Gretel (28 page)

“Mother?” Hansel said, the word coming off his tongue as if only generally familiar to him.

“That’s right, Hansel, your mother.”

“What do you mean ‘why you came here?’” Gretel backtracked, “you’re a nurse, our father was…is ill.”

Odalinde’s mouth turned down in a guilty frown, and she sighed deeply through her nose. “Yes Gretel, but there’s more. Much more. Now I want you both to listen to me carefully.”

She stopped and looked back and forth between the siblings, making sure she had their attention.

“What I’m going to tell you must not be discussed with anyone. Not with your friends, not with your teachers, or even the Klahrs. No one. You’d be wise even to keep it from your future husband or wife. Do you understand me?”

Hansel nodded, rapt with intrigue.

“Okay,” Gretel said, “but why are
you
about to discuss it with
us
?”

Odalinde smiled. “Because Gretel, you’re at the center of this story. You were always to know.”

“Know what?” Hansel asked.

Odalinde began.

“Your mother was born during a time of enormous upheaval and discontent in the Old Country. The kings and emperors of the assorted lands—men who had known the greatest power ever held over humankind—were abruptly and successfully being challenged by their people. The uprisings were fleet and merciless, and within a decade each had watched helplessly as his power receded to the past like broken waves. In their place chaos and strife emerged.”

Marcel was settled back on the couch now, motionless, his eyes barely slits, his mouth effortlessly and eloquently unleashing the story to the ether.

“Most in the nobility and clergy were killed during this time, or banished to the wilderness to die a much lonelier death, one filled with cold and hunger. Those of the tradesmen and peasant classes fared only slightly better though, since once their rulers fell, they were essentially leaderless and naturally distrustful of anyone who tried to assume a position of authority. And this distrust fractured not only regions and villages, but neighbor and family as well. The ultimate result was a continent of borderless nations and mob rule.”

Anika hung on every word, both fascinated by her father’s fecundity and frightened by the delusions that had apparently infected him. He’d obviously been sick for a long time—and
very
sick lately—she’d never been in denial about the truth of that, but it was a sickness that until now had seemed not to affect his mind. Where did this depiction of her mother’s childhood come from? Old kings and emperors? Peasant classes? He was describing a world hundreds of years before her mother was born.

“But there were other peoples in these lands,” he continued, “groups that existed outside of the classes—villages whose families could trace their ancestors as accurately and distantly as the pharaohs of Egypt. They lived beyond the kings’ reaches mostly, in the hills and forests or other grueling geographies abhorred by soldiers and uncharted on most maps of the time. These were places thought to be strategically and culturally irrelevant, and so were largely ignored by leaders and forgotten by historians. Even tax collection was considered folly in such lands, since the cost to reach them was often far more expensive than what could be seized. Those clans that made their homes in these regions were considered at the time to be primitive, tribal, unlearned in the modernity of things like architecture, weaponry and fashion; and indeed, by the standards of the ruling classes and those beneath them, they were comparatively uncivilized in those subjects.

“But in many areas they were genius, intensely curious of the world, scientifically sophisticated and meticulous in their calculations. And perhaps more importantly, they were literate, and therefore able to pass on their discoveries not only through speech and pictures, but through the invention of hundreds of unique written languages, each containing uncommon alphabets and symbols, languages that were frequently known only to the tiny society in which they were formed, where members often lived and died having never spoken a word to a person outside the territory. It was in a place like this that your mother entered the world.”

“That’s enough!” Anika screamed, rising to her feet once again. “You’ve gone mad, Papa! I won’t listen anymore!” She stifled the sob boiling in her chest and breathed deeply. “I don’t understand, Papa, your mind was well when I left you, your memory as nimble as ever. What’s happened to you?”

Marcel gave a patient look to his daughter and offered a subtle gesture for her to sit, a command she obeyed with a sigh of aggravation.

“I won’t argue that I’m not insane, Anika, to you the evidence must seem quite staggering at the moment. But what I’ve told you, and everything I’m going to tell you, is true.”

