9.26 The Witchling Shama
But village life had never been the equal of my stay in Tinker Town, where I felt like I might actually fit in. The biggest component of that was Mrs. Penn, who was someone I adored, which is why I couldn’t bear to see her feeling poorly. If she should become gravely ill and even worse, die, I’d never be able to remain in Tinker Town. Another loss like Old Mother’s would undo me in the worst of ways. I’d become a hermit like Mr. Cutworthy, unable to speak a single word. Or perhaps I’d turn grouchy as Mrs. Fedner, the one that people called the Mean Queen. Maybe I’d even turn into old drunk Mr. Barner, who stumbled in a wavery path as he walked, sometimes even falling down to snore away the alcoholic spirits in his body. (Of course, the latter was the least possible since I’d never drunk anything stiffer than stale water, which had made me sicker than Dr. Peter’s old wolf hound the time he’d managed to dig out some rotted meat from a village garbage can.) I suddenly realized that Carlo had been tugging at my shirt, frantic with worry. Frances was next to him, his jaw clenched, his lips pressed tight. He was staring at me with uncertainty. I guess I’d temporarily turned into someone with the staring disease, those mentally unbalanced who went inside themselves and never came back out. How could I have gone off into my own world and left these precious boys on their own? It was cruel of me to have worried them. I circled my arms around the two of them and drew them closer. “I’m sorry,” I said. “My mind slipped back into something painful, something from my childhood. I was remembering Old Mother.” “Our mother?” Carlo said, crawling up into my lap as assuredly as if he knew it was the safest place to be in times of confusion. “I pulled Frances up, too. He didn’t pull away. He wrapped his arms around my neck and kissed me on the cheek. “You were sad. Did your mommy die, too?” Carlo asked, laying his head against my collar bone. “I never knew my mother. Remember, I was an orphan. Old Mother was the woman who took me in. She loved me, and I loved her. But then she . . . well, she was old. Really old, and the doctor said she had pneumonia.” “So, she died like our mother did. I miss my mommy. We can be sad together. Okay?” Frances was being very quiet, but he chimed in then. “Frank says we’re going to be a family. A new family.” I looked up and across the table. Frank turned red. He mouthed, “sorry.” But there was something good in what he’d promised the boys. Frances and Frank were right. We were forming a new family. But we needed Mrs. Penn to be part of it.
9.25 The Witchling Shama
Then Mr. Turn, the blacksmith, hired me to stack logs for the fire and to haul away spent ashes. His was my favorite place to work, although it was also the hottest because he kept the forge going most of the time. But he treated me like an adult, asking my opinion about things. Sometimes he even asked me to tell him what a letter said or to summarize the village newsletter since he’d never learned to read. Mr. Brown was the third person to take pity on my need. He allowed me to stack merchandise and to help out with the customers in his mercantile business. Mr. Brown was the owner of the marmalade cat that I admired. He kept the cat for rat and mouse patrol, but mainly the pudgy animal slept on the low counter under the cash drawer. Marmalade did not become a friend, but I enjoyed the occasional petting under the chin he permitted. Thus, after Old Mother’s death, I began to chisel out a new beginning. And for a few years, I had a goal. I wanted to restore the shack where I was living. So, doing odd jobs allowed me to earn a few wooden boards, nails, and other materials. Thanks to Mr. Brown’s generosity, I was even able to borrow the tools I needed. During that time, I dodged the Council, just in case they were still searching for me. I was only thirteen, and I worried that they’d insist I be supervised by a house owner. Perhaps the Council forgot about me, or, maybe, they knew that I was working with the three businessmen. I have no idea, but I was allowed to go my own way, and no one tried to apprehend me during those years. Of course, I still returned each day to work in at least three different households. There, I did chores in an attempt to repay the people who’d taken me in during my earlier years: gardening, babysitting, cleaning, cooking or whatever they requested. I worked a total of three hours each day for them, one hour at each house unless they wanted me to manage a team sport for the village. That usually took more time than the three hours I’d mentally scheduled, but it was good for children.
