by Rebecca Tope
‘We should never have come so far from the village, if we had known this would happen,’ Edd said, as he watched me one day. ‘I wonder now that we were so foolish.’
‘Hush!’ I flashed back. ‘Never say that. We made our life as we wanted it. Who else can say that, amongst those dunderheads down there?’
He took my hand. ‘We were right then, to do as we did?’
‘We were,’ I laid my fingers on his rough cheek, where the beard was wispy. He and I were still at that time in a kind of amazement at our good fortune in having each other. We had been solitary and strange as children, both of us, and had only slowly drawn together, as we grew to maturity. One harvest time, we had somehow fallen into conversation over our bread and cider, and I shall never forget that day.
Edd had been staring up at the high moors, looming purple above us, the tors standing out like sleeping beasts. ‘I should like to live up there,’ he said, talking as much to himself as to me.
‘I should, too,’ I said boldly. ‘I should like to spend my days seeing none of these people, hearing none of their noise. I should like my own goats and sheep around me, with dogs and fowl and —
‘You mock me,’ he said severely. Then he sighed. I knew that mockery was his daily fare. A boy with a number of brothers and a powerful father, he stood out like a pigeon amongst a crowd of glossy crows. They pecked at him like crows, too, never letting him rest and dream his own dreams.
‘I do not,’ I denied. ‘It is the same for me as it is for you.’
He looked more closely at me then. We were neither of us handsome, our skin scratched from the corn stalks, and hair the dull brown that came after the first bright gold of babyhood. Some in the village had the wiry black hair of the people from further west, but mostly we were red-cheeked and mud-haired. Edd saw something in me and I in him. We looked deep into each other’s eyes — his a green-grey, the colour of lichen. When I told him that was their hue, a little while later, he said mine were like the moorland rivers, shining and brown with flecks of green where the weeds grew under the water.
And so it was that we discovered our own special way to be together and to enjoy each other. I had never dreamed that two people could want the same things, the way we did. We played with words, spurring each other to find images to make our ordinary lives more vivid. We were not clever like Edd’s brother Bran, who could remember more stories than all the other villagers together. We had no great feeling for music or dancing, and were neither of us fond of the sour-faced priest who dominated us before Brendan came, a man who claimed to have power over the fate of our souls.
There was no objection to our marriage, when the time came. Many said it was the hand of God at work, bringing two such like creatures together. There was greater complaint when we made it known that we would live high on the moors, and make our lives there, in solitude and hard work.
My mother, weak and with few months left to her, accused me of heartlessness. I was her last child, and owed her the duty of my help and care. I agreed, finally, to stay with her through that winter, which was only good sense, in any case. Edd and I would need to wait for spring before building our hut and marking out our land and scratching a living amongst the tors.
The day after we buried my mother, we had the priest marry us, then we took up our bundles, and the few creatures we could call our own, and set off to our new home. We walked for three days, circling and debating, before we found the spot.
‘No, my dear,’ I chided again. ‘We did not make any mistake at all.’
Chapter Two
There was no escaping the limits imposed by my weak back. Walking was still an ordeal for me. I could take steps only when bent forward, one hand pressing hard on the central place where the damage had occurred, the other holding the ash wood prop that Edd had sought out with great care, and shaped so it fitted my hand. It left me shuddering from the effort, feebleness overtaking me, as if I had stumbled and staggered the length and breadth of the moors. The pain rippled outwards, down to my knees and up to my breast. But it was better than being a perpetual cripple and I had a firm hope that one day I would be my old self.
When the blessing was at last decided on, we debated ways of conveying me to the church. Even if we’d had a pony or donkey, I was unsure whether I could safely balance on its back. A donkey-drawn cart would have bumped over the rough moorland beyond endurance. In any case, such luxuries were far beyond our means. Edd even suggested he carry me on his back.
‘Oh, yes,’ I sneered, ‘and who will carry the babe?’ Edd fell silent then, and we talked no more that day.
