Wondering what will become of Absalom, Hanne, and baby
Liesl? Here is the conclusion of “Piper’s Moon.”
If you missed the
first installment, you can catch up here.
***
Piper’s Moon
Part Two
Nothing in Hanne’s previous tirade could have been more
horrible. Absalom’s heart crashed like a boulder into his stomach; his chest
seemed to cave inward until it had squeezed every bit of air from his lungs. He
had sworn years ago never to uncover those memories, never to let them once
again romp through his mind wreaking havoc as they went. But the memories, he
reminded himself, had not stayed memories.
The girl waited. She looked younger than ever now, Absalom
thought. Hardly more than a child herself. How could she understand? She would
call him a liar at best, declare him a lunatic at worst. Regardless, if he told
her she would never let him come near Liesl, much less allow him to save the
child. Exhausted, Absalom sank into a rickety chair, rested his elbows upon the
table, and covered his face with his broad hands. “It’s my fault.”
He did not have to see to sense how Hanne shifted away from
him, readjusting her hold on the baby in protection. “What is?” she asked, but
Absalom did not doubt that she knew quite well what he meant.
Absalom hadn’t realized how his hands still shook. But now
he did, with them pressed over his forehead, his large and calloused fingers
upraising his grey-tinted hair. “I should—should have stopped him. I should
have killed him when I had the chance.” He looked up and found that Hanne sat
across from him, fear shining in her eyes. The already sparse light in the room
had dimmed. The candle flames that only moments ago danced on their wicks now
seemed to have collapsed in upon themselves. Shrinking away from him, as anyone
should.
“Who is coming for Liesl?” Hanne asked again, her voice
strangely calm
He could sit still not longer. Not under Hanne’s gaze.
Absalom started upward and his turbulent motion upset the chair, sending it
clattering backward. They both jumped. When he had caught his breath again,
Absalom began. “He is the piper. Long ago I knew him,” he said, waving his hand
through the still air. “It was a different time, but I knew what he had become.
Yet I did nothing. So you see that I am to blame.
“This piper came in the night. He played his tune and wove
his magic. You cannot hear the tune that he plays unless he wants you to hear
it. He plays with enchantments, bending them to serve his purposes.” Absalom
paused and gulped for air, but it tasted too thick, swelling until his mouth
and lungs ached as though filled with cotton. “But he probed too far, incurred
a debt, and so became enslaved to the magic. He turned on all of us, everyone
he knew. His desperation soon turned to madness. I tried to defy him, but he
had grown too strong. He defeated all but one—my father. Then the piper went
away. Foolishly, I thought he was gone forever. I had hoped that he had
forgotten me as I tried to forget him.”
Absalom paused before the door. How thin the wood of the
door and the plaster of the walls seemed all of a sudden. How very little lay
between him and anything that might wait in the night. He found it hard to
swallow. “But he’s back now. He’s back and he’s trying to pay his debt. Who
know what becomes of the one’s he takes?” He passed his hand over his eyes.
“I’m never going to see my children again. But at least I can give Liesl a
chance. Please, let me save her, Hanne.”
The girl stared in the wavering candle flame. “How?”
Leaning against the table, Absalom lowered his voice. “Only
one man an protect your daughter now. I can take you; I have made arrangements,
but we can’t delay any longer.”
“Because the piper is coming?”
Absalom nodded, and then moved to stand beside Hanne. “Liesl
was born under the moon’s blessing. That is why he missed her, but he would
never leave behind so blessed a child.”
She chuckled. “Blessed?” Hanne blinked through glassy eyes
at Absalom. “She has no father and I can give her nothing, yet you call her
blessed.” She smiled and gently trailed a slender finger over the fuzzy tufts
of hair on the child’s head. Then, in a quivering voice, she said, “It is the
only way?”
“Yes.”
The baby stretched in her sleep and the mother smiled
fondly. “Then I suppose we should leave,” Hanne said and her voice caught.
***
They took the north road. Absalom pushed them at a swift
pace until they had reached the cover of the trees and the village fell out of
sight. Hanne moved like a phantom, clutching the bundled babe against her
breast and never once turning to glance back. Whenever the child waked and
whimpered, Hanne would shush gently and sing softly a lullaby. As they went
along, Absalom listened closely to the air, searching for a trace of pipesong.
The forest, too, listened. No breeze moved to stir the air or rustle the
leaves.
The moon slid across the vaulted sky. They followed the road
for miles, but at last they turned away, into the heart of the forest. To Hanne
they seemed to be striking out blindly. Dry leaves and bits of branches and
needles that the trees had cast aside crunched beneath even the girl’s slight
tread. Absalom, however, moved without a sound and seemed to follow some hidden
path.
“Absalom,” Hanne whispered uncertainly.
He halted and held up a hand. “Shhh. Listen.”
Via Pinterest
Hanne clamped her mouth shut and her heart banged against
her ribs. She did her best to cover Liesl’s ears. She listened for the music
that Absalom had warned her about, but heard nothing. Only crickets and the
distant trickle of water. Absalom straightened and hurriedly guided Hanne
onward. Soon they emerged into a clearing. In the dim moonlight Hanne could
just make out a glassy pond and a tripping stream that lead out of it and
disappeared into the forest. Dried leaves collected between the moss-blanketed
stones that lined the stream. A large cottage stood just beyond the pond,
ancient trees soaring upwards behind it.
An aged man with a patchy grey beard, thinning hair, and a
face full of wrinkles greeted them at the door. “Absalom,” the old man nodded,
and then smiled at Hanne.
