The Stolen One

by Suzanne Crowley

  “I want you and Anna to sleep in the larder tonight. Gather the blankets from the cupboards. You’ll be warm enough,” she murmured.

  “But the wolves,” I protested.

  “We have more than the wolves to worry about tonight.”

  CHAPTER 5

  When Anna and I were little girls, Grace would never let us bathe together. I was plopped down in the sow’s trough, scrubbed with rosemary soap, and then my wild hair washed with elderberries. And then Anna had to bathe in my dirty water. One time Aunt Agnes walked in with news that Christian needed a salve for a badger bite. “If you treat her such, how can she ever be one of us?” And from then on Anna went first. But we both knew that nothing had really changed. What would possess a mother to love a daughter who was not her own above the one who was? Yes, she loved Anna. But I was set apart. I received all the slaps, the reproval, the hugs and kisses. And Anna was never touched for good nor bad.

  “You’ll never leave me, will you?” Anna asked. We leaned together for comfort, shivering under the blankets in the darkness of the larder. A willow warbler cried out. And then a wolf howled, as if answering its call.

  I squeezed Anna’s hand. I knew she would not be able to read my lips in the dark.

  “Someone will die tonight, Kat,” she said, her voice suddenly sounding clear, beautiful, haunting. “I hear hymns being sung. Burial hymns.”

  I turned to her and shook my head. The fog must have lifted, for the moon shone on us through the cracks, setting Anna’s face aglow like a snow-white fairy princess. “No, no one will die,” I said.

  “I will never marry, will I?” she asked. “No one will have me.” I squeezed her hand tighter.

  Anna smiled weakly and laid her head down on my shoulder. “I hear them. They’re calling me.”

  “Sleep, Wren, sleep.” She was soon asleep. Not long after, I slept too.

  I awoke with a start, and it took a moment to realize where I was. Anna had turned away and slept peacefully in the straw, one hand tenderly cupping her ear. I stroked her cheek and then crept away as quietly as I could and crawled out of the larder. It was the middle of the night, the time when God’s eyes are closed and anything can happen.

  I stood up and immediately felt a presence. Something was watching me. I whipped my head around. It was the wolf. He was sitting under our chestnut tree again, calmly staring at me. I reached up and felt my hair, my wolf’s-bait hair, and tried to tuck it into the back of my dress.

  He had come for me—I knew it. I closed the larder door and slowly turned to the cottage, looking back several times over my shoulder. He never moved, but his eyes gleamed in the night like dancing stars.

  The cottage was completely dark. The candles had been snuffed, except one lone one in the bedroom. I crept to the doorway but stood slightly back in the shadows. Grace sat in a chair by the bed, holding Jane’s hand.

  “I looked for you all these years,” I heard Jane murmur. “I never thought you’d come here where it began, like a fox back in its hole.”

  “Where else was I to go?” Grace answered as she ran a cloth over Jane’s forehead. “And Agnes?”

  “Over in the churchyard,” Grace murmured. “Died a year ago now. The sweating sickness.”

  “And you didn’t save her, the sister of your heart?”

  “I saved my brother and her son,” Grace answered, throwing her head back defiantly. “Sometimes we can’t ask too much of God.”

  Jane laughed. “I think if you could, you would have let that brother of yours die. Just your luck to have it the other way around now, isn’t it?”

  “You know nothing,” Grace said.

  “I know enough. I saw you two that time. I saw how you looked at him. You hated him.” Jane laughed.

  “I have forgiven him,” Grace said as she continued to cool Jane’s forehead. “It was all many years ago.”

  “Forgiveness,” Jane said sarcastically. “And have you forgiven him, for what he did to you?” Then she coughed fitfully, and a horrible rattle reverberated through the hollows of her chest. The death rattle. Grace had described it to me before. Once it sets in, there is no turning death back. “It was our lady who shouldn’t have died,” Jane continued. “Dirty hands. Dirty hands. Someone should have looked.”

  I inched forward and bumped something at my feet. The basket of healing herbs untouched.

  “You know I did everything I could for her,” Grace answered. “I had my own cross to bear that night.”

