A Sterkarm Kiss

by Susan Price

  Ribbons and ribbon knots removed from Joan were being eagerly tied around sleeves and waists—they were pretty additions to a wardrobe and would be worn for weeks, both to show that their wearers were at the wedding and as good-luck charms to bring on another wedding. But every pin that pinned on a knot, or secured the skirt more firmly to the bodice, was carefully stuck into a pincushion wielded by Mistress Crosar. It was bad luck to keep a pin, and would ensure that the girl who kept it was not married for another long year.

  Joan’s bodice was pulled off, and her skirt tugged down, and she was left in her shift and stockings of fine wool. With much shrieking and laughter, the girls pulled down the bedclothes, despite kneeling on them, and tumbled Joan into the bed. Then there was a fight, with pushing and shoving, to see which of the girls would pull off her stockings. Joan cowered on the bed as they fell on top of her and, sweating, red-faced, heaved one another up again. Finding herself unencumbered for a moment, Joan hastily sat up, pulled off her own stockings, and tossed them to the end of the bed. With screams, the excited, drunken girls fell on them, as men playing football fell on one another in a heap while trying to gain possession of the ball. Drawing her legs back out of harm’s way, Joan watched as the struggle rolled onto the floor. She had seen such fights before, at weddings she had attended as a guest, but while pretending to take part, she had always kept well back from the fight. She had never had any wish to win a bride’s stocking.

  The bundle of fighting girls broke apart at last, and two stood, their hair all awry, their faces scarlet, waving the stockings, too breathless to do more than pant. The other guests cheered for them though, and applauded. “Canny lasses!” Isobel shouted, holding her hands high as she clapped. “Canny lasses!”

  “Fetch groom!” someone shouted, and many voices took up the call. A little knot of girls separated themselves from the group and ran off to summon the men.

  Mistress Crosar, guarding a glass of wine from pushes and shoves, moved her way through bouncing, excited girls to the bed. Seating herself on the bed’s edge beside her niece, she handed her the glass. “Drink that, and never mind. Tha’ll live to see morn!”

  Isobel Sterkarm sat down on the bed’s other side. “Thine auntie be right. It be nowt but what every lass gans through.”

  The two women looked at each other across the bed. Mistress Crosar didn’t care for being called “auntie” by Isobel Sterkarm, and she cared less for the woman using the familiar “thine,” even though she reluctantly admitted that, as an in-law, she had that right. But for a moment she approved of the woman’s good sense.

  Joan took the wine and drank a big gulp, though her heart pounded and her breathing was tight. Still, her aunt and new mother were right. This had happened to Mistress Crosar herself, and to Isobel Sterkarm, and to their mothers, and grandmothers, and so on, back and back—to Grandmother Eve. They had all been brave, all the Grannam women, because they were Grannams. She had to be brave too.

  Once Joan had been carried from the hall, there were many empty spaces on the Grannam side, and the Grannams fell quiet, watching and drinking as the Sterkarms grew noisier. Per’s cousins, Little Toorkild, Ingram, and Wat, left their table and came to join him at the high table, together with many friends. Windsor, seated beside Toorkild, felt overwhelmed by the crush and the sharp, acrid smell of sweat, but he leaned back in his chair and smiled at everyone, pretending to feel at ease. His bodyguards, he told himself, weren’t far away.

  “If she be too strong for thee, Per, give us a shout!”

  “Aye, we’ll be listening—we’ll run in and gi’ thee a hand. Or something!”

  Sweet Milk held up his glass and shouted, “Here be to Per’s first son! Thy first grandson, Toorkild!”

  Toorkild stood, almost falling back into his chair with his eagerness to stand, and, raising his glass, yelled, “My first grandson!”

  Everyone roared and drank to that, even the Grannams. Per laughed, almost giddy with drink and good fortune. First the Grannam girl—wife, he had to remember she was his wife and a Sterkarm now—as if a Grannam could ever be a Sterkarm. But first his wife, and then the Elf-May. A full and happy day.

  A knot of wild and excited girls came running in from the dark, with fluttering ribbons pinned to their breasts and their hair standing on end and flying everywhere. “Bride be in bed! She waits! Bring groom!”

