While Beauty Slept (4 page)

I picked up the pail and stumbled toward the door, intent on fetching fresh water from the well. When I walked outside, it was a surprise to be greeted by daylight. The closed-up house had seemed to exist in an eternal night. I heard sounds coming from the barn; the horse at least might have survived. As I approached the building, the door was flung open, and I stood face-to-face with my father.

“Elise!” He froze in place, astonished. I must have presented quite a sight in my chemise, flushed and filthy, but his appearance was even more shocking. For the father I had taken for dead looked the same as ever. Weathered, as always, with bent shoulders and a suspicious frown. But healthy.

“I thought . . . I thought you were dead,” I said.

“I thought the same of you.” We stood staring at each other, two ghosts.

“Mother,” I mumbled, “she said . . .”

“She lives?” Father asked, surprised.

I shook my head, and my voice trembled. “She is gone.”

“Aye, it’s as I expected. I thought she might have passed on yesterday, but I couldn’t be sure.”

How could he not know if his wife lived or died? “Were you not tending to her?” I asked.

His face settled into the dark cast it took before I got a beating. “I did my best, missy. I watched my livestock die off, one by one, till I was left with but a few chickens and a horse. I buried my boys, four of them, while you lay abed!”

It did not escape me that he spoke of the livestock before his children.

“Should I have stayed in that house and risked dying myself?” he asked. “Who do you think left water and food at the door each morning? How dare you say I did not look to my family!”

He might have helped us live. But I would not bow in gratitude for his feeble offerings.

“I bedded down here in the straw,” he continued, “but now you’re better, you can get the house sorted. Just as well that I sleep in my own bed for a change.”

“You forgot to ask after Nairn.”

Father watched me, neither mournful nor hopeful. Simply waiting.

“I think he will live.”

“Good,” Father said. “He’s a strong one. I’ll need his help clearing the fields.”

“He’s in no state to plow,” I said sharply. “He cannot even stand.”

“He’ll be well soon enough. You can see to him until then. A few other farms lost animals, but none as bad as us, and those who were spared have sent meat and pies, enough to keep us from starvation. I’ll show you what I’ve got stocked away in the barn, and you can take on the cooking for this evening. Start by cleaning yourself; find something of your mother’s to wear.”

She was not yet in her grave, and already he was urging me to rifle through her things. The anger I had kept tamped down for so many years swelled up, a river overflowing its banks.

“I will set the house in order for my brother’s sake, not yours.”

He stared, caught short by my defiance.

“As soon as the funeral is held, I will leave for St. Elsip. Mother arranged a place at court for me.” The lie slipped so easily from my lips that I almost believed it the truth.

“Court?” He came the closest I ever saw to laughing—his eyes widened and his mouth hung open. “They’ll slam the door in your face.”

“I’ll find a better living there than here,” I said.

To this he had no reply. I spent the rest of that endless day cleaning until my hands were raw and stinging, stopping only when my head spun with fatigue and I feared I would faint. Father wrapped Mother’s body in a sheet, grumbling about the cost of replacing it, and said she could lie in the barn until a funeral service could be arranged with the village priest. Before Father did his grim duty, I asked for a moment alone with her to pray. As he paced outside the door, I knelt alongside Mother and whispered what was in my heart: how much I loved her, my vow to do her proud. All the while my fingers crept along the hem of her underskirt, my nails cutting through the thread that held it together, until I felt the smooth metal disks slip into my hand. Five silver coins. All that my mother had to show for a lifetime of labor. I slid them into my shoe and rushed from the house before Father could see my red eyes and wet cheeks.

During the following days, as my strength gradually returned, I saw Father only for meals. I ate more from determination than hunger, but I was heartened to see Nairn regain his usual vigor, and I sometimes set an extra portion aside for him to eat after Father had returned to the fields. I never saw my brother cry. As soon as he was able to walk, he spent most hours in the animal paddocks or helping Father clear out weeds. I did not begrudge him the wish to escape a house that had seen so much death.

