Brian Aldiss - Helliconia Spring

As they left the place afterwards, Shay Tal heard Klils snigger and say to his brother, “Still, brother, she was only another woman …”

Shay Tal flushed, stumbled, and would have fallen if Laintal Ay had not grasped her round the waist. She went straight to the draughty room where she lived with her aged mother, and stood with her forehead to the wall.

She was of good build, though she had not what was termed a child-bearing figure. Her outward merits lay in her rich black hair, her fine features, and the way she carried herself. That proud carriage attracted some men, but repelled many more. Shay Tal had rejected an advance by her genial kinsman, Eline Tal. That had been long enough ago for her to notice that no other suitors approached—except Aoz Roon. Even with him, she could not subdue her spirit.

Now, as she stood against the moist wall, where grey lichens scrawled their skeletal flowers, she resolved that Loil Bry’s independence should serve as an example to her. She would not be only another woman , whatever else they said of her over her grave.

Every morning at dawn, the women gathered in what was known as the women’s house. It was a kind of factory. By first light, figures would steal forth from ruinous towers, huddled in their furs and often with additional swathings against the cold, and make their way to this place of work.

A saturating mist filled these mornings, divided into blocks by the shadowing towers. Heavy white birds passed through it like clouds. The stones ran moisture, and mud oozed underfoot. The women’s house stood at one end of the main street, near to the big tower. Some way behind it, down a slope, flowed the Voral, with its worn stone embankment. As the women straggled to work, geese—the fowl of Embruddock—came up to be fed, honking and clattering. Every woman had a titbit to throw them.

Inside the house, when its heavy creaking door was closed, the eternal women’s tasks were performed: the grinding of grain for flour, boiling and baking, the stitching of garments and boots, and the tanning of hides. The work of tanning was particularly difficult, and was overseen by a man—Datnil Skar, master of the tawyers and tanners corps. Salt was involved in the tanning process, and the tanners traditionally had charge of it. Also involved was the soaking of the hides in goose scumble, work too degrading for men to undertake. The toil was enlivened by gossip, as mothers and daughters discussed the shortcomings of men and neighbours.

Loilanun was forced to work here with the other women. She had become very thin and her face held a yellowy hue. Her bitterness against Nahkri and Klils ate at her vitals so much that she scarcely spoke even to Laintal Ay, who was now allowed to go his own way. She befriended no one but Shay Tal. Shay Tal had a certain fey quality, and a way of thought far removed from the dumb endurance that was a marked characteristic of the women of Embruddock.

One chill dawn, Shay Tal had just climbed from her bed, when a knocking sounded on the door below. The mists had penetrated the tower, beading everything in the room where she slept with her mother. She was sitting in the pearly darkness pulling on her boots when the knock came a second time. Loilanun pushed open the downstairs door and ascended through the stable and the room above it to Shay Tal’s room. The family pigs shuffled and snorted warmly in the dark as Loilanun felt her way up the creaking steps. Shay Tal met her as she climbed into the room, and clutched her cold hand. She made a gesture of silence towards the darkest corner of the room, where her mother lay sleeping. Her father was away with the other hunters.

In the dung-scented confinement of the room, they were little more than grey outlines, but Shay Tal detected something amiss in Loilanun’s hunched appearance. Her unexpected arrival suggested trouble.

“Loilanun, are you ill?” She whispered the words.

“Weary, just weary. Shay Tal, throughout this night, I spoke with my mother’s gossie.”

“You spoke with Loil Bry! She’s there already… What did she say?”

“They’re all there, even now, thousands of them, below our feet, waiting for us… It’s frightening to think of them.” Loilanun was shivering. Shay Tal put an arm round the older woman and led her over to the bed on the floor, where they sat huddled together. Outside, geese honked. The two women turned their faces to each other, seeking signs of comfort.

“It’s not the first time I’ve been in pauk since she died,” Loilanun said. “I never found her before—just a blank down there where she should be—scratched emptiness… My grandmother’s fessup was wailing for attention. It’s so lonely down there.”

“Where’s Laintal Ay?”

“Oh, he’s out on the hunt,” she said dismissively, immediately returning to her theme. “So many of them, drifting, and I don’t believe they talk to each other. Why should the dead hate each other, Shay Tal? We don’t hate each other—do we?”

“You’re upset. Come on, we’ll go to work and get something to eat.”

In the grey light filtering in, Loilanun looked quite like her mother. “Maybe they have nothing to say to each other. They’re always so desperate to talk to the living. So was my poor mother.”

She began to weep. Shay Tal hugged her, while looking round to see if the sleeper stirred.

“We ought to go, Loilanun. We’ll be late.”

“Mother was so different when she appeared … so different, poor shade. All that lovely dignity she had in life was gone. She has started to … curl up. Oh, Shay Tal, I dread to think what it will be like to be down there permanently…”

This last remark was forced from her in a loud voice. Shay Tal’s mother rolled over and grunted. The pigs below grunted.

The Hour-Whistler blew. It was time to be at work. Arm in arm, they shuffled downstairs. Shay Tal called the pigs softly by name to quiet them. The air was frosty as they leaned on the door to close it, feeling the rime on its panels powder under their fingers. In the greys and sludges of early morning, other figures made for the women’s house, armless as they clutched blankets about their shoulders.

As they moved among the anonymous shapes, Loilanun said to her companion, “Loil Bry’s gossie told me of her long love for my father. She said many things about men and women and their relationships I don’t understand. She said cruel things about my man, now dead.”

“You never spoke to him?”

Loilanun evaded the question. “Mother would scarcely let me get in a word. How can the dead be so emotional? Isn’t it terrible? She hates me. Everything gone but emotion, like a disease. She said a man and a woman together made one whole person—I don’t understand. I told her I didn’t understand. I had to stop her talking.”

“You told your mother’s gossie to stop talking?”

“Don’t look so shocked. My man used to beat me. I was scared of him…”

She was panting and lost her voice. They crowded thankfully into the warmth of the house. The soak pit of the tannery steamed. In niches, thick candles made from goose fat burned with a sound like hair being ripped from hide. Twenty-odd women were gathered there, yawning and scratching themselves.

Shay Tal and Loilanun ate lumps of bread together, and took their ration of rathel, or pig’s counsel, before moving over to one of the pestles. The older woman, now her face could be seen more clearly, looked ghastly, with hollows under her eyes and her hair matted.

“Did the gossie tell you anything useful? Anything to help? Did she say anything about Laintal Ay?”

“She said we must collect knowledge. Respect knowledge. She scorned me.” Talking through her face full of bread, she added, “She said knowledge was more important than food. Well, she said it was food. Probably she was confused—not being used to it down there. It’s hard to understand all they say…”