Nicola Griffith - Hild

Gwladus dipped and drank, wiped the flecks of butter from her chin with her forearm and said, without taking her eyes off Hild, “Hwl, the lady Hild needs to lie down. Pour some of that milk in a jar.”

She took Hild’s clothes from the peg and slung them over her shoulder. She took the jar of milk in one hand, opened the door with the other. “Come on, now, we’re letting the warmth in.”

The sun was high and fat. The air seemed perfectly still.

Gwladus put the flat of her hand on the small of Hild’s back, as you would a person who was old or ill, and Hild’s mind went white.

Gwladus guided her, opening doors, nodding cheerfully at the groom who was carrying a saddle from the byre, closing the door to Hild’s chambers, dropping the latch.

She draped Hild’s clothes on a stool, put the jar on the table by the bed, and said, “Sit.”

Hild sat on the bed. Gwladus knelt by her feet and unfastened the shoes and slipped them off. Then she stood and lifted off the cross on its chain, unfastened the shoulders of Hild’s underdress. It fell around her hips. “Stand.”

Hild stood. Gwladus whisked the underdress away, then her drawers, as she did every night.

But it wasn’t night.

“Lie down.”

“It’s not time.”

“Lady, it’s past time. And you’ll be better lying down.”

Hild lay on the bed. Gwladus sat by her hip.

“Have you ever kissed anyone? Boldcloak? Your gemæcce?”

Hild shook her head.

“Well, perhaps they were frightened of kissing the king’s seer. But I’m not. I know what you need.”

Gwladus smiled, that rich slow curve that blotted out everything but right here, right now, then leaned in and kissed her.

Her lips were soft. Like plums, like rain.

Gwladus put her hand on Hild’s thigh and stroked as though Hild were a restive horse: gently, firmly. Down the big muscles, up the long tight muscle on the inside. Not soothing but… She didn’t know what it was.

Stroking, stroking: down along the big muscle on the outside, up along the soft skin inside. Down. Up. Up more. “There,” Gwladus said, “there now.” And Hild wondering if this was how Cygnet felt to be encouraged for the jump. Her heart felt as big as a horse’s, her nostrils wide, her neck straining, but not quite wild, not quite yet. “There,” said Gwladus again, and ran her palm over Hild’s wiry hair to her belly. “Yes,” she said, and rested there, cupping the soft, rounded belly, and then moved down a little, and a little more, and her hand became the centre of Hild’s world. “Oh, yes, my dear.” She kissed Hild again, and Hild opened her legs.

It was nothing like when she did it for herself. It built like James’s music, like the thunder of a running herd, then burst out, like the sudden slide of cream, like a sleeve pulled inside out, and she wanted to laugh and shout and weep, but instead clutched at Gwladus as she juddered and shuddered and clenched.

Gwladus said, “There now. Better than buttermilk?”

Hild nodded, but couldn’t say anything. Soft, shocking echoes lapped at her bones and squeezed her insides. Gwladus kept stroking her belly and the echoes began to run into one another, like ripples on a pond, and then slowly calmed. She said, “I’m still thirsty,” and laughed for no reason.

Hild and Begu walked through the tall grass by the bend in the river. The moon was full and high. Hild held Begu’s hand, because Begu hadn’t been walking this path for years and at night the world was different. Smells, sounds, shapes loomed from the shadow and were gone, moonlight turned the shadows sharp and steep. It was a bleached world of bone and stone and tin where magic walked.

They came to the alders. One had fallen a year or two ago at an angle to the water. They sat, facing upstream. The water rippled and splashed. Something shook its feathers in the reeds and settled down.

“How are the sheep?”

“Still stupid.” Begu giggled.

“And the shepherd?”

Begu sighed, but Hild heard the smile in it. “He’s sweeter than the ram.” Another giggle, and the kick and scuff of her shoes on the bark. “And he takes longer over his business.”

“Why should he hurry? He has only one to tend.”

“And then, too, I tend him in return.”

“You do?”

Begu sighed again, this time so heavily that Hild felt the heave of her ribs. “It’s like watching a little lamb at suck. He goes all soft and dreamy. He cries, sometimes. And his stick and balls go all little. I can hold them in my hand, like a sleeping mouse.”

Hild wasn’t sure what to say to that. She watched the alders stir in a breeze that didn’t reach the ground, the black tracery of leaves shiver against the moon. She looked for the silhouette of the nightjar she knew lived in the trees but didn’t see it.

“If I hold them long enough, and kiss him on his ear or his neck, they stir again. It’s like watching a pea swell in water. Or a dog when it licks itself. It grows twice as big, three times.”

“How big?” A ram didn’t grow very big. A cat had nothing to speak of. A horse, though…

“As long as my hand?” They stared at her hand, silvery in the moonlight. “Yes, about that. And very thick.” She made a circle with her finger and thumb.

Something plopped in the water.

“I find I want to give him presents. Nothing much, nothing dangerous, your mother warned me about the disapproval of priests, though there aren’t any at the fold. But it’s best if no word reaches Rheged, just in case. But a present—something, a linen undershirt or a better hood. Something to wear against his skin when I’m gone.”

“We’re here another month at least.”

“But I might want to stop visiting the fold before then.”

“Stop?”

Begu shrugged: a strange, writhing movement in the moonlight, uncanny. After a while she said, “Gwladus has a new bracelet.”

Now it was Hild’s turn to scuffle her feet. “It’s not as heavy as it looks.” Another plop from the water. “She keeps talking about a new dress, too. Do you think that would be all right?”

“She’s always been above herself. It might be all right. As long as everyone gets better clothes.”

“You, too?”

“Me especially! And jewels, and new shoes. But mainly clothes. What better way to show the quality and worth of our cloth?”

They grinned at each other, teeth flashing like polished tin in the light.

Hild jumped off the log. “I’ll show you jewels. More beautiful than anything you’ve ever seen. Come on, it’s not far.”

At the river’s edge, the moonlight was brighter. Hild found the overhang where the fern and thung flowers and primroses grew, the stick of ash poking from the water. She pulled it out carefully.

It glistened with fish eggs, perfect as the most delicate pearls on the queen’s veil. They shimmered with moonlit glamour, droplets of dreams.

Hild slid the stick back in the water. They watched the river for a while.

The moon moved higher, drew itself tighter and brighter. Then there it was: true night. That moment when the world seems to stop and wait and the air both stills and quickens, thick with tree breath and the listening of small animals. Foxes were abroad now, and badgers, and uncanny things.

“That smell, it reminds me of something,” Begu said. “Beef tea. The way Guenmon makes it, with thyme and pepper.”

Hild opened her mouth, breathed through her nose, lifting her tongue and letting the air run across the roof of her mouth. At this time of night, anything was possible.

“You look like a slitty-eyed cat when you do that.”

“It tells me things.”

“What things?”

“I can smell… bats. Not here, but close.”