What have I done?
The words were a primal scream in his head as he dashed through the snow that was still piling up as the storm bore down on the village. It was not the first of the season, nor would it be the last, but it was unexpected. Blind Nadeen with her milky eyes usually started squalling a half a day before any storm hit them. She’d stand on her stoop and shout for all to hear. She’d done so for so long that even the animals knew to seek shelter when she started squalling. She’d said nothing about this storm and so the village had begun it’s celebrations. It was midwinter after all.
As he’d torn into the village, his heart pounding as the first gusts of snow began to work down the mountain, he’d passed Nadeen’s house and seen her standing in the doorway in her nightdress, bewilderment written clear on her seamed face.
What have I done? He asked himself again as he burst through the back door of the tavern and felt the warmth of the cooking fire blast against his cheeks like a comfort he did not deserve. Voices barely paused in their celebration at his appearance.
“Oskar!” The voice, like a blow, from behind the counter, past the sounds of celebration. He looked up and saw his father glaring at him, his brow knitted, his eyes full of disapproval and suspicion. “What are you about?” He barked.
“Nothing Father.” He said and then scuttled up the stairs before his father could do more than scream after him.
“Your boots dammit!”
Oskar didn’t stop, he ran until he reached his room at the top, a small space tucked under the eaves with just enough room for a bed, a trunk and a small bit of desk he’d made under the watchful eyes of Vasily. He threw himself onto the bed, soaked coat, boots and all. He pulled the thin pillow over his head, blocking out any scrap of light and trying to mute the screaming in his head. Hiding from the sounds he was afraid to hear.
What had he done? He looked back over the collection of actions and events that made up his colossal mistake and saw each step clearly and winced at each wrong turn. Had it been summer when it had started? Or had it been sooner? He wasn’t certain. Certainly some of it had been going on for years. He didn’t fit, he didn’t belong, that was the core of things, or so he believed. His father certainly made him feel that every time he offered a correction or a suggestion on how Oskar might be more of a man, how he might be less useless. So many little hurts and slights, it was hard to see where it started.
His first clear mistake had been in going to see the witch. Lumilla. So many villagers had gone to her, barren wives wanting babes, young men wanting to know who would make a good wife, or what would be the best field to clear. Little things, big things. They all knew that if they needed answers they could head up the mountain, ask and the witch would tell them
Except Oskar had gone, to see if all the things the Priests had been telling him were true, to see if he should go with them like they suggested and find a place where he fit. He wanted her to clear up his confusion. Their words troubled him. When they spoke to him with their smiles and their kind eyes and their gifts of books it all made sense and his heart swelled to hear it. But when they left, like they always did, the words didn’t ring so true and he felt conflicted in his heart. So the week before they were due, the week of midsummer he’d gone up the mountain and knocked on the witch’s door. But she didn’t come. He knocked and knocked and still she didn’t come. That wasn’t the way things were supposed to go. He felt a rare flood of the stubbornness that seemed to be Oksana’s way with everything fill him. He kept on knocking until a voice finally called to him.
“Go, I will not see you.”
The voice was indescribable. Low and fluid, like wind through the trees but with a hint of birdsong to it. It was sad, so sad that he felt his own throat closing up, cutting off the bile that had been growing.
“Please.” He’d called. “I have a question. I was told you would answer.”
“Not for you.” She’d said. “I have no answers for you.”
And that was it. She did not speak again even though he stayed and knocked long past the point where he felt foolish. He’d asked Oksana about it, had she gone? Of course she had. She’d gone up and asked how to talk her Papa into letting her learn the good stuff. She’d had a similar experience, but the voice had been that of an old woman, cracking with irritation and age. Oksana had called her a bad name and never looked back.
