“But I—”
“Damn you to hell. I never stole anything in my entire life!”
“But you can… whistle like a blackbird.”
“Why, so I can. How terrible. I have to be a thief, then!”
“Rose—”
“If you really want to know, then, we smuggled things. Sometimes. My wretched brother and me. Which is not the same as stealing from your neighbors!”
“It’s still illegal—”
“So it is. So hang me.”
“It’s just that it’s so important that we don’t—”
But Rose was no longer listening. She whistled a sharp signal at Belle and tore out of the door. I felt my cheek tenderly and thought that now was not the time to follow.
“Well, that was pretty stupid,” said Nico, upstairs in the loft.
I spun. I had thought that Rose and I were alone in the cottage.
“Somebody did steal something,” I said defensively. “And that kind of thing can get us run out of town!”
“Rose has been living with you for two years now,” said Nico and stretched his legs so that they dangled off the edge of the loft. “Has she ever stolen anything from anybody in all that time?”
“No,” I muttered.
“So when you asked her like that, it was actually just because she comes from Swill Town.”
“Yes, all right, I get it.” I waved an irritated hand. “I’ve been horribly stupid and insensitive, and I’m sorry. But if Rose and Belle didn’t do it, who did?”
“I don’t know,” said Nico thoughtfully. “But it might be a good idea to find out before the rest of Clayton judges as hastily as you just did.”
“We haven’t time to go thief-hunting,” I said. “There’s work to be done.”
“Mmmmh,” murmured Nico, his mind clearly elsewhere. “I think I’ll have a word with my young scholars, all the same.”
DAVIN
Copper tail
Rose was in a terrible mood for days after that. As I was patching the henhouse roof the next morning, I heard her yelling at Dina in the bean patch.
“Oh, so you think we’re a couple of thieves too, do you? Me and Belle.”
“No, I—”
“Some friend you are!”
Rose rounded the corner of the cottage with angry tears in her eyes and sent me a look that by rights should have made me fall down dead from the henhouse roof. She disappeared into the woods, a worried-looking Belle at her heels. Belle hated it when we fought, but she knew which human was hers.
“That wasn’t what I meant!” Dina, too, came around the corner, looking no happier than Rose.
“What did you say to her?” I asked.
“Nothing,” said Dina. “Just… to take good care of Belle.”
“I don’t think it was Belle who took those chickens.”
“I know that! That wasn’t what I meant.”
“What did you mean, then?”
“Only that she should be careful that Belle didn’t run off. Or get hurt. Or something.” Dina’s voice grew smaller and smaller, until it was hardly more than a whisper.
“Why would she? Belle is no stray.”
Dina didn’t answer. She went back to the beans and the weeding. I shook my head and tried to thread a handful of straw into the old thatch without making more holes than I mended. I thought Dina was acting really strangely these days. What was wrong with the girl?
My foot slipped and went right through the roof. Damn! We ought to tear down the whole miserable half-ruin and build a new coop.
“Dina!” Mama was calling. “Any eggs today?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, find out, can’t you?” There was some irritation in the last remark, because it was normally Dina’s job to collect the eggs.
Dina came back into the yard. She hauled up a bucket of water from the well and washed away the garden dirt from her hands. Then she went into the henhouse without even looking at me. Well, never mind, I was only her brother. Nowhere near as important as hens and eggs and suchlike.
She stayed in there for quite a long while, I thought. Long enough for me to get curious. I lay down carefully on the patchy roof and looked down through the hole I was supposed to be mending.
Dina was holding something in her hands. An egg. But not a hen’s egg. This one was painted in black, red, and white spirals. Dina grasped the top and the bottom of it and tugged, and the egg came apart in the middle. It had to be made from wood or metal or something. And in the hollow space inside rested a small note.
My curiosity grew no less. Who was sending Dina letters by this curious egg mail? Did she have a boyfriend I didn’t know about? Perhaps this was why she had acted so strange lately, what with all her silences, the stomachache, and the droopy looks. But if she was in love, it didn’t seem to make her very happy.
Dina unfolded the letter and began to read. Then she suddenly flung it away from her and began to cry.
I slid down the roof, leaped onto the grass, and flung open the door to the henhouse. Dina looked at me with startled eyes and tried to grab the letter on the floor, but I was too quick for her. “Dearest Dina, I never meant to frighten you,” it said. That was as far as I got before Dina snatched it out of my hand.
“Give it here,” I said.
She shook her head vehemently. “None of your business.”
“It is so my business. I’m your brother, and if some village lout thinks he can break your heart and get away with it…”
She gave me a strange look. “You think I have a boyfriend?”
“Don’t you?”
“If I do,” she said slowly, “that’s a matter only between me and him.”
“Not if he makes you cry!”
She opened her mouth, then closed it again. The tears had stopped, it seemed, as suddenly as they had started. She put her hand on my chest and patted me, almost as if she was scratching Belle’s ear or something.
“Sometimes you’re really rather sweet,” she said. And while I was still trying to work out what to do with that remark, she slipped past me into the yard and let the letter fall into the well.
“No eggs today,” she called to Mama.
