“Mason, I don’t hold it against you. Since Da was killed, I know you’ve had to dodge me, just like everyone else. But I wanted to tell you myself—I have to leave Hartley Cross.”
“What do you mean, leave?”
“Henry’s sending me away,” I said. “We can’t run the croft ourselves. We barely met Lord Geoffrey’s wool and grain quotas, just for the right to stay in our house for the winter.”
“What? Why would he—” Mason’s eyes narrowed. “Where is he sending you?”
“To some priory in Yorkshire…Saint Christopher’s.”
“A priory?” He turned his head in disbelief. “You’re going to be a nun?”
“No. No. I could never be a nun.” I shook my head. “Just a laborer. There’s a wagon coming tomorrow at dawn.”
“Tomorrow?” He unwittingly began to crumple the drawing in his hand. “He couldn’t give you more time?”
“No,” I said. “It’s my only chance to avoid begging or…or worse.”
Mason rubbed his eyes in frustration. I decided to risk an idea, one I’d been thinking of but never dared to say out loud.
“Mason, what if…I…stayed with you? And your da, I mean. I could help you take care of him—”
“What?”
I pressed on. “Or we could leave together, like we always dreamed about. Go where no one knows us. You’re a freeman, and a stonemason. You can find work anywhere—”
“It’s not that simple, Edyth!”
His shout rang in my ears, reverberating like white-hot coils in front of me, and I shut my eyes tight against the assault of noise and color.
“Of course.” I got up quickly and gathered my skirts to run home, away from the growing seed of shame. “You can’t be with an orphan from a cursed family. I’m sorry.”
Mason grabbed my hand. “Edyth, wait. I’m sorry. Please sit, please.” He turned my hand over. “I have something for you, too.” He opened my palm and placed there another stone cross, as smooth as glass, carved with a trail of oak leaves. Its color was just like the one in the box on our doorstep.
“You’re the one who’s been leaving us meals, aren’t you?”
“You don’t deserve all that cruelty,” he said. “But I couldn’t come see you. Not because of these stupid Hartley Cross folks. Who cares about them? ” He drew a long breath and blinked, hard. “My father is dying.”
“Oh…Mason…I don’t know what to say.”
The snow clouds cleared away, and the early moon reflected glittering crystals off the white, like the ground was twilight.
“So you see why,” he said.
I nodded and hung my head, wanting to fall forward into the earth.
“Everything’s changing, Mason. Everything’s fading away.”
He opened his cloak and wrapped it around both of us. We grew quiet, holding each other’s gifts. There was the comfort of Mason and the loss of him, and I craved to keep feeling this moment, willing tomorrow never to come.
— 3 —
Henry and I arrived home at the same time that night, not speaking, and we lay down to sleep in the single bed. Pounce whined at our feet, his brow wrinkled above his big fire-lit dog eyes. Rain began to crackle on the thatch.
My brother and I had slept on the same pallet together since I was a toddler, and after our parents died, Henry was there in the night to get a new rag to dry my tears when the last one was soaked through. He was my closest companion, the one who stood up for me against the cruelty of the other village children. But I guess this is what happens to orphans: life turns you the wrong way round like magnets and forces you apart.
Just then, the frost came so sudden, it slid under the door and crawled into bed with us. And, I knew, anything green outside was now dead. That was that. I blew out the rushlight.
But cold as it was, I got out of bed, walked away from my brother and lay down on the hard floor where our parents’ bed had been. And that night it was Henry who shed tears, silently, and alone.
* * *
—
The packed earth radiated cold up through my body as I woke alone in the still-dark house. Pounce lay pressed against me—Henry must have left him and gone to feed the animals. Embers glowed on the hearth, bits of wood seizing and popping, though the fire was pretty far gone.
I sat on the stool, stoking what remained, and let thoughts fill my head.
In one long thread they came, spinning themselves before my eyes:
I have to leave this house today and go to a place where I don’t know anyone. I will bring Mam’s blue wool dress, and her pale green linen one. And the little pack of parchments Da gave me. And the drawings I did of the family. Henry’ll take Pounce, and Juniper will have to live on field mice. And I will be utterly alone. Henry can force me to go to some priory, but maybe I’ll show him and die early, and then I will be free. I will be with Mam and Da, and I will be free.
And Henry will be sorry he sent me away. He’ll be sorry he broke up what was left of us.
I shook myself and tried to resurrect the fire, blowing on the glowing embers. Once winter finally settled upon the house, the only thing for Henry to do would be to endure.
I rummaged through the rough-hewn wooden chest, and at the bottom was my father’s old rucksack with the drawstring top. I ran my fingers over the rough, waxed weave, then went around the house, packing things into it.
Suddenly I felt how red I was getting, how hard I was shoving my belongings into the sack. Soon I was punching the bag, punching and screaming, and explosions of hot colors mixed with my steaming tears. I threw the bag across the room. It hit the stool, and both tumbled into the fire. Startled, I opened my swollen eyes: the corner of the bag had caught alight. Pounce cowered and Juniper puffed up. I jumped and grabbed the sack, rolling it over to put out the flame. The scorched corner of the bag revealed a singed dress hem and an unfortunate knitted stocking—nothing that couldn’t be mended.
But the drawings—the drawings were badly burned. I held them to my gut and folded over, laid my head on the rucksack and waited for dawn.
* * *
—
Well, this is it, I thought. I strapped on my pattens, shouldered Da’s satchel and trudged outside into the darkness, waiting for the wagon to come. Clouds pulled apart like carded wool, and a bright moon, just shy of full, peeked through the torn sky to shine blue on the whiteness. Across the field, a cloud squalled, and powdery snow rolled and dissipated, falling like a thin veil. I flinched at the sight of a mouse—no, a leaf skimming the surface of the snow.