Black Forest

by Shane Lee

  The next morning, Monty beat the sun to Irisa and reported to the Judge right on time, prompting a smile from the man as he opened the door to his office.

  “Your punctuality is appreciated, Monty,” Judge Mullen said, handing him no fewer than five scrolls to sort in his messenger bag. “You are doing much better than our previous courier, already.”

  “Thank you, sir,” Monty responded, the compliment slightly soured in memory of Rodney Talhauer’s visage. He wondered, briefly, just how poor a job the man’s son had done, and what it would take to be released from the position even though your father was a town official.

  “Get on with it, now,” Judge Mullen said, starting to close his door as he spoke. “With the sending tonight, we both have a lot to take care of before we must depart.”

  Click. The door shut, and Monty stared at the blurry outline of his reflection in the glossy wood.

  The Judge wasn’t wrong. Five messages to start the day was heavy, and Monty knew there’d probably be twice as many once he returned. It would be busy, and he would have to be fast.

  The town pulsed in slow contrast to Monty’s pace through the streets. He noticed it as he moved through Irisa, saying hello to the more gregarious early risers, and watching the more tacit, sleepy folk open their shutters or pull in their wash. There was a pallor here. A sadness. Over the tops of all the other homes and buildings, the Kettle’s two-story loomed.

  So the word had spread. As it needed to, with the sending this evening. The turnout for Ma Kettle had been large, and Monty imagined the same would hold true for Audrey. But while people were somewhat prepared for Dorella’s passing, Audrey’s seemed to have left many villagers numb.

  People were muted and prickled by fear. In his goings, Monty heard plenty of conversations; talk of Audrey’s death and what caused it. Speculation that the rest of the Kettles might be falling off, one by one.

  “Whatcha think, boy?” a stable worker asked him of the last. The stocky man was chatting with two other workers on an east-side estate, leaning against a dirty shovel planted in the ground. “You seen any of it? Are we all dead men?”

  The workers laughed, and Monty joined in with a little chuckle of his own, though it lacked any mirth. The memory of Audrey rustling under the covers pulled any humor from the situation. The workers’ own laughter seemed a little strained, though, and they waited on Monty for an answer.

  “I didn’t see much,” Monty said, unsure if word of his presence at the rites was common knowledge. “The rest of the family seems fine. It’s just the grief.”

  “Aye.” The stable worker pulled the shovel from the ground. “Wish I had time to grieve.”

  Monty moved on until his bag was almost empty. He stopped for something quick to eat, a hot bun with gravy from the west corner baker, Bradley. Monty had known him for a while, and now he was seeing him more; perhaps that was why Bradley, too, brought up Audrey’s death.

  “Can’t believe it,” he said to Monty. “First the grandma, Ma Kettle herself, and now the daughter? Ya know...” Bradley lowered his voice down from his standard shout to simply indoor-speaking volume. “I think that Henry might’ve had something to do with it. Been talking to Joelle, she thought up the idea.”

  Monty managed to swallow his mouthful of hot food without choking. He didn’t want to talk about this, much less engage in rumors so ridiculous. Joelle was the baker’s assistant, fourteen years old, and all Monty knew about her was that she liked to whisper in anyone’s ear about anything.

  “That’s ridiculous,” he said, sounding just like his mother and not realizing it. “You can’t really believe that.”

  Bradley just shrugged, not at all deterred by Monty’s dismissal. “Marries into the Kettle family, then takes out the heirs? That happens all the time, don’t it?”

  “In stories, and the heirs are usually children, not the other way around.” Monty was quick to finish the last of his food and heft his bag over his shoulder again. “They got sick. That’s all.”

  “Maybe sick. Maybe...poisoned.”

  “I have to go, Bradley,” Monty said.

  He left, suddenly angry. He’d known the Kettles his whole life, and he’d been around two of their deaths, now. To hear Bradley talk that way, and knowing that both he and Joelle were probably saying the same thing to everyone who came to buy their bread...

