Shadowsong (Wintersong #2)(61)
“Where I go when I’m feeling sorry for myself.” Her smile was gentle, her expression full of both pity and understanding. “Now, help me to my feet, child, and I shall call Konrad to bring the horses.”
*
I did not ride, but according to the Countess, there was no better way to get to the monastery.
“The monastery?” I asked with surprise. I remembered my brother pointing out the burned-out building as we drove into the valley. “But I thought it was destroyed.”
“It was,” she said. “But the ruins are still structurally sound and it boasts some of best views of the valley.”
“Is it . . . is it safe?” I did not mean the ruins.
“From the Hunt?” the Countess asked, guessing at my fear. I nodded. “Yes, as long as you’re with me.”
“Why?”
“Because,” she said, her green eyes glinting. “There is an ancient protection in my bloodline.” Her green gaze slid to Konrad, who was bringing the horses around. “Because of what my foremother did when she walked away.”
I frowned. “But the Hunt still rides after me. How did she escape retribution?”
The question had been sitting like a burning ember in my chest ever since I had first learned of the brave maiden. Ever since I had seen the gallery of the previous brides in the tailor’s shop Underground, a gown on a dress form the only remaining bit of proof any of them had ever existed. I had received a story and name with each one: Magdalena, Maria Emmanuel, Bettina, Franziska, Like, Hildegard, Walburga. Women who had given themselves to death for a myriad reasons: despair, pleasure, adventure, deceit. But the very first bride—the brave maiden—her name was stricken from goblin memory, her legacy to be forgotten and forbidden by the old laws. How she did escape . . . for good?
“All in good time, my dear,” the Countess said. “Now let Konrad help you up onto your horse, there’s a good lass.”
I eyed the beasts with fear and suspicion. Although we stabled horses at the inn, I had never ridden one before. The Countess assured me that she was a poor rider herself, and that I need not fear, for we would take it easy up the slopes to our destination.
A quarter of an hour later, I was perched precariously atop a white mare called Vesna.
“Named after the goddess of spring,” the Countess said, riding up on her own horse—a dun-colored gelding—and patting Vesna on the rump. For all her claims to be a poor rider, the Countess sat astride her mount with the ease of one raised to a genteel life. She rode for pleasure, not for labor, and kept a brisk pace, leaving me and Vesna to follow as best we could. I wished I were sitting astride my horse, but Vesna had been fitted with a lady’s saddle, and I did not have a lady’s seat. Instead, I clung to her reins for dear life as we jostled and jounced our way up the mountain paths to Snovin Monastery.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” the Countess breathed once we reached the summit. Her cheeks were flushed from the cold and the morning’s exertions, her eyes bright and sparkling. On her mount she had four good legs, and I could see how the freedom exhilarated her. I, on the other hand, could barely feel my hands for the chill and the death grip to which I had subjected them for the past hour and a half.
“Indeed,” I squeaked, my throat tight with nervousness. I was held together with prayer and stiff muscles, but bit by bit, my bones stopped rattling and I was able to enjoy the scene before me.
My hostess was right, the picture before us was beautiful. Up close, I could see that the monastery had been built of a golden stone that still gleamed despite the ravages of time, and from our vantage point we could see around us for miles. I saw for the first time the nearby town of New Snovin, the red-tiled buildings shining bright in the afternoon sun like poppies in a field. The Countess explained that the town had been moved from its original location years ago due to plague and famine; indeed, we had passed the empty remains of several old houses and cottages on our way to the monastery. It was why Snovin Hall had seemed so isolated; the town immediately surrounding it had been abandoned years before.
We passed under a rusted iron gate into a large stone courtyard that very much resembled a village square.
“It was a castle before it became a monastery,” the Countess said. “In fact, it is the burg represented on my husband’s coat of arms. But as the wars died down and the Procházkas grew prosperous with peace, they built Snovin Hall to be their legacy. We can leave the horses here,” she announced as we approached what appeared to be the charred remains of a stable.
“Is it safe?” I asked, eyeing the rotted wooden beams.
“It’s stood for three hundred years like this, so it can stand for at least another three hours. Now, be a dear and help me dismount,” she ordered.
I scarcely knew how to gracefully get off my own horse without tumbling to the ground, but somehow I managed it without cracking a skull. I moved to help the Countess, but she seemed much more nimble than I despite the club foot.
“Otto doesn’t like it when I come here alone,” she admitted. “He thinks I’m not careful enough of my step.” Her smile was wry. “But I love it up here. There is a certain allure to this place, some dark, shameful part of me that thrills at the beauty of death and decay.”
Walking arm in arm with the Countess, I understood what she meant. The notion of finding death and decay beautiful should have sounded ridiculous and morbid, yet it resonated with me with a sort of romance of its own. I thought of the leaves of the Goblin Grove decomposing into mulch, dissolving into soil, that rich, fertile earth waiting to give way to life with the right touch of sunshine and rain. I thought of Snovin Hall, with its former grandeur slowly moldering into ruin, reclaimed by the land. The difference between sorrow and melancholy, the razor’s edge that divided aesthetic pleasure and emotional devastation.