The Hermit of Lammas Wood

by Nathan Lowell

  Gertie walked along the line of barrels and thumped the heads on several, cocking her head at each before moving down the line. She stopped in front of one and thumped it a second time. “Yeah. This is the one.” She beckoned Tanyth closer and pointed into the shadowy space between the barrels. “You can see better in this light than Squeek can, I bet. Take a look in there and tell me what you see.”

  In the shadows Tanyth saw a wooden bucket with a hose running into it from the bung in the top of the barrel. “There’s a hose and a bucket.”

  Gertie cackled. “Well, I’d hope so. Any foam in the bucket?”

  Tanyth leaned in farther, trying to get a clear look. “Looks like clear water, but it’s hard to tell in the dark.”

  “Clear water’s what I expected. The foam’d show up plain enough.”

  “What is this, Gertie?”

  “Hard cider, what else?”

  “I figured that much. What’s this set up? Hose in a bucket?”

  “Keeps the cider from goin’ off. While it’s fermentin’, the yeast in it bubbles and froths. Sometimes a little. Sometimes a lot. This trick lets the overflow out so the pressure don’t hurt the barrel and keeps the air out of it because the end of the hose is under water. Nothin’ can get back in.”

  “All right then. Now what?”

  “Fish the hose out of the bucket and let it hang.”

  Tanyth did as she was told and stepped back.

  Gertie held a tin cup under the spigot mounted in the end of the barrel and poured half a measure into it. She held the cup to her nose and took a deep whiff. She nodded and then took a careful sip. “Oh, my. Yes, this is ready.” She offered the cup to Tanyth.

  Tanyth took it and looked at the dark liquid within. The ripe aroma of apple and spice, along with the sharp edge that alcohol adds, drifted up from the cup. Her cautious sip transported her to fall’s harvest and the crisp bite of warm days and frosty nights when an evening’s fire was warmth as much as light. She let it roll on her tongue for several moments before swallowing. The sting of strong drink warmed her gullet and filled her center.

  “Good, en’t it?” Gertie said, breaking Tanyth’s reverie.

  Tanyth handed the cup back. “Now I understand why they come to barter.”

  Gertie laughed, her delight filling the dark cavern with joy. “Yes, indeed. Indeed they do,” she said. “Now we need to put it in jugs and drag them up to the cottage.”

  Tanyth looked around the cavern. “Jugs?”

  “This way.” Gertie took a torch and stepped through the side passage.

  Tanyth followed, feeling the temperature ratchet up the farther they went. At the end of the passage, Gertie pushed through another door into a low-ceilinged cave, where she lit a torch on the wall. The shuddering light revealed a tumble of brown jugs stacked on the ground around a stone basin filled with water. The air felt thick with moisture and hot as a summer day. A tiny trickle of water seeped down the far wall into the pool, while a notched overflow let the excess water drain out, down the edge of the stone basin where it disappeared into a narrow crevice in the floor.

  “Hot spring,” Gertie said by way of explanation. “We got a dozen or more of ’em in the caverns here. Later I’ll show you my favorite one, but right now we need to wash enough of these jugs to empty that barrel.”

  “How many’s that?”

  “Start with twenty. Then we’ll see where we are.”

  Tanyth crossed to the pile of jugs, some of them coated with dust, and picked up a couple by the looped handles at the top. “Where’d you get all these?”

  “Oh, bartered for some. Made some. There’s good clay for ’em not far off. Gettin’ ’em glazed and fired was more trouble than it’s worth to me. I get enough in trade to keep the pile growin’. You’ll see by fall, I s’pect.”

  Tanyth took the jugs to the deep basin and started to lower the first jug into the water.

  “Mind that water,” Gertie said. “It’s hot enough to cook with.”

  Tanyth stopped and looked to the old woman. “You got a way of dealin’ with this, don’t ya?”

  Gertie grinned. “Now you’re learnin’. Lower ’em in so they sink. Tip ’em a bit so they fill with water but keep your fingers out. It’s not exactly boilin’ but it’s plenty hot to the touch and you’ll not like the burn. When they’re heavy, let ’em go. There’s enough sand in the bottom they won’t break when they fall.”

