The Witches’ Kitchen

by Cecelia Holland

  He said, “What is it?” Fifty yards away, in the sunlight, Euan came up the rise toward him, his hands loose at his sides.

  Mav gave Corban a single intense look and thrust her arm out, pointing to the far shore, then fixed her gaze there again. Corban went on toward Euan. He stopped, in the warmth of the sunlight, and looked down toward the shore again. Those running, shouting men were certainly making for Tisconum’s village.

  He wheeled toward Euan. “Where are the others? Call them—have them bring their bows—”

  “What?” Euan said. “They have turned aside, look.” He pointed out over the narrow neck of the water. “They are no harm, after all.”

  “Get your men!” Corban ran on, down toward his house. cupped in the rise of the land and the sheer of the rock. He had nothing to fight with save his axe, and he plucked it out of the stump by the front door and went back, down the slope, toward the shore.

  Across the narrow water the running pack had gone out of sight, into the woods, but now suddenly from that distance, from the thick green of the trees, a great many-voiced howl went up, like a smoke of fearful noise.

  He had to cross the water. He thought of the hide boat, over in the cove. Euan’s men were still gone, off hunting, Euan himself stood on the rise above him and watched and did nothing. Then, around the lower point of the cove, the red and white sail burst into view, fat with the wind.

  He yelled. Carrying the axe on his shoulder, he rushed out into the water, out into the current, and waved his free arm. On the little ship his boys had seen him. Running before the afternoon wind, the red-streaked sail swelled toward him. They had no weapons. The oars. He waved his arm, shouting to them, and the ship veered toward him.

  Raef saw, first, not his uncle wading out from the island, but a little plume of dark smoke poking up into the sky, beyond the first trees on the mainland side of the water. Then Conn yelled, and he jerked his gaze around and saw Corban there, to his waist in the swift moving current, his mouth open shouting, and the axe on his shoulder.

  Raef gave a great shiver, as if he were putting on another skin. Half sick, he looked back toward the smoke, wondering what was happening; the smoke was billowing up, much more now, thick and black and swollen. Behind him Conn shouted again, sharper, and he reached out for the sail’s foot and pulled it back, and the ship slid softly over to meet Corban.

  His uncle hauled himself up over the gunwale. He was speaking even before he was aboard. “We have to get to Tisconum’s village—someone is attacking him.” He went to the stern, with Conn scrambling out of his way, and took the steerboard and laid it over. “Row. The wind’s foul.”

  Conn and Raef pulled out the oars; the sail slatted against the mast. The sting of hot smoke itching in his nose, Raef brought his oar across the gunwale and bent his back down to the rowing. He had a sudden sense of distance from what went on around him, as if the space around him bulged, separating him from everything else. When the hull grated in on the pebbles of the beach, embers were drifting down like black snow falling, hissing when they struck the water.

  Raef’s hands and feet felt swollen. His head was throbbing. The world around him seemed to be falling to pieces. Everything was happening at once. Somehow they were on the shore now. Corban thrust his oar into his hands and pushed him along, back through the soggy marsh, into the trees. He fought the awkward weight of the oar, trying to carry it over his shoulder, but the trees kept hitting it with their branches. He heard Conn behind him calling sharp questions, and Corban answering, but Rad made no sense of it; he wondered how they could talk when around them everything was crumbling apart.

  They burst out of the trees toward the blazing village, and it was as if the light and heat filled up his eyes and there was just too much to see. The horrible noise of the fire rumbled in his ears, and his throat ached with the smoke. People were suddenly running toward him, screaming, wild-eyed. He gripped his oar with both hands. Should he hit them, should he attack them? Corban grabbed him by the arm and pulled him forward, in among burning heaps of coals that gave off buffets of heat, where hidden in the glare men fought like shadows in the rolling smoke. His eyes felt boiled. Then before him Corban reared back, the axe-whirled above his head, his body twisted to swing.

  Suddenly a naked brown chest rose up right between them, a head of flopping hair. Raef flailed wildly with the oar. The wood shivered in his hands, striking something, too twitchy to keep hold of, and he dropped it. Empty-handed he goggled around him. The wild swirl of the burning light made everything blend together, a churning of bodies, a cauldron. He snatched up the oar again and swung it around him, trying to keep all the whirling colors away from him. Before him he saw Corban, fighting axe against club with a bigger man whose face and chest were streaked with white.

