Wolves Among Us (4 page)

“For what?” Stefan frowned.

“Giving me a place to live.”

Stefan turned to look up at him. “Is that all the church is to you? A place to live?”

“Father Stefan?”

The woman’s voice made Stefan and Erick stand and turn. Mia stood there, clutching her hands together. Stefan sat back down with a grunt and wrestled his boot on, avoiding another look at Erick.

“Father Stefan,” Mia said, “I came later than usual today, but I did hear Mass. I would like to confess.”

Stefan gestured toward the confessional, and she followed in obedience. He glanced back at Erick, jabbing a finger back at the altar. Erick nodded and got back to work.

Ushering Mia into the confessional, Stefan settled his back against the wood wall of the dark chamber. He slid open the lattice window frame that separated them and stretched out his legs, wiggling his toes.

“Forgive me, Father,” she began, “I have sinned. I have provoked my husband to anger again. I did not mean to. I promise I will try harder. I know what is required to be a good wife. I always fall short, Father. That is my sin. But I will try harder. I want to please the Lord.”

Stefan groaned and reached down to take the boot off again.

“Did you just groan?”

Stefan winced. “I did not groan because of you. I am sorry.”

“It’s all right, Father. Your feet hurt. You’re a man, after all, and men work hard. It’s nothing to apologize for.”

“How is Alma?”

She had no reply.

“She is not well, is she? The cough still grabs her? Is that the real reason you came?”

“I’ve done everything you’ve asked. She is no better. Neither of us sleeps much anymore. She coughs worse at night. Sometimes she turns blue, and I know you will say I am imagining it, but I am not. It’s getting worse.”

“But you said you provoked Bjorn; you were confessing to that.”

“Yes.”

“But not for the sake of your marriage, I suppose. Are you searching for the reason God will not heal your child?”

Mia did not reply.

“Mia, my child, do you trust me?”

“Yes, Father.”

“And you know nothing I say is intended to hurt you?”

“Yes.”

“Mia, this has gone on too long. I will speak plainly now. You are guilty of the sin of pride. Does God not have the right to do with your child as He will? Many mothers have sick children, and they do not complain to me as often as you do. Every week you speak to me as if God has forgotten Alma. As for Bjorn, stay out from underfoot. Content yourself with what affection he offers. Never has there been a man who could satisfy a woman.”

“Yes, Father.”

“Do not ask more for yourself than women are due to receive. Repent of the sin of pride. Content yourself with what you have, for these are the words of the apostle Paul.”

“Forgive me, Father,” she replied. “I will try harder to please God.”

“Try harder to please Bjorn, too. His work is difficult. Just try harder to please him, and he will be pleased with you. A man needs to know his wife will not peck him to death before he will come home to roost.”

She sat in silence a moment before exiting. Stefan’s heart softened a bit.

“And pray to our Holy Mother, Mary, for Alma. I have heard from other priests that the women bury statues of Mary headfirst in the ground nearest the child’s room. Try that.”

Stefan followed her out, opening the church door for her. She blushed and thanked him with tears in her eyes. A twinge of something bothered him. He bit each side of his cheeks inside his mouth. He had a copy of a forbidden book tucked away. The book had answers. But if he opened it for Mia, he would open so much more, too. The whole town could be thrown into chaos.

He watched Mia adjust her long scarf around her hair and scurry down the steps. Across the square, Dame Alice roosted on her steps as usual. Spying Mia, she called out to her.

“Come and eat, daughter! You are too thin!”

Mia shot her a frightened look and moved faster, away from the square, away from the old woman who only offered to share some bread. No one else tried to stop Mia to chat or inquire after her family. She had no friends, not since the day the widow Rose had abruptly turned cold to everyone, especially Mia. Stefan tried to talk to Rose in the square, to invite her back to confess her sin, but she had stared at him in horror. Whatever her sin had been, she told no one, and she wanted no one near. Mia had lost her only friend.

On the winding path leading away from the square to her home, winds still blew straight and cold, even as the sun grew stronger day by day. The night rains had made a mess of the mud again, but Mia knew good things grew in this early chaos of spring. The birds sang in a thrash of competing notes over the market cries and church bells, with the children shouting in the distance to be heard above them all. Glad to be out of the confusion of the crowded square and the embarrassment of being singled out by that wrinkled old crow, Dame Alice, Mia relaxed. If she had sorrows, they were her own. Why should Dame Alice care about them or about her? Mia remembered the first law of a fugitive: Never trust an unearned kindness.

In the distance she saw a girl throwing clumps of bread out of a sack draped over her shoulder. Trotting behind her, the fat milk cows gobbled them up, eager tails switching like those of hungry puppies.

Mia closed her eyes in the sunlight and pressed her hands into her empty stomach as she breathed. The wind snapped at her ankles, making her open her eyes and get back to her business after confession. Mia sniffed the air. Someone had baked bread. She inhaled again, holding her breath in this time. Her thin arms stretched out into the sun. Her cloak barely covered her elbows. She had worn it for more than a decade, almost half her life.