  Tanyth lowered the first jug into the basin and felt the heat rising from the surface on her face and hands. She tilted the heavy crockery a bit, pushing the top against the buoyancy and letting some of the scalding liquid bubble into the narrow mouth. A few bubbles splashed onto her fingers, stinging them so she let go by reflex and the bottle sank with a glub. A trail of bubbles surfaced, then petered out.

  “Well, that’s good an’ all, but how do I get it out?”

  Gertie chuckled and pointed to a metal rod hanging from a peg on the wall. “Use that to hook ’em out by the handles when they’ve had a good soak.” Gertie crossed the room, picked up a couple of the jugs, and slipped them into the water. “Put ten or so in there. Work across the front of the basin. By the time you get all the way around the front, start pulling them out in the same order they went in.”

  She crossed the cavern and came back with a small, wooden cart with iron-shod wheels. “Leave them full of water and put them on here. When we’ve got a load, we can roll it back to the cider room.”

  “How did you get all this stuff down here?”

  Gertie just smiled. “Well, we’re still at ground level here. One of my trapper friends made this cart and we just wheeled it in. It replaced one that was here when I came.”

  Tanyth continued sinking bottles in the steaming water. “And the barrels out there?”

  “Rolled them in empty. Filled them here.”

  “How do you get them full?”

  “There’s a cider mill on the far side of the orchard. Apple grinder and press. Buckets of the stuff. I try to get a couple of my lumber jacks to help out before they head back to town in the fall.”

  “Do they?”

  “Oh, yes. I pay them in last year’s cider. No complaints yet,” her smile gleamed in the dim light.

  “So, why do you live alone?”

  “That’s a longer story and one that’ll keep until we can settle in with cups of cider and a round of cheese.”

  “You have cows in a cavern somewhere?” Tanyth asked, picking up the hooked rod and fishing the hot jugs out of the water.

  “No, but that’s an interesting idea. I don’t think I could feed a cow underground like that.”

  “Then how do you have cheese?”

  “Goats.”

  “You have goats in here?” Tanyth straightened from her work to gaze at the old woman.

  “Outside. They wander the valley and feed alongside the elk and deer.”

  “But you milk them and make cheese?”

  “A small amount, yeah.” Gertie shrugged. “There’s a lot to do, but plenty o’ time to sit and watch the trees grow. You’ll see.”

  Tanyth lifted the last hot jug out of the water and placed it on the cart. She started loading fresh jugs into the pool while Gertie rolled the cart out the door and down the short tunnel. The hard iron rims grumbled on the wooden planks as they rolled.

  In a few minutes Gertie was back with the cart. Tanyth loaded it again.

  “That’ll do it,” Gertie said. “We’ll fill these and see what’s left.”

  “You do this often?” Tanyth asked as they rumbled the cart back down the corridor.

  “What? Bottle up cider?”

  “Well, make it, but yeah.”

  “This time o’ year, lotsa trappers and lumberjacks comin’ through. They know me and I know most of them by now. Long summer and lonely business. Long way to the nearest beer.”

  “Why don’t you brew beer?”

  “Cider’s easier. Just need the apples and the All-Mother doe
s the rest. I been doin’ this longer than you been on the road. Just suits me, I guess.”

  It was a matter of less than an hour before they’d filled all the jugs. They poured the hot water out, set the jugs under the cask’s spigot to fill them, and corked the tops. With the two of them working, it took no time at all. The jugs of cider filled the cart with a few left over.

  Gertie picked up a couple . “Tanyth, if you’d drag that cart over to the cottage, I’ll just slip into the cold room and chill a couple of these. It’ll be nice and cool by nightfall.”

  Tanyth took the handle and tugged on it, moving the cart easily despite its heavy cargo.

  “Don’t go too fast. That cart gets goin’ and you’ll have a hard time stoppin’ it.”

  “Thanks for the warning,” Tanyth said. Easing off on the handle, she trundled the laden cart through the stone halls to the broad storage area behind the cottage.

