Foxfire, Wolfskin

by Sharon Blackie

  He blinked, bemused, as Isobel danced over with a steaming cup of freshly percolated coffee.

  ‘You … well, I must say, you seem very cheerful this morning.’

  ‘Yes, darling. I do, don’t I?’

  Rob smiled up at her helplessly. He really didn’t understand Isobel; not now, and not on the day they’d met – thirteen years ago – at the party his flatmates had insisted on throwing after their final exams. She had burst into the room at midnight like a blazing red star, and he hadn’t been able to take his eyes off her. She had stroked his floppy brown hair back from his forehead, gazed deeply into his black eyes, and called him ‘alone and palely loitering’. At the time he’d had no idea what she meant, though he’d wondered if perhaps it had something to do with the fact that he’d been feeling a bit nauseous after one too many glasses of Tony’s rum punch. It had certainly deprived him of the capacity for intelligible speech. He had been perplexed, but smitten. Even then, he suspected that he’d turn out to be a bit of a disappointment to Isobel in the long run, but when she got an idea into her head there was little short of an earthquake that could shift it. So they’d been married within six months, and everything had gone quite smoothly until they’d decided to try for a baby. He sighed. That was when it had all begun to fall apart. And no matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t seem to find anything to do which might make it better. The one thing she needed – a man to fertilise her eggs – was the one thing he couldn’t give her. And no matter how he tried to approach the subject, it was something she simply refused to talk about.

  So he watched now, groggy, mystified, as she sailed around the kitchen and eventually placed before him an enormous platter of fried eggs, bacon, tomatoes and mushrooms. Some strange new charm she was wearing around her neck dangled for a moment over the plate – something golden but curiously furry – but then she sashayed back to the counter and popped bread into the toaster; she swayed from side to side to the jaunty rhythm of Bill Withers’ ‘Lovely Day’, which trumpeted from the radio like a herald of good things to come. Entranced, Rob followed her with his eyes, and the forkful of food that he had been conveying to his mouth missed completely, smearing bright yellow yolk all across his jaw.

  At around six o’clock Rob entered the barn, basket in hand, whistling tunelessly as he crept over to the chicken enclosure. He didn’t know where Isobel had got to, so he had thought he’d just collect the eggs and put the chickens to bed, to save her the job. Do something nice for her, in return for the very fine breakfast she’d produced that morning. As he headed for the nest boxes at the back of the barn he noticed to his surprise that the broody coop had been set up in the corner, inside a small mesh run to keep the other hens – and Clarence – out. He bent down and peeked in. Yes, there was a hen in there, and as far as he could tell in the shadowy gloom it appeared to be Hattie. He raised an eyebrow; Isobel had obviously had a change of heart. She really had been in a much better mood today – almost like her old self, in fact. He blushed to remember the afternoon’s activities; he wasn’t sure the antique satin eiderdown on their bed would ever fully recover. It had been a long, long time.

  Rob moved in closer to check on the contents of the food and water containers inside the run, when something in the nest box caught his eye. He clambered down onto his hands and knees, and squinted into the darkness where Hattie sat, flat and still. And he blinked. Because, bulging out from under Hattie’s right wing was something that looked suspiciously like a large blue egg. A seriously large blue egg. Rob closed his eyes and shook his head vigorously, but when he opened them again it was still there. And what’s more, the egg – if that was what it was – appeared to be emitting a faint glow. He reached out a hand to open the run, when he felt a strange prickling at the back of his neck. He whipped his head around to look behind, unbalancing himself a little in the process. Isobel loomed over him with an odd little gleam in her eyes.

  Rob let out a small shriek and then snickered in embarrassment. ‘Ah … hello, love. You startled me.’

  She smiled enigmatically.

  ‘I … er … I just came down to collect the eggs.’ He cleared his throat nervously. Not that he had anything to be nervous about. Whatever was the matter with him? ‘You decided to let Hattie sit, after all?’

