[Books of Bayern 1] The Goose Girl (10 page)

"Well, Poppo, this isn't a badger or wolf, though it might want to eat from my garden like a common hare." The woman's short-voweled, guttural accent reminded Ani that she was in or near Bayern. Ani cleared her throat. The woman waited for her to speak.

"Hello," said Ani. She had spoken little in days, and her voice came through her throat like a fist. She cleared her throat again.

"Hmm?" said the woman.

"Hello. I'm lost."

"Yes, I see that." The woman folded her arms and looked over Ani's ragged, filthy dress.

She blinked her eyes, waiting for more information. "It might help to know where you're lost from, or where you're lost to, if you see my point, and then I could push you in the right direction."

Ani opened her mouth and then closed it.
I am, or was, crown princess of Kildenree,
betrothed to your king's son, what~is~his~ name, I can't remember, oh mercy, and half
of my escort guard attacked the other half of my escort guard and attempted to murder
me and replace me with my lady-in-waiting.
It sounded absurd in her head. She began to wish for the comfort of the handkerchief in her bodice and reminded herself that she did not have it, and oven if she did, it would do no good, and now she had to learn to rely on herself.

That thought scared her as much as being lost in a strange forest.

"Well, child, I'm waiting," said the woman.

Ani realized that she was extremely thirsty, that it had been hours since she had left her little stream, and that she was likely to faint from panic, hunger, and exhaustion. And as she thought that, thousands of tiny black dots rushed her eyesight until, thankfully, the woman, the house, and the goat were exchanged for darkness.

Ani woke to a cottage window that looked out with a black eye on the night. She realized with a comfortable sigh that she was indoors and lying on a hay-stuffed mattress.

"You're awake, then?"

The woman had removed her headscarf, and Ani could see she wore her thick black hair cropped to her shoulders. She was sitting on a stool and knitting by the light of the hearth fire.

"You might've told me that you were thirsty and saved my boy Finn the trouble of carrying you in. I suspect you fainted on purpose just to get inside my house and onto a bed.

Hmph." Ani smiled politely because she believed the woman meant it as a joke. "I guess you may as well stay the night."

She continued to knit, and Ani watched the yarn pile up in knotted lines, back and forth, with a speed she had never witnessed before. The woman nodded her head to a dish at her feet full of carrot broth and a ceramic mug of water. Ani drank quickly and then ate in silence. She could feel the water and broth go through her chest and into her belly with a warm tingle.

"So, girl," said the woman after a few minutes, "tell me what you're about."

"I was lost in the forest and need to get back to the road or on to Bayern." As she spoke, Ani was mindful of the long vowels and distinct consonants of her Kildenrean accent and wished she had thought to try to imitate the Bayern way of speaking. She thought she could learn it easily enough in the same way she had first learned to imitate the sounds of the swans, but now it was too late to try with this woman.

The woman laid her knitting down in her lap in a gesture of folding one's hands and looked carefully at Ani. "You're not from here," she said. Ani shook her head. "You're in some kind of trouble?"

"Yes, I think so."

"Well, I don't want to hear about it," she said quickly. "The less I know, the happier I'll be, I'd say. By the look of you, there's some mischief afoot. You've got yellow hair. And long, isn't it? Too long to be a wandering field-worker. Obviously not from Bayern, obviously noble, look at your soft little hands." Ani tucked her hands into each other. "And, your accent, tsk, child, you sum up to a problem, and I’ve got knitting to do and pullovers to sell by marketweek. You understand?"

Ani nodded.

"Why don't you speak more?" The woman leaned forward, waiting for an answer.

"I am embarrassed about my accent," said Ani, "and I'm so confused. . . I don't know what to . . . " Ani heaved a breath but could not stop the first sob, which was followed by another and a third. Her stomach tightened, and she bent over and cried hard. Her hair closed in around her face. She felt the woman pat her shoulder.

"There, there, now. No more crying. It's all wetness and no comfort at all."

Ani thought she was right, for she felt more miserable than before, so she put her palms over her eyes and tried to stop. Her breath pulled harshly at her throat, and she sounded to herself like little Rianno-Hancery after a tantrum.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I won't cry anymore. I'm sorry."

"All right, child, all right. Now, just you tell me what I can do to set you straight, provided I don't have to get involved."

Ani nodded and then realized that the woman was asking her to make a decision. She longed for Talone, her father, Selia (no, no, not Selia), Falada, the lost handkerchief (not that either), just one of her onetime advisers.
What a child I am,
she thought. She straightened her back, placed her hands in her lap, and stared at the fire. Even from a distance, its heat burned her eyes.

Grow
up. Think.
What did she need? The road. But the road to where? The thought of going back to Kildenree on her own was absurd. She had no food or means, no horse, and on foot it would take her months, and the snows would arrive before then. Talone had told her to go to Bayern and find the king. It was possible that Talone and his men had defeated Ungolad, and if so, they would be with the king. Besides the king, there was the prime minister. She had met him once as a child—perhaps he would remember her face and act as her witness. And if Selia and her traitors were there waiting for the escaped princess? She could hear her heartbeat escape her ribs like the quick thuds of Ungolad's boots behind her.

Even so, were she offered a carriage back to Kildenree, passage paid, she could not go until she had found Falada and learned the fate of Talone and those faithful few. Bayern. It had to be her choice.

"How far away is the capital?"

"A day and a half in a wagon, but don't you be thinking about walking it and losing yourself again in our forest until I find you facedown in my carrot patch a week hence with no more sense than you had when you left."

"May I go with you to the city for marketweek?"

The woman considered. "Yes, that'll do, and I'll expect you'll be wanting an oufit so you don't stick out like a lightning tree. Finrill take you come next week's end, and then we'll be done." She nodded and picked up her knitting.

