The Sisters of the Winter Wood

by Rena Rossner

  Sasha lifted off

  and took to the sky

  with me on his back

  and brought me home.

  I see it all

  over and over again

  playing in my head

  like a broken memory.

  Was there anything

  I could have done

  differently?

  Laya! Laya!

  I hear a voice.

  My eyes flutter open

  but they are

  heavy heavy heavy.

  Everything hurts.

  Did you miss me?

  Hug me, Laya-bell.

  I tried to get you fruit;

  I am the fruit now.

  I open my eyes

  and see my sister—

  she is battered and bruised.

  Please, Laya, she says,

  take this fruit

  from my flesh;

  no one else can.

  My hands reach up to my hair.

  I want to tear it out at the root.

  What have you done? I rasp.

  Have you tasted of the fruit?

  Liba shakes her head.

  I did not taste, though they

  beat and bound me;

  they pinned me down

  and shoved fruit on me.

  But I resisted.

  They are gone now, Laya.

  Kiss my skin, she says.

  Lick it off me—

  I can heal you.

  There is so much

  we need to say, I think,

  and shake my head,

  No, no, no.

  My throat still hurts.

  I do not want

  your light hidden, I say,

  your spark destroyed.

  I do not want you undone

  in my undoing, ruined

  in my ruin ruin ruin.

  Let me save you, Liba says.

  Only I can.

  She lies beside me;

  my arms reach for her.

  I taste her skin.

  I lick the fruit

  from her arms,

  and her face.

  I rid her

  of the poison

  that I brought

  upon us all.

  But my lips burn.

  They scorch.

  The juice

  is wormwood

  on my tongue.

  Something is wrong

  wrong wrong.

  I start to writhe and twist.

  I rip at the dress

  that binds me.

  I beat my breast,

  and bare it.

  Like a torch, my hair

  lights up the room.

  It is a mane,

  it is a crown.

  I reach my arms

  to the sun.

  I am a caged thing

  freed freed freed.

  85

  Liba

  There are many types of love. But there is nothing like a sister. Mine is a golden swan. She is long and lithe and her wingspan fills the room. She is glorious. She is free. I watch her flit and fly.

  The door bursts open. Ruven sees me on the bed, my dress torn, my skin bruised. I am covered in what looks like blood to him and there is a swan flying above me. He growls in rage, gets down on all fours, pawing at the ground, shifting, ready to pounce on Laya.

  I open my mouth to scream, but there’s a knock at the door. “Liba!” a voice says. “Liba! Are you in there?”

  Ruven lets out an unearthly roar and the door swings open.

  Dovid is there, rifle ready, wearing a fur cloak. But he sees Ruven first, a real bear, and he thinks he knows the difference. He fires a shot.

  Laya flies around the room in a frenzy, golden and white feathers rain down.

  My hand goes to my mouth but it is too late. I am about to scream but it comes out as a growl that turns into a roar. I can smell Ruven’s blood and the way it wets his fur. This was not supposed to happen. Not like this. My bones pop; the aches and bruises fade into hurt of a different sort. But I close my eyes and force the shift away. Not here, not now, not in front of Dovid.

  Dovid is a beast for acting without thinking, but what was he supposed to do? He saw a bear, and in his eyes it was the bear that has been stalking our woods all this time—the bear that was in our house, the bear that may have mauled and killed Jennike and Mikhail. I didn’t want to go to Kupel with Ruven and Alter, not really, but I don’t want Ruven to die. I want to get to know him, just a little bit. If what he says is true, the death of a real Berre Chassid when there are so few of us left may be more of a tragedy than I realize. No matter which way of life I choose in the end, it is clear to me now. There are many different kinds of beasts in this world.

  Dovid’s hand trembles and his eyes go wide as Ruven shifts back from a bear into a man, naked and covered in blood.

  He cries out in horror.

  “What have you done?” I roar at him and rip the gun from his hands. I close my eyes, but I can’t hold it back anymore. I get down, panting on the floor.

  “Liba … What’s wrong? Did I hurt you? How? I … I don’t understand. Oh God, what is he? What’s wrong with you? What’s going on?” He looks terrified, as though he wants to flee. “There’s a mob of men with torches on the river!” he says. “I came from there. Oh God, what have I done?”

  I reach my hands to him, but then I see what he sees. Hands that are claws, and brown fur. And suddenly I am too tired to control anything. I let the change come. He will see everything. Girl and beast and girl again.

  Panic-stricken he looks from me to Ruven and back again, but it is too late. There are no more secrets.

  86

  Laya

  There is blood on the floor

  and a man who is a bear.

  My sister is a bear too.

  She is beautiful and strong.

  I am a thing of feathers.

  I want to cry

  but I don’t know how.

  Where I felt free

  I now feel trapped.

  A man lies bleeding

  and my sister hurts;

  the pogrom has come;

  we will all die

  and there is nothing

  I can do about it.

  I don’t know

  how to become

  a girl again.

  I am just a swan now.

  A bird.

  A thing of feathers and air.

