†
They were a family of six. Yvette and her sister Julianne, who was seventeen, were the only girls. Father and the three boys, ages twenty-two, nineteen and eleven, completed the family. Mother had died when Yvette was born.
That had been a terrible and blessed time. It was the first of the year, a late March evening, and almost Easter. Winter had not even offered a breath of the spring to come. The season had gone late, as had the pregnancy. Yvette came splashing abruptly into the world with the wind outside howling of bad things ahead. There had hardly been much labor, and her mother had cried out aloud as the unnatural tettanic contractions thrust the baby too hurriedly into the world.
Julianne’s father had not seen one born in such a way, had not heard his bride scream so horribly when the others had come. He threw himself across the damp and bloody body of Julianne’s mother and held her tightly as the blood loss turned her an awful ashen gray and her life swiftly faded.
She died very quickly, the blood gushing from her in a river. Then, he’d sobbed…forever it seemed. The boys were too stricken to comprehend the horror of it all and peeked from around the door jamb, unwilling to allow their minds to take in what their eyes saw.
Julianne tugged at her father’s arm, but she could not tear the tormented man away. The blood that ran steady and bright from between her mother’s legs spilled thick to the floor where it congealed a sinister black on the wood planks. Some days later, father tore the wood away as the stains never did come up. He beat the floor with a splitting maul, shattering the wood, screaming at the audacity of it, to soak her up as it had.
Thank God in heaven that some of the town’s women had come right away to help clean and prepare the body. So much blood…so much life to spill. It had been too much for Father to bear.
Julianne, twelve years old, had taken the infant girl from between her mother’s legs. The placenta never delivered, and she was forced to cut the cord with a butcher knife to separate the baby from her dead mother. She blinked back tears, as she wrapped the babe in the birth blanket she and mother had fashioned lovingly for Yvette, and took her to the kitchen.
She heard her father’s sobs in the next room as she laid the baby on the kitchen table and swaddled it warmly. The lamb’s wool was now spotted red with the blood of Julianne’s mother. Gently, she folded back the blanket and stared down at her baby sister. Wiping tears from her eyes, she was unaware of the smudge of blood she left on her own cheek. She carefully tied a heavy thread around the cord to stop the bleeding as she remembered seeing the midwife do when her youngest brother had been born when she was only six.
Some of the old women in the town whispered that tying the cord in such a way also made it so that Satan could not get in. She softly murmured a prayer, just in case. Then, she tenderly washed and dried the new baby. There had been no time for a midwife with this delivery. The wonder and horror of it all happened without even a moment’s notice.
All the while, as Julianne tended the baby, she spoke a soft prayer to her mother, that she would take care of little Yvette. They had picked the name out together and told none of the boys. It was their secret, and mother was waiting to announce it at her birth. She had somehow known that the babe was a girl; of this Julianne had not been able to sway her. It was to be her sister, and of this her mother had been absolutely certain.
She sobbed and shuddered as she remembered these things and promised her mother that she would care for father and her brothers too. She beseeched Mother to flee to her Lord’s feet without worry, that her family would be well tended and safe until they were eventually reunited.
Tears ran down her nose and dripped onto the ivory white skin of the infant. They looked like tiny, transparent pearls, and Julianne stared at them for a moment before hastily wiping them away, causing the baby to cry.
Julianne cared for the new babe as though it was her own. Never once did she blame the baby for her precious mother’s death. It was just how things went sometimes. People died; this is what she told herself.
Later on, Yvette asked about her mother, and Julianne described her in detail, truthfully creating the memory of who she was. Their mother was an auburn haired beauty. She had been nobly born but fell in love with a commoner. It’d been a blessing for Julianne for she’d learned to read and write, a gift she was determined to pass along to her little sister. To Yvette, her mother became nothing short of a saint, an impression she held of her older sister as well.
* * *
A warm evening breeze drifted across the small meadow, causing the long grasses to bend in slow waves before making its way across the windowpane. It was sweet, and gentle, and caused the curtains to stir as dusk crept forth and the moths came out.
Yvette believed the moths to be “grass fairies.” This is what her sister told her, and at five years of age, everything was believable. She peered out the open window, squinting to bring them into focus. With the setting sun coming across the tall grass at such an angle, the blades shone transparent and the moths’ wings truly did look fairy silver. The little girl smiled widely, satisfied that the fairies had returned, and she gave her attention back to Julianne.
