The Hermit of Lammas Wood

by Nathan Lowell

  “Wet bedding. Lovely,” Rebecca said and followed in Penny’s wake, leaving Tanyth to bring up the rear.

  Tanyth just shook her head and kept walking.

  Within a few yards the ground turned to mush. The firm soil of the forest gave way to loess-covered slopes on the ridge made loose and slippery by the rain. Tanyth had to watch her footing, once grabbing Rebecca’s arm to steady her before she slid down the slope.

  They gained the cover of the forest within half a mile, but by then everything was dripping wet. Odd breaks in the canopy gave them fresh water to deal with. They tramped on.

  Tanyth felt the cold leeching her strength as they went. She eyed Rebecca, who walked huddled in on herself. Even Penny’s energy seemed to be flagging.

  “How much farther?” Tanyth shouted to be heard over the rain.

  “Another mile. Maybe two,” Penny shouted back. “Can you do it?”

  Tanyth felt her teeth begin trying to chatter but she nodded and waved. “Go faster before we freeze.”

  Penny gave her a bedraggled smile and headed on up the trail, which took a turn into the base of the mountain a few feet farther along. Before they broke out of the trees again, the roar of the rain in the treetops vanished as fast as it had begun.

  Somewhere in the distance Tanyth heard falling water–but it was a stream’s sound, not the rain’s.

  “That’s not good,” Penny muttered as she picked up her pace a bit.

  She led them to a narrow trail cut into the side of the mountain. The trail followed the curve of the terrain and disappeared around a jutting knee of rock just ahead. When they got around the rock, they found the origin of the running water sound. A heavy stream cascaded down the mountainside from high above and had carved the trail back to bedrock in its fall. The gap between here and there measured at least three feet, possibly four. There was nothing left to the trail except two ends separated by a long drop and flowing water.

  “Ideas?” she asked, turning to Tanyth and Rebecca.

  “I need warmth and shelter soon,” Rebecca said.

  “Do we have to cross there?” Tanyth asked.

  “If not we have to go down, cross over, and then back up,” Penny said.

  Tanyth looked up at the falling water. “What about a bridge?”

  “We’d have to go cut a tree for that. You got the strength for it?” she asked, looking first at Rebecca and then at Tanyth.

  “Down and up, it is then,” Tanyth said.

  They scooted back around the rock and scrambled down the rain-slicked scree to reach the bottom of the slope. it looked a long way off from down here, but as her teeth started chattering, Tanyth moved along sharply to try to convince her body to stoke up the fire.

  “This would be a good time for a hot flash,” she muttered.

  “You all right, mum?” Rebecca asked, turning around to look at her.

  “Nothin’. Keep going. I’m fine.”

  Penny led them across the field of shattered rock and they waded through the wide, flat creek where the run-off spread across the rocky slope, cascading noisily down the mountain.

  Halfway across Rebecca stopped, staring at her feet. She reached down and picked up something from the ground.

  “What is it?” Tanyth asked, her jaw clenched against the shivers that threatened her.

  She held up a smoothed, shining chunk of gold rock about the size of her thumb.

  “Well, put it in your pocket, and let’s keep movin’ before I freeze out here,” Tanyth said as she leaned heavily on her staff. Cold water slipped down the back of her neck, and she started shivering. She couldn’t control it–couldn’t breathe. The shakes pushed the air from her lungs and the darkness encroached at the edges of her vision.

  “Penny!” Rebecca shouted and reached for Tanyth, grabbing her by the arm, supporting her body and pressing her own body against the older woman’s. “Penny, we’re in trouble here.”

  Tanyth’s knees began to buckle, and that just was not acceptable to her. She twisted her staff into the ground, driving the iron shoe down through the loose rock—more by strength of will than of body. She felt the heat of the earth just beneath the surface. It called to her and offered her warmth.

  She lacked the strength to call the full circle, but perhaps she had enough to call on the one guardian that mattered most. Staggering, she rotated around the staff, twisting it like a drill. She looked to the south, down-slope into the treetops still glistening with the morning’s rain. The beauty of it reached into her and she closed her eyes, turning her face to the pale warmth of a sun half hidden by clouds.

