by R D Blake
Ilena, still by habit, remained fully clothed even in the full heat of the summer though these climes were far more moderate than those of Torburg. Most days she thought little of her appearance despite the fact that her nails were now talons and her skin had thickened yet again and bore a light mottled yellow green tint in most places. Along the edge of her jaw line a fringe of hanging threads of skin dangled and her teeth now numbered only eight. Yet that was not all for her voice had dropped, grown raspy and hoarse: her singing more akin to that of the frogs in the ponds and marshes nearby. Yet Ilena found happiness in each day, accepting what fate and God had given her.
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The name of Marta brought warm, knowing smiles to the citizens of Gutenberg and its environs, and if truth be told, to other towns and villages miles away. For her work had not gone unnoticed and it seemed there were few who had not received some kindness from her hands over the last few years. But Marta still wished not for praise. Her attitude caused some unwanted trouble in the church, for the Earl of Westhaven had wished to have a fete for her to acknowledge her good works; but Marta had steadfastly refused, indignant to be considered for such a thing and had demanded that the money intended to be spent on such a frivolity be given instead to the poor and the needy. To add emphasis to her protest, she had locked herself away until her wishes had been meekly communicated by an unwilling bishop.
For her fame had spread and benefited the church to such a degree that the hierarchy chose not to press against her obstinacy, though the ambitious Earl of Westhaven did not enjoy the countenance of such disobedience; for the celebration had already been announced — though as an astute leader he knew when to bend and make it appear as if the idea had been his own and that he was in full agreement with it. But in truth he was not, and a select few knew of his private and personal feelings on the matter including his son, Connor. But there were other matters pressing on the Earl and his son: matters that included long made plans that were about to advanced along their logical path.
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Erick had thought the whole idea odd; but it was far better than sitting through more interminable meetings, trying to stay alert during the long droning monologues that could have been said in fewer than twenty words. How did anyone put up with it? This — this was far preferable. A week ago, a good number of his fellow nobles, including Teton, had left their home duchies to travel on horseback up into the wilderness fastnesses of these northern mountains with the stated purpose to hunt; but the game they chiefly pursued were those of chance played about the campfires.
Yet now he was out alone with Connor who had asked Erick to join in with him on a private hunt. “Those oafs are far too loud and careless. Let us go ourselves and show them what true hunters can accomplish,” Connor had whispered to him the night before while they had watched some of the others play at dice.
The two of them had left at dawn and spent the morning climbing higher into the mountains and had actually reached a height and were now descending, Erick imagined, to the beginnings of the lands to the north. Once along a high ridgeline they had glimpsed the end of the mountains far off in the rumpled distance though neither had been able to see the nature of the terrain beyond those last foothills, lost in a haze at the horizon’s edge. Thus far, they had only found signs of spoor days old and other animal tracks that disappeared far too soon. The heat of the day was increasing and both men and horses were sweating despite the altitude.
Connor led the way, and sooner than they thought, they came upon a broad river. A rumbling was heard from beyond its next bend. Here, they found the waters boiling over a high cliff down to a pool where the waters swirled and circled before they travelled onwards into the forest below them. “Let us rest here a while and refresh ourselves and break our fast for this morning and then I think, young Erick, we will return to the others as God grants His Grace to us.” There was a flash of something within Connor’s grey eyes, but Erick only thought the earl’s son was being overly familiar and pompous in his usual high fashion.
So they ate and drank, and watered and fed their horses, allowing them to roam about on long tethers while they sat in the shade of a large elm tree by the edge of the river. Some time later, Connor rose to his feet and waded out thigh deep into the water near the brink. “Careful, friend Connor, the Mark cannot afford to lose you,” Erick cautioned.
But the nobleman only smirked and laughed above the deep din of the waters. “Fear not, the Mark and the kingdom have greater needs. Come join me and prove that you are a man worthy of following.” Such strange words, but Connor had been peculiar all day, with his long glances and a glint that seemed full of darkness at times. Erick knew a dare when it was given and he understood Connor well enough that the man was not loath to put down those he considered cowards. Enough words had been spoken in that same vein over the last several days.
Erick judged the waters and nodded and came with care to stand with Connor above the cascade plummeting away from them only a few scant feet away. Being a lighter man than Connor made it more difficult for Erick to brace himself against the flow and it helped not at all that Connor slapped him on the back. “You are truly a man to follow,” he roared out. He then pointed out to where the pool below them flowed out and away. “I wonder where it goes from there. What mysteries might yet be discovered in this land?”
Erick made to answer with a light-hearted jibe, but Connor did not wait. “Why don’t you find out?” Suddenly, the cold edge of a knife slammed into his lower back. Erick grunted, bending over from the force of the blow and at the sharp rising pain, looking up in a surprised bewilderment at Connor. But the man only grinned wildly down at him, giving Erick a violent shove, sending him toppling over the falls.
