Chapter Twenty-Eight

 

 

The anger was hard enough to deal with, without visitors. With winter solstice approaching villagers and neighbours visited Ervam's home to have dinners, celebrate and exchange small presents, which gathered in one corner of the living area.

Each year pine branches were brought into the home, just a few, to lie over the doorways and lend a wonderful smell to the whole house. The colour brightened up everything, chased away the dreariness that could set in, in the winter.

Normally, Av enjoyed the spiced rum that the adults passed around in the single cup, enjoyed sharing and breaking bread with commoners. Any other year he would have enjoyed the game he played with Mie, as the young boy attempted to sneak a sip of the spiced rum. Something about winter solstice made warriors bolder, and the spiced rum was practically a rite of passage.

Mie did manage to get a sip of the rum, even managed to get a sip of rum into Anue. Av could smell it on the children's breath as they rushed away to bed, giggling to one another. A bonding moment, yet all Av wanted to do was give them both a smacked bottom for drinking what should have only been for adults.

The children spent time with other children, none of whom made an impression on Anue. Several of the visiting children had been Mie's companions as he grew. Their parents had chosen to visit Ervam to check on Mie, to see to it that he was being brought up properly after his mother's death.

On the actual day of winter solstice they lit the candles to set in the windows, as was tradition in the north, to keep out bad spirits and invite the sun back in. As his father told it, and Av dimly remembered, winter solstice was so long that there was barely any sunlight.

It was the night when the boundary between the spirit realm and the living world was said to be thinnest, when witches were said to be born. Many women had left their children to the elements, children whose only fault was to be born on the darkest night of the year.

Ervam brought in fresh pine branches and burned the older ones in the yard. With the new branches, he brought in three holly berries, which he had travelled to the village to retrieve. Each of the berries was given to each of his sons.

Av sat staring at his berry for the longest time as his hand tingled, then his torso, then his loins. He peered up at his father, wondering if the trainer had lost his damned mind. Av understood, instinctively, what was going on. Red and green were the colours of the solstice and in the startling moment he recalled the holly berries passed around to the warriors during one of the solstices he had celebrated in the north.

Ervam motioned for Av to remain where he was, then looked pointedly at Mie. The boy frowned deeply at his berry, then looked at Anue, who hadn't been given a berry. The boy then looked to his father, at the lack of berry there.

“It's not because we're boys,” Mie said to Ervam.

“No, it's not,” Ervam said. “Jer? Do you know about holly and pine?”

“It's not holly?” Jer asked. “I thought it was just holly berry that did it?”

“No, it's actually the combination of the two.” Ervam motioned up to the fresh pine branches, then to the berry in Jer's hand. “Jer, as the only one who has had a mate and a child, and a lover, do me a favour and be the one to squish that berry.”

“Am I going to need private time after this?” Jer asked jokingly.

“Yes,” Ervam said. “But between you and Av, at least I know you'll control it.”

Jer's almost-smile disappeared. His fingers curled around the berry, but not tight enough to squish it.

“I don't want to play at this, Father,” Jer whined out.

“Then don't, I simply asked you to do me a favour,” Ervam said. “You've every right to say no. Mie, don't eat that.”

The boy opened his mouth and the red berry toppled out.

Anue, becoming ever more curious, approached Mie and took the berry from him. Between two delicate fingers she held the wet berry and turned to Ervam.

“What happens if I squish it?” Anue asked.

“Don't,” Ervam growled.

The girl seemed to lose interest immediately. She gave the berry back to Mie and wiped her hand on her sleeve.

“That is something you might consider if you find yourself a warrior to mate,” Ervam said to Anue. “Winter solstice, up north, they bring in the pine, they bring in the berries and give them to the warriors. My boys here, the grown ones, not the one who would eat anything you put in his hands—Mie, spit it back out—can give you some indication of what it's like.”

“I'd rather not attempt to describe this feeling to an eleven-year-old girl,” Av said through gritted teeth.

“Not one that looks like Aren, anyhow,” Jer muttered. “Palace tradition is to bring in the pine. Em used to claim only mated warriors could feel it and, by the spirits, she'd walk by me with that sprig of pine and a holly leaf and I would just tremble. If I were a woman, my undergarments would have hit the floor every time.”

Anue frowned at Ervam. “Why would I use this on my mate, who is hypothetically,” the girl stumbled over the word, “a warrior? Wouldn't that be forcing him into something he didn't want to do?”

“In the north, the warriors are given a berry. They can either get rid of the berry, hand it to a friend who is a warrior and looking for acceptance, or they can seek out a partner of their choosing. It doesn't have to be a queen, this partner. The warrior would then give the chosen person the berry and the person, if they accept the offer, squishes the berry between their fingers and drops it to the floor.”

“Winter solstice is about adult private time?” Anue asked.

“Sex,” Av corrected. “Adult private time can mean all sorts of things, but winter solstice is more about sex.”

“It's a tradition that goes back generations, back to the original palace. Holly is difficult to find in these parts. Only a select few warriors would receive the berries, marking them as available to everyone. They would be gifted these berries by their women as a pass.”

“A pass?” Mie asked.

“Father keeps begging Mother for a free pass,” Anue muttered, turning her attention to Av. “That means a pass to have sex with another woman without getting in trouble, doesn't it?”

“It does,” Av said, unable to lie or even divert the question.

