Cloud and Ashes: Three Winter's Tales

by Greer Gilman

  * * * *

  It was windy, with a clouted sky. The farm stood foursquare to the heavens, stonebuilt, with a line of trees to northward bending all one way. They danced. There were catkins on the hazels, taws of light, like whips to set the sun a-spin. Kit sneezed. There was pollen dusted in his hair and on his jacket, nebulas of bloom; he sleeved his face with Pleiades. “No geese,” he said. “There's a comfort."

  "I'll go this time,” said Thea, peering through the hedge with him. They saw a drying yard, windriffled, up against the plainfaced farmhouse. There were two girls playing in the yard. They'd tied a rope to an iron ring in the housewall. One turned, the other skipped and sang. “My mother went to feed her crows, turn round and call them in...” The rope made rainbows in the plashy air; it slapped, slapped, slapped the stones. An unbreeched boy ran shouting with a whirligig. It flackered like a rising bird; it caught the sudden light. He tumbled in the mud. A woman in a cap and clanging pattens came out, a creaking wicker basket at her hip.

  Kit and Thea slipped through the hedge. “Hallows with ye,” he said, and bowed. His back was urchined out with brooms.

  The woman nipped the small clothes up. She was rosy with the wind, and round-armed, with wisps of grey-brown hair straggling from her cap. “Here's a rade o scoundrels,” she said to the peg box. “A-ligging and a-laiking, while us poor folk go to work. Well, I's counted shirts."

  "...one for t'rider and one for t'horse and one for t'boatman, for to row me across..."

  The boy was crouching by a puddle, frothing his toy in it.

  Fiercely, the woman pegged the washing out: smock, petticoat, shirt, breeches, smock. All dancing in the wind. Kit tweaked the breeches by the strings. “Here's thy chance,” he said to them. “Do as I would."

  "Huh,” said the woman, but her shoulders quirked. “Would yer go to be hanged?

  "Not I. And yet die bravely in a dance,” he said.

  Another woman looked out through the door. “Eh, Bet, what's to do?"

  "A tain and his tally come a-begging. Lunish folk. Got besoms."

  "Has they pins? We's short.” She came out on the doorstep, flapping her apron. She was small and crumpled, with a smear of soap on her brow. Looking at the travellers, up and down, she said, “If it's guising, yer a bit few."

  "A sword and a bush,” said Kit.

  "And late."

  "The ways are very muddy,” said Kit.

  "And our shoes are very thin,” said Thea.

  "When's Lightfast i’ Lune, then? Come May?” The woman with the basket looked at Thea. “Where's crown? Is t'wren in yer pocket, then?"

  "Under her apron,” said the woman at the door.

  "Whisht,” said the other. “Ista lad then? Or Ashes?"

  "Turns,” said Thea. “Whichever comes in next. Burnt Eldins."

  "Aye well, if it's Eldins, yer first foot,” said the woman at the door, relenting. “Not see'd Arrish lads as yet.” Quirking at Kit: “What's he?"

  Kit turned and shrank and darkened. The witch looked out through him, and cocked her shrewd black eye. Muck, said her mincing, and grubs, said her peck. Watching, Thea felt a thrill of uneasy laughter. He had Morag to the very nails. “The blood I brew, the bones I crack, I bear the childer on my back.” The little girls watched, the rope slack, their faces uncertain. He clawed his hands at them and waggled.

  The brown girl's thumb went in her mouth; she clung to her sister's apron. But the little dark one said, “Yer not a witch."

  "Who said?” He swung the little dark thing in the air, and clapped her in the empty basket, shrieking delight.

  Thea rounded on him, ranting in high style. It was her turn for Burnt Eldins; she had the coat. “Wha comes on stones?"

  "Awd Crowdybones."

  "What's that ye've got?"

  "I's getting eldins for to boil me pot.” Lantern and thornbush, like Mall-i'-th'-Moon.

  "Wha's give thee leave to cut my wood?"

  "Me glass and me riddle, they told me I could."

  "All but nine, they may not go:

  The alder, the elder, the ash and the sloe,

  The witchtree, the whitethorn, the hazel and oak:

  Break one of their branches, and down with a stroke."

  "That's eight."

  Thump, went the basket. Thump. And the girl peeked out, with her hair all tumbled, rough as juniper, her eyes as blue.

  Thea whirled on her heel. “Burnt Eldins is youngest of all of the nine, I see by her stockins you've hung on the line."

  "I's not been etten yet,” said the girl. “It's all right, Tilda. Thou can look."

