The Second Bell

by Gabriela Houston

  “How bad is it?” she asked. Her voice came out as a croak, no louder than a whisper.

  “Well, you’re not ready to go courting, but you’ll be just fine.” Dola smiled. “Are you strong enough to sit up?”

  Salka nodded without much conviction. She grabbed Dola’s outstretched hand and gasped. The skin on her arm hung loose, with barely enough muscle left to wrap her fingers around Dola’s hand. Instinctively, Salka raised her other hand to her face.

  Dola grabbed it before Salka had the chance to investigate. “Don’t,” she said. “You need rest and food. And you’ll soon get back to normal, I promise. For now, those of us without a striga heart will freeze if we don’t find shelter.”

  Salka made an effort to sit up. Maladia, holding the two babies, was awake and smiled shyly.

  “Glad to see you’re well,” Salka said with a grunt, as Dola helped her stand up.

  Maladia looked down to the floor. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know how it happened. Our stigois touched and it seemed you healed me. I feel well now, whole… You saved me, Salka.”

  “But at a cost,” Dola said. “I swear, I could see your body waste away, like water pouring out of a cracked bucket. I wasn’t sure you’d make it down.”

  “Seems I have some learning left to do.” Salka tried to smile. The look of pity on Dola’s and Maladia’s faces told her the attempt was not successful.

  “The strigas spend so much energy suppressing their gifts, you are probably the most qualified to do the teaching right now,” Maladia said with a strained smile.

  “The babies! Look!” Salka pointed at the infants tied to Maladia’s chest. The boy’s stigoi was tightly wrapped around both of them.

  “They’ve been like that ever since I came down from the roof. He keeps them both warm.” Dola smiled. “Lean on me.”

  “Where are we going?” Salka asked.

  “The closest Dola is on the other side of all this…” Dola gestured at the water raging past them. “The striga village is flooded, and not safe for either of you in any case. There’s only one place we can go.”

  “Heyne Town,” Salka’s face fell.

  Dola nodded as Maladia brought the children closer to her chest.

  “The Heyne folk listen to the Dolas. I will protect you,” Dola said. Her voice sounded certain, but her hands shook.

  “I sure hope so. There is no hiding this.” Salka smiled, as her stigoi rose beside her, so that Salka could lean on it as well.

  CHAPTER 44

  The Heyne folk huddled by the walls of Torik’s house. They continued looking out towards the slopes of the Green Sister, where torchlights still bobbed at a distance.

  “They’re getting closer,” somebody in the crowd said. “They can’t go through the main road. Look there, they’re heading here!”

  “Dolas, do you think?” an old woman asked, her voice shaking.

  “Oh, I’m willing to bet somebody much more exciting than that…” Abrik winked at Miriat. She wanted to rip his face off.

  “Look, Torik and Aurek are coming. Torik, what news?”

  Miriat leaned in to hear what Torik had to say. He scanned the crowd until he locked eyes with her. His shoulders relaxed.

  “The water level is dropping but not fast enough. Anyone living on the west side of town below Gurov’s house will be lucky to have anything left of their home by the morning. The livestock is gone, save what managed to escape to higher ground.” There were groans from some townsfolk, as they looked at the devastation.

  “What about the mines?” a man in the crowd asked.

  “Well, I’m not going down there to investigate. It’s flooded, most like.” Aurek crouched down. “At least the rain has stopped now.”

  “In all my years here, we’ve never had flooding like this. Something off about it, make no mistake,” an aged man said from underneath the eaves of the house. Some folk mumbled an agreement.

  Though the door of Torik’s house was not locked, hardly anyone was inside. Not so much out of respect for Torik’s privacy as because they all felt compelled to watch as their lives were swept away. To look away would have felt almost disrespectful, like leaving the deathbed of a loved one.

  Hesitantly, Torik approached Miriat and sat next to her, leaning against the wall of the house they once shared.

  “I saw our daughter,” he said.

  Miriat looked at him wide-eyed.

  “Not now.” He raised his arms up. “Months back. At least, I think it was our daughter,” he said. “I recognized the cloak she wore.”