The boys sat with their father in the kitchen, discussing work and the herd. They were dairy farmers, supplying not just milk but dairy cow stock for most of the township of Marseille. Their cattle were well known to be sturdy and fine milk producers, an exceptional lineage of Braunvieh.
Most of the cheese from the area was made from the milk of Lanviere stock, and the Lanviere men were quite proud of the reputation they held. It afforded the family a humble livelihood and was a sincere and honest trade. In addition, the Lanviere family lineage had remained unfettered by the dreaded bonds of serfdom, and so, although modest, they were free. This was something their father was fiercely proud of.
Monsieur Lanviere took great care to make certain his children were well tended, possessing good manners and morals. They were good Catholic children and feared God as it should be. Church and God were critically important to this family as they were to most in these difficult times.
Gathered about the kitchen table, the boys drank scald milk. Father and sons recounted the calves dropped, the cow with the dead calf who’d developed mastitis, and which bull would be entitled to breed next spring.
Yvette was too small to tend the cows yet, so she and Julianne tended to the house chores and the gardening. Yvette fed the few chickens and gathered eggs when there were some. The growing season seemed very short lately, and so the vegetable garden was particularly meager. Nevertheless, with a small flock of chickens, the meat of a culled steer or dry cow, and all the milk and cheese they could want, the family remained well fed. They led, for the most part, a sustaining and satisfying life.
This was a blessing, and the family realized this, for much of the country suffered even for food. It seemed that France was experiencing a pull and tug between powers. The church and state struggled, and it was the commoner who carried the suffering of times such as these. It was not uncommon to have beggars wander as far as the Lanviere farm in search of food, even with children in tow.
* * *
Years had gone by, and Julianne kept her promises. She was a guardian angel. The goodness in her was equaled only by a fierce protection of her loved ones, should anyone dare threaten or offend her beloved family.
Julianne had been forced to grow up too soon, but regarded her role with indifference. Many in the village suffered greatly. Many women died with childbirth, and sometimes, so did their babies. Julianne was grateful. Her blood ran with fire, the fire of the Lanviere lineage. Her father was a dairy farmer but her ancestors were warriors, descended from the Netherlands. Norsemen, she was told they were, and fierce fighters.
Monsieur Lanviere passed this strength on to his daughter. Julianne prayed her thanks to God for this. It was good, for she believed a woman could not be too strong. She carried her commitment to her family with a grave responsibility that showed deeply in her charcoal eyes.
Books were very rare, but Julianne’s friend, Babette, was wealthy enough and spoiled terribly by a very generous aunt. The hand written volumes given to her were priceless but mostly unread. Consequently, she passed the booklets along to Julianne, and they were appreciated more than Babette would ever know.
Tonight, Julianne was exhausted. The family had worked a hard, long day as usual. Now she sat reading to Yvette, snug in their nightshifts, stockinged feet outstretched on the straw-stuffed bed. She read to her little sister from a hand copied collection of Sister Frances’s Manners for Gentle Ladies, the section on how to entertain company. It was little Yvette's favorite lately as she fancied herself quite a “lady.” She was very feminine—not the tomboy her sister was.
Julianne would have much rather read from the poetry of Christine de Pisan or the controversial writings of the fascinating Jean De Meung. It perplexed her that her baby sister was such a girl! Yvette liked pink flowers best, loved to play court, and told Julianne all about her eventual wedding day—most certainly to a prince. This child refused to believe a hard life was anything other than a fairy tale.
Tonight, as Julianne murmured the scribbled words, “A true lady is to be chaperoned on all affairs, with moments of private conversation to be carefully directed by a guardian and, forthwith, necessarily short,” her thoughts were considerably elsewhere.
Julianne read mechanically, speaking but not hearing. Her thoughts were instead of the day before—her afternoon with the young priest. She blushed as she recalled how irrationally she’d screamed and kicked at D’ata when she tripped in the field. How juvenile of her! Her face flushed as she relived the kiss, repeatedly, with the feel of his arms around her, his lips brushing against hers, his tongue probing hers. She shook her head involuntarily.
“What is chaperoned?” Yvette abruptly asked her sister.
“Hmm?” Julianne pulled herself begrudgingly back to the present. She closed the booklet, her thumb guarding the page. Distracted, she gazed out at the moth fairies fluttering about on the evening breezes. They rode the updrafts created as the warm earth quarreled with the descending evening air.
