Weyward — Chapter 48: Altha

48

ALTHA

I was busy, those last months of 1618. As the leaves turned red, so too did the sky, for a great comet appeared, chasing the stars like a streak of blood.

My mother had often read the stars, and I wondered what she would say if she could see the red sky, if it would have told her what was coming.

Autumn gave way to winter, and the village was struck by fever. It seemed half of the villagers sent for the physician, and the other half – the ones who had not the coin to offer up their flesh to leeches – sent for me. In each fever-bright face – the eyes glassy with pain, the spots of fire in the cheeks – I saw Anna Metcalfe. I saw my mother.

A mistake could cost my life.

And so I stayed up working half the nights, either cooling a patient’s brow at their bedside or toiling in the cottage, preparing tonics and tinctures for the next day. My fingers smelled always of feverfew, as though it had seeped into the fabric of my skin from so much chopping and crushing.

Each night I was so exhausted that I fell asleep as soon as I laid my head on the pallet. I did not even dream.

Neither Grace nor her husband fell ill, as far as I knew, but if they had, they would have sent for Doctor Smythson. They both attended church each Sunday, and though the pews were near empty that winter, with so many ill, I kept my distance and sat as far behind as I could. During the sermon I let Reverend Goode’s voice fade to a low hum, the words running into each other, and watched Grace’s red curls quiver as she bent her head in prayer.

I wondered, then, if Grace still kept the old ways, like her father. If she prayed to Mary for deliverance. Though I doubted the Virgin – who had

been spared the feel of a man’s flesh on hers – could deliver Grace from her husband.

She looked the same as always. The face white and distant, the head bowed. No marks on her that I could see, but I remembered what she had said. That he was taking care not to harm her face. I could not bear to think what lay under her shift. I remembered my vision, at the bonfire on May Day Eve. The blood.

The fever that gripped the village burned itself out by advent, and though snow lay thick as cream on the ground, the church was full on Christmas morning. The villagers sat in the pews, with the ice on their hats and cloaks making them look like floured loaves. In my usual spot at the back, I craned my neck to see Grace. But she was not sitting next to John. I scanned the pews. She was not there at all.

All through Reverend Goode’s sermon, I wondered why she had not come. Had she caught the fever? After the service, John stood with the Dinsdales, and threw his head back and laughed at something Stephen Dinsdale said. He did not have the worried look of a man whose wife was ill, I thought. But perhaps that was to be expected. After all, from what I knew, Grace’s value to him was in her ability to bear him a child, and in this she had failed thus far. Perhaps he would be quite happy for her to wither away and die, giving him an excuse to marry a woman who could give him a son to carry on the Milburn name.

I stood as close as I dared in the churchyard, in case John said something that hinted at Grace’s condition. But I heard nothing: the villagers were merry with the promise of the festivities to come, and the churchyard was loud with chatter. After a time, people trailed off, bundling themselves more tightly in their cloaks and hats, wishing each other a happy Christmas. I felt sad, thinking of the feasts and laughter they would enjoy with their families, while I sat alone in my cottage. I watched as John turned to go and heard Mary Dinsdale ask that he pass on her best wishes to his wife. ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘No doubt she’ll be on her feet by the morrow.

Well, she’ll have to be, seeing as the cows need milking.’ He laughed, a harsh, cranking sound like the jaws of a plough, and bid them merry Christmas.

I walked home through white fields, under trees as bare as bones. I thought on John’s words, and the winter wind numbed my face and chilled my heart.

The next morning, I woke to such silence that I wondered if I had lost my hearing. Looking out of the window, I saw that snow had fallen so heavily in the night that the whole world was muffled by it. No birds had sung that morning and the sun, though weak and grey, was already high in the sky.

I hoped that the villagers would remain tucked up and warm inside their houses, perhaps still sleeping off the previous night’s merriment. I hoped that no one would see me as I set off into that still, white world.

As I walked through the snow, my feet cold in my boots and my hands raw in my gloves, my stomach twisted with fear. Whatever he had done to her, I thought, it must have been very grave if she was not fit to be seen in public on Christmas Day.

When I first came upon the Milburn farm, I thought that I was lost, or that it had vanished. Then, I heard the cows mooing in the byre, complaining of the cold, and I realised that a great lip of snow covered the roof of the farmhouse. I tried to climb the oak tree to get a better view, but my hands and feet could not find purchase, the trunk was so slick with ice.