9.24 The Witchling Shama
They took Old Mother away the next morning. Long bereavements in a house were not permitted, not since the village was attacked by diseases that almost wiped it out. Despite Dr. Peter’s words, it was scarcely an hour later when the villagers came to scavenge furniture and any of Old Mother’s possessions they found of value. Throughout that torture, I sat at the table, my head bowed, my dry eyes, two stinging torments because I hadn’t slept all night, nor moved from my position at the table. None of the villagers spoke to me. No one tried to soothe my anguish. Perhaps they didn’t even see me until that evening when I was asked to move because the table and chairs were being carted away. And then, when I stood up, I went to see what was left of my personal things. Nothing. Even the few pieces of clothing I’d earned in my labors had all been taken. It was then that I noticed that the house had been completely stripped bare. No food remained, no dishes, no books, not even the brews Old Mother had handed out to the sick and needy. When I saw that everything was gone, I was furious with myself. I had not taken a single remembrance of the woman I’d loved, the one who was also the only person who’d ever loved me. I left the empty house and walked for hours. The sky grew dark. I lay down and slept. The next morning, I walked some more. I found a low-hanging apple, one shriveled from age. That was my meal for the day. I stumbled forward, almost blindly, nibbling on wild carrots, finding an old walnut tree that still bore fruit. A nearby creek gave water for my parched lips and throat. I became a wild woman then, living off the land, wondering about without purpose. Still in mourning, still senseless about the future. The only thing I held onto was that I would not return to live with Mrs. Fedner. The day came when they were to bury Old Mother. I didn’t dare openly visit, fearing they would force me back into their web, toss me into Mrs. Fedner’s house of bitterness. I watched Old Mother’s funeral from a distance. A Council member said some words, and each of the villagers stepped forward to throw a fistful of dirt into the already dug hole. I resisted the urge to join them. Old Mother would have understood. She used to tell me that funeral rites were for the people who lived, not for those already departed. “Goodbye, Old Mother. I love you,” I said. Then I turned about and continued my aimless roaming of the countryside. My stomach pained me. My thirst was back. I returned to the creek. A deer and her fawn were drinking. I waited for them to finish. Then I bent down and drank my fill as they had done. The next day I found an old shack. It was a mess with boards sagging from rot. Termites had munched. It was cave-in ready, just waiting for the next wind or rainstorm. I knew better than to crawl inside. Instead, I lay down in front of it and slept. At the end of a week, having spent time dragging away bad boards and stabilizing good ones, I was determined to make the shack livable. I knew it would need a lot of work and materials that I had no money for. I was quite capable of supplying labor for the restoration. But for the latter, that took some time to figure out. I knew, though, that some people would hire me. It was only my fear that the Council might object and force their will on me that held me back. In the end, it seemed unavoidable. Mr. Tully in the apothecary, was the first to give me chores. I stacked goods in his store, mopped the floors of his shop, dusted shelves, and cleaned windows.
9.23 The Witchling Shama
I didn’t weep. My throat was parched, my eyes dry as a wind-bruised land. I couldn’t speak after my parting words to her. I couldn’t look at Dr. Peters either. I think I was afraid he’d say something like “She’s with God now” or “She lived a good life.” Such platitudes would have felt like acid. But, thankfully, he remained silent, his head bowed, his hands in a prayer position, although I don’t think he wasn’t appealing to Heaven for her safe passage. Obviously, he knew she’d never dwell with the villagers’ version of a male god. Perhaps he knew Old Mother was a witch, although he never said. After a bit, Dr. Peters cleared his throat a couple of times, and urged me to accompany him into the kitchen. When I ignored him, and continued sitting there, not speaking or moving, he finally lifted me out of my chair and walked me into the kitchen. I suppose I was inanimate, a walking corpse that still breathed. I hardly remember. I recalled that the doctor lit a fire and settled the kettle onto its iron pedestal. I saw that, yet I was in some kind of spell of yearning. I stood where he’d placed me, wishing with all my might that I could join Old Mother. Why couldn’t I accompany her to Gaia’s side? We could continue our existence then, helping the goddess to serve Nature, doing whatever those who served her did. “Sit down,” the doctor said suddenly, breaking my trance. Obedient, as I’d been trained to be, I slid into the chair, still not meeting his eyes, bereft of purpose. I’d realized in that moment, when he’d addressed me, that Gaia had rejected me. Perhaps I wasn’t worthy. Perhaps I had more years of suffering to live, but, for whatever reason, she demanded that I stay stuck on this plane of existence. I accepted that, yet I still couldn’t get my mind to function. It was frozen on Old Mother’s departure and what her loss would mean. I could not accept the thought of living without her. How could I go on? How did anyone ever continue when a loved one died? She would be missed with every breath I took. As I sat there at the table with Dr. Peters, wishing I was still at Old Mother’s side, holding her hand, hearing her soft voice, I realized that I was alone again. Old Mother had saved me from what the village children called the Mean Queen, grouchiest woman in the entire village. Mrs. Fedner was to have taken me on years ago, but Old Mother refused to let me go, telling the villagers I could stay with her from then on. She’d told the Council that she planned to adopt me, too, just as soon as she earned the legal fees. But months and years had passed . There’d been no flow of money. My adoption never happened. I might have gotten a last name if it had. But, I never even found out what Old Mother’s last name was. Dreams are always crushed in the daylight when reality takes hold again. Dr. Peters had dug in the cookie jar for the money Old Mother had told him was there, but I doubted there’d been enough for his night’s services. Still, he tried to give the coins to me, saying that I’d need them to make my way to my next house. Those words brought me to life more than the hot mug of tea he’d poured for each of us. “I won’t be going to Mrs. Fedner. They can’t make me.” “Shama, where else could you go?” He was a kindly man, a bachelor, so he couldn’t invite me to live with him. I understood such things, even though I thought that customs and traditions were often impediments to what might have been the perfect solution. Dr. Peters could have trained me, and I could have assisted him in his work. That made perfect sense to me, but it couldn’t be. We both knew that the Council would never approve. “I won’t go there,” I said, still not taking a sip of my tea, although he had drunk most of his. “Stay for a week. I’ll tell the Council that it’s necessary for your heartbreak. They won’t like it, Shama, but it’s all the time I can buy you.”