  He clenched his fist. The Kettles didn’t deserve that. They’d been through enough as it was.

  Next time I hear someone say something like that, I’m putting a stop to it, Monty promised himself, letting his fingers relax before he reached into his bag for the final scroll. He had saved it for last because it was the delivery closest to the Commons, a trick he had picked up after the first day walking back across town with an empty bag.

  When it was done, he went and got some more.

  20

  The work took him till just before twilight, where Judge Mullen walked them both out of the Commons toward the sending grounds. The evening was chill, the diffused light of the setting sun clinging to the streets along with the shoes and boots of most of the village. Despite the crowd, the air was silent save for the scuffling of feet and an errant cough or child’s unintelligible voice lost among the legs. Judge Mullen steered the pair of them away from the crowd.

  Monty looked back over the swell of people walking north out of Irisa. “This might be everyone in the entire village,” he said, unaware he was saying it loud enough for the Judge to hear.

  “It might well be,” Mullen said, not bothering to follow Monty’s gaze. “The rumor mill has begun to grind, Monty. I am sure you witnessed it while you were out and about today.”

  “Rumors? I guess.”

  “Mm.” Judge Mullen had a book under his arm, as he always did when attending anything as a representative of the village. “Rumors and hearsay. Speculation. The dirty things that weave their way in and around a town and its people. Impossible to scrub out. They always linger, no matter how much effort you give.”

  Monty looked at the Judge to find Mullen’s eyes forward, locked and impassioned.

  “Rumors unsettle the populace, Monty. You’ll find that. The more time you spend above them, the easier it is to see the things that wind through their minds and mouths like poisonous snakes.”

  “I...see.”

  “You don’t.” Mullen looked to him, and his eyes seemed to glow in the faint light. “You don’t yet. Perhaps you never will, and you might count yourself lucky. Finding things out of your control...it is irritating.”

  Monty remained silent.

  “I have been hearing rumors all through the day. It does not matter if people are trying to keep them secret from me.” They stepped from the packed dirt of the village proper onto grass, moving into the field. “They say that the Kettles are diseased. That their sickness will spread through the town and kill each and every one of us. You have heard that rumor today, I’m sure.”

  “I guess I have, sir,” Monty said, wondering where in the crowd those stable workers were.

  “People want a look at the body,” Judge Mullen said, resuming his speech the moment Monty’s lips were closed. “Sickening, it truly is. They want to see what’s happened, see if it’s something they know. This crowd here, it’s even more than what Dorella had. You think all these people knew Audrey well?”

  “I—”

  “Vultures at best, that’s what we’re witness to.” Judge Mullen was looking away and forward, unblinking. He clenched his book with short, strong fingers. “That damned Tobias, he went and opened his mouth, I know it. After I told him...”

  “Did the doctor say something about Audrey?” Monty asked.

  Judge Mullen dismissed his inquiry with a wave of his free hand, sweeping the voluminous sleeve of his black robe. “I forbade him to see the body after what he spilled in my ears about Ma Kettle.”

  Mullen sighed, and then blinked once; twice; three times, rapidly. He gave a little shake of his head, and when h
e spoke again, his voice was calmer. Measured.

  “Monty,” he said, and now he did look at him. “I need your help to quell these rumors as best we can. For the people. I am certain that this is not a worry for the village, and everyone must understand that. The last thing we want is unrest and discontent. People often fall ill in winter, and if on every corner there is someone whispering about some kind of nonsense plague, the town will be in chaos.”

  He understood what the Judge was saying, and he imagined that rumors about murder and poisonings wouldn’t be any better. “I can help,” he told Mullen. “Anything I hear about that, I’ll put a stop to it.”

  “I appreciate your vigor,” Judge Mullen said, “but you are only one man, and the best thing is to spread the word by scroll. These next few days will be hectic. I will be writing many messages for you to carry.”

