Short Story: Hell's Forecourt

Short Story: Hell's Forecourt

It was the dark time of the year when the women gathered.

The time when the daylight peters out not long after three o’clock and the temperature plummets.

The time when mothers hustle their children indoors and huddle around the fire, dreading the whisk of broomsticks in the air above, capping their chimneys to stop unwelcome visitors flying in when the smoke flies out.

They wait in the candlelit safety of their parlours, eyes smarting with the wood smoke that cannot escape, keeping watch until the women have departed for the devil’s banquet, and the trolls have followed them, grabbing at the birch twigs of their brooms.

The men return from their work, bolting the door behind them and telling their wives about the strangers they have seen in town, the women with wild hair and glittering eyes that promise pleasures behind locked doors, then harden, as they turn away uncourted.

They talk in hushed voices, fearing that they will scare their children but wanting their wives to know that they are desired by the dark, exotic women who dream of their caress.

But their women know different. The witches do not want their men. They are merely routes to the ultimate prize, a soft-cheeked, downy-skinned child, the blond, blue-eyed gift the devil wants delivered at his banquet.

His forked tongue flicks across his lips, slavering at the thought of succulent young flesh, roasted in the fires of hell.

Marta and Micke had heard the story many times before. Every year at school their teacher would warn them about staying out after dark. The church bells would ring out a curfew as the late afternoon sun slipped over the edge of the world, and their mother would be waiting at the gate, her smile wavering slightly as she herded them inside.

Marta knew she was safe. At thirteen she would soon reach puberty and the devil would not want her maturing flesh. Her hair was black as raven’s wings as she favoured her father’s family, so the trolls could not make her out against the gathering dark.

It was Micke she feared for. The eight year-old picked his way slowly through the snow, distracted by the slightest thing that glimmered off the pathway home. Marta would pull his striped hat down to hide the flaxen hair that stood up, brush like, on his little head. Try as she might she could not hide the white skin set off by his apple cheeks and the china blue of his eyes.

She’d hurry him home, looking over her shoulder at every rustle of the lingonberry bushes.

Every gust of wind in the trees became the swish of broomsticks overhead; the whisper of the reeds in the frozen river was the voice of a troll, tempting Micke with sweets and gingerbread horses.

At night, locked in the little weather board house she shared with her family, Marta would press her face against the window and watch the shapes moving across the moon, the witches landing on the cliffs at Bakulla to make their fires and sing old songs to the prince of darkness.

She looked across at Micke in his bed, his lips puffing out as he breathed deeply in his sleep, and prayed that they would not take him.

Her parents stayed awake all night during the season of the witches’ gathering, keeping the fire burning and the lighted candles in the windows.

“We’re not of your world,” they called defiantly to the witches on the cliffs. “You’ll never take our children. Never.”

This year was different for Marta. Her brother was growing taller and chattered to her on their way home from school. He kept up with her along the path and didn’t wander off to look for pine cones, or break icicles from the branches.

Sometimes they were joined by Stefan, the new boy in Marta’s class at school. Stefan was tall and raven-haired, like Marta. His eyes were as green as the river under the ice and his sharp, white teeth flashed in his elfin face whenever he laughed, which was often.

Marta felt safe with her new found friend, and as Micke walked between them she no longer jumped at shadows or was startled by the sound of tinkling ice.

Stefan would hold her hand behind her brother’s back so that, together, they shielded him, two ravens sheltering him under their wings.

“Who is the handsome boy you told cousin Tove about the other day?” her aunt, Gretchen, teased her when she came to visit, “Should I start making lace for your wedding gown?”

“What boy?” her mother asked, her smile tense like when she met them at the gate. “Who are his family?”

“His name is Stefan and he’s new at school,” said Marta, blushing to the roots of her hair. “He doesn’t have any brothers and sisters and he comes from somewhere in the North- and he’s my friend. That’s all I know.”

She left the room at the earliest opportunity and went upstairs to the chamber she shared with Micke. He was sitting on his bed, playing with the wooden horses his father had carved and painted for him last Christmas. He sang to himself quietly as he lined the horses up across the counterpane, his voice sweet and low, like sugared almonds.

