The Land of the Silver Apples Read online

  “Be sure it’s out,” whispered Mother. Jack broke up the coals with the poker and poured on more water until he could feel only a fading heat in the hearthstones.

  Father opened the door, and a blast of icy wind swept in. The rooster groaned in his pen, and a cup rolled along the floor. “Don’t dawdle!” Father commanded, as though Jack and Mother had been responsible for the delay. Snow lay everywhere, and they could see only a few feet ahead by the dim lantern light. The sky was shrouded with clouds.

  Father fetched the donkey for Lucy. Bluebell was an obedient, patient beast, chosen by Brother Aiden for her good character, but she had to be dragged from her pen on this night. She fought until Father smacked her hard and seated Lucy on her back. The donkey stood there, shivering and blowing steam from her nostrils.

  “Good old Bluebell,” crooned Lucy, hugging the animal’s neck. The little girl was covered in a heavy woolen robe with a hood, and the robe hung down over Bluebell’s sides. It must have given the donkey some warmth because she stopped resisting and followed Father’s lead.

  Jack went ahead with a lantern. It was slow going, for the road was icy where it wasn’t covered with snow. Jack had to keep trudging to the side to find the posts that marked the way. Once, they wandered off course and knew they were wrong only when Jack bumped into a tree.

  The wind gusted and the snowflakes danced. Jack heard a rooster crow, but it wasn’t the golden bird sitting on the branches of Yggdrassil. It was only John the Fletcher’s fighting cock that threatened anyone who passed by. They came to a cluster of buildings and turned at the blacksmith’s house. “There’s no fire,” Mother murmured. The forge where iron bars were heated was as black as the anvil under the oak tree.

  Jack felt a cold even deeper than the winter night. Never, in all his days, had he ever seen that fire out. It was like the heart of the village, where people gathered to talk and where you could warm your toes after a walk. Now it was dead. Soon every fire would be dead, including the two brown spots of light they carried.

  More would have to be called up, using wood that had drawn its strength from the earth. For the need-fire had to be alive to turn the wheel of the year. Only then would the frost giants return to their mountains and the door be closed between this world and the next.

  Chapter Two

  THE NEED-FIRE CEREMONY

  The chief’s house was large and surrounded with outbuildings for livestock, storage, and a dairy. To one side was an apple orchard, now leafless and dark. Jack had often visited the chief since he’d become the Bard’s apprentice. He carried the old man’s harp for musical evenings and relished his position by the fire. Earlier, when Jack had been only Giles Crookleg’s brat, the boy had been pushed to the coldest part of the room.

  He had been given his own small harp, but he was not nearly ready to perform. His fingers, more used to digging turnips, did not have the practiced ease of his master’s. The Bard said not to worry. The skill came with the years, and anyhow, Jack’s voice was good enough to stand on its own.

  Jack rapped on the chief’s door with his staff, and Father shouldered his way in with Lucy in his arms. The hall was filled with the men who would take part in the ceremony. They needed to be strong, for the rite was difficult and might take a long time. The weak, the elderly, the children, and most of the women were huddled under sheepskins in their own dark homes. The Bard and Brother Aiden sat together by the still-burning hearth.

  “May I put the donkey in your barn?” Father asked the chief.

  “Sit down and rest, Giles,” said the chief. “I know how difficult it was for you to walk here. Pega! Stir your stumps and attend to that beast.” A girl sprang up from the shadows in a corner.

  Jack had glimpsed her before. She was a silent creature who fled the instant you looked at her, and no wonder. Pega was woefully ugly. She had ears that stuck straight out through wispy hair. She was as skinny as a ferret, and her mouth was as wide as a frog’s. Saddest of all, she had a birthmark covering half her face. It was said her mother had been frightened by a bat and that this was the mark of its wing.

  No one actually knew who Pega’s mother was. The girl had been sold as a slave very young and traded from village to village until she wound up here. She was older than Jack, but her growth was stunted. She was no taller than a ten-year-old. She had been bought as a dairymaid but performed any chore anywhere, for anyone who gave her an order.