  Chapter Twenty:

  Tall Tales

  With the cider jugs safely lined up two and three deep on the shelves beside the door, Tanyth moved the cart out of the way and stepped out into the cottage. Sunlight filtered through the treetops outside to paint the small windows with a flickering pattern of light and shadow, of green and gold. Crossing the room, she gazed out into the orchard, the sparse foliage allowing views of the peaks beyond the valley.

  “It’s lovely, isn’t it?” Gertie said, joining her at the window.

  “It is. I feel like I’ve come home.”

  “You have, dear girl. You have.”

  Something in the woman’s tone made Tanyth turn to look at her. Gertie stood with her face turned to the light and her eyes closed. A small, dark gray nose peeked out of the woman’s hair.

  “Squeek shows you what you need to see?” Tanyth asked.

  “Yes. Sometimes. He can be balky. Insists on looking at things that interest him and not necessarily what I need to see, but without him and his sisters and brothers I’d be blind.”

  “I have to be asleep to see.”

  “No. You’re just more used to it. Sleep breaks the barrier easier. That’s why you came, isn’t it? Because of your visions?”

  “Yes,” Tanyth’s voice was little more than a whisper in the stillness.

  “You’re not goin’ mad, dearie.” Gertie’s voice held a gentle humor. “You’re just gettin’ old. But you knew that, didn’t ya?”

  Tanyth gave a small laugh. “Yeah, I know about the gettin’ old part. My knees ain’t exactly what they used to be.”

  “You’re one of the rare ones. Touched by the Lady, they say.”

  “Is that what this is?” Tanyth leaned a shoulder against the narrow window frame and looked at the old woman. “These dreams where I see through somebody else’s eyes.”

  “Yeah. That and healing your broken arm. Chasin’ away that storm and changing the flow in the oceans.” Gertie turned her face toward Tanyth; the small mouse seemed to gaze at her. “You almost killed yourself with that one, you know.”

  The words chilled Tanyth’s core. “I what?”

  Gertie’s lips curled at the edges and the laugh lines at the corners of her eyes grew deeper. “I didn’t think you knew about that.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “What part, dearie? The storm, the ocean, or killin’ yourself?”

  “My arm?”

  “Oh, that. Yes, that, too. Didn’t occur to you that it healed too fast?”

  Tanyth’s fingers sought the once-broken bone and danced along her skin as she remembered. “I had dreams.”

  “Pebbles in the stream?” Gertie asked.

  “Yeah. Night time. The moon shining down on a stream and the pebbles clickin’.”

  “That was your body putting the stone back in your bone. You helped it along. Prob’ly took three, maybe four weeks off.”

  Tanyth tried to remember. “Mighta been. We were travelin’ and I lost track of the days.”

  “You prob’ly slept good. Even on the ground,” Gertie said. “Power takes power. Unless you know what you’re doin’, it all comes from you.”

  “The storm?”

  “Knocked you out for a few days. Woulda killed a lesser woman. Woulda killed me,” Gertie said, her words simple statements of fact with no particular emphasis.

  Tanyth felt her jaw go slack.

  “Say, you wouldn’t mind makin’ some tea, would ya?” Gertie asked. “Talkin’ is thirsty work and we got a lot to talk about.”

  Tanyth felt her body go through the familiar motions of stoking the fire, filling the kettle, and settling it near the coals to heat. Her mind couldn’t gather all the ideas that Gertie had strewn out like so much dandelion fluff in a summer breeze.

  “The raven dreams...” Tanyth said.

  “Which ones?” Gertie asked, propping herself up in one of the chairs and leaning her elbows on the smooth table top. “The nightmares?”

  “Yeah. The ones where I couldn’t change back.”

  Gertie snorted. “You didn’t change to begin with. That’s just your mind’s way of telling you that somethin’ ain’t quite right.”

  “They seemed so real.”

  Gertie shrugged. “If they didn’t, they wouldn’t be so scary, now, would they?”

  Tanyth blinked the older woman’s face into focus. “No, I guess not.”

  “When you saw through the raven’s eyes, you always knew it, didn’t you?”

  Tanyth shook her head. “Not in the beginning. I didn’t know what it was.”

