Rainwillow Crossing (part 1 of 4)

1

 

He tilled the soil.

Always, he did that foremost.

When he woke to a silver sunrise, when he looked out over past it, at the roiling fog, the soot-laden clouds, he thought about the fields first. He was a farmer in his blood, had been in the before-times, would be for life.

Yondel began each morning with a breakfast of eggs. He flavoured them with pepper and fennel, noting each time that the pepper was dwindling, remembering that he would not be able to replace it. Fennel--luckily--still grew in the sparse, sky-close woods. He sat in his doorway to eat, so that he could watch the sunrise--watch its colours melting in the clouds below, see them turn from night-black to blood red, through rose, cinnamon, silver; into the marbling of greys and acid whites that ushered in full daylight. The sun sat a burnt sky, blue scorched with ruddy brown, blotchy and melted; while the sun itself wore a redder, rough face, haloed in bright, new silver.

He went amongst the livestock when he was done, feeding hay, collecting eggs, pulling thistles out of pasture and feeding them to the Crossing's tough little goats. He checked the fences and ditches, cleared them where they needed it. Headed down into the fields to work the grain crop--ploughing, weeding, planting, harvesting: all these things in their season.

When the other horizon took its turn: silver, cinnamon, rose, blood-red, dark; he'd head back up to the hills and dig. He'd dig until well into dark, and then drag his age-weary body back to the cottage, to where he'd make his own fire, sit alone on a bale of hay, covered in a ragged woollen blanket, listening as the night made no sound.

Sometimes his daughter’s face appeared in the fire as he worked. She swirled there in amongst the flames, and each time he thought he recognised a little bit less in her, saw the child he'd sired and raised somewhat less in her features, heard it less in her voice.

And soon...

He preferred not to think about it.

#

Rainwillow Crossing had been in this part of the world for longer than Yondel's memory, longer than the memory of his grandfather, or his. Nobody knew the origin of its name--no more than that once upon a time, herdsmen had chosen to cross the StarBegotten Ranges this way. He'd been told once as a child that the village was over three thousand years old. He'd asked his great-grandmother how she could know this, having seen not quite a hundred years herself.

“Ah, well. These are the words that are passed down. Every mother tells her daughter, then her daughter grows and marries, tells a daughter of her own.”

“What about her sons?”

“Ah, they forget, don't they?”

“Do they?”

“They do my dear. As you will. It's the fate of us women to remember.”

“Us men?”

She chuckled. He'd seen her eyes soften, seen the wistfulness seep into her smile. “You men will keep the stone strong and the sky standing. Can you do that?”

As all boys of four, he knew he could, he was eager to prove it. “And I'll remember.”

Her withered hand cupping his cheek: “No need my dear. Your sisters will for you.”

And yet he did. He had. He'd collected the stories of his village, his people, carried them in his head with the steadiness of a woman. He knew the origins of this little collection of people--tenacious, leather-hearted survivors--he knew of the battles they'd faced, plagues and triumphs, changes, lineages. He could see in the faces of his neighbours where their bloodline flowed, saw at times where it flowed a direction it shouldn't: kept such secrets for the peace of all.

A strange one, some of the villagers had said of him. Worse, later.

Now he lived above them, able to sit on the ledge near the northern border of what once might have been called his family's lands, to watch their patches of colour as they moved about the village. Memory could be a curse of kinds: he pitied his mother and sisters, his daughter. His sisters all three dead now; his mother less than a memory; his daughter so very far away.

Time will never reunite us. Never in the flesh. How I miss you, child.

#

There was trouble down in the village.

He could hear the shouting from where he worked his eastern field--the acoustics of the mountainside brought it to his ear as if on wings.

Yondel sighed. He sometimes wished he could shut the village out, declare himself no part of it--as the village had all-but him. He knew that wish for madness though--for the route into madness. His mind needed to be grounded in the society of others--he was too full of memories to leave himself utterly to himself. And besides... trouble...