  Pega, pushed her way through the crowd, looking for all the world like a frog struggling through tall grass. “I’ll take the donkey,” Jack said suddenly. He grabbed the lantern and set off before anyone could stop him. The wind tore at his cloak as he dragged Bluebell through the snow. He shoved her into the barn with the chief’s cattle.

  I’m an idiot, thought Jack, fighting his way back. He’d meant to pull the Bard aside and tell him about Lucy’s necklace, but the sight of little Pega struggling to reach the door had struck him like a blow. He’d been a slave once. He knew what it was like to be utterly at the mercy of others.

  I’ll tell the Bard about the necklace when I get back, Jack decided. He knew the fire had to be kindled without the flint and iron they usually depended on. Metal was in the service of death—or, as the Bard put it, “Unlife.” Tonight Unlife was at its most powerful. If it contaminated the new fire, the ceremony would be undone.

  “Hurry!” cried the chief as Jack squeezed through the door. In the middle of the hall a plank of wood was laid into a groove on top of another plank, forming a large cross. Several men held down the lower piece and several more grasped each end of the upper one to saw it back and forth. Rubbing two sticks together to start a fire was hard enough. This was like rubbing two logs together.

  Lucy had removed the woolen cloak to show off her beautiful white dress and the pollen-dyed belt Mother had made. Her glorious golden hair gleamed in the dim light. She held one of Mother’s candles in her hand.

  Jack didn’t see the necklace. Thank Heaven! Mother must have taken it, he deduced, but then he saw a glint at the neck of the dress. Lucy had hidden it underneath.

  “Now!” cried the Bard. Someone whisked Jack’s lantern away and blew it out. The chief poured a bucket of water over the hearth. The coals hissed and crackled with steam. Jack felt the warmth die and the cold seep under the door around his feet. The hall turned completely black.

  I have to do something, he thought frantically. He didn’t want to yell across the room about the necklace. Father would get angry at him, and then everyone else would get angry at Father. A fight would break out. Conflict would sour the ceremony just as surely as metal. Maybe silver won’t matter. It isn’t used in weapons, Jack told himself, although he knew better. Any evil contaminated the metal. Frith Half-Troll had worn the necklace, and there were few more evil creatures than she.

  He heard the saw-saw-saw of the plank being pulled back and forth. When one lot of men got tired, another group would take over. The Bard said it sometimes took hours to get a flame. The sound went on and on until Jack heard someone fall down. “Change sides!” cried the Bard.

  “About time,” someone groaned.

  Men banged into one another in the dark, and John the Fletcher swore his hands had more splinters than the planks. The saw-saw-saw began again, and Jack smelled pine resin. He knew the wood was getting hot. “Faster!” roared the chief.

  If I get close to Lucy, I can take the necklace without starting a fight, Jack thought. But as he wormed his way across the room, he got too close to the men. An elbow slammed into his stomach and knocked his breath out.

  “Sorry, whoever that was,” a man muttered.

  “You’re standing on my foot,” someone else growled.

  Jack blundered off, clutching his stomach. His sense of direction was gone. “Lucy!” he called.

  “Jack?” she answered. Oh, stars! She was on the other side of the room. He’d got it wrong. Jack started to work his way back and blundered into the men again.

  “Sorry,”
grunted someone. Jack was sure he’d got a black eye this time.

  “Change sides!” shouted the Bard. By now Jack could smell smoke, and the men needed no encouragement to move faster. A spark appeared, then another and another. Jack saw a glow and a pair of hands crumbling the dry mushrooms everyone used as tinder. The flame blossomed.

  “Hurrah!” everyone cheered. The chief fed handfuls of straw into it, and shadows danced along the walls. Lucy glided forth and lit her candle.

  “Stop!” roared the Bard. Startled, Lucy dropped the candle, and it went out on the floor. “What’s this?” the old man cried. It was rare that the Bard showed his true power, but he was showing it now. You could see exactly why the Northmen called him Dragon Tongue and took care to stay on his right side.

  “You’re wearing metal!” said the Bard, yanking the silver necklace up to the light. Lucy shrieked.