  Per jumped onto his chair and, from there, to the tabletop. He waved his arms in the air, gave a cockerel crow, and dived, full-length, into the arms waiting to catch him. A tangle of shouting, struggling men moved down the hall, carrying Per among them. The girls danced around them, cheering them on. The older Sterkarm men, Toorkild, and his brother, Gobby Per, followed behind, and Windsor walked with them. He kept a smile on his face and tried to think of it as boisterous high spirits—but the combination of armed Sterkarms and high spirits made him nervous.

  The procession grew as Grannams rose from tables and joined them—even they were laughing and cheering. Per appeared above the knot of men, riding on their shoulders. They carried him out into the blue darkness of the evening, which smelled of damp earth and peat fires. The two big hounds, Cuddy and Swart, leaped up from where they’d been dozing and capered about the procession, jumping up and trying to reach Per. The men bawled about cuckoos’ nests and the prickly bush all the way to the Sterkarms’ dormitory, and even as they carried Per through the hall to the wedding suite.

  Women peeped from behind the brocade curtain that hid the bed, giggled, and ducked out of sight again. The men set Per down in the midst of them and quickly undressed him, throwing aside his Elvish cap, pulling at the buttons of his Elvish shirt until it came undone. Some supported him while others yanked off his long boots, and then there was a fight—even more boisterous and noisy than the women’s fight—for his woolen stockings. The hounds became so excited, frenziedly running about and howling as they tried to defend Per, that Sweet Milk and another man had to drag them outside by force and tether them to stakes. Inside the hall, by the time two men were victorious in claiming Per’s stockings, there was a bruised eye and a bloodied nose among the company.

  The undressing was completed by pulling down the strange fastening of Per’s Elvish breeches and pulling them off, leaving him in his Elvish shirt.

  “They be unco short, these Elvish sarks,” Toorkild said. “Th’art only meant to show one lass what tha’rt made of!”

  Per covered himself with cupped hands. His cousins swept back the curtain, and to squeals and cheers, Per was ushered to the bed, while the men chanted rhythmically in a way that reminded Windsor of 21st-century football supporters. Isobel started to cry, hugged her son, kissed him, and herself turned back the bedcovers for him to get in beside Joan.

  Andrea, watching, saw Per look at Joan with a big smile, but Joan was doing her usual thing of looking down. She stared at the cover of the bed and refused to look at anyone.

  The men gave deafening hunting whoops. Fiddlers and pipers played. And people screamed above the din, “Stockings! Stockings!” Andrea put her fingers in her ears. She saw Windsor standing among the men, looking pained.

  The winners of the stockings, two men and two girls, now fought their way to the end of the bed, where one of each couple sat, their backs to the newlyweds. The girl looked over her shoulder, and everyone immediately yelled, “No looking! No looking!”

  The girl threw her stocking, and it landed in the middle of the bed. Everyone groaned. Isobel snatched up the stocking and returned it to the girl. “Try again. Three goes!”

  As the man threw his stocking, Per leaned forward, as if trying to catch it on his head—but the stocking fell onto the floor. The men booed, the women cheered. Andrea had no idea what was going on but was thrilled to be an observer.

  The girl with the stocking tried another throw, tossing it harder this time. Joan, in the midst of all this noise, sat perfectly still, lookin
g at the covers, as if she was alone. The stocking fell between her and Per, and Per threw it back to the girl so she could take her final turn.

  This time the stocking landed on Joan’s head—and the cheer that went up, together with the clapping, stamping, and whistling, was so loud that Andrea had no doubt that this was the point of the game. Joan plucked the stocking from her head and threw it aside, onto the floor.

  Both of the men managed to throw their stockings onto Per’s head—but then, he helped them considerably by moving to catch it. The second girl failed to toss her stocking onto Joan’s head even after being given a fourth try, and everyone groaned with her in sympathy.

  Then the game was over, and the uproarious noise subsided into chatter and laughter. Andrea sidled through the crowd until she stood beside Isobel Sterkarm. “Be so kind, Mistress Sterkarm, will you tell me—why do they throw stockings on their heads?”

  Isobel turned toward her, her pretty face flushed and beaming. Her pale-blue eyes were exactly like Per’s, and despite her happiness, she knuckled a tear from one. She dived at Andrea and enveloped her in a tight, warm hug, kissing her on the cheek. “Bless you, Mistress Elf—if you get a stocking on their heads, you’ll soon be married yourself!”

