Other Earths (collection)

CSILLA’S STORY Theodora Goss

Porch steps. Wooden steps, with a dandelion growing through a hole in the wood. A dandelion covered with white tufts.

The breeze blew away a tuft, with its brown seed attached, and a frightened voice said, “She hasn’t talked since I met her at the airport.” A hand touched her arm. “What’s your name, child? Your real name? Mi a ne’ve?” The hand withdrew, and the frightened voice continued, “Did I pronounce that correctly?”

And the other woman, the one standing on the porch steps, with two dandelion tufts caught in the fabric of her dress, said, “How long has the child been traveling, Mrs. Martin?”

Mrs. Martin said, her frightened voice growing fainter, “A week, I think. The trip to Vienna should only have taken one day, but Helga was stopped at the border, and the guards kept telling her to wait another day and then another, although she’d given them all her money, until finally she gave them her wedding ring, and they let her through.” She added, her voice so faint that it seemed to float away on the breeze, “But in Vienna they had a passport ready and put her on the plane to New York …”

Another tuft detached itself from the dandelion. An inchworm stretched and hunched onto the bottom step.

“I tried to buy her something to eat on the train …”

“And the border guards never found her?” Now the woman on the porch steps had three dandelion tufts caught in her dress.

“Well, you see, the car had two bottoms, and she was lying between them.”

From the corner of her eye, a ghost. No, a handkerchief fluttering down to rest on the grass. It was wrinkled, and she remembered Miss Martin sitting in the train compartment, crumpling a handkerchief in her hands.

“You mean that for three days she lay between …” The woman on the porch steps moved, and the tufts caught in her dress floated away over the grass. “I’m surprised the child is alive.” Her voice was not frightened. There was another word for it, perhaps angry, or tired, or—the inchworm stretched and hunched up to the next step.

“I’m so terribly sorry, Mrs. Mad’r.”

But already she was climbing the porch steps, and Miss Martin was behind her, bending to pick up the handkerchief, and the hand on her shoulder belonged to the woman on the porch, who was wearing a turban on her head, like Imre when he hid in the Turkish camp, and whose voice was neither tired nor angry as she said, “Drink this.” And the pillow smelled like grass.

In one corner of the room was a spider. Her grandmother had kept a spider in one corner of the apartment, because spiderwebs caught good fortune. A house with a spider would always have good fortune in it.

“I’m glad you’re awake,” said Mrs. Mada’r. “Will you take some broth?”

It tasted like her grandmother’s mushroom soup. The mushrooms were gathered by moonlight …

“No, child. I want you to pay attention. Can you tell me your name?”

The spider let itself down from its web and dangled in the corner. A crack ran across the ceiling, from the spiderweb to the window.

“Do you remember the train ride? Being in the airplane? Leaving Budapest?”

Outside the window she could see a tree. One of its branches tapped against the glass.

“Listen, then. I’m going to tell you a story. This happened long ago, on the shores of the Volga, a great river. Along the shores of this river grew groves of oak and alder, birch and willow. And among those groves lived the Daughters of the Moon.”

Hársfa’s Story

“I wish we were dead,” said Ha’rsfa. She sat on a rock covered with moss and shaded by an oak tree. The river was green under the tree’s shadow, and it flowed so slowly that she could see its branches and leaves reflected. In a hundred years, those reflections would not have changed. The oak tree would still be there.

“Hush,” said Ny’rfa, applying another wet leaf to H’rsfa’s forehead. “When you move, it begins bleeding again. And who would lead our sisters, if we were—” The words hovered in the air between them, like a dragonfly. Dead, like T̈lgy. Tölgy of the light foot, like foam floating on the water. T̈lgy of the wise words, as slow as the river and as filled with shining things: silver fish, stones with veins of crystal, laughter. Tölgy, the eldest and best. Lying at the center of the village with blood on her tunic, as though she were covered with leaves.

Awkwardly, because Ny’rfa was still holding the leaf, Ha’rsfa wiped her cheeks with one hand. “Where would we lead them? We’ve never known anywhere but here.” Her fingers were pale green with blood and tears. “Why can’t things be the way they were before?”

Ny’rfa sat down beside her. “Hold this now.”

Ha’rsfa held the leaf to her temple. “Do you remember the milk?” Left by the villagers in hollow stones. When their mother was shining in the sky like a silver egg, all of the sisters would leave the forest to drink and dance in the pastures, among the silent sheep. Sometimes the villagers left wool, which the sisters spun on wooden spindles and wove into winter coats. In return they left walnuts and baskets woven from willow branches.

Ny’rfa stared at the river. Was she also thinking of its permanence, its peace? “All I remember now is the village burning. The screams, Ha’rsfa. And the blood. And the swords of the Horsemen.” She sat so still that H’rsfa was afraid she had been injured and was bearing the pain in silence. But when H’rsfa touched her hand where it lay clenched on the moss, she said, “T̈lgy wasn’t the only one. I saw Boro’ka fallen, and Ibolya didn’t come back with us. There, I said if you moved, it would bleed again.”

“I wish we had stayed in the forest! If we hadn’t been picking flax in the meadow and smelled the burning—”

Ny’rfa put a hand on her shoulder. “I told you, you must stay still.”

“T̈lgy was wrong to lead us into the battle. The villagers could have fought the Horsemen alone. They would have lost just the same. They’re not warriors, any more than we are.”

“H’rsfa, you don’t mean that. How could we abandon them? Think of what they have given us, and some of them—are our children. Here, cry on my shoulder if you have to.”

“Sometimes,” said Mrs. Mada’r, putting a damp cloth on her forehead, “when the Daughters of the Moon danced in the pastures, one found a shepherd sleeping among his sheep. If he was handsome in the way of the village people, with black lashes fluttering against his cheeks like wings, she would wake him and lead him into the forest, where she would lie with him on a bed of ferns and mosses. If a child was born with skin that was paler than the brown skin of the villagers, with hair as green as leaves and eyes like the pools of the forest, which reflect the leaves above, it was left at the edge of the village. The villagers would care for it, because it was considered fortunate to have a grandchild of the Moon. There, it would grow to become a poet or perhaps a prophet, which were much the same thing in those days. But it could never sew, or fish, or hunt, because the touch of needle or hook or knife would burn it like fire.” She felt a hand on her cheek. “Are you more comfortable now?”

“Let me wash your face a little. Is that better? We have to go back to the cave. Our sisters need us to be strong for them, Ha’rsfa. As Tölgy would have been.”

Ha’rsfa dried her face with the edge of her tunic, leaving streaks like grass stains on the fabric, and stood. “I think I’m ready.”

Suddenly, Ny’rfa screamed. H’rsfa saw a flash, like a fish leaping from the water—no, a sword at her sister’s throat. Then H’rsfa felt her own throat burning like fire from the touch of a knife. They were surrounded by Horsemen.

The Horsemen wore leather boots to the knees and leather tunics. Their coarse black hair was tied back with strips of leather. They smelled of sweat and horses. One, whose hair was braided with red wool, tied strips of leather around her wrists. He touched the wound on her head and then her hair, with a look of wonder. Then he led her, stumbling after Ny’rfa, through the forest.

The village also smelled of horses and blood. Women in tunics of red wool were taking what remained from the burned houses: sacks of grain, carved bowls, beds stuffed with straw. They stared at Ny’rfa and Ha’rsfa, and one made a sign over her forehead. A child playing with a wooden spoon began to cry and hid his head in her skirts.

There was blood on the earth, churned by the hooves of the horses. Ha’rsfa felt her stomach turn. Would she be sick, right here before the Horsemen? The man with red wool braided into his hair touched her arm. He tapped himself on the chest and said, “Magyar.” How could Ny’rfa walk before her so calmly, like the river, so straight, like a fir in the Northern Mountains? Then she noticed that Ny’rfa’s hands were clenched so tightly that the nails must be leaving new moons on her palms. What had he said, that his name was Magyar? Afraid, she pulled away from him.

At the center of the village, horses tied to what had once been doorposts stamped and snorted. Horsemen cleaned their swords, or ate bread and dried meat, or played with bones that were marked with red lines. They shook the bones in their hands, then let them fall to the earth. Each fall of the bones was followed by laughter and exchange: knives, horsehair bridles, a ring. By a burned wall sat the villagers, their wrists and ankles bound with leather strips. They looked at Ny’rfa and H’rsfa with frightened eyes. How many of them were left? she wondered. Here and there, she saw a face that was paler than the others, hair that was tinged with green. She and her sisters had never known the villagers well. Perhaps, she thought, we should have known them better.