I picked up the painted egg. It was very light, too light to be made from wood, I thought, but I couldn’t tell what kind of material it was. I put the two shells together. The design wasn’t just random spirals, I could see now, but the coils of some kind of animal, a dragon or a monster serpent. It shone with a greasy gleam, as if the paint was still wet. It looked delicate and foreign and not at all like the kind of thing a village boy would make. And wasn’t it a strange way to start a love letter? “I never meant to frighten you.” Not that I had a whole lot of experience in that field, but if I was to write to a girl, that wouldn’t be how I’d choose to start my letter.
“Dina,” I muttered. “What kind of trouble have you got yourself into?”
It was not a cheerful supper that night. The smith had just come around with the black gelding. He couldn’t find a buyer for it after all, he said. But he was staring at the ground when he said it and wouldn’t look in Mama’s direction at all.
“It’s all right,” said Mama. “We’ll just have to find a buyer ourselves.”
He nodded. “It’s a good little horse,” he said. “Maybe you should try in Weaversham, or even farther south. There are probably people there who would buy such a good little horse.”
But apparently not in Clayton, I thought. Were the stolen chickens still haunting us?
The smith left, and we sat down at the rough table I’d nailed together for us. Bread and nettle soup. I almost wished we really had stolen those chickens or that pie. My rabbits were practically the only meat we got. Dina was picking at her food and looking pale, and Rose was still in her thundercloud mood.
“Could we please ease up on the long faces?” said Mama. “We’ll sell that horse. And sooner or later the village will realize we didn’t steal anything; if not before
, then when the real thief is caught.”
Nico cleared his throat. “Katrin—remember Katrin?”
Mama nodded. “The small dark-haired girl. The youngest of your students.”
“Yes. Katrin says she knows how to get into the inn’s henhouse. Perhaps we might consider setting up a guard.”
Mama shook her head. “Let the village deal with it,” she said. “It’s best that we stay out of it.”
Dina got up and put on her shawl.
“And where might you be going, young lady?” asked Mama.
“I left the hoe and the basket out by the bean patch,” she said. “I’d better fetch them before it gets dark.” And she was out the door before anyone had a chance to say anything more.
I got up as well.
“And what did you forget?” asked Mama sharply.
“Nothing. I just wanted to make a start on the dishes.”
“Davin, are you sick?”
I could feel my cheeks heating.
“Very funny. Of course not.”
I grabbed the empty earthenware bowls and carried them out to the well, but instead of washing them I merely dumped them into the empty bucket and sneaked around the corner until I had a clear view of the bean patch.
Dina wasn’t there. I saw just a quick glimpse of her before she disappeared among the trees.
Just as I thought. She’d gone off to meet this boyfriend of hers.
I returned to the well and began cleaning and wiping the bowls. By the time I was done, Dina still hadn’t returned.
“Careful, Dina,” I muttered to myself. “You’re heading for trouble.” Mama must already be thinking that it was taking her an unduly long time to fetch a hoe and a basket.
I went back to the corner and looked toward the woods. Still no Dina. I would have to go and look for her soon, I thought. She was only twelve, and it was getting dark. And there was that strange sentence from the letter: “I never wanted to frighten you.” The more I thought about it, the more uneasy I became.
“Davin?” Mama was standing in the open door.
“Yes.”
“Where is Dina?”
“I can’t see her right now,” I said. “But she’s around somewhere.”
“Go and find her,” said Mama, and I understood the anxiety in her voice perfectly well. I only nodded and headed for the place where I had seen Dina disappear into the trees.
I had barely reached it when I caught sight of her. She was walking toward me, sobbing and out of breath, and she was holding one arm awkwardly away from her body.
“A snake bit me,” she said. And then she collapsed to her knees, and I had to carry her the rest of the way home.
Two streaks of blood on Dina’s lower arm, two fang marks.
“It fell on me,” said Dina. “From a tree.”
I didn’t think the snakes around here climbed trees. But that had to wait.
“What color was it?” asked Mama sharply, tightening the leather thong she had wrapped around Dina’s arm. I knew what she was thinking. If it was yellow-green it might be just an arrow-snake like the one I had seen by the snare. Bad-tempered, but not venomous.
“Black and orange,” said Dina.
Coppertail.
“Davin,” said Mama in an unnaturally calm voice, “give me your knife.”
I gave her my knife. My hand was shaking. I didn’t understand how hers could be so steady. But maybe it was because it had to be. She was the one who would have to do the cutting.
Coppertail. Its venom could kill. How much of it was now in Dina’s blood?
“Light the lamp,” said Mama. “I can’t see what I’m doing.”
Nico lit the oil lamp and held it so that the light fell on Dina’s arm. Dina was lying on the table now, where the nettle soup had been only moments ago.
“Rose, take Melli into the loft. Tell her a story.”
Rose nodded and took Melli’s hand. Melli stared at Dina’s arm and looked frightened, and at first she wouldn’t move.
“Go on, sweetie,” said Mama. “Go with Rose.” And Melli went.
Mama held the knife into the lamp’s flame for a moment. Then she looked Dina in the eyes. “It’ll only take a moment, my love,” she whispered.