Mother was laid to rest on a bright, clear day, her body buried beside those of her sons in the village churchyard. I had never attended a funeral before, and only in hindsight did I realize that the priest performed the quickest rite possible, most likely because my father had skimped on the fee. Rushed as the ceremony might have been, I felt the weight of my grief lighten for a moment, as if God himself were urging me to lay it down. Mother and the boys had been welcomed into heaven. Their suffering had ended.

The next morning, as dawn started to push aside the darkness, I climbed down from the sleeping loft, past Father snoring in the bed. I gathered the small bundle that held my few possessions: a chemise, a pair of winter stockings, a few needles and some thread, and a small loaf of bread. I carefully opened the chest that held my parents’ clothing and took out Mother’s best dress, the one she had saved for Sundays. With the years it had become worn and stained, marked forever as a peasant’s garment. Still, the fabric was of better quality than that of my tattered clothes, and I pulled it on.

I heard a rustle of straw behind me and turned to see Nairn peering down from the loft. I offered a smile, but he only nodded somberly before turning away. Perhaps, given the losses he had already suffered, he could not summon the will to grieve my absence. Such was my leave-taking from the only home I had ever known.

I headed for the cart path that led toward the village, the lure of what lay before me overpowering my fear. Where did I find the strength to take step after step into the unknown, alone and unprotected? To this day I cannot explain why I set my sights so single-mindedly on the castle. All I can say is that I felt called, whether by devilish temptation or God’s will I’ll never know.

Or do I?

Is it possible that Millicent, on the hunt for an acolyte, sent out a call that only I was capable of hearing, a call I was powerless to resist? It would be madness to believe such a thing. Yet what else could explain the unshakable certainty that drew me forward? Every great legend is at its heart a tale of innocence lost, and perhaps that was the role I was destined to play. I was ignorant indeed of the choices that lay ahead, choices that would raise me to heights I never imagined and others that pierce my heart with anguish to this day.

Two

TO THE CASTLE

T
wo days later, squeezed in the back of a jostling cart with an assortment of hogs and sheep, I arrived in St. Elsip. Good fortune had hastened my journey, for I had not walked more than a mile when I was offered a ride by a passing farmer and his wife who were traveling in the same direction. My anticipation rose so high that the first sight of our destination came as a crushing disappointment: The ramshackle buildings on the outskirts of town were not much different from the humble country shacks I had left behind. But then the cart turned a corner and I saw it: a soaring fortress of stone encircling the top of a rugged hill. The castle. From that distance only the outer walls were clearly visible, yet my heart leaped all the same. I could hear Mother’s words, as clearly as if she sat beside me:
It was the most wondrous place I have ever seen.

How I ached for her in that moment! It is only now I realize that my hunger to enter those gates was fueled by grief. Deep down I hoped that some trace of my mother’s spirit would linger in those grand halls.

On we drove, as modest dwellings gave way to solidly built homes that pressed up against one another. Taverns began to outnumber churches. Our wagon’s progress slowed considerably as we fought for passage with other carriages and riders, and I felt the unsettling sensation of the world closing in around me. People swarmed the streets, wending their way amid the hooves and wheels. The buildings grew ever higher, crowding out the sky. I craned my neck and still could not see the roofs.

“Here we are,” announced the farmer, Mr. Fitz, who had acted as my protector during our travels. We pulled into a large square, where roads from every direction converged in a wide, open space surrounded by shops and a large stone church. The center, laid with bricks, had been given over to animals of every size and shape: cows on one side, pigs on another, smaller varieties such as chickens and songbirds in the middle. The noise, both human and animal, was overpowering. Disoriented and overwhelmed, I hung against the side of the cart. Mrs. Fitz placed a hand on my shoulder, but I could barely hear what she was saying.

“I’ll go ask after your aunt. We won’t leave till you’re sorted out.”

I nodded dumbly and remained where I was while Mr. Fitz unloaded his animals. All around me people jostled against one another, their voices assaulting my ears in a cacophony of shouts. How would I ever navigate such a place on my own?

