Meri

by Bohnhoff, Maya Kaathryn

  “Ah! Ah! What do you, cailin? What do you know?” He fairly pranced in the aisle now, and dew stood out on his round forehead, glistening like the mica in his altar stone. “A Healer, is it? You have those talents, do you? And do you use the crystals then?”

  “Well, yes, sir. I was apprenticed to—”

  “I find that most interesting. Yes, most interesting. Did you know, cailin, that there is, among the myriad legends of this wretched place, one that speaks of the resurrection of the Wicke? Oh, aye,” he went on. “And at the hands of one of their own. It’s a most interesting legend. I don’t believe it, of course.”

  His eyes glowed, belying that. “An inauspicious female shall redeem the souls of the Wicke of Blaec-del Cirke and free them. Absurd, of course, since how can anyone redeem what those fiends never had—souls, I mean. Wicke don’t have souls...do they?”

  He was in her face again, mesmerizing her with his dulcet, singy voice. “Do they?” he repeated, and raised his hand suddenly to her cheek.

  She yipped and jumped aside, seeing, as she did, that he held a star-shaped amulet in his hand. Worked from a metal plate, it covered his whole palm.

  “Ah-ha! See there! You fear it! The sign of the Meri. You shrink from it!”

  Recovering herself, Meredydd tried to resume some semblance of composure. She smoothed the front of her tunic, running her hand over the amulet there. “Nonsense,” she said. “You startled me, that’s all. Jumping at me like that.”

  “No, you’re afraid.” He held the star before his face. “Yes, you’re the one, aren’t you? The Dark Sister come to rescue her soulless cronies. Well, it won’t happen. I’ll see to it.”

  He stepped toward her, the star clutched in his hand, and Meredydd did the only thing she could think of. She grabbed the talisman right out of his fingers.

  “There,” she said to his shocked face. “You see? I’m not at all afraid of it. The Meri is the last thing in the world I’d be afraid of. I—” Her eyes fell on the thing in her hand then, and she saw it clearly for the first time. In the center of the silver, stellate plate was a crystal the size of a large egg, which was almost certainly the one missing from the sanctuary window.

  Before she could decide what to make of that, the little cleirach had wrested the talisman back again and concealed it beneath his robes. “Get out of my sanctuary,” he hissed, “or your situation shall be the same as your Dark Sisters—buried alive beneath this Cirke. I give you fair warning, Wicke. This talisman possesses powers far greater than the one you wear. And I will bring them to bear if you do not get out of Blaec-del. You shall not free your sisters, nemesis. You shall not!”

  He raised his hand again, this time apparently meaning to strike her where she stood. The light of fanaticism inflamed his eyes and Meredydd, knowing there was no balm made that would soothe that, turned and fled the Cirke.

  Intellectually, she knew the Sun was higher in the sky and she had to allow that the mist seemed to have lightened visibly, but for all that the little village of Blaec-del Cirke looked more dark and dismal than it had when she’d first stumbled upon it. Her eyes swept the swaddled street for any sign of Old Mors, but she didn’t see him. She needed a place to sit and think. A place to decide how she was going to go about retrieving the crystal talisman from that horrid Cirke-master.

  A man of God, indeed. How dare he even mention himself and God in the same breath? And to speak so cold-bloodedly about burying people alive....

  Meredydd twitched and rubbed her arms, darting away from the Cirke toward a shambling line of buildings along the street, afraid if she tarried much longer before the sanctuary, she’d be able to hear the two hundred year old screams of Blaec-del’s victims.

  At the corner of the first building she met, she beheld steps leading up to a wooden walkway. It seemed to stretch the length of the building and even to continue on to the next, showing that at least some of the denizens of Blaec-del preferred not to wallow in the mud. She mounted the steps and moved along the facade.

  It was a shop of some sort, she realized, and as she neared the doorway, she saw two men go inside. Screwing up her courage, she followed them.

  Inside, there was the smell of leather and sweat, of oil and tallow and smokeweed. The source of the latter was easy enough to see. A wizened person who could be either male or female sat before a little black parlor stove puffing on a horn pipe, while along a nearby counter, several customers jostled each other for the mercer’s slow attention.

