Breath (9781439132227)

by Napoli, Donna Jo

  No one pays us mind as we cross the east bridge—an old woman and a thin boy are hardly the vision of threat. We go directly toward the market square. A boy ahead of us has dead birds slung over his arm, tied by their feet. He calls out his goods, and a woman leans from a window and tells him to come inside for a sale. Once he goes through the doorway, the road is deserted.

  The market square is only slightly more active. The booths of the local merchants—with their handicrafts and meats and vegetables—have closed down for the midday meal by the time we get there. But traveling merchants rent booths for the whole day, and they have nowhere to go for their meal, unless they can afford the food sold in the inn or in the ground floor of the Rathaus, the town hall. So most of them sit in clusters, keeping an eye on their booths, as they wait for the afternoon shoppers.

  Their children—three of them—throw dice in the dirt. When they see us, they come running, their greedy beggars’ hands extended, filth flaking from their hair. Großmutter pulls a ball of yarn from her cloth sack and gives it to them. Did she prepare it just for this? They take it and beg for more. When they see she’ll give nothing else, they go back to their game. Not for an instant did they give evidence of even noting my existence. They’ve seen many more farm boys like me than I’ve seen beggar boys like them; they know a boy like me carries nothing.

  We pass by piles of salted herring and cod from the North Sea, and furs from Sweden, amber from Russia, lumber from Poland, flax from Prussia. We pass by sacks of raw wool from London, way across the water, and tables of minerals from Brugge, in Belgium.

  In the past I’ve ogled these things. But now my eyes race on in search of damask and colorful rugs. Where is that merchant with the Arab goods? I take a long drink from the fountain in the center of the market square and go back to searching.

  Finally we find a booth with a large sack of peppercorns. The merchant is munching on boiled beets. There are no gaudy Arab goods here, only open sacks arranged in two parallel lines. But the merchant washes down his beets with beer from a jug I recognize.

  I step forward.

  Großmutter catches my elbow and squeezes. She moves ahead of me. “Enjoying that, are you?” she asks the merchant.

  “It lets itself go down easy, that’s the Lord’s truth,” he says.

  She looks in another bag.

  The merchant sets his meal aside and stands over her. “Ginger,” he says. At the next bag he says, “Cloves.” Then, “Nutmeg.”

  But before he can label the next bag, I’m saying, “Cinnamon.”

  The merchant nods at me.

  “And what’re these little dried leaves?” asks Großmutter. “They’re an odd color.”

  “Ah, that’s saffron. It costs seven times the price of those peppercorns you were looking at. A speck colors a whole pot of water gold.” He puts a hand on a hip. “How much do you need?”

  “My grandson already bought the spices I needed—a handful of peppercorns for that jug of beer you’re swilling.”

  The merchant smiles. “Nice lad, he was. Good looking, too.” He crosses his arms at his chest. “So, what can I do for you?”

  “Where’d you get these goods?”

  “Why’re you asking?”

  “This lad here is my grandson too.” She pulls me to her side. “I have four.”

  The man nods at me again.

  “He’s sickly, though. He needs medicine.”

  The man looks at her. Then he opens his eyes like he’s finally understood. “Eastern medicine, is that what you’ve come for?”

  “Arab medicine.”

  “That’s what I meant. Arab medicine.” He shakes his head. “I’m not an alchemist. For that you’d have to go to Hannover.”

  “Have you been to Hannover?” I burst out.

  “Just come from there.”

  “Did you hear a piper? A dandy, dressed in red and green and yellow?”

  Großmutter glances at me in surprise, for I haven’t mentioned the piper to her.

  The merchant smiles. “Best music I’ve ever heard.”

  “Then, you’ll want to return,” says Großmutter without an instant’s hesitation. “And you could bring medicine back from Hannover the next time you come to Hameln town.” She opens her cloth sack and reaches inside, feeling around for something.

  The merchant watches her hand in the sack. “I could bring some, sure I could.”

