Chapter IV

The warm summer sun shone brightly from its perch high in the sky. A few play-sick clouds tumbled along next to it. The clouds' shadows moved like ships across the golden sea of wheat fields and the green waves of the barley field. The wind was in the west, soft but insistent; it brought with it the cool air of the wild western sea and the briny scent of adventure. In the bushes, which grew in the field boundaries, the bluebirds and their cousins were busy with their young chicks and made quite a spectacle.

Ida stood on a slight hill and watched as the world unfolded around her. Her keen eyes could just about make out the main road into Dustring. On it, a slight trickle of wanderers came and went. To the south, across the many fields and grassy hills, the pines of Rold Forest rose to form a thin band of brown and green linking heaven and earth. Behind her, to the north and west, her house blocked her view, but she knew well what lay beyond: more farms and fields, then the oak forest, and, beyond even that, the sea. Ida took in a deep breath and sighed. With one, two, three little jumps, she descended from her looking-post and walked back through the undulating green field. Absentmindedly, she ran her hands through the silky tops of the barley. In the thick hedge around the garden, she found the hole her coming and going had formed over the years. She pressed through it.

The very back of her garden, nearest the hedge, was the domain of the gnarled old fruit trees. Each autumn their branches were weighed down by their rich bounty and the trees looked weary and old. Yet each spring they awoke from the slumber of winter and blossomed with the unbridled vitality of youth. At the moment they were midway in their transformation, with budding plums, apricots, apples, pears, and cherries soaking up the sun's warm rays. The air back here was stuffy and humid and the sun a rare visitor beneath the greedy green leaves of the trees. Next came the flowerbeds with their colorful displays of red, purple, orange, and blue. Here the air was fragrant and alive, and the lawn was greener, lusher, and less mossy. Bees from far and wide danced a complicated dance here, jumping from flower head to flower head in search of sweet nectar. Nearest the house was the vegetable garden, safely enclosed behind a wicker fence warding off the ever-hungry hens. Here Ida had been busy uprooting weeds before she afforded herself a break. In the corner of the garden close to the house was the henhouse where the hens spent their nights clucking conspiratorially amongst themselves, colluding to break down the wicker fence and ravage the vegetable garden which each day beckoned them to come and scratch its fertile soil and eat its unripe bounty.

There was much work to be done this time of year. Weeds grew with upsetting speed. The nascent fruits on the fruit trees had to be pruned. The hens had to be fed and given fresh water each day and the flowers needed to be tended with delicate care. Only a few days of idleness separated the neat garden from the unruliness of nature.

As Ida resumed her work of uprooting weeds from a strawberry patch, a raven landed with silent wingbeats on the top of an apple tree at the back of the garden. The black bird's black eyes watched Ida as she worked.

Ravens were rare on the island. The Cimbri disliked them, as the black birds would eat almost anything. They would eat seeds and berries and even eggs if they could get to them. Young children were encouraged to hunt them with slingshots, and it was not uncommon for a farmer to give children prizes if they slew a raven on the farmer's land.

As the nagging feeling of being watched slowly began to grow unmistakable, Ida finally looked up and spotted the raven on its lonely branch.

When they were younger, Willa had been deft with a slingshot and had had the patience for the hunt. Ida had not. She had always scared their prey away by releasing her sharp rock too soon, when she, Willa, and Ella had gone hunting.

Perturbed by the presence of the bird, Ida continued her weeding. It would leave soon enough of its own accord, she thought to herself as she scowled at the bird.

After a long while, the raven on its perch let out a loud, gurgling croak. Ida unearthed a weed and looked up at the bird. The bird looked back at her with infinitely black eyes. "Go away," yelled Ida and waved the bird away. The raven croaked again, its whole body convulsing to produce the terrible sound. Ida threw the weed she had uprooted unto the pile of weeds she was gathering in her wheelbarrow. The raven in the tree spread its wings and fluttered them a little before closing them again.

Annoyed by the presence of the bird, Ida decided to finish her work in the garden early. She drove the large pile of weeds she had uprooted over to her compost pile, threw them on, and parked her wheelbarrow in the little shed on the side of her house where she kept her gardening tools. At the outdoor pump she rinsed her hands and her face. The water from the underground well was lukewarm. She wondered where she had left her old slingshot.

Down in her root cellar, Ida found one of the smoked sausages she had bought from Nora down the road. In her kitchen she peeled off the sausage's thick outer skin and cut the sausage into thin slices. In her bread drawer, she found a lump of day-old rye bread. This too she cut into thin slices. She fed a log into the smoldering remains of yesterday's fire and opened an air valve on the side of the stove. The log burned merrily a moment later. She roasted the slices of sausage in a pan, then toasted the bread in the leftover fat. Back down in her root cellar, she found butter to spread across the roasted bread. The cold, deeply yellow butter melted down into the warm bread. Ida placed the roasted, buttered bread on a plate and went into the garden. The raven still sat looming on its perch. A dark presence in the otherwise sunny world of her little garden.

"Go away, you." Ida looked at the raven for a long moment to see if she could scare it off. Normally they were skittish birds, smart enough to know the danger a Cimber posed to them. The raven in the tree sat unnaturally still and stared at Ida.

Ida plucked a cucumber from its vine and returned to her house. She rinsed and sliced the cucumber and put the slices of sausage and cucumber on top of her roasted, buttered bread. She looked at the two open-faced sandwiches she had made. She was not hungry, she realized. At the pump over her sink, Ida filled a glass with water before carrying her lunch outside on a tray. She ate her meal slowly on the small terrace next to the house, casting sidelong glances at the black bird as she tried to concentrate on the book she was reading.