  Isobel shrugged. ‘She was so determined. It seemed a pity not to let her.’

  ‘Well, that’s wonderful. How nice for Hattie. But …’ he trailed off uncertainly, glancing back at the nest box. ‘There seems to be a rather … unusual … egg in there.’

  ‘Nonsense, Rob. Whatever are you talking about?’ The smile was wider now.

  ‘Honestly. I caught a glimpse of it just now. It’s far too big for a hen’s egg. Bigger than a goose egg. It’s enormous. And it’s blue.’

  ‘Blue.’ Isobel rolled her eyes, and Rob felt himself blush. ‘Of course it’s blue. Hattie’s an araucana, after all. And you know perfectly well that araucanas lay blue eggs.’

  ‘Yes, but have you seen the size of it? And it’s glowing!’ Isobel laughed out loud. ‘No, really, Izzie. I’ll show you.’ He turned back to the door of the run, but she reached out and clamped a surprisingly firm hand on his shoulder.

  ‘Rob, darling. You’re imagining things. And anyway: I think it’s best if you just leave the hens to me, in future. You have quite enough to do around the croft as it is.’ Firmly, she extracted the basket from his hand. ‘Why don’t you go back to the house and put the kettle on?’

  For a moment Rob thought of persisting, but an image of this afternoon’s activities flashed into his mind, followed by the memory of this morning’s perfectly cooked breakfast. He closed the mouth that he had begun to open, and glanced down at his watch.

  ‘Too late for tea. Just about time for a glass of wine before we eat, don’t you think?’

  Isobel produced her enigmatic little smile again. ‘Oh, I don’t think so. I don’t think I shall be drinking alcohol again for quite a while.’

  A few weeks later, looking for Isobel, Rob peered into the barn. She sat cross-legged on the floor in front of the broody coop in which Hattie still appeared to be resident. She was humming a lullaby; her hands rested on the gentle, barely perceptible swell of her own belly. Silently, hopefully, he crept away.

  Being pregnant seemed to have changed Isobel, Rob reflected happily over their usual bacon and eggs, one Sunday morning around midsummer. It wasn’t just the usual clichés – though she did seem to be a lot less brittle these days. Her face and eyes positively glowed, and she oozed contentment and ease. But it had changed her creatively, too. She still kept her graphic design work on the go – after all, along with his soliciting, that was what paid the bills. But she’d eased off a little, and suddenly she’d started to paint again. She hadn’t done that for years. She’d set up her easel and arranged her paints in the bedroom that had always been set aside for their first child. Now the room smelled strongly of turpentine, and was cluttered with brightly coloured canvases which clashed uncharacteristically with the tastefully neutral antique white walls. Curiously, most of the paintings seemed to feature a golden, blue-eyed hare.

  On the two hundred and seventieth day after Easter Sunday, early in the morning, the enormous, glowing blue egg finally hatched. Isobel watched as it cracked open, and out popped a perfectly formed leveret with bright blue eyes and a beautiful golden coat. She opened the door of the run; Hattie squawked plaintively as the baby hare ran through the barn door and out towards the loch – where an enormous hare with identical colouring sat perfectly still on the pebbled beach which fringed it. With a sudden sharp turn of its head, the distance between them shrank into nothingness – and Isobel smiled as it winked.

  Isobel gasped and clutched at her belly as her waters broke, and the warm liquid seeped through the straw and down into the soft brown earth.

  The baby was born late in the afternoon.

  Speechless, Rob looked down at his daughter. She looked so delicate, with her peachy skin and
the strangely thick pelt of golden hair that covered her scalp and dusted the tips of her large, slightly pointed ears. He reached for her tiny fist, and smiled down into a pair of glowing, sky-blue eyes.

  THE WEIGHT OF A

  HUMAN HEART

  Ibor Cind Tráchta, Ulster, Ireland

  EMER: So there you are: the deceitful slut who thinks to steal my husband. Skulking behind him like the coward you are. Come out of there, Fand. Face me, if you dare.