  They were at the site now. The pyre was in place, set up earlier in the day. Audrey’s body rested atop it, hidden in a simple casket reminiscent of her mother’s. The neatly-stacked pile of wood and branches was braced by a priest and three laborers whom Monty didn’t recognize.

  “I’ll need you overnight the next three days, I surmise,” Mullen said. “Starting tonight. Can you do that?”

  His mother wouldn’t be happy about it, but it had to be done. “I’ll be there.”

  “Good, good,” he said. “Go and find your family. I must begin the preparations.”

  Mullen broke off from their gait and to the pyre, approaching the priest and saying something Monty couldn’t hear.

  Moving past the pyre and continuing north, Monty set his sights on the dark horizon toward home, where his mother and sister would come from. He could have waited back at the gathering for them to arrive, but something made him restless. He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but wanted to move.

  In the gloom, he couldn’t make out his family until they were a hundred feet from him. Seeing his mother guide Terra along by the hand helped to dispel the unease that was clinging to him, and he hurried up to them with a suppressed smile. It was a solemn occasion, after all.

  “Hi, Monty,” Terra said, breaking free of Delila’s hand to run up to him.

  “Hi, Terra,” he responded in kind. He glanced up to his mother.

  “She knows about Audrey,” she said to him, reading his mind.

  Terra nodded. “It’s sad.”

  “It is,” Monty agreed.

  “But everyone’s here to see her to the beyond,” Delila said, holding out her hand again once Terra looked back.

  “I won’t get lost,” Terra said, putting her hands into the small pockets of her pants.

  Delila didn’t argue the claim, but gave Monty a look that read clearly as ‘keep an eye on her.’ The three of them began walking to the pyre, where the two torches that straddled the gathering blazed into existence.

  Monty decided to get it over with. “Judge Mullen needs me overnight the next few days.”

  Delila flinched, but she kept walking. Monty heard her exhale through her nose, a huff of hers that he always referred to as ‘dragon’s breath,’ because it generally preceded a roar.

  But she didn’t yell or raise her voice. She slowed her pace just a little and said, “Is that really necessary?”

  “There’s a lot going on,” Monty said. “He said he’s going to have a lot of work. He’s counting on me.”

  Delila looked back to Monty, then toward the crowd and the Judge. Her posture slumped, ever so slightly. “I won’t argue with you, Monty. But if I need to, I will make sure the Judge understands that it cannot be this way during the season.”

  “I’ll take care of that,” Monty said quickly. “And if you need me for anything, you can send for me.”

  She didn’t respond, and Monty accepted it. If she wanted to be mad, let her be mad.

  As they neared the site, the Judge’s voice carried back to them, growing clearer with each step forward as he addressed the gathering.

  Delila broke her silence. “We’re going to be close to the sending. We owe Audrey that, at least, after not being able to be there for her when Ma Kettle was sent.”

  Given the haunted visage Audrey had adorned that night, Monty thought it might have been best for neither Terra nor his mother to have seen her that way. But if she had been there to comfort her, would things have turned out differently? Would she have been stronger, able to fend off whatever combination of sickness and grief had sucked the life out of her body?

  If so, maybe Henry Kettle needed that now. Or the children.

  “We can be close,” Monty said, and it wasn’t long before they were near the crowd. It was easy to come to rest close to the sending site; as they approached from the north, they simply settled at the front of the swell. Monty noticed that Terra hadn’t taken his mother’s hand again, but she was just a bare inch or two from her legs.

  “...is a sacred rite bestowed to all…”

  Judge Mullen’s voice cast out over the crowd, repeating words they’d heard far too recently. Henry Kettle stood on small platform by the pyre, where he’d been at Ma Kettle’s sending, but with no wife before him now. Just him and their five children. The family shared the same haunted look their mother had worn, and Monty’s heart wrenched with pity. There had to be something that could be done for this family.

  “...sent by her husband, Henry. He will start the flame that will carry her beyond...”