  “Something that cures phlegm in the lungs. Something that cures blockages in the gut. Something that cures salt on the forehead and chest.”

  The merchant is looking at me now. His face contorted a little when Großmutter mentioned salt. There’s a saying in these parts that a child who tastes of salt belongs to the devil. That’s supposedly why we die so young.

  I really had three sisters, not two. But Gertrude was as salty as me, so it was my job to teach her how to survive. Gertrude didn’t listen to me much, though, and she never did learn to stand on her hands. She died before her fourth birthday. She was a year younger than Eike, three years younger than me.

  The next year Mother died. But Mother wasn’t salty. Bertram said Mother died from grief, his beloved mother. Grief because Gertrude had died. Grief because I hadn’t taught the small girl my secrets for survival. I said I’d tried. I said I’d tried so hard. And I had, because I loved Gertrude—and I loved Mother, just like Bertram did. But he didn’t listen. He said I should have died too, years before. He took me behind the pig shed and beat me so hard bones broke in my chest. Every breath hurt for a month. My arms and legs turned green with bruises.

  Großmutter said Mother’s death wasn’t my fault. She slept beside me for a whole year, till she was sure Bertram wouldn’t kill me in the night. She wove a curse into a blanket, using magical knots and plaits, so that anyone who bore me malice would get burned at touching it. I huddle under it at night, even in the dog days of August. Once I dreamed Bertram came at me with a scythe. Everyone knows strong dreams come true. So I’ve never spoken that dream; I won’t do anything to strengthen it. Still, since then two sharp stones have lain under my bed within arm’s reach.

  I look back at this merchant with steady eyes. I’m a child of God’s. So was Gertrude. He’ll know that the saying about salty children is wrong if only he’ll consider my eyes.

  “I could try,” he says at last, “sure I could.”

  Großmutter gives him a coin. It sits relief-side up in his hand, and I can see the cross in the middle surrounded by a ring of raised dots and then letters circling around the edge. It’s a schilling.

  The merchant practically jumps at the sight. His hand shuts fast over the coin, and it disappears into his clothing.

  I’m just as jumpy as the merchant. I can’t believe she’s given him a whole schilling. That’s worth 144 pfennigs. I’ve never seen a schilling in anyone’s hand but a burgher’s.

  “If you bring back the medicine,” says Großmutter, “you’ll get that much again.”

  “Count on me,” he says.

  Milk

  Melis carries in the milk buckets. He’s taken over my job because I came down sick again after Großmutter and I returned from town. She said my bellyache made me weak and that’s why my chest filled up with muck.

  I’ve been lying around with fever for two days. At first I wanted to get well fast so that I wouldn’t miss the boat that’s supposed to take me to Höxter in only a handful of days. But then I got worse, and I didn’t think about my lessons anymore. My belly bloated and was tender to the touch. When that passed, my chest got so hot and heavy it could barely move. All I thought about was air. Life is getting another breath.

  Großmutter says she’s too old to climb the stairs a dozen times a day to care for me. So I’m lying in the common room, close to the kitchen. It’s good, because this way I can see who goes in or out. Großmutter says it’s important that I take an interest in what’s going on, that I don’t get lost in the delirium.

  So I try to pay attention to everyt
hing and everyone. No one else pays any attention to me but her, though. They’re so used to my being sick all the time and then pulling through that they don’t waste energy on worry. They simply go about life without me; I’ve disappeared for the time being.

  Kuh is curled on my chest, eyes closed, purring. My hand is closed over his small head. Every now and then I move my fourth finger to pet his ear, and his purring gets louder. Sometimes I pet just a little harder, and he bites me affectionately. I’m concentrating on not coughing. My throat is raw from coughing, and every cough makes my gut ache.

  Melis puts the buckets on the floor and takes a seat at the table. Breakfast is later than usual so that Melis can eat with everyone and they can all go out to the fields together. He pushes his bowl toward Großmutter for her to fill.

  “Finish the job first,” says Father.

  “I have,” says Melis.

