Widow's Welcome

by D. K. Fields

  ‘Tie another branch,’ she said, without looking up.

  *

  He’d cut back a quarter of the trees when his mother called him for lunch. He tied his blades to the branch he was working and climbed down the ladder. There was no one else in the field, and a good many sintas still lay in the nets, waiting to be stowed in barrels. He wondered what his parents had been doing while he’d been in the trees. It couldn’t be that they were idling. Maybe Elin’s cough was bad, and his father had gone to the Wayward.

  When Ghen came to the house he saw that Aunt Sot’s cart was gone. He’d been so engrossed in what he was doing, he hadn’t noticed her leaving. It was always like that when he was using his hands. It didn’t matter if he was cutting back the old sinta wood or cleaning the sand from the mostins’ wings; it was the doing that mattered. The touch and the movement of it.

  The kitchen smelled of honeytons – his favourite cake, and one his mother only made for birthdays because the honey that set the cake was the expensive kind, from Hend’s hives.

  When he asked his mother why Sot had gone, she told him to sit down. She explained what was going to happen, and she did it quickly. In two days Sot would be back. She’d agreed to wait for him to finish the harvest before he joined her workshop.

  ‘Workshop?’ Ghen said.

  ‘She’ll teach you,’ his mother said.

  ‘Teach me what? What does she make, farm tools?’

  His mother hesitated and looked to his father standing by the stove, Lyra in the crook of his arm, Elin holding his hand. He pulled Lyra to him and buried his face in her hair.

  ‘Yes, in a way,’ Ghen’s mother said. ‘Sot makes Tillers.’

  Ghen didn’t know what that meant. The word sounded like someone who worked a field – who tilled the ground. That was a good thing, surely, for all that was to do with fields and yields and earning money from the crop was good. But how could Sot make people to work the fields? And the way his mother said the word made it sound like a bad thing. Like Tillers were dangerous. And yet he was going to work for Sot. Why were his parents sending him away?

  He was full of such questions but his parents had no answers for him. He didn’t want his bread and cheese, or the honeytons his mother pressed on him. He wanted to know what he’d done wrong to deserve being sent away.

  ‘Sot will explain,’ his mother said. ‘And you won’t be far away. Only over the hill and two lanes more.’

  His father made a noise that sounded like a sob, but one he caught before it could fully sound its pain. ‘I hope one day you can forgive—’

  ‘One day,’ his mother broke in, ‘you’ll understand why.’

  *

  He was relieved when lunch was over and he could return to work, hoping that once he was using his hands in the trees again he would be able to make sense of it. But as he untied his blades and scraped two fine slivers of old wood into the air, soft and light as mist, he wondered if it was his hands that were the problem. That was what Sot had been watching. Not the blades, not the wood, and not the tongut. She didn’t care about sintas. She cared about these Tillers, whatever they might be.

  As the light faded and he could no longer see the wood well enough to cut, he climbed down the ladder. He told his parents he was going to see Rit and Melle. They both nodded dumbly, and he had the feeling that if he’d told them he was going to chop down all the sinta trees in the field they would have let him. It had been the oddest day and he wondered if he had fallen asleep after his mother had taken the coins from him that morning, and was still asleep, surely, for nothing was right.

  Of the three farms, Ghen’s was furthest from the river. He came to Rit’s first, and found him sharpening a pair of blades in the barn. That Rit’s family had a barn had always impressed Ghen, but today he didn’t linger in the doorway to admire the tall stacks of hay, the rows and rows of shining blades and turnpokes. He needed to get to the river as soon as he could. They could talk safely there with only the Washerwoman to hear them.

  ‘But my dinner will be ready soon,’ Rit said. ‘Gresta pie.’ He hung up his blades and was making for the door.

  ‘Please, Rit. It’s important.’

  Ghen was surprised to hear the tremor in his voice. It had been threatening to come out since his parents had told him what was going to happen. Rit looked surprised too.

  ‘Have you got blight?’ he said in a whisper.

  Ghen shook his head. ‘It’s worse than that. Or I think it is. I don’t know. We’ll call for Melle on the way.’

