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ANGRY SHOUTS OFTEN drown out reasoned argument.
—Barabas, druid
* * *
GWEN AWOKE LIGHT-HEADED and with prickling skin, a sense of foreboding looming. It took an unusually long time for her to feel fully awake, and she couldn’t remember what she’d been dreaming when she’d first drifted out of sleep. But drifted she had and by slow, dull degrees, as if the distance between the world of dreams and the world of the living were a vast expanse of desert, barren of thought and physicality. Unpleasant memories dampened her mood but remained beyond her grasp.
Getting out of bed and dressing made her feel less detached from the living world, and by the time she left her room and joined her family for breakfast, she felt more like herself and less like a spirit trapped between dreams and consciousness. Her father and grandmother didn’t say much during the meal, and Gwen followed suit, restricting her conversation to telling them about how much Mignon and Gilly liked their gifts, especially the veil.
“Your mother looked so beautiful in it,” her father said, the smile of a happy memory stretching his lips before he bit off a hunk of bread and chewed silently.
Her grandmother chuckled. “My fingers bled when I made that. I was afraid I’d stained it, but I spit on it and got the blood out.”
Gwen thought about what her grandmother said. She’d not considered how much work it took to stitch the veil, much less to tat all the lace. Though it had been her first attempt and sure to have taken longer than it would an experienced seamstress, Gwen had spent months dying thread and embroidering a small piece of sackcloth. She couldn’t imagine how long her grandmother had taken to create such a beautiful piece of finery. “Gilly loves it. She always has. It’s a dream come true for her to have it, and she’ll look beautiful on her wedding day.”
“Good. I hate to see it go to waste,” her grandmother said.
The reality that she wouldn’t be wearing it because she wouldn’t ever marry struck Gwen in the gut, knotting her stomach with returning fears she had about living the life of a monk. How lonely will I be? she wondered.
Her father interrupted her morose musing by announcing it was time for him to load her trunk into the cart so they could leave for Vasterberg.
Gwen rose, and her grandmother took her plate. “You go on and get your things together, and don’t forget the bag of food,” she said as she rose and turned to carry the dirty plates into the kitchen. She nodded toward the butcher’s block, atop which a small gunnysack sat, its midriff bulging and its open ends tied into a knot so the bag could be carried over a shoulder. “Your pa’s put some meat in there too.” She paused before turning her back and continuing with her task as if today were any other day. “Now don’t you forget it, girl.”
This was as close to saying good-bye as her grandmother was going to get, thought Gwen, and she could live with that. “Thank you. I won’t forget it.”
Thanks to the preparation she’d done the day before, gathering her belongings took no time at all. Gwen grabbed the bag with Gilly’s breads and the one with meat and dried fruits and tossed Mignon’s shawl around her neck, and she and her father left the cottage without fanfare in a matter of minutes. As the horse hitched to the cart turned onto the road, Gwen heard the hogs snorting and grunting. She wouldn’t miss them at all.
During the trip to Vasterberg, she and her father chatted like they would on any other day, her father reminding her of all the things she needed to do to be safe.
“And don’t go away from the caravan without somebody with you, not even to wee,” he said.
Gwen wrinkled up her nose. “Eww. Do we have to talk about that?”
“Just be careful, Gwen. The world’s not always as friendly a place as Vasterberg.”
“I know, Father, and I promise I’ll be cautious.” She tried to shake off the mental image of someone standing nearby while she squatted behind a bush.
“I know you will,” he said, but his tone said, “I’m afraid you won’t.”
“Really, Father. I promise.” His worry palpable and making his forehead look like that of a wrinkled old man, Gwen wanted to comfort him, so she gave him an earnest look, repeating, “I promise.”
“Right, then,” he said. “Looks like they’re getting the caravan all lined up.”
Gwen looked around, her eyes filled with surprise. They’d arrived and she hadn’t even noticed how far they’d come. She’d missed all the serene scenery she’d wanted to firmly plant in her memory. What lay before her instead was chaos. Master Gabaldi was parading on a horse in and out of a throng of trainees on horseback too. “Two of you get up front. No, not you, Frank. You’re gonna drive the wagon.”
“But, sir. What about my horse?”