“You’re speaking of Mother as if she were born in medieval times! What…what are you saying?”

“I’m telling you now, Anika. If I may continue?”

Anika gave a permissive nod and listened.

“I’m not here to nurse your father,” Odalinde began, “not primarily anyway.”

Gretel studied the woman’s face, which seemed now to have become softer, more innocent. But Gretel’s wariness remained, and she even left open the possibility that this conference was a trick, though intuitively she knew it wasn’t. “I don’t think I ever believed that,” she replied, “I don’t think I’ve believed most of what you’ve said since you came here.”

She could feel Hansel’s eyes on her, wide and disbelieving, but Gretel’s eyes stayed fixed on Odalinde.

“I’ve tried not to lie to you, Gretel, to either of you. I’ve been brusque at times, I realize that, but…”

“Why
are
you here then?” Gretel interrupted, not interested in rationalizations or anything resembling an apology.

“To put it concisely, I’m here to protect you.”

“Protect us?” Gretel snorted, her eyes wide with astonishment. “
Protect
us?” She repeated the phrase, as if offering Odalinde a chance to rethink her word choice.

“I know that seems odd to you right now, but…”

“No, Odalinde, it doesn’t
seem odd
right now
, it actually seems insulting and deranged right now! Protect us. How have you protected us? By starving us? By threatening us?”

“I’ve never…”

“You’ve done nothing to protect us! Hansel and I have been protecting ourselves since the day father got sick. And every day after. And you coming here has made it all worse!”

Gretel stopped abruptly and stared at Odalinde, waiting for her to fire back with shouts of her own, or perhaps with one of her moderately concealed threats. Instead the woman stayed silent, her hands folded in front of her as if encouraging Gretel to finish.

“Why is my father still sick?”

Odalinde nodded, as if understanding this question was inevitable. “Your father is a good man,” she said, “and I’ve grown very fond of him.”

“
Very fond of him
? Have you grown fond of him? You’re marrying him! I should hope you’re fond of him!”

Odalinde looked away. “Yes, well, we’ll need to discuss that as well.” She looked back to Gretel and waited for another barrage, but Gretel had, for the moment, said her peace. Odalinde then leaned forward conspiratorially. “But to answer your question, I’m keeping your father sick to protect you from him.”

Gretel’s face again twisted in anger and disbelief at the woman’s brazenness, and all the blood in her body seemed to hurtle toward her head, flooding her brain with the energy it would need to defend her father from this villainous slanderer.

“As I said, Gretel,” Odalinde added, holding up an open hand in anticipation of Gretel’s eruption, “your father is a good man. A good father and husband. I know that. And so do you. And what you also must know is, that above all else, he loves you both. Very much.”

Hansel was now crying, the combination of fear and love and anger too much for him to contain all at once. Gretel put her arm around his shoulders and offered a reassuring shush.

“Then why…” Gretel could no longer arrange her thoughts into a rational sentence.

“But your father is also weak. Weak emotionally, temperamentally, and, increasingly so, physically. He would never withstand the temptation once offered. There are few men who could, and your father is not one of those men.”

“Temptation? What temptation?” Hansel asked, “I don’t understand what you’re talking about.”

“It’s a very long story, Hansel—centuries old—and most of it doesn’t concern either of you. Or me for that matter. But some of it does. Some of this story involves you both quite directly. So I suppose the place to start is at the beginning. Or at least at the beginning of when it matters to you.”

“And when is that?” Gretel asked.

“It’s the day I met your grandmother,” Odalinde said.

She paused a beat and tilted her head slightly forward, narrowing her eyes, making sure the children understood that what she was about to say was true, and that she, Odalinde, recognized the preposterousness of how it sounded.

“Long before your mother was born.”

“By the time your mother was born the elixir was already discovered and, as your mother recounted to me many years ago, it was spoken of throughout her early childhood, though apparently none in her particular village knew the precise recipe at that time. Or even if the stories were true.”

