Kissing the Witch (9 page)

Walk lots hours. Where trees thickest he make small fire say, Rest now like good children while I go deeper in to chop wood for a while.

Brother want go with. Huntman say, Look after your sister or I’ll beat the skin off you.

We wait. Lots hours later trees so thick no light at all outside fire. Sound like wolves. Fire tiny. Brother go for wood. I cry so he come back curl round me. Warm fart. Then no fire. He say,
Don’t worry half pint I’ll bring you home as soon as it gets light.

Wake all covered snow cold laughing. Throw ball brother. Home home home like song loud through snow. When brother wake face like old bread. Say he can’t find way when all white. I say,
Follow me dance like snow home to mother.

Snow thicker feels like no feet no hands no noses. Brother follow me cry try hide it.

Get dark again. Brother go up tree see wide round. Slither down say, There’s a light, littie loaf.

We walk walk walk. When ground dip all dark again I not cry. I not cry. Brother find light again.

When we see up close dazzle I think morning. When we see cottage I think dreaming. Windows shine like sugar walls brown like gingerbread.

Brother say, Home. Not home. Then brother say, Come. I feared. I known wormy apples with shiny skin. I seen rotted teeth behind handsome beard. Brother go knock knock.

When door open I think mother then no. Young. Woman say, What brought you here? No words from brother no words from me. Woman say, Stop here with me tonight and no harm will touch you.

Bed so soft I think hot snow.

She wake me blowing on nose. I tell her walls gingerbread. She say, And the door is toffee and the chimney is liquorice and the beds are chocolate. I not know words. Laugh anyway. She make
pancakes two each me her and brother. Her eyes red like crying. Face smooth like girl.

We can stay if work. She know all that grow in woods. She know how talk rabbits into big cage in kitchen so never starving. Brother chop logs laugh like grown man ask kiss get slap. She teach me
roll dough for baking into shapes of woman tree star.

Only bad nights. Wrap round brother like bread before oven. Very quiet say home like would get me there.

One night brother gone out bed. I look sugar crystal window. No steps in moon snow all swallowed up. Too feared to cry. Then woman scream like mother old nightmares say, Get out of my bed.
Brother fall on floor. Say, Just for a warm. She hit something. Brother say, Lonely.

Morning woman wake me stroking say, Bonny red cheeks what will we do? I look brother out axing wood. Bake bread, say I. She laughing.

Days on days go by snow shrinks to nothing. I dance like white flowers pushing through cold head first. Brother has hair chin instead of smile. Woman make him chop all trees died in winter till
hands red like robins. I pick mouldy seeds from good.

One day we baking brother walk in call her name I never heard lift her skirt behind. Woman no scream this time. Put skinning knife to chin make drop of blood till he get in rabbit cage. He
laughing as she chain it. I laughing I feared. He shake cage. It hold fast.

Night I cold so woman let me in with her. Make like she not hear brother shouting. I say, He cold. She say, Not for long.

I sleep warm between arms. Wake up understanding she go to skin him like rabbit.

Slip into kitchen heart banging like churn. Brother sleep till I find key in drawer open chain put hand over mouth.

He climb out stretching. Come on, he whisper. You’re safe with me little nut.

Not safe anywhere.

He shake my head to wake it. Don’t you understand? Now the snow is gone I can find our way home to mother.

No, I crying quiet. Home not home if mother not mother.

But you can’t stay here, she’s mad, she’s got a knife.

Take my chances, I say.

He look for long while then nod. I give him fresh bake loaf shape like me. Tell him no come back with huntman gun. No come back ever.

I watch him run through trees. Snow begin falling cover tracks. I lean head in door wait for woman to wake.

Snow melting round next morning I ask,

Who you before so angry?

And she say, Will I tell you my own story?

It is a tale of a skin.

S
EE THIS LEAF
, little girl, blackened under the snow? It has died so it will be born again on the branch in springtime. Once I was a
stupid girl; now I am an angry woman. Sometimes you must shed your skin to save it.

There was a king, there was a queen. He was as rich as she was beautiful. They were as good as they were happy. They lived in a palace on the edge of a vast forest where the leaves never fell.
They were wrapped up in each other like a nut in its shell.

The only strange thing about this king was that his favourite, of all the splendid beasts that snorted and tossed their heads in his stables, was a donkey with lopsided ears. The princess was
allowed to stroke the creature’s ears on feast days, but never to ride her.

When I say the princess, I suppose I am referring to myself, though I have come such a long way from that little girl that I can hardly recognize her. I remember that I had golden hair, lily
cheeks and ruby lips, just like my mother. I know I used to run in the garden and muddy my ankles. I liked to slip out of the palace grounds and visit a cottage in the evergreen forest. An old
woman lived there who earned her bread by her needle, and by gathering herbs for medicines. I used to call her my flower-woman because her face was dry like a flower pressed in a book.

When the queen took sick, as good queens do, the king sent for physicians from east and west, far and wide. I overheard the maids talking about it. I asked to look at my mother but they told me
to go and play.

By the time the physicians arrived, through the first drifts of snow, she was past hope. My father’s knees were planted at her bedside like pine trees. I saw him through a crack in the
door.

Snow fell on the palace like a shroud that night, and in the spring the lilies stood tall on her grave. The king was still locking himself away every day to lament. He had his favourite donkey
brought to him, and wept into her hide until it was soaked; he slept between the animal’s legs each night. His courtiers breathed through their mouths.