Mia heard steps behind her, slow and dragging.

She turned to see Dame Alice, who had followed her out of the square. Heat raced to Mia’s face. She did not want to be made a sport. She pulled her arms back in her cloak, wrapping them into her body, hiding their inadequacy.

“Come here, child.” Dame Alice opened her arms and gestured for Mia to come to her.

Mia shook her head. “Stop following me.”

“Come and eat with me. I only want to talk with you.”

“Why?”

“Because you need to eat.”

“You don’t know what I need. Go back to your business.”

Dame Alice’s shoulders slumped forward, her face pained. “Mia,” she breathed, “you need a friend.”

Mia turned for home.

Mia had a dream that the wolf was circling her house, burning Alma with yellow eyes, waiting to devour her with moon white teeth. Each paw had sharp claws that sank into the wet earth. Mia saw deep indentations between each rib and dry, withered teats that hung with no milk.
The wolf has found us,
she thought in her dream.
The wolf smells the weak.

Pushing herself up from the floor in front of the fireplace, she rubbed her eyes. She needed a few moments to blink and clear away the dream as she caught her breath. Alma slept on her straw pallet against the wall and seemed well. Bjorn’s mother slept in the chair by the fire. Mia reached out and touched her feet. They were warm, but to be safe, Mia covered them with the edge of Margarite’s long cloak. It hung too big for her now that she had shrunk with age and disease, but Mia did not want to alter the cloak. Margarite loved it. Any change would remind her of how much time had taken from her. The truth would be one more screaming wound in this world, a world without remedies.

Bjorn had not returned while she’d slept, Mia decided, judging from the iron pot left undisturbed over the fire. There were hot coals glowing white beneath it but no flames. Looking around in the moonlit shadows, Mia could not guess the hour. She would listen for church bells now that she sat awake. She began contemplating whether to keep dinner warm or begin to think of breakfast for Bjorn. Her mouth watered.

Bjorn had spent many nights gone since Alma’s birth three years ago. Better to police the town at night, he said, when the drunks kept business hours. Mia agreed, saying she knew nothing of men’s work. She would not doubt him. She did know that since the recent drama with that man Cronwall, Bjorn had to tamp down the wicked gossip that had infected the town. Some thought Cronwall was dead, even murdered. Some said he had abandoned Catarina for reasons best whispered in the ear. Not that anyone whispered in Mia’s. What news she heard in the market fell to her by accident, when women gossiped with their backs to her, unaware. Mia had good ears.

The white coals were fading to black. With a grunt, Mia pushed herself to stand. She would fetch another piece of wood from outside and then freshen herself for Bjorn’s return. Some heated water would be good too. She probably looked a horror.

“I’ll give you one last chance.” The man’s voice came from outside her door. The voice was clotted with rage. She did not recognize it.

Mia froze. She heard weeping, then a woman’s muffled cry, as if someone held a hand over her mouth. Her heart fluttering, Mia ducked down to the floor. Whoever they were might see her through the window. Had she let the fire burn too low? Would they think no one home and come inside? She wanted none of their trouble.

She heard the voices arguing and then a dragging sound. Something crawled toward the front door.

The woman spoke. “If you cannot stop yourself, then I will stop you.”

A low popping sound came next. The crawling, scraping noise stopped. Mia held her breath. She had one candle box by the door. The flame in it burned low, not even a thumb’s width high—probably too low to be seen from outside. But Mia crawled to it, picking up each knee with silent effort, and managed to snuff it out without making a sound. She breathed in shallow bursts, listening for the voices.

She heard the man speaking in ragged whispers. Silently, Mia crawled as fast as she could toward Alma, grabbing her blanket and covering her face completely. If they came in, the pallet might look tumbled but empty. She could do nothing about Margarite. Mia saw her kitchen blade and crawled to it next. She had to shuffle under the window to get to it, praying God would not let her make a mistake that alerted the couple to her movements. The shutters hung open, but she could not shut them from the inside. Whoever stood out there could simply stick his head right into her home and see her. Mia forced herself to breathe and think.

“I have not kept your secrets,” the woman said, weeping.

“Who? Who did you tell?”

Mia’s hand closed around the blade as she stretched for it. She blessed the weight of the blade in her hand, the glistening edge of the knife. Slowly pressing her back against the door, bone by bone, she sat and listened, willing her heart to slow down, breathing through pursed lips. The woman’s voice drifted softer now, as if she had moved farther away. The man’s voice changed to a plea, but Mia could no longer make out the details of their conversation. Mia heard a sharp crack, and she started.

She scooted along the wall a little closer to the window, twisting at the waist as she pulled up just enough to see out of the corner. A man stood silhouetted against the moon, his heavy boot on the back of someone on the ground. Mia stared at the shape lying motionless, wide, and flat.
It’s the woman,
she realized,
with her skirts spread out around her.