  Kit crouched malefically. “Blood and bones, I'll crack, I'll crack, and fell and hair will patch me back. Eyes to me ravens, and breath to me bread, and fat for a candle to light me to bed."

  Thea drew her sword of air.

  "Take a broom,” said Kit softly. “Plays better."

  "Ah. Right then.” Thea cleared her throat and struck a penny-plain bold stance. “Wha brings thee down but Hallycrown?” Turn and turn, they rimed.

  "My tower's where thou'lt never find."

  "They's left me a thread, and I walk and I wind.” Round in merrills in the mud, she trod.

  "I's ower t'riddles and back o Cawd Law."

  "They's spinned me a clew and I's under thy wall.” Thea ducked the clothesline.

  "I's snecked t'door, thou shan't come in.” All a-twitter.

  "Brock turns locks and lifts thy pin."

  "What's within but mirk and mist?"

  "But I's a sun frae Mally's kist.” She upraised a withered apple-john.

  "Here comes my ravens to peck out thine eyes."

  "And here comes my chopper, for to make ‘em mince pies."

  Once, twice, thrice they clashed and down fell Morag in the mud. Kit clutched his heart, turned tipple, kicked his heels and croaked. Tilda giggled uncertainly. Thea snatched the child from the basket, and Kit spun it round with his foot. Down went the child in it. Thea spoke.

  Now it's a ship and we all sail away,

  So give us your hands for to finish our play.

  The sail's o th’ siller, the mast's o th’ tree,

  The moon's for a keel and the morrow's the sea.

  Kit whispered to the child, “Hang on.” He jumped up beside Thea and they took the handles of the creel. They hoisted it between them and they swung it, one two three, and whirled it round.

  Up let her rise, and t'sisters take hands,

  So gi’ us some siller to bring them to land.

  A sadcake, an apple, some eggs and old ale,

  To help us poor guisers and weave us a sail.

  "Now Tilda's turn,” said the child when she'd got her breath.

  * * * *

  "Thou gut yon fish,” said Whin. “It's that and slawk."

  Kit turned from the bitter bright morning. Salt in candle flame: it sparkled. “Ah?” Carefully, from rock to driftwood, rock to rock, he hobbled back to the fire, took the knife in stiff hands. “What's this, a dolphin?"

  "Herring,” said Whin. “Filched it. They'll blame cat.” She prodded at the pot of seaweed, doubtful. “So, where got yer that guising? Not i’ Lune."

  "Imp Jinny. Said it might get an egg or two."

  "Thin wind for thieving, March. All green and mockery.” Whin clapped the lid to. “Wants a whet to it, does slawk. Verjuice or owt.” She swiped the ladle with her finger, licked it. “So yer kept them rings."

  "And who'd buy them?” Kit's hands were glittering with blood and scales. “Who'd make change? As good sell orchards in the moon."

  "Spatchcocked, I think,” said Whin. She took the fish. “Salt enough."

  "There were two left. For the—for the child, she said. Her portion. Those you took.” He rubbed his fingers dry in sand. “One spent, one tossed away in scorn. Three ta'en by—ruffians. And one she gave away."

  "Did she, then?"

  "To a boy. A whitehaired starveling boy. A scarecrow."

  "Oh,” said Whin,
so poignantly that Kit knelt up by her.

  "What is't then? At thy heart?"

  * * * *

  They came by a ploughed field, pricked with the new green corn. A crow lad with his clapper cried, he clacked his sticks and cried, “Ban craws!” The cold wind shook his rags. The crows took up into the air. It was a brash day, bare and windy, with a sky of curds and whey. Thea stood in the furrows, watching; Kit stood by her. A stone's throw away, the birds swirled and settled, like a fall of ashes, calling out. Their voices glowed and faded like the sparks from the anvils of war.

  Kit said, “He cries them barley."

  "They defy him,” said Thea. She was gazing at the sky. The clouds went swiftly. “Crows, that's all."

  Cracked pepper, and a salt of smaller birds.

  Hoarsely, hauntingly, the boy took up his chant.

  Shoo all o't craws away,

  Shoo all o't craws:

  Out thrae John Barley's ground

  Into Tom Tally's ground;

  Out o Tom Tally's ground

  Intil Awd Mally's ground;

  Out frae Awd Mally's ground

  Into Black Annie's ground...