“Tie him to the wagon, boy. Do as I say!” shouted Gabaldi.
His cheeks rosy with embarrassment, Thomlin scrambled down from his horse, the bundle secured to his waist belt bouncing wildly. He tied the reins to the rear of the wagon then climbed onto the driver’s bench, where Madame Gabaldi sat with reins in her hand while some boys who would be traveling with them tossed trunks and sacks up to a couple of boys who stood in the bed of the wagon behind her. Gwen’s father drew his cart alongside the schoolmistress.
“Good morning, Madame Gabaldi,” he said.
She gave a warm smile. “Good morning, Master Ahlgren.” She leaned forward so she could see past Gwen’s father. “And good morning to you, Gwendolin. Are you excited?”
Gwen thought before answering. “A little nervous, but a little excited too.” Looking past the teacher, she could see Thomlin and the pinched look of fear as he stared straight ahead.
The woman nodded as if she truly understood the mixed emotions Gwen felt. “You boys get her things,” she called back to the two in the wagon’s bed.
The lanky youths scampered down, crawling over what they’d already packed tightly enough that it wouldn’t shift when the wagon started to move. They grabbed Gwen’s trunk and hauled it to the wagon, but when one of the boys reached for the two bags she intended to carry—the one with Mignon’s journal and Gilly’s baked goods and the other with food from her father and grandmother, she stopped him by placing her hand on his, “Not those. I’ll take those.”
The two boys looked at each other, and one said, “You sure, Gwen? They’re pretty heavy.”
At that moment, Master Gabaldi rode up to them. “You boys leave her some room in the back of the wagon. That’s where she’ll be riding. And redistribute the weight. I don’t want to break an axle because of an unbalanced load. It’s too heavy on the port side.” He pointed to a stack of crates.
“Yes, sir!” they shouted in unison before hopping into the wagon and quickly turning what had looked like a neatly arranged load into a jumble of trunks and sacks and crates.
While they lifted each piece of cargo to weigh and set down in piles before reorganizing the load, Gwen got down from her father’s cart and hefted each of her two bags onto her shoulders. The boys were right. The bags were heavier than she’d remembered either being when she carried them out of the cottage. “Maybe you could put these next to where I’ll be sitting,” she called up to the two boys.
“Hand ’em here,” said one, who took them and tossed them carelessly on top of one of the piles when Gwen offered them to him.
“I’ll be right back,” Madame Gabaldi said as she handed the reins to Thomlin and climbed down, disappearing into the schoolhouse.
“Git on up here,” said one of the wagon loaders, “and let’s be sure you’re gonna fit and not fall out.” He offered a hand to Gwen, who grasped it and was immediately lifted off her feet. It was as close to flying as she could imagine, and she squealed with delight just before landing on the wooden planks of the wagon bed.
“Sit over here,” the boy said, patting a burlap bean sack that was stuffed behind the wagon seat at the front of the bed.
Gwen plopped down on it. She could barely see over the side rails of the wagon, but at least none of the stacked cargo was blocking her view or making her feel as if it would tumble down on her. The bean sack was hard and lumpy. Gwen knew it would be unforgiving of every bump and divot along the way. “This is fine,” she said.
Her father had become engaged in a conversation with Master Gabaldi, and Gwen didn’t think she could manage to stand hearing it, so she busied herself by standing up and retrieving the two bags she’d brought with her. Reaching inside, she took the bundle of breads out of one bag and stuffed it into the one with the food her family had given her but not before Thomlin caught the scent of Gilly’s bread.
“She gave you bread too,” he said, holding up a small bundle of his own that Gwen recognized as the same cloth Gilly had used to make her bundle. “She brought it over early this morning.” He beamed.
“Yes. She’s so thoughtful.” Gwen resettled onto the lumpy sack and looked up at Thomlin, who was twisted on the bench so he could look at her while he spoke.
“I don’t know what I’m gonna do without her around,” he said quietly, as if ashamed.
“Well, maybe you could concentrate on driving that contraption,” said a voice from behind Thomlin.
Gwen stood up, a broad grin on her face. In front of the wagon stood Rolf in a buckskin coat, his bow and a full quiver strapped to his back, his sheathed sword hanging from one side of a leather belt, his hunting knife hanging on the other side in its own leather sheath. In one hand, he held a small rabbit-skin bag.
