The Witch's Trinity (15 page)

Frau Zweig came to visit, she of the thrice-quickened womb.

“Would you have any more salt?” she asked. “Frau Töpfer traded some with me. It makes things taste so fine.”

Irmeltrud’s eyes narrowed. “And what do you put it on?”

“Eggs. Our hen was not cursed,” she said.

“You have a hen?”

“Yes. Have you not known of this? ’Twas hardly a secret.” Frau Zweig reached out to Alke, to touch her cheek. All smiles she was, and she bent to kiss the young girl atop her head.

“I knew not,” said Irmeltrud stiffly.

“You’re so fair, my dear,” said Frau Zweig to Alke. “Your lips are darling blooms of roses. Are you not a joyous, beauteous sight?”

Alke, in return for the compliment, curtseyed and kissed Frau Zweig’s skirt hem.

“So you are wanting salt to better fasten the eggs’ flavor? I’m eager then to help you improve your meals, while my children and I sit here with naught to eat,” Irmeltrud said.

“Don’t be bitter. Look, I’ve brought you eggs.”

We all inhaled, our breaths loud. Irmeltrud’s face showed a full smile, and I saw again the handsomeness that had once led Jost to her favor. Frau Zweig showed her basket. It contained three eggs, nestled with cloth to cushion them. I reached out and picked one up, felt the slump of the thing inside. “Three eggs,” said Irmeltrud. Her smile faded.

“I know you are four with Jost gone,” said Frau Zweig, “But this is all I can spare. Surely you and Güde can share?”

“You want the salt only to flavor your eggs?” Irmeltrud asked. Her meaning was clear:
What other food do you have?

“You look like a wolf!” said Frau Zweig. But I thought she was more the wolf, with her wispy face and sharp chin. “Believe me, we are not hiding food from you. I would give all I had to keep the young sweetings happy.” She opened her arms to Alke and Matern, and they went to embrace her. I saw Matern’s eyes, however, focused not on her face but on the basket. He hugged carefully so as not to rock the fragile eggs inside.

I put a second hand around my egg, to make sure it didn’t drop.

Irmeltrud’s face did not shift out of suspicion, but she nodded. She went to the salt cellar and spooned a palmful, wrapping it up in the cloth from the basket.

“Your hen lays daily?” she asked.

“Oh, no, we are not as lucky as that. She lays when she wishes. Herr Zweig and I wanted to gobble them up but saved carefully these many days so we’d be able to trade.”

I had to turn away so that Frau Zweig would not see my face. She lied! No one as hungry as we were would’ve been able to set the eggs aside; they would have been eaten raw and instantly, as I now craved to do with the one I held. Yellow yolk would have run down her chin and maybe her haste would have been such that she ate some shell too. The Zweigs must have food.

“Thanks for the trade then,” said Irmeltrud, emptying the basket. “We’ll do it again. Tomorrow, if she lays. You haven’t made agreement with anyone else, have you?”

“Oh, no, I thought only of you with two small ones,” she said. “But I think this salt will last us for a while. Perhaps we can trade again in a week.”

Irmeltrud pressed her lips together until the entire area around her mouth was white as snow. Frau Zweig didn’t see, though, for she turned to give a huge smile to Alke and Matern. They shyly smiled back. “I brought something for you two especially,” she said. She produced a puppet as long as her hand, dressed in miniature breeches and shirt.

Matern reached out and grabbed the doll and held it above his head. Alke laughed delightedly, since she was taller than he was and could easily pluck it from his hands. Then she darted past him and ran around the cottage with it, chortling her joy to have a reason to run. I could scarcely believe her legs still worked after so much listlessness. Matern’s high-pitched voice joined hers and the ground shook with the slapping of their feet. Around and around they went, stirring the skirts of the three women watching.

I was first to give in to the infectiousness. I clamped my hands on either side of my jaw to feel the shaking as I laughed; it felt like my body had forgotten how to do it. Frau Zweig was soon after, with her loose bosoms rolling above her bodice. She shrieked with laughter when Alke grabbed her about the waist and hid behind her, the toy still clenched in her palm. Frau Zweig winked at me and grabbed the toy and threw it across the room to Matern, who crowed and again held it above his head as if in triumph. Alke lightly spanked Frau Zweig’s rump and she jumped.

“Child! The adults do the spanking, not the children!” she laughed.

I watched Irmeltrud’s face relax and the edges of her mouth slowly, slowly rise. But she didn’t have a full smile until Matern stopped right in front of her, making Alke plow into his back in surprise, and handed the toy to his
Mutter.
Then it was as though she were ten years younger, with a whimsical smile touching her lips and her blue eyes opening wider: finally, something she cared to look at! She took the toy and gave Matern a kiss for it, then spun in a circle, intermittently holding out the toy and snatching it back as soon as the children reached for it. They circled her deliriously until somehow they all fell into a rhythm. ’Twas miraculous to see, like the mill wheel’s gears catching the teeth of the face wheel, everything working in harmony.