  “Two buckets?” Father slaps his hand on the table beside his bowl.

  “That’s all they’ll give.”

  Father gets up and stands over the milk buckets. Then he swears and goes out the door.

  Breakfast is sausages and lard spread on black bread. My favorite—when I have an appetite, that is. And Melis’s favorite. He looks at Großmutter. “I’m hungry.”

  She fills his bowl. Then her eyes meet mine. We’ve been fearing this would happen. Cows on other farms have been giving less milk for the past month. People have come knocking at the door, talking obliquely of this and that, hesitant to come right out and ask the coven for help. She bites the side of her thumb anxiously. Then she, too, goes out the door.

  “Give me your hand,” says Ludolf, reaching across the table to Melis.

  “No,” says Melis. “I’m a good milker. I’ve got strong hands. I don’t have to wrestle you to prove it. The cows are sick. Whatever’s been going around has finally hit them.”

  “It’s the planets,” says Bertram.

  Everyone looks at him.

  “They’re lined up wrong. That’s the problem with the milk. The folk in Hameln town know it. Johannah tells me.”

  “Don’t talk like that,” says Melis. “Pater Michael warned against astrology. It’s hocus-pocus.”

  “No, it’s not,” says Bertram. “It’s as much a science as astronomy is. The only reason Pater Michael doesn’t like it is ‘cause he’s nearly blind. Much worse than Großmutter. He can’t see the stars and planets, and he doesn’t want anyone talking about what he can’t see.”

  “No,” says Melis. “It’s because the pope condemns it.”

  “The pope?” Bertram laughs. “Germany has never really loved any pope. Our emperor Frederick was actually excommunicated little more than a century ago.”

  “I don’t care about the past,” says Melis. “Germany’s emperor obeys the pope now, and the pope now condemns astrology.”

  “The pope condemns witchcraft, too,” says Bertram, “but you don’t see Pater Michael doing anything to stop Großmutter’s coven.”

  “Großmutter doesn’t work for the devil,” says Melis. “We’re all good Catholics here. That bishop, Albert the Great, who lived and died in Köln, he made a list of which ancient practices were good and safe, and which practices were dangerous. Pater Michael reads the list at Mass regularly. The coven’s acts are not condemned.”

  “Oh, Pater Michael reads the list, all right,” says Bertram sarcastically, “but not every word. He skips any mention of things the coven does that it shouldn’t, the old hypocrite. He was a peasant before he became a priest. He likes all their mumbo jumbo, all of it. Father said so.”

  “What did Father say exactly?” asks Melis.

  “He said our priest won’t banish pagan practices because there’s nothing to replace them with. The church lacks answers to too many things.”

  Melis looks like he’s been slapped in the face. He doesn’t speak.

  I feel like Melis must. I’ve listened to Pater Michael read the list, of course. And I also know that he skips parts of it, because Pater Frederick has warned me against practices that Pater Michael never mentions. Pater Michael doesn’t interfere with our coven’s practices no matter what may be on that list. It makes me nervous to admit Bertram is right. And it makes me more nervous to realize I am as big a hypocrite as Pater Michael, for I have refused to think about our priest’s loose ways. If I think about them, if I question them, I must question my own ways.

  “Dont look so wretched, Melis.” Bertram shoves half a sausage link in his mouth. “What do you care whether or not the coven is condemned? Großmutter should face it and quit. Everything they do is a bunch of nonsense anyway.”

  “Don’t say that. We all used to revere the coven. It’s important to Großmutter.”

  “A lot of good it does her. She couldn’t even save her own daughter’s life, no matter how many stupid incantations the coven performed. The woman’s dotty in her old age. And the coven is nothing but riffraff.”

  “Stop it,” I say, rising to my feet unsteadily.

  Bertram looks at me with a flash of anger in his eyes. Then he laughs. “The proof of the coven’s powers stands right here, on our floor.”

  “Let him be,” says Melis. “He’s still sick.”

  Bertram says nothing. He doesn’t have to; Melis made his point.

