The Magic Circle (2 page)

I give the answer I always give: “It is best not to speak of the dead.” The words are no lie. They do not say he is dead to this world—only to me. That the villagers accept this answer and keep me in their fold is, likewise, no miracle. They need a midwife. It is only Bala who
receives my answer without gratitude, without relief. She has not moved since I spoke. She is too close. I pronounce each word with resonance: “It is best to let the dead go.”

Bala looks at me sharply all of a sudden. “Did you know that Otto of the West Forest is looking for a midwife? His wife has lost three babies already. He says he’ll pay anything for a midwife who can make this baby live.”

Payment from a noble would not be a single bale of wool or a lone ribbon. I cannot begin to imagine what it would be. I cannot begin to imagine what I might want it to be. Confusion floods me. I am unaccustomed to this sort of speculation. I am disturbed by the tiny flicker of curiosity and want. I replace the mica in the dish and scrape a wart off my elbow, hoping Bala does not read the mixed emotions in my face. “Otto of the West Forest would not take an ugly midwife.”

“He would if he knew your reputation,” says Bala. “You’ve saved the smallest newborns. You’ve nursed back to health the sickest mothers. Your hands are deft.” She takes my hands and turns them so the palms are open to her. “These hands read a pregnant belly and fly to the task. You have the gift of birthing.”

I pull my hands back, surprised by the praise. Bala has never before shown such interest in me. “God is good to me,” I say.

The neighbor Bala cocks her head. “I’ll tell this desperate noble of you. I’ll have him begging for you. But then you must give me part of what he pays you.”

I nod.

Bala rushes out, her greed cleaving the air.

I put Bala and her needs and Otto of the West Forest and his needs out of my mind. The day is long and hot and lazy. Asa spends most of it in the stream, then the meadow, then the stream again.

I feel almost without worry. The summer will be long. Food will be plentiful. I let myself slide inside my head, down and around, faster and faster, into God’s waiting hands. I am ready for those hands to close over me, to envelop me in the love that has no bounds. But today the hands sit open. Something is uneven, off balance. There is something I must learn. But I feel stupid today. I’ve been too lazy all day. I cannot learn what God wants me to learn.

“Ugly One!”

Bala’s scream jerks me back to the world where mortals walk. I stand up to meet her. Even standing as tall as I can, I am stooped over so much my nose reaches only to her shoulder.

She looks at my twisted back for a second. “Oh,” says
Bala, “they will have a shock when they see you. But Otto of the West Forest is waiting. You must hurry.”

“Asa,” I call.

Asa runs to me.

We walk to the noble’s house, past the well-tended fields, toward the dark cool of the small woodland. It takes us most of an hour. Bala explains to Asa what lies ahead of us. Asa is eager. She has seen many peasant babies born. But this is the first time she will see a noble’s home from the inside. It is my first time, as well. I stay silent, trying to roll in God’s hands, trying to understand what it is I’m supposed to learn today. Is there something I must know to save the noble’s baby?

And then Asa is sitting with Otto of the West Forest, with the noble himself, and, lo, she is even singing in her trill of a voice, though no one listens. Bala is pacing outside the door, and I am alone with the noble’s wife. Her eyes are sunk in her fat face. My heart goes out to her fear. She clutches at my cloak. On her hand is a ring of orange and yellow golds from Spain. Bala spoke of the Spanish gold in this house as we walked here, but her description did not prepare me for the splendor. The ring’s face is a large, raised oval with a figure eight in the middle. Around the eight are grape leaves with clusters
of grapes. It is as near to perfect a ring as I can imagine.

The wife’s grasp is so strong, I almost lose my balance. I rub her thighs hard. Already I know the presentation is wrong. But it is early enough; the baby is not yet in the birth canal. I pull a clean new leather strap from the folds of my cloak and hand it to the frantic woman. She knows to hold it in her teeth and scream and bite. I reach inside her with one hand, and with the other I work the outside of her belly. The child must be turned. I have a baby shoulder under my palm. I massage the small lump downward. I push and work and the wife screams.