9.22 The Witchling Shama
On that last day when Dr. Peters examined Old Mother once again, he stayed with me throughout the night. He never tried to reassure me. In fact, he did the opposite, telling me that Old Mother had only a few hours to live, but I wasn’t ready to hear that. I guess I still believed in miracles. Old Mother was lucid then. She spoke to both of us, telling the doctor where he could find some money to pay for her care, and informing me that everything she owned was to belong to me after her death. I hadn’t wanted to hear that. I’d brushed her words away, telling her that she would soon get better and we could once more hunt for herbs in the woods and make potions for the sick. “You were the sweet smelling flower of my old age, Shama. I am grateful that you shared your company and your youth with me. I love you, child,” she’d said. I was holding her hand. I squeezed it gently and whispered that I loved her, too. “Please get well,” I whispered. She started coughing then, and the doctor moved closer, but in a moment, her cough stopped. Her breath was a steady wheezing and grating noise that told me that each breath she took caused her pain. I wanted to fix it, to make her well again. I ran my mind over all the witchy things she’d taught me, but nothing relieved lungs so badly consumed by fluid. “Isn’t there something we can . . .?” I asked the doctor. “I’m dying, Shama. He can’t help me . . . nor . . . can you,” Old Mother had said, her voice so unlike what I’d come to know that it sounded like a stranger’s “Doctor, see that Shama . . . gets . . . everything. Don’t let . . . the villagers . . .” Another coughing fit seized her body and almost lifted her into the air. I wondered for a moment if the goddess was taking her, but the rattling throat noses told me she was still with us. “She cannot live here, Matilda,” the doctor said. “The village will take back the cottage and seize all the furniture. You know it wasn’t yours to keep,” he told her with the soft voice of someone who cared, who maybe even had loved her once. That was the first time I’d ever heard her real first name. Even the villagers called her Old Mother. “Do you want some water?” I asked mainly to be doing something, but she shook her head. “Help the child, Sam. Please.” Those were Old Mother’s last words. Her body wilted in on itself then, shriveling into the empty shell that a body takes on after the soul departs. My lungs collapsed in that moment, too. No air. My heart almost stopped its frantic beating. I knew she was gone, wouldn’t hurt anymore, and couldn’t hear me, but I leaned forward and kissed her cheek once more. “I love you,” I’d said.