  A maid came through the curtain, carrying a large wooden bowl with handles on either side. At the sight of the bowl, the crowd gave another cheer. The maid gave it to Mistress Crosar, who took it solemnly and carried it to the bed. As she passed where Andrea stood beside Isobel, there was a whiff from the bowl’s contents: something warm, milky, and spicy. There was a smell of alcohol, certainly, and cinnamon, and—nutmeg? Andrea wouldn’t have minded a glass of it herself.

  Mistress Crosar handed the bowl to Joan, who drank from it. Everyone watching clapped and shouted encouragement, and Andrea was quick to clap too.

  Joan handed the bowl to Per, though without looking at him. Per took a big gulp, and there was enthusiastic applause, especially from the Sterkarms.

  “That be it! Keep up thy strength!”

  The crowd around the bed was thinning, Andrea noticed. People obviously knew that this was the end of the day’s ceremony, and they were drifting away.

  Per took another big gulp of the posset. The sooner it was all drunk, the sooner he and his wife would be left alone. He passed the drinking cup back to Joan, who took a tiny sip, then held the cup a long time before taking another tiny sip. She didn’t want the posset to be finished at all.

  “Come along now, come along,” Mistress Crosar said. “Hurry and drink it all up.”

  Joan took the biggest gulp she could and handed the cup to her husband. There was no point in trying to put it off. She was a Grannam. She had to be brave.

  Per finished the last of the posset and handed the cup to his new aunt-by-law. Only Mistress Crosar, Isobel Sterkarm, Andrea, and one or two other women were left by the bedside now. Isobel kissed Per on the forehead and both cheeks; and Mistress Crosar kissed Joan on the head, and they all withdrew.

  Andrea, glancing back over her shoulder as she went through the curtain, saw Per wink at her.

  8

  16th Side: The Wedding Night

  With a jump, Per woke from a doze. The room was too big, and reeked overpoweringly of flowers and spices, and sweet, scented smoke. Beneath him the bed bounced and wallowed if he shifted even slightly, and instead of the musty, homely whiff of hay, there was another gust of lavender and roses. Every sound, every smell, everything was strange.

  The Elf-Chamber. His wedding. Remembering, he scrubbed one hand over his face. His head ached a little, and his mouth was dry.

  Aye, his wedding night. Raising himself on one elbow, he looked over his shoulder. There was his bride, his Grannam bride, curled up under the covers, her bony, knobbly back turned to him. She slept, it seemed. Well, there was nothing he wanted to wake her for.

  He shifted gently onto his back, fearing to disturb the Grannam woman—if he had to marry her a thousand times, she would never be a Sterkarm. Above him was the dark canopy of the bed. All was silence. Not a sound reached him from outside. Everyone must have eaten and drunk themselves into a stupor and fallen into bed.

  He’d missed a few fights, most likely. Sterkarms settling scores among themselves at a time when they could blame it on the Grannams—and Grannams taking their chance to blame the mischief on the Sterkarms. There would have been a few skirmishes between the Grannams and the Sterkarms, too. Whatever his father and Richie-his father-in-law-said, there would be no preventing it. They would try to smooth things over by buying off the injured parties, and hope that only cheap blood had been shed.

  The memory of the Elf-May rose from the forgetfulness of sleep, and he shifted eagerly, half sitting up, before remembering the sleeper beside him and stilling his movement. He studied the Grannam woman for a while. She slept on.

  What a sweet wedding night. When they’d finished the posset and everyone had left them alone, he’d looked at her, and she, as ever, had looked at the bed covers. “I be over here,” he’d said, and then she’d looked at him with a frightened distaste.

  He’d leaned over to kiss her, and she’d twitched her head aside, so that his kiss landed on her cheek. Sighing, he’d leaned back against the pillows, caught between annoyance and pity.

  With any other girl he might have had more patience and taken more time—but this was a Grannam. And his wife. Hadn’t they told her what was expected of her? Grannams had been reiving Sterkarm farms, driving off Sterkarm cattle, killing and raping Sterkarms for generations—were they now trying another way of robbing?

  “What shalt tell ’em in morn?” he asked.

