by Caroline Lea
Rósa sighs and lies down, but as she does so she hears a noise overhead. A definite creak, as if under the pressure of a soft-soled shoe. Rósa holds her breath, not daring to move or breathe. Another creak. She exhales unevenly and stuffs the blanket into her mouth.
There is the scratch of the lock, then footsteps coming down the ladder.
Rósa squeezes her eyes shut and holds her breath again. The person – whoever it is, if it is indeed a living person – is standing in the baðstofa. There is silence for the space of five thunderous heartbeats, then a gust of air as someone passes Rósa’s bed. The footsteps stop next to her head and Rósa attempts to exhale, to breathe evenly, to seem to be sleeping. After a moment, the figure continues into the kitchen and then out into the night.
Rósa lies rigid and counts the tug and push of each breath in her lungs. After fifty, she staggers upright, bolts into the kitchen and vomits into the cooling ashes of the hloðir.
She leans her head against the stone until her breathing steadies. Then she stumbles back into the baðstofa and lies down to wait for Jón. He does not come, and she squeezes her eyes shut and lies shaking, counting her heartbeats.
When Rósa finally opens her eyes, pale early-morning light is seeping through the gap between the sheepskin window and the horse-skin curtain. She must have slept, in spite of her terror, and now it is late. Jón will be furious. He must have come in at some point in the night – but when? Dry-mouthed, she remembers the footsteps overhead, the figure that had stood over her, the rush of air as someone – something – strode past her.
How can she ask Jón about it? She remembers the way his hands had clenched into fists the day before when she mentioned the loft. Or will he look at her with pity, as if she is a fanciful child?
She sits on the bed, pressing her palms against her closed eyes, then forces herself to stand, to breathe, to tug on her clothes, to walk into the kitchen.
Jón is at the bucket, splashing water from the pail over his face and arms. His unclothed chest and back are thatched with brown hair, like the pelt of an animal.
Rósa flushes and looks at the floor. ‘Forgive me,’ she croaks, ‘I must have overslept. I thought I heard . . .’ She raises her eyes, searching his face for any hint that the noises might have been his footsteps. That he might have been watching her while she slept.
His expression remains blank. ‘It is early still.’ There is no trace of the previous night’s irritation in his voice. But where had he slept? Not at the table? Mixed with her relief that he hasn’t touched her is the worry that perhaps there is something about her that he finds repellent.
Around his neck is a leather cord, holding a tiny ornament made of glass. It is similar to the glass woman he gave her, but is one of the saints, she thinks, like people of the Catholic faith used to wear. It is not the sort of ornament that a goði should have. Jón notices her staring and raises his eyebrows, as if in challenge. Rósa looks away.
He takes her hand, pulls her towards him and presses a kiss onto the corner of her mouth. She holds her breath and stands utterly still. His beard scratches her cheek; he smells of the mutton-fat soap.
‘I will finish the hayfield today. Bring dagverður at noon and we will eat together. You would like that, yes?’ He strokes her cheek.
Her skin itches. ‘Yes,’ she whispers.
‘You won’t need to feed Pétur.’
‘Oh?’
‘He left for the south before sunrise. I sent him with supplies for your mamma. There was no time for a letter, but he will tell her you are happy here.’
His words knock the breath from her, but she manages to murmur, ‘Thank you.’
Perhaps she could pass a letter to a merchant, travelling south. Again, the longing strikes her to climb aboard a trader’s cart and journey back to Skálholt.
Jón reaches out, puts two fingers under her chin so that she has to look him in the eye. There is an odd intimacy in his work-roughened fisherman-farmer’s fingers so close to her throat. There is possessiveness too: he studies her face, then his gaze travels down her body. She quivers like a rabbit, stripped of her skin. She waits for his hand to move down to her breast or to encircle her throat. He sighs and his fingers trace a burning path down to the hollow at the base of her neck, where her pulse frantically flutters.
Thoughts of fleeing dissolve under his touch. He would hunt her down and haul her back.
He smiles. His teeth are large. ‘It must seem so strange. I know that. But you will be happy here. The Bible tells me to honour you. And what does it say wives should do, Rósa?’