  The shop seemed to sell a little of everything: Foodstuffs, leather, small gardening implements, animal traps, lamp oil. Lumpy candles hung from their wicks all along the fat, low beams that supported the dingy ceiling; long strips of jerky were draped over a piece of twine stretched over the counter; wooden dippers hung everywhere. It made Meredydd realize that she was tremendously thirsty. She could tell by looking, that the only drink in this place was the homemade brew being foisted upon the mercer by one of his patrons.

  “S’good stuff,” complained the brewer, shaking a small-mouthed jug at the shopkeep. “Fresh as the mornin’ dew and ten times as frisky.”

  “Good stuff, is it? Care to explain then, how such good stuff gutted old Tuathal? Man’s sick to death. To death, I tell you. Spittin’ up blood this mornin’, his wife says.”

  “No fault of mine if he’ll drink this stuff on empty stomach. I tell him t’were not for breakin’ fast. Come, Ruhf, don’t be shunnin’ me, now. Ye’re my salvashin’.”

  The mercer laughed. “Hadder ain’t buyin’?”

  The brewer scowled and pecked at the filth that lay across his knuckles. “Didn’t ’spect her to what with her thinkin’ my stuff done foul to one of ’er payin’ customers.”

  “Well, if she ain’t buyin’....”

  “Damn you to hell, Ruhf! Ye’re a fine one t’talk! Every man here knows ye’re the horse what had her filly. Why, if enough of us were to give Hadder that Tell—”

  The mercer, Ruhf, had the surly brewer by the scarf around his throat before Meredydd could even squeak in surprise. He hauled the other man half over the counter while the other customers looked on with a singular lack of distress. “If ye breathe a whisper of tha’ to the old hag, I’ll treat you the same as I treated the girl. Why d’you think she’s said naught of who done her? She knows me fair well, now. Knows what I’m likely to do, angry.”

  “Hadder’d ne’er believe her if she spilt it now, anyway,” said one of the other men casually. “Not after she made up that grand Tell about the magic buck leavin’ its spore on her belly.”

  He wheezed and slapped at his leg. “Gawd-the-Spirit!” he guffawed. “Magic buck!”

  “Only Hadder’d believe something that wild,” chuckled Ruhf, loosing his hold on the brewer’s kerchief, “Half Wicke, herself, I think.”

  The brewer coughed and pointed across the counter. “It were your belt buckle.”

  Ruhf’s grip tightened again. “Which she’ll never take note of. Will she?”

  The brewer coughed again. “Maybe if you were to buy some still—”

  “Buy it?” roared the mercer. “I’ll make you drink it!” And, with his free hand he snagged a jug of the brew from the counter and popped the cork out with his teeth.

  The brewer squealed, the other men roared with laughter and Ruhf hollered obscenities at the top of his lungs, all the while trying to force the suspect liquid down his adversary’s throat.

  Meredydd stood transfixed, completely unwilling to believe that any of these people were any more than a figment of her Pilgrim’s imagination.

  I’m in an aislinn world, she thought. I’ve fallen asleep somewhere in the wood and I dream.

  She started to back toward the door, praying no one would notice her amid the howling chaos in the room. But she would trip over an uneven floorboard and the old person smoking by the cold stove would glance up with rheumy eyes. The eyes pierced her and the gums clamped hard over their pipestem.

  “Who’re you? Wh
o’re you?” The voice was as shrill as breaking glass, as strident as a hawk’s hunting keen. The entire universe could hear it. Every star, every sun, every being that ever lived on every planet.

  Five pairs of eyes speared her where she stood, back to a rough support beam. One man wondered if she’d heard everything said and if so, she knew who to tell about it.

  “Who’re you, cailin?” asked the mercer. “What ye want here?”

  “Please, sir. A drink. I was just looking for someplace to get a drink. A wayhouse?” She gestured at the street with one hand, saw it was shaking and pulled it down to her side.

  “Ye were listening,” accused the old one by the stove. “Ye were pryin’.”

  “That true, girl?” asked the mercer. “You hear aught?”

  Lie, Meredydd. Lie! whispered a fierce voice in her rabbiting heart.

  But her hesitation was enough to damn her. Ruhf let go the brewer and came around the counter. “What’d ye hear, girl? What’d ye hear?”