The bird that flies on darkest wing

Will take you where the fairies sing.

The mermaids and the fish will rise

To greet the moonbeams in your eyes.

Fair, sweet child come to me

And you will see what fairies see.

“Did you learn that in class?” Marta asked “You seem to have every word by heart.”

Micke looked up dreamily, holding a white horse in his chubby fingers, stroking it against his cheek.

”No,” he smiled smugly at his sister. “Stefan taught me it. He’s my friend too.”

Marta’s forehead creased into a frown as she struggled to remember when Stefan could have taught Micke the song. He only saw him on their walks home from school, and all she could remember was him telling them stories of the icy caves of the North Country.

She shrugged, Micke must have misremembered. He was always getting things mixed up.

Their mother called them down to supper and Marta helped Micke pack his horses away. Her brother was distracted by Aunt Gretchen’s questions about school and the song was soon forgotten, but Marta couldn’t help thinking she’d heard it somewhere before.

The following morning Marta looked for Stefan on the way to school. She never saw him on the road, emerging from the edge of the forest where he told her he lived, and at night he always hurried away into the gathering dark, telling her to get indoors.

As usual he was nowhere to be seen and Marta hurried to her morning sewing lessons with the other girls, reciting the old sagas while she embroidered table cloths and pillow cases.

At lunch time as the boys returned from woodwork class she searched eagerly for Stefan in the jostling crowd but couldn’t catch a glimpse of him as she joined her friends to skate around the frozen pond.

As the sun sank lower outside the schoolroom windows, and the children finished their day with the national song, she suddenly saw Stefan reflected in the darkening glass, waving and smiling at her – and her heart leapt. She must have been too busy with her equations to notice that he’d been there all along.

He was waiting for her at the school gate, holding Micke’s hand and swinging his arm as they sang together, the same haunting song she’d heard Micke singing the evening before.

She was just about to ask him if it was a North Country song when he turned and smiled at her, his eyes full of something shadowy and warm like a kiss, stolen when no-one’s looking.

She took his outstretched hand, feeling a fluttery sensation, low down in her stomach. ”This is what it must be like to have a sweetheart,” she hugged the thought to herself as the three of them started out across the snow.

Micke chattered away like a starling as they made their way homewards.

“It’s the witches’ party tomorrow night,” he announced to his companions, “when they sing their songs and light beacons on the cliffs to tell the devil they will soon come to him. They cook lovely things for his banquet and go out with the trolls to capture children so he can roast them for his supper.”

“Don’t be silly, Micke,” Marta snapped nervously. “You know that’s just an old story.”

“It’s alright Marta,” Micke smiled sweetly. “It doesn’t hurt. Just before the devil eats you he shows you all the secrets that no-one knows, and your soul flies out of your body to join all the other children who fly about outside the world, like fairies.”

“And do you know which children he likes the best?” laughed Stefan, letting go of Marta’s hand and jiggling the pom-pom on Micke’s hat. “Blond ones – just like YOU!”

He pulled the hat off with a flourish as Marta screamed.

“Stop it Stefan!” she shrieked. “He’ll have bad dreams – and the three of them ran off, giggling, towards Marta’s mother, standing in the doorway of their house.

As Micke ran into her arms Stefan pulled Marta back for a moment.

“Until tomorrow, lovely Marta,” he whispered, “when I will give you a special gift.”.

Marta beamed with pleasure at the promise.

“He’s going to make me his sweetheart,” she smiled to herself, waving to her mother and turning to introduce Stefan.

But he was already gone, almost invisible against the outline of the forest so that she had to strain to see him.

She could hardly sleep that night. Micke was singing softly in his sleep and somewhere, far away, she thought she could hear other voices joining his. “It’s just the wind,” she told herself, concentrating on her parents’ voices below as they stoked the fire and trimmed the candles to keep the house full of light.

She had not told them about Micke’s devil story and the conviction with which he’d told it. It would worry them and he was only a child after all.

Marta pulled a shawl around her shoulders and went to the window to watch the witches flying across the moon.

She shivered as she watched them, black specks in the distance, gathering along the headland.