‘Obey,’ she whispers, thinking, What about love?
‘And you are obedient.’
She forces herself to nod – a tiny inclination of her head, which increases the pressure of his fingers under her chin.
‘Tell me you are happy, Rósa.’ He is steely-eyed, unsmiling.
‘I am . . . happy,’ she mutters.
He runs his thumb over her bottom lip, then lets his hand drop. ‘You will be a good wife.’
The door bangs as he leaves, and the croft slumps into a pensive silence.
Rósa stands shaking. It must have been Pétur she heard last night, in the loft room – perhaps he was fetching papers for the journey south. But why would he stand over her, watching her? She turns to the ladder, but she cannot make herself climb into the gaping mouth of the darkness above.
Instead, she finds the mutton-fat soap and scrubs the table. She sweeps the floors. She rubs whale oil into the wooden doors and rafters until they gleam; she washes and scrubs and sweeps until not a speck of farm dust remains in the croft. Then she finds the rye flour and makes more bread. Pétur must have slaughtered a lamb before he left: the legs hang from the rafters in the storeroom. They are dry now, but there are dark pools on the straw where they have dripped blood.
She will make a lifrarpylsa for Jón. She chops the liver, mixes it with oatmeal and stuffs the mixture into the stomach sack of the lamb. Then she boils some water and drops in the lifrarpylsa, where it bobs and bubbles until nearly noon, filling the croft with the bitter smell of cooking offal. Throughout it all, she hums, to cover any other noise – real or imaginary.
When she takes the lifrarpylsa to Jón, he exclaims in wonder and devours it, wiping the fatty juices from his beard with his sleeve. When he smiles at her like this, it is hard to imagine the man whose presence feels like iron bars encircling her. Perhaps she has imagined all of his threats – or perhaps his words have been kind all along, and she has twisted them somehow into something menacing.
But sometimes she will look up and see her husband watching her, and something in his expression makes her want to wrap her arms around her belly.
Still, he has not lain with her, has barely touched her. At night, he leaves the croft and walks down the path to the barn. Rósa lies alone in the dark. When she closes her eyes, she imagines she may be invisible, as if she is slowly being rubbed into translucency.
The more time she spends around this huge stranger, the more distant Jón seems. When he walks past her in the croft, she shrinks into herself, flinching from his animal heat. One morning he notices, then takes her hand, uncurls her clenched fist and presses his lips to her open palm. It is a gesture of such intimacy and tenderness that it takes her breath away. He smiles at her, then walks outside and up to the fields, leaving her standing in the doorway, staring after him. She almost calls him back, but the words die on her lips.
On the third morning of Pétur’s absence, she waits until Jón has gone to the fields, then runs down the hill to the village.
The crofts are larger than those in Skálholt, and dug into the hillside, so it seems they are hiding. She pauses, before walking among them, then takes a breath and fixes a smile on her face. These are her husband’s people: she must impress them, and then Jón will see that he need not keep her away from them. She glances back up the hill, towards the fields, but he is out of sight and the swell of fear in her ch
est subsides a little.
The first croft she comes to is silent, the door ajar. She peers inside. In Skálholt, it would not have been unusual for strangers – travelling merchants or pilgrims visiting the church – to call at some of the crofts, but Rósa reminds herself that she doesn’t know the customs here. She is wavering on the doorstep when there is a cry from behind her.
‘You!’
She whirls around to see a huge man, even bigger than Jón. His face is red and fleshy, his eyes tiny gimlets.
‘You’re the new one,’ he growls, folding arms like mutton shanks across his broad chest.
‘I . . .’ She takes a step backwards. ‘Do you live here? Forgive me, I was –’
‘Prying,’ interrupts the man, sourly. ‘Like the last one. And look where that got her.’
‘I meant no harm.’
‘So she said. Didn’t stop the sickness, though, did it?’
‘Olaf! Leave her be.’ Katrín is suddenly between them. She puts her hands on her hips and scowls at Olaf, who glowers back at her.
‘Is this the courtesy you show to our goði’s wife?’ demands Katrín. ‘What will Jón say when he learns you’ve been threatening her?’