  I want to argue, but I can’t seem to find the right beginning. Our coven isn’t doing very well. We held a meeting and chanted charms against the rats, but they keep on coming into the houses, more and more of them.

  No, we aren’t strong. It’s the lack of a piper, I wager. We haven’t been able to dance since our piper died last winter, and so much of our power lies in dance.

  The memory of the piper in the woods makes me angry now. I should have tried harder to convince him to join us. I should always try harder. It s my fault things are going wrong. I sink to my knees.

  “I’ve been listening to talk about the dairy cows too,” says Ludolf quietly. “But I heard the milk is drying up because of foul winds from earthquakes down south.” His words are like balm; the raw anger of a moment ago is instantly gone. There’s no reason for it, it’s not like we all agree Ludolf is right. It just happens that way—it’s the close of the argument.

  The brothers turn their attention to eating the rest of breakfast with noisy lip smackings, and I’m almost wishing they’d leave me some sausage, for I’m getting hungry. I’m sitting on my feet now, my hands pressing my belly.

  Großmutter comes inside. “Bertram, get the ax. We need to build a fire upwind from the cow barn. Ludolf, go find hassock. As much as you can hold. There should be plenty on the east side of the lagoon, over near the woods. And Melis, you get fennel from my physic garden.”

  Bertram and Ludolf are already out the door. Melis looks at me. Picking herbs from the garden should be my job. He’s sick of doing my chores. And in his face I see something else: I’m a thorn in his side. He s the one who told Bertram to let me be because I’m still sick, but he’s angry for that very fact. He suffers a double injustice—for he has to do my home chores because I’m sick, and he isn’t allowed to become a cleric because I’m sickly, so I get that role. But he doesn’t protest now; anyone can see I can’t do the chores. I wish he’d protest. I’d feel less guilty then. But he just leaves.

  Großmutter goes to her sewing bins. She takes out linen, fine linen, the finest we have—the stuff she calls Godwebbe. She goes to her wooden chest that no one other than me is allowed to touch. She takes out a handful of incense sticks. There’s going to be a ritual of some sort.

  I’m on my feet again.

  “Get back down,” she says.

  “You’ll need me. And I’m feeling better,” I lie.

  She shakes her head, but she doesn’t insist. “Drink your tea.”

  I walk to the stove. I’m light-headed from eating nothing but brewed herbs for two days. Kuh walks behind me, practically under my heels. I look into the pot that’s been steeping since last night. A wedge of hog lung bobs
in a mess of froth. Mustard greens and caraway seeds add colored spots to the gray liquid. I drink the whole pot. Then I eat the lung. I wipe the scudge off the inner sides of the pot with my finger and I lick it clean. I’ve absorbed every bit of nourishment and healing power this brew has to offer. It may be working. A hint of energy makes my ears buzz.

  I go to lift the linen.

  “No, no, carry Kuh,” says Großmutter. “Only Kuh.” She goes to the shelf and gets a sprig of mustard and a sprig of caraway, twists them together with yarn, and hangs the charm around my neck.

  This is one of the dangerous practices on Albert the Great s list. It is acceptable to drink brews from herbs. But it is dangerous to wear herbs—or eagle claws—or anything else. “The brew is efficacious,’” I say, using one of Pater Fredericks words. I lift the yarn necklace off over my head. “But amulets and hanging herbs—they’re superstition. They do nothing.”

  Großmutter’s face goes slack. “Is this the moment to question?” Her voice grows hissy. “You sleep under a blanket I wove to protect you.” She whispers now. “Stay with me, Salz.”

  I couldn’t fall asleep without that blanket.

  I put the yarn necklace back on.

  Have I let myself off the hook for the same reason Pater Frederick in Höxter does—because I figure a dying person should be allowed minor transgressions? Do I humor myself?

  Großmutter gathers the linen against her chest. “And you can hold these, too.” She hands me the incense. “That’s enough for you to carry—Kuh and the incense. Stay right behind me.”