  She was already halfway through her dinner when Ghen knocked, but one look at his face and she was out of the door before her parents could say a word.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ she said once they were on their way.

  Ghen shook his head. ‘At the river.’

  It was important to be away from the fields. He didn’t know why but that feeling was a strong one, and with so much he didn’t understand, he held fast to it.

  There would be no mostin hunting. Melle and Rit sat on the bank; he stood in the shallows, moving the water with the toe of his boot. They waited for him to speak; Melle with patience, Rit throwing stones into the water.

  ‘I found out what Sot does,’ Ghen said at last.

  Rit’s hand froze in mid-air, holding a stone. ‘It’s blending, isn’t it? I knew it.’

  ‘No. Not blending. She makes Tillers. My mother told me. She says I have to work for Sot.’

  ‘Oh Ghen,’ Melle whispered.

  ‘What is it? Do you know what they are?’ He splashed towards where she sat on the bank and was astonished to see her flinch from him.

  ‘Tillers are for burying people,’ Rit said.

  ‘Burying who?’ Ghen felt faint with panic as he pictured his parents lying dead in their beds.

  ‘Everyone,’ Melle said. ‘You’ve not been to a Last Planting, have you?’

  Ghen shook his head. ‘Mama wouldn’t let me go when Grandfather Lar passed. She said it would be too sad, but I think she just wanted me to stay at home with Elin.’

  Melle looked like she’d say more but instead she drew her knees to her chest and hugged them.

  Rit gave a low whistle. ‘So, Sot makes Tillers. No wonder she never came to visit.’

  ‘It’s bad, isn’t it?’ Ghen said. He was suddenly cold. Freezing cold, every inch of him.

  ‘It’s bad, all right,’ Rit said. ‘People like Sot make money from things that don’t grow – from dead wood. And they plant them, like they’re crops. But they’re not. Tillers are dead things, and if your hands touch them then you’re dead too. You’ll never make anything grow again.’

  ‘Well then, I won’t make Tillers,’ Ghen said. He sat next to Melle on the bank.

  ‘Don’t work for Sot,’ she said. ‘Run away, if you have to. You can live in our barn. I’ll bring you food. No one has to know, it’ll be a secret.’

  ‘A Tiller maker,’ Rit said. He threw his stone into the river, just where Ghen had been standing.

  ‘I won’t go,’ Ghen said to Melle. ‘Don’t worry. My parents can’t make me. Nothing has to change.’

  They were each silent then. The only sound was Rit throwing stones.

  When night fell, they stood to go home. Ghen wished for Melle’s hand for the walk back but she kept her hands in her pockets all the way.

  *

  When he woke the next morning, Ghen wondered if perhaps it had all been a dream and he’d have plenty to tell the Child. Everything in his room looked the same, and if nothing had changed in the world around him, how could it be true that he was leaving? There was his slingshot, there was the shell from Bordair that Melle had given him; at the thought of Melle keeping her hands in her pockets he pushed the blankets off. He had work to do.

  In the kitchen he found his father darning; Elin and Lyra played at his feet.

  ‘What about the sintas?’ Ghen said.

  His mother laid a pile of clothing on the arm of his father’s chair. ‘We’ll b
e out to join you as soon as we can.’

  ‘But what’s more important than collecting the fruit?’ he said.

  ‘We have to get your things ready,’ his father said. He bit off the thread he was using. A jagged line of large stitches ran across the knee of a pair of trousers, barely patching the tear. Ghen realised they were his own trousers. His father handed them to his mother, who laid them in an old sack, and then reached for a shirt from the pile. Ghen’s shirt.

  ‘So it’s true then,’ he said.

  ‘Of course it’s true,’ his mother snapped, her harshness making Lyra look up from her game. ‘Why wouldn’t it be?’

  ‘Because I don’t want it to be!’ Ghen shouted, and the tears came then. They ran down his face as thick as if the Wayward woman had painted his cheeks with fint.

  His father held him. When Ghen had sobbed himself to a kind of peace, he said softly, ‘There’s no other way. I see that now. You will too, in time.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ Ghen said.