‘Not threatening,’ mumbles Olaf. ‘She was poking about in my croft and –’
‘I’ll remember that,’ snaps Katrín, ‘next time you want chickweed for blisters and I find you poking about in my croft. Come, Rósa.’
Katrín takes her arm, and Rósa leans into her as they walk away.
‘Thank you. I –’
‘Does Jón know you are here?’ Katrín’s eyes are wide.
‘No, he is in the field. I –’
‘Then you must go back to the croft. Now!’
‘But I thought I might visit –’
Katrín places her hands on Rósa’s shoulders. ‘Come to me some other time. Now you must go.’
‘But I –’
‘Look, people are talking. What if they tell Jón you were here?’
Rósa looks over Katrín’s shoulder and sees a small crowd gathering. They whisper to each other. Someone laughs: a harsh sound, like shattering glass.
‘Go now,’ Katrín says urgently. ‘I will talk to them, try to keep them quiet this time. But you must be more careful. Go!’
Katrín pushes her away, and Rósa stumbles as she runs up the hill, breath tight in her chest, skin tingling with the sensation of being watched.
Halfway up the hill, she stops and bends double, trying not to sob. She dare not turn to see if the villagers are still watching her. She can picture their hard-eyed stares – the same look Olaf had worn when he talked about sickness. But the expression on every face hadn’t been of hatred: it had been of revulsion and fear, as if she were some venomous snake that had been placed in their midst.
She has to force her legs to move, has to force herself to return to the darkness of the croft. And she cannot make herself venture further than the kitchen. She huddles next to the hloðir, drawing breath after shuddering breath deep into her lungs.
Outside, the wind moans. Overhead, the boards creak and sigh. Rósa presses her hands over her ears.
By the time Jón returns, later that day, she has compelled herself to stand and to prepare the food. She can barely look at him, and waits for him to accuse her of disobedience, waits for him to say that he knows she has been to the village. But Katrín must have kept the villagers silent, because Jón says nothing to her, other than speaking of the hay and the sheep.
At night, the croft exhales: time is measured in silences. For five nights, Jón waits until she feigns sleep before he comes to bed, loose-limbed and sour-breathed with drink. She lies cold in the darkness, confused and frightened. When she falls asleep her body is curled into a ball; she wakes in the same position, her muscles aching from remaining still.
Does she repulse him? Is there something wrong with her face, her body, her smell? She fears his touch, but she cannot stand this strange isolation. She feels like the hard, transparent ornament that hangs around her neck.
Perhaps he is nervous of her, although why, she cannot think – he has been married before, after all. Or does he think that she does not desire him? Does he wait for some sign from her? Her thoughts hum in the darkness as he snores next to her. On the fifth night, she turns to him in bed.
‘Mamma knew a woman in Skálholt. She was married, but had no children.’
‘Did she not?’ The drink has made his voice slack.
‘No, she . . .’ Rósa bites her lip. ‘She thought it a sin to . . . lie with her husband.’
‘She did?’ Jón’s words are sharper. He is suddenly alert. ‘The Bible tells us lust is a sin.’
‘But,’ she swallows, ‘did not Adam ask God to create Eve as . . . as a companion?’
Tentatively, Rósa reaches for his hand and lays it on her cheek. There is a catch in his breath as he touches her. She presses her lips to his palm; he moves his hand, slowly onto her shoulder, then to her breast. Something inside her shrinks from his touch, which is cautious and tickles unpleasantly. She forces herself not to cringe as he moves his hand to her stomach, then under her shift.
He kisses her. His mouth, large and wet. His lips, rubbery and slack. The drink is sour on his breath. His eyes are tightly shut. He kisses her harder and rolls on top of her, hitching her shift up over her hips. He is heavy. Rósa pushes against him so that she can breathe. He uses his legs to prise hers apart.
It stings when he enters her. She gasps and clamps her jaws. His movements are violent; she closes her eyes and counts in her head. The cold glass figurine on the cord about his neck taps repeatedly on her chin. But after a little shaking and grunting and shuddering – his eyes closed, his face twisted, as if in agony – it is over. He rolls off her and, almost immediately, falls asleep.