  What can I possibly do?

  Sasha came,

  and then he left.

  He said

  he’d come back

  with all the swans.

  Everyone makes promises.

  My sister is the only one

  who keeps them.

  I know what I must do.

  I fly up out of the house

  onto the roof.

  I open my beak

  and I let out a cry.

  87

  Liba

  Ruven’s head is cradled in my lap. He’s still breathing, but he struggles.

  The door bursts open, and there before me are my parents.

  “Mami? Tati?” My hand is over my mouth and I don’t know if I should cry or scream. I look from one of them to the other and back again. They look pale, haggard, and haunted.

  Alter is behind them. “I went to find them. A swan showed me the way,” he says.

  “Ruven!” Tati says. “Ribbono shel Oylam, what happened?” He rushes to my side. “Who did this?”

  Alter goes down on one knee, hand over his mouth; he looks as if he’s seen a ghost.

  “He was shot, Tati,” I say. “It was an accident. It was Dovid Meisels, but he didn’t know. He thought it was a bear attacking me.”

  My father prods Ruven’s wound. “Did this happen when he was in bear form?” he asks.

  “Yes,” I say.

  “Should I go get the doctor?” Dovid asks.

  Alter gets up. “Oh, no you don’t. Not if you shot the gun t
hat killed him.”

  “I didn’t know,” Dovid says, meeting his eyes. “I came into the cottage and saw a bear, a swan, and Liba. What was I supposed to do?”

  I don’t know what to think. I can’t meet the eyes of the boy I love, the boy who said he loved me. “I’ll go,” I say.

  “You can’t go out looking like that,” Alter says.

  I look down at myself, covered in what looks like blood but is mostly fruit, and I shake my head. “It doesn’t matter. Ruven matters—I won’t let him die.”

  “Please—let me go,” Dovid begs, closing his eyes. “It’s my fault. I don’t want Ruven to die. I was supposed to raise the alarm. I was on my way to tell the people of the shtetl that there are men with torches and guns on the river. The pogrom is here. Let me go get the doctor, and I can alert everyone on the way. Please let me go.”

  “How do I know that you won’t flee?” Alter asks.

  My eyes meet Dovid’s. I see only pain. “He won’t,” I say.

  Alter lets him go. “It’s on your head, prietzteh, if he disappears.”

  I swallow and nod. “Dovid, listen. What you saw here tonight … Know that people aren’t always what they seem.” I hear Mami’s voice in my head again. “You are stronger than you know.”

  His eyes meet mine and I see a hint of understanding. There is fierceness there, I know there is.

  He swallows hard, turns, opens the door of the cottage, and sets off at a run.

  I try to keep Ruven comfortable and breathing.

  “Can you stay with him, Alter? I need to speak to my parents.”

  Alter grunts and switches places with me.

  I launch myself into my father’s arms. He catches me, and I feel his body convulse against mine. He is crying. Why is my father crying?

  “They’re gone, Liba. Everyone’s gone … There’s nothing left.”

  “What?” I don’t understand.

  “Kupel. First the Rebbe, he was niftar when we got there, but after Kishinev, they came to Kupel. They put everyone into the shul …” He shakes his head. “It’s all gone, Liba. Burnt to the ground. Everyone … Six hundred Jews …”

  I don’t know what to say.

  I look over at Mami and I see that she is crying too. I hug her to me.

  “Tati, listen: the kahal organized the Jews of Dubossary to fight back tonight. But is there anything you can do to save Ruven?” I ask, looking up into my father’s eyes which are so very like my own.

  He shakes his head. “Even the shift cannot heal a gunshot wound, and he is too weak to try it.”

  “Okay, so we wait for the doctor,” I say. “Is there anything I can do?” I look from my father to Alter. “Some kind of tea I can brew? A bandage? A salve?”

  “Sage, oregano, and lavender,” Mami calls out. She is climbing the ladder.

  Laya! I forgot about her! Is she on the roof? But Mami is here now—she can help her better than I can.

  I go to the kitchen to start brewing hot water and crush the herbs. And I hear the call. It’s Mami. And I know then that I’ve heard the sound before. I just never knew what it was.

  She trumpets out a sound like the honk of an instrument. It is so loud I think that all the village must hear her. She sounds it again and again and I know that she is calling them home.

  Alter stiffens. “What is she doing?”

  I can’t help the grin that spreads across my face. “She’s calling the swans,” I say.

  “The swans?” Alter grunts. “Ruven is bleeding out on the floor and she calls swans? Swans were what got us into this mess.”

  “No. A swan helped you find my parents. And these aren’t just any swans. One of them is my sister,” I say. “She needs help too. She is not well. She needs her family.”

  Tati shakes his head. “What happened to her? Why is she ill?”

  “It’s a long story …” I say.

  “They are not her family,” Tati mumbles.

  “She needs them right now. It’s been a long time without you, and much has happened.”