  This was the part where Henry was to take the torch. As it was handed first to Judge Mullen, Monty felt a small hand slip into his. Terra. He looked down to her, but she wasn’t looking at him. Her eyes were straight ahead. A little river of warmth, of brotherly love, wound through him as he held her cold fingers.

  Judge Mullen held the torch out to Henry, saying something else that drifted past Monty’s ears. He watched Henry, close enough to see the emptiness in his features, just the same as yesterday when he’d been in their house.

  Henry lifted his arm for the torch—Mullen pushed it into his hand—and he dropped it on the stage. The crowd flinched as a whole, Monty included. It wasn’t dropped near enough to light the pyre; it simply rested on the platform, burning.

  Henry stared down at it like he was trying to read words in the fire. He made no motion to pick it up.

  Judge Mullen swiftly pulled the torch from the short wooden platform before it could catch light.

  Monty turned to his mother only to see her gone; she was walking up to the stage, not to Judge Mullen, but to Henry. She went up to the much taller man and rested a hand on his shoulder, saying something too quiet to be heard by anyone but the two of them and perhaps the more attentive of the Kettle children. Henry’s head swung to look at her in awkward, broad motion, and Delila’s eyes were sympathetic when they met his. The Kettle father nodded, and Delila turned to the Judge, holding out her hand.

  “If I may, Judge,” Delila said.

  Judge Mullen nodded. He handed the torch to her and stepped back off the stage, the Kettle family following shortly after.

  Once they were all clear, Delila set the torch down at the foot of Audrey’s pyre. She moved back gracefully as the kindling caught, crackling and popping, before the fire swept upward, engulfing the pile and Audrey’s casket and billowing out a cloud of heat to the villagers.

  The black air above the flames swirled in invisible torment.

  Delila raised her arm, shielding herself from the brightness of the blaze and the swelling heat. She stepped backwards, faltering. Monty moved forward, stepping quickly to catch her, but she regained her balance and made it safely off of the platform. Terra’s hand was still enclosed in his own.

  Their mother rejoined them at the crest of the gathering, and the town of Irisa watched Audrey Kettle burn.

  21

  The day after the burning was the first time Monty felt afraid of Judge Mullen.

  Once the sending was over, he and his family had parted ways; Delila and Terra headed home, and Monty went back to Irisa with the res
t of the villagers to spend the night in his quarters. His mother had wished him well, but she had seemed distracted and far away. He knew she’d need some time to feel all right about the courier job, and two days wasn’t enough, especially with him being gone this much.

  He had slept through the night without incident; no ghosts or visions.

  The next day had started off well, with Monty grabbing his usual morning quarry from Judge Mullen and greeting the sun as it swept over Irisa. The town was lethargic. People were sleepy, and everyone seemed drained after the sending. Even the sunlight was weak through the clouds.

  Henry Kettle’s stony silence—during and after the sending, while his children wept—settled like a weight on the villagers, and no one was in the mood for talking.

  As a result, Monty’s deliveries went quicker than usual, though they left him with a somber reminder of the past evening’s events. The pallor of Audrey’s passing was uniform among the people of Irisa, save for the Judge.

  Mullen was not morose today. The man was furious.

  He had seemed fine in the morning when Monty was filling his bag with scrolls, but when it came time to replenish his load, what answered the door was an entirely different man.

  Monty knocked on the Judge’s office door, his first round of deliveries done. He was sure the Judge would be pleased with how the morning had gone.

  The door ripped away from his knuckles shortly after his last knock. It was such a sudden and violent motion that Monty fell back a half-step. The Judge stood in the opening. His face was not the visage of kindness and patience it normally was; veins throbbed underneath the sweep of his gray hair. The color in his face was harsh and loud, enough that Monty thought he would feel the heat from it, were he a few inches closer.

  “What in the blazes took you so long?” Judge Mullen snarled.

  Monty’s jaw dropped, and he struggled to find a response. He held his bag with one hand, raising it slightly, as though it would answer the Judge’s question.