  FAND: Peace, Emer. Lay down your knife. And tell your fifty friends to do the same. Killing is not the answer to our differences.

  EMER: Our differences? Differences? Is that the only word you can find for what you have done? You have torn apart my life, ripped out my heart. The first blood spilled between us was mine, not yours. But mine is an honest blade, at least; there is no deceit in it. Killing is what it is made for. Just like him. Killing is his profession; it’s what Cú Chulainn does best. And maybe he’s right, after all. Maybe killing is the only decent response to such a faithless world.

  FAND: Killing me will not return him to you. Do you think you will win him back by murdering the one he loves?

  EMER: The one he loves? He loves me, and always has. I am his wife. I have slept beside this man for years – I know him. As I know you for the thieving whore you are. Mark me, Fand: do not underestimate me. I’m a woman who is known for her words. For the truth of them, and their power.

  FAND: Indeed. He always says you talk too much.

  EMER: And now here he is. Cú Chulainn, the fearsome Hound of Ulster. Following a fairy round like a slobbering pup.

  FAND: A fairy, Emer? You know better than that. It is said of you that you are good with words, but it is also said you are wise. There is no wisdom in these words; no wisdom in this path of knives.

  EMER: Oh, I am good with words – don’t doubt it. It was I who was crowned queen of all the women of Ulster by the trickster Bricriu, on the strength of my way with words. My husband there – the wretch who has just risen rumpled from your bed – chose me because I was good with words. I matched him, riddle for riddle, when first we sat down together to determine if we would wed. That was what he wanted, once: a woman who could match him in every respect. But his vanity has grown great over the years, and the words of others have no more import than the yapping of dogs snapping at his heels. You will not take my voice from me, though, for all your Otherworldly magic. I’ll take yours from you: I’ll slit your treacherous throat. You people of the hollow hills are full of lies and mockery. And I would have you silenced.

  FAND: And yet your words are not winning him now. See how he frowns at you?

  EMER: He will not stop me, though. He might betray a wife, but he will not set his hand against her. This is between you and me, now, Fand. Just between you and me. Are you too cowardly to face me, woman to woman?

  FAND: I will not fight you this way, Emer: my power is stronger than your knife. This is not about you; it is about my love for him. I have no wish to do you harm.

  EMER: You have harmed me nonetheless. You have broken my life. He has taken lovers before, and still been husband to me. But this fever of love which has come over him, this spell you have cast on him … in leaving me for you, he has dishonoured me before all of our people.

  FAND: Then maybe it is against him that you should bring your knife?

  EMER: Maybe I should, Fand. But somehow, it is your lily-white throat that my blade thirsts for. Is there no honour between women? Would you break a marriage for your pleasure? Do you care nothing for another’s pain?

  FAND: What has been between the two of you in the past is not my concern. I love him. And he loves me. See how, even now, I am the one he stands with.

  EMER: Loves you? He doesn’t love you. He wants you, that is all. He is a man. So everything new to him is bright; everything familiar grows bitter. What hasn’t yet been had is exalted, what is already possessed is dismissed. I was never enough for him. And you won’t be, either.

  He thinks he loves you best now; you’re his newest love, and bright. But in the end, he will love the woman best who loved him first. Who has loved him down all the days, through all the times when love seemed lost.

  FAND: Woe to her who gives her love to a man if he takes no heed of it. It is better for that woman to be cast aside if she is not loved as she loves. And Cú Chulainn might have tired of human loves – but he will not tire of me.

  EMER: Oh, I’m just a mortal woman: straight up, no frills. And I know your kind. You fish for human men for sport, hooking them fast with silver-spangled dreams. And how could he ever have resisted you? You came to him first as a bird.

  FAND: I came to him first as a bird, for I am as much bird as woman.

  EMER: But he was a man for killing birds, did you ever think of that? Do you remember, by chance, the day the two of you met? The beautiful seabirds he killed for his mistress’s pleasure? Perhaps you saw it, while circling the lake on your silky white wings? Or was that before you happened by? Then let me tell you how that story went.