The next morning my mood was dark. The child must be blessed for the sake of his soul. The holy water, drawn from St Bride’s well, would wash him clean. The church stood on a sacred spot, where once a great oak had grown. My mother’s mother recalled to me, in my childish years, the day the tree had been taken down, for fear it would fall on the church in its old age. Before the winter, the child must be protected from the damnation which would befall him if he were to die unshriven.
There was another reason why it seemed urgent for him to be taken into God’s Family. Cuthman had brought injury and suffering to his mother, as he was being born. He had an ill omen upon him from that. There were days when I could scarcely abide him near me, for thinking of what he had done to me. These days had not grown fewer with time or with the easing of my pain. At first, the sweet newness of the babe had overcome my resentment, but as he grew so blithe and assured I came close to turning against him. I would do him no harm, and no-one knew that such black moods came on me now and then. I could not tell Edd that our son must be cleansed of the demon I glimpsed in him. Not then, at any rate.
And yet we still could see no way for me to be present at the baptism.
‘Go without me,’ I said, pretending to a greater bitterness than I truly felt. ‘It seems I am never again to leave this place.’ I turned my face away from Edd’s indecision. The way was steep to the church, with a ford across the river Ock and a stretch of bog to traverse. ‘Unless there be a miracle,’ I muttered to myself. If this great God so badly wanted Cuthman to join his flock, might he not ensure in his own way that the child’s mother be present?
Edd dressed the child, in a bleached embroidered linen gown which had been my mother’s. We had carefully laid it at the back of the hut in a dry press. Wynn had worn it for her baptism. I fingered it for a moment, as it hung over my man’s arm. It shamed me that I could not witness the holy ritual, but when I forced myself to stand and walk to the doorway, I could scarcely lift my feet from the ground. Shuffling through a bog, splashing into the icy river water, falling over the rocks on the cruel hill up to the church - all were unthinkable. I dashed away the tears and chivvied Edd into departing. He gave Wynn one hand, and Cuthman perched on his arm. I had not the heart to keep Wynn with me, although I felt terribly alone when they had gone.
And constantly, throughout the day, I glanced out, scanning the sky and the distant moors, waiting for something to happen which would transport me to the church. An angel, surely, would come to carry me? Once, the dogs all barked from the barn and I held my breath, sure that this at last was the miracle. Mutinous thoughts flitted through my mind — if we had been devoting the child to Morgana, or the great Mother, there would not be this shutting out of the one who had given birth to him. Faeries would come in swarms and waft me to the sacred forest grove where my son would be promised to Wicca and the earth spirits. Whispering to myself, I remembered the hints and secrets that women passed amongst themselves over their spinning, secrets which had to be kept away from the priest and the menfolk who embraced the Christian God so obediently.
The hut was untidy with loose straw. The corn had been threshed and the chaff and straw drifted everywhere. Although the Lammas festival was over and the corn dollies made, I took it into my head to make another, as a pastime. Carelessly, I gathered some good stalks, though none had the ears on them as they do for the real thi
ng and they were mostly broken and short. This would be something different, then. With no real intent I stacked them, weaving others in and out to fix the uprights in place. It became a little wall, like the wattle hurdles we made for controlling the sheep. My fingers worked faster, some magic directing them, some greater magic holding the tiny sticks together. I made two more woven walls in the same way and stood them up, forming a miniature open-fronted hut. Scratching round for further straw, I quickly found the materials for a roof.
Standing it on the table, I moved back for a better view. I could scarcely credit that I had made it myself. It seemed perfect. No gaps to let the rain in, the sturdy little house stood foursquare. It merely needed a front wall with a door and a smoke hole under the eaves to be complete. And decoration, I thought. It called for some elaboration to make it purely my own.
I made the additions, losing myself in the amusement it provided. The decoration consisted of rowan berries from a cluster I had saved for a healing potion, threaded into the walls in intricate designs, as well as a variety of seedheads from grasses and weeds which grew around the house. A row of beechmast outlined the edges of the roof. A home for the faeries, I decided, glancing briefly over my shoulder, afraid that I might be inviting something into my hut that I might afterwards regret.