The earl’s son chuckled louder as he waded out of the turbulent waters. “Fair travelling, my friend, but I will not follow where you are going now. Nor did I ever intend to. Not here in these wilds or within our realm. For only one can rule and that is the house of Westhaven.”
Then Connor began his true preparations to return to the hunting party. First, he killed Erick’s horse.
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Ilena was dancing among the seas of wild flowers, a garland wrapped about her hooded and covered head, her bare, horny feet sensing vaguely the softness of the earth beneath them. So she had danced and sang the day away and fully intended to continue. But off in the distance when she stopped to catch her breath, she spied a dark flock of birds racing toward her. And more were gathering with them rising up out of the meadowlands. It was different — strange. Ilena had a deepening presentment about it. They swooped down around her, chirping, singing and twittering, loudly imploring her. Then they swooped away and returned again above her head when she remained unmoving and then away again. Ilena knew from over the years she had been among them that these birds wished her to follow them. She did so but with a nervous feeling that their behaviour was an omen of change.
She moved cautiously, eventually with growing reluctance; but the birds darted several more times down upon her and a few, imprudently, flew up against her back, and other landed on her shoulders and pecked at her. Something they had never done before! What had happened that they needed her and that they were leading her to the forest? Once she was upon its vestiges, foxes, wolves and even that bear joined her and moved along beside with her. Ilena only wished to stop — to return — to hide within the ruins. What was up ahead? A forest denizen – hurt?—caught in some ancient trap or pit? What — what would drive them to act this way? Finally, they came to the edge of the river, and still they urged her on and then at last around a bend and down a slope to the waters themselves, she saw him!
Ilena stopped. Stopped and refused to move closer. Ready now to flee — to run back to the ruins of the fortress, pack up her few belongings and leave all this. But the bear and the wolves blocked her retreat and would not allow her to pass. They wanted her to approach this man, this human — but perhaps he was
dead already. A small hope rose slightly inside Ilena. But still she refused to move: her feet frozen, her heart unwilling to beat. She could not do this. She could not!
Yet the wolves pushed up against her, shoving her with their noses until she fell over. For the first time since she had come here, Ilena was cross with them and she slapped at the nearest animal as she rose to her feet. But the creature made no sound of remonstrance or of fear or of anger. There was only pleading for understanding in his dark eyes. The bear joined in, giving her another strong nudge with his shoulder into her back.
Ilena darted a glance back at the beady black eyes of the great beast and surrendered all of her protests. This creature would not countenance any other action but obedience. Amidst all her taut fears, Ilena took a quickening breath and approached the man lying prone, face up in the shallow water; his limbs sprawled out at the edge of the river bank. Hesitantly, cautiously, she knelt down on her knees in the water and leaned over him. Ignoring the bruises on his face and the tangle of matted hair, she concentrated on his chest. There was a slight movement there: a slow rise and fall below his tunic.
Placing the warty palm of her hand on his chest, Ilena sensed a slow, erratic heartbeat, detecting too a slight warmth rising up through his sodden clothing. Pulling back from the man, she surveyed more of him. His left arm was in an odd position. Ilena wondered if it was broken. Then she noted a line of red seeping out from underneath him — a long crimson finger following an eddy until it was lost and consumed in the greater part of the river.
How had he come to be here? What had brought him to this land? Or was he one of its inhabitants and were there more of them nearby or others who would soon be looking for him? Perhaps close by! That thought made Ilena rise to her feet more determined than ever to flee away — leave this man and her place of refuge. She could not be found. She could not!
But Ilena discovered her escape still blocked. And there more animals gathered about her now and even a few of the golden eagles had drifted down to survey her from the lower limbs of the great trees that bordered this river. Seldom did they visit and all of them, all the birds’, all of the animals’ eyes were upon her.
“I cannot! I cannot do what you ask!” she shouted out in her hoarse voice, its raspy tone rising above the babble of the river. “I cannot let him — let anyone look upon me.” Ilena tore off her mask. Something she seldom did, even in sleep and never outside. “Look at me! Look at me!” she wailed out. “I am more monster than human. I — I only wish to be left alone — alone with all of you!”
She fell to her knees again, her arms outstretched, pleading with the animals. But they only looked on and waited. Ilena raised her hands to cover her face, tears — tears that she seldom allowed herself to shed fell from her eyes. Because of her weeping she had not noticed until the two dogs were almost upon her, nor had she heard the clatter of the travois that they had somehow contrived to harness to themselves and to drag to this secluded place in the woods.
Listlessly, Ilena saw the bear and the wolves join in to position the sledge down into the water beside the body of the man and with one heave of its arm the bear tossed him onto the carrier. The wolves grasped hold of the clothing surrounding his arms and legs and pulled them such that his limbs would not drag upon the ground. Then the two dogs with the help of the larger animals began to travel back in the direction of the castle ruins.
