Pathways, Part 4

In which the plot finally begins. OMG, spoilerz! I haven't touched this story for a while. Hope it doesn't show.....

My father, on his part, never set foot in the town unless he absolutely had to – meaning that he only went when there was trouble with our taxes. And since it was an act of great bravery for our tax collector to set foot in our woods every year, this was not often. So he was not too concerned with the looks we received, or what they might be saying about us.

I wished, more than once, that I could be more like him – but more than just in not caring about others’ thoughts.

I remember, as I sat there going at my sewing like a crippled old horse plowing their last, huge field, thinking about the stories of those schools in the cities – wondering if they might be true. I was not as taken to reading as my two little brothers were, but I liked to learn. And I suppose I liked the thought of being educated, like a proper city dweller was supposed to be. Maybe, I thought to myself, I could even become a great science scholar – one of those clever people who were building those strange and delightful machines that made life easier, like the stove that didn’t need wood and the carriage that went without horses (which we had never seen but had heard much talk of). Maybe I could even invent something that would make me famous! Everyone all over the world would know my name – and far into the future, I would still be remembered as Maria Wood, the one who had invented this very useful and amazing thing. My fantasies took no notice of my impatience with sitting still, or that I took no interest in books, but they were nice fantasies anyway. They took my mind off of my sore fingers.

It was then, in my fifteenth winter, that my fantasies drove me to wonder about the world outside of the forest, beyond even Laktown. As I went about doing learning my duties in the home - scrubbing, sweeping, cooking, sewing, repairing – I wondered about that faerie-tale land that we were so far away from. What was it like, really? My mother only rarely spoke of her life before she married Father. I tried, once, to ask her what her hometown was like.

Her answer was to pause her sweeping and look at me.

“Why do you want to know?” she asked.

“I just wondered.” I said, looking down at my own broom.

She sighed, returning to sweeping. “It was nothing like this, Maria, I can tell you that. It was very grey, lonely place. Nothing like this at all.”

I took this in quietly, and didn’t ask her about it again.

It didn’t stop me from thinking about it, though. The older I grew, in fact, the worse it became. My mother noticed, and my father noticed, and I even think my brothers noticed, but nothing was said of it. I think they reasoned that I would grow out of it – or if I didn’t, I would soon have to leave it behind. As much as I daydreamed, I didn’t really have the courage or desire to do anything about it, and deep down I knew what was waiting for me. I didn’t argue it, or was even really very much against it. Marrying was not so bad a thought, although who in our small world would want to marry me was a mystery. My troubled ancestors had managed well enough, but very narrowly. Looking at my family tree (the only thing my family took any care to write down, in a tattered bunch of paper and parchment on top of our single bookshelf), it was very thin and straight, with many lines ending right where they started.

What would become of me, I thought, if I didn’t marry? Would I just stay here forever, taking care of everyone? Mother and Father would die before us, I knew, so there would be a time when it would be just my brothers and me. And what would they do? Perhaps they might marry, and have families. Perhaps not. Maybe they would be like me, old and still single. This thought felt better to me. I thought it would be terribly lonely for me, if they did marry. They would have families, wouldn’t they, and I would be…what would I be? An old spinster aunt, maybe, who told stories to my nieces and nephews in front of the hearth at night and who cooked the most wonderful meals. That was not too terrible, I suppose. I still preferred to my other vision. At least then I would still have my brothers to myself, and we would all be on equal ground with our spinsterhood - or bachelorhood, whatever the phrase is. Our line would come to an end, to be sure, but it would be a peaceful one. I don’t think our ancestors looking down from heaven would mind too much.

But what if I did find someone to marry?

This brought up a whole new bunch of questions in my head, and I finally, wearily, stilled my brain and told myself to stop thinking about it. I had a good long time to think of those things. I contented myself with living my life as it was. I was young , and that worrisome time was a far ways off.

Chapter 3

It was one other winter day that it so happened my brother Josef snuck out of the house after chores were done, and went out into the woods. He had done this many times before, so it was no surprise when we noticed him missing. We did not bother ourselves to search for him – we knew that he would come back in a few hours, flushed and sheepish, and Mother would give him his scolding and Father a smart smack and a stern talking-to of his own.

Many hours later, when the sun had set and dinner had been served and eaten, Josef still had not come back. Mother, sitting in front of the fire with her sewing, glanced often out the window, looking more and more worried. Father, sitting beside her and tending to his gun, grew slower and slower in his movements as time went on, until finally he stopped altogether.

