Marcus Steve's Arc

Chapter 8 of 8

Marcus found the fairies in the rafters of his porch, small and bright as struck matches. He told them the widow was coming with her chest and chair before the second bell. He told them she meant to bring a weaver and a temple reader. He did not tell them about the rings under the floor. "She moves fast," said the smallest fairy. "Good. Sweep the porch again. Light the lamp by the door. A woman judges a house before she judges the man in it." He swept. He lit the lamp. He carried the broken chair out to the dead tree behind the shed and left it there. The homestead looked at him with its two upstairs windows like eyes. The warped rail on the porch shamed him. He nailed it flat and split his thumb doing it. The second bell rang across the valley. She came up the path with a boy pulling a cart. On the cart sat a chest, a chair, a loom in pieces, and a covered basket. She did not knock. She walked onto his porch, looked at the fresh nail in the rail, and nodded once. "North room?" she said. "Cleared." She paid the boy and sent him off. Then she carried the basket inside, set it on his table, and opened it. Bread. Salt. A small pot of lard. She put them on his shelf like she had lived there a year. "Sit," she said. He sat. She sat across from him and laid both hands flat on the table between them. "The weaver first," she said. "She's at the low well most mornings. Her husband drowned two winters back and her brother's wife has grown tired of feeding her. She'll come if she's asked right." "Asked how?" "Salt again. And a spool of undyed thread from the emporium. You give the salt. I give the thread. She'll understand what that means." "And I say what." "Your name. Your location. That a household is forming and there is a loom waiting." She tapped the table once. "Not more. Widows and near-widows don't want speeches." He watched her hands. They were steady. She had done this kind of planning before, for other people, in other kitchens. "Tomorrow," she said. "Morning bell. I'll walk you to the well and stand back. You do the giving. I do the reading after." "Reading?" "Her hands. Same as I did yours." She almost smiled. "You learn fast for a foreign man. Go to the emporium before dark. Buy the thread. Buy salt in a paper twist, not a jar. Jars are for widows already settled." He stood. She was already looking at his kitchen shelves, sorting them in her head. He walked out with a name he did not yet know and a plan he had not written. The household had begun without him and around him. Tomorrow he would meet the second woman.