reposted from my old blog, which got deleted: Â
Mary was a beautiful baby, sweet and affectionate, but by the time sheâs three sheâs turned difficult and strange, with fey moods and a stubborn mouth that screams and bites but never says mama. But her motherâs well-used to hard work with little thanks, and when the village gossips wag their tongues she just shrugs, and pulls her difficult child away from their precious, perfect blossoms, before the bites draw blood. Maryâs mother doesnât drown her in a bucket of saltwater, and she doesnât take up the silver knife the wife of the village priest leaves out for her one Sunday brunch.
She gives her daughter yarn, instead, and instead of a rowan stake through her inhuman heart she gives her a childâs first loom, oak and ash. She lets her vicious, uncooperative fairy daughter entertain herself with games of her own devising, in as much peace and comfort as either of them can manage.
Mary grows up strangely, as a strange child would, learning everything in all the wrong order, and biting a great deal more than she should. But she also learns to weave, and takes to it with a grand passion. Soon enough she knows more than her motherâwhich isnât all that muchâand is striking out into unknown territory, turning out odd new knots and weaves, patterns as complex as spiderwebs and spellrings.
âArenât you clever,â her mother says, of her work, and leaves her to her wool and flax and whatnot. Maryâs not biting anymore, and she smiles more than she frowns, and thatâs about as much, her mother figures, as anyone should hope for from their child.
Mary still cries sometimes, when the other girls reject her for her strange graces, her odd slow way of talking, her restless reaching fluttering hands that have learned to spin but never to settle. The other girls call her freak, witchblood, hobgoblin.
âI donât remember girls being quite so stupid when I was that age,â her mother says, brushing Maryâs hair smooth and steady like theyâve both learned to enjoy, smooth as a skein of silk. âTime was, you knew not to insult anyone you might need to flatter later. âSpecially when you donât know if theyâre going to grow wings or horns or whatnot. Serve âem all right if you ever figure out curses.â
âI want to go back,â Mary says. âI want to go home, to where I came from, where thereâs people like me. If Iâm a fairyâs child I should be in fairyland, and no one would call me a freak.â
âAye, well, Iâd miss you though,â her mother says. âAnd I expect thereâs stupid folk everywhere, even in fairyland. Cruel folk, too. You just have to make the best of things where you are, being my child instead.â
Mary learns to read well enough, in between the weaving, especially when her mother tracks down the traveling booktraders and comes home with slim, precious manuals on dyes and stains and mordants, on pigments and patterns, diagrams too arcane for her own eyes but which make her daughterâs eyes shine.
âWe need an herb garden,â her daughter says, hands busy, flipping from page to page, pulling on her hair, twisting in her skirt, itching for a project. âYarrow, and madder, and woad and weldâŠâ
âWell, start digging,â her mother says. âWonât do you a harm to get out of the house nowân then.â
Mary doesnât like dirt but sheâs learned determination well enough from her mother. She digs and digs, and plants what sheâs given, and the first year doesnât turn out so well but the secondâs better, and by the third a cauldronâs always simmering something over the fire, and Maryâs taking in orders from girls five years older or more, turning out vivid bolts and spools and skeins of red and gold and blue, restless fingers dancing like theyâve summoned down the rainbow. Her mother figures she probably has.
âJust as well you never got the hang of curses,â she says, admiring her bright new skirts. âI like this sort of trick a lot better.â
Mary smiles, rocking back and forth on her heels, fingers already fluttering to find the next project.
She finally grows up tall and fair, if a bit stooped and squinty, and time and age seem to calm her unhappy mouth about as well as it does for human children. Word gets around she never lies or breaks a bargain, and if the first seems odd for a fairyâs child then the second one seems fit enough. The undyed stacks of taken orders grow taller, the dyed lots of filled orders grow brighter, the loom in the corner for Maryâs own creations grows stranger and more complex. Maryâs hands callus just like her motherâs, become as strong and tough and smooth as the oak and ash of her needles and frames, though they never fall still.
âDo you ever wonder what your real daughter would be like?â the priestâs wife asks, once.
Maryâs mother snorts. âShe wouldnât be worth a damn at weaving,â she says. âLord knows I never was. No, Iâll keep what Iâve been given and thank the givers kindly. It was a fair enough trade for me. Good day, maâam.â
Mary brings her mother sweet chamomile tea, that night, and a warm shawl in all the colors of a garden, and a hairbrush. In the morning, the priestâs son comes round, with payment for his motherâs pretty new dress and a shy smile just for Mary. He thinks her hair is nice, and her hands are even nicer, vibrant in their strength and skill and endless motion. Â
They all live happily ever after.
*
Hereâs another story:
Gregor grew fast, even for a boy, grew tall and big and healthy and began shoving his older siblings around early. He was blunt and strange and flew into rages over odd things, over the taste of his porridge or the scratch of his shirt, over the sound of rain hammering on the roof, over being touched when he didnât expect it and sometimes even when he did. He never wore shoes if he could help it and he could tell you the number of nails in the floorboards without looking, and his favorite thing was to sit in the pantry and run his hands through the bags of dry barley and corn and oat. Considering as how he had fists like a young ox by the time he was five, his family left him to it.