She lies still, staring at the black shadows and the silver flood of moonlight. From between her legs, a tiny gush of fluid, like the contents of a handkerchief. She rolls away and it remains between them, the sludge of a contract signed with her blood. In the morning, she will strip the bed and soak and scrub the sheets in the stream.
But, in spite of the pain, she feels a swell of victory. Perhaps he will be kinder to her now; perhaps he will love her as a husband should, now that she truly belongs to him.
That night, Rósa dreams of Páll. His body is on top of hers, but she cannot feel anything. As he moves, she tries to kiss him, but her lips, too, are numb. She wraps herself around him, pulling him closer, but he fades away to air and she is left feeling hollow, like a discarded eggshell.
Rósa wakes early, in the mother-of-pearl half-light before dawn. The bed next to her is empty, as usual. She pads into the kitchen, pulling her shawl tight against the chill, a sting between her legs with every step. She doesn’t realize she has been holding her breath until she sees the empty kitchen: Jón has already left. She should make bread; she should burn the wool from the sheep’s head and put it in the whey. She should darn the socks he has laid over the stool, a gaping hole in one heel.
She slumps next to the hloðir and huddles close to the warmth. Then she takes the perfect, untouched glass woman from around her neck. The tiny, transparent face is so humble, so flawless. Was the figure based on a real woman, or did the man who had crafted it imagine this perfect creature?
Rósa sighs and shoves it into her pocket. She had hoped to feel something. Love? Contentment? Some new power over her husband? Instead, the transaction has made her feel small and soiled, like a spoon used to scoop the slippery innards from a dead animal.
Still, Jón is keeping Mamma and Páll alive. And he doesn’t beat her, hasn’t hurt her. Perhaps that is enough. Perhaps a contented marriage is only a matter of becoming resigned to the shape of one’s own discontent.
The nights fall into a pattern: Jón drinks enough to become slack-faced and smiling, his easy speech slightly slurred. When they go to bed, he sometimes falls straight to sleep, snoring. Those nights are better: his
face, as he sleeps, looks younger, more open. In the muted half-light, she sometimes thinks she might feel . . . something for him. A certain tenderness, brought on by proximity. And she feels safer on those nights and often falls asleep soon after him; she doesn’t listen, breathlessly, for sounds from the loft room.
But on the nights where he climbs atop her, his face is as blank and closed-off as the locked room above. He says nothing to her but, after he has finished, presses a kiss onto her cheek or her breast, then climbs off her and walks out into the night. Sometimes he returns in the early hours and slides in next to her, his skin cold and smelling of the sea, his breath sour with brennevín. On those nights, while he is gone, Rósa has to keep her pillow pressed over her ears to prevent herself hearing noises from the loft. Twice, she has fallen asleep, then woken to the stir of air as a body passed close to hers, walking out of the baðstofa. Once, she woke, her breath tight in her throat, certain that someone was standing over her, watching her. She clenched her jaw and lay absolutely still; she could feel the heat from a body close to hers; she could feel the rake of someone’s gaze on her face, her hands, her body. She didn’t move.
Eventually, she must have fallen asleep, and when she opened her eyes some time later, the croft was dark and silent.
She doesn’t tell Jón any of this. She doesn’t know which would be worse: his anger at her questions, or his contempt at her childish imaginings.
When Rósa gazes out at the sea, it no longer looks beautiful, like some escape to a distant land from the Sagas. Instead, it seems like an enclosing ring of iron.
Sometimes, while she is washing clothes at the stream, Rósa sees a distant figure, which might be Gudrun or Katrín or some other villager, watching from afar. Occasionally, they come closer and speak to her, but there is something skittish in their movements and expressions; their words are guarded.
Katrín had promised she would find a way for Rósa to visit her, hadn’t she? Or had Rósa dreamed that too? Increasingly, she finds herself scoured by the whirlwind of her thoughts and is no longer sure she can trust her own senses. She considers going down to the village again, but then she remembers Olaf’s snarling face and stands frozen in indecision on the hillside, gripping the runestone in her pocket so hard that her hand aches.