It is night as the baby gasps for air. A girl. I suck the mucus from her nose and place her naked and wet at her mother’s breast. The girl baby suckles, and I laugh. The new mother laughs and cries and laughs. We feel lucky to have shared a miracle. For this one moment we are as sisters, overflowing with love. Ephemeral bond. But she is tired. I back out of the room.

Bala has been sent home. Asa is asleep in the barn. I go to her and lie beside her. Tomorrow, Otto of the West Forest has promised, tomorrow I may choose my payment. I fall asleep thinking of Spanish gold. Orange and yellow gold.

The gold of morning sun on straw wakens me. Mosquitoes have already begun to plague the barn. I snap my hands in the air, keeping them from Asa’s face. Then we are called to the house.

The noble has a pouch of money hanging from his wrist. He holds it out for me to feel its weight. “Money for a job well-done. Or, perhaps, something else?” He extends a closed fist. “I’ve heard of your love of beautiful things.” He opens his fist. An emerald glistens at me.

I look at Asa. Her eyes are on the table in the room beyond. I follow her gaze. The table is laden with fruits and nuts in large porcelain bowls. I shake my head. “Asa, look at the emerald.”

“Candy, Mother.” Asa walks to the table and the noble follows her. “There are mints and chocolates,” she says.

Otto of the West Forest laughs. He places a square of chocolate in Asa’s mouth, almost as the local pastor would place the host in our waiting mouths. He hands her a circle of green mint. He looks at me. “Have you decided?”

“The emerald,” I hear myself saying.

When we get home, Bala is waiting on the dirt path. “An emerald?” she screams. “How am I to take a part of an emerald? You must trade it immediately for clothes and food.”

I search the land, the trees, the skies with my eyes. “What can I set the emerald in for Asa to wear?”

“You fool!” screams Bala. “If she wears an emerald, she’ll be robbed. Robbed. And maybe killed, too.”

Bala is right. The emerald must be hidden. We must find a treasure hole. Bala talks on and on, but my mind is already peering into every hole I know, looking for the right one, when my eyes finally pass the door of our cabin. Above the door is the green circle of mint. Asa has climbed up onto the roof to place it there.

Asa smiles at us from the roof. “Don’t you love it, Mother? We can know it is there. We can shut our eyes and pretend we live in a candy house. All candy. Everywhere.”

“The birds will eat it,” screams Bala. It seems she can do nothing but scream this day.

“I lacquered it,” says Asa. She slides off the roof and runs toward the stream. She is much smarter than the ordinary five-year-old. I can feel Bala’s anger following Asa’s back.

“Birds won’t eat a lacquered mint,” I say to Bala, relishing Asa’s victory over the logic of Bala—the logic of these hard and ascetic people.

“Shut up, Ugly One,” she says. “I did you a favor. You owe me now.”

“Yes,” I say, stifling my smile. “The next birthing I do, the payment goes to you.”

“No. Midwifery around here brings nothing more than sacks of flour or bales of wool. And none of the other nobles’ wives are heavy with child.” Bala sighs. Then she says slowly, “But the burgermeister’s first child is ill.”

I am silent. There is nothing to say.

“You can cure him.” Bala looks at me with bird eyes. “You.”

“I am a simple midwife,” I say. “I am not a healer.”

“You could be. You know the secrets of nature better than anyone. You bring down milk fever in new mothers. You banish the pus from newborns’ eyes.” Bala dances around me as she talks. “Why, you are a healer already. Everyone is astonished at what you know—at what you can do.”

“Devils bring illness. Only those who can chase devils away can heal.”

“You are a woman of God,” says Bala. “You can chase devils away.”

I shake my head, not daring to allow the conversation to go any further. “Not me,” I say, but already the stirrings of new hope are alive within me. No one has ever asked me to step beyond the limits of the birthing bed.