On a carved stool sat a man with a ragged scar across his face, from his left eye to the right corner of his mouth, like lightning. Magyar gestured toward Ny’rfa and H’rsfa, then spoke in the Horsemen’s language. The bones stopped clicking and the Horsemen stared at them.

“They are brothers, Hunyor and Magyar.” Ha’rsfa turned. The man who had spoken was shorter than she was, balding and dressed in a frayed yellow tunic. “Do not be surprised. I speak many languages: Attic, Phrygian, barbaroi.”

“You are not one of these Horsemen,” said Ny’rfa.

The man chuckled and thumped his chest. “I am Demas. Father was merchant, captured by barbaroi. I was small boy.” He held out his hand at his waist, to show how small.

Hunyor rose and spoke in a voice as rough as bark. So close to him, she could see that he resembled Magyar; they both had broad foreheads and noses that curved like the beaks of hawks.

Demas replied, gesturing toward the clouds above, the forest around them. “Hunyor asks, are women with hair like leaves ghosts? I say, they are spirits of trees, daughters of Forest Goddess. My father taught me: dryads, hamadryads.”

“Can you ask them what will happen to the villagers?”

Demas’ face wrinkled in an anxious smile. He shook his head, as though unsure what Ny’rfa had asked him. She pointed to the villagers. “Those people.”

Demas spread his hands, as though the answer were evident. “Slaves.”

“What about our sisters?” asked H’rsfa. It was the first time she had spoken, and the sound of her voice frightened her. So many Horsemen staring, and Magyar staring at her with an intensity she did not understand. “Women like us, with hair like leaves.”

“Ha’rsfa, you’re bleeding again,” said Ny’rfa. She raised her bound hands, but Magyar was there already. He tore a strip from the edge of his tunic, wet it from the waterskin at his waist, and cleaned Ha’rsfa’s wound, holding her chin to keep her face steady. His eyes, she noticed, were brown, and ringed with black lashes. She swayed for a moment, but when he reached out to steady her, she held on to Ny’rfa.

“Hunyor says two are dead. He says, if you are daughters of Forest Goddess, then show him.” Demas looked up at Ny’rfa, anxiously. “You can show him?”

What was the penalty, Ha’rsfa wondered, for failing to prove that one was a spirit of the trees? She looked at Hunyor’s face, as expressionless as a rock. Then she looked at Magyar and saw the answer in his eyes. There was only one penalty among the Horsemen.

“If only our brother were here,” she whispered to Ny’rfa before she swayed and fell.

“Try to sit up,” said Mrs. Mad’r. “Let me move the pillow. There.” She felt the blankets being arranged around her. “Would you like me to open the window?” She heard the sash being raised, but she did not turn her head to look. A breeze blew through the open window. It smelled of rain.

“Once, the Moon looked down upon the hills of Anatolia and saw a shepherd lying in a meadow. She loved him, but the love of the Moon is dangerous to mortals, so she poured a potion made of the meadow poppies into his eyes so he would sleep for thirty years. Each of those years, she bore him a daughter, and when that daughter was weaned she placed her in a willow basket, which she set floating on the river Volga. The first of those baskets was found by women washing clothes on the riverbank, who took the child and raised her in their village. She was called T̈lgy, which in English means Oak. Did you learn English in school? Did you understand Anne Martin, when she spoke to you?”

She nodded, still without looking at Mrs. Mad’r.

“Would you like something to drink?”

She nodded again, and Mrs. Mada’r poured water from a pitcher into a cup. Both were made of a thick, green glass with bubbles in it.

“The Daughters of the Moon grow quickly. When the second of those baskets floated down the river, Tölgy carried her sister Bor’ka into the forest, where she raised her among the groves of oak and alder, birch and willow, with foxes and owls for companions. And so with all the Daughters of the Moon. But after thirty years the shepherd woke, to find that his friends no longer remembered him, that he had lost the shining woman who came to him in dreams, and that he could no longer sleep. He spent the rest of his life consulting doctors and magicians, drinking medicines and potions, anything that would allow him to sleep again. But he died with his eyes open. The year after the shepherd she had loved woke, the Moon bore a son, the White Stag, and when the stag was weaned, she set him down on the bank of the Volga, where he was raised by his sisters. But being a stag, it was his nature to roam, and he often left to wander the slopes of the Northern Mountains. Yes? I thought you said something. Perhaps you’re wondering what happened to Ny’rfa and Ha’rsfa. Well, I’ll tell you.”

Ha’rsfa lay in Ny’rfa’s arms. No, they were Magyar’s, and Ny’rfa was standing beside her, looking up at the sky.

“Oh, Mother,” she heard Ny’rfa whisper, “if your arms tightened around us as you lowered us into the baskets, if one tear of yours mingled with the river before you sent us floating away from you to live among the trees of the forest, help me now.”

The clouds shifted above them, gray and white, like floating mountains. Then something flashed in the sky, and Ny’rfa shrieked, a high, piercing sound. The Horsemen covered their ears, and even Hunyor stepped back, startled, kicking the stool so that it toppled onto its side. Something shrieked in response and hurled itself from the sky, like lightning. A falcon, as gray and white as the clouds, perched on Ny’rfa’s shoulder. It turned its head, glaring at the Horsemen.

Ny’rfa glared at them as fiercely, but H’rsfa saw that her hands were trembling. The falcon had dug its claws into her shoulder, and a stain was spreading from her shoulder down the front of her tunic. Instinctively, wanting to help, she reached her hands, aching now from the leather that bound them, toward her sister. But there was another way.

“Let me stand,” she whispered to Magyar, and gestured as well as she could so he would understand. More gently than she had expected, he helped her to her feet, keeping one arm around her. “Oh, Mother,” she whispered, “let me show what you gave your daughters when you mingled your blood with that of a mortal.”

She held her hands over the mud, and so low that the Horsemen heard it only because they had been still since the falcon’s scream, she made the sound of wind blowing through the meadow: “Shhhhhhh …”

Green stems rose from the mud, developed leaves, flowered. Magyar bent down to touch the grasses that were spreading around them, the small blue flowers of flax. Then he spoke to Hunyor, and Hunyor answered. Magyar spoke again, pointing to the falcon on Ny’r-fa’s shoulder.

Ha’rsfa turned to Demas. “What are they saying?”

Demas stroked the grasses with wonder and said, “Magyar wants to have you for wife. He says Hunyor should take your sister. He says it is lucky, marrying daughters of goddess. Many tribes of barbaroi are coming from mountains to north. With luck, this tribe will win battles, find land.”

“Many tribes?” said Ny’rfa. The falcon clutched her shoulder more tightly, glaring at Ha’rsfa with golden eyes. “Oh, my sisters, what will happen to you when those other tribes come?” She raised her hands to her face. For the first time, Ha’rsfa realized, she looked defeated. The falcon sprang into the air and flapped its wings.

H’rsfa thought of her sisters, binding their wounds in the cave by the riverbank, waiting for her and Ny’rfa to return. They were not warriors. Suddenly she said, “Let our sisters come here! Demas, tell Hunyor there are many daughters of the goddess, twenty-five, maybe twenty-six more. Tell him we will bring him luck, we will call birds from the air, make his crops grow. Tell him, oh, tell him anything!”

“H’rsfa, no!” said Ny’rfa. “How can we live with these barbarians?”

But Demas had already spoken. H’rsfa could feel Magyar’s arm tighten around her. Hunyor stood silent while the Horsemen waited for his decision. H’rsfa heard the falcon shriek high above them. She looked up and watched him circle once over the village, then fly off toward the west.

Hunyor walked to Ny’rfa and stood before her, then held out his hands. Slowly, reluctantly, she put her hands in his. He spoke, a single word, then untied the leather from her wrists. Ny’rfa pointed to the villagers. “Them too,” she said. “Untie them too.”

Magyar clutched Ha’rsfa’s shoulder and shouted with triumph. He turned to Demas and said—

“This is your tribe,” Demas translated. “This is your home.” And through her tears, H’rsfa saw that the Horsemen were untying the villagers’ hands.

“So Ny’rfa and H’rsfa married Hunyor and Magyar. They learned the language of their husbands, and took names in that language. Ny’rfa became Tünde, and Ha’rsfa became Csilla. Be careful, you’ll spill your water. Is your name T̈nde, then?”