  “Aye, you did, didn’t you?” She coughed again, and this time she couldn’t stop. I turned my eyes away as Grace lifted her head.

  “Drink,” Grace told her. “It will ease your suffering.”

  “Will I die tonight?” Jane asked.

  “Yes. I’m sorry. It’s too late for you.”

  Jane took a long, languid breath. “What did you give me? I see my mama standing in the doorway.”

  I stepped back as quiet as a field mouse.

  “It’s to make you sleep,” Grace said to her.

  “The girl, she favors her father,” Jane murmured, her eyes closing, fluttering.

  “Let’s not speak of him,” Grace said.

  “Aye, he was a naughty rogue, wasn’t he?”

  “Shush. Shush,” Grace whispered.

  “You can’t hide it forever, Grace,” Jane said. “They both have it, don’t they now? I saw with my own eyes. Aye, I did. Others will see it too, and know the truth.”

  Grace ignored her. It was silent except for the wheezing of Jane’s chest.

  “Where is the pendant, Grace Bab?” Jane murmured. “I was a fool to believe you. Aye, a fool indeed. I was, a queen’s fool. But you were a whore. And I’d rather die a fool than a whore.”

  I leaned forward again. Grace calmly stroked Jane’s hand as though she tended a child who’d woken from a nightmare.

  “You’ll never get it, Jane. I’m sorry. No one shall. It’s buried forever.”

  “My mama’s waiting for me,” Jane murmured. “She’s calling me.”

  “It’s time,” Grace said. “Go to her.”

  Then it was quiet. I saw Grace shut Jane’s eyes.

  I felt as though my heart would beat out of my chest. A full minute went by as I stood there and Grace sat, staring at what I knew not. Then she spoke. “Now you can go to Nutmeg Farm. Just Christian. Only bring him. We must bury her. Uncle Godfrey must not know. He won’t understand.”

  Father Bigg used to say that murderers live eternally in agony, for they are the worst sinners of all. But after Emma Townsend’s husband had been killed and left on his doorstep, Father Bigg didn’t say a word about it at church the next Sunday, even though we all knew the murderer sat among us.

  I wondered what Father Bigg would say if he’d seen what I’d seen and heard tonight. Is it right to hasten a death when death is already waiting?

  What did you do, Grace? I asked myself as I ran from our cottage. What did you do? Could you have saved her? I stopped when I saw the wolf under the tree. Behind him in the darkness, the landscape seemed to hold its breath. The wolf knew death had come to our cottage that night.

  I ran through the dark night toward Christian. Christian. He would help us. I knew he would.

  I ran across the downs, hilltops, and lanes till I reached Nutmeg Farm. Several times I looked over my shoulder, expecting to see glowing eyes in the night. But I saw nothing.

  Cowslip Cottage was still asleep when I reached Nutmeg Farm, dawn just approaching. It’s said that a centurion dressed in full golden armor still sitting on top of his mount lies beneath Winn Hill. I used to beg Christian when we were children to dig the man up and we’d be able to live richly off our find. But Christian always said no good ever comes of digging up the dead, gold or no.

  I found him in the orchard, sitting with his back against one of the pear trees. His lambs grazed nearby. I wasn’t sure if he was awake or not, so I crept up to him. But his hand shot out and pulled me down.

  He sm
elled of the night—of ale, and wool, and something else—something husky and raw. “Christian?” I started, but he pulled me close before I could say anything, and God’s me, I tell you, I couldn’t stop him. I wanted him to kiss me, even if a dead fool lay in our bed back at Blackchurch Cottage.

  I melted into the kiss, reveling in his tender lips, kissing him back. It was Christian who pulled away first. Two of his sheep stood nearby watching, their collar bells gently tinkling, and behind them several of Agnes’s geese squawked. “Is that your answer, Kat?” he asked with a small smile.

  “Christian,” I said, standing up and brushing my skirt off, embarrassed. Piper was right. Why, I was no better than Maud Davey, I was. “Something has happened tonight at the cottage. You must come now and bring a shovel.”

  “What?” he said, rising. “What has happened?” I watched as he easily picked up one of his sheep as though it were a feather and put it in its enclosure. When had he become so strong?

