Snow Fields - Book Two of The Fields of Mendhavai Trilogy

Chapter Sixteen

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

The clearing was empty and still when we arrived, not even a bird chirped. I gazed around wondering where everyone had gone off to. Smythe and I exchanged glances of concern.

Movement caught my eye when the hide over the doorway of Ansuul’s “palace” twitched, then was pulled back. Taphille ducked through, letting the hide fall back into place while he stood staring blankly at me. The woman may not have been his blood mother, but the grief in his eyes threatened to overwhelm him. I stood where I was, and turned my hand up, offering him solace should he choose to take it.

The gesture was all he needed. In a fraction of a moment he was in my arms sobbing. I held him tightly, and when his arms wrapped around me and I found myself taking comfort in them, I realized I was still feeling unreasonably guilty. Horror washed through me as, once again, I began to blame myself for what had happened. Smythe cleared his throat and I looked over Taphille’s shoulder at him. The soldier narrowed his eyes, staring at me. His jaw hardened when what he saw made him angry and he shook his head at me, glaring. I knew what he was thinking – I couldn’t blame myself. Yet this guilt was coming from somewhere and if I felt is so strongly then, even if I could think of no reason otherwise, it must be right; it must have been my fault. I turned away from Smythe, focusing on Taphille and soothing him. Perhaps in doing so, I could redeem myself. But something told me there would be no redemption from this evil I had done. I battled to hold the guilt and fear back. It would do Taphille no good to see me fall apart; to see me fail.

Eventually, Taphille’s sobs turned to sniffles and he pulled away from me, red-eyed. “Father would like you to join in the family ritual. We’ll start when you’re ready. I was just coming to find you.”

Panic surged. The family ritual? No, I certainly didn’t deserve to be a part of that. Not after what I had done. But the look of pleading in Taphille’s deep brown eyes tugged at my heart, as his hand tugged my sleeve, and I followed him through the doorway of his father’s home after casting a look of trepidation over my shoulder at Smythe.

The interior, as always, was dim and hazy with smoke from the tiny fire that was the only light. Taphille left me standing frozen in fear just inside the door, going to the pallet where his step-mother was laid out. His sisters, mother and father sat in a ring around the body, speaking in low voices. They must not have been talking to each other, for they each spoke at the same moment, and continued to speak as if they heard no one else. With each breath between sentences, a flower was taken from the pile on their laps and laid on the body.

Maudla squatted near the fire, mumbling under her breath and tossing pinches of herbs from a set of little bowls she had set out before her. She did not look up, but somehow I knew that she had noticed my arrival. Her chanting wound down as she took a handful from the largest bowl and threw it onto the fire. She lowered her head for a moment, as if in prayer, before she stood, stretched quietly, and came to stand by me. After a moment, she moved in front of me and grasped my face between her warm dry hands, forcing me to look her in the eye.

Not now, not ever. Never your fault. Came her warm voice in my mind. I was so shocked by this that I forgot the fear that had followed me into this dwelling, and somehow the warmth in her words and in her hands managed to release me from my state. She gently took my hand, and pulled me to the others. Then, she moved to the empty place at the head of the pallet.

The next candlemark passed slowly for me, not just because I did not understand a word of what was said, or the strange customs, but because it wasn’t long after Maudla had moved away from me that that unreasoning guilt began to seep back in.

I watched and listened, trying to pay attention, trying to distract myself, but my mind kept replaying the scene I had awoken to. My eyes kept returning to the body, no matter how hard I tried to focus on the wisewoman. When the corpse suddenly sat up, scattering the flowers, then turned to me and opened its eyes to stare at me in angry accusation, my hand flew to my mouth to hold in the scream. I barely registered the very slight pause in Maulda’s chanting.