She shook her head.

“Csilla? Welcome to my house, Csilla. You’ve been very brave, like a Daughter of the Moon.”

Csilla put the cup on the table beside the bed. “What happened then?” Her voice sounded hoarse, like a rusted lock.

“The Daughters of the Moon married Horsemen, except for Ibolya, who became a healer, collecting and studying the plants of the countries they traveled through. They traveled west, following the falcon’s flight, which the Horsemen had taken for an omen. Finally, they settled in the lands about the river Danube. Their children played with the children of the tribe, and those children’s pale faces, their hair as green as the leaves of the forest, were seen as signs of luck, the blessing of the Forest Goddess. But they could not touch metal, and they would not eat meat. So the tribesmen called them the T̈nde’r, after T̈nde who had married Hunyor, which means the Fairy Folk, and always regarded them as different from themselves.”

A sparrow was singing in the linden tree outside the window. Csilla could identify the tree by its heart-shaped leaves. Her father had taught her the shapes of all the leaves …But she did not want to think about her father.

Sunlight had dried the rain. The linden was in flower, and its scent filled the room. She was sitting up in bed, leaning against the pillows, listening to the sparrow. How cool the pillows were, how clear the sunlight.

She whistled, a tune like the sparrow’s song, and it stopped to listen to her, then hopped down to the windowsill, and onto the table, and onto the finger she held out for it.

“Like Tünde,” said Mrs. Mada’r, standing in the doorway. The sparrow, startled, whistled and flew out the window. “Do you think you can eat some cucumber salad?”

Csilla nodded.

“I made it with just a bit of sour cream.”

“My grandmother always said it was best with sour cream,” said Csilla.

“Well, I’m glad to hear I made it like your grandmother! Here, take these.” Mrs. Mad’r handed her a napkin folded around two slices of brown bread, a wooden bowl filled with cucumber salad, and a wooden spoon. She sat down beside the bed in a carved wooden chair.

When Csilla had eaten the cucumber salad and both slices of bread, Mrs. Mad’r said, “Can you talk about it now?”

Csilla shook the breadcrumbs from her napkin onto the table and whistled. The sparrow flew through the window and landed on the table. He picked up as many of the crumbs as he could, tilted his head to look at her, then flew off again.

“He’ll be back,” said Mrs. Mada’r. “I think he has a family. There’s a nest in the linden tree, and several days ago I saw brown heads poking out of it. I think there’s a Mrs. Sparrow and some young sparrows waiting for him.” She paused, then said, “Csilla—”

“My father sent me away! And I had to lie in the bottom of a car, and that woman only let me out at night, and I thought I was going to die. And then on the airplane and in the train I wished I had died. I wish I were dead now.” Csilla covered her face with her hands. The tears that she had not cried, not since her father had told her, “You have to leave Budapest—as quickly as possible, Csillike,” came now. She shook with them, violently, like a tree in a storm. Then, suddenly, she felt a wave of nausea, and the bread and cucumber salad were no longer sitting quietly in her stomach—

“That’s all right,” said Mrs. Mada’r. “I can wash the blanket. But you have to stay quiet, very quiet for a while. You’re still sick from the metal in the car. Helga tried to protect you as well as she could with blankets, but remember that you breathed in metal for three days. It will be a while before you feel well again.” She took the blanket from the bed and put it in a heap on the floor.

“I could have helped him!” said Csilla, wiping her mouth with the napkin, ashamed of herself. “I was helping him. Why did he have to send me away?”

She could feel Mrs. Mada’r’s hand on her arm. “I’m sure he sent you away because he loved you.”

Csilla turned to look at her, furious. “How do you know! You don’t know anything about him, or me! Who are you, anyway? Who are all of you, you and Helga and that woman who brought me here, who squeaks like a mouse?”

Mrs. Mada’r reached up and unwrapped the turban around her head. Her hair fell down around her. Green as leaves.

“Oh,” said Csilla. For a moment, she could not speak. Then she said, “Not even my grandmother’s hair was as green as yours, and my father says she had more Tünde’r blood in her than anyone in Hungary. That’s where it comes from, doesn’t it? From the Daughters of the Moon?”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Mad’r. “My hair and yours, although you don’t have quite as much of the T̈ündér blood as your grandmother. Your mother was not one of the T̈ündér, was she?”

“No,” said Csilla. “She died when I was only a baby. And then my grandmother died last year, and now Papa …”

“Hush,” said Mrs. Mad’r. “Remember, you have to stay quiet so you can get well. Let me put this blanket in the tub to soak—and the napkin, while I’m at it. I’ll be back in a moment.”

When she returned, Csilla was still sitting on the bed, staring out the window. “I’ve brought you more water,” she said, handing Csilla the green cup. She paused, then added, “We’ll have to talk about what happened—soon. But for now, why don’t I tell you another story?” She waited for a moment for Csilla to answer, but Csilla was silent. So she began, “The Daughters of the Moon died, eventually. They had mortal blood in them, as well as the blood of the Moon, and they were not eternal. But their children, the Tünde’r, lived peacefully among the farms and villages of Hungary, until the church decided that they were children of the Devil …”

Reluctantly, Csilla wiped her eyes with her hands and settled back against the pillows to listen.

Erzsébet’s Story

“Erzsike!”

“Shhh,” said Erzse’bet, putting one finger to her lips. She leaned closer to the chapel door, which was open just enough to let a sliver of torchlight fall on the stones of the courtyard. “I think it’s the landgravine.”

“You’re supposed to be in bed already,” said M’rta, but her voice was low, and she too leaned closer to hear what the landgravine was saying.

“I have sent for Ludwig. He would prefer to stay at the university, but I’ve told him it’s time he assumed his father’s position. How peaceful the landgrave looks, as though he were sleeping. A pity if, as you tell me, his soul is suffering the torments of hellfire.”

“That, I’m afraid, is the penalty for excommunication.”

Poor old landgrave. Erzse’bet had seen him earlier that day lying in the chapel beneath a pall of crimson velvet, looking more peaceful than he had ever looked while alive. How could the landgravine speak that way about him? And who was that other voice?

“I don’t know who the landgravine’s talking to,” she whispered. “It doesn’t sound like anyone in the castle.”

“For his science, as he called it, he risked his immortal soul,” said the landgravine. “I think you will find me quite different from my husband, Father Conrad. I have no interest in old women who gather weeds by moonlight, and I value an alliance with the church.”

“Then I take it the Inquisition can resume its activities in Thuringia?”

“I don’t think it’s in either of our interests to have Thuringia isolated from the Empire.”

“No,” whispered Ma’rta, “he hasn’t come to the Wartburg for many years. But I’ll remember the sound of his voice until the day I die. That’s the Inquisitor.”

Erzs’bet remembered the landgrave muttering, over his pots of agrimony and rue, about “that damned superstitious nonsense, the Inquisition.” Then he would finish watering his pots, make notes on a sheet of vellum, and sit with her in the sunlight of the herbarium. “Someday,” he would say, “we will understand the properties of plants and draw out their essences. And then, my dear, we will cure the illnesses that have bedeviled mankind since we were banished from Eden.” Finally she would read to him from his Aristotle, while he fell asleep on a bench.

“And when will you celebrate the marriage between Ludwig and Princess Elizabeth?” asked the Inquisitor.

“Perhaps you could marry them yourself, Father Conrad? It would lighten our grief, following the landgrave’s funeral with a wedding. My husband was foolish, delaying her marriage to Herman until he thought she was old enough. We almost lost her dowry, until the king agreed to an engagement with Ludwig. Well, she’s certainly old enough now, older than when I married. And no time should be lost, now that the king has left for Palestine. If he dies, Ludwig will have as good a claim to the throne as anyone else, I think. Oh, my poor Herman! Such a fine boy, Father. You should have seen him riding across the fields, whipping his pony into a lather. What a king of Hungary he would have made!”

“We must never regret the will of God, Landgravine. I remember hearing that the landgrave had some excellent Tokay?”

“They’re coming this way!” said Erzs’bet.

“Hush,” said M’rta, pulling her back by her sleeve, into the shadows beyond the torchlight.

The landgravine emerged from the chapel, followed by a man in a Franciscan habit. She stood in the courtyard, the torchlight from the open door flickering over her yellow hair, which was coiled in elaborate braids on either side of a cap sewn with pearls that had come all the way from Paris. “I’m glad we’ve had this little talk, Father. I think we will be useful to one another.” She smiled as sweetly as the Virgin in the chapel window.

