The Spinner and the Slipper (2 page)

CHAPTER TWO

A New Family

“I will be home soon, I promise you,” said the miller to his daughter one day in spring, three years after the death of his wife. “I cannot bear to visit my brother for longer than a week and will return to you within a fortnight. You may rest assured!”

Eliana kissed her father’s cheek. She preferred that he not leave, of course. She was not used to staying home alone for such a long period of time. But she was mistress of this humble house, and she knew how to care for the mill, the geese, the pig, and the cow. If she grew lonely, she could always walk down the lane to the village church and say her prayers amongst others.

She held out his hat. “Give my very best to my uncle,” she said. With a grateful nod and a smile, her father donned the hat, mounted his donkey, and set off down the road, leaving Eliana behind on the doorstep.

She watched until her father disappeared through the trees. Then, with a sigh, she went about her solitary day, doing her solitary tasks, preparing for a solitary two weeks. First, she decided to chop wood for the fire, then draw water from the well. There were plenty of tasks to keep her busy, and she did not shirk a single one of them. The more she worked, after all, the more time she filled before her father’s return.

Since the death of her mother, Eliana and her father had grown close, depending on one another in their grief. For the first few months Eliana had feared the miller would sink so far into despair that he would never recover. However, slowly but surely she had drawn him back into the world of the living, giving him reason to smile again.

Now, though both felt the hole left behind by her mother’s death, they got on with their lives well enough. The mill was prosperous, serving to grind the grain of three separate villages, and though they were not rich, Eliana and her father were comfortable in their lot. Sometimes the miller even spoke of adding on to their small house, though Eliana protested that they had no need of more room.

On the third morning Eliana woke to find that one of the geese had broken free of the pen and wandered off into the wood somewhere. With a heavy sigh she set out after it; if she let the fool thing roam free, it might become a feast for some fox. She followed the trail of downy white feathers, calling and clucking to the goose as she went. The whole flock knew her voice and, while not exactly obedient, they would often come to her when she called.

She crossed the mill stream and continued on into the forest. The long shadows cast by the trees never gave her pause. This was
her
forest. She had grown up in it. She knew every deer trail as thoroughly as any merchant knew the cart paths to and from the various towns. Never once in all her days had she felt afraid.

This day, however, something felt different. Perhaps it had to do with the isolation she’d experienced since her father’s leaving. Somehow, knowing that no one waited for her back home made the forest itself seem much bigger . . . much more brooding.

“Ho-oh!” She whistled twice, a low and high note. “Ho-oh, here, goose!” she called, but her voice faltered. What was that whisking away behind the oak tree? Was it only her imagination? Or perhaps the shadow of some silent bird wafting between tree limbs?

Giving herself a little shake, she hastened on her way, whistling shrilly. “Ho-oh, here goose! Ho-oh!” She called more loudly now, as if to convince herself that she wasn’t afraid. “Where are you, silly bird?”

Something crackled behind her. Something heavy-footed.

Eliana whirled around, her mother’s gold necklace swinging free at the suddenness of her movement. Chills crawled up her spine. Her eyes round, she stared into the shadows. But there was nothing to be seen. Not even a little fawn startled into flight. The forest was empty around her.

Suddenly, a noisy honking startled her; but her fears subsided a moment later, for she recognized that raucous voice. “Ho-oh!” she called, turning and hurrying down the deer trail. She found the goose waddling toward her, shaking its little tail and flapping its wings as if trying to fly. It looked spooked, as though it fled from something. Though it was a heavy bird, Eliana knelt and scooped it up into her arms. It nestled there like a lost child relieved to be found at last.

“What frightened you, feather brain?” Eliana asked it, peering around the goose’s nuzzling head into the forest beyond. The silent, looming forest, shot through with rays of early morning sun . . .

Some sixth sense told her that
something
was there, but she could not quite see it.

“Come on,” she murmured to the bird. “Let’s get you home.”