“What is chaperoned? You said it, reading—just now,” Yvette insisted.
Julianne fanned herself with her other hand. “It means when a lady is in the presence of a suitor, she is to have a chaperone. Mmm—someone else, usually an older woman, who is present to keep things proper, I suppose.” She peered down at her little sister to see if her explanation was adequate.
“What is a suitor then?”
Julianne smiled wryly, looking at the cherub face of her precious baby sister. She squeezed her knee to make her squeal in delight. “Oh, that’s a gentleman, like a boy, who’s a friend, only more.”
“Like Monsieur Father D’ata is to you?” Yvette looked innocently up at Julianne, her eyes enormous and sparkling.
She may as well have struck her sister flat handed across the face, Julianne was so dumfounded. “What makes you say that, Yvette? Who told you such a thing?” she demanded. Stunned, and suddenly much more attentive than she’d been just seconds before, she shifted on the bed so she could look directly at her baby sister and demanded, perhaps a bit too harshly, “Who gave you such a notion?”
Unaware that she’d said so much more than she’d intended, Yvette pouted. “Nobody! It’s just that, well…I heard Father making such a noise about it out in the yard yesterday, and the boys say so.” Then her eyes lit up. “Maybe it’s because you weren’t properly chaperoned?” Yvette seemed instantly satisfied and swung her legs so that her woolen stockings crept down around her ankles, refusing to succumb to her sister’s sudden bad humor. She grinned up at Julianne, her baby teeth charmingly crooked.
Julianne waved her hand and set the reading aside. “Monsieur D’ata is a friend…only a friend. Do you understand?” She closed the pages, laying them carefully onto the bedside stand. “You shouldn’t listen to rumors,” she scolded Yvette. “Surely you know that he is ordained into the priesthood.” Her argument was weak, even for Yvette’s sake.
Yvette reached for the booklet, not yet ready to finish. “Yes, mmm, but that doesn’t mean he cannot be your suitor, does it?” She cocked her head to one side. “That would just be sad.”
“Well, yes, it does mean that.” Julianne was at an immediate loss for explanation when she saw the look of doubt in her sister’s eyes. There was definite confusion in her own heart as well. “I know it’s hard to understand, but we could never be more than friends. It wouldn’t be right with God, now would it?” The question was meant to convince herself as much as her sister, but it did nothing to enlighten either of them.
Julianne reached to pull her own stockings from her feet, the wool uncomfortable in the warm evening. She struggled with the feeling of sadness that suddenly blanketed her heart. Why did such a heaviness weigh in her stomach whenever she considered she might never see him again?
“I wish he was my suitor,” the child giggled, flopping back on the bed.
Julianne’s mouth dropped open as she watched her sister wriggle with joy. She abandoned her own troubled feelings, laughing and tickling Yvette. The little girl shrieked with glee, slid off the bed, and lay panting, helpless on the floor. Julianne slid off the bed to join her. They lay side by side on the planks, staring for a bit at the ceiling as the sun crept in golden red ribbons across the beams. They wordlessly shared something that only sisters can.
Finally, Julianne leaned over and kissed Yvette on the forehead. She shuffled her into bed, tucking her in with sheets only because it was so hot. “Well, perhaps we will keep this our secret. If we tell, it might go away,” Julianne offered kindly.
Yvette nodded in total agreement and smiled again. “Our secret, because he would be the most perfect suitor.”
The wisdom of a five year old lay heavy on her heart, later, when Julianne stole away to the wild flower garden behind the cottage. The days were so much longer lately. She wanted to be alone as the evening cooled, to think things through. Confusion clouded her thoughts, and this was very unlike her.
Sitting on the bank of the creek, she leaned against the old willow, watching the moon. A water wheel slopped lazily, sending a small river toward the south pasture. A favorite, tattered volume of poetry dangled loose in her hand but remained closed. There was no poem as sad or poignant as Julianne was at this moment. It was so unfair that it should be this way.
As she and D’ata walked home the evening before, after the horse had bolted—such a clever beast—they’d talked quite a bit. At other times they wandered along in comfortable silence. It had been so wonderful, so perfect. Julianne happily and cautiously thought of it as a day she would never forget, knowing that to covet it would be to invite the wrath of God.