Hungry and tired, I realised that the sun was low on the sky, and Edd should be back with the children. The church was a good distance away, but I had expected them home before this. The priest would have arranged a small meal to celebrate the new Christian, there would have been dancing and a song or two - it would all take time, I supposed, and there would be no haste to return to the ratty bent thing that I had become.
Finally, they appeared down the tussocky path, weary and quiet. Edd’s arm remained locked for a few moments when he set the baby down, and I realised what a weight he’d carried so far. Wynn was pale, red juice on her face from the fruit she’d eaten. She was the first to notice my little straw house. Her face came alive and her hands reached out to it. ‘Oh!’ she cried, in real delight.
Edd turned to look. I saw surprise, admiration and then fear cross his face. ‘It’s a faery house!’ he hissed. ‘Destroy it! What would the priest think?’
My laugh was a little forced. ‘Nonsense!’ I said. ‘Just my little amusement during a long day. I’ll smash it, if you want me to.’
I raised my fist over the toy, but then lowered it again. Wynn had whimpered in protest, and the baby also seemed very taken with it. I found myself fiercely reluctant to break it.
‘I’ll put it outside,’ I said. ‘It’ll blow apart in a few days.’ Edd made no protest and I clumsily took it up and shuffled out and around to the back of the hut with it. There was a small place under a thorn bush which seemed the natural spot to place it. I set it lightly on the ground, and tried to straighten my back before going into the hut again.
Two things happened. For the first time in over seven months I stood unbent without pain. And something rushed past my head, with a whirring of wings like a little bird. Bewildered I turned my head from side to side and raised my arms to the sky. Then I lifted my feet one by one, disbelieving, my heart stopped from shock. I was cured.
With a loud cry of triumph, which echoed over the moors like the call of a seabird, I flew back to the hut to show myself.
Edd stared at me as I rushed in. ‘I am cured!’ I sang, a madwoman with my hair outflung.
Wynn ran to me, throwing her arms about my thighs. ‘I prayed for it!’ she boasted. ‘Just as Father Brendan said we should.’
‘Then I thank you,’ I laughed. ‘With all my soul.’
‘But the faery house really did it,’ she added, suddenly solemn. I lowered myself to be level with her face, the stiff muscles only mildly complaining.
‘We must not place our faith in faeries,’ I said, gently. ‘But perhaps they have given our Lord a little help?’
She nodded wisely, and I hugged her to me. She and I were restored to each other thanks to the end of my crippledom and I rejoiced in it. We all slept soundly that night, after a day we would not quickly forget.
Chapter Three
Edd attributed the cure of my crippled back to Cuthman’s baptism. It seemed plain to him that the washing clean of the child’s soul had drawn God’s favour down on us. The priest had said something in his blessing about the purity of a newly christened child being a great force for good. He had said, too, that he sensed an unusual innocence in our child, hinting that Cuthman might be special in time to come. ‘He has a glow to him, like an angel,’ he had murmured to Edd, blushing a little, my husband noted, at his fancy. ‘And I think it too,’ Edd maintained, a trifle defiantly.
‘I never saw it,’ I spoke shortly, mindful that where the priest had seen an angel, I had glimpsed a demon. ‘But perhaps now he has been blessed, I shall find him as you do.’
‘It is plain to see,’ Edd persisted. ‘And your mended back is the evidence of it. Can you doubt it?’
At the time it seemed to me that he had heard more in the priest’s utterances than was in fact spoken. It was many times the case that I misjudged my husband and dismissed his words when I should not have done.
