“Why do I need to spend time learning foolish tricks?” Claire asked Einar. “This seems a waste.”
“It won’t be. It’s important. You’ll see.”
She was eager to go. She had waited such a long time.
But she had come to trust Einar, his wisdom and caring, deeply. So she sighed and nodded.
In the winter she slept beside Alys. When the fire died late one night, with wind howling outside, the old woman shivered and Claire embraced her, trying to send warmth from her own body into the frail limbs that could no longer hold on to their own heat.
“You’re a good girl,” Alys murmured. “Your own mum must miss you fierce.”
Claire was startled. When she tried, in response to Alys’s words, to think of her mother, there was little that came forth. Parents. Yes. She had had parents. She could remember their faces, and could even recall the sound of their voices. But there was little else.
“No,” she told Alys. “I don’t think she loved me.”
Alys turned in the bed and through the dim light of the last embers that glowed in the fireplace, Claire could see her bright eyes, open in surprise. “How could that be, child?”
Claire chuckled and hugged her. “I’m not a child anymore, Alys. Maybe I was when you found me. I was a young girl, then. But so much time has passed, Alys. I’m a woman now.”
“To me you’re a child, still. And a mum always loves her child.”
“It should be so, shouldn’t it? But something stood in the way of it. I think it was a—well, they called them pills. The mothers took pills.”
“Pills?”
“Like a potion.”
“Ah.” That was something Alys understood. “But a potion is meant to fix an ill.”
Claire yawned. She was achy and exhausted.
“My people—” (“My people”? What did that mean? She didn’t really know) “They thought that it fixed a lot of ills, not to have feelings like love.”
“Fools,” Alys muttered. Now she yawned too. “You loved your boy, though. That’s why you’re soon to climb out.”
Claire closed her eyes and patted the old woman’s back. “I did,” she said. “I loved my boy. I still do.”
Twelve
In late spring, Tall Andras had a plump newborn son, and there were lambs prancing in the upper meadow, their soft fleece warm in the changed, gentler weather. Early wildflowers were in bloom, and lavender butterflies with lacy-patterned wings darted from one to the next. Bryn’s twin boys grinned and showed two teeth apiece. The fishermen folded freshly knotted nets they had mended in winter while their wives, beside them at the fire, made the sweaters they would wear on their boats.
Even the wind seemed new. It wasn’t the same brutal wind that had ripped the roof thatch and swirled the snow. Now it pulled the warm scent of brine-washed sea urchins, mussels, and kelp from the rocks and carried it gently across the beach and up the hill. It lifted Claire’s long curls as she knelt and filled a basket with nettles. The rigid stems and heart-shaped leaves were covered with stiff hairs that were painful to touch, but she was wearing the special protective gloves Alys had made. The plant would be a valuable pain reliever for Old Benedikt, who was suffering from gout.
“Don’t touch,” she warned Bethan, who had come with her and wanted to help. “It stings. You gather the elder bark, over there. Your mum needs it for your brothers.”
Bethan peeled bits of the bark and added it to the basket. The twins were fussy from teething.
“When I leave, you’ll be in charge of the gathering, then. Alys will make gloves for you. You must be careful with these nettles.”
Bethan hung her head.
“Do you think you can’t do it? You’ve learned so much,” Claire reassured her.
“I can do it. But I don’t want you to leave.”
“Ah, Bethy.” Claire hugged the slender girl. “You know why I must go.”
“To find your baby.” Bethan sighed. “Yes, I know.”
“Not a baby anymore. He’s a boy now. If I don’t go soon to find him, he’ll be a man!”
“I fear for you, Claire.” Bethan’s voice was low.
“Why is that? You know how strong I am. Look!” Claire reached up with one arm and grasped a limb of the elder tree. She raised herself until she balanced, unwavering, from the one muscled arm. Then, slowly, she lowered herself back to the ground. “Not even your pa can do that, can he?”
Bethan smiled slightly. “No. And Pa’s getting fat, too, Ma says.”
“You mustn’t fear for me, then. You can see that I’m strong, and swift, and . . .”
“Smart, and sly, and . . .” Bethan giggled. It was a game they often played, with the sounds of words.
“And silly!”
“And sleepy!”
“And slugbucket!”
“Swatbottom!”
As it always did, their word game dissolved into nonsense and they laughed as they carried the basket back down the hill.
Time passed quickly now. The seasons flowed into one another and Claire was no longer surprised as the changes came. Like the other villagers, she bundled herself against the increasing cold as each winter approached, and welcomed each new spring. The growth of the children made her aware of time passing. Bethan and her companions were no longer giggling, exuberant children; they were becoming taller, quieter, preparing for womanhood to come. Elen, no longer a baby, was the small, mischievous one now, playing the imaginative games that her sister once had. The redheaded twin boys scuffled and scampered together while Bryn, their mother, fretted over their misbehavior and laughed at their antics.
Each spring the snow melted and Claire took Yellow-wing’s cage outside to hang it once again from the tree. Each fall, when the wind swept in from the sea and the leaves fell rustling on the ground, she brought her little companion into the cottage once again.
“How long will he live?” she asked Einar one day when she was feeding the bird. Suddenly she was aware that each life had a beginning and an end.
“Birds have a long life. He’ll be here to keep Alys company when you be gone.”
Claire glanced at him. He had not mentioned it in a long time, the fact of her leaving. He tested her strength, still, and kept her working at it, but he had not spoken of the climbing out for many months. It had been six years now since the day she had been carried in from the sea, and five since the morning that Elen’s birth returned the memory of her son to her. Somewhere he would be a half-grown boy: running, shouting, playing.