  Then Conn rushed up beside him, and in Raef’s mind suddenly an order appeared, of himself, Conn, and Corban, where he stood at one point, and they at two others. Abruptly everything seemed easy, even with the whole world spinning wildly around him; now nobody could come at him from behind, and when a man rushed at him from the front Raef jabbed the oar into his belly, and knocked him flat. Then behind him somebody screamed, and he spun around, to see Corban ducking under a sweep, of the club, and rising to chop the white-streaked man off at the waist with the axe.

  A great screech went up from the men they were fighting. Raef felt them flinch back, their voices keen with fear, higher, edged with a strident restlessness, falling away. Corban rushed forward, and Raef knew to keep with him, at his point of the three-pointed figure. Still the spinning colors and sounds around him drowned him, fragmented, terrifying. His belly felt sick. He stepped on something soft and his guts heaved.

  Before him was a soothing darkness. They were among trees now more than people. The smoke stung his eyes. He gasped for breath, hearing the fading yells and screams ahead of them, disappearing into the forest. He dropped the oar again. Corban stood before him, his mouth open, breathing hard. The older man turned; his gaze ran slippery over Raef.

  “You’re all right?”

  Raef opened his mouth; no words would come out. His uncle smiled at him, and bent and picked up the oar and put it back into his hands. Palming the boy’s shoulder, he nudged him softly back.

  “Go. It’s over. They’ve gone.” His hand rested gently on Raef’s shoulder.

  Raef turned, his legs shaking. Conn came up beside him and slung one arm around him.

  “We fought a battle! Do you realize that? We have fought in a battle together!” Conn yelled. His eyes glittered; he was smiling. He held up something in his other hand, a long stout painted stick, curved at one end; the curve like a fist of wood held a round stone. “See what I won? Ulf and the others are just getting here. They missed it.”

  Raef blinked; a battle: He supposed that was what had happened. The club in Conn’s hand held his eyes, the curious carving and painting of it, the stone locked solidly in its grip. He heard a loud dansker voice, over across the ruins of the village, and Corban beside him shouted, “Ulf! Over here!”

  Raef took in a deep breath. He felt as if he had not breathed in days. Blinking, he looked around him, startled. The village was all burned, no houses left, only heaps of smoking charred ruins as high as Raef’s head. The light was bad—the sun was going down. All around, like tendrils of smoke, the wails of the people rose. Before him an old woman knelt above an outstretched body and struck it over and over with a stick, wailing and screaming. The deep orange light of the burning village flickered over her face.

  Corban stood before him; Raef moved closer to him, afraid, and suddenly Corban reached out his arm and gripped him tight. “You did a good job of it, Raef.”

  Raef said, “What—what—” He wondered what he had done. He remembered nothing. He wondered if he had killed anybody. The white-streaked body of the man Corban had killed lay just off to his right, in the red flickering light of a burning hut. As he watched, the villagers, weeping and screaming, gathered aro
und A and began to hack it to pieces. Raef’s belly jerked up into his throat.

  Corban said, “Oh, no.”

  From the darkness Tisconum walked toward them. The tall man held a body in his arms. Conn’s hold tightened on Raef’s arm. Tisconum’s face was slimed with tears. He walked up to Corban and held out the body in his arms, a boy, a boy that Raef had known, the long jawed scornful boy that Conn had beaten on the ocean shore. Raef sobbed; he broke away, running, heading for the woods, and in the shadowy dark and the broken brush he dropped to his knees and threw up.

  C H A P T E R S E V E N

  Lasicka wiped his hand over his face. Still dazed from that fighting, he was slumped against a tree, his throbbing leg stretched out before him; the other men stumbled in through the trees and sank down around him. He heard them moan in pain, he saw them clutching wounds, he smelled clotting blood. He smelled the sick sweat of frightened men. He gasped, his leg a fiery ache, and looked around him at the others, and his chest contracted at what he saw.