By the time he'd gotten down there they were dragging the girl out onto the common. Her dress was torn, her chin blood-smeared, one eye already swelling and bruising. The villagers had her on her knees, shoving her, spitting and kicking. It only took Yondel one look at her to know that she was cursed. The first amongst them in over thirty years to be so.

It brought back memories--his and older--it brought back the first day, his father's face, the awful things he'd been saying.

Surely, we knew this might come again.

The villagers had. And they had their own memories. They were looking at the girl now as if she were poison. Her name... Eminlae, he thought that was it, daughter of Kepron Norgrood, himself the son...

He cleared his throat, dredging for authority: “What's happening here?”

“Stay back old man. She's cursed!”

It was something that manifested itself in the skin of its victim, infesting her skin with black patches, raised and red-crescented; drawing silver-ish black lines into her flesh, and leaving it sunken and puckered elsewhere. The change had only begun in this girl--in Eminlae--but thirty years is too short a time to erase some things--especially in the parchment minds of women. They were calling up yesterday--some with crystal clarity. They knew... And the eyes were a giveaway, suddenly so grey, the whole eye flooded, as if the child's eyeballs had been harvested and replaced with balls of dark iron.

She was fourteen, Yondel thought, maybe fifteen.

They would kill her. Anyway, she would die.

I only need to go. Just back to cottage...

Instead, he was wading into the conflict, coming amongst the villagers and standing as Eminlae's shield.

“What do you care?” somebody shouted. “What've you done for us but killing?”

“You can see what she is!” from another.

“Go home if you can't remember what happened.”

I can remember better than half of you. And the memories flung themselves at him, teeth gnashing, claws whistling through the air.

Besla, of his own generation, white-haired, straight-backed, slid effortlessly to the front. “What are you doing here, Yondel?”

“I heard this.”

“Then you know what's going on.”

“She's barely fifteen.”

“Still fourteen.”

“A child.”

“See for yourself. See her eyes. She can't stay here.”

“She can't survive out there.”

“It's the haze or the blade. We can't take the chance.”

Eminlae was behind him. She'd huddled near his legs, hefting her human shield with desperation. Yondel wasn't sure if she fully understood what was happening to her--too young to remember in her own flesh--maybe too young to have come into her full memory. But she'd have heard stories, seen her own skin. Yondel could only imagine the full horror that must be playing out in her head. That poor child.

His neighbours were doing what had to be done. Besla said as much. And he certainly knew. But this girl's face behind him, still young under the damage: he found he couldn't move, couldn't step aside.

Besla was saying: “She can't remain.”

“Then I'll take her.”

“It's not far enough.”

“I said I'll take her.” He had no authority here--he was no Landed-man's son; old but no elder; memoried, but no woman, no True-Seer--not even liked, not trusted, and not normal. He wasn't sure himself how he could so often take command, stand his ground and see these others melt away from his stronghold.

Besla said, “What then? What once you've taken her up the hill?”

I don't know. I've no idea.

“You won't find anything digging in the dirt. And you won't find anything in her.”

Where was Eminlae's mother? Her father was dead, but her mother, her brother… She seemed to have no defenders except grey-haired, failing Yondel. Why do I think I'll find answers? I'm probably twice as mad as they say I am.

Someone--Holp Bringleby--was saying: “Don't let him take her!”

Another: “Let him have her!”

Blond, buxom Unselfa Lawlane: “She'll come back for us, you all know she will. It's not her fault, and I know she can't help it, but she will. When she's done with him. It has to be the blade, it's the only way.”

Yondel pulled his new charge to her feet, quickly, before more started talking the way Unselfa was. He'd be a poor match for even one of the village's young men, and there were several here who looked like they were spoiling for a fight. He marched forward, hoping a way would clear for him. It did slowly, breaking his stride, but it cleared. The villagers stepped back and let him drag Eminlae past. He still held some sway--or did they just fear to touch her in spite of having just so recently beaten her?

Take what luck life gives you.

With Eminlae in tow he took the steep, rocky path back up towards his cottage. As they walked, he wondered: what am going to do now?

 

Picture credit/discredit: author's own work