9.21 The Witchling Shama
So, things were going great. I knew that soon Frances would be heading off to school, and I was resigned to that, and I believed that it would be good for him. Mrs. Penn had commented that Carlo would need me more then. Carlo had another two years before he could start at the Tinker Town School. Frank, the sometimes irksome officer, had stepped back slightly in the forcefulness of his wooing, giving me space, although he was still a steady presence in our household. (Carlo even called him Dad once.) Frank said he liked Mrs. Penn’s cooking and so he came to partake of her fried chicken, meat loaves, and pot roasts, but she said, winking at me, that it wasn’t her table servings that kept the officer in attendance. One Saturday between afternoon and time for dinner prep, I took a good look at Mrs. Penn and saw that she looked drained and almost flat, if that makes sense. Her face was pale, and she lacked her usual sparkle and animation. I asked her about it, and she admitted to feeling tired. I practically dragged her into one of the two downstairs bedrooms and urged her to take a nap. I pulled back the covers and watched as she slipped underneath. It was worrisome to see her looking “sickly” as the villagers put it when one of them dropped by to peek in on Old Mother in those final days. I returned to the kitchen and completed the meal prep. When the boys stormed in for dinner and Frank, looking freshly showered and handsome as ever, sat down at the table, I explained about putting Mrs. Penn to bed. “She doesn’t look well. Should we call the doctor?” I asked. I think Frank tried to read my face to see the seriousness of the situation, but then he said, “Dr. Benter is over in Bristle delivering a baby. That’s a good three hours away, and when he does get back into town he’s going to be thoroughly worn out. And, of course, babies seem to happen in the wee hours of the morning, so he probably won’t arrive in Tinkle Town much earlier than sun rise. Then, he’ll need rest. Let’s see how Mrs. Penn feels in the morning. If you can get her to stay here all night, that would be a good thing. Then we can keep a watch over her.” Frank didn’t stay in the house during the night, so I didn’t know what he was saying about “we can keep a watch over her,” but I nodded, relieved that, even if he hadn’t bothered to look in at her, he believed that she was probably just overly tired. I guess he hadn’t seen how quickly someone her age could succumb to pneumonia, which is what the doctor had told me killed my beloved Old Mother.
9.20 The Witchling Shama
Both boys had learned to guide Frey about the yard with a subtle lean of their bodies, and Frances had even survived a gentle trot without falling off. Of course, Frey had modified his gait to hobby horse smoothness. He was, as always, the perfect steed for each of my two youthful spitfires who liked to yell giddy-up when they were still only unbalanced collections of body parts on his high and overly broad back. But although they were short on riding skills, their enthusiasm and tenacity made up for the rest. Frances had broken through his fear of the b and d reading challenge and was progressing. He was already starting on the easiest of the beginner books that Mrs. Smith had stored in the attic boxes. Frances had a tendency to give up easily, and I’d been alarmed that he might have some other problem in his ability to sound out words, but instead of trying to persuade him to continue with Mrs. Smith’s beginning readers, he and I had written stories together. Since we made the tales all about Willow, Frey, and the people he knew, plus pancakes, (We always had to include the word pancakes.) his resistance to reading seemed to lessen, and he stopped hesitating and was doing better. After that, he would often take his stories to Carlo and read the whole collection to his little brother. Everyone enjoyed that. Even Willow would draw near and sit beside the boys to hear the latest fictional tale of how Carlo and Frances had found a magic rock and wished themselves into the land of Tinker where they ate pancakes every day and slept with a cat named Willow. Frey was often part of the tale. too. He galloped them into their adventures. Increasingly Frank was in them, too. Mrs. Penn and I seemed mere after thoughts, only fitted inside the tale because Frances thought we should be involved. Mrs. Penn was always placed in the kitchen making pancakes, while I was usually outside grooming Frey. (If that was how Frances saw the females in his life, I’d have to work on his bias, but for the moment, I just deemed it a success that he wanted to read and write.)
9.19 The Witchling Shama
As to Frank and Mrs. Penn, Willow seemed almost invisible. They both tried to become her friend, bending down to pet her head, attempting to touch the secretive underside of her chin, but Willow was a phantom-like twist who slipped away mid-pet. Most of the time she hid and watched from underneath a table or chair, in a dark corner, or hidden beneath a stray blanket left to warm a sitting body on the couch. Nor could she be enticed by a piece of bacon or other delicious tidbit, if Frank or Mrs. Penn offered it. She only ate what I gave her, abstaining from the food a cat should eat — the meats and the fish of the feline diet. She liked scrambled eggs and would occasionally nibble at a pancake, if one of the boys offered it to her, But the source of her nutrition was almost always the remnants from my plate, which she patiently waited for, perched on the floor with one jade- green eye only partly opened and the other appearing closed in sleep. Of course, if anyone moved, both of Willow’s eyes shot open as her attention focused on the movement. Mrs. Penn was the one to notice that Willow’s eyes seemed to change color at that point, going from the normal slightly bluish green of restful relaxation to a startling mint green — or as Mrs. Penn liked to put it, the exact hue of a Granny Smith apple. Frank, always one to calm such things down, would add, “It’s only the light’s reflection. Nothing more.” Meanwhile, the days had formed a flow of normalness. Frank and the boys had gone on that fishing trip they’d discussed, which Carlo didn’t much enjoy but Frances raved over. (It seemed that Carlo thought worms on fish hooks and seasickness-inducing row boats were not as exciting as they’d once sounded.) I surmised that on the next fishing time only Frances would wish to accompany Frank, something I thought which would be good for the older boy. I still worried about the sadness in his eyes and continued to believe that giving him the chance to chat one-on-one with Frank might brighten his gloom. Even if that didn’t help him leave the past behind, at least talking about it might corral it into a more manageable memory. It seemed that even a six-year-old — or almost seven-year-old, as Frances kept claiming to be — could hold onto guilt as skillfully as an adult. Frances believed, although we’d told him numerous times that there was nothing he could have done, that it was somehow his fault for not saving their mother from their father’s violence.
