Cecilia Dart-Thornton - The Bitterbynde 01 - The Ill-Made Mute

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For my beloved parents,

My wonderful husband, and my entire extended family,

For my friend, author Paul Witcover,

For Betsy Mitchell and Martha Millard,

And for Lizzie, who was the manuscript's first reader.

Cecilia

Dart-Thornton

CONTENTS

1—Foundling

2—The House of the Stormriders: Tale and Travail

3—The Windships: Sail and Swordplay

4—The Forest: Tree and Trickery

5—Waterstair: Candlebutter and Spiderweb

6—Gilvaris Tarv: Pain and Perfidy

7—The Road: Thicket and Thorn

8—Mirrinor: Wights of the Water

9—Doundelding: Secrets Under Stone

10—Rosedale: Briar and Bird

FOUNDLING

Speechless, castaway, and wry, a spellbound oddity am I.

My feet are planted in the clay, my gaze is locked upon the sky.

—FROM THE TALITH SONG "YEARNING FOR FLIGHT"

The rain was without beginning and without end. It pattered on incessantly, a drumming of impatient

fingers. The creature knew only the sound of the rain and the rasp of its own breathing. It had no concept

of its own identity, no memory of how it had come to this place. Inchoate purpose drove it upward, in

darkness. Over levels of harsh stone it crawled, and through dripping claws of vegetation. Sometimes it

slept momentarily or perhaps lost consciousness. The rain lapsed. Time wore away.

With stiffening limbs the nameless creature moved on. Reaching level ground, it now rose onto

trembling legs and walked. Thought-fragments whirled like dead leaves inside its skull.

The ground emptied from beneath its feet. It hurtled downward, to be brought up on a spear-point

of agony. A band around its arm had snagged on a projection. The scrawny thing dangled against the

cliff-face, slowly swinging like bait on a hook.

Then slowly, with great effort, it lifted its other arm. Bird-boned fingers found the catch and released

it. The band sprang open and the creature fell.

Had it landed on the rocks, it would have been killed—a kinder fate—but it finished, instead,

facedown in a green thicket of Hedera paradoxis. Stealthily the juices of the poisonous leaves ate into its

face while it lay there for hours, insensate. When it awoke it was too weak to scream. It used its last

energies to crawl from the toxic bushes and lie frozen in the morning sunlight, its now-ghastly face turned

up to the sky.

———«»——————«»——————«»———

A benison of warmth began to creep into the chilled flesh, seeping into the very marrow of the

bones. Detached, as though it viewed itself from afar, the creature felt its jaws being forced open, inhaled

the steamy aroma of warm broth, and sipped instinctively. The sweet, rich liquid coursed inward,

spreading waves of flowing warmth. The creature sipped again, then fell back, exhausted.

As its body attempted to normalize, its thoughts briefly coalesced. It held tightly to the one idea that

did not spin away: the awareness that for as long as it could remember, its eyelids had been shut. It tried

to open them but could not. It tried again and, before being sucked back into unconsciousness, stared

briefly into the face of an old woman whose wisps of white hair stuck out like spiders' legs from beneath

a stained wimple.

———«»——————«»——————«»———

There followed millennia or days or minutes of warm, foggy half-sleep interspersed with waking to

drink, to stare again at that face bound in its net of wrinkles and to feel the first very faint glimmerings of

strength returning to its wasted body. Recognition evolved, too, of walls, of rough blankets and a straw

pallet on the stone-flagged floor beside the heat-source—the mighty, iron-mouthed furnace that

combusted night and day. The creature's face felt numb and itchy. And as senses returned, it must endure

the sour stench of the blankets.

Stokers entered the room, fed the hungering furnace with sweetmeats of wood, clanged the iron

door shut, raised their voices accusingly at one another, then went away. Children with malt-brown hair

came and stared, keeping their distance.

The white-haired crone fed some broth to her charge and spoke to it in incomprehensible syllables.