  “We came home from the revel and found a visitor at our cottage. A very sick visitor.” I heard a morning sparrow chirping of the coming day. “Oh, hurry, Christian, we must return before the sun is up!”

  Christian glanced back at his cottage, thinking of his father. “No,” I told him. “Don’t wake him. Grace said just you.”

  CHAPTER 6

  There were two now. Two wolves sitting under our chestnut tree when Christian and I made it back to Blackchurch Cottage a little while later. And the new one, a female, growled at us ferociously. Christian started at them with his shovel, but I bade him no. “Leave them be. It’s in there.” I motioned with my head at our cottage, my eyes still frozen on the wolves.

  He started for the door and I called after him, remembering. “Wait, Christian. It’s the plague. I’ll go.” But he had already walked inside. I ran after him.

  The hearth fire was in a full-blown blaze. Immediately we were thrown back by its fierce warmth. Grace sat near the fire, clutching something in her lap, her face wet with the heat. Amidst the red flames I caught a glimpse of gold. She was burning the child’s gown.

  “Where’s Anna?” I asked. Christian stood next to me, so close I could feel the warmth of his wool coat.

  “Still in the larder,” Grace answered. “I wouldn’t let her come in.” She stood up and I saw that she held the linen from our bed. She threw the bundle into the fire and the flames roared up to greet the new offering. “Have you ever buried a body, young Christian?” she asked. Her eyes shone golden red.

  “No, Aunt,” he replied calmly. “Only one of my lambs once, last Michaelmas.”

  “Well, then,” she said, looking over at him. “That’ll do. You’ll be able to bury her.” She motioned with her head to our sleeping room.

  Christian walked toward the bedchamber. “But the plague,” I called. “He can’t touch her. He’ll get the plague!”

  “I have faith. He will not get it again. It’s you I’m worried about, Kat,” she said as she carefully sat back down on her chair, wiping at her brow. “Go to Anna. You need not see any of this.”

  Or she didn’t want me to see any of it. I suddenly did not trust her anymore. Not after what I had seen and heard. But I held my tongue, for once. I glanced back at Christian, who was lifting the tiny figure off the bed. Grace had shrouded her. At least she’d given Jane that dignity. I turned my eyes and ran from the cottage.

  I found Anna huddled in the larder, grasping her knees. “I brought Christian,” I told her. “All will be fine.” But I was not so sure myself. Something, light as a devil’s kiss, went up my back.

  “Someone is here, Kat,” she said, her eyes glowing in the dark corner. “I can hear her. Aye, I can.”

  The shivers ran up my arms as I peered around the empty larder. “No, Anna. You’ve been dreaming.”

  “She’s here, Kat,” Anna persisted. “And she’s come for you.”

  “Who? Jane the fool?”

  “No. Someone else.”

  Christian was walking away from the cottage, the shrouded figure in his arms. “Stay here,” I said to Anna. His shovel was still by the front door, and I ran for it. I picked it up and went after him.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” he yelled over his shoulder.

  “I want to help you!” I called after him. “And you can’t speak to me like that, I tell you, Christian.”

  “I can speak to you any way I please. You are acting the fool. This is man’s work, Kat,” he said more softly. “Go to Anna.”

  “I will not. I want to help you!”

  He shifted the bundle in his arms and grabbed the shovel. “Go now!” he said, his voice low and threatening.

  I stood staring at his back, my hands still feeling the soft wool of his coat as he walked off into the woods. Finally I glanced back at Blackchurch Cottage. My truth, my destiny, was in there.

  I went to Anna first. I lifted her head. “Christian is burying Jane. I’m going to help Grace clean up. You must at all costs stay out here. Do you understand me, Wren?” She nodded.

  “I’ll be back for you soon, I promise,” I said as I left the larder.

  A moment later I found Grace, collapsed on the hay of our stripped bed. An arrow of fear coursed through me as I slowly walked to her side. The smell of juniper had returned, intermingling with the sweet smell of death. I stood there watching her heavy breathing. She stared back at me, and for the first time ever I saw that she was scared.

  “I saw a ghost tonight, Grace, walking up Sudeley Lane,” I told her. She watched me carefully, but her eyes seemed somehow empty. I described the figure and her dress.