âHeâs a changeling,â his father said to his wife, expecting an argument, but men are often the last to know anything about their children, and his wife only shrugged and nodded, like the matter was already settled, and that was that.
They didnât bind Gregor in iron and leave him in the woods for his own kind to take back. They didnât dig him a grave and load him into it early. They worked out what made Gregor angry, in much the same way they figured out the personal constellations of emotion for each of their other sons, and when spring came, Gregorâs father taught him about sprouts, and when autumn came, Gregorâs father taught him about sheaves. Meanwhile his mother didnât mind his quiet company around the house, the way he always knew where sheâd left the kettle, or the mending, because she was forgetful and he never missed a detail.
âPity youâre not a girl, youâd never drop a stitch of knitting,â she tells Gregor, in the winter, watching him shell peas. His brothers wrestle and yell before the hearth fire, but her fairy child just works quietly, turning peas by their threes and fours into the bowl.
âYou know exactly how many youâve got there, donât you?â she says.
âSix hundred and thirteen,â he says, in his quiet, precise way.
His mother says âVery good,â and never says Pity youâre not human. He smiles just like one, if not for quite the same reasons.
The next autumn heâs seven, a lucky number that pleases him immensely, and his father takes him along to the mill with the grain.
âWhat you got there?â The miller asks them.
âSixty measures of Prince barley, thirty two measures of Hareâs Ear corn, and eighteen of Abernathy Blue Slate oats,â Gregor says. âTotal weight is three hundred fifty pounds, or near enough. Our horse is named Madam. The wagon doesnât have a name. Iâm Gregor.â
âMy son,â his father says. âThe changeling one.â
âBit sharperân your others, ainât he?â the miller says, and his father laughs.
Gregor feels proud and excited and shy, and it dries up all his words, sticks them in his throat. The mill is overwhelming, but the miller is kind, and tells him the name of each and every part when he points at it, and the names of all the grain in all the bags waiting for him to get to them.
âDidnât know the fair folk were much for machinery,â the miller says.
Gregor shrugs. âI like seeds,â he says, each word shelled out with careful concentration. âAnd names. And numbers.â
âAye, well. Suppose thatâd do it. Want tâhelp me load up the grist?â
They leave the grain with the miller, who tells Gregorâs father to bring him back âround when he comes to pick up the cornflour and cracked barley and rolled oats. Gregor falls asleep in the nameless wagon on the way back, and when he wakes up he goes right back to the pantry, where the rest of the seeds are left, and he runs his hands through the shifting, soothing textures and thinks about turning wheels, about windspeed and counterweights.
When heâs twelveâanother lucky numberâhe goes to live in the mill with the miller, and he never leaves, and he lives happily ever after.
*
Hereâs another:
James is a small boy who likes animals much more than people, which doesnât bother his parents overmuch, as someone needs to watch the sheep and make the sheepdogs mind. James learns the whistles and calls along with the lambs and puppies, and by the time heâs six heâs out all day, tending to the flock. His dad gives him a knife and his mom gives him a knapsack, and the sheepdogs give him doggy kisses and the sheep donât give him too much trouble, considering.
âItâs not right for a boy to have so few complaints,â his mother says, once, when heâs about eight.
âProbably ainât right for his parents to have so few complaints about their boy, neither,â his dad says.
Thatâs about the end of it. Jamesâ parents arenât very talkative, either. They live the routines of a farm, up at dawn and down by dusk, clucking softly to the chickens and calling harshly to the goats, and James grows up slow but happy.
When James is eleven, heâs sent to school, because heâs going to be a man and a man should know his numbers. He gets in fights for the first time in his life, unused to peers with two legs and loud mouths and quick fists. He doesnât like the feel of slate and chalk against his fingers, or the harsh bite of a wooden bench against his legs. He doesnât like the rules: rules for math, rules for meals, rules for sitting down and speaking when youâre spoken to and wearing shoes all day and sitting under a low ceiling in a crowded room with no sheep or sheepdogs. Not even a puppy.
But his teacher is a good woman, patient and experienced, and James isnât the first miserable, rocking, kicking, crying lost lamb ever handed into her care. She herds the other boys away from him, when she can, and lets him sit in the corner by the door, and have a soft rag to hold his slate and chalk with, so they donât gnaw so dryly at his fingers. James learns his numbers well enough, eventually, but he also learns with the abruptness of any lamb taking their first few stepsâtottering straight into a gallopâto read.
Familiar with the sort of things a strange boy needs to know, his teacher gives him myths and legends and fairytales, and steps back. James reads about Arthur and Morgana, about Hercules and Odysseus, about djinni and banshee and brownies and bargains and quests and how sometimes, something that looks human is left to try and stumble along in the humansâ world, step by uncertain step, as best they can.
James never comes to enjoy writing. He learns to talk, instead, full tilt, a leaping joyous gambol, and after a time no one wants to hit him anymore. The other boys sit next to him, instead, with their mouths closed, and their hands quiet on their knees. Â
âLetâs hear from James,â the men at the alehouse say, years later, when heâs become a man who still spends more time with sheep than anyone else, but who always comes back into town with something grand waiting for his friends on his tongue. âWhatâve you got for us tonight, eh?â
James finishes his pint, and stands up, and says, âHereâs a story about changelings.â
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