  Miriat pursed her lips and said nothing for a while. “She came here in the autumn. A silly childish adventure. I’m surprised you didn’t have her captured.”

  Torik tensed up his shoulders. Miriat watched him from under her eyelashes.

  But he only let out a sigh and hung his head. “I deserve that,” he said. “And who knows, maybe I would have, had I not recognized her.”

  They sat in silence for a moment, Miriat’s anger growing.

  “Did you know she uses her powers? I saw her. It was terrifying. She sucked all the warmth and life straight out of the air.” He shook his head. “If I’d told anybody they would have invaded your village, truce or not.”

  Miriat tensed. She didn’t know. How many secrets had her daughter kept from her? She wasn’t going to let Torik see it though. “So, she used her powers. And what terrible ill befell this place? Did she hurt someone?” she asked.

  Torik hesitated for a moment. “She healed a lamb, I think. It lay as if dead in her arms and then, as soon as she was finished, the animal started wriggling.”

  “Terrible dark powers indeed then!” Miriat scoffed. She turned her face away from Torik, so he wouldn’t see just how much his words had affected her.

  “Nobody should have the power to do that,” Torik said. “What if she meant for it to go the other way?”

  Miriat didn’t respond.

  “They’re coming up the hill!” Aurek called out. “They’re not ours and they don’t look like Dolas!”

  The whisper of strigas rolled through the assembled townsfolk. Such a thing was unimaginable.

  “They done it!” a young woman screamed. “Our town’s never been flooded! And now this?”

  “It’s an invasion!” someone else chimed in.

  Aurek noticed Miriat. His expression turned hard and he strode up to her. He reached out and grabbed her by the neck, lifting her up and slamming her against the wall of the house. Torik jumped up but was warned off by a look Aurek gave him. It was the first time the townsfolk really noticed Miriat’s presence, and those who knew her spread the whispered word.

  “Did you know? Are they coming for you? Did you make them destroy our town? Maybe you did it yourself?” Aurek grabbed the front of Miriat’s shirt and ripped it open.

  “Have you grown another heart while you were over there? Or has yours simply blackened?”

  “Cut her open and we will find out!” A short woman waddled up to Aurek, pulling a paring knife from the pocket of her apron.

  “No!” Torik punched Aurek, making him roll back into the dirt. Miriat fell to the ground, coughing. “Are you mad? It’s Miriat, for gods’ sake! There is not one ounce of magic in her! She wouldn’t hurt us!”

  “And why not? We threw her out, didn’t we? She whelped a monster and kept it! What does that say of her?”

  Torik took a step back, shielding Miriat. “It’s a flood, Aurek. We live in the mountains; floods and avalanches happen. The strigas have no cause to hurt us now. Miriat least of all.”

  “Why? Because she loves you so?” the woman who had given Aurek the knife jeered. “Because she loved her mother? She left you both for the sake of the two-hearted demon she spawned. The council lets the Dolas tell us how to go about our business and this is the result: the entire town’s underwater. My house is gone. Look at it. Look at what your bitch has brought onto us,” she spat. “Aurek knows his duty. As do we.” She made a sweeping gest
ure to include the gathered crowd. “Do you?”

  “I won’t let you hurt her,” Torik said.

  “Let?” Aurek said. He made a gesture and a couple of young men moved forward.

  Torik leaned backwards and whispered, “When they attack, you run.” She gave an almost imperceptible nod.

  The two men lunged at Torik, who punched the first in the jaw. The loud crack of bone breaking rang in Miriat’s ears as she ran.

  “She’s escaping!” somebody screamed. Miriat didn’t dare look back. She rolled and slid down the other side of the hill, ankle-deep in soft mud.

  “Got you!” Aurek’s hand closed around Miriat’s wrist. She turned and saw only madness in his eyes. Miriat spun around and bit his hand hard, till her mouth filled with the coppery taste of blood. Aurek screamed and slammed his other hand into Miriat’s head, making her reel back. She regained her balance and turned to run again. Aurek took out the small knife. “You’re not escaping from me tonight. Not after what you done.”