“I hate her!” said Erzs’bet when the landgravine, followed by the Inquisitor, had disappeared across the courtyard. “I’ve always hated her. I looked out the window and saw her walking across the courtyard, so I thought she was going into the chapel. And I came down to ask her if I could go back to Hungary. She never liked me anyway, and I thought she would send me home, now that the landgrave is dead. But she wants me to marry that stupid son of hers, that Ludwig.” She hit the chapel wall with her hand and felt a cold pain run through her arm. “M’rta, I haven’t even seen him since I was a child! All I remember is that he used to collect bugs. He once put a caterpillar in my hair.”

“Erzsike!” said M’rta, catching her hand and examining it with care. “Erzsike, you’re speaking too loudly.”

“You know, I bet he’ll be just like Herman. Did you know that Herman used to call me a witch? He said my face was as white as the moon, and people with moon faces should be burned. M’rta, do you think I’m ugly?”

“Erzsike, remember the windows.”

“I don’t care.” Then, looking up at the shuttered windows, darker patches on the dark walls of the castle, Erzs’bet said, “Yes, I do care. M’rta, I’m going to run away, tonight. Don’t tell me not to, because I won’t listen. If I can reach Erfurt, perhaps I can stay at the Abbey and send a letter to the king—” she hesitated, then said, “—I mean, to Papa.” She looked down at the stones of the courtyard. “It’s been so long since he sent me away. Do you think he will recognize me, after all these years?”

M’rta said, “I won’t try to stop you, Erzsike, because I’m going with you. Do you really think you can run away from the strongest castle in Germany by yourself? Now go to your room and fetch your cloak and your bottle of ointment.”

“My ointment? Funny M’rta, to care about my complexion at a time like this!” Erzs’bet almost laughed, but she remembered the windows.

“I’ll pack some food. Meet me in the scullery.” M’rta sighed. “Oh, that I should see this time come again!” Then, more briskly and in her ordinary voice, she said, “Tell me, child, do you have any money?”

“I know this story,” said Csilla. “My grandmother told it to me. King Andr’s sent Princess Erzs’bet to Thuringia. She was supposed to marry the landgrave’s oldest son, Herman.” She remembered listening, in the kitchen of their apartment in Budapest, while her grandmother rolled the gingerbread dough.

“Remember this story, Csillike,” her grandmother had said. “It’s one of the most important stories to remember, almost as important as the Daughters of the Moon. That’s why I tell it to you again and again, so you will remember it when you need it most.”

When the gingerbread was in the oven, her grandmother had said, “Now you tell it back to me.” Csilla had repeated it, again and again. She had named one of the gingerbread men Herman, and while her grandmother had sat by the stove, listening and correcting her if she made any mistakes, she had slowly eaten Herman, starting with the feet.

“The king thought she would be safer there, especially after what had happened to the queen. But Herman died, so she couldn’t marry him any more. And then …”

“Yes?” said Mrs. Mad’r. “What happened to Princess Erzs’bet?”

Moonlight glimmered through the branches. Erzs’bet tried to avoid tripping over shadows on the path: rocks, or perhaps roots. In summer, the landgravine would go with her ladies to the forest. They would sit by a stream, gossiping and listening to one of the traveling minstrels that came to the Wartburg during the summer months, strumming his lute and singing about the landgravine’s hair. The landgravine, dressed rather implausibly as Flora, would lean back against her cushions with the satisfied smile that Erzs’bet always found so unsettling. She remembered the forest as a series of sunlit glades. This was not the same forest. There was a constant rustling and scurrying in the bushes around her. She smelled fallen leaves, and mushrooms and the cold smell that meant winter was coming.

She clutched M’rta’s cloak. “Are you sure this is the right way to Erfurt?”

The rustling and scurrying stopped, and the forest waited, unaccustomed to this new sound.

“We can ask the travelers ahead. I see a fire through the trees. Come on, Erszike.”

“I thought we were trying to avoid other travelers …” But M’rta was already ahead of her, walking toward the fire.

Hurrying to catch up, Erzs’bet stumbled over a shadow that turned out to be a rock. When she found her footing again and looked around her, she was standing in a clearing. The travelers were sitting around a fire at its center.

Once, Erzs’bet had gone to Erfurt with the landgravine, to a fair celebrating the new windows of the Abbey, which showed the Virgin and Saint Anne. On the road through the forest she had seen merchants, their wagons filled with glass vessels from Venice, brocades and damasks from the weavers of Flanders, holy relics from Rome. As the landgravine’s procession had drawn closer to the town, it had passed farmers carrying dried meat and heads of cabbage in nets. She had seen their wives and daughters walking beside them, their baskets filled with goose eggs, honeycombs dripping with brown honey, walnuts. Often the road ahead of the procession was blocked by travelers and sheep, who must be moved aside to let the landgravine pass.

These travelers were not like those she had seen going to the fair. On one side of the fire crouched a woman with white hair like a bird’s nest, whose legs were so twisted that she could scarcely have walked along the forest road. Yet surely Erzs’bet had seen her begging in front of the Abbey. And wasn’t that the scullery girl from the castle, still in her apron? Beside the scullery girl sat a man surrounded by children, from a baby to a girl almost as old as Erzs’bet who was holding the baby in her arms. They were dressed in rags, and the baby’s mouth was surrounded by sores. She had seen the man before as well; he had been the Devil in the play at the fair. She had seen him afterward juggling colored balls, while the boy who sat beside him, with the dirty cap on his head, had walked on his hands. The landgravine had forbidden her to watch such a vulgar spectacle.

“Hello, sister,” said M’rta.

“Hello yourself,” said a woman who was standing in the shadows beyond the firelight. “I see you’ve brought the girl.”

Beside the children sat a peddler, who grinned at her without teeth. Out of his sack spilled bottles of ointment and what looked like a mandrake root. And then she noticed that the baby’s curls, which at first had seemed yellow, were the color of spring leaves.

“Is that the way to talk to a princess? Where are your manners?” M’rta turned to Erzs’bet. “You’ll have to forgive her, Erszike. My sister is a queen in her own right, although her nation does not belong to the Holy Roman Empire.”

M’rta had a sister? A sister dressed in gray, like the habit of a nun. A sister whose hair cascaded over her shoulders like ivy.

“Where have you brought me?” She was surprised to hear her voice, so frightened. Her eyes stung from looking around the fire. She rubbed them. The woman’s hair was still green. “Is this a meeting of witches?”

“The Inquisitor would tell you so,” said the woman in gray. Surely Erzs’bet had seen her before. She remembered the mouth, with lines of laughter around it, and the nose, as thin and sharp as a knife. But where?

She felt M’rta’s arms around her, as comforting as when she was a child. “Erszike, these are the T̈nd’r, and my sister Cec’lia is their queen.”

Later she remembered music, although she was not sure when it had started: the music of a pipe and drum. She remembered a dance, but it was not like any dance she had learned at court—a wild dance in which she bent and turned and spun as though before a great wind. Later there was bread with raisins and walnuts baked in it and a honey wine that warmed her to her toes. All these she remembered, sleepily, when the dancing had stopped and she sat among the roots of an ancient oak, with her head on M’rta’s shoulder, listening to the queen of the T̈nd’r.

“Let us examine the facts,” said Cec’lia. Erzs’bet touched a strand of her hair, which was curling over a root. It was as green as the moss on the root, and as soft as—well, ordinary hair. “Item primum: that your mother was murdered by Hungarian counts while your father was visiting the emperor’s court. Afterward, they were absolved by the church, since the wound was so slight that it should not have killed an ordinary woman. Item secundum: that your father sent you to Thuringia, whose landgrave considered himself a man of science and forbade the burning of witches. Item tertium: that since your childhood, M’rta has rubbed your face and hands with an ointment whose secret is known only to the T̈nd’r. Aristotle would tell us that the conclusion is inevitable. But the evidence of the eyes is more convincing than logic. Give me your finger.”

“My finger?” Ersz’bet stared at the thorn that Cec’lia was holding. Was this a meeting of witches after all? Witches stole the blood of baptized children to make their bread. Herman had told her that, when he had called her a witch.

“Let me do it, Erszike.” And this was strange, because M’rta had never even allowed her to sew, for fear that she would spoil her fingers. Perhaps she should run away from these witches, as she had run away from the landgravine. But she felt so sleepy, leaning her head against the trunk of the tree. How much honey wine had she drunk?

