bother to learn your name, that’s what I’ve heard, just call you Elsie or whatever it is they’ve chosen for the girls in your position. Because you’re not a person then, are you? I sink my head in my hands. How can Mum think that’s going to give me a better life?

There’s no point trying to convince her. She’s beyondlistening, even if I came up with the best lie in the world. And the truth? That would sound like the biggest lie of all.

In jail… or worse
. All she can see is me on the same path she took, into the arms of a lad who promises the world but runs off as soon as your belly is showing. She’ll do anything to save me from her fate, no matter how much life she bleeds from me in the saving.

But I can’t live like she wants me to, all meek and squashed and sorry, crumpled into a corner like a worn-out blanket. I can’t shrink myself into what she wants me to be! I think again how I felt in the grocer’s, that loaf of bread smashed in my fist. That’s how I’ll feel every day when I’m a scullery maid, sleeping under the eaves in a shoddy maid-set bed, up and scrubbing the grates before dawn, gazing down reverently when the great ones pass so we can all pretend I don’t exist. Disappearing into the woodwork. Like I believe what Caroline thinks of me.

“Why must you be so headstrong?” Isn’t that what Mum always says? “Take the hand you’re dealt and make the best of it.”

And then, in the black middle of the night, I sit up in bed, stifling a cry of wonder, as I realize exactly what cards I’m holding.