  “I didn’t do anything.” Miriat spat. Her chin was covered in Aurek’s blood, which speckled her chest where Aurek had torn her shirt open.

  “That what you think? It’s because of you Kristin’s dead.”

  Miriat’s face blanched. “I never hurt Kristin. It breaks my heart she’s gone but I had no part in it…”

  “She would have followed you,” Aurek said, his face red. “She saw you leave and thought she could do it too. She told me. She told me she wouldn’t give up the baby, stigoi or not.”

  He stared at her through the rain and the realization of what he meant dawned on Miriat.

  “Aurek… What have you done?”

  Aurek didn’t seem to hear her. “She asked me to go with her. Do you get that? Me! To leave our life here, my bakery, my trade. To live in poverty, hunger and squalor with the other monsters in the forest. And for what? That worm she pushed out of her body?”

  “You… You killed her…” Miriat said through gritted teeth. She felt a sudden urge to bite him again, wanted to tear his throat out.

  “No.” Aurek shook his head. As he talked he was edging closer to her. “Don’t you see? It was you. The stigoi had to go. Fallen into the well, nobody would care. But it was you, in her head. You made her follow it. She wanted to fish it out, to save it. She jumped right in. Kristin died because of you.”

  “Aurek?” A voice made Aurek spin around. A dozen or so stone-faced townsfolk stood a little above him.

  Aurek spun around. “She’s here, Tomlin! Get her, boys!”

  “I don’t think so, Aurek,” the man addressed as Tomlin said.

  Aurek twisted his face. He turned around and charged at Miriat, swinging wildly with the knife. He slashed her lightly across her exposed chest. She screamed and stepped away. Her foot slipped in the mud and she fell back, landing on the soft ground. Aurek jumped forward, losing his balance. Miriat kicked out with both her feet making him fly over her head and roll downhill till he landed face down in the mud.

  He lay there motionless. The townsfolk walked past Miriat, without as much as a glance in her direction. Tomlin grunted as he and another man rolled Aurek over.

  “Broke his neck,” Tomlin said. He stood up from the mud, with a strange expression on his face. “Leave him here for now. He don’t deserve no special attention. We can bury him once all is back to normal.”

  They all walked past Miriat, just as if she wasn’t there, heading back to the top of the hill. Tomlin paused for a moment, and without looking at her he tipped his hat, ever so slightly.

  She stood there, shivering as they left. She looked towards the mines in the distance. The river of mud separated her from the world and her daughter, both. She sat down on the ground and buried her face in her hands. Large hot tears poured between her fingers.

  She jumped up as someone sat heavily next to her. Torik looked at her sadly. “You never had cause to fear me in the past, lass, and you don’t have one now.” He rested his elbows on his bent knees and looked eastward.

  Miriat stood there watching the swelling bruise under his eye and his split lip and felt a moment of sympathy. Then she thought of Salka and looked away. “What are you doing here? You should go back to your people.”

  “You’re my people,” Torik said, shrugging his shoulders.

  Miriat growled, surprising herself at the sound. “Don’t presume.”

  “You’re right. I’m sorry.” He closed his eyes, looking for the right words, which never came easily to him. “I have no claim.”

  “Damn right you don’t,” she said, looking away.

  “In any case, the strigas are coming whether we wish them to or not. And the question is, do you want to be here when they arrive?” he asked. “I will abide by whatever you say.”

  “Oh, will you?” Miriat looked at him properly for the first time. His once black hair was greying at the temples. His muscles were hardened from years of hard labor and his face was lined from the harsh mountain sun. He looked tired and resigned.

  The old Miriat would have wrapped her arms around his neck and tried to comfort him. But that Miriat was gone, she reminded herself. So she just looked away and sat back down in silence.

  “I’m not the same as I was, Miriat. I have regrets,” he said. “But you know, you never actually asked me, back then, to come with you. Ever since you give birth to her, it was you and her against everyone else. And you counted me among them.” He gestured at the townsfolk up on the hill.