She turned and strode swiftly back along the trail, carrying her fat goose. Though her arms were slender, they were strong from hard work, and she did not mind the burden. Having something to hold, something that needed her protection, gave her courage.

She did not see the shadowy figure that appeared from behind the oak tree and watched her walk away.

“She almost saw me,” the shadow-man whispered. “Amazing! No mortal eyes could spy me”—he chuckled in disbelief—“but she nearly did. I must take care to keep my distance if I don’t want to be found out.”

With that he flitted away, and the forest was silent once more.

As the end of the fortnight drew near, Eliana could not help watching the road with a little more eagerness than usual. She had not been completely solitary during her father’s absence, having taken the opportunity to pay calls on neighbors and visit the village church, as was her custom. But the nights were lonely and dark, and she longed to have her father home to fix meals for and to talk with him about the day.

Just two days before Eliana knew she could reasonably expect to see her father home again, Grahame the milkman’s lad drove his cart into the mill yard. This appearance was not unusual; Eliana often sold some of their cow’s creamy milk to the milkman, and Grahame liked any excuse to pay a call on the miller’s daughter. He was a rough-skinned, ill-spoken young fellow, and he certainly would never have dared “speak up” to lovely Eliana. But he liked to sit a few minutes in her presence every so often, enjoying her gentle voice and polite manners.

Eliana, recognizing the bell on the milkman’s donkey, stepped out into the yard and shaded her eyes as Grahame drove up. “No milk to sell today,” she called out as the cart creaked to a stop. “I needed all of it to churn my butter.”

Grahame shrugged at this, quiet as usual. To Eliana’s surprise, he reached inside his threadbare jacket and pulled out a letter, which he handed to Eliana without ceremony. He then sat hunched in the driver’s seat to see how she reacted.

Eliana blinked several times, turning the missive around in her hands. She recognized her father’s scrawling hand, unused to practicing penmanship save in the keeping of ledgers. Why should Father write to her when he was due home soon?

An inexplicable feeling of dread creeping over her, Eliana opened the letter and read it under Grahame’s watchful eye. Her face paled. She tried to smile then, but it was a weak attempt.

Grahame, seeing the object of his affections distressed, dug up words from deep inside himself and rumbled, “Be aught amiss?”

“No,” Eliana said quickly, glancing up at him and trying to strengthen her smile. “Not at all. My father is . . . he’s getting married. He’s bringing a new wife home at the end of next week.”

Grahame grunted. Realizing that something more was probably required, he pushed out the traditional phrase: “Best wishes.”

“Thank you. Yes . . .” Eliana’s thoughts whirled. Though she had been lonely only a few minutes before, she suddenly wished she knew of some miraculous word that would send Grahame on his way. She needed no one looking at her as she tried to comprehend this revelation. She needed the creak of the mill, the gurgle of the stream, the sounds of her animals, the wind in the trees . . . and solitude. She needed solitude. But she was too polite to ask Grahame to leave.

The milkman’s lad, however, proved himself a little more insightful than one might suppose. He tipped his slouchy hat. “Be on me way, miss,” he muttered regretfully. It would be at least a week before his master sent him down to the mill again. But he clucked to his donkey, and the bell on the harness tinkled into motion. Soon enough the tinkling vanished down the tree-shaded road.

Eliana sat down hard on her own doorstep. She read the letter again.
Married.
Yes, she had read that correctly. To some gentleman farmer’s widow, fallen on hard times, who needed a man to look after her and her two daughters before ruin set in. “
A rite fine lady,
” her father had written, “
with plesant maners and graces.
”

His spelling was bad, but his excitement was unmistakable. Could it be that her father had . . . fallen in love?

Tears filled Eliana’s eyes. She knew they were foolish tears, knew she should not indulge in them. After all, it was three years since Mother died. Why should she feel this resentment at her father? It wasn’t as though he had forgotten his first wife! Eliana knew him better than that. He would always love her and mourn her loss, but did that mean he must remain widowed forever?

