“You stole everything from me! My inheritance, the future I was meant to have, my grandfather’s regard for me. Everything! It was all your fault, Rosemary. You made me do this! You remember that! You made me do this!” Pell’s gaze met hers as he drew his knife from his sheath.
She gasped in disbelief. The cat was right. Flee!
At the last possible minute, she turned and ran. Where, where? Her frantic mind demanded of her, but she didn’t know. There was no place she could go to escape him. But she ran, over the fence and through her own garden, spurning her seedlings under her flying feet, then over the fence she had built, tearing her skirts and half knocking it down, and then through the tall dead weeds behind the cow’s byre.
“You stupid slut!” Pell shouted, only steps behind her. “I won’t let you ruin my life!”
And stupidly she spun and swung the hatchet, knowing he was still out of reach, knowing that she couldn’t win. In horror, she felt it slip from her sweaty grip, saw her only weapon fly away from her.
It struck him on the brow. Pell advanced two more staggering steps and then fell like a chopped tree. His outstretched hand struck her ankle and she shrieked, jumping backward as the knife tumbled from his grip. She spun, ran toward the house, and then, hooting and panting with fear, forced herself to turn back and dash for the dropped hatchet. She snatched it up and rounded on him, expecting him to come up from the earth and after her. But he didn’t move.
She paced around him anxiously, fearing it was a trick, fearing she had killed him, dreading that she had not. He sprawled unmoving in the crushed vegetation. Was he pretending, hoping to lure her closer? She lifted the hatchet threateningly and stood perfectly still. Was she breathing too loud? She closed her lips and breathed through her nose, feeling as if she were smothering herself. His face was turned away from her. How long would he lie there, hoping she’d come close enough that he could rise up and drag her down? She gritted her teeth, willing her body to be content with less air. She was still shaking all over. Was he breathing? She stared at him, saw the slow rise and fall of his back. He was alive. Stunned or faking.
She tightened her grip on the hatchet. This was her best chance to finish him off. One good hard smashing blow to the back of his head and he’d be all done. She lifted her weapon and willed herself to bring it down. Could not. Her fingers were made of grass, of yarn.
“Mama!” It was a long drawn cry of pure terror.
Gillam was standing in front of the cottage, and by the time she reached him, he was screaming uncontrollably. He held his arms out from his body, and his hands were shaking wildly. She flew to him and gathered him into her arms. His body was stiff, and he continued to scream as if not even her reappearance could comfort him. “Mama, mama, you were gone. Gone!”
The cat appeared suddenly, winding himself comfortingly around her ankles, and she sank down, the last of her strength spent. “We have to get out of here,” she whispered to them both. “Hush. Hush. We have to go now, right now. You, too, cat. Come on.”
“Where? Where we go, Mama?” Gillam barely choked out the words.
“We’re going to go visit. We’re going visiting, we’re going to see . . . On a visit. You’ll see, you’ll see.” Where could she go? Was there anywhere she could flee that Pell wouldn’t find her? She carried Gillam despite her throbbing knee. Odd. While she had been fleeing from Pell, she hadn’t even felt it. Now it kept time with the beating of her heart, sending surges of pain up her thigh. It would have to be borne, just like everything else.
She’d left her packed bag by the cow’s byre. She snatched it up and kept walking. She would not go see if he was sitting up yet or if he still sprawled there. Gillam did not need to see his father that way. Where to go, where to go? Which of her friends deserved the trouble that would go with her? Flee to Hilia, hope her husband would be home to keep Pell from killing her? Go to Serran’s? No, the old woman would be frightened to death if Pell came shouting and breaking things.
In the end she followed the cliff-edge road and limped all the way into town, Gillam on her hip and Marmalade trailing after her and the hatchet clutched in her hand against her child’s back. The promised rain began as she hiked, a gentle spring rain of small droplets. At the outskirts of town, the cat sat down. She glanced back at him. Rain glistened in drops on his whiskers. “Aren’t you coming with us?”