9.18 The Witchling Shama
Frank thought the kitten belonged to one of the nearby houses. He went door to door to check that someone wasn’t missing their pet, but I knew the truth. The cat hadn’t said more than mew to me, but I was positive that this was the younger version of the cat, Willow, from my dreams. Working with Old Mother had taught me that in the witch world, there were always going to be things we didn’t understand. Everyone admits to that, but those of us who walk moments in alternate worlds, feeding on the magic, absorbing it into our systems so we can utilize it for good, we know in a deeper sense that there are elements to life that can’t be examined too closely. Sometimes, the phantoms of reality have no explanations. With Willow, how she’d entered my dreams before she was even born, that was, perhaps, one of the biggest questions of my twenty years of life, but I sensed that Frank and I would find no answers. Magic drifted in time. It had no anchors. Willow was vividly alive back in that creek bed dream and during the dreams I’d encountered in my chamber here, and yet she wasn’t. But now, without question, she’d entered my daytime life to become the familiar she’d promised to become. I just needed to let her grow up a bit. As I’d predicted, Frank couldn’t find anyone missing a grey kitten. He couldn’t find a mother cat who’d delivered kittens about her age either. So, for him, I know that the mystery of Willow’s presence vaguely annoyed him. The officer was a person firmly entrenched in certainty. For him, reality held reason and stability. Of course, I didn’t disillusion him. The Fates, also known as Gaia, sent each of us an individual cup of life. As we drink of it, we take in what we are meant to have. Frank was perfect just the way he was. And so was Willow. She quickly adapted to the household, being playful for the boys, following strings and absorbing pets and lap holdings as any normal kitten would, but she made it clear from the start that I was her special one. She’d often spend time with one of the boys until he fell asleep, but then she’d always accompany me to bed, where she’d crawl under the blankets and make herself a sprawling bundle of slightly scratchy claws and fur. But I never woke to find her with me. I think she spent the majority of her night outside with Frey. They became almost as close as the kitten was with me.
9.17 The Witchling Shama
At last when my tears settled down into a monotonous sniff, sniff, I pulled away. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s gotten into me. I never cry like this. I’m . . .” “Human?” he said, tugging me gently back so that I form-fitted with his chest. “Have I told you how amazing I think you are? The fact that you might cry like other females does not alarm me at all. In fact, it might worry me if you didn’t.” That sounded a little like a male bias statement. I twirled it about my brain a moment, checking it over, then just mentally shrugged. If I cried when I was happy, then I supposed Frank could have his occasional “I’m a big bad male, and you’re only a little female statements . . . once in a while. I was erasing that criticism from my mind when I heard the oddest sound. It was like someone gasping for breath or calling out for help when they couldn’t speak. I froze and listened for a repetition and heard it again.’ “What is that?” I asked, We both turned toward the sound. Somehow a tiny gray kitten had managed to get itself locked up in the yard with Frey. It was sitting on top the old picnic table making strange little peeps and ehs. I disentangled myself from Frank and ran over to the little baby. “Where did you come from?” Of course, I picked it up, and at that moment I saw the distinctive markings. The white muzzle, the white paw on his hind leg. It was Willow, yet, not Willow, because in my dream, she had been much bigger. Her tiny pink tongue reached out and licked my chin. “Mew,” she said, this time sounding more like a cat than a bird. I petted her head and rubbed under her chin. The mercantile store owner’s marmalade cat had taught me how to do that. If I didn’t do it correctly, she used to swat me. Mr. Brown would shake his head at me. “Why do you bother with that grumpy, old cat?” he’d asked, but what he didn’t understand was that with a cat, it was a privilege to pet them, an honor when they allowed it. If you were really lucky, and you did everything just right, a cat would even purr, that gentle vibration of warm joy that entered your heart and made you smile. So, thanks to Marmalade, as I’d called the cat, since Mr. Brown had never even named it, I knew exactly how to please this little one.