The Dragon & the Alpine Star

by Allison Norfolk

  Letter mailed, she made her way slowly home.

  She sent Signore Lynd to look for the reply a few weeks later, not trusting her ability to navigate the icy path any longer by that point. The first time there was nothing, but a week later, just as a storm was blowing up, he returned with a damp envelope safe in a coat pocket.

  Wilhelmina opened it and unfolded the contents carefully, comfortably ensconced in her usual seat by the fire. Even the children seemed lulled by the warmth, though they had been tormenting her all day with their dancing.

  Dear Signora Lynd, read the letter,

  Congratulations on your nuptials and the impending joy of the birth of your children. I will admit to you that our surprise at the contents of your letter was great. I will not dwell overmuch on Lord Montgomery’s consternation at your request, but I believe I have persuaded him to spare me in order to assist you. I agree that no one else is in a better position to do so. The distance presents some difficulty, especially in winter, but I believe that if I set out not far behind this reply I should be able to make it in time to attend you even if I am delayed or if your time is earlier than you expect. With twins, no matter how unusual, there is every possibility of this. But it is my hope to come to you as soon as it can be arranged, and I can be of some assistance to you in these final months.

  Sincerely,

  Lady Clara Montgomery

  “Well? What does she write?” asked Signore Lynd. Wilhelmina had been making some perfunctory efforts to teach him to read, but since the letter was in English even if his skills had been better he would not have had much success. Wilhelmina only read and spoke it, along with French, because Frau Heller had insisted she learn in order to read aloud letters from their fellow hedgewitches as the older woman’s eyesight for detail began to fail.

  “She says that she is coming, and that we can expect her soon unless she meets with some delay in the weather,” said Wilhelmina. Grunting a little, she heaved herself to her feet and immediately groaned as her weight settled. She felt at least as big as she’d been during her last weeks with Karl, and she supposedly still had months before the babies were ready to be born. It wasn’t as easy twenty years later to carry this much extra weight gained in such a short period, and it was only going to grow worse.

  “Sit down, and tell me what needs to be done,” Signore Lynd said, taking her elbow and guiding her back into the chair.

  Wilhelmina wanted to protest, but at least one of the babies chose that moment to start pummeling her spine, while the other tried to kick its way through the front. She sucked in her breath and settled back. “Very well.” She poked her belly. “You win, as you always seem to.” A strong poke back was her response.

  “What? Ah.” Signore Lynd realized she had not been addressing him with this last remark. He smiled and knelt down, putting his hands around her belly. “You behave, and mind your mother,” he said. His deep voice vibrated through her, as it often did, and she was certain the babies could hear it as well. The movement didn’t still, but it did grow quieter, even after he took his hands away.

  “Thank you.” She rubbed the bulge, and told herself it wasn’t to feel where his hands had been. “I should get you to do that more often. They have terrible notions about when it’s appropriate to be awake.”

  “I thought you were looking tired of late,” he said. “I can sleep in here, if you think that might help.”

  “I’m ready to try anything at this point. I have no idea if it will work.”

  “Anything I might do to help.” As he set about performing the tasks she set him to make a place ready for Clara, he asked, “How is it you know this dame? I do not remember if you ever said, only that you knew her through the war.”

  “Oh, that. I put a curse on her husband.”

  He stopped in midstride and turned to stare at her, raising his eyebrows.

  “It isn’t as bad as it sounds. Her husband, Lord Montgomery—though they weren’t married then—was the man who killed my Karl.”

  This time his eyes grew wide, and he put down the blankets he had been carrying and came over to sit on the floor beside her and stroke her hand. “I think now I understand.”

  “I found him, but as you know hedgewitches can’t cast spells in anger. I saw that he was suffering, his humanity dying as slow a death as gangrene, so I put a curse on him that the wounds Karl inflicted before he died would never heal until his killer found his heart again. It was a way of ensuring that he, at least, would kill no more mother’s sons and that some good might come out of Karl’s death. As it happened, he met and fell in love with a young nurse, together they broke the curse, and they are now lord and lady of their sweet little English manor. I visited them briefly and they seem very happy.”

