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Authors: Margo Lanagan
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whatever, let alone resist following the little moon-lamp. Had it led her back over the precipice or into the depths of the marsh, she would have gone there without question, without happiness, without terror.
But it returned her instead to her father’s house. She stood in the trees and watched it approach the broken cottage, and spill a small puddle of light at one end—the northern end—of the doorstep.The resistance to following, the fear she ought to feel, sat just the other side of her numb exhaustion.
Near falling with tiredness, Liga walked past the folded-asleep goat and up the path. She knelt, laid her baby daughter down, dug a hole a handsbreadth deep, put the clear stone at the bottom, and pushed the earth back in. As she tamped the dirt flat, the light slithered across the step and pooled at the southern end, and she crossed the step and, grimly obedient, set to planting the ruby there.
But when she was done, she could not bring herself to walk in through the gaping door of the cottage; it would be too much like entering the mouth of a laughing ogre, or rushing into the arms of a nightmare.
She walked back into the wood, found a dry, grassy place, and lay down there. ‘I must name you, that creature said,’ she told the baby, untying her own dress-front. ‘Ah, it is too much for me now. I will name you in the morning.’ She put the child to the breast, where it seemed to suck all the moisture straight from Liga’s mouth, and she thought she would not sleep for thirst. But the moment she laid her head in the grass and the forest shadows, she was gone away into sleep—not hungry, not thirsty, not mourning or enraged or frightened, but as comfortable as she could be, insensible.
She woke into a body so whole and healed, it was as if yesterday’s horrors had not happened. Her fair-skinned daughter lay asleep beside her, a glimmer of milk on her lip.
‘Branza,’ she whispered. ‘I will call you Branza, after all things white and clean and nourishing.’
She stood, and picked the child up, and set off towards the cottage, putting her mind to the tasks that must await her in the ruin.
But when she stepped into the clearing, everything was changed. The house, which had always slumped to one side as if held up only by the force of her father’s anger, sat square and solid on the grass. The torn-out windowframe had been reset in the wall, the trampledwattle shutters woven anew. The door bore none of the boot-marks and splinters she had glimpsed by the light of the moon-plum the night before; it did not gape, but was held just a little way open with a rounded knuckle of wood. At the southern end of the doorstep, a red-leafed bush grew to the height of Liga’s knees; at the northern end stood a green bush of the same size and circularity. The roof-thatch had no holes or thin places, and the chimney had lost its inclination towards the west.
‘What is this, Branza?’ she whispered, in fear of what she saw. This was the house her father might have made them had he had the money and the heart to fix the roof and straighten the frame—had he been, in fact,
not
her father, but a different man.
She stood on the step and pushed open the door. ‘Oh, my Gracious.’
The polished-earth floor spread out before her, unscarred, unscraped, untrod by booted feet, her little rush mats rewoven here and there on it. The marriage bed was gone, as was Liga’s truckle; now the bed was set in the wall—a fresh-made bed for a single person, she could see from here, with the curtain, of new calicut, tied back with a clean band to a proper hook in the wall. Near the head of that bed stood a cradle very like one she had once seen outside the cabinet-man’s workshop, which her mam had stopped and admired, and in that cradle new linen rested soft as a cloud, and a canopy shaded it. Slowly she approached, expecting it to fade like a dream-object before her eyes. Timidly she touched it, and gasped at how smoothly, how
But it returned her instead to her father’s house. She stood in the trees and watched it approach the broken cottage, and spill a small puddle of light at one end—the northern end—of the doorstep.The resistance to following, the fear she ought to feel, sat just the other side of her numb exhaustion.
Near falling with tiredness, Liga walked past the folded-asleep goat and up the path. She knelt, laid her baby daughter down, dug a hole a handsbreadth deep, put the clear stone at the bottom, and pushed the earth back in. As she tamped the dirt flat, the light slithered across the step and pooled at the southern end, and she crossed the step and, grimly obedient, set to planting the ruby there.
But when she was done, she could not bring herself to walk in through the gaping door of the cottage; it would be too much like entering the mouth of a laughing ogre, or rushing into the arms of a nightmare.
She walked back into the wood, found a dry, grassy place, and lay down there. ‘I must name you, that creature said,’ she told the baby, untying her own dress-front. ‘Ah, it is too much for me now. I will name you in the morning.’ She put the child to the breast, where it seemed to suck all the moisture straight from Liga’s mouth, and she thought she would not sleep for thirst. But the moment she laid her head in the grass and the forest shadows, she was gone away into sleep—not hungry, not thirsty, not mourning or enraged or frightened, but as comfortable as she could be, insensible.
She woke into a body so whole and healed, it was as if yesterday’s horrors had not happened. Her fair-skinned daughter lay asleep beside her, a glimmer of milk on her lip.
‘Branza,’ she whispered. ‘I will call you Branza, after all things white and clean and nourishing.’
She stood, and picked the child up, and set off towards the cottage, putting her mind to the tasks that must await her in the ruin.
But when she stepped into the clearing, everything was changed. The house, which had always slumped to one side as if held up only by the force of her father’s anger, sat square and solid on the grass. The torn-out windowframe had been reset in the wall, the trampledwattle shutters woven anew. The door bore none of the boot-marks and splinters she had glimpsed by the light of the moon-plum the night before; it did not gape, but was held just a little way open with a rounded knuckle of wood. At the southern end of the doorstep, a red-leafed bush grew to the height of Liga’s knees; at the northern end stood a green bush of the same size and circularity. The roof-thatch had no holes or thin places, and the chimney had lost its inclination towards the west.
‘What is this, Branza?’ she whispered, in fear of what she saw. This was the house her father might have made them had he had the money and the heart to fix the roof and straighten the frame—had he been, in fact,
not
her father, but a different man.
She stood on the step and pushed open the door. ‘Oh, my Gracious.’
The polished-earth floor spread out before her, unscarred, unscraped, untrod by booted feet, her little rush mats rewoven here and there on it. The marriage bed was gone, as was Liga’s truckle; now the bed was set in the wall—a fresh-made bed for a single person, she could see from here, with the curtain, of new calicut, tied back with a clean band to a proper hook in the wall. Near the head of that bed stood a cradle very like one she had once seen outside the cabinet-man’s workshop, which her mam had stopped and admired, and in that cradle new linen rested soft as a cloud, and a canopy shaded it. Slowly she approached, expecting it to fade like a dream-object before her eyes. Timidly she touched it, and gasped at how smoothly, how
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