A memory of war and sola.., p.3
A Memory of War and Solace, page 3
“Marga,” I said. “Don’t you know your old Marga?”
Pinala shook her head and smiled ruefully, “Of course I know you, Marga! Why-ever would you think I could forget you! Just the afternoon heat an’ the hearth fire… made me loopy for a breath. Onions and lentils and grain, is it? Let me get you some sacks.” She scooped the coins from my hand as she turned, tucking them safely into her apron pocket.
I stepped into the small kitchen as she bustled around, filling a small sack with onions from a basket in the corner, then hunting around on a shelf for another for dried red lentils that filled a large clay urn.
As I waited, I could hear voices from the public room through the door. Pinala’s husband Forth seemed to be arguing something with another man. There was little enough I could make out, especially with her shifting pots and stacks of plates here and there, and the fire crackling beside me.
She spoke absently as she worked, “Don’t mind ol’ Forth, he’s just all of a lather with the peddler.” She shook her head. “Coming in here talking talk of war and battles and Dukes! As if wars was a thing we had any care of here in Evans Hill. I mean! Can you imagine? Dukes and lances and swords—ha! Swords! Have you ever heard such nonsense?”
I stepped closer to the open door so that I could hear more of her husband’s talk and less of Pinala’s.
“…won’t be reaching you, I’m sure. Not here out in the nowheres as you are. But mind: Anywhere west, an’ prices are getting higher and the roads less and less safe. You watch an’ I’ll tell you, this goes on any longer and this time next year won’t be any peddlers making the trek this far out. Won’t be no profit in it for us. I’ll give you a good price for those last casks of that liquor you make from buckwheat down here. Ain’t no-one else going to give you better. It’s harsh stuff and not suitable for drinking anywhere but here…but I’m thinking maybe it’ll do for some thirsty soldiers…”
“Aye, talk talk talk is all those men do,” Pinala said next to me. I turned and she pressed a basket into my hands: onions, lentils, and a sack of buckwheat just as I asked. There was also a small sweet loaf tucked in. “For the road,” she said kindly. “Now, you get on back home to…” her face took on another look of confusion, and I knew it was time for me to go. The power of the Warding line clung to me, but if she fixed me in her mind, she might not let the memory go. I thanked her and took my leave of the cramped, hot kitchen.
I walked back behind the line of houses, not looking to meet anyone else before I could make the road. But as I turned past the edge of the second-to-last house, I saw a small, dirty face peek out from behind the corner.
I knelt down in the dusty path and pulled my hood back a bit. I guessed the child was no older than five but was small even at that, and was dressed in a ragged homespun dress that had not seen a wash in days, perhaps longer. Matted and tangled curly brown hair framed a narrow face that showed dried streaks of tears through dirt and dust that no parent would have stood for. From the urchin’s thin, boney shoulders and sunken eyes, it seemed that food had been in as short supply as washing for the last several days.
“What’s your name, little mushroom?” I asked quietly, my voice light and full of humor that I did not feel.
“I’m not a mushroom, I’m a little girl,” she said, indignant and proud. “I’m Deala. You’re Marga—I heard Pinna say your name.”
“You’re Andia’s little one, aren’t you?” I asked. “Deala, you live down southwest by the Hasser farm, right? That’s miles off. What brings you to town and peeking between the houses?”
She looked down, hands and feet fidgeting. With her face down to the ground, I couldn’t see the tears flowing anew, but I could hear them in her voice. “I’m sorry. I don’ wanna bother you. But momma’s sick, an’ no one can help.”
I held out my hand to the child. “Let’s see about that.”
• • •
As we walked, I tore a hunk off the end of the loaf for the girl, who took it shyly and began gnawing on it. We crossed the green and set off southwest. For the most part, I followed Deala’s lead. As well as I could reckon, we were heading in the right direction, but I didn’t know our destination well. I passed by the orchards on my monthly encirclement but had never had any need to come close, and never through the village.