A boy in late adolescence entered the house and stepped u p to the hearth to kiss his mother. The firelight lit up bits of white wool that were stuck to his sleeves and the hairs of his arms. He stuck out a hand to Ani and said, "Hello."

"Hello, Finn," said Ani.

The boy smiled and disappeared into a dark corner where his bed resided.

"Go to sleep now," said the woman, rising.

"Yes, um, lady?"

"Gilsa," said the woman. "I'm no lady."

"Gilsa, when is next week's end?"

"Eight days. Hmpf, child."

Ani lay on her side, watching the black logs throb orange with the last life of the fire and thinking that she would never fall asleep. It seemed only the next moment that she opened her eyes to a room already silvery with dawn. The door opened and Gilsa came in with a handful of eggs, her hair uncombed and stuck with bits of hay and wisps of wool.

"Oh," said Ani, sitting upright, "this is your bed."

"Well, of course it is. Do you think I sleep in the shed every night?"

"I didn't think at all." Ani stood and smoothed the blankets over the pillow. She had never had to wonder where other people slept. In a palace, everyone had a place. In her ignorance, she realized, she was thoughtless and selfish.

"I'm sorry," said Ani. "Thank you. You don't have to sleep out there tonight."

"That's certain. My charity lasts about one night on thin hay and then I get tetchy."

Ani resolved that for the rest of her stay she would not be a burden. The first day, while Gilsa knit ferociously on her stool, Ani tried her hand at preparing the noon meal. After the questionable results were painfully consumed, Finn returned to the cooking and Ani, chagrined, observed carefully.

Gilsa discovered that Ani was quite good at finding the roots she needed for dyeing the yarn. Soon Ani was sent more and more on errands in the woods to keep her away, Ani suspected, from the delicate work. After one such errand, Ani made her way across the neat, dirt-swept yard with an apron full of roots when she heard the chickens croaking uncomfortably in their coop. Small feathers took flight as they left and reentered the pen again and again.

A rat, a rat,
they croaked.
We will not stay, the rat stays still, there, under, under.

“I don't know what's the matter," said Gilsa, her hand on the coop door. "They're scared, as if there's a green snake in a nest or a fox underfoot. But I've cleaned out the coop twice and can't find a thing."

"A rat," said Ani. "A dead rat, under the floor, and the hens sense him."

Ani took the roots inside and was sorting them before she realized she might have to explain her comment. When she stepped back outside, Gilsa was directing Finn to remove the floorboard Ani had indicated. Underneath was a newly dead rat corpse.

"How did you . . . ?" Gilsa looked at her sharply.

"My parents used to raise chickens," said Ani.

After the first night, Ani spent the sleeping hours on the itchy wool and hay in the shed.

She was restless at first, waking at every creak of board and whine of tree. Could Ungolad track her here? She did not know, but after her first night in the shed, Ani begged a board to lock herself in from the inside. Finn complied without asking questions.

The night before their departure, Ani sat by the fire, rolling up Gilsa's pullovers into tight bundles and fitting them into the packs. Finn prepared the travel food. Gilsa was finishing the sleeve of one last pullover, a vibrant orange with suns and birds floating on its breast and back. She hummed a tune, light and sleepy, a lullaby. It tugged at the lip of Ani's memory, and she stopped her packing and watched the singer.

"You aren't done yet," said Gilsa.

"I know that song. Does it have words here? Do you say, 'The tales that trees could tell, the stories wind would sing'?"

"'Hear the trees a-listening, feel the fire whispering. See the wind a-telling me all the forest dreams.' It's an old tune. I used to sing it to my boy."

"What does it mean?" said Ani.

Gilsa's metal needles clicked together, a sound like a strange beast feeding. "It talks about the old tales, I guess. How in faraway places there are people what talk to things not people, but to the wind and trees and such. 'The falcon hears the boar, the child speaks to spring.' And to animals, too, I gather. I've always wondered." Gilsa looked down her nose at Ani. "Is it possible? Would you know about such things, child?"

Ani continued packing. "It may be so. I. . . have heard tales about the times after creation when all the languages were known, and tales of people who still remember how to talk to the beasts. But about wind and trees and spring and all that, I thought it was just a nursery story."

"May be. But all things speak, in their way, don't they?"

"I suppose. Just not very clearly."

Gilsa looked narrowly at Ani as though at a troublesome child. "We all talk to something besides just ourselves, from time to time. I talk to my goat and my chickens and my apple tree. I don't know if I'm heard, and I don't think I've been answered back, but it can't hurt. Now, just think of this, that a person could talk to fire or to a goat and the fire and the goat could answer back. How would that be?"

"Are there such things in Bayern? Magic things?"

"Magicians, sorcerers, witches," said Finn. He rocked back on his stool, and it creaked.

"Tricks is what they do, boy," said Gilsa. "That's not what she means."

"I've seen them," Finn said softly, "in the market. A witch can look at you and say what ails you, and a sorcerer can make things into what they're not."

"Yes, yes, child." Gilsa waved a dismissive hand. "They've some kind of gift for seeing and showing, but it's all flashy and comedy and giving a coin to hear what you already know.

She's talking about the old ways, aren't you, little one?"

"I think so. There are so many tales, so strange and beautiful and perfect. They are not what are real, but better. I thought I had something that was magic once, but I lost it, and now I don't think it was at all." She touched her chest where the handkerchief had been and frowned. "I wish there was magic. If all the tales were true, then maybe they could tell me what I'm doing, and what I am to do now."

"Ah, now, don't cry over lost years and forgetfulness. The tales tell what they can. The rest is for us to learn. The question is, are we smart enough to figure for ourselves? Now, that's what I'd like to know."