“How can a woman of God say such a thing?” Bala puts her face close to mine. “Every God-fearing soul battles with devils daily.”

“There is a difference,” I say, my heart beating faster, “between fighting devils in the daily battle of souls and seeking out devils for a battle of choice.”

Bala squats on the ground and looks hard at the dirt. She picks up a stick and draws a large circle. “But if you could chase devils away without endangering yourself, you would do it, wouldn’t you?”

I think of the plains stretching to the north, crisscrossed with streams. My mother and I walked there. She pointed out the herbs. She showed me the medicinal value of the hare’s liver. She revealed to me the secrets of the river fish. I know cures from her. And through the years I have added my own. I have experimented, always following my instinct. But until now my cures have been offered only to newborns and their mothers and to my own sweet Asa. My heart is now in my throat. My breath comes hard. “I would heal if I could.”

“Then we must make you a magic circle,” says Bala. “You can stay entirely within the magic circle, and no devil can get you.”

“A magic circle,” I whisper. This is what God wanted me to learn yesterday. I am sure. I will learn from Bala.
She is an unexpected wealth of knowledge. I must learn about this magic circle.

“Yes,” says Bala. “You will be paid by everyone.” She pauses for effect. She believes I want the worldly pay. Maybe she believes I want to build a house of emeralds. “You will be paid well.” Her voice is avarice itself. “And I will take my share. You will be our holy one to drive away devils.” She smiles.

I roll in God’s hand and feel fingers closing gently over me. Instantly, I know; this is it. This is why I was put on this earth. This is my calling.

Bala says in a strong voice, “You will be God’s helper. Our own village sorceress.”

And thus begins the dangerous journey.

I
sit by the stream where it burbles the loudest. No one else must hear me. I practice the syllables, starting at the end of the word: “Cajfz.” It is difficult to train my tongue. How can a syllable end with so many sounds? I practice over and over, until the syllable feels solid. Then I add another syllable. My lips can’t seem to move fast enough. I work and work. Only a true sorcerer can pronounce the unspeakable word. And only perfect pronunciation commands a devil. I must keep working. I add a third syllable, always tacking onto the beginning. It’s getting easier. Lips and tongue and teeth are all cooperating now. I let it grow. But I cannot add the first syllable. If I say the full word, I will call the demons,
and I must not call them until I am ready to face them. That will be when I am safely within the magic circle. Bala has gathered information from sources I must not ask about. She has assured me it will all go well, once I am within the magic circle. I take a deep breath now and repeat the incomplete word: “Diatmoaamvpmsciccajfz.”

The word makes me smile. I realize now why I practiced from the end to the front. The front of the word is easy. Fools are lured into thinking they see simplicity. Then they stumble on the final sounds, and devils laugh at them. Bala tells me if the devils laugh loud enough, fools have been known to rush from the magic circle to a most hideous fate. Since I have no experience with these things, I listen to her and to all who tell of devils. I record each detail. Who knows what may be useful some day?

Fools race over the sacred word and thus seal their own fate. But those who start at the end learn to appreciate the difficulty. They never forget whose presence they are in.

I will speak the unspeakable. Yes. I will call devils unto me by saying correctly the words they must obey. The devils will not laugh at me. And I will never forget their power.

As I sit here, my thoughts are in harmony with my
actions. The care with which I perform each action is crucial. Recognition and respect, these form the foundations of sorcery. My performance must be meticulous, so that God and devils sense my recognition of and respect for their powers. I rise thoughtfully, my head full of anticipation of the first meeting that lies ahead.

The first meeting with the devils is the most dangerous. On the first meeting I do not know which devil it is that inhabits the sick child’s body. I will not yet have even seen the child. At that meeting I am forced to call all devils at once. I am in the most grave danger that I will ever be in. But so long as I stay entirely within the magic circle, so long as no part of me, no wisp of hair, no curl of breath, extends beyond the circle, the devils cannot get to me.