  “I call on the Guardian of the South, Fire of the Earth, Passion of the Heart,” she muttered through a jaw that she could barely control, with breath she barely held. “Grant us warmth against the cold.” She felt the earth under her shifting, the loose scree sliding a bit. “I ask in the name of the All-Mother.” She didn’t have the strength to stamp her staff on the ground but lowered her lips to the wet wood and kissed it. “So mote it be.”

  Under them the ground rumbled, no major movement. Not a large sound, but the stones began to steam and Tanyth felt the heat of the earth working through her boots and up her legs. With warmth came strength—up her legs from her feet, up through the iron shoe dug into the soil just inches below the rocks. Her lungs filled and emptied once, twice. Full breaths filled with the heat of a summer afternoon, warming her from the inside out. The quivering of her muscles slowed and ceased. With a final silent prayer of thanks, she opened her eyes and stared into the shocked face of Penny Oakton.

  “Mum? Are you all right?” The woman’s eyes showed white all around and her face held something that was either shock or fear. It might have been both.

  Tanyth tested her breathing again before replying. “Yes, I think so.” A yawn took her by surprise. “I could use a bit of a lie-down, I think. How far is it to your camp?”

  Penny pointed. “About a mile that way. Twenty minutes if you’re up to it.”

  Tanyth rested her forehead against her staff, silently offering another prayer of thanks. When she looked down, the rocks had stopped steaming. She stood in the middle of a circle of dry, white scree. She stared at it, her mind muzzy. Something about the dry rocks. Something important.

  “Mum?” Rebecca said, taking her by the upper arm. “If you can walk now? We need to be going.”

  Tanyth nodded. “Of course, my dears. Lead on, Penny. You’re the only one who knows the way.”

  Penny looked to Rebecca who nodded in return. She shuffled through the rest of the scree and led the way through a tight ravine of earth and trees at the base of the trail high above them. “It’ll take us some doin’ to get up to the caves, but I think we can get there if we take it slow,” she said.

  Tanyth let Rebecca lead her. The younger woman needed her support, after all. Soon they’d be safe and warm and dry in the cave.

  The final mile took well over an hour, and the sun dipped too near the horizon for comfort but they eventually regained the high ground. Penny led them between two huge slabs of rock and into a hidden pocket.

  Tanyth looked around at the walls’ rough surface. “Not exactly what I’d call a cave,” she muttered.

  “No, mum. This is just the entry,” Penny said and stepped through the rock face, disappearing.

  Tanyth stared at the rock for a moment and looked to Rebecca. “Did she disappear?”

  Penny’s head emerged from the rock. “It’s a crack in the rock. Come over on this side and you’ll see it.”

  They shuffled around to the far side of the pocket and saw the narrow crack in the face of the mountain. Penny smiled at them. “Come on in. I’ll get a fire going, and we can have a nice pot of tea.”

  “Tea. That would be lovely,” Tanyth said, and turned sideways to slip through the crack.

  Chapter Sixteen:

  Those Who Came Before

  Tanyth awoke, snug and dry in her bedroll with no recollection of having crawled into
it, let alone laying it out. A ruddy glow illuminated one wall that arched up to a ceiling. A pile of wood lay against the back wall. When she turned her head, her face was just inches away from Rebecca’s curly mop sticking out of a bedroll.

  “Cozy,” she murmured.

  “Mum?” The hoarse whisper drew her attention to the shadows beyond the fire pit. Penny slipped from the darkness and leaned over her. “You feeling better now, mum?”

  Tanyth blinked several times. “Better than what, my dear?”

  “You remember bein’ out in the rain? The trail?”

  “Of course.”

  “You remember almost shiverin’ to death out there in the scree?” Shadows made Penny’s eyes into dark pools.

  Tanyth remembered. “Yes, my dear. I remember.”

  “Do you know what you did, mum?”

  “I know that I did something, and the earth warmed us enough to get here.”

  “You felt the heat of the earth?”

  “Yes, my dear. I asked the Guardian for help. The Lady brought the heat a little closer to the surface.”

  “That’s what you think, mum?”

