The Execution (19 page)

“
Ravan, I’ll find the
knife, child. When I do, I’ll hide it at the bottom of the barley
barrel. No one would think to look there.” She sounded pleased that
she could do this small thing for him.

He nodded and closed his eyes, taking
comfort in the proximity of her.

She reached out to take his lean,
battered hand into her fat one, sandwiching it warmly.

He smiled weakly at the feel of her
touch. Then, mercifully, he drifted deeply off into a dreamless
sleep.

CHAPTER
THIRTEEN

†

They were a family of six. Yvette and
her sister Julianne, who was seventeen, were the only girls. Father
and the three boys, ages twenty-two, nineteen and eleven, completed
the family. Mother had died when Yvette was born.

That had been a terrible and blessed
time. It was the first of the year, a late March evening, almost
Easter. Winter had not even offered a breath of the spring to come.
The season had gone late, as had the pregnancy. Yvette came
splashing abruptly into the world with the wind outside howling of
bad things ahead. There had hardly been much labor, and her mother
had cried out aloud as the unnatural tettanic contractions thrust
the baby too hurriedly into the world.

Julianne’s father had not seen one
born in such a way, had not heard his bride scream so horribly when
the others had come. He threw himself across the damp and bloody
body of Julianne’s mother and held her tightly as the blood loss
turned her an awful ashen gray and her life swiftly
faded.

She died very quickly, the blood
gushing from her in a river. Then, he’d sobbed—forever it had
seemed. The boys were too stricken to comprehend the horror of it
all and peeked from around the door jamb, unwilling to allow their
minds to take in what their eyes saw.

Julianne tugged at her father’s arm,
but she could not tear the tormented man away. The blood that ran
steady and bright from between her mother’s legs spilled thick to
the floor where it congealed a sinister black on the
tongue-and-grooves.

Some days later, father tore the
planks away, as the stains never did come up. He beat the floor
with a splitting maul, shattering the wood, screaming at the
audacity of it, to soak her up as it had.

Thank God in heaven, that some of the
town’s women had come right away to help clean and prepare the
body. So much blood, so much life to spill. It had been too much
for Father to bear.

Julianne, twelve years old, had taken
the infant girl from between her mother’s legs. The placenta had
never delivered and she was forced to cut the cord with a butcher
knife to separate the baby from her dead mother. She blinked back
tears as she wrapped the babe in the birth blanket she and mother
had fashioned lovingly for Yvette and took her to the
kitchen.

She heard her father’s sobs as she
laid the baby on the kitchen table and swaddled it warmly. The
intricate pink and yellow tatted butterflies were now spotted red
with the blood of Julianne’s mother. Gently, she folded back the
blanket and stared down at her baby sister. Wiping tears from her
eyes, she could feel the smudge of blood she left on her own cheek.
She carefully tied waxed thread around the cord to stop the
bleeding, as she remembered seeing the midwife do when her youngest
brother had been born, when she was only eight.

Some of the old women in the town
whispered that tying the cord in such a way also made it so that
Satan could not get in. She softly murmured a prayer...just in
case. Then, she tenderly washed and dried the new baby. There had
been no time for a midwife with this delivery.

All the while, as Julianne tended the
baby, she spoke a soft prayer to her mother, that she would take
care of little Yvette. They had picked the name out together and
had told none of the boys. It was their secret and mother was going
to announce it at her birth. She had somehow known that the babe
was a girl; of this Julianne had not been able to sway her. It was
to be her sister and of this her mother had been absolutely
certain.

She sobbed and shuddered as she
remembered these things and promised her mother that she would care
for father and her brothers too. She beseeched Mother to flee to
her Lord’s feet without worry, that her family would be well tended
and safe until they were eventually reunited.

Tears ran down her nose and dripped
off onto the ivory white skin of the infant. They looked like tiny,
transparent pearls, and Julianne stared at them for a moment before
hastily wiping them away, causing the baby to cry.

She cared for the new babe as though
it was her own. Never once did she blame the baby for her precious
mother’s death. It was just how things went sometimes; people died,
this is what she told herself. Later on, Yvette asked about her
mother and Julianne described her in detail, truthfully creating
the memory of who she was. To Yvette, her mother became nothing
short of a saint, an impression she held of her older sister as
well.

* * *

A warm evening breeze drifted across
the small meadow causing the long grasses to bend in slow waves
before making its way across the windowpane. It was sweet and
gentle and caused the curtains to stir as dusk crept forth and the
moths came out.

Yvette believed the moths to be
‘grass-fairies’. This is what her sister told her, and at five
years of age, everything was believable. She peered out the window,
squinting to bring them to focus. With the setting sun coming
across the tall grass at such an angle, the blades shone
transparent and the moths’ wings truly did look fairy
silver.

The little girl smiled widely,
satisfied that the fairies had returned and she gave her attention
back to Julianne.

The boys sat with their father in the
kitchen, discussing work and the herd. They were dairy farmers,
supplying not just milk but dairy cow stock for most of the
township of Marseille. Their cattle were well known to be sturdy
and fine milk producers, an exceptional lineage of
Braunvieh.

Most of the cheese from the area was
made from the milk of Lanviere stock, and the Lanviere men were
quite proud of the reputation they held. It afforded the family a
humble livelihood and was a sincere and honest trade.

In addition, the Lanviere family
lineage had remained unfettered by the dreaded bonds of serfdom and
so, although modest, they were free. This was something that their
father was fiercely proud of.

Monsieur Lanviere took great care to
make certain his children were well tended, possessing good manners
and morals. They were good Catholic children and feared God, as it
should be. Church and God were critically important to this family,
as they were to most in the fourteenth century.