  She’d given him a quick, guilty, wary glance from the corner of her eye. She knew as well as he did that their families would crowd into the chamber again the next morning, full of questions about their first night together, and making the filthiest possible jokes, for good luck. It would be a disgrace to her if she was still a virgin.

  He’d pulled off his own shirt and thrown it on top of the bedclothes and then reached for her gloved hands. She hadn’t tried to stop him pulling the gloves off. “Now thy shift,” he said, and pulled at it, tugging at it where it was trapped beneath her. She didn’t help him, but he succeeded in dragging the shift off over her head. Then she’d slumped, drawing up her knees and folding herself over them.

  The curtains around the bed were gauzy and let through the Elf-Light. He’d thrown back the covers and seen the sharp points of her shoulder blades and the knobs of her spine. He pulled her back on the pillows. Ribs showed across her chest, above her tiny breasts. More ribs showed below. Her thighs were like sticks. A skinned rabbit.

  The Elf-May wouldn’t be like that. She would be all warmth and softness, with no bones to stick in you—you could tell, even seeing her fully dressed. He would have to turn this skinny one around. There’d be a little more padding on her backside than on her front.

  “Let me kiss thee,” he’d said. “That will be a start.” He’d leaned toward her, and she’d held herself stiff with distaste—and even so, her chin retreated from him into her neck.

  In the end it had been a struggle, like dancing with a wooden doll. But he’d done it. It had been pleasurable enough, as chores went, and they would be able to look their families in the face tomorrow and give plain answers. Now he’d done his duty, he deserved a reward. He remembered how the Elf-May had used her eyes when they’d been talking, the way she’d smiled. He’d bet it would be very different with her. Elf-Women were said to be eager and lickerish.

  Carefully he sat up. His shirt had fallen onto the floor. Pushing back the covers, he slipped out of the bed. Joan didn’t move.

  The great thing about Elf-Clothes was that you didn’t have to be laced into them. He went through the damask curtain into the main part of the hall, buttoning the shirt as he went. The Elf-Lights still burned. His Elf-Breeches were lying o
n the floor. Originally they’d been ankle-length, as the Elves wore their breeches, but he’d cut them off at the knee, to make it easier to wear his riding boots with them. The cloth was so stout and good, it had hardly frayed.

  There was a spindly little chair—so delicate, it could only be of Elvish workmanship—and he sat on it to pull on his woolen stockings, and then struggled with his long leather boots, which reached above his knee.

  He stood, listening. There were whispers and shiftings from the Sterkarm dormitory, but from the bed behind the curtain nothing. The Grannam woman was still asleep then. Walking quietly, Per went through into the dormitory—to find the Elf-May.

  Joan knew that Per was awake and moving but kept still, her knees brought up almost to her chest, her arms folded tightly over her pinched, mauled breasts. Let him think her asleep. She prayed he might think her asleep.

  A terrier catches a rat by the scruff of the neck and shakes it vigorously, choking it and rattling its bones, disjointing it. She felt that she knew, almost, what it was like to be the rat in the terrier’s mouth: pounded, hammered, bruised. Her husband had gasped, sweated, grunted, as intent on his work as the terrier. She had kept quiet by clenching her fists, gritting her teeth, and enduring—and good God, it had gone on so long—for her family’s honor. Why did people—why did women—speak of it as a pleasure? She could find no pleasure in being jolted, pounded, and rattled. Now she wanted only to attract no further attention. He might have put a child in me, she thought. A Sterkarm brat. Year after year, another Sterkarm brat, each one lugged in her guts for nine months and then brought forth in sorrow. Surely, God hated women.

  When she felt her husband slip from the bed, a tiny hope flickered in her. Lying very still, not daring to move and hardly daring to breathe, she nevertheless listened hard and realized that he was dressing. Oh, thank You, God! He would hardly bother to dress if he only wanted to piss. There would be a chamber pot under the bed, or if the Elves had forgotten to put one there, he would do it in some corner. So he must mean to leave her—to join his friends, maybe. To sit up late, wasting candles, bragging and drinking and gambling. If she was lucky, he wouldn’t come back until it was time to get into bed beside her before their morning visitors arrived. Even so little time free of his hot body, damp with sweat, seemed a blessing. And this was to be the rest of her life.