  Every one of them was hurt, one with an arm dangling, another gashed across the face, over there a man doubled up on the ground, knees to his chest, his breath slobbering through his lips. Mostly there were too few of them. Burns-His-Feet was dead, and Anatkwa, and three others, and these their living brothers had left them behind; their bodies lay in the hands of their enemies.

  Miska came in among them, with their packs and camp goods, and Epashti.

  Miska alone bore no wounds. Lasicka searched him with his gaze, amazed again at that. Miska had fought at the front of them, had taken and given more blows than anybody, yet he was untouched.

  The memory swamped Lasicka again. At first they had been winning, but then the whites had come, and more and more of them, as if they would never stop coming. Like a wave shoving them back, breaking them up and shoving them back. Lasicka had fallen, his leg crumpling, and Miska had hoisted him up on his shoulder and hauled him away. Even now, through the daze of his pain, he remembered that sure hard touch on him, Miska lifting him up.

  Epashti brought him some infusion of elderberries. Night was falling but there was no fire. In the damp gloom they huddled together on the floor of the forest like mice, afraid. The dark around him hummed with the whimpers of the other men. Some were hurt enough to die. Many might die. Lasicka himself could die, his leg a useless sack of flesh and bone. Epashti went tirelessly among them all, murmured gentle words and charms, gave them what she could, her hands a momentary comfort.

  Worse than hurting, worse than maybe dying, was that they had lost. Lasicka closed his eyes, heartsore. He wondered how they could even dare go back to their home. Everything in him was gone, hollowed out and eaten by their enemies. Burns-His- Feet. Anatkwa. His leg throbbed with overwhelming hurt; his mind throbbed, too hurt to think.

  Beside him, Miska said, “We have to get moving.”

  Lasicka’s head bobbled on his weakling’s neck. He felt the current of this carrying him away down into a deeper dark. “What’s the use?”

  Something struck him, hard. He lifted his head, amazed. This topless boy, this green shoot, had hit him. A spurt of outrage stiffened him He stared into Miska’s eyes, inches away. “Don’t you touch me, you whelp.”

  Miska smiled, his eyes unblinking, staring into Lasicka’s. “Remember last night? I told you the water was unpassable, and you hit me then. Remember? I’ll hit you more, if you quit. We are going home. Find something to lean on so you can walk.”

  “We can’t go home,” Lasicka said bitterly. “We lost.”

  This time he saw it corning, even in the dark, the hard slap toward his head; he ducked, but it hit him anyway. He gaped at Miska, who dared this.

  Looming over him, in the dark, Miska seemed much bigger. Unwounded. The whites could not hurt him. He said, “We haven’t lost. If you had listened to me we would not have lost. I will find some better way, and then we will win. But you must not give up now.”

  Lasicka laid one hand against his swollen leg. Everything had fallen apart, if this could happen. A topless boy, whom he had beaten yesterday, beat him today. He said, “Who are you to say this, Miska?”

  “When it happens,” Miska said, “you will know. Now, come on, help me, we have to get moving.”

  He went off through the dark. Lasicka saw him talking to Epashti, and soon the other men were up, complaining and whining, cursing Miska under their breaths. But they were all up, all moving. Going home. Lasicka hoisted himself onto his good leg and leaned against a tree. Going home. Carefully he edged his way on to the next tree.

  Ulf said, “You haven’t asked me, but as an old friend I think we all ought to get out of here, now.”

  “No,” Benna said.

  Corban turned toward her voice, and their eyes met. She sat small among all these strangers, penned up, her shoulders hunched, her mouth curled down. Beside her, Conn raised his head, and his voice rang out loud around the fire.

  “No! My mother is right. This is our land, and we won! We beat them. So we don’t leave.”

  Corban turned his gaze back to Ulf, across the fire from him. “You hear them.” He knew they had only begun this.

  The old sailor grunted. The firelight shadowed the deep prickled seams of his face. “I think you’re all mad.” He and most of his crew had come back from hunting with a fine deer, sometime before dark, and Benna had harried them on over the narrow water in the hide boat. Their sudden rush had broken the strangers, sent them scurrying away into the forest, leaving behind their dead. Corban locked his hands together; he had done death again, inescapable.