Ilena remained immovable by the side of the riverbank feeling so many things, but fear was the most predominant, for matters seemingly had been taken out of her hands. Her companions were determined that she aid this stranger. So reluctantly, gathering her skirts about her, Ilena lifted herself from the river shallows and followed unwillingly behind the progression in front of her. Stopping only once, she firmly tied the mask about her face again and then trudged full of trepidation and dread and with a sullenness that seldom had touched her over the last few years into a future that she believed only held terror for her.
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Connor knelt before Erick’s father, his face formed into grief and contriteness. “Name it, my lord, whatever punishment you deem fit. I have failed you, Erick and the kingdom. He was in my care and I failed to protect him and bring him back to you and the realm.”
But Erick’s father answered him not, simply dismissing him with a flutter of a hand. Connor obeyed instantly, bowing as he backed away until he was out of the chamber. His father had correctly foreseen the way of it. There would be some minor, inconsequential punishment eventually but not death. And Connor knew Erick’s father would have need of him with the loss of his son. Such were matters in the kingdom. And within a few years those matters would bring he and his father into the power they both coveted.
But there were other concerns almost as important as what had just transpired. He had caught a glimpse of her again and Connor intended that within a few more days, he would arrange for more than just that.
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The memories were elusive, only moments of dreamlike consciousness: pain, flashes of movement, sips of noxious fluids, murmurs of sound, dim light followed by a burst of colour then darkness again, and ever a deeper darkness that he fell back into. But now he was awake again and after what might have been minutes or perhaps hours, he felt a hand lift his head and a warm liquid spill into his mouth, with more escaping to drip down onto his chin and travel even farther to soak into his tunic. But this time the liquid was pleasant. Something was placed upon his lips once more. “Again,” a low raspy voice said almost in a whisper. He felt a pressure behind his head and against his lips and he tried to obey, to comply with this gentle order. “Good. Once more.”
Then he felt his head settled once again against some sort of pillow. “Rest. I will come again.” Then a shadow departed the room.
Sometime later, Erick awoke again and blinked, trying to turn his head to see more of what this place was. It was small whatever and wherever it was, and somewhat the daylight contrived to enter in. But what Erick noticed most was the colours surrounding him and as his eyes came to focus he realized that the chamber was full of flowers. And their aroma brought back from the depths a memory he had forgotten: a wordless tune that had been crooned over and over him through the days since he had been brought here.
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Marta refused to speak to this stranger, this nobleman who had intruded into the church orphanage, acting as if this place was his, to use or abuse as he willed. She was well aware his eyes had followed her every movement since he had arrived — presuming he had a right to be here and to hold her in his sight. Yet he did nothing but look — did nothing of service or give any aid to these children. In fact, when a little one had spoken to him, assuming him to be a helper and had tried to crawl up on his lap, seeking comfort and love, he had acted as if to cuff the boy; but he had stopped when he had noticed her alarm, thereafter merely lifting the boy off himself and, with a none too gentle slap on his rear, sending him off. But he had smiled in a far too knowing, familiar manner at her as if what had just happened was merely for mirth and was unimportant.
Marta would have left shortly after this noble had appeared, but she was determined not to be cowed by his manner. Despite who he might be, this was the church: God’s place in this city where He was to be served. This man had no rights here and she would give him none. But now her tasks were complete and her fellow workers would look after the final needs of these dear children. Marta prepared herself to leave, but she found the exit blocked — by this man and he showed no inclination to remove himself from her path. So he was contriving to speak with her in this clumsy, disrespectful manner.
She lifted her eyes to meet briefly his own. He made no effort to hide his hunger: his certainty that she was his. Though her heart wished her to say other things, Marta chose her words carefully. “Carry these, servant of God.” She tossed the box containing the medicines and ointments in a manner that required him to bend to catch them. At the same instance, s
he commanded with her hands that ten of the older boys accompany her. “Follow us.”
In among the crowd of boys she slipped by the man and led them all into the sanctuary of the church where she commanded the youngest to take the medicines on into the room adjacent to the refectory where they would be kept secure. Marta had observed that there were a few supplicants in the sanctuary as well as others of her order carrying out their duties. She was not alone.
Ordering the boys to accompany her, Marta fully intended to leave this impertinent man; but he called out to her, approaching despite the young boys. “I would have a word with you, Sister.”
She merely answered by a lift of her eyebrows. “A matter of importance,” he added, somewhat slyly, motioning with his head and hands that the boys should be dismissed.
“That is more properly done with the priests. The confessionals are over there,” she answered, pointing to the front right hand side of the church.
“It is not a matter of sin.”
“Is it not?” Marta replied. “Much of what I have observed of you today speaks of sin. Humble yourself before God. You are nothing before Him.” And she implied much more with those few words.
Turning away and like a shepherdess, Marta led her flock down to the sacred emblems and gathered the boys about her to pray.
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Connor watched her for a minute until he became aware of the approach of one of the priests. He cared nothing for this place — only how it could be used. But Marta the Good’s words had not pacified him at all or turned him from his intent — they had only inflamed his desire more.
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Chapter Five