  “Well, sure. First time is always rough. I think Alice started up the still right after her first few times.”

  “Mother Willowton?”

  “Yeah. Good woman, Alice. She made her peace and went back to the world.”

  “What’s that mean? She went back to the world?”

  “She came up here for a visit along about the time of her change. She has some gift but the All-Mother didn’t so much touch her as blow a kiss in her direction. Was enough to scare the bloomers off her in the beginnin’.” Gertie smiled a gentle smile. “Good woman, though. Made a darn smooth brandy.”

  “So she went home after visitin’ you?”

  “Most women do.”

  “Them that don’t?”

  “Well, most women don’t come all the way up here to visit. Too many die first.”

  A grimace twisted Tanyth’s mouth. “Sure, but we’re not talkin’ about those.”

  “So far, every woman who ever made the trip to learn from me went home again,” Gertie said with a small slap of her open hand on the table between them. “I s’pect you already are home.” She bestowed a gentle smile on Tanyth. “And I s’pect you already know that.”

  The kettle boiled over with a hiss of water against hearth. Tanyth busied herself with the homely task of setting tea to steep. “Wish I had my tea pot.”

  “We can get one,” Gertie said.

  “I got one I like. Just didn’t bring it with me.”

  “’Fraid it’d break?”

  “Yeah. I got it at Ravenwood and left it there on the mantel in my cottage.”

  “Ceramic’s easy to replace here. Plenty of clay in the lower end of the valley. Plenty of heat to fire it.”

  Tanyth laughed. “That’s a skill I never learned.”

  “You’ll have time here, if you’ve a mind.”

  “What I’ve a mind for is findin’ out what’s happenin’ to me.” Tanyth took a deep breath and blew it out through her nose. “What’ll happen next.”

  Gertie shrugged a shoulder and looked at her fingers. “Mostly that’s up to you, dearie. The All-Mother’s given you a gift. One I don’t think we’ve seen in a couple of centuries. You’re gonna be tested by it, sure as rain on a summer’s afternoon. There’s gonna be them that might be threatened by it, if they know of it.”

  Tanyth let the ideas sort themselves in her head. After months of living in fear and in motion, she felt thrown off-balance by the weight of her body in the chair, by her sense of st
illness. It was the same feeling she got coming ashore in Northport after a couple of weeks at sea. She knew the ground lay unmoving beneath her boots, but her legs kept trying to compensate for the waves that never came. She focused on pouring tea to give her mind a chance to catch up.

  “There’s too many questions,” she said after a sip of the hot tea. “Who’s gonna be threatened? How’ll they know?”

  Gertie smacked her lips in appreciation for the tea. “Well, some know already. All them women you wintered with from Agnes Dogwood on. All them folks you left behind in Ravenwood. Every man jack on that ship. They all know.”

  “They feel threatened?”

  Gertie shook her head and took another sip. “Naw. Most of ’em prob’ly don’t even believe it. Your teachers all got some amount of the gift themselves, so they’re gonna understand better’n most. You asked who knows. It’s a bigger group than you might think. It’s gonna get bigger, I s’pect. Once them sailors start spreadin’ the word back in Kleesport.”

  “They prob’ly started in Northport already,” Tanyth said, looking into her mug of tea.

  “Prob’ly, but you got competition there.”

  “Competition?”

  “The hermit. Fearsome stories goin’ around about the hermit.” A gleam danced in Gertie’s eyes and the laugh lines on her cheeks deepened as she smiled. “Some strange happenin’s out here in the Lammas Wood. Locals’ll have stories of their own to tell.”

  Tanyth laughed in spite of herself. “I heard some o’ them all the way down in Kleesport.”

  “What’d you hear?”

  “The hermit breaks traps with her hands and releases the animals.”

  Gertie cackled loudly. “I been known to release a few animals. Trappers who should know better than trap in my valley. Course, they never mention that part, I bet.”

  “Naw. Always somewhere out in the woods.”

  “And I gen’rally use a rock to bust up the traps. Some of them are pretty rugged, too. Some I just drag back here. There’s a box of ’em in the storage room.” She took a sip of tea. “What else?”