  His mother eased him from his father’s arms and walked him to the door. ‘You’ll only be on the other side of the hill.’

  ‘Why? Tell me!’

  She was opening the door. ‘You go and start the cutting back. We’ll be out in no time. Take a honeyton with you.’

  ‘Because of Hend,’ his father whispered.

  *

  He would do as Melle said and run away. Once he was up the ladder and felt hidden by the leaves, he thought about how he would do it. But as soon as he began cutting back the old wood, such thoughts became less certain. At first, he listed the things he would take with him – the slingshot, socks, a knife good enough for the Partner – but then he only saw himself with a bag. And then the bag faded and there was only him walking, and then he wasn’t thinking of anything at all but the blades in his hands and the wood lifting, floating to the ground below, to lay wherever it wished. He couldn’t run away. The sintas needed to be cut back and tied off. The fruit had to be collected and barrelled, before it went bad, and he might have to do that himself. His parents had forgotten who they were, what had to be done. Ghen was the only true Lowlander left in the three fields he knew to be home. And so it was that he worked every waking hour up to the moment that Sot arrived to take him, thinking only of the land.

  *

  She came early. He heard a cart in the lane but waited for his mother to fetch him from his room. He knew it would be her and not his father, like he knew there was no point him running away. They would only find him, wherever he was, and give him to Sot anyway. And that was Hend’s doing. Hend’s fault, all this. Ghen got up and put Melle’s shell in his pocket.

  His mother didn’t knock. She opened the door quickly, and said just as quickly, ‘Time to go, Ghen,’ as if him leaving was a poultice that must be ripped off in one fast pull to avoid prolonging the pain. And she did feel pain, he could see it in her face, the way she wouldn’t look at him.

  The kitchen was empty. He could hear a cheery prattling coming from the porch: Sot. His father was there, holding the girls. He put them down to embrace Ghen, but Ghen felt himself to be as hard and unyielding as a holen root. His mother handed him a cloth bag.

  ‘The honeytons,’ she said. ‘I thought you’d like something from home to help you settle in.’

  He took the bag and managed to thank her. With one finger she swept the hair that was hanging over his eyes. When at last he was able to look at her, he saw that she, too, was crying, and a small part of him was glad, even as he was wretched beyond any wretchedness he thought could exist in the world.

  ‘Take care of him, Sot,’ his mother said, but she kept looking at Ghen as she spoke. ‘He’s a good boy.’

  ‘Mama…’ he said.

  She closed her eyes and stepped away from him.

  ‘It’s only for a little while, isn’t it?’ he said. ‘I’ll be back soon. Won’t I, Mama?’

  Elin pulled at her skirts, mewling, and his mother picked her up. She didn’t look at Ghen again.

  ‘It’s not like he’s dying!’ Sot said.

  His parents flinched and Sot threw up her hands.

  ‘Time we were going, Ghen,’ she said, setting off down the porch steps.

  She helped him climb into the cart and he was glad because his legs were shaking. All of him was shaking. Rit’s words were loud in his ears: you’ll never make anything grow again.

  Sot took up the reins. ‘Don’t look back,’ she murmured. ‘It won’t help.’ And the cart lurched forwards.

  He did as she said and kept his eyes on the lane, trying to memorise every stone, every tree. They were flashing by too quickly. He couldn’t catch them all. He was losing them. He craned his neck to see the broken cart wheel left long in the grass, and without meaning to his eyes sought the porch. It was empty. They hadn’t even waited until the cart was out of sight.

  At the bridge he asked Sot to stop.

  ‘We can’t go back,’ she said, but she stopped all the same. ‘Once you’re going forwards, better to keep it that way.’

  Ghen got to his feet but made no move to jump down. He picked up the cloth bag of honeytons and hurled it into the river. Let the Washerwoman have them.

  ‘Your mother always was a terrible baker.’

  He didn’t reply, just watched the bag flounder in the shallows. There wasn’t enough depth or current to take it from sight. He thought about finding a stone and throwing that at the bag, to at least cover it somehow, but Sot was waiting to cluck the horse on.