A drop of blood ran into her palm, leaving a trail behind it, like a snail moving over a stone. It was a clear and shining green. Suddenly the effect of the honey wine left her, and she understood.

“Then why don’t I have green hair?”

“Your mother’s hair was as green as mine,” said Cec’lia. “Look around at our company.” The children were sleeping at the edge of the firelight, the oldest girl still holding the baby in her arms. The peddler had made a pillow out of his sack. Only the man who had played the Devil still sat piping, like a plaintive bird. “Some of us are lucky. S’ndor’s hair is brown, and his eyes have enough brown in them that he can pass as an ordinary man. But you see his youngest, little Juli. Some of us must hide in the forest, for fear of being identified as a witch. Although the landgrave ordered that witches cannot be burned, they can be driven away. S’ndor’s wife, the mother of those children, was killed two summers ago by a miller’s dog.”

S’ndor stopped his piping to throw another branch on the fire. Before he began piping again, he touched the baby’s hair, ruffling it like spring grass. The beggar moved in her sleep, muttering something that sounded like a song M’rta had sung to Ersz’bet when she was a child.

“You, Ersz’bet, look more like your father than your mother,” Cec’lia continued. “With the help of M’rta’s ointment you can even handle metal, although it could not protect your mother from the prick of a knife. She did not die of her wounds but of poison, since metal is poison to us. How we appear depends on whether both of our parents were T̈nd’r, and both of their parents. But all of us have the blood of the T̈nd’r in us, what the Inquisition calls the witch blood: the blood of the Moon. M’rta’s father was not of the T̈nd’r, but mine was. I could not live at the Wartburg, as she does.” Cec’lia smiled. “Don’t you recognize me, Ersz’bet? We’ve met before.” She reached behind her and picked up a piece of gray cloth, then draped it over her head like a veil. “Now?”

And suddenly Erzs’bet remembered where she had seen that mouth. It had been praying in the Chapel of Saint Anne at the Abbey. She had watched it because she had been bored, and the alternative was to look at the landgravine. “If they knew that the Abbess of Erfurt …”

“Sit still,” said M’rta, who was still holding a handkerchief to her finger. “I don’t want you to start bleeding again.”

“Then there would be no one at the Abbey to help the T̈nd’r. Old Ildiko there, who can’t help singing the songs of the T̈nd’r in her sleep, would no longer be able to beg on the Abbey steps or curl beside our kitchen fire. She would be cast into the street, and if the Inquisition found her …” The lines around her mouth became lines of anger. “I was born after the witch trials, but M’rta remembers.”

M’rta looked down at her hands. “I was only a girl when the Inquisitor came to our town. My father was a baker; he had money to send me and my mother to N̈rnberg. For that, he was burned in the marketplace, although his blood was as red as the priest’s.”

“Like my father sent me away.” Erzs’bet put her face in her hands.

“You think you’re so smart, don’t you?” said Csilla.

“What do you mean?” asked Mrs. Mad’r.

“Getting me to tell Erzs’bet’s story because you want me to talk about my father. He sent me away just like King Andr’s send Erzs’bet away. Well, I think he should have kept her in Hungary!”

Mrs. Mad’r shook her head. She looked, Csilla thought, like the mathematics teacher at her school, when she had hopelessly muddled a multiplication problem. “Then she would have been killed, just as her mother the queen was killed. Csilla, you must understand that the Inquisition was burning anyone identified as a witch. And the easiest way to be a witch was to be one of the T̈nd’r. We have always been hiding, always fleeing, since the days of the Daughters of the Moon. Your father was working to change that. He was writing a book—”

“I know,” said Csilla. “He worked on it all day long, and sometimes all night long.” She would wake in the darkness and hear the sound of the typewriter. So she would put on the sweater that her grandmother had worn on days when the apartment was cold, walk down the hall to the kitchen, turn on the old stove, and boil the water for tea. When she brought it to him, he would look at her with that tired look in his eyes, her handsome Papa, and say, “Thank you, Csillike. You are my own guardian angel, aren’t you?”

In the mornings, she would make his lunch so that he would eat something while she was at school, but often when she came home, she would find the bean soup cold, the brown bread gone stale. “You forgot to eat again,” she would say, accusingly. “Have you been typing all day?”

“I’m so sorry, Csillike,” he would answer. “I seem to have forgotten some of the details of Szent Erzs’bet’s story. Could you sit beside me and tell me if I have the name of the Abbess right? I promise I’ll eat whatever you made me, no matter how cold it is.”

“It was a book about the T̈nd’r. He was writing down all of my grandmother’s stories. I used to help him with it.”

“Help him?” said Mrs. Mad’r. “How did you help him, Csilla?”

Csilla looked at Mrs. Mad’r curiously. She was leaning forward in her chair, no longer the disapproving teacher. Instead, she sounded like an eager child. “Well, not really help. I mean not with the typing or anything. But when he forgot something, or got something wrong, I told him how the stories went. My grandmother told them to me, and she made me tell them to her, so many times! I don’t think I could forget them if I tried.”

“Oh, my dear,” said Mrs. Mad’r. “Don’t you know why your father sent you away? He sent us a message, but messages are so difficult. They have to be—well, not exactly clear, in case the wrong person reads them. He said he was writing down his mother’s stories, the whole history of the T̈nd’r. We’ve never had a history, just stories, Csilla. Stories remembered by the old people, because the young had so many other things to think about, and when something was forgotten, it was forgotten forever. In Erzs’bet’s time the church burned everything written about the T̈nd’r, and even now in Hungary books about the T̈nd’r are banned. They cannot be published or sold because the state believes that we do not exist. Can you imagine what that means to us? We have been hiding and fleeing so long that the T̈nd’r are scattered now, over Europe and here in America. Without a history, how can we know who we are, or find each other again? Your father was trying to teach us. His message—it was so difficult to understand. First we heard he was sending us a copy of his manuscript. Then Helga said he was sending us his daughter. And then there you were—”

“In my science class,” said Csilla, “the teacher told us that the T̈nd’r had a genetic defect. That we were …sick, not as strong as other people because we had bad genes. She said everything could be explained scientifically.”

“Do you believe that?” asked Mrs. Mad’r.

“I don’t know,” said Csilla.”My father believes in the stories, and he’s a professor at the university. But of course, he’s a philosophy professor, and not at all practical. He can’t even keep his socks mended. If the stories are real, what happened to M’rta’s ointment? I mean, there’s nothing like that now.”

“It’s another thing we’ve lost,” said Mrs. Mad’r. “That’s why the stories are so important.”

Csilla said, suddenly, “Did you know my name, when you told me about the Daughters of the Moon? Or did you really think I could be named T̈nde”

“No,” said Mrs. Mad’r, “not exactly. But in his message your father referred to a guiding star—another thing I didn’t understand at the time. Csilla—star. And so I guessed. I thought if I told you about the bravery of another Csilla, you might respond. About your father—you have to understand that he was in great danger, of going to prison or worse. But he was very brave.”

“I could have been brave too,” said Csilla.

“I’m sure he knew that,” said Mrs. Mad’r. “But like the king of Hungary, he loved his daughter too much to put her in danger. And like Erzs’bet, you’re going to have to make a choice.”

When Erzs’bet could not sleep, M’rta would stroke her hair and tell her about the Daughters of the Moon or how Saint Istv’n rode the White Stag. She was stroking her hair now. “Do you see why I brought you here, Erszike?”

Although she could hear the forest around her, the rustling and scurrying, and the crackles of the dying fire, she felt the stones of the Wartburg pressing against her, so that she could not breathe.

“To escape the landgravine?” But she knew, as she said it, that it was not the reason.

Cec’lia took her hand and looked at the spot where the thorn had pierced, which had already stopped bleeding. “To give you a choice.”

M’rta stroked her hair again, but now it offered no reassurance. “You could help the T̈nd’r, Erzsike. If you stayed at the Wartburg …”

She had not noticed when the piping had stopped. S’ndor lay by the fire with his mouth open, snoring slightly. He had taken the baby from his daughter, and it lay beside him, wrapped in his ragged coat. Green curls tumbled over the baby’s eyes. Its thumb was in its mouth, and it made a sucking sound in its dreams.

Erzs’bet looked down at the mark on her finger. Then she said to Cec’lia, “M’rta and I have to get back before dawn. Will you distribute the money?”

“There’s more,” said Csilla, because Mrs. Mad’r had stopped.