  Kit took up a stone and flung it in the birds’ midst. They shrugged derisively; they hopped a little sidelong, pecked. He ran at them, lickering his coat and crying, “Craws! Ban craws!” He clodded them with earth. Huffed as dowagers, they ruffled in their black; they snapped their well-I-never beaks. “Sod off!” yelled Kit. They rose and scattered in the wide grey sky; went silver and were gone.

  Turning back, triumphant, he saw Thea, pinched and shivering among the furrows. He clouded over. They'd had nothing all that day; she could eat nothing when they had, but picked and spewed. Coarse provender, he thought: no stomach for't. And it was cold and muddy in the lanes, her shoes were worn—ah, not her slippers, cast away in ruin. These were new old shoes, clodhopping country boots, ill-sorted with her rags of Lunish finery. And dearly they had cost her purse: her silver comb. Now he saw how odd her clothing looked, how tattery. Half tinsel and half drab. He'd thought of it as hers. Herself. How strange that started brush of hair, that boys cried Vixen! At. Cried whore.

  Seeing him forlorn, she clapped and called to him, “Oh, bravely done."

  He grinned and wiped a sword of air and sheathed it. “My turn for the boy,” he said. The coat flapped windily.

  "I'll be Ashes, then; I'm tired of Eldins."

  Kit came and held her. “Ah,” he said. “Did I tell thee? I dreamed it hailed moonseed. ‘Twas full and it split."

  "What sprang of it? Witches?"

  "Children,” he said. “All naked as the moon, and shining, as they were made of sky. They danced."

  Thea looked toward the barley-white boy, still crying. Further on, the ashes fell. “What then?"

  "A woman caught them in her apron."

  "And then?"

  "I woke,” said Kit. “And seeing thee, forgot.” There was straw still in her hair: a garland. They were wed each day. Remembering, he plucked it out and gave it, lightly, to the wind. Then turning with her gaze, he saw the boy. “Poor lad, it's weary work, alone wi’ crows."

  Thea said, “Shall we play, and let him play?"

  "I'll not hang ranting from a pole, even to please thee.” He grimaced fiercely, knotting up his brows. “But I'll play thee a tyrant rarely, or a crone or what thou wilt."

  "'Tis a strange play: we clap and they go."

  "But an ancient play,” said Kit. “The first true gallant of the part was Tom o Cloud, who claps the shadows from the sky.” He'd taught her all of that: the names which country folk did give—Awd Flaycraw, Jack Orion—to the sprawl of stars she'd called the Gallows Tree. A bookish name. “Wilt play it naked, then?” said Thea.

  "With a sword,” said Kit. He sang the old tune from the masque, the woodwo's brag:

  Orion wears a coat of sparks

  And starry galligaskins

  But men may see what man I be

  Without my first dismasking...

  They were walking toward the crow lad's coign. The earth by the headland was scratched with mazes, glittering with shards of hoarded glass. The crow lad blew his hands and stared. His coat was rags of sacking and his shoes were mud. His hempwhite head was bare, in a ravel of rope-ends.

  "Hey, lad, would thy master hear a play?"

  "Has dogs. And sets ‘em on."

  And a stick, thought Kit. And lays it on. He saw the wary face and wincing shoulders. The bruises. The boy stared back unblinking. He had eyes as green as hail. Kit found the last of what they'd begged, a sadcake and a scrape of fat. “Here's for thy piece,” he said. The crow lad snatched it fiercely and he bit, he crammed. Kit waited. “What's thy name?"

  "Called Ashlin."

  "And thy kin? Who keeps thee?"

  "No one,” said the boy. “I's lightborn."

  "So am I,” said Kit. “We two are Mally's bairns.” He saw a bright child made of azure falling, rolling naked in the dust. They come to dust. The woman in his dream turned elsewhere, as her lap was full. And still the lightborn fell: so many for the world to waste. Not all of them, he thought to say. Not ours to come.

  But Thea said, “And I am darkborn."

  "See'd,” the crow lad said.

  "But he and I go longways, out of Law.” She looked about. “Her eyes?"

  "Stoneblind. Off elsewhere, anyway."

  "But if they follow—"

  "I's a sling o stones. What I do."

  Thea looked long at him. “Wouldst do it?"

  "Owt I can."

  Kit caught his breath, leapt in with, “Who's thy master, lad? I'd have a word with him. Wouldst come with us? Art fast?” He turned to Thea, bright with indignation, mischief, pleading. “He could play the boy."

  "Got work. Hers,” the crow lad said, and becked at Thea. He glanced at Kit's coat. “I see yer ta'en already. Go yer ways."