“I may not come back this way.”
“Very well.” It was yet another thing she could not change. Eda bless and watch over him, she prayed silently. She paused to put the hatchet in her bag and then walked down the last hill and into the village. It seemed a quiet day. In the little harbor, only the small boats had set out to fish. The larger ones were waiting for a better tide. The little market was just starting to stir. She could smell the first bake of the day’s bread on the rising wind. She glanced back the way she had come, but the cat was not to be seen. She had to believe he could take care of himself.
Before she reached the market street, the rain began in earnest with the rising wind tugging at her skirts. Her boy shivered in her arms and huddled into her. “Hungry, Mama,” Gillam told her, and the fourth time he said it, he dissolved into helpless weeping. Her heart sank. She was hungry, too, but if she spent her coin on food now, what would they live on tomorrow? The rain was penetrating her clothing already.
She went to the tavern, the only one in the village, the one by the fishmonger’s where she had first met Pell and been courted by him. Those days seemed like a song she had once heard, something about a foolish girl infatuated with a heartless man. It had been months since she had passed those doors, years since she had sat by the fire with a mug of Tamman’s ale and sang choruses with a minstrel. For a moment, she recalled it all clearly. The fire was hot on her face and legs, and her back had been warm where she leaned on Pell. He didn’t sing but had seemed proud that she did. All those times when she had defied her mother to be there with Pell, creeping from her bed quietly and sneaking off; how often had she lied for the sake of being with him?
It hurt to remember that deception.
Her mother had been so right about everything. She wished she could tell her that now.
She could barely bring herself to push open the tavern door and carry her child inside. It was darker than she remembered, but it smelled the same, of fish chowder and wood smoke and spilled beer and pipe smoke and hearth bread. There were few customers at that hour and she took Gillam to a table near the fire and set him down. The innkeeper himself came over and stared down at her in a peculiar way. Tamman’s generous nature was reflected in his personal size. He looked from the door to her to the boy and then back again. His mouth moved as if he were chewing words, deciding to spit them out or swallow them. She spoke first.
“I’ve got a couple of copper shards. Can I have a bowl of chowder for the boy, and as much bread as that will buy?”
Tamman didn’t budge from where he stood or change his gaze. He only opened his mouth and bellowed, “Sasho, chowder and bread for two!” Then he abruptly dropped down on the bench across the table from her. “Pell coming in?” he asked somberly.
A shudder passed through her. She hoped he hadn’t seen it. “I . . . I don’t know.” She tried to sound calm.
Tamman nodded sagely. “Well, nothing against him or you, but I don’t want trouble here. He was here last night, you know. That cross-the-bay woman, that Meddalee Morrany? She was here last night, waiting for Pell. She got pretty angry, sitting and waiting, but he finally got here, looking like something the cat dragged in. It wasn’t coincidence, Rosemary. She was waiting for him.” The innkeeper who had known her since she was a child looked into her tearless eyes, trying to see what his words meant to her. There was no malice in his look, only measurement. She blinked, trying to contain her thoughts. Tamman nodded to himself. “Yes. Those two had planned to meet here. And they sat in the corner there, by the back door, away from the fire and the crowd, and they talked for a long time.” Tamman shook his head. “That woman’s crazy. Her face was still bruised blue from the last beating that damn Pell gave her. Why she would come seeking that cruel bastard . . . Sorry. Forgot the boy was here. Sorry.” He leaned his forearms on the table and it creaked.
“Never mind,” she said quietly. Gillam was watching the fire and not paying attention to them. Sasho appeared with the food then, two brimming bowls that were dribbling white chowder down the sides and a napkin with three brown-crusted rolls on it. Gillam snatched at the bread before the serving lad could even set the food down. Her boy stuffed the corner of the roll in his mouth. “Gillam!” she cried, mortified, but the innkeeper put a large hand on her arm.