From what I had gathered from overheard town gossip, Andia and Deala lived alone in the small cottage by an apple orchard—Deala’s father had died some time before I arrived in Evans Hill. They tended the apple trees and brought in their meager harvest to sell on market days, but otherwise kept to themselves.
It wasn’t long before Deala’s steps began to flag, and not wanting to push her past exhaustion, I stopped and picked her up, balancing her weight on my hip. She curled against my body and wrapped her arms around my neck, laying her head on my shoulder. The sudden intimacy was discomfiting to me, who had never held a child before, aside from the handful of births I had aided.
As I carried her along the rough path that cut across the rolling land, a memory of my mother’s voice came to me unbidden, crooning a meandering melody. I found myself humming the tune absently, almost more of an intoned breath in my chest than voiced singing. Deala hugged me tighter.
At the pace I set, it was only half an hour or so before I could see the orchard in the distance, and soon we were among the trees. There were signs I noted immediately. Fruit fallen on the ground and uncollected, crawling with ants. A cluster of baskets by the trunk of a tree, not only empty, but with the beginnings of weeds growing through them. A sense of dread crept up my spine, and I spoke to the child with some trepidation.
“How long has your momma been sick, Deala?”
I felt her whole body shrug in response, and she buried her face further in my shoulder.
I set her down on her feet beside the baskets and rooted through the stack, finding one that looked intact. I handed the basket to the girl and gave her a little pat. “Here. Gather as many of the fallen apples as you can that are still good while I go see to your mother.”
I watched her for a moment, then turned to the house. It was a snug little cottage, reminding me much of the little one-room house I had grown up in. The boards were whitewashed, neat and trim, though there were signs of neglect in the thatch. As I reached the door, I placed a hand against the latch and paused, worried at what I might find within.
A soft moan came from inside, and I released a breath I hadn’t realized I was holding. A worry left my shoulders. I would at least not need to tell the child that her mother was already dead. I pushed the door open and entered.
As I expected, the interior was a single room, though what should have been cozy and homey was close and unpleasant. The two windows were shuttered, leaving the air stifling and the room in a deep twilight.
Andia was curled up in the one bed tangled in sweat-stained blankets and her face crumpled in pain. I set my basket and satchel down and moved about opening both windows to let in light and catch the slight breeze, and came to sit beside her on the bed.
Sweat beaded on her brow and her face was flushed and hot. Her lips were dry and cracked. I worried about dehydration, but before letting her drink I wanted to find out what had brought her to this. A sour smell came from the chamber pot—old vomit. It wasn’t enough to cover the rich scent of blood. I gently pulled back the blankets and uncovered her body. Her thighs and the blanket wound around her was stained with black dried blood and fresh red.
Her response to my every touch was to curl more tightly around her abdomen, clearly the source of her pain. I began to suspect the nature of her illness.
In Birth Magic, one draws on the pain of the patient. It is a profound well of power, and that makes the work relatively easy, if one can open oneself to it. For me, it is easy enough to find the empathy required. It would take very little to have gone a different way in my life to find myself here where she lay. Had I been slower at knowing my own mind, or better at keeping it to myself, I might have grown up in my parents’ house and eventually wed. Had I been a little older when Cal took me, I might have been inducted into a different kind of service in Ma’am’s house or some other, with similar consequences.
I placed my hands on her, shrugging off Andia’s weakened attempts to fend me off. I drew in her pain and spun it into threads to find its source, scanning her body with power that was somehow both eyes and fingers. Through these ethereal senses, I could see the problem immediately.
She was pregnant. But it had gone wrong in the way that such things sometimes did. The mass of almost-life was there, growing fast, becoming something more than a collection of undifferentiated tissue. But it was in the wrong place. Instead of implanting in her womb it had begun to grow in the passage to it. Such a thing was known to the healers of Reft, and easily resolved by them if caught early.
But this was not early. The growth had caused enough damage already to her mother’s body that Deala was now unlikely to ever have this sibling or any other, and may still lose her mother in the bargain. I didn’t have the skills or knowledge of Atua and the healers, and I knew I probably couldn’t save the pregnancy.