She remembered the evening seemed to pass so swiftly. They’d wandered through the countryside, and Julianne recalled when they approached a fallen tree on the path to her home. It hadn’t really been all that tall, and she’d hopped across it easily many times before. D’ata reached out instinctively to catch her by the elbow to help her over it. Ordinarily, she would disdain such a gesture, but from him it just seemed…kind. Now, she absentmindedly rubbed her elbow where he’d touched her. She closed her eyes, sighed, and allowed her mind to return to their walk together.
While approaching Julianne’s home, and the end of their journey, D’ata hesitated, looking back down the road from where they’d come. Julianne paused and wondered why he stalled.
He turned back to her and gazed into her eyes. “I must see you again,” he said suddenly. His hair was tousled, and he was so lovely and enduring before her. His was beauty of another kind, like a storm.
Julianne stepped close, peering up at him. “You know that it would be ill-advised for us to see each other again. They will disapprove.” She stayed close, unable to step away.
“It doesn’t matter. What is meant to be is meant to be,” he whispered, his voice deep and inviting.
She reached up as though she would touch him but did not. “What is meant to be is not necessarily the way of things.” She was so close to him that her lips practically brushed the laces of his shirt lapels. Julianne lifted her face to look into the eyes of this stranger.
His eyes were closed, his chest rising and falling, his lips parted. He was frozen as though afraid to move and have it all vanish. She laid her palms against his chest, and he startled beneath them. The steady cadence of his heart was strong, steadfast—perfect.
Time suspended and circled the two of them, a dairy farmer’s daughter and an unlikely priest. Then, without warning, Julianne stood on tiptoe to let her lips brush against his. It just seemed the only thing to do. She’d read of encounters such as this, had snorted her derision at the cliché of it all. Now, she questioned her lack of insight into what she’d believed. Can this be? Dare I even believe it to be true? she wondered silently.
His eyes opened, and he peered deeply into hers as though all the way into her mind and heart. Then they kissed again. This time neither pushed away, and eternity was lost. The silent eddy of their souls merged and swept between them. There was no past, no future, no consequence. Time ceased, and forever was this moment. It was as if it had always been so and always would be. They kissed deeply, spiritually, and passionately—as one. When they parted, there were tears in Julianne’s eyes.
“Oh, why do you cry, have I hurt you? Is it because I—”
“Shhh, no,” she interrupted. “Oh, no. It’s just that…” She shook her hands as though she could shake away the wrong of it. “Don’t you see? This is a mistake. This will cause such tribulation! Your family will never allow this.” She stepped away from him, blinking tears away. She refused to cry again, despite the horrible irony of it all. “D’ata, I’m sorry; what was I thinking?”
“Julianne, stop. Please, don’t say that. I will speak to my father. You will see.” He reached for her.
“No!” She stepped away. “No,” she repeated more gently. “You know as well as I what they expect. This whole township knows you. All of Marseille knows you, has expectations of you.” She tried to reason with him but had to look away, torn at the injustice that was life and the wounded look upon his face. There was no right or wrong. Things just were, and sometimes there was no making it what you wanted it to be. Of this, Julianne had much experience. “Besides, you’re practically a priest as it is! God will be angry with us.” It was painful to look at him, to see him stand before her with the hurt in his eyes as he listened to her words.
“You have done nothing wrong. Let me deal with God on my terms.” He spoke defiantly and stepped toward her.
“No! I mean…” She sidestepped him, stalling. It would be so easy to believe him, to disavow society, the rest of the world, and eternity. Nevertheless, she’d lost her mother at the whim of fate, and so she believed she had an insight beyond eternity. “Let’s give this time,” she diverted the conversation, looking away. “I must get home now.” She turned to continue down the path.
He caught her hand. “Promise me.”
“What?”
He appeared wounded, tormented. “Promise me that you will not let life here on earth destroy this. Promise me that you will see me again.” He spoke urgently as though time were scarce, as though there was a great beyond, an escape, a door they must go through before it might shut forever. D'ata held her hand firmly, waiting for an answer
She hesitated, taking in his words, feeling his strong hand around hers. Allowing her fingers to lace into his, she replied, “You know I will…” She smiled sadly and shrugged, glancing away. “…at mass, if nowhere else.”
Now, sitting on the bank under the willow tree, Julianne regretted her words. The fairies turned to moths and disappeared, settling into the grass as dusk fell. Her palms sweated with the warmth of the evening and her memories. She leaned against the old tree, digging her heels into the soft earth, watching the moon. It was beautiful and sad, hanging there—a thumbnail crescent in the eastern sky.