Then, I saw the dark figure of a man make his way from the white mound of the farmhouse. Even from a distance, there was no mistaking his long, flowing robes and the leather case he carried in his hand.

Doctor Smythson.

I spent the last days of December rising before the sun, when the valley was thick with darkness and silence. As the sky greyed around the edges, I made my way to Milburn Farm, where I climbed the oak and sat high in its branches. I might have been another of the crows, who welcomed me silently with their glittering eyes. One of them settled next to me, its feathers brushing my cloak. Together we watched the farmhouse.

I watched candlelight flicker orange through the shutters. I watched the back door open as John left the farmhouse and walked to the byre to milk the cows. I heard their low protest as his rough fingers pinched at their udders, and the fear grew in me. Milking had been Grace’s job. John took the cows to the fields, which were dark and swollen with melted snow.

Some days, the Kirkby lad came. I did not see Grace. The winter sky grew light, and then pink became icy blue. Still she did not leave the farmhouse: not to wash the clothes, not to fetch water from the well or make her way to the market.

Five days passed thus. Then, as the sixth day dawned, I watched as the back door opened and Grace emerged in John’s stead. I saw her make her way to the byre for the milking, moving slowly, her body curved over itself with pain. I saw her stagger, and then sink to her knees and retch. I pressed my hand to my mouth as I saw the door open again. John came out, walking quickly towards his wife, who knelt in the frozen mud.

In spite of all I knew of the man, some innocent part of me expected him to offer his wife some kindness, to take her hand in his and tenderly raise her to her feet. Instead, I saw him tear off her cap and twist his fingers into her hair. In the dull light, her curls were the colour of old blood. John pulled her to her feet by her hair, and her sharp cry of pain sent a shiver through the morning. Around me, the crows shifted uneasily on the branches.

Tears froze on my cheeks as I watched him haul her into the byre, as if she were no better than a piece of waste. It had been one thing to hear her speak of his rough treatment of her. It was quite another to see it. Fury flowed through my blood like fire.

The next morning, New Year’s Eve, Adam Bainbridge delivered me a gift for the new year. He had wrapped a small piece of gammon in a cloth. ‘There’s something else,’ he said, after I thanked him. ‘I stopped by the Milburn farm first this morning, to deliver my gift. John Milburn has long kept us in veal, you see, and my father bid me to take a token of our gratitude this new year.’ He paused, as though the act had made him uncomfortable. He knows, I thought. He knows how John treats her. ‘John was in the field, so it was Mistress Milburn who answered the door.

Grace. She asked if I planned to give any other gifts that day. I said I was taking a gift to you, next, for the care you showed my grandfather when he passed this year. She bid me give you this.’ He pressed a bundle of cloth into my hands. I didn’t dare open it in front of Adam, and pretended the gift was a surprise – as far as the villagers knew, Grace had not uttered a kind word to me in public for seven years.

He looked at me for a moment, as if he had wanted to ask me a question but thought better of it. ‘Well, happy New Year, Altha,’ he said. ‘Blessings be upon you.’ He touched his cap and left.

I watched him disappear down the path, then went inside. Once I had shut the door behind me, I unwrapped the bundle. It was a fragrant, golden

orb – an orange, I realised. I had only ever heard them spoken of, the fruit is so rare and precious. An expensive gift. The smell of it was sharp in my nostrils, mingled with another, woodier scent. Clove. I pulled at the clove; it was rough against my fingers. I saw that it had not been secured with a simple piece of twig, but a figure fashioned from twigs and twine. It was crude and looked hastily made, but I could see what she had intended it to be. The figure of a woman, with a curl of twine around her waist. A baby.

Grace was pregnant again. And she was asking for my help.

That night, I dreamed again of my mother, as she had been on her deathbed.

Her features were waxen, and the pale lips barely moved as she spoke. ‘Altha,’ she said. ‘Remember your promise … you cannot break your promise … it is not safe. You must keep your gift hidden …’ I woke with a jolt and the dream fell away. I pushed my mother’s face from my mind. A sound had woken me, I realised. I heard it again. A cry that throbbed in the quiet. A crow. I looked outside. Night was only just beginning to lift from the valley. It was time.

I dressed quickly. In the looking glass, my hair shone bright as feathers.

With my black cloak fastened around my shoulders, I looked as dark and powerful as if I were a crow myself.

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