Tomorrow they would all be assembled, and would make their spells, laying traps for beautiful children, taking them prisoner with the help of the sharp faced trolls that came out of the forest.

Micke stirred in his sleep and she thought for a moment that she saw a dark shape crossing the garden, something silver glistening in the blackness.

It reminded her of Stefan, and the sudden flash of his smile, and she felt a knot of something in her breast, like the clamouring of birds. She couldn’t wait for the coming day and the special gift that Stefan had in store for her.

She must have slept, to be woken by the sharp glare of the morning sun piercing the shutters. Downstairs the candles were out and the smell of the fire was replaced by the scent of new-baked bread.

Micke’s bed was empty and she could hear him chattering to her parents, calling up to ask if she was awake.

Marta took extra time dressing this morning. She felt different today, like someone new. Her face, in the looking glass, was rosy and her lips crimson against the raven black of her hair.

Her eyes shone greener than usual, like glass, and a smile played about the corners of her mouth.

She realised she’d never felt so happy as she ran downstairs two steps at a time.

She couldn’t wait for the day to end, even if it brought the witches’ Sabbath closer. Stefan and his gift would make everything alright.

She hugged her parents and danced her way to school with Micke who was in the same effervescent mood.

They slid across the ice, wheaten hair and raven’s wing, singing and chanting words they thought they’d always known:-

The bird that soars above the night

Will bring to you, your heart’s delight

The prince will draw you to his side

And make you his with lovers’ pride

Sweet fair child come to me

And I will set your dark soul free.

The day flew by in the crystalline shimmer that winter days have, and the air held the promise of more snow.

Marta looked in vain for Stefan once again, but knew he would appear as the day grew dim and the chill fingers of the north wind wrapped a mantel of ice around the world.

And there he was as the school bell rang, almost a shadow in his dark cloak and elk skin boots.

Micke was with him, holding out a garland of dark fir and blood-red berries.

“Micke has made you a crown, my queen,” Stefan smiled. “Let me crown you.”

Marta giggled and bent her head to wear the proffered wreath. The berries reminded her that she was a woman now.

The crimson trail she had left across the white bed sheets had frightened her when it first appeared, but it had stopped after a few days and her mother had soothed her pains with cloudberry and myrtle tea. Her father had brought her roses.

Stefan took her hand in a loop around Micke’s shoulders and the trio walked, singing, towards the trees as the sun dipped earthwards.

Micke fell silent, walking as if in a dream, and Marta felt like she was all alone with Stefan, the boy she knew was meant to be her sweetheart.

He turned towards her, over Micke’s head which, she noticed, was bare.

“Where is Micke’s hat?” she almost murmured, absorbed by the heat she felt somewhere in her throat and spreading across her breast.

“He doesn’t need it anymore,” said Stefan, and his voice was like the rustling of leaves, and wings, and the movement of air.

“It’s getting dark,” cried Marta, her concern interrupting her reverie, “I must get Micke home.”

“He’ll be home very soon,” Stefan smiled, “but first, let me give you your gift.”

He pulled Marta and her brother towards the fir-dark forest, eager and happy in his swirling cloak.

At last they stood beneath the towering pines, the dark green glow mirroring the light in Stefan’s eyes, drawing them in.

Marta looked up at him and suddenly he seemed taller, more imposing, like a fairy king.

The winter crown on her head felt heavier but she felt light as thistledown, as if Stefan had freed her from the earth.

Above them the branches of the trees were shifting but there was no wind. Marta had a feeling of foreboding somewhere at the back of her mind.

The light was fading fast and in the distance she could hear her mother’s voice, shrill and frightened in the gloom, calling them home.

She tried to turn towards it but all she could think of was Stefan, pulling her close inside his cloak, her mother’s cries replaced by shadowy singing coming closer through the trees.

The darkness wrapped itself around them so that Marta was unsure where Stefan’s cloak ended and the night began; where she ended and where he began.

All was one as the air throbbed with the sound of beating wings, a thousand birds clothing them in shadows, soft feathers brushing skin and the singing, louder now, more haunting, ringing high above their heads.

“I will give you your gift now,” whispered Stefan and kissed Marta’s ruby lips with an intensity that thrilled and frightened her, lifted her up and threw her back into the darkness, so that she was lost, then found, then lost anew not wanting to be found.