He looked out the window like Mother, and sighed. He rose from his chair, placed his gun in its place on the mantelpiece, and went over to the door. He grabbed his hat and coat from the rack, hurriedly wrapping himself up as he opened the door.

“I’m going to look for him,” He announced. He looked at my two brothers sitting in their customary place. “Tomas,” he said, addressing the elder brother, “Keep watch. Martin, you’ll help him? Good.”

Father’s eyes traveled to me. I, standing wrapped in my blanket before the fireplace, stared back, feeling suddenly very afraid.

“Maria,” he said, “You will keep charge with your mother?”

I, too startled to do anything else, swallowed and nodded. And so he turned his back and left to go look for Josef.

We all sat frozen for a long while. Father had never left us at night before. Night was when the forest was silent – not a peaceable silent, but a frightening silent. There was nothing friendly or good about this nighttime forest. Now, with so much worry on our shoulders, it seemed more frightening than ever.

I looked at Mother, who was sitting very still, sewing limp in her hands.

“M-Mother?” I said.

She blinked, and turned to look at me. She smiled, in a forceful way.

“It’s all right, Maria,” she said. “They’ll come back all right. Nothing can harm them there.”

My grown-up resolve dissolved as she said this. Shaking, I went and sat down beside her, snuggling in close and took her hand. Tomas and Martin, with only the smallest bit of hesitation, came up as well. Mother, surrounded on all sides by her children, grasped our hands and smiled. We all looked at the fire, crackling warmly away in the fireplace, keeping away the frightening darkness.

My thoughts went to Father and Josef. I wondered….oh, I did so much wondering in my mind, in those days. My mind just could not help itself. The images came, so bright and vivid, and right then none of them reassured me. My thoughts were of Josef, fallen from a tree or down a ditch, bloody and broken. Or, perhaps, mauled by some ferocious animal, ripped to pieces. The terror ran down my back and up again, and my shaking grew worse. Mother, feeling my fear, placed a hand on my head and rocked me back and forth, humming gently – as she had done when my brothers and I were babies, helpless and crying. I felt a great deal like a baby then, wanting my mother to take care of me. Not the almost-grown-up young woman that I knew I should be.

The minutes slowly, slowly went by, so very painfully. We were all stuck then, lost in our heads. I don’t know if you know this feeling – the feeling of pause, when one moment seems to keep on going and going, and you can’t think of it stopping.

It did stop, what felt like a thousand winters later, with a hard knock on the door. We all jumped, startled. Mother rushed to the window, and then to the door to open it.

Father limped in, carrying Josef in his arms. Josef was stiff, his face whiter than the snow outside. I saw blood dripping down his leg, and felt the panic rise in my chest again.

“Josef! Bern, what – Josef! Josef, can you hear me?” Mother cried. Father went down the hall, Mother coming close after him, and I could hear Josef’s moan as they set him down on his bed.

“What happened?” Mother demanded.

“He fell.” Father replied. “Broke his leg pretty badly.”

I found myself drifting towards their talking, and stood at the doorway, staring at what was going on inside.

My brother laid on his bed, eyes closed and teeth clenched. I stared at him. I couldn’t do anything else – my arms and legs had stopped working.

Mother looked up, and saw me. Father looked up as well.

“Is he….” I said. My voice wouldn’t come out all the way. It was as frozen as the rest of my body.

Mother rushed over, taking me out the door. “Come along, Maria,” she said. “Go to the fire. Please.”

I did as she said, my legs sliding stiffly across the wooden floor. I sat down in my place – Martin and Tomas were watching me, eyes wide.

“What happened?” Martin asked, his small voice shaking.

Mother looked at them, and then back at me. Her face was blank – for a moment, she could think of nothing to say.

Then, she closed her eyes, and took a deep breath. “Josef broke his leg.” she said. “He was wandering out in the woods, were he shouldn’t have been.” She looked at all of us, severely. “Let his be a lesson to all of you.”

We all lowered our heads, properly shamed. We had never wandered the woods as Josef had, but we knew better than to point that out now.

Mother went back to Josef’s room, shutting the door behind her, and we were left sitting in front of the fire, back where we had started. I looked at my two little brothers. Their faces had gone pale – as pale as Josef’s. I thought of our mother holding us while we waited for Father and Josef to come home. I would not be much use to my parents now – or to Josef. I rose, and sat next to Martin and Tomas. They leaned into me, instinctively, and I held them both, stroking their hair.

I still felt afraid, but I couldn’t let my brothers see it. I couldn’t let them feel my fear. So I shut my eyes, and thought of nothing else but the feel of their warmth and their soft hair underneath my fingers.