The males sat around the kitchen
table, the boys drinking scald milk. Father and sons recounted the
calves dropped, the cow with the dead calf who had developed
mastitis, and which bull would be entitled to breed next
spring.

Yvette was too small to tend the cows
yet, so she and her older sister tended to the house chores and the
gardening. Yvette fed the chickens and gathered eggs. The growing
season seemed very short lately and so the vegetable garden was
particularly meager. But with a small flock of chickens, the meat
of a culled steer or dry cow, and all the milk and cheese they
could want, the family remained well fed. They led, for the most
part, a sustaining and satisfying life.

This was a blessing, and the family
realized this, for much of the country suffered even for food. It
seemed that France was experiencing a pull and tug between powers.
The church and state struggled, and it was the commoner who carried
the suffering of these times. It was not uncommon to have beggars
wander as far as the Lanviere farm in search of food, even with
children in tow.

* * *

Years had gone by, and Julianne kept
her promises. She was a guardian angel. The goodness in her was
equaled only by a fierce protection of her loved ones, should
anyone dare threaten or offend her beloved family.

Julianne had been forced to grow up
too soon, but regarded her role with indifference. Many in the
village suffered just as she did. Many women died with childbirth
and sometimes so did their babies. Julianne was grateful. Her blood
ran with fire, the fire of the Lanviere lineage. Her father was a
dairy farmer but her ancestors were warriors, descended from the
Netherlands. Norsemen, she was told they were—and fierce
fighters.

Monsieur Lanviere passed this strength
on to his daughter. Julianne prayed her thanks to God for this. It
was good, for she believed a woman could not be too strong. She
carried her commitment to her family with a grave responsibility
that showed deeply in her charcoal eyes.

Tonight, Julianne sat reading to
Yvette, snug in their nightshifts and stocking feet, legs
outstretched on the feather-stuffed bed. She read to her little
sister from the complete collections of Sister Frances’s Manners
for Gentle Ladies, the chapter on how to entertain company. It was
little Yvette's favorite volume as she fancied herself quite the
‘lady’. She was very feminine, not the tomboy her sister
was.

Julianne would have much rather read
from the poetry of Christine de Pisan, or the controversial
writings of the fascinating Jean De Meung. It perplexed her that
her baby sister was such a girl! Yvette liked the pink flowers
best, loved to play tea, and told Julianne all about her eventual
wedding day—most certainly to a prince.

Tonight, as Julianne murmured the
words, “A true lady is to be chaperoned on all affairs, with
moments of private conversation to be carefully directed by a
guardian and forthwith, necessarily short,” her thoughts were
considerably elsewhere.

Julianne read
mechanically, speaking but not hearing. Her thoughts were of her
afternoon with the young priest. She blushed as she recalled how
irrationally she had screamed and kicked at D’ata when she tripped
in the field. Her face flushed as she relived the kiss, repeatedly,
with the feel of his arms around her, his lips brushing
ag
ainst hers—his tongue probing
her
s.

She shook her head
involuntarily.

“
What is chaperoned?”
Yvette suddenly asked her sister.

“
Hmm?” Julianne pulled
herself begrudgingly back to the present. She closed the book, her
thumb guarding the page. Distracted, she looked out at the moth
fairies fluttering about on the evening breezes. They rode the
updrafts created as the warm earth quarreled with the descending
evening air.

“
What is chaperoned? You
said it, reading—just now,” Yvette insisted.

Julianne fanned herself with her other
hand.

“
It means when a lady is
in the presence of a suitor, she is to have a chaperone.
Mmm—someone else, usually an older woman, who is present to keep
things proper I suppose.” She peered down at her little sister to
see if her explanation was adequate.

“
What is a suitor
then?”

Julianne smiled wryly, looking at the
cherub face of her precious baby sister. She squeezed her knee to
make her squeal in delight. “Oh, that’s a gentleman, like a
boy—who’s a friend, only more.”

“
Like Monsieur D’ata is to
you?” Yvette looked innocently up at Julianne, her eyes enormous
and sparkling.

She may as well have struck her sister
across the face, Julianne was so dumfounded. “What makes you say
that, Yvette? Who told you that?” she demanded. She was stunned,
and suddenly much more attentive than she’d been seconds before.
Shifting on the bed, so she could look directly at her baby sister,
she demanded, a bit too harshly, “Who gave you such a
notion?”

Unaware that she’d said so much more
than she had intended, Yvette pouted. “Nobody. It’s just that,
well—I heard Father making such a noise about it out on the lawn
yesterday, and the boys say so.” Then her eyes lit up. “Maybe it’s
because you weren’t properly chaperoned?” Yvette seemed instantly
satisfied and swung her legs so that her stockings crept down
around her ankles, refusing to succumb to her sister’s sudden bad
humor. She grinned up at Julianne, her baby teeth charmingly
crooked.

Julianne waved her hand and set the
book on the night table. “Monsieur D’ata is a friend—only a friend.
Do you understand? You shouldn’t listen to rumors,” she scolded
Yvette. “Surely you know that he is ordained into the priesthood.”
Her argument was weak, even for Yvette’s sake.

Yvette reached for the book, not ready
to finish yet. “Yes, mmm, but that doesn’t mean he cannot be your
suitor, does it?” She cocked her head to one side. “That would be
sad.”

“
Well—yes it does mean
that.” Julianne was at an immediate loss for explanation when she
saw the look of confusion in her sister’s eyes. There was definite
confusion in her own heart as well. “I know it’s hard to
understand, but we could never be more than friends. It wouldn’t be
right with God, now would it?” The question was meant to convince
herself as much as her sister, but it did nothing to enlighten
either of them.