Dina stared at her without saying anything, and I could tell that she was clenching her teeth.
Mama rested the point of the knife against Dina’s arm, directly above the fang marks. Then she cut, a fast, deep cross. Dina moaned once, an out-of-breath sound that hurt me to the bones, but Mama had already put her mouth against the cut to suck and spit, suck and spit. I hoped it was true that you could get rid of some of the venom that way. She kept it up for a long time, and Dina just lay there, not moving a muscle, not making a sound, though I was sure it hurt her. In the loft we could hear Rose’s voice, trying to tell Melli a story. She kept getting stuck and repeating the same phrase twice or even three times, but Melli didn’t object. I doubted she was listening.
“Get my basket, Davin,” Mama finally said. There was blood all around her mouth. “And the kettle.”
I got the basket and the kettle. Mama took a small earthenware flask from the basket.
“Spirits,” she told Dina. “It will sting, but it will cleanse the wound.”
She poured what seemed like quite a lot of the clear spirits onto Dina’s arm. Dina hissed and bit her lip.
“It hurts,” she whispered.
“I know, love. But the worst is soon over now.”
If only that were true. I had never seen anyone die from venom, but I had heard ghastly tales aplenty, of gangrene and blindness and people who gasped themselves blue before dying. But that wouldn’t happen to Dina, I told myself. She had come walking on her own two feet; it might have been a fairly superficial bite. And being bitten by a coppertail was not always fatal. Far from it.
Mama soaked a bandage with the steaming hot water from the kettle. She only let it cool for a moment before putting it on Dina’s arm.
“Clean sheets in the chest,” she told me. “Change the bedding.”
I got the sheets and started to make up the bed. Mama loosened the thong, and once more there was a thin moan from Dina. Mama stroked her forehead.
“The rest is up to you now,” she said. “Remember what I always tell you when you’re sick?”
“The body is only half of it,” Dina muttered tiredly. “You also need to use your head to get well.”
Mama nodded. “That’s right. Picture it to yourself—that arm is fine again, and you are well. The venom is gone. Believe it. See it in your mind.”
“Yes.” The word was just an exhausted, miserable sigh.
“Dina! You have to promise to fight as hard as you can!”
Dina was silent for a moment. “Things would be easier if I didn’t,” she said, so softly that the words were nearly inaudible.
Mama looked stunned. “Child! What a thing to say.”
There was a hoarse croak from Dina. It was a moment before I realized it was meant to be laughter.
“It’s a little silly, isn’t it?” she said. “I mean, being bitten by a snake when you’re serpent spawn yourself.”
Mama stood completely still for a draggingly long moment. Then she put a hand on either side of Dina’s face and looked her in the eyes.
“Forget about him. You are my child. Not his. Do you hear me?”
Dina closed her eyes.
“Do you hear me?” said Mama once more.
“Yes, Mama,” whispered Dina. But it sounded as if she didn’t quite believe it anymore.
Nobody slept much that night. Rose and Melli made their beds in the loft where Nico and I usually slept. Dina kept complaining that she was cold, even though we kept a fire going in the hearth all night, so we took turns lying next to her, trying to keep her warm.
I waited until Mama and Nico were a little way off, sitting by the hearth and speaking together in low tones.
“Who is he?” I whispered into Dina’s ear.
“Him. The bastard who is sending letters and luring you into the woods to throw snakes at you. That him.” My voice was shaking with fury.
“That… wasn’t what happened.”
“No? Coppertails don’t climb trees, Dina. Who is he?”
She stared at me. Her face was shiny with fever, her hair sticky with sweat. For a moment I thought she might actually give me an answer. But then she shook her head.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said.
Her eyes closed, and she pretended to be asleep. But I knew she wasn’t. Her breathing was much too troubled.
At some point, I fell asleep without meaning to. I kept dreaming of that wretched egg. Dina was opening it, and instead of a letter, it contained a snake, a red, white, and black serpent. The snake wound its way up her arm, opening its maw to show two long venom fangs….
“No, Dina,” said Mama. “Dina, you mustn’t!”
“I want it off.”
“No, love…”
I woke up. Mama was bending over the bed, holding Dina’s wrists. She noticed that I was awake.
“Davin,” she said hoarsely. “Help me. Hold her for a little while.”
“Hold her?” My head was still full of hazy serpent dreams.
“So that she doesn’t tear off the bandage. Davin, wake up!”
I sat up. Dina was looking at me, but her eyes were glassy, and I don’t think she actually saw me. My heart pounded in fear, because she looked like someone who was already half in another world.
“Hold her!”
I put my arms around my sister and seized her wrists. They were slippery with sweat.
“Let go,” begged Dina. “I want it off. It hurts!”
She tried to break my grip, but it was easy to hold her. Far too easy.
“She mustn’t spend her strength like that,” said Mama, as if Dina couldn’t hear her at all. “Try and see if you can calm her down, Davin.”
“How?”
“Talk to her. Sing to her. Tell her a story. Anything.”
My head felt completely empty. I couldn’t think of a single story.
The Serpent Gift Page 9