by Chloe Garner
“So what did your da do?” someone asked.
There was a long silence.
And then the stories started.
It was halting, at first, with girls giving short, hesitant answers that were ambiguous at best, but slowly the details came out.
Heather’s mother had been supportive, but her father had forbidden her from leaving the clan, and her mother had had to intervene just to get her to the midwinter festival.
Jinny’s brothers had taken her pony and sold it to another clan.
Kelsi had taken a beating when she got home, and was only allowed to eat with the sheep.
Vika had been promised to a boy back home while she was gone and came home to a wedding. He wasn’t allowed to take her as his wife until after her womanhood ceremony next year, so for the time being, she was living with him and his parents and acting as a servant.
Men were contacting their fathers and backing out on negotiations for marriage. Older women were shunning them at meals and chores. Just today, several of them had been accused of rejecting men in favor of women by drunk men - both those they knew and strangers.
“He asked me if I was even worth marrying, now,” Jinny said.
“Lyall said not to answer them,” Brietta told her. “That they’ll forget soon enough, when our hair grows out again.”
“I’m not growing my hair out,” Kenna said.
“Me, either,” Kelsi said.
“I don’t want to, but…” Brietta said.
Allie turned her back, clutching her fists. She found Isobel standing not far away.
“Bastards,” the woman growled. Isobel took a step forward, shadows fleeing from her face, and Allie found an expression that matched her own mood. Isobel held a hand forward, and Allie found a thick bundle of leather cords in her hands, cut long and narrow. She recognized what they were for immediately.
“I can’t,” she said. “I promised ma.”
“Gwen and I have spoken,” Isobel answered. “She underestimated the importance of what you’ve done.”
Allie was confused, but fired beyond the need to understand. She turned back to the rest of the girls and found them silent, watching Isobel as she left.
“What did she want?” Kenna asked. Allie held out her hand.
Kenna disappeared for a little while and returned with stolen leather. Allie had raided all of Aedan’s clothes and was wearing what was probably the same loin cloth from the previous year. Their bodies were covered with patterns - place names, clan symbols, anything that struck them, as well as some artistic ones that meant nothing. Allie was tying the long strip of leather around her head after criss-crossing it between her eyes several times and watching as Brietta helped one of the other girls get the leather settled on her own face.
Isobel had planned this. The leather was well-worked with light blue sea shell shards and had a texture that took hours to generate.
“Drude is watching out for us,” Kenna said when she got back.
“What?” several of the girls asked, alarmed. Kenna shrugged, grabbing a cord and beginning to wrap her own face.
“He caught me,” she said. “He likes Allie.”
There were glances in Allie’s direction, and she nodded. They could trust him. Several minutes later, they were ready. The cold air took her breath away, and the infinite stars had the same dizzying effect they always had. It was like she could drink it all in. They wouldn’t stop her.
They couldn’t stop her.
Drude was at the gate and he waved them on, catching Allie’s arm and motioning to the wall shadows. Isobel stepped forward and held out her hand again.
“You might need this,” the woman said. Allie frowned, seeing the glint of metal in the white moonlight. She took it and held it up to catch the torchlight.
“This is Gede’s,” she said.
“He never came back for it,” Isobel said. “If you need to defend them, you should be able to.”
Allie tucked the knife into her waist and nodded, trotting to catch up to the girls.
This year, they wouldn’t be able to just walk down the hillside. They made their way along the side of the hill, along the stones and into the forest.
“Anyone can go back now,” Allie said, feeling the expanse of trees and stars pulling her like she would dissolve. She didn’t check to see if anyone did. The drums and the firelight were in front of her. She heard the soft footsteps on the frozen ground behind her, felt the sharp pain as she lost feeling in her feet, then she was weaving through the sparser side of the crowd, downhill from the bonfires. There was increasing disturbance behind her as the Caledd realized what was happening. The rest of the girls created a wider and wider wake.
And then she was in the open.
It cleared as the dancing men stepped aside to see what would happen, and she felt the crowd of girls behind her, like wings. The drummers picked up pace and intensity as she came to occupy the center of the space between the bonfires, her feet sinking into the grassy mud.
They danced.
With whoops and shrieks, they danced a frenetic rhythm, blue and white and brown in gold firelight. A few tentative men joined them, but the crowd at the edge of the intense firelight was increasingly unsettled. Fights broke out, mostly verbal, but a few physical scuffles showing the stress of the crowd as it attempted to react. A large man stumbled out of the grasp of his companions and into the ring, nearly landing on his face as the mud sucked at his feet, but he regained his balance and grabbed the first girl who came within his reach.
Heather shrieked, spasming away with enough force that he only barely held her. Allie was on him in seconds, the pointy end of the knife against his neck where it met his chest.
“She isn’t yours,” Allie said, loud enough for most of the Caledd nearby to hear her. “She’s mine. Let her go.”
