Nerron jumped on to his horse just as the first wolf came slinking towards Reckless. The others would soon follow. Unlike the onyx lords, however, Nerron didn’t find the screams of a dying man very entertaining.
And Louis had probably found a virgin by now.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
A HOUSE AT THE EDGE OF THE VILLAGE
The house looked even more shabby than she’d remembered. Mould sprouting in the stone walls. The stench of rotting straw and pig manure. Fishing had made some men along this coast rich, but her father had always taken his money to the tavern than rather than bring it home. Father. Why do you still call him that, Fox? Her mother had married him when Fox was three. Two years and two months after the death of her actual father.
A stump was all that was left of the apple tree by the gate, which she had climbed so often as a child, because the world always seemed much less frightening when viewed from above. The sight nearly made her turn her horse about, but her mother had planted primroses in front of the house, just as she used to every spring. The pale yellow blossoms reminded Fox of all the good times she’d had because of her behind those shabby walls. As a child she’d wondered that something as fragile as a flower could withstand the wind and the world. Maybe her mother had always planted those primroses to teach her and her brothers just that.
Fox touched the posy she’d tucked into her saddle. The blossoms had withered, but that didn’t make them any less beautiful. Jacob had given them to her. For a brief moment, those dried flowers made her feel as though he was by her side. Their two lives, connected through a flower.
The gate stood open, just as it had on the day they chased her away. Her two older brothers and her stepfather. They’d tried to take the fur dress away from her. Fox had torn it from their hands, and she’d started to run. She had felt the bruises from the stones they’d thrown at her for weeks, even under the vixen’s fur. Her youngest brother had stayed hidden in the house, together with her mother, who’d stared through the window as though trying to hold her back with her eyes. But she hadn’t protected her daughter; how should she have? She could never even protect herself.
As Fox walked towards the door, she could see her younger self running across the yard. Her red hair braided into pigtails, her knees covered in scabs and bruises. Celeste, where have you been this time?
She’d been in Ogre caves with Jacob, and in the oven rooms of Black Witches, yet she’d never wanted to leave a place as badly as she had this one. Not even her love for her mother had been able to bring her back. Now it was her love for Jacob that led her here again.
Knock, Celeste. They won’t be here. Not at this time.
As soon as her hand touched the wood of the door, Fox was assaulted by the past. It gulped up whatever strength and confidence she’d been given by the fur and the many years away from this place. Jacob! Fox pictured his face so it would remind her of the present and of the Fox she’d become.
‘Who’s there?’ Her mother’s voice. What a mighty animal the past is. The hushed songs her mother used to sing to her at bedtime . . . her mother’s fingers in her hair as she braided it . . . Who is there? Yes, who?
‘It’s me, Celeste.’
The name tasted of the honey Fox used to steal from the wild bees when she was a child, and of the nettles that used to sting her bare legs.
Silence. Was her mother standing behind the door, once more hearing the impact of the stones on the ground and on her child’s skin? It felt like an eternity before she pushed back the latch.
She’d grown old. The long black hair was now grey, and her beauty had all but faded, washed, little by little, from her face by each passing year.
‘Celeste . . .’ She spoke the name as though it’d been waiting on her lips all these years, like a butterfly she’d never shooed away. She took her daughter’s hands before Fox could pull them away. Stroked Fox’s hair and kissed her face. Again and again. She held Fox tight, as though she wanted to get back all the years when she hadn’t held her child. Then she pulled the girl into the house. She latched the door. They both knew why.
The house still smelled of fish and damp winters. The same table. The same chairs. The same bench by the oven. And behind the windows, nothing but meadows and piebald cows. As though time had stopped. But on her way here, Fox had passed many abandoned houses. It was a hard life, having to rely on sea and land to feed you. The machines’ noisy promises were so alluring: everything could be made by human hands, and wind and winter no longer had to be feared. Yet it was the wind and the winter that had shaped these people.
Fox reached for the bowl of soup her mother had pushed towards her.
‘You’re doing well.’ It wasn’t a question. There was relief in her voice. Relief. Guilt. And so much helpless love. But that wasn’t enough.
‘I need the ring.’
Her mother put down the milk jug from which she was filling her cup.
‘You still have it?’
Her mother didn’t answer.
‘Please. I need it!’
‘He wouldn’t have wanted me to give it to you.’ She pushed the milk towards her daughter. ‘You can’t know how many years you still have.’
‘I’m young.’
‘So was he.’
‘But you’re alive, and that’s all he ever wanted.’
Her mother sat down on one of the chairs on which she’d spent so many hours of her life, mending clothes, rocking babies . . .
‘So you’re in love with someone. What is his name?’
But Fox didn’t want to say Jacob’s name. Not in this house. ‘I owe him my life. That’s all.’ It wasn’t all, but her mother would understand.
She brushed the grey hair from her face. ‘Ask me for anything else.’
‘No. And you know you owe me this.’ The words were out before Fox could hold them back.
The pain on the tired face made Fox forget all the anger she felt. Her mother got up.
‘I never should have told you that story.’ She smoothed the tablecloth. ‘I just wanted you to know what kind of a man your father was.’
She brushed her hand across the tablecloth again, as though she could brush away everything that had made her life so hard. Then she slowly walked to the chest where she kept the few things she called her own. From it she took a wooden box that was covered in black lace. It was lace from the dress she’d worn in mourning for two years.
‘Maybe I’d have survived the fever even if he hadn’t put it on my finger,’ she said as she opened the box.
Inside it was a ring of glass.
‘What I need it for is worse than fever,’ Fox said. ‘But I promise you, I’ll use it only if there is no other way.’
Her mother shook her head and firmly closed her fingers around the box. But then she heard some noises outside.
Steps and voices. Sometimes, when the sea was too rough, the men returned early from their boats.
Her mother looked towards the door. Fox took the box from her hand. She felt ashamed of the fear she saw on her mother’s face. Yet it wasn’t just fear; there was also love. There was always love, even for the man who struck her children.
He banged on the door, and Fox pushed back the latch. She longed for the vixen’s teeth, but she wanted to look her stepfather in the eyes. She’d barely reached up to his shoulders when he drove her out of the house.