“Is there?” said Mrs. Mad’r. “You see, I don’t know the rest. We know our stories only in fragments. But your grandmother knew more of those fragments than anyone.”

“Yes,” said Csilla. “You’re missing the most important part.”

The chapel was filled with the thump of boots sewn from embroidered leather, the shush of sleeves edged with ermine.

I am a cloud, thought Erzs’bet. I am a mist, creeping across the room. I am invisible, like air …

“Elizabeth!” said the landgravine. “Father Conrad, this is the Princess Elizabeth.” The pearls in the landgravine’s hair glowed in the light that came through the stained glass window, turning her left cheek a delicate blue. “Elizabeth, surely you know enough to kiss the Inquisitor’s hand?”

It happened, as Erzs’bet knew it must, when she bent to kiss the wrinkled fingers, dirty under the nails and wearing an iron ring engraved with a cross. Out they tumbled, the rolls that she had stolen from breakfast, stolen for the woman who waited in a corner of the scullery, anxiously holding a child whose head was wrapped in a ragged scarf. How carefully she had wrapped them in her skirt, how carefully she had held her skirt so they would not fall out. And now they lay on the chapel floor, where boots stepped aside and skirts drew back to avoid them. What good was it being at the Wartburg, when all she could do to help the T̈nd’r was steal rolls? Lenke, the scullery girl, could do more than she could.

“Bread?” said the landgravine. “Why do you need bread?” She watched the rolls rolling, as though she had never seen bread before.

Erzs’bet felt as though she could not breathe. What should she answer?

“Speak, child,” said Father Conrad. “Speak as truthfully as our Lord taught us.” He smiled, a smile that he might have thought was kind. But his eyes glittered like steel.

What had M’rta whispered, lying beside her at night when she could not sleep? The T̈nd’r could call the blossom from its bud, the rabbit from its burrow, the fox from its den. They could smell the storm coming while the sky was still blue. She was one of the T̈nd’r, but none of these skills would help her now. What good did it do her, having the blood of the Moon?

Then suddenly she heard it: soft, insistent. The cooing of doves in the courtyard. Usually they stayed in their cote beside the kitchen, where they were kept for their eggs, and for pie.

“Come,” whispered Erzs’bet. “Come to me.” It was not much, it was probably less than nothing, but it was what she could do. Because she was one of the T̈nd’r.

“What was that, Elizabeth?” asked the landgravine.

“Speak up, child. Father Conrad can’t hear you.”

Then a rush of wings, and the doves, so many of them, white and brown and gray and speckled, were stepping over the chapel floor—pecking, pecking, until the very last crumb was gone.

“Surely these are the birds of God.”

Erzs’bet turned to see who had spoken. There was a boy standing beside her. He was tall and thin and slightly stooped, as though ashamed of his height. His eyebrows rose to a peak in the middle, which gave him a look of perpetual curiosity. Like the landgrave’s, she thought, and, suddenly realizing who he was, looked down again at the floor, where the doves were still searching for more bread. She noticed that his boots were covered with mud.

“You don’t remember me, Princess. Or if you do, I’m sorry for it. I seem to remember that I was a particularly unpleasant boy.”

“Ludwig! I thought you weren’t arriving until—well, later.” The landgravine did not look particularly pleased to see her son.

“I left the university as soon as I heard that my father was ill. But I find that I have arrived only in time to pray by his body.” He looked toward the chancel, where the landgrave lay beneath his crimson pall, in a cloud of incense. Erzs’bet saw that although he seemed calm, his eyes were red, as though he had been weeping. He turned back to the landgravine. “Surely the princess meant this bread for the poor. The landgrave himself would have done no less. The Word of God traveled as a dove to announce our Savior. Isn’t that right, Father Conrad? I think these birds rebuke us for our impiety. Here, Princess. Give this to those who need it.”

The purse jingled as he dropped it into her hands, sending the doves flying upward, while velvet sleeves fluttered to protect faces. They flew around the beams of the chapel, then out through the door and up into the blue of the sky. She clutched the purse carefully and watched as Ludwig walked up the steps to the chancel, then knelt beside the landgrave’s body, with his head in his hands. She thought, He is not like Herman, and perhaps in time I could like him, just a little.

“So she married Ludwig,” said Csilla, “and they lived happily until he died in the Crusades. Then she went into a convent, where she lived for the rest of her life. And the people said she could perform miracles, like curing the sick. So they called her a saint.”

“Is that the end?” asked Mrs. Mad’r. “I’m glad you told it to me. It’s not like in the official history books, is it?”

“It never is,” said Csilla.

“And you know all of your grandmother’s stories, like this, so complete?”

“Of course,” said Csilla, wondering why Mrs. Mad’r should doubt her.

“Csilla,” said Mrs. Mad’r, “I want to tell you a story that I know you have not heard. But first we must have some dinner, and then we must take a walk into the forest. Do you think that you’re strong enough? It’s not too far.”

“I’m all right,” said Csilla, although as she sat up, she felt the nausea again. But she was going to be brave, like her father.

Mrs. Mad’r wrapped a shawl around Csilla’s shoulders. “This dress used to be Susanna Martin’s. That’s Mrs. Martin’s daughter. You look a little like her—it was her passport we used to get you on the airplane in Vienna. It’s going to be colder in the forest. Are you ready, Csilla?”

“Yes,” said Csilla, although she did not know what she was supposed to be ready for.

They walked down the back steps and through what had once been a garden. It was dilapidated now. Weeds grew in the flower beds, and the pond was covered with scum. But some ancient peach trees still stood to mark where an orchard had once been. Soon the garden gave way to rhododendrons and mountain laurels, and then an oak forest, and they were walking along a path littered with oak leaves. Sunlight came down through the branches above, and the shadows of the trees stretched eastward. The sun was beginning to set. The forest was silent, except for the occasional call of a bird or the rustle of a squirrel in the treetops.

“I wonder if Erzs’bet’s forest was like this,” said Csilla.

“Older,” said Mrs. Mad’r. “This forest was cut seventy years ago for lumber. These are young trees. No, this reminds me of another forest.” She walked on for a moment in silence. Leaves crackled under her shoes, and a twig broke with a loud snap. Then she continued, “Once, there was a girl named Margit.”

Margit’s Story

Margit wondered how long they had been sitting in the barn, surrounded by the smell of hay and horses. She thought there was only one horse in the barn—she could hear it stamping in a corner and occasionally banging its bucket against the far wall. But the sky was clouded, and moonlight came only occasionally through the barn door, which anyway was only half open. Judit would not allow them to open it further.

“I’m hungry,” said Deb’ra.

“Hush,” said Judit. “We have to stay quiet. Anyway, you ate the last sandwich hours ago.”

“How do you know it was hours?” asked Margit. “Can you see your watch?” It was so dark in the barn that she could barely see Judit’s face, or Deb’ra’s, scowling as though she were about to cry, or Magda’s, silly Magda’s, blowing spit bubbles that shimmered in the faint light. With her handkerchief, which smelled like cheese from the sandwiches, she wiped the trail of spit that ran down Magda’s chin. Thank goodness D’nes had fallen asleep on the straw. For a moment the moon escaped from the clouds, and she saw that he was sucking his thumb. Well, let him.

She felt a hand on her arm, and then Judit was pulling her away, saying, “Stay there, Deb’ra, and take care of Magda.”

“Listen,” said Judit. “We have to have a plan. Once Deb’ra gets really hungry, she won’t care how much noise she makes. She’s been that way since she was a baby. And what about D’nes when he wakes up? At least Magda will stay quiet as long as we tell her. But we need food too, Margit. I don’t know how far it is to the border, but when Father took us to Arad last year, it was more than an hour by train. We can’t walk if we’re hungry.”

“Can we ask the farmer for food? We could tell him we were on a trip with our parents and got lost. They’d have to feed us, wouldn’t they?”

“They wouldn’t have to do anything, not if they saw these on our clothes.” Even in the darkness, Margit could see the yellow stars sewn on Judit’s and Deb’ra’s dresses. “Why should they treat us any better than the people in Szeged?”

Margit understood the bitterness in Judit’s voice. The Lengyels had lived in one of the largest houses in Szeged. Next year, Judit was supposed to graduate from high school. She had been planning to study art in Budapest, and eventually in Paris. Margit had never understood why Judit had helped her that day in the schoolyard, when P’ter Nagy and his friend Tam’s had pushed her down on the pavement, shouting, “Hello, T̈nd’r! Let’s see if she has scales under her clothes.” She was two years younger than Judit, and her family lived in a small house on Boszork’ny street. Had lived, she corrected herself. But after Judit had pummeled the boys with her school bag, shouting, “Stop it, you idiots!” they had become friends.