Fearing his mind was disturbed, they urged him to find a new wife. For the sake of his subjects, for the sake of the princess, for his own sweet sake. He shook his head from side to side as if
to shake grief loose. No one could compare to his queen, be bellowed at them: where would he find again such golden hair, such lily cheeks, such ruby lips?

Finally he let them bring in the portraits. He stared at Flemish princesses and Spanish infantas, English duchesses and even an empress from beyond the sea. But though one had yellow hair and
another white cheeks and another red lips, not one of them had all these at once, so the king smashed each picture in turn against the walls of his room. The donkey brayed in panic, and stove in
the side of the throne with her hoofs. The king tore the hair from one canvas, the cheeks from a second, the lips from a third, and squeezed them together in his hand.

The mingled howls of man and beast travelled along the corridors. The cowering courtiers held perfumed handkerchiefs to their noses so as not to catch the king’s madness. His food was set
on a gold tray outside his door.

After the death of my mother, I grew paler and taller. My curves prickled as they swelled; my limbs hurt from stretching. Not all the flower-woman’s herbs could make me sleep through the
night. One day I was walking through the palace when I heard a moan. I stared at the door and remembered that the king was my father. I picked up the heavy gold tray and brought it into him.

The king was as hairy and grimy as the donkey asleep beside him. He looked up as if the heavens had opened.

I cleared my throat. Here is your dinner.

He peered closer. To think that all this time, the answer was under my nose, he whispered.

I gave him a doubtful smile.

Tell me, do you love me?

Of course.

The words barely had time to leave my mouth. I have been waiting too long, cried my father, and then he dashed the tray from my hand and pressed his mouth to mine. Bowls spun like snow, goblets
shattered like hail. I knew that something was very wrong. He pleated me along the length of his body in a way no one had ever done before. He held me at arm’s length and said, Such ruby
lips, such lily cheeks, such golden hair is all my heart desires. You will be mine again, and more than ever before.

By the time I got out of the room, my dress was torn in three places. I smelt of dirt, and fear, and something I didn’t understand. I wrapped myself in a cloak and ran to the
flower-woman’s cottage.

The courtiers had it proclaimed that the king’s mind was unhinged; in a sort of waking dream he thought himself to be young again and the princess to be her mother in virgin form; a
natural mistake. They urged me to stall, to let him court me while they sent for better physicians from farther afield; it could do the poor man no harm. They spoke of compassion, but I knew they
were terrified.

Each afternoon I would be called to the king’s chamber, with a maid for a chaperone. Some days he called me daughter; others, lover; others, his beauty. He sometimes let me comb the lice
from his hair. His starving lips would make their way from the tips of my fingers to the crease at my elbow. He would serenade me on his knees, fawn over my forehead and weep in my lap. His words,
sometimes in languages I had never heard, filled up the room till I couldn’t breathe.

So matters continued for a month. If I loved him, the king whimpered, why would I not lie down in his bed? The courtiers insisted that I continue to humour him. The flower-woman told me how to
win myself a little time. I had never played the petulant princess, but I set my mind to it now.

I told him, You have torn my dress. I need another before I marry you; would you take me for a beggar? I will have one as gold as the sun.

The king laughed out loud. He sent his courtiers to inquire through the whole kingdom. The only needle that could make such a dress belonged to the flower-woman. She worked with such meticulous
detail that another moon passed, and I was still safe.

On the day the gold dress was finished, I put it on and danced a waltz for the king. The donkey brayed in time with the music. But when he would have let down my hair, I backed away and told
him, I need another dress before I marry you; would you take me for a vagabond? I will have one as silver as the moon.

The king clapped his hands. He sent his courtiers back to the flower-woman. She worked with such tender care that another two moons passed, and I was still safe.

On the day the silver dress was finished, I put it on and danced a polka for the king. The donkey flapped her lopsided ears in time. But when he would have seized me in his arms, I backed away
and told him, I need another dress before I marry you; would you take me for a woman of the roads? I will have one as glittering as the stars.

The king caused a fanfare to be blown. He sent his courtiers back to the flower-woman. She worked with such infinite slowness that another three moons passed, and I was still safe.

On the day the glittering dress was finished, I put it on and danced a mazurka for the king. But when he would have lifted my skirt, I backed away. I had one last request, and then I would marry
him. Give me a cloak, I said, made of the hide of this donkey.

His face fell into itself, crumbled like a rotten pine cone. I almost softened.

Winter is tightening its grip on the palace, I cried. Would you have me colder than this dumb beast? Would you grudge me what the least of your brute subjects wears? Would you have me go naked
against the wind?

My father hung his head.

I wept into my pillow that night, from relief. The kingdom might be turned upside down, but I would be safe now. I listened to the far-off scream of the wind.

The king came to my room at first light, and spread the skin before me, still warm with blood. His grin hung in folds as he said, Tomorrow shall be our wedding.

All that day I stayed in my room. I clung to the blanket and said to myself, You’re a grown girl now. Worse things happen in the stories. There must be worse husbands. He is not a goblin,
or a bear, or a monster. He is only your father, and mad.

And then I shuddered and thought to myself, He could kill me. I belong to him as surely as that donkey did. He could skin me like he has skinned his beloved beast, and who could stop him? I bent
my head and wept until the blanket ran with rain.

But my old flower-woman came to me in the night, as I lay awake. You must fly now, she whispered, alone, in disguise, into some distant land where no one knows your name. She blackened with soot
that cursed golden hair, those lily cheeks and ruby lips; she showed me how to rub dirt under my nails. I took my three bright dresses, my mother’s wedding ring, and the donkey skin, wrapped
round me to ward off curious glances.