It was Frau Zweig who ruined the rhythm. She reached out and easily grabbed the toy, then threw it to me. It bounced off my outstretched fingers and fell to the ground. I bent to get it but felt a bolt of pain in my back and stopped. Matern dove for it and lay on his back holding it on his belly, laughing so hard his face reddened.

We almost, but not quite, had forgotten about the eggs.

“Well, that was a bright gift,” said Frau Zweig. “I’ll be off now. Enjoy it, children!”

“No,” wailed Matern, getting up and running over to bury his face in her skirts.

“Stay, Frau Zweig,” said Alke. “Won’t you?”

“I must go but I’ll return ere much time goes by,” she said. She gave kisses to the children and ran a lingering hand over their two heads. She gave them a
Mutter
’s look: protective, proud, and grateful. She’d make a good
Mutter
if her stomach ever stopped being barren, for she had these qualities plus the ability to make merry. Irmeltrud was still smiling, but I saw that she was relieved to close the door behind our visitor, for it meant we could now eat.

The children ran to the board and Irmeltrud produced a bowl to break the eggs into.

“We’ll cook them,” she announced, “and that way we can divide them.”

The sound of the shell cracking was like a cowbell clanking on the hillside, for it reminded me of a time of plenty. We had cracked eggs thoughtlessly once, moving without heed through the sound of sheep rustling and bähhing, hearing the cows lowing and not realizing what a miraculous thing it was.

Into the bowl slid the egg’s innards, the wholesome wide yolk that made us think of the sun at noontide, and the slippery matter that protected it. Three times she did this and we watched the liquids pool. Then she stirred them with a wooden spoon until the whites and yellows blurred. As the eggs cooked in the skillet, we all watched spellbound. Moisture collected in my mouth, sour and salty. How fluffy and bright they were! We had nothing else in the house of such a color. Finally, we moved back to the table and Irmeltrud doled out the portions. She gave me a sadly tiny amount. I put the egg into my mouth to taste the hen’s gift. I made myself chew, and when I swallowed, a sob choked up to meet the egg.

How pitiless the world was. The hen might not lay every day, and Frau Zweig would share with us only if she needed something. I thought of Jost trudging through the snow, as wet and thick as it was, and wished that a thousand woodland animals came out to stare at him, let him approach them with his arrows, and drop down into the snow with howls and groans.

“Ah, God!” I cried out, and then my forehead sank to the empty plate and I sobbed outright. Matern put the toy in front of me, and when I didn’t respond, he closed my fingers around it. Then he grabbed for it, making a sound that tried to be a laugh. I didn’t resist and so he instantly had it. As I sobbed, he looked at the doll’s jolly painted face. Then he set it down on the table. All three left me there while they cleaned the plates.

Irmeltrud was staring into the fire. “The Zweigs have food,” she muttered to herself. “The friar too. He brought some store with him when he came. We have to please him.” The children had fallen asleep on the hearth. I would have carried them to bed but was too frail to lift them. Irmeltrud could have managed but was lost in reverie. “Cut the wood for him,” she whispered. In the half-light, her head moved not, but her eyes slid over, smoothly as the door creeping open, until she stared at me from the corners of her eyes.

10

And I have found a woman more bitter than death, who is the hunter’s snare, and her heart is a net, and her hands are bands.

—M
ALLEUS
M
ALEFICARUM

T
he next day I walked as far as I could, to see if I could catch sound of the hunters returning. I knew what the look Irmeltrud had given me by the fire meant.

I knew it, I knew it.

So I set out to find Jost. Only he could stop her from her cruel choice. The forest path was buried in snow, but the opening in the trees showed me where to walk. I walked until my feet were soaking wet and the shoes useless scraps of leather, until I could not feel my fingertips and had to look at my hands to be sure they were still there. The wind howled and moved through my clothing. I became panicked, thinking how long it would take to return the way I’d gone and that every step I continued away from the cottage meant that I might become too exhausted to make it home. But I couldn’t stop myself. And what would I be returning to?

I passed the Lehnt Rock, a landmark men spake of, but which I had never seen before. I huddled against its face for a moment, to block the wind, but then my feet of their own device moved me forward and I continued on. The land rose and I was climbing a hill, and at one point looked down to see the cottages of another town, Steindorf, that sometimes joined us for fests. The last time we had gathered together was years ago. The image of the dark-haired woman rose in my mind. She was from here. She had eaten of our food at Michaelmas, with her bright red lips. I stared down, wondering which
Hütte
she lived in. With a pang, I remembered that she had food. She had fed me pig meat. She had helped me fly. She could feed me and then carry me through the woods to find Jost. I wouldn’t mind her black hair draped over my body if it meant I could see my son again. I was plunging down the hillside now, falling to my knees in the thickened snow. The
Hütten
here were of stone, not wood, with mud chinking the gaps between. I had never seen such an oddity. In my village, only the Witch’s Tower was made of stone. There was a certain coldness to Steindorf, as the gray of the stone echoed the white of the snow.

Smoke pumped from all the chimneys, and I saw not a single person out of doors. I moved as quickly as a young woman now, hungry to find her. I walked to the closest home and pounded on the door. A woman came to open it and her face registered no surprise, no emotion. She was gaunt, with slack skin hanging from her high cheekbones.