“You’re in luck, my girl,” Mrs. Fitz said, reappearing by my side. “The ribbon maker told me how to find your uncle’s house. Come, I’ll take you.”

I was grateful for the press of her hand against my back as we elbowed our way through the square, past jittery horses and impatient shoppers. We had just turned down a dark, narrow side street when suddenly she threw her arm across my chest, pushing me aside and slamming my body flat against a wall. Liquid splattered on the ground next to us, and I looked up and saw a jug being pulled into a window above my head.

“Can you believe that?” Mrs. Fitz exclaimed indignantly. “They put on airs in town, but you never see country folk empty chamber pots out the window.” I stepped around the filthy puddle with a grimace.

As we turned from one crooked road to another, the streets and houses grew wider. Instead of passing mud-spattered workmen or scowling mothers tugging along their grubby children, we now walked past finely dressed ladies and gentlemen who strolled with the poise of good breeding.

“This must be it, brick with a red door.” Mrs. Fitz nodded toward the building in front of us. To the right side of where I stood, a carving of a shoe hung over a simple wooden door; on the other side were two windows covered with iron bars. I looked up and saw that the house rose three stories. Cowed by her home’s size, I wondered if it had been a mistake to arrive on my aunt’s doorstep without warning. This was a woman who had not offered her own sister shelter when she needed it most desperately.

Mrs. Fitz knocked, and the door was opened almost immediately by a middle-aged man wearing a short black tunic and black stockings. He stared at us, his expression unchanging. I wondered if this could be my uncle.

Mrs. Fitz, more skilled in reading status from clothing, addressed him as a servant.

“Is this the home of Agna Diepper? This girl is her niece.”

The man looked me over as he might any other delivery from the market, then pulled the door open wider.

“Madam is at home. I will announce you.”

Cautiously, I took a step inside, then glanced back at Mrs. Fitz.

“Good luck to you,” she said, patting me quickly on the back before taking her leave.

The man who answered the door was already halfway down the hall, and I hurried to catch up. I glanced into the room we passed: a formal reception area, with carved wooden chairs arrayed before a grand stone mantelpiece; to the other side, I glimpsed a gleaming table surrounded by more chairs than I could count. Such a place would not intimidate me now, with all the riches I have seen, but at the time it seemed astounding that a person related to me by blood should live in such luxury.

Ahead, at the end of the hall, I heard voices coming from behind a pair of closed doors.

“Wait here,” the man ordered, opening the doors enough to allow his passage.

I stood motionless, my hands clutching each other for reassurance, as the man shut the doors behind him. I heard muffled sounds but could not make out the words. Was it possible my aunt would refuse to receive me? What would I do then? Sick with worry, I waited to discover my fate.

The doors opened, and the man waved me inside. The kitchen I entered was unlike any I had ever seen. It extended the entire width of the house, a space that could easily have accommodated twice over the hovel where I had grown up. To my right was an enormous fireplace, big enough to house two massive kettles and a spit for meat. The walls were hung with a mouth-watering abundance of food: onions, baskets of carrots and leeks, bundles of dried herbs, slabs of cured meat. To my left, a girl stood at a basin, washing a stack of pans. I had never seen so many plates in one place; there were enough to set a meal for my whole village. Against the wall at my side were barrels filled with oats and flour, any one of which could have fed my family for months.

The center of the room was dominated by a wide worktable. At one end a young woman was flattening out a pile of dough, twisting and turning her rolling pin with practiced ease. At the center stood two women, both looking directly at me. The first, dressed all in black except for a white apron and cap, was the widest person I had ever seen; her ample belly was proof that in this house no one went hungry. The other woman’s air of authority and elegant yellow dress signaled her as the mistress of the house. I was surprised to see she held a quill in her hand; I had never known a woman other than my mother who could write.

“Aunt Agna?” I asked nervously.

“Elise, is it?” She looked me over suspiciously. She had the sort of features referred to as handsome rather than beautiful, with a strong brow and a sharp chin. Her lips were drawn together in a tight, thin line. “What brings you here?”