“I don’t want to take care of Magda anymore,” said Deb’ra. “I want to come talk with you.” Her voice rose. “You never let me do anything!”

“Shut up, or I’ll make you!” said Judit. “Do you know what will happen if anyone finds out we’re here?”

Deb’ra started to cry. “I’m going to tell Papa that you were mean to me!”

“Oh, don’t, D’bora,” said Margit, but Judit said, “Let her. It’s more quiet than when she talks. Now, we have to get these things off our clothes. We should be able to cut them off with the pocket knife.”

“But won’t we get in trouble?” There had been so many ways to get in trouble, recently. First, they could not listen to the radio. Then, they could not ride in motor cars, and Mama had to walk all day to visit Aunt Ilona in the country. Then they could not play in the park, or watch movies at the cinema, and finally Margit had to stay home from school. Papa stayed home too, because he could not work at the newspaper. And finally all of them, all of the T̈nd’r in Szeged, even those who had brown hair and went to the Catholic church, had to move into the part of the city where Judit’s family had moved after the police took the big house on Gutenberg Street for their headquarters. Mr. Lengyel had asked them to move in, although there were already three families sharing the house. The police had marked down who was living there: Jews, Bolsheviks, T̈nd’r.

“Do you think we could be in any more trouble than we’re already in? We ran away from the police, Margit. If anyone finds out who we are, we’ll probably go to jail.”

The horse whinnied in the corner, and D’nes turned on the straw. Moonlight broke through the clouds again, and Margit saw with relief that Deb’ra had fallen asleep beside him. Magda was rocking back and forth, crooning quietly to herself.

“We could explain that we ran only because Papa told us to. It was so quick, with the police knocking on the door, and Papa telling Aunt Ilona to take us into the alley. We didn’t know what we were doing. If we tell them that we just want to be with our parents—”

“You idiot.” Judit’s words felt like a slap. “Don’t you understand that’s what your father was trying to prevent? The police were coming to take them away. They were coming to take everyone away. They’ve already done that in other towns. My father heard from the Rabbi.”

Papa and Mama taken away. “Where? Where would they take them?” Margit was crying now too, but silently, although she felt as though she were about to break apart. In a few moments, she would be lying in fragments on the barn floor.

“I don’t know,” said Judit. “Nowhere good.” Margit felt Judit’s arms around her, and she could not help letting out a sob so loud that it made Magda jump. “Remember what happened to your Aunt Ilona.”

Margit had been trying not to remember. She had been ahead of Judit, who had been carrying D’nes and leading Magda by the hem of her skirt. Aunt Ilona had been behind them. And then—a sound, like a loud crack. She had looked back to see Aunt Ilona lying on the stones that paved the alley, in a green puddle. Aunt Ilona had lived on a farm, and Margit remembered visiting with D’nes, feeding the chickens, eating apricots picked from the orchard, swimming in the river Tisza. But eventually Aunt Ilona had moved to Szeged, saying that the countryside had become too dangerous for T̈nd’r. She had brought Magda, a farmer’s daughter whose father had been afraid to keep her. That day, Margit had wanted to go back to where Aunt Ilona lay, but Judit had not let her. She had said, “Don’t stop, Margit. Go through the Szomorys’ garden. Hold Deb’ra’s hand, and don’t lose your school bag. It has all the food in it.

“No,” said Judit, “we’ll do what our fathers planned. We’ll cross the border to Romania and find my uncle in Arad. As soon as it’s light enough to see, we can walk across the field and into the forest. The border is to the west, so we’ll just keep walking toward where the sun sets. It’s too bad the map and the compass were in the other bag. If only I knew how far it was!”

“What about food?” asked Margit. She was not going to remember the green puddle. She was going to be practical, like Judit.

“We’ll have to steal it.”

“Hunh,” said Magda. “HunhHunhHunh!”

“Hush, Magdi,” said Margit, but then Judit put a hand on her arm again, as though to hush her too.

“Listen,” she said. “Do you hear it?”

The engine of a motor car. She could hear it, faintly at first and then louder. Then suddenly a sound as though the motor car were coughing, right in front of the barn. Then silence.

“Damn these country roads! Sergeant, you told us you could get us to the farm.”

“Yes, sir. But, sir, the roads do get like this. When it rains, sir, and it’s been raining heavily—”

“And while we sit here, stuck in mud, the children are escaping.”

Margit felt Judit’s hand clasp hers, hard. She wanted to tell Judit that her fingers were aching, but she was too frightened to make a sound.

“So sorry, sir. I’ll go to the farmhouse and wake the farmer. He’ll be able to tell us if he’s seen anyone.”

“Is it time for breakfast?” asked Deb’ra. She sat up in the straw and looked around, as though expecting to see her bedroom on Gutenberg street. When she saw D’nes lying beside her and the horse champing at the edge of his bucket, she cried, “Papa!”

A voice outside said, “Did you hear that, sir?”

“Come on,” whispered Judit. She let go of Margit’s hand and pulled Deb’ra up from the straw. “There’s a door in the back, I saw it when we came in. We’ll have to go out that way.”

Margit shook D’nes. “Wake up! It’s time to wake up.” He opened his eyes and looked at her the way he did when he was going to open his mouth and wail. “But you have to be very quiet, because we’re going on an adventure. We’re Imre and Fair Ilona, and we’re taking the children of the T̈nd’r to the mountains. We can’t let the Turks hear us, or they’ll capture us again. Do you understand?”

He nodded, got to his feet, and took her hand. She held the other hand out to Magda, who was always happy to follow wherever she was led.

The back door opened with a creak as Judit pushed it, and they emerged into the night. The moon shone over the fields, alternately veiled and unveiled by clouds. They waded through barley, which scratched Margit’s knees so that she wished she were wearing pants. They went quickly, as quickly as they could, but there was a sea of barley ahead of them and already they were faltering, because oh, how tired they were, thought Margit, dropping D’nes’ hand for a moment to scratch her itching knees. And every step seemed more difficult, pulling D’nes and Magda, both of whom lagged behind, until she felt as though she were carrying them. And D’nes was about to cry, she knew it.

She looked behind them. The barn was already filled with light, and a voice cried, “Sir, I found a handkerchief!” Which meant the voices knew they were here, and they would be caught, and their blood would form puddles among the stalks of barley. If I really were Fair Ilona, she thought, I would make the barley grow so that the Turks could not find me. But that’s only a story.

“Margit,” said Judit ahead of her. Even Judit was moving slowly, carrying Deb’ra, who was whimpering and refusing to walk. “What’s that in the trees?”

There was a light among the trees at the edge of the forest. Not like the light of a lantern, but pale and still.

And then, although a dog began barking behind them, which meant that the farmer was awake, Margit stopped and stood among the barley, thinking to herself, can it be true? But D’nes said, “Look, it’s the White Stag.”

He shone like the moon, and he stamped his hoof on the ground as though telling them to hurry.

“I’m Imre, and the White Stag has come to save me from the Turks!” Now D’nes was dragging her forward, and all of them were running, with a breath they did not know they had. And then the forest was all around. They were following the glimmer of the stag through the trees, while the barking of the dog faded away behind them.

“Look,” said Mrs. Mad’r. “You can see the moon.”

“I haven’t heard that story,” said Csilla. “Is it true?”

Mrs. Mad’r stared at the sliver of moon, pale against the darkening sky. “Judit was my best friend.”

“Were you Margit? I mean, are you Margit?” Mrs. Mad’r nodded. “Well, what happened? What happened to Judit and the children?”

Mrs. Mad’r sighed. “Judit stayed in Romania and was sent to prison—this was many years later—because her art was considered subversive. Deb’ra went to Israel with her uncle. She studied economics—but I have not heard from her in years. I was sent to Switzerland with D’nes and Magda, where other children of the T̈nd’r were sent as refugees. Magda is still there, in a good home. After the war, D’nes and I were brought to America. He went to a university and became a history professor. It was his idea to bring as many of the T̈nd’r here as we could, from the countries where they are oppressed and imprisoned. It was also his idea that your father should write a book. He’s the one who will be handling the petition to have you declared a political refugee. But you’ll hear more about that soon. We’re almost there.”

“And—” Csilla hesitated. “Did you really see the White Stag?”