It stared back at her, wincing as she lifted it, blankets and all, and carried it into a small room. Beneath

the peelings of bedding the creature was clad in filthy rags. The old woman stripped it naked before

lowering it into a bath of tepid water. Wonderingly, it looked down at its own skeletal frame, floating like

some pale, elongated fish, and perceived a person, with arms and legs like the crone but much younger.

The crone was doing something to its hair, which it couldn't see—washing it in a separate container

behind the bath, lathering the hair thoroughly with scented soaps, rinsing again and again.

The woman dressed the rescuee in garments of a nondescript sepia hue—thick breeches,

long-sleeved gipon, and thigh-length doublet corded at the waist. There was a heavy, pointed hood with

a wide gorget that was allowed to hang down behind the shoulders, leaving the head bare. About the

creature's neck, beneath the gorget, she strung a leather thong tied to a rowan-wood charm crudely

carved in the shape of a rooster. The bathed one sat, obediently, cross-legged while gnarled hands

combed the short hair dry.

Bewildered, feeble, it lifted its scrawny hand to its head and felt the short stubble there. Its spindly

fingers wandered to its face, where there was no sensation other than slight irritation. They found there

grotesque lumps and swellings: a knobbed, jutting forehead, thick lips, an asymmetrical cauliflower of a

nose, cheeks like bags of acorns. Tears filled its eyes, but its benefactress, chattering gummily to herself,

seemed oblivious of its agony of humiliation.

Time organized itself into days and nights.

The days organized themselves around eating, dozing, and the exhausting minutiae of existence.

———«»——————«»——————«»———

The spider-haired woman jabbed a stubby thumb at herself. "Grethet," she repeated. Apparently

she had discovered her charge was not deaf.

Instantly grateful for this first attempt at communication, it opened its mouth to respond.

No sound came forth.

Its jaw hung slack, a crater of hollow disbelief—it had simply forgotten, or had never known, how

to make speech. Frantically it searched its memories. It was then that the fist of despair slammed into the

foundling.

There were no memories.

None at all.

The thing, pale and debilitated, stared into hot iron darkness for half the night. To its dismay, it could

dredge up no recollection of a past and was unable to evoke its own name, if name it had ever

possessed.

———«»——————«»——————«»———

As days passed in bewilderment, meaningless sounds began to metamorphose into

half-comprehended words—communications among other people. Although still confused, the newcomer

compared their raiment with that which Grethet had put on him and concluded that its own sex was male.

This was an identity, no matter how generalized, to be grasped and held secure, a solid fact in a morass

of uncertainty.

He also discovered that he was unwelcome.

———«»——————«»——————«»———

Despite his inability to guess or understand more than half of what they were saying, it was not

difficult for the misshapen youth to recognize the despisal, contempt, and hatred of the people among

whom he dwelled. He huddled into a smaller bony heap in the furnace-room corner when children spat at

him. They thought him too repulsive to be approached, or they would have pinched him, as indeed they

slyly pinched one another. Men and women generally ignored him. When they noticed him, they ranted

coldly at Grethet, who appeared unconcerned. Sometimes, as if in self-defense, she would point out the

stranger's hair for their inspection. The apparent importance of his hair, he could not fathom. It seemed

that she was tough, this old woman; they could not sway her. However, her frail patient had no illusions

that she nurtured any love for him—she was kind, in a callous way, and he owed her his life, but all her

actions were in the long term self-serving. To act selfishly, as the youth learned, was the way to survive in

this place.

———«»——————«»——————«»———

What was this place? The youth knew little of it beyond the windowless furnace room with its huge

wood-stack, where translucent spiders concealed themselves with only their claw-tips showing in rows of

four. The black walls of this chamber were rough-hewn blocks of rock; they sparkled with tiny silver

points where they caught the firelight. One corner of the room held the hefty iron fire-tongs, pokers, and

other implements with which Grethet poked the fire after the men stoked it, several times a day.

