Page 129 of Malady

I bow my head, trying to steady my breathing beneath the gentle movement of her hand, but every time I close my eyes, I see that flooded road again, and my little girl lying in the mud. For three hundred years I have struggled to remember the children whose faces haunted me, and now that I finally can, I do not know how to bear it.

“Avis,” I manage at last. “Her name was Avis. She was my little girl, and I had her in a handcart. I was trying to get her to the abbey, but there was a man, and he… She was crying for me, Ophelia. She was so frightened, and I could not get to her. I tried, but I could not…”

Before I can force another word, she slips her arms around my shoulders and draws me against her. I bury my face in her neck, clinging to her as the tears finally come, while she holds me close and gently strokes my rain-soaked hair.

“Come on,” she murmurs. “Let’s get you inside, shall we? I’ll put the kettle on, and we can sit somewhere a little warmer than this bloody roof.”

The scent of cardamom rises from our tea as we sit together beside the hearth, listening to the rain pattering against the windows. Ophelia cradles her cup between her hands, while mine remains untouched on the table, slowly growing cold.

Little by little, the black membranes covering my eyes recede, and the room’s familiar colours return. The fire burns warmly in the hearth, casting its light across Ophelia. She watches me with an expression I cannot quite bear, her eyes red from crying, and when our gazes finally meet, she shakes her head.

“Oh, Iscairn,” she murmurs. “I’ve been trying to think of something to say, but everything I come up with sounds bloody useless. I’m so sorry. I really am.”

For three hundred years, I have wondered about the children who sometimes appeared in my memories, never quite knowing whether they were mine. Now I remember their names, their faces, the peculiar things they did that made Margery laugh, and all the ordinary afternoons I spent with them before sickness came into our home.

“I remember her laughter,” I whisper. “She had the loveliest laugh, Ophelia. Whenever something amused her, she would throw her head back and laugh until she could hardly breathe, and then Margery would begin laughing too, simply because she could not help herself.” A tear slips down my cheek, and I wipe it away with the back of my hand. “I had forgotten all of that. My own family, and I had forgotten them.”

My voice breaks. I reach for her, and she meets me halfway, drawing me into her arms. She holds me as I weep, her fingers moving gently over my back while I mourn the family I have lost and all the years I can never have with them. For a long while, neither of us speaks, and when my tears finally subside, she rests her cheek against my hair.

“Take your time,” she murmurs, pressing a soft kiss to the crown of my head. “I’m here, Iscairn. I’m not going anywhere.”

I draw a shuddering breath, closing my eyes as another memory comes rushing back. There are so many of them now, one following another, bringing with them things I had long since forgotten, and I try to gather my thoughts as I remember the stranger kneeling beside me on that flooded road.

“It told me to be a physician of the soul.” I lift my head from her shoulder to look down at my hands, half expecting to find them covered in blood again. “The creature who changed me. It saw my satchel spilled open in the mud and told me, ‘We take from those who are finished, to stitch up the ones who are not.’”

Thunder cracks across the sky, rattling the shutters, and with it comes another memory. A great oak door, bound with iron, and the weight of an iron ring beneath my hand. I can hear a bell tolling somewhere beyond it, and when I close my eyes, I see a monk standing before me with a lantern, his face pale with fright as he looks down at the girl in my arms.

“An iron ring,” I murmur, my brow drawing together as the image flashes behind my eyes. “The toll of a bell. There was a monk holding a lantern… he looked terrified. I remember his face perfectly, but…” I shake my head, the gap in my mind stretching wide and blank. “I was at the ditch. And then I was at the abbey. The eight miles between—there is nothing. Only the sound of the bell, and the rain.”

Ophelia’s blackened fingers curl around mine as I try to piece the memories together.

“And what happened to Avis?” she asks softly. “Did she…?”

“Live?” I whisper, the memory growing clearer as I speak. “That night, she did. I went to her after the stranger left. There was still something of the soulglimmer inside me—though I did not know what it was then—and when I pressed my hand against her chest, I felt it passing into her.” I close my eyes, remembering how her little body had trembled beneath my palm. “The rattling… the rattling stopped. She drew a clean breath. I must have carried her. I left her at the abbey. That is why the brother looked so frightened—he opened the door to a monster holding a child.” I swallow thickly. “I gave him her name. I told him Margery’s name, and our village, and made him swear to send word to her. I watched him carry Avis into the warmth. I listened to the doors close. And then I went away.” I stare down at our hands. “Whether she lived beyond that night, I shall never know.”

“You went away because you were frightened,” Ophelia says, her thumb moving steadily over my knuckles.

“Because I was starving,” I correct her. “I did not know what that creature had made of me. There was this terrible hunger clawing at my insides, and I had no idea what it wanted or what might happen if I could not satisfy it. I was terrified, Ophelia. I did not want to be anywhere near my family until I knew I would not hurt them.”

“You got Avis to the abbey,” she says fiercely. “You made sure they knew where to find Margery. You gave your little girl every chance you could, Iscairn.”

I shake my head, unable to meet her eyes. “I abandoned them.”

“You protected them,” she counters, her grip tightening on my hand until it almost hurts. You got Avis through that night, and then you kept a starving, frightened creature away from your own door.”

“I did not know anything,” I confess. “I thought I had to endure the hunger until it broke me, until the membranes sealed over my eyes and I could think of nothing but feeding. I would seek out the dying, drawn to their terror, and tear their souls from them, because I believed that was simply how it had to be. I did not know I could feed before the hunger became unbearable, or that I could take a soul gently. It took me years to understand what I was doing. Decades. By the time I dared to go back, so much time had passed. The house was empty. The garden had grown wild. Nobody in the village remembered where Margery had gone, or if she still lived.” I lower my head. “I do not know if they waited, believing I would eventually walk through the door. They must have thought I died on that road. And all the while, I was wandering about England, too frightened of myself to go home.”

She draws me a little closer, keeping her hand in mine as I search for the right words.

“I cannot even tell you whether Margery lived to see our children grow up. I had three children, Ophelia, and I do not know what became of any of them.”

She tightens her hold on me, and for a while I sit quietly beside her, until a fresh wave of guilt washes through me.

“Ophelia, do you know what I thought of when I found you in that crypt?”

She shakes her head slightly.

“Avis. I did not remember her name then, or even that she was my daughter, but I remembered the helplessness of watching somebody I loved die when there was nothing I could do to save them.” My fingers tighten around hers as the memory of that night comes back to me. “When I looked through the iron grate and saw you lying there in the dark, I was back on that road again, trying desperately to reach somebody who was slipping away from me.”