This Rough Magic

'It cannot leave that place, master. It would die.'

'No matter,' said Jagiellon. 'We will lead the priest and his companions to the beast, before they can reach the marshes. If it fails to kill them, it may at least drive them back. I want him away from Venice, and Marco Valdosta. There is something about that meeting that I do not like the feel of. Your birds will continue to watch and follow when Lopez moves.'

* * *

First babies, the wise old midwives all said, were hard. Hard on the mother, hard on themselves. Issie evidently agreed with the wise old midwives of canalside, for the closer came the day that Maria was due, the more horrifying became the tales the old woman dragged out of her memory. Tales of birth-struggles that lasted for a week; of every possible complication; of girls that died and babies that died; of both that died together. And she had the unmitigated gall to bring in all the other foresters' wives to regale Maria with still more tales of birth- horrors, until Maria wondered why so many of them had gone through the ordeal not once, but six or eight times.

Maria had cause to thank all the saints together that Umberto was never around to listen to these stories, or if he was around when Issie began one of her tales, he was so used to ignoring her that he really didn't hear what she was saying.

As for Maria—well, Issie had been one of the people who had tried to frighten her with stories of ferocious wild beasts in the forest. The wild beasts had been no more ferocious than the occasional hare or deer, and by this time, Maria was disinclined to believe any of Issie's tales.

That didn't mean she wasn't prepared for a hard go; but her own mother had given birth and gone out to deliver a load the next day. Maria knew that she came of tough stock. She wasn't expecting much trouble, really.

She still wasn't expecting much trouble when the first pangs started, and the water broke—though that was a shock—and Issie chased Umberto out.

But then the real pains began. And after the first hour, Maria was vowing—between groans—that the next man who touched her with sex on his mind was going to draw back a bloody stump.

After the third hour, she knew that it wasn't going to be the stump of his hand.

After the fifth hour, when the pains were continuous, wave after wave after wave, and her throat was hoarse, she couldn't think of anything but the pain.

There were women milling about everywhere, praying out loud—what were they doing there? She hadn't asked them to come! The air was hot and stifling, her hair and bedgown were absolutely plastered to her with sweat, and someone was burning some vile herb in the fireplace. And all she could do was bite on the rope they'd given her, and tear at the bedclothes and it went on and on and on—

And that was when she swept into the room.

She was a tall shape in a dark, draped dress, and all the praying women fell silent as she raked the room with eyes that gleamed in the firelight.

'Out,' she said. And the women, the horrible, useless women, fled before her like chickens before a falcon, cackling in panic.

She flung the windows wide, threw something on the fire that chased the stink out with the scent of fir and rosemary, and came to the side of the bed.

She leaned over Maria, and the silver pentacle gleaming at her throat told Maria everything she needed to know.

'Strega,' she gasped. But in recognition, not condemnation. After all, none of those women and all of their calling on saints and angels had helped her.

'Exactly so.' The woman smiled, and placed a hand on Maria's forehead; then, sketched a sign in the air and murmured some words.

Suddenly, Maria was . . . there, but not there. Detached from her body and all the pain and the mess. Floating within her own head, dreamily watching, as the Strega helped her out of the bed and got her to walk, then rest, then walk again, a little. She was there, but she did not care, except in the most detached possible way. Her body strained and hurt, but she did not.

Issie's friends all huddled fearfully at the door, and the Strega cast them glances of contempt from time to time, but said nothing. 'I should have come to you before,' she murmured in Maria's ear, 'But I did not know your time was near. Did you think that we would leave one who was a friend to us alone with a flock of chattering monkeys in her time? No.'

Then she made Maria squat on a peculiar stool, and there was a moment when Maria was back in herself, fully, and shouting, and then the baby dropped into the woman's hands in three, hard heaves.

Maria went back into the dreamy state, and the woman got her into bed again and put her little girl in her arms, and with an imperious gesture, allowed the silly chickens back in again. And they cleaned the room, and Maria, and made everything pretty so that poor Umberto would not be horrified, and she stayed awake only long enough to look into her daughter's eyes and fall in love—and smile vaguely at her husband in reassurance when he came in.

The last thing she saw was the Strega woman, whose name she never learned, sketching a sign of blessing in the air and leaving as mysteriously as she had come.

* * *

In the night, the cliffs loomed dark and threatening. The air was still cold, the wind blowing from Albania. Here, in the craggy folds of the mountains, winter still held firm. And threading her way through the darkness came a woman. She disappeared into the cliff. A little later a second woman came threading her way along the narrow path. Later a third. And then, two more. Deep within the caves the chanting began.

Georgio Steplakis was a hill shepherd. He had thirty sheep, and twenty-two goats, and a hut in the hills. He could hear the chanting. He had absolutely no inclination to leave his pallet. Rumor among the shepherds was that