  “Don’t hurt her!” cried Father.

  “And you, Giles, knew she had it,” the old man said.

  “It was to honor St. Lucy,” Father protested.

  “Don’t give me that drivel! She cried and you gave in to her. Weak, impossibly foolish man! It was up to you to direct her. She’s only a child. You have endangered the whole village.”

  Giles Crookleg recoiled, and Jack’s heart went out to him even though he knew his father was in the wrong. Grumbles rose from the other men. “After all that work,” muttered the blacksmith.

  “My hands are full of splinters—and for what?” said John the Fletcher. Lucy burst into tears and buried her face in Mother’s dress.

  “We will not argue,” the Bard said firmly. “The life force is not served by anger, not mine nor anyone’s. We’ve worked with one heart, and it’s possible that harm will not spread beyond this child.” Father looked up, shocked. Jack was startled too, for he’d thought about only the need-fire being spoiled, not that actual harm would come to Lucy.

  “We need another girl to pass the flame to the rest of the village,” said the Bard.

  “The baker has a girl and the tanner’s widow has two,” said the chief. “It will take time to fetch them.”

  “There’s no need. We have someone here,” came Brother Aiden’s gentle voice. Till now the little monk hadn’t taken part in the ceremony. It was, after all, a pagan rite. “There’s Pega.”

  “Pega?” said the chief. “She’s only a slave.”

  “More’s the pity. She’s a good child with a loving heart.”

  “But she’s so—so—”

  “Ugly,” finished the blacksmith, who had two handsome grown-up daughters.

  “Not inside,” said Brother Aiden quietly.

  “He’s right,” the Bard agreed. “Fate has not been kind to Pega, but the life force shines in her. Come, my dear,” he said, holding his hand out to the terrified girl, who was being pushed forward by the men. “This night you will save the village.”

  “What about me?” wailed Lucy, who was still clinging to Mother’s dress. “I’m supposed to be St. Lucy.”

  “Hush,” said Mother, attempting to hold her in her arms. Lucy shoved her away.

  “I’m the most important person in the village! I’m beautiful! I’m not a froggy slave!”

  Father swept her up. He took the crown from her head and handed it shamefacedly to the Bard. He untied the yellow sash from her dress as she tried to kick him. “Sorry,” he said in a strangled voice.

  “Da! You can’t let them do this,” shrieked Lucy. “I’m Lucy! I’m the lost princess!” Giles Crookleg carried her screaming and protesting to the far end of the hall. Jack heard him promise her all sorts of treats if only she would be quiet and not cry and forgive him. Tears ran down Mother’s face, but she did not leave her place by the fire. Even Jack felt shaken.

  “Come, child,” the Bard told Pega.

  “You won’t—beat me?” Pega said. She had a surprisingly sweet voice. Jack realized it was the first time he’d heard it.

  “Never,” promised the old man. “You are the bringer of light to the new year.” He put the crown of yew on her head and tied the belt, dyed with the sunlit color gathered by bees, around the girl’s shabby dress. Pega looked up and smiled. She did have an awfully froggy mouth, Jack decided, but there was no denying the goodness in her eyes.

  The Bard took a candle—not the one Lucy had dropped on the floor—and handed it to Pega. “What should I do, sir?” she asked.

  “Light it and hold it out so that others may take fire from you.”

  Pega obeyed, and one by one the men in the room lit their lamps. They left at once to kindle their own hearths or bring fire to those who were too ill or old to attend. Last of all, Mother lit her two lamps. “These are for you,” she told the Bard and Brother Aiden, giving each of them four of her precious beeswax candles.

  Pega, meanwhile, gazed at her candle in a kind of rapture. “I never had one of these,” she murmured. “It’s so soft and creamy. I believe it’s the prettiest thing I ever saw.”

  “Then you may keep it,” Mother said. “Put it out for now. It has done its work. When you feel the need, it will brighten your nights.”

  “I won’t burn it. I’ll keep it forever,” Pega declared. “And when I die, I’ll be buried with it.”