There was a hesitation in the crowd around her, and Allie herself held her breath, not sure whether she had actually done what she just did, then the man growled something obscene and dropped Heather. Allie stood tall as Heather scrambled back into the space between the fires, and there was another chorus of wild cries from the girls, then the world reeled, streaking orange and black as Allie flung her arms out and spun over the balls of her feet, palms out. There was more whooping and calling, and the drums picked up their pace, challenging them.
When she noticed the girls tiring, and when she thought the crowd would tolerate no more, she motioned, feeling a stab of fear that she couldn’t extract the girls all at once. As if they had rehearsed it, though, the girls formed a spear behind her and she charged through the crowd toward the trees at the bottom of the hill. The element of surprise was with her, and men and women scrambled to get out of their way as the girls made their frightening noises. A few tried to follow them, belatedly, but the girls were up in the trees and working their way toward the rock wall.
As they reached the edge of the forest and came back down, Allie was struck by the strange aspect of the women she found everywhere around her. Their fair skin was fully silver in the moonlight, like glinting metal in the snow, whereas the leather absorbed all light, cutting swaths of black across their bodies. If she hadn’t been there amidst the giggling as they’d painted themselves, she would have been hard pressed to not believe them to be of the otherworld.
A shadow split from the trunks of the trees in front of her and before Allie had time to dodge, it encompassed her.
“I’d know that loin cloth anywhere,” Aedan whispered. Allie’s back found a tree and he kissed her, the warm skin of his hands stark against her sides, her back. Her own heat, finally trapped against her, warmed his skins and brought out the scent of him on them. He pushed harder against her and she struggled to find herself. Finally, she pushed him away.
“Oy, boyo. Not here.”
“Why not?” he answered. “Where?”
“Somewhere where I can feel my feet,” she said, pushing harder. She heard him laugh, and wanted to pull him back as t
he night cold hit her with renewed force, but she could hear the girls whispering to each other as they climbed the rocks not far away. She had to go.
He hugged her hard, then let her turn and flee up the sharp slope and begin climbing.
It was easier this year. Part of it was that she had feeling in her fingers for a moment from Aedan, but mostly it was that she was much stronger, and her arms reached things she never would have tried for, before. She heard Kenna hit the top and start helping girls up. Fingers found hers and she pulled herself onto the flat stone next to Kenna.
“That’s everyone?” she asked. Kenna nodded, then flashed her a grin.
“They’re going to talk about us for years,” she said, turned to sprint toward the hillfort. Allie glanced down but couldn’t find Aedan against the dark, then turned to follow Kenna.
Compared to the first half of the winter, the second half was rather dull. Drude stayed at the hillfort when they left the morning after midwinter. The rest of the girls had said wonderful, kind things as they had left, and then Allie and Aedan had sneaked a few minutes on their own as the sun had come up.
“Spring,” he said in her ear as she stood with her head tipped back against his chest, looking down over the clans breaking camp. It gave her tingles, the feel of his breath on her ear, and the idea of being his wife, come spring.
He’d kissed her, not hard, like after the bonfires, but more like he was realizing how much he was going to miss her.
“Spring,” she’d echoed, letting her fingers fall away from his. Gwen had packed away her mistletoe headdress, saving it for the marriage ceremony, and they had ridden home in a quiet, exhausted camaraderie.
Allie had spent the rest of the winter slipping away to practice with her bow and find space to sit in trees and let her mind wander, but mostly she did chores. The entire house had to be cleaned from the men in the infirmary and prepared for the ones that would come next year. For a few months, Allie had almost forgotten the war, but come spring, it would resume. The Romans had made large gains and were camped out in villages and forts across the south end of the traditional Caledd land, and while the winter had frozen them in, Drest would have to turn them back from further gains once the ice was gone.
She spent long evenings with Gwen in front of the fire, mending clothes and sewing new ones, working bows and fletching and grips, listening to men tell stories that took new depth to Allie. Infrequently, they discussed the spring that was coming.
“I don’t want to go,” Allie admitted one evening.
“But you must,” Gwen answered without looking up.
“This is my home,” Allie said. Gwen shrugged, eyes giving her a playful glance.
“You’re going to have to learn to live at that anthill of people that your betrothed calls home. Especially now that he is Drude’s champion.”
“But Gede lives there,” Allie said. Gwen snorted.
“It is unfortunate. If you want, I can make you a great green cape and you can go live in the woods. I’ll tell them you ran away to become a fairy.”
Allie sighed.
“You’re not supposed to be enjoying this,” Allie said.
“Why not?” Gwen asked, feigning attention to the pile of leather in her lap. “You’re someone else’s problem. You know how much more sleep I’m going to get?”
“You’re going to miss me,” Allie pouted. Gwen laughed softly to herself.