Marcel seemed adrift in his chronicle of an era to which he’d never belonged; Anika thought he looked almost melancholy, sad that his experience of the time would never be more than vicarious and obscure.

“It was a bit of legend at first I suppose, the elixir, but most believed in it, believed at least that there was some truth to it, though the full extent of the power was surely doubted.”

Anika’s skepticism was unshaken, but she listened carefully, resigning herself to hearing the tale. Besides, she’d never known much about her mother’s youth, her schooling and adolescence and such, and even considering the setting in which she now found herself—imprisoned for the second time in as many days—there was comfort in the idea that even a portion of what her father was telling her might be true.

“It was not until your mother reached sixteen or so that the magic was revealed to her explicitly.” Marcel paused and stared intensely at his daughter, as if considering whether to continue with the revelation.

Anika could see in her father’s eyes that he believed every word he was saying. And that his madness was rampant.

“The magic came in the form of a book, written in a language spoken by so few people that the number could have been measured in dozens. And among those who spoke it there were even fewer who could read it. Your mother was one who could.”

The excitement had returned to Marcel’s voice, signaling the impending climax to his tale.

“It was true magic, Anika. Of the kind you’ve always read about in stories. It was, in fact, the unearthing of the most quested possession since the birth of humankind. Truly! And not one whose value was found only in the sentiment of religion or culture, like the Holy Grail or some Pharaoh’s sarcophagus,” Marcel grimaced at the insignificance of such things, “but one of true power. Life unending, Anika. Immortality.”

Anika sat stone-faced, disinterested, a complete opposite reflection of her father’s face across from her, which was alert and grinning maniacally, his eyes carefully searching his daughter’s face for the look that conveyed, due to the marvel of his story, that she now understood his motives and forgave him his actions.

“Anika. Did you hear me? There exists the formula to let me live forever.”

“So for you to live forever requires me to die?” Anika retorted. Her voice was low and clear, her expression never changing.

“Yes, well, it is…” Shame returned to Marcel’s face and he looked away from his daughter quickly. He rubbed his hands together in a nervous gesture and then covered his face with them. He sat motionless for a few seconds, and then removed his hands and soberly answered his daughter’s question. “Unfortunately, the answer is yes,” and then almost as an afterthought, “you or one of your children.”

Anika was now at full attention, but she stayed balanced and icy. “And what is it about me…and
your grandchildren
…that makes us so perfect for this priceless recipe of immortality? Surely the pollution that
your
blood contributes can’t be it.”

Marcel attempted no defense. “There is nothing about you or Gretel or Hansel that is particularly unique, for the formula that is, except that you
are
my blood, and therefore a necessary match for what I need.”

Anika glared hatefully now. “I don’t understand.”

“According to your mother, virtually any human under the age of sixty or so can be used to create the mixture. The measurements must be exact and the timing perfect, but those parts contained within the natural anatomy of any normal human being are all that is required. Only those with the rarest of deformities or genetic conditions are exempt. In other words, any transient on the street can be harvested for the miracle.”

Anika closed her eyes and turned away in disgust at her father’s morbid detachment, then breathed deeply and resumed her confident stare.

“If I had decided earlier in my life to participate in this evil, I, of course, would have used the degenerates of society—the criminals, the molesters—all of the monsters that feed on the weak and drag humankind toward the sewer. Of course I would have done that!’ Marcel stifled a cough and then softly said, “It is what your mother did for all those years.”

Anika wanted to interrupt, pursue this off-handed charge by her father that his wife—her mother—was in fact some kind of serial killer, albeit one utilitarian to society. Instead she stayed silent, not wanting to veer the story away from the substance.

“But I resisted, Anika. Steadfastly! I kept a vigil for my soul. I knew that even immortality wouldn’t last forever. And when that final day came, even if millennia in the future, I would face the judgment awaiting all of us and would have to answer for my actions. It is this belief that kept me unaddicted. And when your mother finally died, my sobriety was only reinforced.”