  The Wayward’s tent was in sight. He should go and see her, let her know he wouldn’t be able to bring her any more mostins. But then he remembered that she already knew.

  ‘I’m ready,’ he said.

  ‘Good boy.’ Sot flicked the reins, and they were on their way again.

  From the bridge the lane climbed and crested the hill, and then Sot had to press heavily on the foot brake when the cart raced down the other side. Over the hill and two lanes more: that was what Ghen thought of when anyone mentioned Sot, and now here he was, making the journey himself. The lanes were long and narrow, the surface thick with weeds. It clearly wasn’t a way many people travelled by cart.

  He caught a glimpse of red tiles among the green tree tops and presumed this was the workshop, though the trees screened the building beneath. Sot drew the cart to a halt and climbed out. Ghen followed her down a path. He wondered what kind of trees these were, standing so tall and so thick with blossom but barren of fruit. Then he saw a flash of orange on the ground a few feet ahead. He hurried over. It was as he thought: a sinta, but the fruit was small and shrivelled. Gnarled branches and fruitless blossom: two signs, he knew, of idleness. Rit had been right when he said Sot left land idle.

  Sot called him from further along the path and he ran to catch up, the ruined trees a dark canopy above him. They came to a square building with a porch. Sot climbed the steps and each one let out a terrible groan, the groans of people dying, Ghen thought. The fruitless sintas above watched him and he thought they might as well be dead too, the use they gave. Death was everywhere here and so he would be death too. He’d never make anything grow again.

  Sot held the door open for him. He climbed the groaning porch steps and his feet took him closer to the door, closer to the end.

  ‘Come on, there’s no need to be afraid,’ Sot said.

  He didn’t believe her but he forced himself to step inside. The walls were lined with shelves and on the shelves were—

  He closed his eyes. Sot squatted in front of him.

  ‘Now listen, Ghen, you need to forget all the nonsense you’ve heard about what we do here. Your parents, your friends – they need Tillers, and that means they need people to make them. We provide a service, that’s all. And an excellent one, at that. Now, open your eyes. You’re no good to me blind.’

  She moved to the centre of the room where there were several short wooden benches, each with a stool to accompany them. And on the benches were small set
s of blades. Without realising what he was doing, Ghen reached for the pair nearest him. They sat in his hands neatly, not as heavy as his sinta blades, the metal finer.

  ‘How do they feel?’ Sot said.

  He dropped the blades on the bench and stepped away.

  ‘I’m not staying,’ he said. ‘I don’t know why I’m here and I’m needed at home.’

  ‘You’re needed here, Ghen,’ she said, with gentleness.

  ‘I’ll help with your sinta trees and when they fruit again I’ll go home.’

  ‘The order list is full and there are only so many hours in the day. If we’re late with Tillers for one Last Planting then Canna will have the upper hand.’

  ‘You don’t understand, I have to grow things.’

  ‘Such crude Tillers that Canna’s workshop turns out,’ Sot muttered to herself. ‘Not that it can even be called a workshop. The work is clearly absent.’

  Despite himself, Ghen’s hands were once more straying to the blades on the bench. He wanted very much to use them, to feel he was doing something good again.

  ‘Those are mine,’ a voice said.

  Ghen dropped the blades a second time. A man was standing on the other side of the bench. A young man, with dark eyes and thin lips. The beginnings of a sandy beard coloured his cheeks but that was thin too. All of him was thin.

  ‘Ah, there you are,’ Sot said. ‘I was just giving the boy the tour, such as it is.’

  ‘Sounded to me like you were telling him about someone else’s workshop,’ the young man said, and he raised his eyebrows at Sot. ‘Someone you said you weren’t going to worry about anymore. Only this morning you said that.’

  Sot steered Ghen beyond the benches to the far end of the room. ‘Yes, well. The best intentions sometimes need time to action. This is Wyne, by the way.’

  ‘I’m sorry I touched your blades,’ Ghen said to Wyne.

  ‘Blades?’ Wyne frowned.

  ‘He means the rooters,’ Sot said, and then to Ghen: ‘Wyne’s been here so long he’s forgotten there are other words beside rooters and Tillers.’