Oskar hadn’t been able to let it go. He’d gone back up a few days later. While everyone was celebrating the solstice with drink and music. He’d hung at the edges of the gathering and when he was certain no one would notice he’d slipped up the mountain. He arrived just as she was leaving her house. It had been dark and she’d shone like the moon, softly glowing, luminous. She was the most beautiful woman he’d ever seen. He’d had enough sense to stay hidden, to bite back his gasp at the sight of her. But even so she’d paused and looked around for a moment before proceeding up a path he would have sworn wasn’t there earlier. She moved as if she were pulled by some force. He followed, even though he knew it was wrong.
She seemed distracted as she’d walked, all but floating along the path and Oskar had a long enough time to begin to appreciate the sway of her hips and the curves of her body as she’d walked. At long last she’d come to a pool in a small clearing. Standing before the pool she held her hands up, her arms a crescent just big enough to capture the full moon that could be seen through the trees. Oskar’s skin prickled, his heart pounded when she lowered her hands and slipped out of the robe and into the pool. He knew he shouldn’t watch, it was obscene, it was wrong, but he couldn’t look away. Finally he’d wrested enough control over himself to look away. He felt enough shame to force himself away. He’d gone crashing down the mountain filled with thoughts that were not pure.
When the priests came a week later he was still wracked with guilt and stirred up thoughts. They were only too happy to take his confession. They were so happy to hear his words and absolve him of his sins. If the priest who heard his confession had eyes that were overly bright, overly interested Oskar hadn’t thought much about it. He was absolved. For months he’d felt lighter, warded by their forgiveness.
But then the priests had come back just the day before. They had come in number, quietly and only a few had come to the village. The grandmother’s had watched them like crows, their eyes dark and curious but they had said nothing even though the priests presence had made it hard to get ready for the Midwinter celebrations. They watched and waited, holding their tongues. It was the way of things. Whenever the priests came, no matter how inconvenient, the villagers just played along. The Priests did what they always did, even if their timing was off and when they were done going through the motions they sought out Oskar, finding him chopping wood behind the tavern.
What they asked of him was so simple. Would he show them where the witch was? Oh how he’d agonized, he wasn’t supposed to talk about the witch, the words tasted like ash in his mouth but he’d been so burdened before, so troubled. They had helped him, they had told him what he needed to do to feel whole. She had not, she had turned him away. Their smiling faces, their kindness had won him over. Tonight he’d taken them up. There had been so many of them, all robed in black and they had followed him silently through the woods like shadows until they caught sight of the house. They hadn’t even waited for him to point it out. Once they saw it they swarmed past him, battering against the door in a swirling black mass. He’d heard her cry out, her voice just as the one that Oksana had heard, old and crackling.
“Oskar, Run!” she’d screamed and her voice had been tinged with very real fear.
Then it was lost in the sound of her door splintering. He ran. As sounds of chaos and pain erupted behind him he charged down the mountain, falling more than once but never, ever stopping. It was Midwinter, the solstice and the village was tucked away in warm houses but certainly still awake. Someone must stay awake all night to make certain the sun rose again after the longest night. Oskar worried for the first time in his life, that it might not.
He could hear sounds of celebration in the Tavern below him and despite himself he strained to hear sounds past that. Lifting a corner of his pillow he blinked tear-filled eyes as he caught something in the distance. Pulling the pillow off of his head he sat up and scurried to the small window and threw open the shutters letting in the cold night air and the swirling blasts of snow. There, he heard it again. A low rumble with a strange scuttling to it, like dead leaves scraping across cobbles. Leaning out the window he made himself look up the mountain. He made himself see what he’d wrought. Billowing blackness was sweeping down the mountain like the leading wall of snow in an avalanche. But the blackness did not knock down trees, it swept around them, engulfed them and in the blackness he could hear things. Voices, shrieks, howls, unholy things given voice, rolling down the mountain towards the Village.
He saw movement then, Old Blind Nadeen stood in the center of the Village in nothing but her night dress, her white eyes turned towards the coming blackness.
“It comes!” she shrieked loud enough that the din in the tavern below stilled. “Brace yourselves!” she screamed again.
“It comes!” and then it hit. The lead bit of blackness hit the edge of the village, rolling over it as it had the trees. Where it hit animals and people began to scream.