  He had huge hands; fists like flesh and bone mallets. He was as broad as a century oak and around his thick waist was a studded belt with a clasp shaped like a cloven, upside-down heart...or a buck’s hoof.

  “I said, what’d ye hear?” Her hair in his fists, he yanked her nearly off her feet.

  Blood pounded in her ears, forcing fear down into her heart. “Magic buck!” she cried. “I heard magic buck! That’s all, sir! Please!”

  The mercer brought his face on a level with her own. Bloodshot blue eyes ferreted for the truth. His fingers twisted her hair, making her tremble with pain. “And do ye believe in this magic buck, cailin?”

  “I do. Yes. There’s powerful magic in these forests, sir. I do believe.”

  “Ah, ye say that now, but what’ll ye tell Hadder, if she asks?”

  “I don’t know any Hadder!” Meredydd gasped as he yanked again at her hair. “I’m not from Blaec-del!”

  “She’s right there,” said one of the other men. “I’ve ne’er seen her. And I’d be sure to recall such a fine pretty. You married, girl?”

  “No, sir.”

  He grinned. “My son’ll be interested to hear tha’. Come to think, I’m interested to hear tha’.”

  Ruhf guffawed. “And what difference to ye? You’ll poke anything movin’ on two legs, if it swishes its skirts at ye.”

  “Aye,” muttered the brewer, seemingly relieved the attention was no longer on him. “I ne’er heerd ye ask the girls at Hadder’s if they’re married or not.”

  Meredydd cleared her throat, managing to coax it into producing a semblance of speech. “I’m just passing through, sirs. Please, sirs, a drink is all I want.”

  Ruhf leered and all Meredydd’s hope of slipping quietly away dissolved out from beneath her feet. “Drink is it?” He glanced back over his hammy shoulder. “Okes, bring me a jug of that swill.”

  Terrified and chafing at her own cowardice, Meredydd’s eyes scoured the room for some source of help. It would certainly not come from any of the other men. They watched her the way a pack of dogs watches a limping grouse, intent on her pain, relishing it.

  “Don’t do this, sir,” she said, keeping her voice even.

  “And why not?”

  “You will surely regret it.” Oh, won’t something fall on him? Won’t someone distract him?

  He laughed and glanced back at his cronies. “A threat! The little cailin utters a threat!” He straightened completely then, his crown catching the handle of a wooden dipper that hung from the beam over head. It dropped, bringing with it two more dippers and a metal lantern. They pounced, as if alive, upon his head and shoulders. He let go of Meredydd’s hair.

  She leapt back a good three feet and started to turn, but his hands were fast as well as large. He reached out and grasped her shoulder, yanking her off balance. She found herself suddenly facing the door of the shop and wishing, praying, that she was just now sailing through it to safety. She even gave a half-hearted leap in that direction but just as suddenly, found herself staring at Ruhf’s immense chest.

  “Ruhf Airdsgainne, what are ye doin’? Where’s my Okes? Ah! There!”

  Rudely deposited on the rough floorboards, Meredydd could only skitter aside and stare at the personage in the doorway. She nearly filled it with her bulk and her skirts and her awesome height. If this was Okes’s wife, she was more than his match in stature. She was almost, in fact, as big as Ruhf. Entering it, she impressed herself upon the room, making it seem suddenly much smaller and more cramped.

  “Who’s this then?” she asked, glancing down at Meredydd.

  “Just a girl seekin’ the wayhouse,” said Ruhf. He looked at Meredydd. “It’s up the street. This side.” He bent to pick up the stuff that had fallen from the beams, muttering about “useless girls.”

  Okes’s lady collared her husband and ushered him out.

  Meredydd made to slip away on their heels.

  “Damn,” she heard the mercer snarl. “Where’s that good for naught child when she’s wanted. Gwynet! Gwynet, come clean up!”

  Meredydd paused in the doorway, frozen by the horrific idea that this man was in some way related to the gentle, skittish little girl. As if he sensed her gaze on him, Ruhf rose and faced her, eyes spewing hatred across the dusty, rough-hewn floor. “Get out of here, you little bitch, or you’ll know more of magic bucks than Hadder’s lame-brained get.”