  “And the lady nurse is a hedgewitch herself?”

  “Yes. Quite a splendid coincidence, isn’t it? In any case, she and I have kept up a correspondence—she doesn’t harbor anywhere near as much uneasiness about me as her husband. She also, dear lamb, became her district’s midwife after the war to continue putting the healing skills she gained on the battlefield to good use. So you see why she was the first person I thought of when I wondered who on earth might attend me when these two ruffians decide to put in their appearance.” She patted her belly with both hands for emphasis.

  “A combat nurse-midwife. Yes, that sounds just right.” Then he thought of something. “Does she speak any German?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “How are we to understand each other, if you are not around to translate?”

  “You are both intelligent people. You’ll figure it out,” Wilhelmina said, trying to sound confident. They would have to, if it came to it. She tried not to think about the time she’d spent insensate, during and after Karl’s birth.

  “At least I haven’t been growing more lizard-like, so we won’t shock her with two of us in the house when she arrives,” she said. She had been worried, after the hissing incident and her continuing fondness for barely-cooked meat, but no other symptoms of change had presented. Her mind in general seemed to be handling the idea of carrying a lizard-child well—it still didn’t feel too different from her first pregnancy other than her larger size—but she didn’t think she’d react well if she’d started bursting out in scales.

  He chuckled. “I don’t think I could take the competition. Raising our son will be challenging as it is.” He came over and kissed her temple.

  Her belly fluttered.

  Clara Montgomery arrived a week after the new year. She carried only a small bag, and had apparently located the cottage and made the trek up to it without incident. She was the same slight, brown-curled young woman with the shy, sparkling smile Wilhelmina remembered. She’d even dug out her old gray nurse’s uniform for the occasion, though it showed signs of strain at the midsection.

  “Oh, my dear, not you too! You should have said!” Wilhelmina exclaimed in genuine dismay, ushering her guest in rather than keep her standing out in the gently falling snow. “I am so sorry you felt it necessary to come so far in such a state. You should have refused me. I could have asked someone else.”

  “Yes, we will likely have to let out my clothes at some point during my stay. I am not so far along that I cannot travel, or assist you,” Clara said, laying hands on her own rounding belly, which looked in comparison like a foothill next to Wilhelmina’s mountain.

  “And there have been no signs of anything amiss so far,” the young nurse continued. “This will be our second, as you know, and I managed to get out of the house before David noticed. He will be terribly cross with me when I return, but by then it will be water under the bridge and all of us will be no worse off. And as you so aptly pointed out, I am uniquely qualified.

  “Besides,” she grinned as she hung up her coat, “how often does one in my profession get an opportunity like this? I hope you don’t mind if I take copious notes of your progression from here on, if only for my own private study later. I will swear wit
h a clear conscience to show them to no one, if you wish my discretion. But I couldn’t not come, if you take my meaning.”

  “We would be most grateful for complete privacy, thank you,” said Wilhelmina.

  “Of course,” said Clara. “Now, let’s get you sitting, and I’ll start some tea, and you can tell me all about it. Your letters didn’t contain anywhere enough detail to suit me. You look very well, by the way, for being eight months gone with twins, even more so given your age.”

  “I don’t feel it,” Wilhelmina grumbled, reaching around clumsily to rub her lower back.

  “Yes, and I don’t imagine it will grow any more pleasant from here,” said Clara sympathetically. “But we’ll do the best we can to make it bearable, and before you know it it will all be over.”

  “Do you say that to all your mothers? I recognize a line when I hear one, girl.”

  “It may be a line, but it doesn’t make it any less true. I will do my best for you, and we will get through.”

  “Brits,” Wilhelmina muttered, and Clara laughed.