And so the months unfolded, and then the years. Edd expected that we would have more children, so that we could care for more sheep and prosper accordingly. Each new child meant an additional flock of twenty or more could be grazed on the moors, watched over by its young shepherd. Edd himself had little feeling for sheep, preferring to grow corn in the good upland ground and mill it into bread. The beasts we did own were mainly confined close to the buildings, foraging on the riverbank. Edd had taught two of the dogs to bring the sheep back if they wandered too far, which was a great fascination to me to watch. The dogs and I had a bond that I valued. Their great brown eyes would watch me, reading my thoughts, waiting to find a way to please. But I never attempted to teach them tricks, the way Edd had done. For me they were friends more than servants, warm bodies in the night and good signallers of some alarm or change.
I could not openly admit to myself or my man how deathly afraid I was to give birth again, but he came to understand and accept the truth of it. It seemed certain that I would once again be crippled, and it was too much to require of me. Despite the miraculous events on the day of Cuthie’s baptism, I was not fully mended after all. I could stand straight, bend and turn, but walking over the moors for more than an hour together would bring an ache to the same place as before, and prevent me from sleeping that night. I treated myself with care, a cracked vessel which could stand no sudden knocks or bumps.
It was a hardship for me to avoid the union which created new life, but I was adamant. If ever I was tempted, I only had to recall the agony I had suffered and I was easily suppressed. If Edd became urgent, as he would sometimes in the warm depths of the night, I found other ways of pleasuring him, which was itself a satisfaction. We remained friendly, as we’d always been, with the shared labour of the land and stock and children to bond us.
Wynn and Cuthman grew robustly, taking their place in the family quickly and readily. My son was spoken of as Cuthie by everyone. Wynn seemed to admire him, with a mixture of big-sister patronage to ensure he never forgot his place. I came upon them one breezy day, in the lee of the hut, playing quietly together. It took me some time to understand what they were doing.
Cuthie had my little straw house, long since forgotten, set down before him, and was poking a large stick through its doorway. ‘Come out!’ he was saying, in his deepest tones. ‘Come out, you faery!’
Wynn was watching anxiously, her hands clasped tightly before her. ‘Oh, Cuthie, no,’ she pleaded. ‘Don’t hurt the faery.’
At first I was amused at their childish fancy. But then I looked more closely at the house. It had been over two years since I made it, yet it was as perfect as it had been on that first day. Slowly, I crept closer to them, hoping not to disturb the game. Cuthie’s rough jabbing with the stick seemed certain to break the lit
tle house into pieces, yet it held together. I gave it my full scrutiny, coming ever closer. The beechmast was still around the roof edges, but the rowan berries had come away from the walls. Instead there was a different design, made of the red seed-covered spears of dock, which gave the walls a bristling appearance. Wynn must have done it, I supposed, and admired the fancy handiwork.
As my shadow fell across him, Cuthie finally looked up at me. Defiance came into his eyes. ‘I not care,’ he said. ‘Faeries be sinful.’
I nodded at him. ‘That’s so,’ I said, wondering where he had learned this piece of doctrine.
‘No!’ cried Wynn. ‘Not sinful. The faeries are lovely. See how well they keep the house you made, Mam. They honour you for it. They told me so.’
I remembered, then, the thing that had rushed by me, whirring so quickly I couldn’t see it, when I first took the house outside. A great fear gripped me. Since the holy church had come, talk of faeries was altogether forbidden. My grandmother had told me she saw some once, dancing on a sunny hillside, but that they were disappearing - going away to places where the humans still understood their powers and the new Church had not yet come. My mother would never speak of them. When I told her one day that I believed there was a tiny faery swinging in the foxgloves beside our house, she slapped me hard on my cheek.
‘How can you speak with someone so tiny?’ I asked Wynn, resolved to be a kinder mother than my own had been.
‘They can grow bigger when they talk to us,’ she told me, with absolute seriousness.
Cuthie rattled his stick again, and shouted ‘Out! Out!’ I tried to peer into the house, but it was in shadow, the stick filling most of the doorway.
‘Cuthie takes God’s part,’ Wynn explained sadly. ‘God speaks to him, and tells him to destroy the faeries. But the house will never break.’