  Thea said to the boy. “Is it fast, then?"

  "Clap and done.” He spat his hand; they shook.

  Kit stood bewildered, like the child in the basket, whirled round in their play. Thea touched his arm. “Soft, love, ‘tis a game we play.” To the boy, she said, “What then?"

  "Seek hallows."

  "What way?"

  "Gang wi’ t'sun."

  "How far?"

  "While it's hallows."

  Thea stretched her hand out, with its tawny ring. A turn and flick, and it was bare: she held a scrawny orange. “For thy noon."

  The crow lad caught it and he tossed it in the air. He laughed, looking up at it, his bright hair scattering day. “What's ta'en is anyone's.” Kit saw it fall.

  * * * *

  "I'd an Ashes bairn,” said Whin. Her turn, gazing through the fire, chin on close-hugged knee. “And left him. Naked as he came, for owt as found him. Craws or kin.” And in a raw voice, small and wretchedly, she cried, “They would've cut his throat.” Still raw. As if a horny hand, a sailor's or a drystone waller's, cracked and bled. “Me mam and her gran would. For t'harvest. Starving earth, I is."

  Kit said softly, “Was he yours, the crow lad? D'ye think?"

  "I knaw not. Like enough, I doubt.” Whin rocked the small ring on her fingertip. “I cannot tell my blood."

  "Ah,” said Kit. The fire shifted, sighed.

  "Thowt it were guising, being Ashes. When I ta'en her coat. And I laughed that I were chosen out of all, that I could take owt I willed. Whatever lad. So long as I did play her part, walk earth until she waked. So long as I kept nowt."

  Kit looked for the child in her, as black as he was white. Broad cheekbones and a mournful lip, her long AEgyptian eyes. “And you would still be Ashes. If you'd kept the boy. Still hunted.” Coverless as hares.

  "What I is, is Ashes. Same as earth is earth. Her coat that she put on. And when I's doffed, I's done with, breath and bone. No giving back.” Whin leaned from shadow into shying light. “I could ha’ kept him, see."

  The rain fell, water into water. After a time, Whin sti
rred the embers. “Blood or no. For his sake, for thy kindness, thanks."

  "All mine, a hundredfold,” said Kit. “He saved us. For a time."

  * * * *

  Margaret, see. Bright Hesperus, the moon's epitome, hangs at thy window. Perseis her lamp. When I was Thea, I did love that star, her winding journey through the maze, the quickset stars. ‘Tis lucent, there: a brilliant toy, a plaything from a mage's baby house. Burnt Eldin's bauble. Canst thou catch? Let my lady set her hedge as thick as gramarye, as high as ravens cry, the light will in at it.

  In April of that wandering year, I spied a comet. In the Crowd of Bone it hung, toward Ninerise, in a thaw of fleeting snow. I waked and saw it, like a pearl dissolving in black wine; I drank that cup, light full of thee. And thou didst leap to it.

  I knew then that I went with child.

  * * * *

  Thea turned at the waystone, calling. What she said was blown away. And still she turned on the hillside, at the twelve winds’ nave; the fellies of the wheel were hills. “What's that?” said Kit, coming breathless behind.

  "Those folk. Here's all their petticoats away."

  It rained, a hill beyond them and a hill behind: a cold fine windy rain. From the ragwell, where they stood in light, they saw the stormdark clouds onsailing. They were tall and tattery, their skirts of ragged silver draggling heedless through the hills. Then the thorn tree shivered in its rags; the spring winced light, it puckered with a sudden doubt. The sky darkened and a hail came on: small hail, but sharp and green. Kit cowered from it. Thea ran to it and whirled about, catching hailstones in her hands. They filled them, greener as they massed, bluegreen.

  "Come back,” called Kit. “Hey, Thea?” And he came a few steps, blindly, in the shattering of the hail. How it danced and it daunted, how it hissed and rattled on the ground. It beat him blind, it stung. “Hey!"

  "Catching souls,” she called.

  As sudden, it was past. The hill was white: a spring made glass, the sky made soul and shattered. Slateblue to the eastward, slashed with rain, the heels of storm rolled onward. All above, the lift was blue. He shook himself. Thea's head was haily crowned; it glittered when she turned. Her neck was bare. She flung her hoard of stones away. They scattered on the earth like seed. Cold seed, he thought. No crows would take. A cloud away, a rainbow sprang. It spanned the storm. She clapped her wizened hands and laughed. “Do you turn and I'll dance to it."