  “Don’t speak of death on this night!” said the Bard. The girl looked so stricken that he patted her on the shoulder. “There, I’m only joking. We’ve put death behind us, thanks to you. It’s time to be happy.” He gently lifted the crown of yew from her head. He untied the yellow belt and handed it to Mother. Pega blew out her candle. With its light gone, something seemed to go out in her as well. The old, frightened look crept back into her eyes, and she looked down to hide her face.

  “What should I do with this?” Mother pushed Lucy’s discarded candle with her foot.

  “I’ll deal with it, Alditha,” the Bard said. “Brother Aiden and I are going to sleep here. Are you staying?”

  “We’d planned to, but—” Mother nodded at Father and Lucy huddled at the far end of the hall, then gazed at the chief scowling by the door. “Now may not be a good time.”

  So Jack took a lamp and went to fetch Bluebell. The donkey was even more unwilling to move this time, having found herself a warm nest between two cows. Jack pulled and smacked her on the rump until he had wrestled her back to the chief’s door. Father came out with Lucy, but she screamed and refused to let go of him.

  Jack saw, just before the door closed, the chief, the Bard, and Brother Aiden warming their hands at the fire. Pega was heating a poker to make them hot cider.

  They started out, with Father carrying Lucy, and Jack hauling on Bluebell’s rope. Light was building behind the heavy snow clouds. The long night was over and the sun was returning. The frost giants were retreating. The wolf of winter, though still healthy, would grow lean as the weeks passed.

  Lucy stirred in Father’s arms and said, in a sleepy voice, “You will remember what you promised me? I’ve been such a good girl.”

  Everyone slept late. Jack forced himself to crawl out of the warm sheepskins and return the rooster to his flock. The hens were huddled together in the straw of their enclosure. They barely stirred when Jack opened the barn door. Clouds blanketed the sky, and again snowflakes swirled on the wind. From the privy, Jack could hardly see his own house.

  It was a day of rest, although no day on a farm was completely without work. Father coiled straw into beehives for use when spring came. He fastened sticks across the top for the bees to hang their combs and covered the basket with a tight-fitting lid. Mother spun wool.

  Jack brought hay to Bluebell and fed the chickens, pigeons, and geese. Once there had been only chickens, but Father had increased his stock with the silver Jack had given him. The herd of sheep had grown from twenty to thirty. It was good to have more animals, but it also meant more work.

  Jack trudged across the snow-covered garden to a tiny shed blanketed with turf. It was here Mother preserved her winter hives. Most had to be destroye
d in fall because it was impossible to keep them through the cold, but Mother always saved five or six of her best producers. They were special bees, unlike the small, dark bees of the forest. They had come from Rome long ago, when Roman armies had ruled the land. The armies had gone, leaving behind the house where the Bard lived, a road going north through the forest, and the bees.

  Jack crawled through the door of the shed and put his ear to the straw of the nearest hive. Its hum was low and sleepy. There were no sounds of distress or the chirps that meant the bees were starving. A faint warmth rose from the straw as if an animal slept inside. Jack smiled. He liked working with bees. He went from hive to hive, making sure they were healthy. Nearer spring, he would feed them bread soaked in cider and honey, to give them the strength to emerge.

  Lucy slept till afternoon and came down in a rotten mood. Mother gave her breakfast and Father told her a story, but her sulks didn’t lift for hours. No one talked about what had happened the night before.

  Chapter Three

  WASSAIL

  “Fine weather,” said Giles Crookleg, gazing up at the bright blue sky. The sun blazed along the icicles on the roof.

  “Perfect,” agreed Jack. He picked up a birch rod and a skin bag full of cider. Father already had his. Their feet crackled the icy covering of the road as they set out for the village. Jack saw crows sliding down a small, snowy hill, exactly like boys on sleds. They landed with a whump, flew back to the top, and slid down again. John the Fletcher’s fighting cock was wearing itself out chasing another crow that kept landing within tempting reach and flying up again when the enraged rooster charged after it.

  “Wake up!” Jack called to the leafless apple trees as they passed.

  “Oh, aye. They’ll wake up soon enough,” said Father. “Both boys and trees improve with beating.”