Stefan’s kiss filled her every corner, exposing her and emptying her of everything - putting something secret in its place.

She cried out in the black forest, losing all consciousness of herself, and as she fell she heard Micke’s scream of delight as he crowed with laughter and clapped his hands in excitement:-

“They are here! They are come,” he cried out.

Then silence as the stars went out and Marta could hear Micke’s voice no more.

The shouts of men with lanterns coming through the pines brought Marta back from wherever she had been.

“Marta! Micke!” Their voices were urgent, tinged with fear as they crunched through the snow in search of what they thought they had lost.

Marta pulled the cloak more tightly around her shoulders, covering her white dress, and felt, for a moment, the lingering warmth of Stefan’s body.

Stefan. Micke.

She jumped to her feet, whirling round, expecting to find them still laughing with delight.

But she was alone in the forest, a trampled crown of pine and berries at her feet, and a striped, woollen bonnet in her hand. It was Micke’s hat, striped anew with blood as bright as berries, and Marta’s scream split the night in two, bringing her rescuers to her side.

It took her father many long minutes to calm Marta enough for her to tell her story.

She had been betrayed by a boy made of moonbeams, a thing of light and shadow masquerading as a man.

He had held her in the warm folds of his cloak, filling her with longing and delight, as the witches took her brother by the hand and led him away, singing an enchantment, as their hands became claws and their faces shone with the roaring flames of the devil’s court.

Micke’s laughs became screams as the dark women flew with him to where Mephistopheles waited.

And the kiss that had so consumed Marta was a pile of ashes, a garland and a cloak – and crimson blood on snow.

She thought she heard Stefan’s laugh somewhere among the trees, as her father knelt in the snow and wept, saw his sharp featured face gleaming white for a moment in the gloom.

She just caught his whisper, low upon the wind, “I’m sorry, Marta. I had to take your brother – but I have given you something in return.”

They helped Marta’s father stand and began the heavy trek out of the forest, silent save for his regular, guttural cries of grief.

Marta was too stunned to speak, unable to believe her friend, her sweetheart, had been in league with the witches, a troll from the dark of the forest.

In the midst of his grief, it all made sense to her father. His wife’s claims that Marta and Micke’s teachers had seen them acting strangely, like they were with someone when there was no-one there; Micke’s haunting singing and Marta’s sudden maturity.

He stopped to vomit into the snow.

Marta walked behind him, dazed and trembling as the sun began to rise.

“I gave you something in return.”

What could Stefan have meant? The kiss? This grief? This guilt and loneliness?

She looked among her clothing for some kind of talisman, a jewel, even a flower, but she found nothing.

At last they reached the house, where her mother’s screams of pain and loss were like daggers in her heart.

“My boy! My beautiful boy! What did we do wrong, Krister? Why couldn’t we protect him?”

Marta’s rescuers were fed and warmed by the fire.

As morning filled the air, the women of the village came to comfort Marta and her parents, making endless cups of glog, and a stew that would last long after their tears had dried.

They told of the weird cries and cackles that had resounded along the cliffs at midnight, the dancing lights and howls of ecstasy and pain, before the witches left at dawn on their broomsticks, a flock of dark crows against the blood-red sky.

“Someone should build a church on those cliffs,” said one. “Reclaim that space for God. They don’t call it Hell’s forecourt for nothing.”

“I’m so sorry,” Marta wept against her mother’s bosom.

“It’s not your fault, beloved,” she replied sadly. “You were bewitched and I’m just grateful that you’re safe. If I had lost you, too…. I’ll keep you close now, I promise.”

Marta closed her eyes, relief flooding every inch of her.

The day rolled out another carpet of snow, glittering in the sunlight.

The little family hugged closer together around the fire, praying that the devil had spared Micke the suffering of a slow death.

Slowly, they stretched out their grief-numbed fingers and bowed to the inevitable, warming their broken hearts in the fire glow.

And deep within her belly, Marta’s gift stretched out his spindly limbs and smiled his sharp-toothed smile; a troll child with eyes as green as the river under the ice, and hair as black as ravens’ wings.