“From what I was told, the men rarely took the pass. There would be a ball, and the north still has this ball, where they wear masks. The warriors who were given the berries would pretend to be confused, but always go to bed with their women.”

“How does that equal presents?” Mie asked loudly.

Ervam chuckled. “The children received presents, mainly. There would be presents and much visiting and running around and sweets until all the little children crashed from too much activity.”

“Oh,” Mie said slowly. “So the adults could do adult things.”

“Have sex,” Anue said to Mie expertly.

“No, in that case, Mie is right,” Ervam said. “The adults would dance long into the night, partaking in drink and feasting, celebrating the return of the sun. Their children would sleep well and long, giving them time to recover. Winter solstice was not just about sex, but it was created in order to make it easier.”

Anue was quiet for a long time. “Because a summer baby is blessed by the spirits.”

“Born as far away from the darkest night as possible,” Ervam said with a nod. “Having never existed during a time when the darkest night happens.”

“Who can be moody when you're having a rutting good time,” Av grumbled, setting the holly berry on the table, where it could no longer affect him.

He was thinking about Aren. His limbs were tingling in a pleasant, yet terrifying way. He regretted not being able to celebrate this holiday with Aren, that his father wasn't able to teach Aren this lesson.

“In my house,” Anue said, rocking back on her heels as she watched the adults, “we would have a feast and exchange handmade presents with one another while Mother and Father got quite drunk on wine. Once they passed out, Aren would send Brother and me to bed, but I'd sneak down. Brother would stay in his room, drinking.”

“What did Aren do after your parents went to bed?” Ervam asked.

Anue shrugged. “The servants would be eating what was left of the feast, at the table. I'd join them. They said she went outside. That's all.”

“What did you ask them, specifically?” Ervam asked, sounding strangled suddenly.

“I would ask where my sister was,” Anue said. Her eyes narrowed as she considered Ervam. The young queen was very aware that she was causing fear, might even have been able to guess why the trainer was afraid. “The servants would say that she's gone to be with the spirits. I asked Aren about it last year.”

‘Gone to be with the spirits’ was a term that sounded familiar to Av. It made him think of his mother, which he knew meant his father would have an answer for him, should Av have the courage to ask.

“What did she say last year?” Av asked.

“Last year, this was right before they decided to send her so she thought she'd be there, but last year Aren said that this year I could go with her,” Anue said, turning her attention back to Ervam. “I'm guessing that you aren't going to allow me to go be with the spirits.”

“Not a spirits damned hope,” Ervam said.

“Is it a bad thing?” Anue asked.

“It's something I'll explain to you when you're older,” Ervam said.

“Is it a sex thing?” Anue asked.

Av growled through gritted teeth, making the young queen, as bold as she had become, pale and shift away from him. Aren had told him that she was a virgin when he had her. He was the only one to ever be like that with her.

“No, it's not a sex thing,” Ervam muttered with all the annoyance of a man who had raised many children. “Go wash, the both of you. Our feast is humble this year, but still should be seen as a feast. Go on, go wash. Right now.”

Anue made a face but marched off. Mie waited behind just a moment, eyes flickering between each of them.

Ervam sighed. “You ate it, didn't you?”

Mie's mouth opened and the berry popped out, bouncing and then rolling across the floor. The young warrior smacked his lips together before he walked off, following Anue to the bathing room.

Av waited for the door to the room to close, very aware of the fact that Mie closed the door so that the adults might feel like they had privacy. He bared his teeth at the trainer, snarling just slightly.

“Gone to be with the spirits is a queen thing, boy,” Ervam said steadily. “Aren shouldn't know about it. She's wild. Queens, they have that same tradition, only for them. Word is, a queen will go to the spirits when there's no man available, and she'll even take others out to teach them how to go to the spirits, sacrificing her year to help another.”

“Mother did that,” Av snarled.

“Yes,” his father snarled back, advancing on Av, challenging the younger, larger man. The trainer should have been afraid of Av's anger, not fuelled by it. “Yes, your mother went with the spirits and she came back to me pregnant. I killed the son of a bitch who did it for rape, because that's what it was. A queen gets like that, she can still say no, still has the right to, damn it. It should have been me out there. Me. Damn it!”

“Calm down.” Jer stepped between them, tears in his eyes. “Father. Please, there are children in the house and Av doesn't know what he's saying. Neither do you. Please. Father?”

Ervam was ready to strike Av. He was ready for it, ready to accept the strike and take up the challenge.

“Av,” Jer said, pleading with him.

Av swore and stepped back, ceding ground to his father. The words only then dawned on him. What his father had said, what Jer had said earlier. What ‘going to the spirits’ seemed to imply.

“Aren will do that?” Av squeaked out, because suddenly that was all he could focus on. Aren outside in winter, bare before the spirits, ready to breed?

And Jer, his precious brother, was an example of what a bad union during that time could do?

“Did, uh, did you ever go to the spirits with her?” Av asked.

“Once, before she knew how to properly,” Ervam said.

Av pointed to himself. His father gave the barest nod. The world did a funny sort of tilt.

“I…” Av gulped in a breath of air. “Need to find some mud.”

“Mud?” Ervam asked.

“He's going to eat it,” Av said, motioning to Jer as he made his way for the door. He had to get outside, had to get a lungful of clean air, free of the pine and the light scent of holly. “Even if I have to sit on his chest to do it.”