  “We shine best in adversity, it’s true. Now, when do I get to meet this fellow of yours?”

  “He’s not my fellow, precisely. I wouldn’t presume to bind him. Ooh!” Wilhelmina winced at a particularly hard punch from one of the twins.

  Clara studied her intently with a delicate eyebrow quirked, but said nothing. While they had been talking she had indeed made tea, and she handed over Wilhelmina’s share. Wilhelmina took a deep, professional sniff through the nose.

  “Very nice. One of your blends?”

  Clara nodded with a blush at the praise. “I made it out of desperation when I was late with James and thought I was going to go out of my mind with anxiety. It’s made with expectant mothers in mind. You seem a little…tense.”

  “Is it any wonder?” Wilhelmina sipped, and felt the magic in the tea begin to relax her muscles one by one. “This might even keep the children quiet, for a little while. They’ve been resistant to anything I’ve tried, but that may be because the spells are mine.”

  “Really?” Clara pulled a notebook and pen from her bag, placed the book on the big kitchen table, and began scribbling like mad. “That’s an interesting theory. We may have to test that.”

  “I always knew I liked you.”

  Clara’s energy and enthusiasm were infectious, and Wilhelmina began to feel a bit more positive about the next two months. Clara really might be able to do as she said she would and lighten the proverbial load. They could even commiserate on the inconveniences of pregnancy.

  The door opened, and Signore Lynd stood silhouetted there, a large slab of goat meat in one hand and looking quite ferocious even though he was in human form. Clara turned, and Wilhelmina heard her stifle a gasp. But the younger woman put on a smile and said in heavily accented German that sounded like a recitation, “Hello, sir. I am Clara Montgomery. I am the nurse.”

  “Welcome, Lady Montgomery,” he replied in slow, careful German so that she could follow. “I am Markus Lynd.”

  “It is a pleasure to meet you.” Clara put out a hand to shake his free one, and got half her forearm engulfed as well for her trouble. She looked down, blinked, and then her mouth quirked in a more genuine smile.

  “I see there were quite a few details you left out of your letters,” she said over her shoulder to Wilhelmina once she had been released.

  “I didn’t think you’d be too discomfited. You get used to him, after awhile,” said Wilhelmina.

  “What did she say?” asked Signore Lynd.

  “She said you are bigger than she expected.”

  “She did not.” He smirked at her. “I may not speak English, but I caught enough in there that sounded like German to guess.”

  “Yes, you’ll figure out how to talk to each other without any help from me,” Wilhelmina sighed. “That may not be what she said, but it’s what she meant. The English and their refusal to come right out and say anything.” She rolled her eyes. All three of them laughed, even Clara who if she had not understood the last bit understood the tone.

  Chapter 16

  Winter 1921. Brig, Switzerland

  The next two months did indeed pass, though the swiftness seemed to come in fits and starts like the snowstorms outside. Some days dragged endlessly, with Wilhelmina increasingly trapped and uncomfortable as she continued to grow bigger, and then bigger still. Every time she would think her straining waistline couldn’t expand any more, the next day the children would have pressed her belly out just the littlest bit further as if proving her wrong. She wondered with sour humor whether she’d imagined ever having feet, and swore she would be much more sympathetic to her patients carrying multiple children for the rest of her life.

  To her great embarrassment, one frosty February morning she split the seams on the loosest dress she owned trying to tug it down. With Clara’s help she had to add panels to the sides and extensions to the front laces to fit into it. A week later they had to extend the laces a second time. Her skin itself cracked with the strain, though clever Clara had an ointment to ease the pain and itching, and purple stretch marks webbed their way over every part of her body she could still see.

  The only small bright side to this peculiar race for expansion was that the twins themselves out of necessity were much more subdued. She could still feel them poking at each other and at her, but the extreme liveliness they had exhibited in the middle months gave way to a more settled concentration on making the most out of the increasingly tight quarters. Growing seemed to occupy the majority of their time and attention.