  “Ahh, it was her favorite. In crimson, her favorite color. Henry gave it to her. She loved that gown even though it belonged to his former wife, who was a little minx and got her head chopped off. It didn’t matter to her. She loved beautiful things, and that gown was lovely.”

  “Will you tell me now, Grace?”

  Grace coughed, and spittle ran down the side of her mouth. I grabbed a cloth from the bedside and wiped it away. “Who was my mother, Grace?” I asked calmly. “And my father. Who were they? I’ve a right to know.”

  “I’ve sinned,” she said, her eyes starting to roll. “I’m stained with my sins. Can you see them, Kat? My stains?”

  I could only see the signs of death marching its way through her body. “Grace, tell me what to do.” I grabbed both of her hands. They were icy, dead. “How can I save you?” I pleaded.

  “I was already dying, Kat. Of the cancer,” she said. “Aye, and I’m glad of it. God is calling me and I will do as he bids.” She shivered, and I pulled the remaining blanket up to her. “You must marry Christian immediately or there will be talk….”

  I laughed. “There’s always talk of us, Grace.”

  She grabbed my arm with such force that I felt as though a lightning bolt ran through me. “Heed my words, Spirit,” she said, trying to pull herself up. “You have no choice. You must marry Christian. He’ll make you a fine husband and will take care of Anna. You’ll have a good life here, Kat. It’s all that I’ve worked for.”

  “You said you would tell me the truth someday, Grace,” I said quietly. “You promised.”

  “I made lots of promises in my life, Kat. But I kept the most important one. I took care of you. Loved you as my own,” she said.

  Yes, I had known that my entire life. But it was a love hued with many things—regret, guilt, and something else I never could perceive. I heard a muffled sob behind me in the shadows of our keeping room. Anna. Could she see Grace’s lips from where she stood? I glanced very slowly over my shoulder and could see the tip of her boot in the doorway.

  “Yes, Grace,” I said to her. “I know you love us. I know.” Tears began to run down my face.

  “Anna,” she cried. “I tried to love her too, Kat. I did. But every time I looked at her, I saw him and what he did to me.”

  “Who was her father, Grace?” I said.

  “I can’t speak of that,” she choke
d. “She’s marked with my stains. I’m so ashamed. God forgive me. God forgive me.”

  “Shhhh, Grace,” I stopped her. “Speak no more of it.” I glanced again to the doorway. Anna was gone. Grace had closed her eyes. She was breathing heavily, and I heard the rattle. The death rattle. God’s me. “No, Grace, don’t die. Don’t die!” I was shouting. I couldn’t help it.

  She smiled. “That tongue of yours will get you in trouble someday. And you’ll suffer more than the duck pond, I warn you.”

  “Grace,” I said more calmly. “Please tell me. Please.”

  “Your mother was lovely, Kat,” she started, her eyes still shut. “Such a good woman. She would have loved you. She didn’t deserve what he did to her. A no-good nasty beast, he was. Handsome as the devil, and a devil he was.”

  I took her hand and held it tightly. She went on. “Your mother died of the childbed fever, not long after you were born. I tried to help her. God help me, I did. But it was too late. And after she was gone, much later, it was dangerous for you. So I saved you.”

  “Where is my mother buried, Grace?” I asked.

  “You…staring all the time. They never marked it.”

  “My father, where is he?”

  “He got his just rewards.” She laughed. “The bastard.” She coughed again, and I heard a growl. The wolf was standing in our doorway. Strangely, I was not scared, even though Grace had taught me my whole life to be afraid of wolves. I clapped my hands wildly at it. It turned and ran, its tail tucked low.

  “Grace?” I whispered.

  “Go for your uncle. I’m ready,” she said softly. “But do not tell him of Jane.”

  “Grace. You know I heard her. Everything. There’s more you are not telling me. Where is the pendant? She said it was worth a queen’s fortune. Anna and I could live off it perhaps for the rest of our lives.”

  “You do not need it. I’ve given you a trade. And a husband who will adore you.”

  “I shall not marry,” I proclaimed.

  “It’s buried. Buried where no one will find it.”