Whether I could save Deala’s mother was the question at hand. From the state of her heart, I could see there were only moments left to act.
Still, I agonized over the decision. I knew Andia was not conscious enough to make the choice, and she had little time left. Here and now, in this circumstance, I was at a crossroads where I had to choose for her. A small part of my mind took a grim satisfaction at my predicament. I had taken on responsibility for the whole village without their consent. And now the hard consequences had become real.
In the end, it was the thought of Deala outside, needing and expecting her mother to come back to her that decided me.
It took very little of the power I could draw from her to separate the bundle of tissue and urge the ruptures in her body to close. There would be scarring within. Likely enough to prevent any future pregnancies from taking root, for good or ill.
Blood flowed from her womb, and as her insides continued to knit I moved on to the damage and infection impacting nearby organs. I could sense her heartbeat steadying and calming. I stayed beside her long enough to be sure that she was stabilized, then stood and moved to the door, taking up the washing tub and the soiled chamber pot.
A brief look down at my own clothes showed me that I had not escaped my work unstained. I didn’t want Deala to see me covered with her mother’s blood. I remembered my horror at seeing my own mother’s crumpled body and drew on that pain, turning the dark red stains gray to match my tunic for a time.
As I emerged from the house, I could see Deala standing some ways off, gripping the basket with both hands and on the verge of tears. I gestured her to come to me. She abandoned the basket and came at a run. I knelt down and held out my hands to catch her before she could touch my clothes. Though hidden, her mother’s blood was still wet upon me.
“Your mother is going to be okay, little one. She needs plenty of rest now, and lots to drink. Where is your well?”
Deala led me along a narrow path behind the house to a low stone ring. Along the way, I tipped out the noisome mess of the chamber pot. At the wellhead I dropped the bucket down on its line and hauled it up, once, twice, and thrice. With the washing tub half full, I dropped the bucket twice more to sluice out the chamber pot and then carried them back to the house. At the door, I admonished the girl to stay close, but remain outside for now.
“I’ll call you in when your mother is well enough to see you.”
That she obeyed was, I think, more a testament to her desperation and exhaustion than to my persuasion.
Back inside, I checked Andia’s heartbeat and breathing again, and having satisfied myself that she remained stable, I moved to start a fire in the small hearth. I dipped the kettle full of water from the washtub and hung it over the flames, then set to work stripping the blankets and her clothes, using them to wipe blood from her body as best I could. These went to soak in the washtub while I found a fresh dressing gown on a peg and got Andia into it.
A quick scan of the room showed that I had cleaned enough of the evidence of her mother’s trauma that it was safe for Deala to enter. The child entered slowly, trepidation showing in her features. When her mother sighed and shifted, with no sign of the previous pain and illness, Deala ran to the bed and made to climb in.
“Wait little mushroom. Let’s clean you up first. What would your mother say about tracking such dirt into the blankets?”
Deala silently suffered me to strip off her filthy clothes and drop them in the washtub. With the corner of an apron dipped into the kettle of warming water, I wiped the worst of the grime from her face, hair, hands, and feet. Finally, she was willing to wait no longer, and slipped away from me and up into the bed beside her mother.
I spent the next hour setting a stew of lentils and buckwheat to bubble over the fire—both of them would need food, and lots of it—and scrubbing the blood-soiled clothes. After some time, I looked up to find Deala asleep, and Andia staring at me. She worked her lips, trying to speak for a few moments before finally finding enough moisture for her throat and lips.
“I don’t know you.” There was suspicion and a hint of fear in her voice. So much for my Wardings. I had lingered here too long by far to hide in their shadow.
“I’m Marga. Deala brought me to you,” I said, making my voice light. “I was in the village for some trading.” I tried an easy diversion. “She thought I might be able to help. As it happens, I know something of herbs—”
“No herbs could have helped me,” Andia interrupted. “I know what…” Her eyes darted to my scar, down to my bare arms and the crosshatching of fine scars there. She looked away from me and wouldn’t meet my eyes. “There’s no herbs could have helped.”