Men here wore the drab surcoat belted at the waist, the thick breeches stuffed into boots, and the

oddly heavy hood that was left to hang down behind the shoulders. Their wood-brown hair was cut

short. Some were bearded. They disregarded the stranger as they ignored the other crawling things

scrambling out of the fuel or unwisely hiding in it, to be later incinerated, curling in silent agony like dried

leaves in the flames.

The children would poke at the wood-heap, disturbing insects and arachnids that scuttled crazily

across the floor. Curiously emotionless, the brats stamped in a frenzied dance—when they had finished, a

random design of smashed cephalothoraxes and carapaces remained, like pressed orchids, scarcely

visible on the black stone floor with its shining flecks.

Truly, the lesser creatures had little chance.

Most of the time, Grethet was elsewhere. She would appear briefly to tend the fire, sometimes

bringing food, abruptly leaning close to her ward to whisper, so that he shrank from her stinking breath.

"Boy," she would always say, "You, boy. You do as I say. It is better."

The youth in his weakness was grateful to be left alone, to lie in the warmth, feeling the pounding of

the ravening heart in his birdcage chest; drifting in and out of exhausted, dreamless sleep.

He had been discovered, like a babe, with eyes shuttered against the world; this finding was the

foundation of his aliveness. But unlike a babe, he was gifted with more than raw, untutored instinct—his

body remembered, if his mind did not. A wide, if basic, world-understanding was patterned there, so that

he comprehended heat and cold, high and low, light and dark—if not the word-sounds that symbolized

them—without having to experiment. He recognized that a frown or a sneer, a suddenly engorged vein at

the temples, or a tautened jaw boded a forthcoming kick or blow; he could walk and work and feed

himself as though he were normal, as though he were one of them. But he was not one of them. A huge

piece was missing: the sum of a past.

Without memories he was merely an automated husk.

Some nights the youth half woke, with tingling sensations making a racetrack of his spine and

standing his hair to attention. Some days that same surge charged the air, rousing the blood like strong

liquor. These crispate experiences generally dissipated after an hour or so, and as time dragged on, he

became accustomed to them and did not think on them any further. They were a phenomenon that issued

from Outside, and Outside was, for now, beyond his reach.

But oh, it beckoned—and sounds came to his ears from Outside—voices, the distant silver fanfare

of trumpets, shouting, the heavy tread of boots, the barking of dogs, and often, very often, the clatter of

hooves on faceted planes of black stone that sparkled like a star-pricked sky.

One night, awakened by one such commotion, he crept on trembling legs into an adjoining

storeroom. Through a thin slot of a window in the thick stone wall he glimpsed a round, red-gold moon.

And for an instant he thought he saw an impossible silhouette flying across the bright face of it.

———«»——————«»——————«»———

Soon—too soon for the nameless youth's liking or well-being—his benefactress decided he was fit

enough to work at light tasks. She hustled him out of his pile of blankets and set him to sweeping floors,

helping in the laundries, and cleaning the various ingenious instruments of lighting that had accumulated in

this place over the years—brass candlesticks and chamber-sticks, candle-snuffers, wax-jacks, bougie

boxes, wick-trimmers, douters, candle-boxes, and lamps.

His legs trembled constantly, and sometimes he nearly fainted with the effort. Fatigue and

unfamiliarity made him slow—at whiles, Grethet lost patience and cuffed him. The first time it happened,

he was greatly shocked and stared at her in horror, his thick lips wordlessly mouthing protestations. At

this an expression of guilt flashed across her face, chased by a look of ruthlessness, and she cuffed him

again, harder.

As day followed day like a queue of weary gray beggars, he became accustomed to her light,

stinging blows and abusive tone, but alone at night he sometimes wept silently for want of love.