  Tanyth smiled at the serious look on the young woman’s face. “That’s what I know, my dear.”

  “Do you remember coming into the cave, then?”

  “Well, of course. There’s a narrow crack. We had to slip through it sideways.”

  “Do you remember having tea? Eating a travel ration bar?”

  Tanyth stared at her for a moment. “When?”

  “After we got into the cave.”

  Tanyth searched her memories. “I thought you had disappeared. One moment you were there. The next, gone. I remember sliding through the crack...” Her voice trailed off. “I don’t remember anything after that.”

  “Mum, you’re pretty weak still. The cold can take the starch out of old bones, and you were really cold. Your lips were blue. I don’t know how you walked from the scree field all the way up here. I surely don’t. I’m glad you done it because otherwise Rebecca and I woulda had to carry you, and that woulda been tough.”

  Tanyth smiled. “I’m glad, too.”

  “Whatever it was you did out there, it saved you, but it came near to killin’ you, too. If we’d had to go another half mile, it mighta.” Penny leaned down to kiss her on the cheek. “You go to sleep again, mum. It’s just around midnight, and you need the rest.”

  Tanyth felt the truth of her words and simply nodded, pulling her blanket up around her chin and sinking below the surface of consciousness.

  The dream, when it came, faded into her like a misty morning. All the women she’d shared the last twenty-plus winters with came to her and smiled on her. Agnes Dogwood led the procession and all her teachers followed along. The gray hairs. The gapped smiles. The laugh-lines on wrinkled cheeks. Each as precious as the last. Some were gone, others lived on. Even Alice Willowton, who distilled more than essential oils, and Mabel Elderberry, the last teacher who had pointed her north. A stooped and gnarled woman followed Mabel, her kindly face with high cheekbones and deep creases looking not the least familiar.

  “Mother Alderton?” her dream voice asked.

  The woman smiled and gave a small curtsey before moving on.

  A dark shape followed her. Tall and straight, striding through the mists that had grown around her. He stepped into the shrinking clearing and smiled as well. His heart shone in his eyes; his familiar, precious mouth curled to one side in an endearing smile.

  This was not right. The women had all been her teachers. People from whom she had learned and to whom she owed much.

  Frank lifted a hand to tip his hat and gave her a cheeky wink before following the line of women into the mist and out of her sight. She turned to watch him go. He did not look back, just strode away fading into the void.

  When she turned back, a new figure stood before her. Not a woman she knew. An old woman, perhaps the oldest she’d ever seen, her eyes milky with cataracts and her fingers knotted with arthritis. She stared at Tanyth with her white-sheathed eyes for several moments until a movement in her frizzy white hair drew Tanyth’s gaze. A gray field mouse rested on the woman’s head, his black eyes staring at Tanyth seeming to look into her soul.

  “Well?” the woman said, her voice shaking with age and impatience. “Are you going to sleep or are you going to get here someday?”

  “Mother Pinecrest?” Tanyth’s dream voice said.

  The old woman sighed, a soft huff of her breath. “Girl, you are the single most stubborn—. Never mind. We never had a lot of time, and what little we got left is running out. You need to get up.”

  “Well, of course, I do,” Tanyth said.

  “No, you need to get up now!” the woman said, reaching out to shake her by the shoulder.

  “Mum? You need to get up now,” Penny said, patting her shoulder again. “We need to get on the trail if you’re up to it.”

  Tanyth blinked several times, trying to reconcile her mind to the reality it now perceived.

  “Mother Fairport?” Penny said. “Are you feelin’ all right?”

  “Yes, yes.” She pushed herself up on her elbows. “A bit stiff, but quite well.”

  “Mornin’, mum.” Rebecca grinned at her across the fire. “Tea’s ready if you are. We even made some oatmeal.”

  Tanyth’s stomach told her it had been too long since she’d last eaten. The inside of her mouth tasted like a gravel road on the summer solstice. She cleared her throat, trying to open her windpipe a bit. “Tea would be most welcome,” she said at last.

  She started to crawl out of her bedding, but Penny patted her back down. “You just rest there, mum. We’ll fetch for you.”