I moved to stand, and saw her reflexively draw back in fear and loathing at what she guessed I was, pulling Deala’s still-sleeping form protectively away from me.
So be it.
I nodded. “I’ll leave you now. Take care standing at first, and eat as much as you can bear. Your body needs the nutrition.”
Without looking back at her, I picked up my satchel and the remains of the food I had bought, and walked out into the dwindling light.
• • •
On reaching home, I absentmindedly put the food away. Onions, buckwheat, lentils—barely half what I had bought from Pinala—some more wrinkled apples I had picked up leaving the orchard, and a handful of mushrooms I’d foraged on my walk back through the wood.
I was exhausted and disheartened by the day’s work. I shed my clothes, sticky now with Andia’s dried blood, and left them to soak in a wooden tub.
A quarter-hour walk from my home of crumbling stone was a deep pool accumulating in a cleft of rock as it tumbled down a steep gully. It was formed by the waters of the same spring that fed my cistern.
The whole wood was my personal world. I walked naked and barefoot down to my bathing pool. I could tell from the evening sounds of the wood that I was alone under that living canopy. The crisp air against my skin felt good; bracing.
As I reached the gully and stepped into the frigid water, I felt it traverse my skin like a line of fire burning my nerves from toes to ankles to calves to thighs. I was heedless of my own pain even as the icy waters of the earth took my breath. When it reached over my hips and touched my abdomen, I shuddered with it—so cold that it felt like searing heat. I forced myself to duck the rest of the way under the surface, traversing for a moment from the world of sunlight and living wood to a world of ice and stillness and death.
From a fold of rippled stone along the edge of the pool I scooped a handful of fine white sand, the remnants of quartz pummeled by eons of the tumbling stream. I scrubbed my skin with it, something enough like soap to clean my body, rubbing some color back into my cold-grayed skin.
There was only so long I could stand the frigid bath before my body began to rebel, my muscles losing control and my teeth rattling. I ducked my head once more and scrubbed my scalp under the water before climbing out, shivering on the wet rocks.
I dried as I walked back to my home under the moonlight, warming enough that the shakes had stopped by the time I pushed the wooden door open and stepped inside. I didn’t even bother to eat. I was tired beyond any meaningful measure. I rolled myself in my blankets, exhausted.
And I dreamed.
It began in violence—a raging tumult of sound and light and fear. War. There was clashing and burning and screams of the dying, and in the center of it all, I walked.
I moved barefoot through the din, my mind turning from one scene of pain to another, trying to pick any detail from the morass of agony around me. The ground was churned to a welter of mud and blood and white-foamed water that thrashed at my feet in waves and swells—somehow I stood at a sea shore, though armies flailed around me.
Now and then as I walked I caught a glimpse of the distant horizon through breaks in the melee. It was a startling sunset of orange and yellow, glowing like embers in the sky and fading to a darkness above streaked with luminous purples and blues. That sky caught my eyes and though I did not falter, I spared no thought to my footing. I was lost in the infinity of colors, and the pandemonium around me faded to silence.
When I brought my eyes back from the horizon, I felt small and vulnerable in that silence. The battle around me had diminished to nothing, and all I could see or hear or feel was the swells of the waves at my feet. They throbbed like a heartbeat, slowing and calming until they too were nearly still, only echoing distantly from the far shore. The light of the sunset dimmed and the sky above me settled into a deep oppressive darkness. It had weight. It pressed down on my shoulders like a reminder that I had more to do than simply bear witness to this end.
As the light faded, there was no sign of the great fray that had thrashed around me. I knew the ground should have been piled with the bodies of the slain, but there was nothing, not even bones. The mud I had trod was choked and smothered in the endless remains of all that I knew—it was a fine dust that had settled so thick upon the land that nothing could ever grow again.