Nourished by food, sleep, and warmth, he began to gain strength as time passed. With strength

came more understanding of the words employed by the other servants living and working within these

dark walls. He "spoke" with the loveless Grethet, employing simple, universally obvious gestures.

"Hide yourself," she would nag. "Maimed boy, you are. Wrap yourself and they won't see."

How did I come to this place? he wanted to know, and, Who am I?

But he was unable to concoct a way of inquiring. Nonetheless, by keeping his eyes and ears keen he

learned other things.

One law he learned first.

Miserable, stooped with weariness, he swept lint from the floors of the laundries. Steam imbued the

air with breathless humidity. He pushed his taltry off his damp head for just a few moments of relief, but

as he drew breath to sigh, a staff cracked down on his shoulder. He flinched but could not cry out.

"Taltry on . . . head!" screamed the chief laundress, her face empurpled as a ripe plum. "Never . . .

off, understand?"

The wearing of the taltry hood was not merely a rule. To disobey it was a crime, punishable by

beatings and deprivations. He must wear the heavy hood at all times, tied at the neck. It did not seem as

important to wear it indoors, but outdoors was a different matter.

Later, Grethet took him aside and pointed to a slit of a window.

"Outside," she pronounced in the simplified language she used for him, "outside. When outside, wear

hood. Always." She took him by the shoulders and shook him to emphasize the instructions. Working the

drawstring of his hood, she compounded the ordeal by half strangling him. "Tie tightly," she hissed. "Like

this."

The boy had examined his plain, mud-colored taltry closely, finding the reason for its peculiar

heaviness. Between the outer cloth and the lining was a fine, metal chain mesh that could be felt through

the cloth. Its purpose eluded him.

In the course of discharging his limited indoor employment, his toil in dark halls and cramped

storerooms, the foundling came to understand in greater measure the vast and complex structure in

whose understories he dwelt.

Grethet sent him to one of the kitchens to fetch bread. As he entered the fragrant, smoking cavern,

one of the underbutlers spied him and emitted a yell of rage. By this time, the unnamed lad had become

accustomed to loud vociferations of indignation accompanying his arrival anywhere. It had become part

of his education.

"Get it out of here!" shouted the underbutler, brandishing a ladle. "It's not allowed in the kitchens!"

As the lad was being chased down the passageway, he overheard a couple of scullery maids

attempting to stifle their giggles.

"Its ugliness might cause Cook to faint into the soup," said one.

"Such an accident might add flavor," her companion retorted.

His appearance might have prevented his entry into some areas, but there were plenty of other tasks

to be undertaken indoors.

Simply polishing the brass door fittings consumed much effort. There were knobs and handles,

lock-plates and chased escutcheon plates embellished with the zigzag lightning insignia, engraved

lock-covers, door-hinges and beaten copper fingerplates and cast-iron doorstops in the shape of coats

of arms. Sometimes, with a sinking heart, the polisher caught sight of a monstrous visage leering at him

from the convex surfaces of the burnished doorknobs and recognized his own reflection.

When Grethet suspected him of possessing a few moments of idle time, she would rattle off lists of

occupations with which he might amuse himself. Unfortunately, by this time he understood her well

enough.

"Furbish the bronze wall-sconces!" she would cry. "Wax the aumbries! Scrub the flagstones! Clean

the second-best silver, sweep soot and cinders out of the fireplaces, and black the grates!"

He fetched, carried, and scoured. He rubbed whiting on the moon-bright trays, salvers, and elegant

handbells with which the higher-ranking servants were summoned.

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[Version2.0—proofreadandformattedbybraven]Formybelovedparents,Mywonderfulhusband,andmyentireextendedfamily,Formyfriend,authorPaulWitcover,ForBetsyMitchellandMarthaMillard,AndforLizzie,whowasthemanuscript'sfirstreader.CeciliaDart-ThorntonCONTENTS1—Foundling2—TheHouseoftheStormriders:TaleandTravail3—T...

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