“Besides,” Eliana whispered, “I’ll have two sisters. The company will be nice. And . . . and this lady must be lovely if Father wants to marry her on such short acquaintance.”

Unconsciously she fingered the gold chain about her neck and rubbed the shiny ring on her finger. Both objects seemed to warm at her touch, and she felt a calm come over her—a calm similar to what she’d experienced whenever, as a child, she ran crying to her mother and was folded into loving arms and held. This feeling was much softer, much fainter, but it sprang from the same source.

Eliana wiped the tears from her face. Her next smile was more sincere than the last one. “I will welcome them with open arms,” she determined. She knew that’s what her mother would want her to do. “I will welcome them, and I will love them.”

So saying, she rose and went about her daily tasks, mentally listing all she should try to do in the week before her father returned with his new bride. As best she could, she suppressed the sorrow creeping up at the prospect of seven more days of isolation. After all, at the end of those seven days she would have a whole new family. Surely that was worth a little extra loneliness.

CHAPTER THREE

A Different Kind of Life

In a lonely watchtower in a far-off world, the green-eyed man stood in a large room with tall pillars supporting a heavy ceiling. The floor was polished marble, and atop a pedestal at one end of the chamber, a crystal ball gleamed.

The green-eyed man stared into this crystal’s depths, watching the miller’s daughter. Watching Eliana.

It was several weeks since he’d last looked in on her quiet mortal life, several weeks since she’d almost spotted him in the forest near her home. His heart still raced when he thought about how close she had come to spying him, and he dared not approach her again anytime soon. But he had a promise to fulfill, so he did not let much time pass without peering in upon her world again.

He now saw her hard at work, cleaning the miller’s humble house. She polished and swept and dusted. She cleared out a small storage room, moved her own belongings into it, and then prepared fresh beds in her former bedroom. She spread fresh rushes on the floor and buffed the pots and pans until they shone like silver and gold rather than tin and copper. All this she did with a smile, though the green-eyed man thought perhaps he glimpsed a tear welling in her eye now and then.

Mortal time moves differently than time in the green-eyed man’s world. So he watched Eliana over the course of several days, though for him it was merely an hour or two. At last he saw her chopping, mixing, and then sliding a delectable peach cobbler into the stone oven on the hearth. While it baked, she combed out her long, dark hair, arranged it in a pretty crown braid, changed into a fresh apron, and waited near the open front door.

A horse-drawn cart rattled down the forest road, the miller’s donkey tethered and trotting behind it. In the driver’s seat sat the miller, whom the green-eyed man recognized at once. Beside him sat a lady of upright bearing and cold beauty, who looked straight ahead and did not smile. Two solemn-eyed girls, neither pretty nor plain, sat in the back on a pile of belongings. None of the party spoke save for the miller himself, who tried now and then to liven up his quiet companions with a cheery word.

The cart pulled into the mill yard, and Eliana hastened through the open door, her smile brave and beautiful. She smiled first for her father, rushing to embrace him even as he swung down from his seat. Then she turned that smile upon the cold woman and upon the two girls, who looked approximately her own age.

“Allow me to present my new wife and your new stepmother,” the miller said, leading his daughter around to the other side of the cart where the woman still sat stiffly, still staring straight ahead. “Mistress Carlyn, meet my Eliana.”

“Welcome home!” Eliana said warmly, reaching out both hands in greeting.

The woman looked down at Eliana for the first time. Her gaze traveled from the girl’s sweet face to the gold necklace she wore and then to the gold ring gleaming on her finger.

A slow smile spread across the woman’s face, slow because it first had to break through the layers of ice rimming her mouth and eyes. “Eliana,” she said. “I am so glad you are my new daughter. I always thought two would not be enough. Now I have three!”

The words were sweet as honey, but the green-eyed man frowned as he heard them. For in that woman’s eyes he saw the barely veiled hardness and cruelty.

“My room back home was twice this size. And I didn’t have to share.”