  She got out—fear pouring cold and electric through body and soul. She ran up the rattly walkway, her eyes scraping along the buildings searching for any sign that one of these horrid, grey shacks was the wayhouse.

  It was four doorways up, a little better kept than the other shops in Blaec-del and somewhat more tidy. She tucked into the doorway and found herself in a dark, low-beamed cavern of a place with a huge ember-filled hearth at the far end and a service bar near the door. There were people here, sitting at rough little tables about the room. The only light in the place came from the hearth coals and candles and from dirty, sunlight falling, exhausted, from high, narrow windows in the second floor gallery.

  No one had seen her come in or, if they did, they didn’t seem to care. She scuttled over to the hearth and huddled there, curling herself into as small a ball of flesh and hair and cloth as she could. She felt whipped and raw inside; ready and willing to lie down and give up and weep until she ran out of tears.

  Clutching the Wisdom amulet in both hands, she closed her eyes and gave in to silent despair.

  Chapter 9

  The goal of the Osraed must be to open the hearts,

  fill the stomachs,

  calm the minds,

  brace the bones,

  and so clarify the thoughts and meet the needs

  that no sly meddler could touch

  those he has touched.

  — Book of the Meri, Chapter 9, Verse 72

  Meredydd woke with a start, unknowing how long she had slept. She did not feel particularly cramped and the embers in the big hearth looked about the same; she thought she must have merely napped. Reluctantly, she uncurled herself and raised her head. She was still in the wayhouse and the little village of Blaec-del was very likely still outside its doors.

  Yawning silently, she began watching the room. There were few people in it, and most of them were involved in eating breakfast or drinking hot beverages. Behind the bar worked a sturdy, crane-like woman who, though her clothes were poor, exuded an aura of cultivation. She held her head high, even while cleaning up after her more careless patrons.

  At the end of the bar opposite the door was a staircase on which sat a girl about Meredydd’s age. She was huddled in a misery which seemed no less abject than Meredydd’s own, and rocked continuously back and forth, back and forth. While Meredydd watched, the woman behind the bar called to the girl sharply and she rose, moving awkwardly to the woman’s bidding.

  Even in the half-light, Meredydd could tell she was pregnant. The woman continued to speak to the cailin harshly, gesturing with both hands. The w
ords were lost in the field of chatter and mumbles that lay between them, but the gestures were clear enough to Meredydd. The girl was lazy, they said, had left something undone, had not listened, had not obeyed.

  Her sympathy was immediate. She doubted this poor creature could have managed a disobedience comparable to her own and no one deserved to be derided before a room half-full of people. Not, Meredydd had to allow, that anyone was paying the least bit of attention. That implied the scene was not an unfamiliar one.

  The front door opened a crack just then, and a small, shapeless figure appeared for an instant before the room was plunged once more into shifting gloom. Meredydd sat up straighter and strained her eyes in the direction of the door.

  In seconds she was looking into a pale, grimy face that wore an incongruous grin.

  “Hello, mistress,” said Gwynet and plopped down next to her on the hearth. “I thought you might be here after what happened...” She jerked her head toward the mercantile.

  “How did you know about that?” Meredydd puzzled.

  “I was about. I’m always about. Kind of have to be. Ruhf always needs somethin’ done.”

  “Ruhf...he’s not-not your father, is he?”

  The little girl let out a trill of laughter. “Oh, no, mistress! Whatever’d make ye think tha’? My folks’re dead. Ruhf, he just...looks after me.”

  “He’s your guardian, then.”

  “He gives me a place to sleep when I’m not on outs with him. Otherwise its the stable.” She grinned as if she had not just said something that twisted Meredydd’s heart. “Hay makes me sneeze, so it’s best I stay in wi’ Ruhf.”

  “Aren’t you afraid of him?”

  Gwynet cocked her head to one side and seemed to consider the question. “I s’pose ye could say he’s sparked some fear in me now and again. But if I stay clear while he’s in one of his dangerous moods, well—I’m safe enough.”

  Meredydd raised a hand to the girl’s cheek. “Did Ruhf give you those bruises, Gwynet?”

  The blush was visible even beneath the smudges of soot and grime. Gwynet covered the other cheek with her own hand. “I can’t rightly recall, mistress,” she said. “It means naught.”