  “Should I have asked? You wanted me to beg you to come with me?” Miriat stood up and tied a knot with the torn shirt ends to cover herself. She caught Torik looking at her. He blushed and turned away.

  “I have no time for whatever is to come. I need to find my daughter,” she said.

  “I’ll come with you.” He raised his hands quickly. “I owe you that much. But we will leave in the morning. You stand a better chance of killing yourself than finding anyone in the dark. Let’s hope your daughter had sense enough to find shelter. But you must wait till the morning. You can stay in the house. I’ll make sure nobody bothers you.”

  She looked at him as if expecting a trick and then nodded reluctantly. “Will they let me go?” She pointed upwards, where the flood survivors stood.

  “After what Aurek did… nobody will have any appetite for more bloodshed.” He looked at Miriat strangely. “And I promise you if any blood is spilt tonight, it will not be yours.”

  He rose up and offered his hand to Miriat. She looked at it for a moment, then took it in her own.

  CHAPTER 45

  Salka stopped again, gasping for breath. The nightgown she wore was falling off her skeletal frame, and she shivered in the cold, in spite of her stigoi’s arm spread protectively over her shoulders. Maladia and Dola exchanged a worried look.

  “You must make an effort, pet. We have no water, no food. We need to find you a shelter. You need to rest, and you can’t do it here,” Dola said.

  “Leave me,” Salka croaked. She leaned against a tree. “I can’t walk anymore.”

  Maladia came up to her and took her by the shoulder. “You saved us all. More than once. You think I’m going to leave you here? I wouldn’t be able to look my babies in the face if I did. Now, lean on me.”

  “You’re carrying our children,” Dola said. “Don’t worry, I will carry her if I have to.”

  “But–”

  Dola snapped. “Enough! You can’t quieten your conscience by risking slipping and hurting the children you carry.” She wiped her sweaty forehead. She looked up and saw Maladia’s stricken expression so she added, more kindly, “We’re both responsible, but none’s more guilty than me. Let me carry the load.”

  Dola turned to Salka, and adjusted the drenched fabric on the girl’s shoulders, uncertain whether it would be better to remove it entirely or keep it on Salka in spite of the water dripping off its seams. She set on the latter. “Are you able to put your arms around my neck? I will hold your legs and you can travel on
my back, broad as it is.” She made an effort to smile, but none were fooled by it. “Can your stigoi help?”

  Salka nodded reluctantly. Even speaking seemed like terrible effort. Her stigoi spread out, growing legs like a spider, and moved to either side of Dola to help her carry Salka. Dola eyed the stigoi’s disconcerting form and was momentarily glad there was nobody around them to witness it. She felt unsettled not so much because of the shape, but by how much fainter the stigoi itself looked, almost transparent in places. She said nothing though. It would do nobody any good to think on what couldn’t be mended. It would take time and rest and food, and plenty of it, for Salka to survive this. And Dola had little confidence such luxuries were within their grasp.

  Still, she walked on, wishing her burden greater. She could feel every bone in Salka’s bony arms and legs, as the young girl barely had the strength to hold on. Dola listened intently to the raspy breath and willed herself to walk faster.

  They had left the forest now, and they stopped in horror at the sight of the devastated town in front of them.

  “Look! Over there!” Maladia pointed with her chin, both her hands holding the babies secure. “The lights!”

  “The strigas!” Dola said, her mouth open. “Alma must have not returned to them, or else she didn’t manage to reach the Dola elders!”

  Maladia looked at her in alarm. “What do we do? If they see Salka, they’ll kill her. They’ll kill me too if they get the chance.”

  Dola felt Salka’s stigoi wash away from her, her body feeling even colder once it left. “We’re dead if we stay here,” Dola said. “And I think the strigas will have other things on their minds right now.” She looked Maladia in the eyes. A thread of understanding ran between them. They turned towards the hill which was now the only passage through the town, and walked on, both with a stony expression on their faces.

  CHAPTER 46

  The Heyne townsfolk watched the strigas walking up the hill they stood on. They huddled together for comfort. Most of them had never seen a single striga out of its infancy, and to see a whole village of them put a face on their most ancient fear.