“Hello, Father,” Absalom said, and his voice fell away under
the weight of weariness.
Hanne’s heart had begun to thud ominously. She tightened her
grip on the bundle in her arms so that Liesl squirmed. The interior of the
cottage was dim yet friendly. A fire crackled on the hearth and sweet-smelling
bunches of herbs hung suspended from the ceiling. Hanne blinked quickly to
clear her eyes. In a corner a shadowed staircase rose to the upper level. It
seemed a nice enough place. Far better than she might provide. Hanne stroked
Liesl’s cheek. The old man, who said his name was Anaias, smiled softly at her
and offered a cup of tea. She shook her head and swallowed. Her mouth felt
gritty like sand, but she couldn’t think of eating or drinking anything at this
moment.
“May I?” the old man asked and reached out a hand to stroke
Liesl’s downy head. “Such a beautiful child,” he murmured. “She is like you.
Very like you.”
Looking into Anaias’ bright, old eyes, Hanne knew that he
meant it. She tried to hold back the welling tears, but they rebelled, slipping
down her cheeks. “You will love her?” she asked.
“Like my own flesh.”
“You will tell her about me?”
“Of course.”
“We cannot stay long,” Absalom offered. Hanne bent over
Liesl and sobbed quietly.
“Please,” she gasped and then could speak no more.
“Take as much time as you need, my dear,” Anaias agreed.
Then he stepped toward his son and the two of them went out of the house.
***
Absalom stood with hands clasped behind his back, staring
into the deep, reflective blue of the pool.
“So it has begun,” Anaias said, coming to stand beside him.
“We knew someday it—he—would come back.”
“But not like this, Father, I never thought—” Absalom rubbed
his broad hand through his hair and over his face. “He took Maria and David.”
His breath came long and hard. “If I could get near enough, I would wring his
neck like he has wrung everything from me.”
“We may yet see them again. It is not impossible.”
“You know as well as I that they belong to him now. They
followed his song; they walked in his footsteps.” The night should not rest so
still, so quiet, Absalom thought. The stars should not wink, the stream should
not gurgle, and the moon should not follow its course. Tonight should not be
like any other night. “You will protect the child, won’t you?”
The old man turned his face towards the moon. “So long as I
breathe he would not come to this place.”
They both turned at the creak of the opening door. The girl
emerged, her eyes clear, her face streaked, and her arms empty. Then addressing
Anaias, she said, “My daughter is yours.”
***
When they emerged from the forest the moon hung low in the
western sky. Tension prickled across Absalom’s skin as he noted its size. It
was huge and luminous. Obese. In contrast the surrounding sky bore a green
tint, hovering over the deeper shadowed green of the fields, the ravine, and
the forest. When they reached the center of the stone bridge’s span he heard it
at last. Pipesong. Absalom froze. And turned. There, atop a ridge and
silhouetted against the mammoth, milky moon, danced the piper.
“What’s the matter?” Hanne asked as she stopped beside him,
but her words slipped out of the grasp of his consciousness like a mist.
Absalom’s gaze fixated upon the piper, how the black shape
of his body twisted and leaped and frolicked. As if he had not just snatched
away the lives of an entire town. As if Maria and David slumbered safely in
their beds. As if he had never done a thing to Absalom.
Via Pinterest
Absalom’s hands folded into fists; his muscles tightened. It
was not so far a distance. He could see the path would take now. Over the edge
of the bridge and the short drop into the ravine. Charging through the
underbrush would be no difficulty, not with his eyes focused on the piper. Up,
up, up the ridge he would plow. He would snatch that foul, enchanted pipe away
from the piper’s lips. The tiny carved fingers on the side would call at him in
their lilting voices, but their words would have no sway over him. Not this
time. He would crush it until only splintered shards remained.
Then he would turn to the piper. Absalom would wait until
the piper’s cerulean eyes glimmered with recognition. How he would relish that
moment. He would stretch out his hands, and they would wrap around the piper’s
neck. It would be no trouble; Absalom had always been the larger of the two. No
magic would save the piper this time. No magic, not even the powerful
enchantments of years long ago, could fend Absalom off now, not when the piper
had Maria and David and threatened little Liesl. He wouldn’t stop until the
piper’s body lay limp upon that very ridge where he now danced.
“Absalom?” Hanne’s prodding voice scattered the image.
Absalom blinked. When he looked again it had all changed.
The moon was of an ordinary size, the sky velvet midnight not green, and the
ridge empty. No sign of the piper. A ragged breath slipped past Absalom’s lips
and sawed at the air.
“What’s the matter? What do you see?”
“Nothing,” Absalom finally replied and turned away towards
home.
The gold of dawn edged the horizon when Absalom entered the
house. Already the reminders of the angel’s visit had begun to wear away. He
couldn’t quite decide which was worse. Absalom had hardly removed his boots
before he stretched across his bed, slowly so as not to wake his slumbering
wife and suddenly aware of his exhaustion. As he lay there, watching the
currents of darkness float above him, he thought of the piper dancing along the
ridge top and of the little girl tucked safely away at the mill, out of the
piper’s grasp. Absalom had finally, at least in this small way, beaten him.
Deep inside the caverns of his chest, Absalom’s cold, dead heart sputtered.
Cough. Then it beat. Once. Now twice, and the slightest hint of hope began to
pump through his veins.
Copyright
© 2014 Rebecca Fox. All rights reserved.
What do you think? Thanks for
reading!
