Page 4 of The Maiden and Her Monster
The next morning, the sun did not rise.
It hid behind dense clouds and fog, leaden with heavy moisture.
The wind rustled through the trees, blowing the front wisps of Malka’s hair from her kerchief.
She wiped at them with the back of her fist, pulling a piece from her mouth.
The bag tugged at her shoulder, and she shifted its weight to the other side for some relief.
Sleep had been fruitless. She tossed and turned throughout the night, eyes stitched open with images of Minton’s mutilated hand and his blood splattering over stone. When dawn shone in though her window, she had sighed and finally slipped from bed.
She began her routine early, filling her bag with the medicinal tonics Imma made for the villagers.
Imma used to charge extra for delivery, but the strange sickness spreading around their village had left fewer people able to rise from their beds or leave their houses.
It was a type of consumption illness which whittled its victims away until nothing of them was left.
Cases had begun to crop up a year ago in Eskravé but had worsened in the last six months.
They attributed the sickness as another symptom of Mavetéh’s curse, since a handful of men from the Rayga hunt were the first to catch it.
So Imma made exceptions to her fee, and Malka delivered them at daybreak.
In the quiet dawn, Malka swore she heard Minton’s pleas in the howling wind, brushing thunderously against her ear.
She shook the sound of him away and stepped to the door, knocking on the wood which had gone concave from the heavy winter.
“Peace and light, Malka,” the shektal meat carver, Chanoch, greeted her when he opened the door. His daughter Yael, thin and boney, had always been prone to terrible illness, but her condition had worsened severely after developing symptoms from the consumption sickness a week ago.
“Peace and light,” Malka responded, digging into her bag. “How is Yael’s cough?”
Chanoch frowned, the creases on his forehead deepening. His beard caught a few drops of snow, glistening as they melted into his graying hair. “Getting worse. Yesterday, when she awoke, we found blood on her pillow.”
Malka’s throat tightened. “I will let my mother know.” His broad figure was made small by his grief. “Do not lose hope yet, Chanoch.”
He smiled tiredly, the bags under his eyes murky pools. “Thank you, Malka.”
She handed him a glass bottle from the bag. “Make sure she takes all of it and follows with some food. I’ll be back tomorrow.”
The wind howled again, sweeping the tails of her skirt as she headed back to the dirt path. The lingering snow on the ground was caked with mud and crunched under her boots.
Beyond the jagged canopy of houses, Malka could hear the murmurs of her village livening as another day unfurled.
After they threw Minton back into the horror-struck crowd, the Order had declared they would remain in Eskravé until twice the tithe could be procured in full. Faces of sorrow had overtaken the villagers, the lit torches making their tears gleam in the night.
The Paja had erected magnificent tents alongside the shektal, though many forced their way into Yahadi houses when the weather began to slip at night.
The villagers could say nothing, for they did not own the houses they occupied.
Instead, they crammed together to make space for the members who demanded beds and warm meals, who rummaged through their cabinets for food they did not have.
Malka was glad her own house, far on the outskirts of the village, went unnoticed.
“Malka!”
She twisted her neck to see her friend Amnon jogging to meet her.
“Peace and light,” he greeted, lips curving into a smile. He was vibrant against the overcast morning: his eyes green like the darkest juniper, hair the color of oiled frankincense glimmering in the sun.
“Peace and light, Amnon.”
“You’re out early.”
He appeared boyish, red from the cold filling his cheeks, nose scrunched as the snow landed like freckles across his skin. It was exactly how he had looked when they were younger, chasing each other through the woods.
The woods. Mavetéh. Minton.
She swallowed the taste of copper. “I couldn’t sleep.”
His eyes lost their glimmer. “I heard about last night. I’m sorry you had to witness that.” He raised his hand as if to console her but decided against it.
“I’m glad Danya stayed with Hadar. She’s so stubborn I thought she would sneak out anyway. But I’m glad she didn’t have to see that. I don’t think I will ever forget.”
Even though only the eldest child could accompany their parents to each shektal announcement due to crowding, Malka knew Danya would betray the rules without a second thought.
She had done so once—snuck out after Malka had left with their parents and hid behind a market cart until the vendor kicked her out.