  She began to have nightmares wherein she was a misshapen creature made of nothing but stomach, barely able to see over a grossly swollen belly. When she woke from these, groping at her stomach to make sure that it was not about to overwhelm her entirely, or gasping from a particularly hard poke from tiny fist—or tail, it was impossible to tell—Signore Lynd would patiently get up and either wake Clara, or make her Clara’s calming tea himself. He and Clara seemed to have some sort of understanding about this, and an unspoken schedule of whose ‘turn’ it might be to sit up with the sleepless Wilhelmina as neither of them ever seemed resentful at the disturbance. Their calm alternately annoyed and soothed her.

  Sometimes, it seemed she blinked and an entire week had gone by. She would have increased in size by the end of it, yes, but the days were full of talking hedgewitchery with Clara, or helping let out Clara’s things as her own pregnancy advanced (though of course not as spectacularly as Wilhelmina’s; it was difficult not to envy the nurse her sweet little bump at times), or having long, convoluted conversations with both Clara and Signore Lynd where she was caught in the middle as translator. On those weeks, she never had time to dwell on her inability to walk across the cottage without having to rest.

  Clara reacted with an appropriate amount of awe to Signore Lynd's lindworm form. Wilhelmina watched this exchange from the doorway of the cottage on a day when the snow was not too deep. Clara actually screamed with shock at the clap of air that accompanied his transformation, and then just stood staring with her mouth open for a full minute after that.

  “It really is a remarkable achievement,” she gushed once they were all back inside. “And you were both so brave to try an untested spell like that! I do not think I would have had the nerve.”

  Coming from someone else this might have sounded condescending, but Clara was so sweet and earnest in her diffident English way that it could not be taken as anything but a compliment. Clara was a talented hedgewitch in her own right, and impressive in Wilhelmina's opinion because she was for the most part self-taught. Clara's mother had died before she could teach her daughter anything but the basics of their craft, and having no one else to turn to Clara had managed her own education from there. It was just like her to be uncertain of her own ability when it came to magic.

  In her skills as a nurse and a midwife, however, she showed no doubt and no hesitation. She had a will of iron. She listene
d and took into account any aches and pains and real complaints Wilhelmina voiced and was the picture of sympathy, but she also had no patience for self-pity or evasion. In her more generous moments, Wilhelmina could see how this stalwart girl had won the heart even of a man tormented by shellshock and cursed to be in constant pain.

  The longed-for, dreaded day arrived only a little sooner than Wilhelmina had originally thought, in the third week of February. Since she didn’t remember any of her delivery of Karl, she only had her own experience as a midwife to go on for how she was supposed to feel.

  And she had Clara. She had grown used to the younger woman’s unobtrusive observation, and her periodic scribbling in her notebook. On this particular morning, she caught Clara scribbling frequently and watching her with more intensity than usual.

  “You think it might be today, don’t you?” she asked.

  “The signs are looking that way,” Clara replied placidly, still scribbling. “We’ll see whether our instincts are proven correct.”

  “The sooner, the better,” said Wilhelmina, fervency in every word, wrapping her arms as well as she was able around the bulge. “I don’t suppose you know of anything that might help things hurry along?”

  “I do, but you know it’s best to see if things will happen naturally before you start trying anything…unnatural,” said Clara, finally looking up and meeting Wilhelmina’s eyes with her understanding brown ones. “I would council you against trying, if you were considering it. I know you are terribly uncomfortable and it is difficult to wait now that the end is in sight, but you have endured this long. I know you can endure just a little longer.”

  “You know how I hate it when you talk sense,” grumbled Wilhelmina. She fought the growing urge to pace, which told her more than anything that labor was likely imminent.

  “I ought to, after this month and more. And yet you haven’t turned me into a goat yet, so I know you do not dislike it as much as you pretend,” smiled Clara. She patted the table next to her. “How about a game of cards? And perhaps some bread and butter. You will need the strength.”