  Tanyth nodded and pulled a deep breath into her lungs, blowing it out in something that wasn’t quite a yawn and certainly not a sigh.

  Rebecca handed her a tin cup full of tea, kneeling down beside her to look into her eyes. “Are you sure you’re all right, mum?”

  Tanyth held the cup up to her nose and inhaled the musky, spicy aroma. “Yes, dear. I’m fine, I think.” She sipped with a slurp that sounded loud in the dead air of the cave. The tea nearly burned her tongue and she sucked in a mouthful of air to cool it. “Just had the strangest dream.”

  Rebecca smiled. “Another owl?”

  Tanyth shook her head as Penny turned and leaned down. “Dream?”

  “All my teachers were there. They just walked by me in a parade. They stepped out of the fog and smiled or nodded, and then walked on. One after the other.”

  “You sure it was a dream?” Rebecca asked.

  Tanyth pursed her lips and thought. “Yeah. I’m pretty sure it was. It wasn’t like one of my visions because I wasn’t an animal. No owls. No rats.”

  “No raccoons?” Rebecca asked, her mouth twitching.

  Tanyth chuckled once. “No, you cheeky thing. No raccoons. Just my teachers until the next to the last one, and I didn’t recognize her.” She paused, trying to see the woman’s face again. “She was stooped over and gnarled as an old apple tree.”

  Rebecca’s eyes narrowed.

  “She had high cheekbones and deep creases on her forehead and around her mouth,” Tanyth said.

  “Mother Alderton?” Rebecca asked.

  “That was my guess, but she didn’t speak in my dream.”

  Rebecca rocked back on her heels. “What do you suppose it means?”

  Penny snorted as she brought a small bowl filled with steaming oatmeal. “Means she’s had a lot of influences on her life and that’s her brain’s way of sayin’ ‘thank you’ to ’em. That’s my guess.”

  “I saw Frank, too,” Tanyth said, blowing on a spoonful of the hot oats before taking a nibble from the spoon’s tip. “He didn’t say anything, either.”

  Rebecca clapped her hands. “Well, if you had a line of teachers, only makes sense that Frank would be among ’em, don’t it, mum?”

  “Maybe they’re not teachers,” Penny said. “Could be just important peo
ple in your life.”

  Tanyth considered her words while she shoveled the cooling oatmeal into her very insistent belly. “Could be. That would make sense, except the last one was your granny.”

  “Granny Gert?” Penny asked, looking up from where she was rolling her bedding.

  “That’s what she said.”

  “What’d she look like?”

  “Like an old woman with frizzy white hair. She had cataracts and her hands were all knotted up. She stood straight enough and looked me right in the eye. Told me to wake up and get movin’. That we’re runnin’ out of time.”

  Penny sat back on her heels. “Cataracts? How’d she look you in the eye?”

  “She had a mouse in her hair.”

  Penny’s face went blank and she cocked her head to one side. “A mouse?”

  “Yeah, field mouse by the look. He sat in her hair and just looked at me.”

  “Huh.” Penny shook her head. “Coulda been. What I remember of her, she had frizzy hair and the cold weather bothered her hands.”

  “Well, she was none too pleased with me.”

  Penny’s eyes softened and she bit her lower lip. “Sounds about like the woman I remember.”

  “You haven’t seen her in how long?”

  Penny shook her head and focused on her bedroll. “Twenty-five? Thirty winters? She left when I was a wee thing. I couldn’ta’ been more than five winters.”

  Rebecca looked at her. “Really? You don’t look that old.”

  Penny and Tanyth both laughed.

  “What?” Rebecca said, looking back and forth between them.

  “Nothin’,” Tanyth said. “Just struck me funny. Come on. Let’s get packed up and get movin’. I’d kinda like to see this Valley of a Thousand Smokes I keep hearin’ about.”

  Chapter Seventeen:

  Valley Of A Thousand Smokes

  The morning smelled clean. Stepping out onto the trail from between the huge slabs of rock, Tanyth looked out over the dark green spruce tops to the ocean gleaming on the horizon. She drank in the scent of spring as if the first time. Spring came late to the north country, it seemed, but it still smelled sweetly of promise and life.