  Tati takes a look at me. “You don’t look so good yourself.” He turns to Alter. “Altisch. Oy, Altisch. When I got there …” He shakes his head. “Everything was gone … everyone … Nothing’s left. Everyone … everything is ash …” Father starts to sob again and bites his thumb. “You and Ruven are all that’s left.”

  Alter looks shocked. He is white now too. I feel as though all the ghosts of Kupel are spinning around our cottage, all the memories, specters of all the Jews who went up in the sky with the smoke.

  Alter embraces my father. They cry onto each other’s shoulders. It is not something I have ever seen my father do. Not even at a funeral. My stomach hurts like I’ve been punched. There is too much sadness here. Too much sorrow. I go back to the kitchen to brew the tea because I don’t know what else to do.

  Is that what will happen to Dubossary tonight? Is fire to be our fate? I set more water up to boil, then bring a cup of tea and sit beside Ruven. I place a tea-soaked rag at his lips. “Try to drink from this,” I say. I take a second rag and dip it in the brew, then place it on his wound. He winces and his whole body arches up in pain.

  “I’m sorry,” I say. “So sorry.” His eyes flutter open and he sees me. I don’t want him to die. That’s all I can think. I don’t know what will be with Dovid, but I do want a chance to get to know Ruven. He and Alter and Tati are all that’s left of Kupel, of my father’s people. We are all that remains of the Berre Chassidim. We must live. We must find a way to survive.

  There’s a knock at the door. “The doctor!” I say.

  “I came as fast as I could,” Dr. Polnikovsky says, breathless. He has his daughter with him. Dovid is just behind them.

  Alter nods his head at Dovid and Dovid returns the gesture. “I have to go back,” he says. “The men have gathered by the river; they’re preparing for a battle.” He looks to Alter for permission.

  “Go,” Alter says. “Chas ve’shalom this should become another Kupel.” He catches his breath and can say no more.

  Dovid looks at me. I know there is so much he wants to say, but he turns and runs back out the door and to the river.

  “I boiled water,” I tell the doctor, “and this is tea I brewed with sage, oregano, and lavender.”

  “I need you all to clear out so that I can work on him in peace,” the doctor says. “My daughter will assist me.”

  “If you need anything, we will be just outside the door,” I say.

  As soon as we get outside, we hear the flapping of wings. First a dozen swans land upon our roof, then another dozen come, then a hundred, and more. The sky above us darkens. We run down to the river bank and we see them: fifty men making their way down on a barge, holding torches, wielding pistols, but they are all looking at the sky—as awestruck as we are.

  I see the Jews of Dubossary lining the banks of the river, dressed in furs, each one primed and ready for a fight. I think of Mami’s stories about Saint Anna of the Swans.

  For a moment, it seems like anything is possible. I blink, and suddenly the men of our town each take on a shape, a form: Isser the Cobbler’s son is a fox; Heshke the Cooper is a wolf; Reb Motel the Silent is a bison; Shmulik the Knife is a nighthawk; Pinny Galonitzer is an elk; and Dovid, my Dovid, is a bear.

  My heart soars.

  I blink and they’re men again, just men, but I feel as if I’ve seen into their souls and I know—and I know that they know—that we will survive, because being a Jew is worth fighting for.

  The swans dip towards the barge, surrounding it in a sea of white feathers. The men cross themselves and drop their torches into the river. They are crying and trembling with fear. The boat starts to turn around.

  88

  Laya

  The swans surround me

  like in my dream.

  But there are more of them now.

  More than ever.

  They fill the sky—

  it is glorious.

  Mami sp
eaks to them.

  She asks why they

  did not come sooner.

  Why were they

  not watching over me?

  They were! I honk,

  and everyone looks at me.

  I want to put my hand

  over my mouth.

  But I don’t have a hand

  only wings.

  I can’t believe the sounds

  that come from me.

  But they seem

  to understand.

  When I was held captive

  by the Hovlins, I say,

  a swan took me away from there

  and brought me home.

  Why was no one here

  to witness her transformation?

  Or is this not the first time

  you have changed? Mami asks me.

  It’s not the first time, I say.

  So much happened

  while we were away,

  dochka, Mami says.

  Dmitry comes forward.

  She was inside a cottage

  full of bears, he says.

  We were not going

  to enter.

  Do you betray your own kind?

  Mami is fierce in her anger.

  A different swan

  steps forward. Sasha.

  I was watching, he says.

  I’ve been watching her for years.

  My name is Sasha.

  She was not in danger,

  and I have not forgotten, he says.

  I never will.

  Well, when did you plan

  on showing up? Mami says.

  A war between the bears

  and the swans at this point

  is not advisable,

  Dmitry says.

  My daughter is not a pawn.

  Mami’s voice has an edge to it,

  sharp sharp sharp like a knife.

  Enough! I scream

  and it comes out

  like a trumpet shriek.

  Can someone please

  help me become

  myself again?

  They all look at me.

  I do not know

  how to change back,

  I whisper.

  89

  Liba

  We stand in wonder at the river bank and watch the boat retreat. The men of Dubossary raise their voices in a cheer. I look at my father, but his face is streaked with tears.