Nicola Griffith - Hild

“Cian?” Hild said, bewildered. Cian?

“They say he’s the son of Ceredig king, yet he saved the Anglisc overking’s life and is sworn to him. He’s perfect!”

In the sheepfold, Hild held the fat white ewe against her while Breguswith rubbed the fleece at its flank between her fingers, ran her palm over its shoulder, nodded to herself, then felt its front legs, neck, and belly. She frowned and tried its back legs, tugging enough for the ewe to bleat. She shook her head. Hild set the struggling ewe back on its feet and let it go. “The breech wool is worse than I thought. But the back and flank is thick. Thick and soft and good enough for a king.”

“What are we going to do about Cian?”

“The front wool might not be fine enough for the Franks, but it will do well enough for the Frisians. Now let’s try one of the brownlings.”

Hild caught one of the little grey-brown ewes and hauled it up and back until it balanced on its hind hooves and its eyes rolled in panic. She pulled back a little more until it gave up and let go, and its slotted eyes went blank.

Her mother knelt and began running her hands over its neck. “You should have talked to me first,” she said.

“Yes. But—”

“It’s not like you.”

“No. But—”

“This is very soft,” Breguswith said, “very fine. But delicate. We’ll have to try different bleaches.” She stood up. Hild let the ewe go. “Why did you speak before thinking?”

“It’s—”

“This isn’t the first time, is it?”

Hild looked at her feet.

“I need to know. But bring me that yearling first.”

And so while her mother ran her hands over the bleating lamb, Hild stared at the tight black hairs at the tufts of its ears and tried to tell her mother of the restlessness that rose like the tide, the formless longings, the dreams, the sleeplessness, the strange distance of the world, the urge to play with danger, to touch something she couldn’t reach. “It’s like… like climbing a great ash tree, higher and higher, and the boughs are bending, and I’m reaching, reaching for something, and part of me knows the bough will break, but I don’t care. I want it. I just don’t know what it is.”

“And now Cian might end up in Rheged.”

“Yes. We—”

“But not today. Today we need to sort you. You’re a danger to yourself and others.” She looked up. “Have you started touching yourself?”

Like Begu, under the covers.

“Next time you feel… restless, try it. It will help you sleep. But that won’t work for long. You need a person to anchor you. Someone whose smell and touch will keep your feet on the ground, stop you from climbing until you fall, or from running off a cliff.” She stood up.

“A person?”

Breguswith wiped her hands. “Someone no one will notice. Someone no one will believe.”

The yearling bleated and struggled.

“You can let him go now.” Hild did. He trotted over to a ewe and butted her anxiously on the flank. The ewe ignored him. Breguswith held her apron out for Hild to wipe her hands. “People can always tell who you’ve chosen, but if it’s someone they can dismiss, they won’t dismiss you. Do you understand?”

“No.”

“If they’re not your equal, if they don’t matter, you will be seen to be you, still.” She looked at Hild and sighed. Hild felt stupid. “Look around you. Pay attention to people. Like Lintlaf with your bodywoman and now Wilnoð’s. Or Cian with that red-handed dairymaid at Bebbanburg—no one thought anything of it. But if he took up with one of the queen’s women, everyone would gossip because it matters. Like it mattered to the people of the bay about Mulstan and Onnen.”

“She’s wealh.”

“Don’t be dense. She was the seer’s companion, cousin of Ceredig king. Just as Cian is rumoured to be his son. Your bodywoman, now, she’s no one important. Do you see?”

Hild felt as anxious and bewildered as the yearling.

“Also, make sure they’re clean. Shall I find someone for you? No? Well, don’t get yourself with child. Do everything but that. You know what I mean. If not, talk to your bodywoman. The king will have no use for a swollen seer, and you’ll be more interested in your belly than anything else in the world. Oh, yes, even you. So anything but that. And don’t attract the attention of priests. Why Christ or his priests should care what we do with each other, I don’t know. But they like to meddle. So be careful. And should you slip, come to me immediately. Just remember, no one who matters.”

“You chose Osric,” Hild said.

“Osric was a mistake.”

They listened to the sheep tearing grass. “What was he like?”

Her mother sighed, then smiled a slow, regretful, entirely human smile that made Hild like her. “When no one was watching? Biddable.”

Biddable. She could see how that might be good. But what would she bid her person to do, exactly? She had seen people, in hall, in the byre. She had watched from the trees and through cracks in the wall. But not up close, not properly, just movement, blank eyes, flushed faces. She’d seen animals.

“Help me with this gate.” They opened the fold, shooed the sheep out. They watched them flow like woolly clouds over the grass. “One thing. Whatever you do, make sure it’s not your gemæcce: When these things go wrong, and they always do, you’ll need her to be on your side, the one constant. And you’ll need to find someone for her, now Uinniau’s gone. I’d suggest you buy her a slave. In Kent you can buy gelded ones.”

Hild stared.

“No? Perhaps not. Filthy Frankish custom. But she’s the seer’s gemæcce. She matters because of that. Because of you.” She put a hand on Hild’s shoulder. “Be careful.”

Careful. Always being watched, always spied on. “I’m so tired of being careful.”

“We all get tired of being careful.” She cupped Hild’s cheek. Her hand was soft with sheep grease. “But it will never change. It will never stop.” She dropped her hand. “I’m sorry for it.”

A breeze lifted the corner of her veil. Hild wanted to smooth it for her, but her mother hated to be fussed over. “Don’t you ever want to… just walk away?” She waved her hand at the elms on the crest of the hill and the rolling wolds beyond.

“I could have,” Breguswith said. “When your father died. I didn’t matter. But your sister mattered, matters still, though it’s out of my hands now. And you mattered—and will until this king is dead and gone, and his successor after him, and even the one after that. You can never walk away. They’ll always find you. You matter for your blood. And your mind.”

“Which you made.”

“To keep you safe.”

Your mother has built you a place where you can speak your word openly.

“So be careful, child. Delay finding a person until you must—because once you’ve shared yourself with another, touching yourself isn’t enough. But find someone for your gemæcce soon.”

Hild began to look, for Begu. She began to look through Begu’s eyes. When she sat at the board, she noted where Begu’s gaze lingered, what made her breath catch, her eyes cut sideways, or her hand pause halfway to her mouth. As the days warmed, and men stripped to the waist to wrestle, women cast off their sleeves and wore lighter cloth. Hild learnt to notice her gemæcce’s nipples stiffen and push out the front of her dress when the gesiths wrestled, the way she shifted on the bench and demanded food from a passing wealh, or beer: something to mask how often she swallowed, how her eyes fixed on the men’s hands grabbing a thigh, wrapping arms around another’s waist, or slapping each other’s arses when they stood.