“You made it!” squealed Thomlin, and though Gwen couldn’t see his face, she could tell from Rolf’s expression that his friend was grinning as widely as she was.
Rolf shrugged. “I got nothin’ else to do, so why not?” He walked forward and tossed the bag up to Gwen, who noted how lightweight it was and wondered how anyone could subsist on so little. “Just some dried meat left over from winter. You keep that away from Thomlin. I don’t trust him to be alone with it.” He winked at Gwen, who laughed.
“Hey, if you give me some of it, I might give you one of Gilly’s rolls. On second thought, never mind. I’ll keep them all to myself,” said Thomlin, who reached down and patted the bundle, which made both Gwen and Rolf laugh.
Madame Gabaldi made her way from the schoolhouse with a book in one arm and a well-worn pillow in the other. She handed her retrieved booty up to Thomlin and then hauled herself up. Taking both items from him, she tossed the pillow onto the bench. After sitting down on the pillow, she slid the book under the edge of it between her and Thomlin. Almost defensively in response to the looks she was getting from Gwen and Thomlin, she said, “In case the ride is boring.”
Gwen regretted that she’d packed the book about religious orders in her trunk, but she cheered up when she remembered that Mignon’s journal was in the nonfood sack. Panic struck her, and her gaze searched for her father when her thoughts about the journal were interrupted by Master Gabaldi shouting, “Get in line. It’s time to go!”
Jacob Ahlgren got down from the cart and walked over to the wagon. Leaning over the side rail, he kissed the top of Gwen’s head. “You take care now.”
A lump formed in Gwen’s throat and she nodded. “I love you, Father, and I will think of you every day.”
Her father nodded and looked up at the sky. “It’s gonna be a good day for traveling. Not a cloud in the sky.”
She wanted to leap up and throw her arms around her father’s neck, but she knew he was doing all he could to avoid breaking down and crying in front of others, so she tried her best to be unemotional. Her attempts failed miserably when he looked back at her. “Your mother would be so proud of you—is so proud of you.” Gwen lost all control. She jumped up, dumping Rolf’s sack onto a pile of other bags near her. She wrapped her arms around her father’s neck, and he squeezed his arms around her waist. Gwen burned every second of that moment into her memory, the slightly smoky smell of her father’s hair, the tautness of his arms around her. She wanted to remember what it felt like to feel so loved. At last, her father released her, and she did the same.
When Rolf started to climb into the back of the wagon, Master Gabaldi’s voice rang out again. “No. I want you in the rear of this caravan. I need you to watch the road behind us.”
The hubbub of villagers who had come to see off the young boys grew silent.
“I can watch from the back of the wagon.”
“No. I want you behind the wagon.”
Rolf’s face screwed up in disgust. “What difference does it make if I’m in the wagon looking back?”
The crowd shuffled.
“He can ride my horse,” Thomlin called out.
Master Gabaldi looked around at the villagers as if he were calibrating how far he could push Rolf without a rebellion. “Fine. Take the boy’s horse, but you will ride behind the wagon.”
Rolf shrugged. “Whatever.”
Gwen let out a sigh of relief.
The hunter’s son untied the reins of Thomlin’s horse, mounted it, and guided it behind the wagon. Gwen knew he was being punished, and so did everyone else, she thought, based on some of the looks he was getting from the villagers. Gabaldi hadn't changed at all, and now he was putting Rolf in the worst spot to be in on the road with a caravan. The rear of the line would be the dustiest, dirtiest, and smelliest spot. Thanks to Thomlin’s quick thinking and generosity, at least Rolf would be above ground level, where the dust and smell of horse manure wouldn’t practically choke him every step of the way to Sutherhold.
Gabaldi galloped to the head of the line and shouted, “Forward!”
The wagon gave a little start as Thomlin clucked his tongue and shook the reins. The horses pulling the wagon took their first eager steps forward, jostling Gwen back into her spot atop the bean sack. From there, she watched the skyline of the village, knowing it wasn’t the place but her childhood getting ever more distant and finally disappearing on the horizon as the wagon rolled away from Vasterberg.