  Euan said, “Well, if you won’t leave, Corban, someone must go back to Jorvik and bring help.”

  Angry, Corban jerked his gaze toward him. Euan had not come across the water to fight; Euan did nothing but complain. “What help do you think you could raise, Euan? Who would come out here, to the edge of nowhere?”

  Euan leaned forward, his face like a wedge, forcing his purposes on. “For me, no one. But they would come for you.”

  “Pagh,” Corban said. “I don’t believe it.” He turned away, not liking where this was going.

  Ulf nodded solemnly at him. “Many a man would follow Corban Loosestrife, even all across the sea.” Behind him, his crewmen, listening, raised a general murmur of agreement.

  Away beyond his mother, Conn was watching his father with shining eyes. Corban lifted his hand up between them; he wanted nothing of that kind of look. He said, “I would sooner go back to Jorvik myself, with all my family, than bring such as Eric Bloodaxe here.”

  “Bloodaxe is dead.”

  “None of the Ericssons. Or Bluetooth. Is he not still the King of Denmark?”

  “No, not Bluetooth either,” Euan said. He sat motionless, canted forward, his hands on his knees, his eyes direct, his voice steady, even mild, a man who turned other men by his will, and not his strength of arm. “But there are still free men in Denmark. There’s Hakon of Lade. There’s Pahiatold.”

  Ulf burst out, “That’s the truth.” He turned around, looking over his shoulder, and his sailors nodded and muttered, excited. Corban lowered his hand to his side. Euan sat still a moment, letting them talk around him, building up a little wave of agreement. His gaze met Corban’s, and they stared at one another.

  Beyond Euan, Arre was looking somberly in another direction. Corban followed her gaze and saw Benna’s heart-shaped face there, pale as a moon.

  Off in the dark, suddenly, another voice rose, a sharp, alert bird-cry. Still under Corban’s gaze, Benna startled; she got to her feet. Corban stood up, turning toward the noise.

  Out of the darkness, Mav came walking, the firelight washing up over her as she approached, and by the hand she led Tisconum.

  A great shout of alarm went up from UIf’s men. Many of them reached for their weapons. Corban went quickly out to meet his sister and the native lord, calling, as he did, “Stay where you are. I know him, he is a friend.” He gave one quick look into Tisconum’s face, set a
nd hard, and turned to shield him from the others.

  Ulf and Euan had risen up to their feet; Ulf clutched a long knife. At Corban’s look he sank down at once on his heels. Euan sat back by the fire, and the sailors quieted behind them, and there was silence.

  Corban faced Tisconum. The other man looked all undone, his hair hanging ragged around his shoulders, his face smeared with mud. His sunken cheeks were seamed with bleeding scratches, as if he had torn himself with grief. He raised his hands and spoke in the language they had made between them, half words and half gesture.

  “You came to us. You came and fought for us. We thank you. If not for you they would have killed us all.”

  Corban glanced at the others of his camp, hunched around by the fire, every face turned on him, watching him. He wiped his hand over his mouth. To Tisconum, he said, “There are many dead. I am sorry.” He had no way to say that he thought he had brought it all down on them. “Was that your son?”

  “My sister’s son.” Tisconum’s eyes burned in the bloody ruin of his face. “The hope of all my people. He would have been headman after me. We all loved him.” He blinked. “We didn’t kill them all. Those others—they will come back.”

  “Who are they?”

  The other man’s face twisted, until in the firelight he seemed like a wild beast snarling. “They are the Wolves. They came from the west, not long ago, dragging their feet, their tails down, yes, they were running away from something when they came here, not so fine then, grateful for a little peace. Now they have licked their wounds and think themselves strong again, and they hate us, because we have the waterland, which is the best and richest country in the world.” He blinked at Corban, an eddy in the spill of words. “You know that. That’s why you came here to live. They want it, and they will come back again to try to take it from us.”

  Corban said, “Then we will fight them again. I’ll help you.”

  Tisconum lunged toward him, and by the fire everybody leapt forward; Corban thrust his arm out, holding them back. Tisconum lifted his two fists between them.