  We were gathered as always to celebrate the feast of Samhain on the Plain of Muirthemne; a beautiful flock of white seabirds landed on the lake nearby. His mistress – which one was it now? Eithne? Derbforgaill? – I fear I am losing track – declared her desire for a pair of those birds. In no time at all, every woman there was clamouring for birds of her own. ‘One for each shoulder!’ they coyly enjoined. And so he brought them all down with his sling – every last white-winged, freedom-loving angel. In doing so, he killed them, of course; the shock of it was too great for their tender bodies. So he calmly handed the dead bodies round: warm still, but hearts no longer a-flutter in their beautiful soft breasts.

  At the end of it, there was no bird left for me. There’s an irony there, when I think of it now. Though this, I should tell you, was no matter for regret; I’ve never been a woman to imprison what is made to be free. Nor understood men’s penchant for killing for sport. But Cú insisted; he would have it no other way. I would have my dead beauties whether I wanted them or not. The next pair that flew by would be mine.

  Well, you know the rest. Along came two white seabirds, joined by a golden chain. I begged him not to shoot at them; these were clearly no ordinary birds. But Cú is a man for the killing; he can never be held back from it once the idea has taken hold. So he took up his stones, and threw them one by one. All fell short – till finally, inevitably, one seemed to have struck home. But it had passed through the wing of one of the birds; they cried out their displeasure, and then they flew away. You were that bird, Fand; you, flying by with your sister, Lí Ban. Do you make a habit of falling in love with those who begin their courtship by trying to kill you? Is this the kind of man you want to have?

  FAND: Is this the kind of man you want to keep?

  EMER: He might be flawed, but he is my husband. Mine. I gave him my word. I gave my love, and my life, and he gave me his in turn. But there is more honour, it seems, in a wife’s word; more fidelity in a wife’s heart. I have never wanted anyone but him.

  Why do I cling, you wonder, to what is so unutterably flawed? Is a promise not reason enough? Then think on the years we have spent side by side; the years that have bound us together. I have measured my days by his battles, mapped out my life by every scar on his body. I’ve tended and healed his wounds. I carry his stories, and he bears all of mine. There is something between a man and his wife which is greater than the two of them. A new organism – a conscious thing – that otherwise would never have been born. It will die if we are severed from each other now.

  And what will I be if he leaves me? What could I ever become? I am no longer quite so young. A lonely old age awaits me, Fand, and I had not planned for it. I am too small to fill our bed alone.

  FAND: And a barren bed it was, Emer. At least I might give him the child you never could.

  EMER: You cut deep, Fand. Even without a blade.

  FAND: I’m … sorry. That was beneath me.

&nb
sp; EMER: Indeed.

  FAND: And yet you choose this moment to sheath your knife?

  EMER: My mind is no longer clear. Memory is a trickster book; it opens its own pages at will. And I am remembering things now … He had a child once; did you know? He killed him. In the end, it seems, he always does. He killed his only son. A boy just like him, as beautiful and strong as his father.

  No, you are right: that child was not mine.

  It all began before we were wed – in those early days when first we fell in love. My father was determined; he would not have me marry him. No good would come of it, he said – and my father was right, for in the end Cú killed him too. But I’m running ahead of myself; one killing at a time. My father sent him away, on the pretext of setting him a test. Cú must go, he declared, to Scotland, and there must apprentice himself to the mighty warrior-woman Scáthach. My father, of course, hoped that Scáthach would kill him – but that was not to be. What was to be was that Cú trained with Scáthach, defeated her rival Aife for her, and spared Aife’s life – on the condition that she would lie with him and bear him a son. He’d already, at that point, taken Scáthach’s daughter as a lover, and some say he also slept with the great teacher herself. He wasn’t a man, even then, to hold himself back. Aife had no choice but to consent to her own violation, and he left her pregnant as he’d planned. And then he came home, and married me.