Bridin, the older of the two sisters, stood in the center of Eliana’s former bedchamber, looking around at Eliana’s hard work of the last few days without a trace of appreciation in her eyes. She spoke with no malice, but with a sort of hollow emptiness.

The words cut Eliana to the heart. She gulped down resentment, reminding herself that both Bridin and Innis had recently lost not only their father but also their standing as prosperous farmer’s daughters in a lively village many miles away.

Immediately after their arrival Eliana had learned (in a quick, whispered conference with the miller) that their father had gotten himself deep into debt and, following his death, his widow had been obliged to sell off nearly everything to satisfy his creditors. As a result, Mistress Carlyn and her daughters were left destitute.

“She married me for security,” the miller said with a sad smile. “I know that well enough. But she is a fine woman, and her daughters are good girls. They’ll be company for you, Eliana, so you’ll not have to be alone next time I travel. And . . . there was no one else to take them in, you know?”

Eliana hated to see the pain in her father’s eyes as he made hasty explanations for his actions. She gave him a quick kiss on the cheek. “I am so excited to have sisters!” she said with much more enthusiasm than she felt.

With that, she had returned to her role as hostess, leading the two girls up to their room. But no matter how much she smiled, she could not erase their sad, sad frowns.

“The view is quite lovely from this window!” Eliana said cheerfully, throwing open the shutters and beckoning for them to join her. Neither Bridin nor Innis moved; clutching their eager satchels of belongings, they stood as though their feet had grown roots.

Realizing that this approach would never do, Eliana gently took the satchels from them and set them on their beds. These were really little more than straw-stuffed mattresses on the floor, but Eliana had covered them with her mother’s best, most beautiful quilts and laid sweet-smelling lavender on the pillows. “Come downstairs and have something to eat,” she said, taking their hands and leading them from the room.

They made no verbal protest, but both quickly removed their hands from her grasp, clinging to each other instead.

The peach cobbler was hot and aromatic as Eliana served her new family. Mistress Carlyn thanked her but ate only two bites before pointedly laying aside her spoon and placing her hands in her lap. Bridin and Innis said nothing. Bridin sniffed over her serving, whether to keep back tears or in pure disgust, Eliana could not guess. At least Innis ate with some enjoyment if no gratitude.

Eliana took her place beside her father, smiled at him, and struggled to think of something to say that might break the awkward silence. “How was your journey, Father?” she asked at last.

“Easy enough. Your uncle sends love, of course.”

That ended that conversation. Even the miller, ordinarily a talkative, cheerful man, felt oppressed by the silence of his new family. He grinned across the table at his new wife, who answered his smile with an icy one of her own.

Eliana tried again. “We may have to add on to the stable,” she said. “I’m afraid our donkey may feel a bit cramped sharing.”

“Oh, no.” The miller shook his head and swallowed a bite of cobbler before continuing, “We cannot possibly afford to keep a horse. I’ll ride him into town tomorrow and see what I can get for him. Perhaps,” he said, looking round at his new wife and two new daughters, “I’ll have enough to buy fabric for new frocks! Pretty things to please my pretty ladies.”

Innis sank deeper into her seat and went on eating without a word. Bridin did not look up from her plate but muttered, “We can’t even afford a horse?”

Eliana’s stomach sank at those words. She knew their house wasn’t elegant by any means, but she had never felt dissatisfied with it. How could she possibly learn to understand these girls with finer tastes; how could she possibly make them feel welcome?

She exchanged a glance with her father, and he raised his eyebrows in a sad expression. Suddenly, looking into his face, Eliana felt something she could not quite name. A premonition, perhaps. A strong sense of foreboding, inexplicable and yet undeniable. Her heart began to race, and what little appetite she possessed fled away.

She hastily dropped her gaze to her plate, not wanting her father to read her thoughts in her eyes. After all, there was no reason for her to feel this way! The miller had ridden into town innumerable times before and never come to grief.

Why should she have this terrible suspicion that . . . he wouldn’t be coming back?