Malka still remembered how loudly Abba had roared, how red his face had bloomed.
“How is Minton?” Amnon asked.
“Resting. But Imma says he will never regain the use of his right hand.” A terrible fate for any smith.
“I will pray for his speedy recovery.” He eyed her bag. “Do you need help with that? I’ve finished my morning chores.”
Malka opened her mouth to protest but decided against it, knowing Amnon’s determination to feel helpful. Instead, she passed over the bag, rubbing at the dull pain in her shoulder.
They continued down the path, weaving through the houses and streets until there were only a handful of tonics clinking in the bag.
“I should’ve been there,” Amnon said, kicking the mud at his feet.
Malka settled her hand on his shoulder. “It is a blessing you were not. Believe me.”
“I could have—”
“You could have what, Amnon?” Malka dropped her hand. “Stood up against the Church yourself? Talked back to Father Bro ? ek? That’s exactly what Minton did, and you know what happened to him.”
Amnon ran his fingers through his hair. “I wish I had been there to cover your eyes. To shield you from the violence.”
“Then it would be me consoling you through the nightmares instead. Either way, we do not win.”
“I only want to protect you, Malka,” he said softer, letting his thumb trace the vestiges of the bruise on her cheek. “Have you given anymore thought to it, at least?”
Malka closed her eyes. Mavetéh’s curse had stolen the rest of her youth, leaving her flush against the expectation of marriage and motherhood.
But Malka couldn’t imagine leaving the house with her sisters yet or leaving Imma to care for patients without her.
Not when the Rayga captured lives in the night and illness raged.
“Not yet,” Malka responded softly. “But I will. When things get a little better here and I’m not needed as much.”
Amnon’s smile didn’t reach his eyes, but he nodded.
“Is your brother back from Valón?” Malka asked, desperate to change the subject.
“Got in early this morning,” Amnon responded. “Abba was happy.”
Valón, Ordobav’s capital city, existed in her mind as a fantasy, drenched in color by stories from Eskravé’s merchant traders like Amnon’s oldest brother Micah, who bought wool materials from Valón’s renowned spinners and sold them to the southern villagers who traveled to Eskravé’s marketplace.
Micah had told them stories of grand buildings painted in every color of clay and the shul Bachta—the greatest synagogue in Ordobav—with its stained-glass windows and spiraling tower.
It had long been known to the outer Yahadi villages as a place of safety and refuge, its Yahadi Quarter flush with thriving businesses.
It had its own municipality, the Qehillah, where Yahadi leaders wrote up laws for the Yahadi Quarter. Some even served in the king’s court.
Even Baba, her grandfather, had shared stories of the city before he passed a few years ago.
As a prominent healer, he often helped with Valón’s brutal sick seasons, bringing back tales to a wide-eyed Malka.
A street vendor adorned with many colorful hats juggling his produce; a Fanavi woman’s delicious, sweet bread which filled the whole street with its scent; fire-lit torches flying through the air as a parade crossed the sprawling hilltop castle.
She had swallowed the stories like plum juice, her curiosity as constant as its sticky sweetness on the roof of her mouth.
Though, as with most sweet things, rot rode in on its coattails.
Addicted to the saccharin, Malka still dared to ask, “Does he have any new stories?”
Amnon sighed. “It’s been months since he shared anything. I don’t even bother asking at this point.”
Her shoulders sagged, but she could only blame herself. The memory of her mistake gnawed at her again. Micah’s last few stories had been a smooth balm over the worsening state of the forest’s curse, and she had pushed too hard, asking what she knew she shouldn’t.
The Maharal and his magic.
He was more myth than man to Malka, a Valonian rabbi revered and reviled for practicing a contentious Yahadi mysticism known as Kefesh.
Whenever Malka asked about the Maharal, Baba unfurled his stories like allegorical, century-old tales, told in the same way the sacred Yahadi scrolls revealed their lessons and commands.
They were never grounded the way his other stories had been, and almost never mentioned Kefesh.
It was as if Baba did not want to place the Maharal in the present, as someone still existing and practicing a magic her village declared forbidden, even if the city didn’t.