“It was long ago,” said Mrs. Mad’r. “I’m not sure I really remember. But D’nes has always believed that we did.”

The first person she saw in the clearing was Anne Martin.

“I can’t tell you how glad I am to hear you’re doing better,” said Mrs. Martin, clasping her hands in front of her. “Helga didn’t realize. I mean, most of you aren’t so affected by metal anymore. My husband had some Fairy in him, on his mother’s side, and he could eat with a knife and fork, just like ordinary folks. You wouldn’t even have known it, except he had hazel eyes. Such beautiful eyes! He died a couple of years ago, of lung cancer. No one knew about cigarettes when we were growing up. That’s why I do this, you know. For him and for Susanna. She’s so proud of her heritage! Really, I’m just a librarian. And of course Mrs. Mad’r is so persuasive. I mean the queen. Although she never lets us call her that, outside of the forest.”

Mrs. Mad’r looked like a queen, standing in the middle of the clearing. Someone had put a crown of ivy on her head. I could be Princess Erzs’bet in the forest, thought Csilla. Except that the man talking to Mrs. Mad’r was wearing overalls, and the people standing and talking to each other, or sitting on the stones that ringed the clearing, looked ordinary, like people she might meet in a grocery store. But one boy who was building the fire had green in his brown curls, and a girl in a school uniform looked at her with eyes as green as a cat’s.

“Are they all—T̈nd’r?” It felt strange, speaking English, and Csilla could not use the English word, as Mrs. Martin had done.

“Or related to the T̈nd’r, though not by blood. Like me to my Henry.”

“Csilla, can I speak with you for a moment?” Mrs. Mad’r was standing beside her.

Mrs. Martin tactfully withdrew to speak to the girl in the school uniform. Csilla wondered if that was Susanna Martin. They were about the same age, although Csilla wondered why anyone would mistake Susanna’s picture for hers. They didn’t look that much alike. But perhaps they would be friends?

“This is my brother, Professor Kert’sz.” He didn’t look like Csilla’s idea of a professor. Her father had always worn a jacket and tie, even to the grocery store. This man’s overalls had grass stains on the knees.

Professor Kert’sz held out his hands. Without thinking, she put her hands in his. “Csilla, I’m sorry to bring you such bad news when we’ve just met. Your father has been arrested.”

Csilla sat down abruptly on one of the stones. Mrs. Mad’r knelt beside her. “Oh, my dear. I’m so terribly sorry.”

A crack was opening inside her. She could feel it open, and everything was falling inside it: her grandmother’s gingerbread, her father’s jackets, which always needed mending, the city of Budapest. The night itself was falling into the crack, and Csilla thought, We’re all going to fall in, all of the T̈nd’r.

There were whispers around her, as the story spread. “Yes,” said Professor Kert’sz, turning to the people around the fire. “Antal Szarvas has been arrested. This is, of course, the worst news I could have for you. But I am also sorry to say that we have been unable to locate his manuscript. We believe there were two copies, his personal copy and another that he was sending us. We searched his apartment after his arrest, but the police had already been there. We found nothing, and we do not know if the second copy was sent. I can’t tell you how sad I am to have a colleague in danger. To have lost Queen Gertr’d’s stories is a double blow. Translating them into English would have been the most significant work of my life.”

“We haven’t lost her stories,” said Mrs. Mad’r.

From the darkness into which she had fallen, Csilla suddenly saw what seemed to her like a flicker of light, bringing her back to the stone she sat on, and the forest. “My grandmother was queen of the T̈nd’r?”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Mad’r. “Your grandmother was our queen. If she had told you, it would have put you in danger.”

In the blankness of her grief, Csilla thought, I wish people would stop trying to protect me.

Mrs. Mad’r looked at the people around the fire, ordinary people who looked like farmers and teachers and librarians but were, it turned out, not ordinary at all. “This is Csilla Szarvas, Professor Szarvas’ daughter and Queen Gertr’d’s granddaughter. She knows where the second copy of her father’s manuscript is located.” Csilla heard the people around the fire whisper to one another.

“What do you mean?” she said. “I don’t know anything about a second copy. I just know about the one he was typing.”

“Csilla,” said Mrs. Mad’r, “don’t you understand? You are the second copy—or rather the first copy, because what he was typing was really the second. You know all the stories that your grandmother knew—she made sure of that. We couldn’t understand your father’s message—was he sending us his daughter or his manuscript? It turns out he was sending us both.” Mrs. Mad’r put her arm around Csilla’s shoulder. “But don’t think about that right now. Just keep getting stronger. We’ll try to help him, I promise. Even in prison, we’ll try to help him and bring him out. We’ll never stop trying.”

The people around the fire were turning to each other, talking. She heard a pipe begin, and then a drum. But Csilla could not stand, and she could not speak, because her father might be dead already, and who cared about a bunch of stories that were probably, anyway, a bunch of lies? Even the White Stag.

“Csilla, there is someone I want you to meet.” Mrs. Mad’r squeezed her shoulder and then stepped aside.

The woman who stood before her was so small, no taller than Csilla herself, and so slender. Her bones were like the bones of birds. She was so pale, like white stones at the bottom of a stream. Her skin was wrinkled, all over her cheeks and around her eyes. She looked infinitely old, but the hair that hung over her shoulders was as green as grass.

“Drink this,” she said in an accent so strange, so ancient, that it seemed to echo from a thousand years in the past. As the honey wine burned her throat, Csilla felt the crack in her chest …not close, but ease.

“Csilla,” said Mrs. Mad’r, “I told you that the Daughters of the Moon were dead. That is what we would like the world to believe—the T̈nd’r have been feared enough, and an almost-immortal ancestress might convince even the twentieth century that we are the witches we were once thought to be. But this is Ibolya, the last of the Daughters of the Moon.”

“Welcome, child,” said Ibolya. Her voice sounded like the whisper of leaves overhead. “You have lost so much, we have all lost so much. That is why you must help us find ourselves again.” She turned to Mrs. Mad’r. “Show her, Queen. Show her what we are doing here, in this new land.”

“Den’s,” said Mrs. Mad’r to her brother, “I think we can begin.”

It was a song Csilla’s grandmother had never taught her, and it sounded as ancient as Ibolya herself. Mrs. Mad’r sang the first verse, then Professor Kert’sz joined in, then the others, one by one, until even Mrs. Martin was singing. Csilla watched firelight flicker on the singers’ faces.

First came a doe, with its fawn. They looked at the firelight and the circle of singers before slipping away again into the forest. Then came a fox with a mouse, its dinner, hanging from its jaws. Then a porcupine curled into a ball by the base of a stone, like a small stone itself. An owl swooped over the fire, adding its cry before it flew off into the forest. And the forest around them was growing. Csilla could feel it, the thickening of trees, the flowing of their sap. The ferns uncurling fronds, sending their spores floating into the air. Moss climbing the tree trunks, covering the scars where there had once been saws.

Ibolya put her hand on Csilla’s shoulder. It felt as light as a dry leaf. “Someday, this forest will be like those I knew in my youth, so long ago, and the T̈nd’r will care for it. Perhaps this new world will be better for us than the old. And perhaps we will restore what has been damaged. That is what we are, my child. That is what is means to be T̈nd’r.” Then the Daughter of the Moon slipped silently into the trees, so that for a moment Csilla wondered if she had actually been there. But she was still holding the cup of honey wine in her hand.

One by one, the singers stopped, and she could hear the forest around her, the sounds and silence of the night.

“Csilla,” said Professor Kert’sz from the other side of the fire, “will you tell us one of your grandmother’s stories?”

No, she started to say. What did the stories matter? All they did was show how often the T̈nd’r had lost. How often they had hidden, slept on straw, begged for scraps of food. But the stories had mattered to her grandmother and to her father, and they mattered to everyone here. She could see it in their faces, all the faces in the firelight looking at her, waiting. Susanna Martin nodded, as though to say, go on, I know you can.

“Shortly before Istv’n was to be crowned king of Hungary,” said Csilla, “one of his huntsmen came to him and said, ‘I have been hunting in the forest and have seen a marvel: a stag as white as snow.’ So Istv’n determined that he would hunt the stag. He set out in the morning with his retinue, but he soon lost them and rode on through the forest alone. At noon, when he was growing hungry, he came to a glade, at the center of which stood a woman with skin like milk and hair as green as the leaves of an oak tree. ‘Lady,’ he said …”

Around her, the forest listened.