Winter broke. The marriage ceremony was an embarrassingly large event on the lawn below the hillfort. Nearly every member of Rafa’s household attended, and the hillfort emptied itself to watch Tavish join Allie’s hands with Aedan’s. Kenna threw flowers and incited the children to shouting. Allie wore her white dress and the mistletoe, with her hair recently cropped short. She was too flustered by the number of people staring at her to notice much of anything else, though she was pretty sure Tavish said something inappropriate to her and Aedan while Drest led the cheering.
They had set up a sod hut out at the end of the stone promontory where Aedan took her that night, long after the sun had set and the moon risen, after the food and the singing and the dancing, after Rafa and his people… left.
She was alone.
With Aedan.
In a place where they expected her to be a part of the community, as Aedan’s wife.
Wife.
She slept in his arms that night, feeling lost and alone in one sense, but like she would never really be alone again, in another. He was warm and his body fit to hers like she had always belonged there.
She cried herself to sleep that night, despite that she had never been happier.
They had planned the ceremony as early as they could, but the arrival of the warriors was still too soon for anything about her life as wife to start to feel normal. Drest had sent out the word weeks before, and the men began to arrive in much the same way that the boys did at Rafa’s school, only Drest hoped to preempt any Roman attempt to take more territory and perhaps drive them back out of some of the nearest villages. There was still snow deep on the ground as the hillfort’s lawn filled with men and their horses and their tents.
Allie saw it in how Aedan looked at her: he was worried about what she was going to do.
She wasn’t.
And then Brietta came. Lyall had no words for anyone who asked about her, but there she was.
And then Heather.
And then Kelsi.
Allie was sitting on the rocks, absently working the edge of Gede’s Roman dagger, when Aedan came to sit next to her.
“I don’t want to fight with you about this,” he said. She glanced at him, not giving anything away.
“Then don’t.”
He sighed.
“I’m not indulging you,” he said. This brought a stir of anger that she couldn’t keep off her face. His dark eyes were watching her closely.
“You expect me to change, simply because I married you?” she asked.
“If you did, you wouldn’t be Caledd,” he said. Now she was confused. She kept her eyes down, watching the men in their waving masses below.
“I’m not indulging you, because I believe you’re strong enough and determined enough to do it.”
She turned to face him, trying to read exactly what that meant.
“Drest wants to see you.”
She entered the main hall a few steps behind Aedan, not sure what to expect. Drest was sitting at a short table near the fire, a thick pelt cape draping down to the floor behind him, talking to a pair of older warriors Allie didn’t know. He looked up at her and nodded at Aedan, who left her standing alone in front of the king. She looked for Drude, hoping for a friendly face to reference, but the king’s son was behind her and wouldn’t be any help.
She didn’t know what to do, how to carry herself, how to show respect without being silly or groveling. It didn’t help that Gede was sitting down the boards from Drest and the rapidly-graying man was glaring holes in her. Drest looked up again a moment later and gave her a smile that she immediately recognized. He was older, certainly, and more worn, but the shape of his face and the humor in his eyes was a dead ringer for Drude.
“It’s about time that we spoke,” he said to her. Allie’s throat froze and he waited a moment, then nodded off the warriors and regarded her openly for a moment.
“Gede says you’re upsetting our ways.”
“Then they weren’t very good,” Allie answered. If Gwen had been there, she would have smacked her forehead with her palm. Allie couldn’t help herself. After all the abuse the girls had taken, she wasn’t going to apologize. Drest’s face winced, but she couldn’t tell why. He steadied himself, then gave her a solemn nod.
“I see. And now I understand several of the girls who trained with you plan on accompanying the warriors to the front.”
“I haven’t really talked to them about it,” Allie said.
“So it wasn’t your idea?”
“Not for them to come, no.”
“Do
you plan on going?”
She hesitated here, then plunged on.
“I do.”
“And what does Aedan say to that?”
“I don’t know. I never asked.”
There was another twitch.
“I see. Do you think that you are prepared to handle yourself? I can’t allow you to go if you are just going to die.”
“I do.”
He licked his lips, casting a quick glance at Gede who had made a noise that Allie didn’t recognize or understand.
“What makes you think that you are qualified, that you stand any chance of surviving, when so many men die?”
“My father and my brothers were killed by the Romans. They destroyed my family and they will kill my husband, as well, if they can. I may not be able to stand in front of them with a sword, but my arrows will go through their chests as well as anyone else’s.”
Drest put his fingers to his chin, considering.
“Our boys spend most of their lives training with Rafa to learn the disciplines of war,” he told her.
“Maybe it takes a lifetime to teach a boy discipline,” Allie answered. “Girls are much faster.”
His face split into a grin.
“They are, indeed,” he said. His eyes sobered. “I take my responsibilities very seriously, little one. Many of my men didn’t come back last year. Can you live with the results, if some of your girls don’t make it home?”
The answer was there, waiting for her, but the seriousness of the question made her pause. Yes. It was what she believed.
“They make their own decisions.”
He nodded again, then gave her a grin.
“I see what they say is true. You have my blessing to go, but the girls who go with you are your responsibility. They fight with you, as you lead them.”