Near the Bone(22)

She stayed in the outhouse until she saw the light of dawn brightening the interior of her foul hiding place. Then she pushed open the door, wondering what the day would bring, wondering what she ought to do next.

How can I even look at William now? What am I to do?

Mattie stopped, staring at the snow before her. There were marks scratched there, almost like symbols, carved with a bloody claw.

She couldn’t make sense of them, felt overwhelmed by the very idea of them—an animal making shapes in the snow, shapes meant for her to see.

Then the meaning of the symbols suddenly snapped into place, and she understood why the creature had followed her the night before, why it hadn’t killed her.

It wanted to know where she lived—her and William—because they’d gone into its lair. And it wanted to warn them to stay away. The writing in the snow was a warning.

Mattie didn’t think that they would receive a second warning.

She caught movement at the bedroom window and saw a flash of William’s face there before it disappeared. A moment later she heard the cabin door slam.

He strode around the building. She could tell by the look on his face—the compressed lips, the ice-chip gaze—that he was gearing up for a lecture on the Proper Behavior of an Obedient Wife. But Mattie didn’t want to hear his lecture.

No, she thought. Samantha doesn’t want to hear it.

Mattie didn’t want another beating, though. She was sick and sore and exhausted from the last one and her ordeal of the night, so she pointed mutely at the symbols on the ground and hoped that William would be sufficiently distracted to forget about whatever he had in store for her.

William halted, following the line of her finger with his gaze. The blood drained from his face, and she felt a small and very petty sense of glee at seeing him so wrong-footed.

A moment later all sense of delight was gone when he said, “What is this devilry? More of your witchcraft?”

“No!” she said, holding up her hands in front of her body, as if to ward him off. “I didn’t do that. It was that creature—the bear. It followed me last night.”

She had to get his mind away from any thought of witchcraft. If she didn’t, then he might decide she was performing some spell to keep from getting pregnant, and he might kill her this time.

“How could a dumb animal do this?” William said, his voice made of ice and fury. “This is some vengeance of yours for last night.”

So you know it was wrong to leave me outside, she thought, but there wasn’t time to dwell on it. She had to move him away from witchcraft.

“Look,” she said, crouching halfway to point at the deep gashes in the snow. “They’re claw marks. You can see they’re just like the marks on the trees we saw two days ago. I don’t think it’s just some dumb animal. There were all those strange bone piles in the cave, remember? It sorted them all. Normal animals don’t do that.”

William’s eyes moved from Mattie’s face to the symbols and back again. He was thinking about it, she could tell. She considered mentioning the animals tied to the trees—the ones she’d seen just before he’d knocked her out. She decided against it. If she interrupted his train of thought, he might find it was easier to conclude it was her witchcraft, after all.

“What could it mean?” he murmured.

She knew he wasn’t talking to her, didn’t expect an answer. She waited while he walked all around the symbols, bent down to peer more closely at them, ran his fingers over the gashes. Mattie wished he would hurry. Hunger gnawed at her, and she desperately wanted as much water as she could drink.

William stood up. “Go inside and wash yourself. You smell like the outhouse. Then make eggs and bacon for breakfast.”

Mattie hurried away, leaving him there to contemplate the markings in the snow. He’d have to get the eggs and bacon from the storehouse, which meant she’d have a few moments to herself.

The fire wasn’t lit when she entered the cabin, which meant she’d have to wash in cold water. Exactly as he meant for me to do. More punishment.

She took the jug of water from the table by the window, poured it into a basin, and carried the basin into the bedroom, careful not to slop water on the floor. William hated it when she did that.

What if he slipped on the water and got hurt? What if he knocked himself on the back of the head and wasn’t able to get up? You could throw him out in the snow and leave him there for the creature to find.

Mattie shook her head. No, she couldn’t do that. She didn’t want to hurt William. She only wanted to get away. She didn’t want to be hurt anymore.

(He did it to you. He left you out there in the snow to die.)

She had to stop thinking about it or he would see it on her face—her resentment, her anger. If he saw those things in her eyes then she’d never escape him. He’d make sure of it. He’d break her legs, starve her, watch her every moment of the day. So she had to be good and keep her head down and reveal no spark of rebellion.

And wait for my chance.

Mattie stripped off her trousers and shirt, soaked a cloth in the cold water, then wet her skin all over. As she did, she discovered new bruises—a band of screaming purple around her ribs, a swollen mass in her thigh, the clear outline of his knuckles near her belly button. She rubbed a sliver of soap every place, trying not to cry out when she touched a tender spot. Then she rinsed herself with the cloth.