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i. Plum Tree
He barely remembers her. His sister, Caroline.
She was the only one besides Ma, Pa and Auntie Corrin who was big enough to carry him. And she planted a plum tree before he was born, before Calliope was even born.
No one talks about Caroline anymore, so Caduceus doesn’t either.
Some days he settles on the thought that she was only imaginary, only a friend he made up to catch beetles with. On others her face is clear in his mind and it is smiling down at him, front teeth missing. Her arms are warm and she is lifting him to stare at the dewy plums that grow on her tree. She plucks the fruit from the young branches and splits it with her fingers. Inside the flesh is orange, the stone deep red.
ii. Wood Sorrel
“Do you remember Caroline?” Caduceus asks one afternoon. He sits in the moss with his brother and sister, knees damp, fishing creatures and treasure from a peaty pool.
Colton stands, says nothing, and storms off.
Calliope watches him go and huffs. She turns back to Caduceus. “She’s with Melora now,” is all she says before she too stands to leave.
“Why?”
“What do you mean, why? She didn’t want to come back,” Calliope replies, sharp-voiced. “That’s why.”
“She’s real?” asks Caduceus, because he’s not quite sure.
“Quit it, Caddy.”
“…Okay.” He droops his ears and pulls a handful of wood-sorrel from the moss besides him. He eats the leaves slow, one at a time. They’re sour, sharp-tasting for just moment. Calliope sits down again and goes back to creature-searching. She scoops the murky water into an old jam-jar.
iii. Caterpillar
Caduceus pulls a chair to the kitchen table to watch a green-blue caterpillar creep along the rough wood. It scoots slowly, then stops, then starts again. He presses his cheek to the table and closes one eye, to look more closely, to see its tiny legs.
Caroline is real. But she’s not here now.
She’s with Mother instead.
Maybe with Mother a nice place to be.
The caterpillar falls through a gap in the table and Caduceus gasps. He hurries beneath it and scoops the bug into his paws. It writhes in his hands as he carries it outside and sets it gently on a dandelion leaf. He sits to watch the caterpillar right itself, holding a piece of dried pear inside his mouth until it turns to mush, fuzzy between his teeth.
iv. Nest
At bedtime Colton pretends he doesn’t hear him. They’re huddled in their bed-nest, Colton’s stinky paws rested too near to Caduceus’ face. And when Caduceus shoves them away he kicks back. Hard. So Caduceus bites his tail. Colton yelps and sits up, grabbing him by his hair, yanking a fistful of it.
“Stop that,” Calliope hisses, half-awake. She gives a stern kick to Colton’s legs, then to Caduceus’ hands, still grasping his tail. “I’m trying to sleep.”
Colton groans, loud.
Caduceus doesn’t say anything. Instead he takes his favourite blanket and curls up in the willow basket at the foot of Ma and Pa’s bed, wiping his nose until it stops sniffling.
v. Fever
It’s cold outside, frost glittering in the clear sunlight.
His head hurts so badly, thumping and heavy. Ma lays her palm against his too-hot cheek, brow furrowed, and sighs.
“I’m sorry these cold months are so hard on you, honey,” she says.
Caduceus only whimpers. Opening his mouth to reply is too much work.
“Supper’s almost ready. I’ll bring you some soup and bread. How’s that sound?”
Caduceus nods and his head feels like it’s drowning in the river.
He stays in bed for a long, long time, shivering and panting. He wakes from restless, scary-dream sleeps with mucus in his mouth and blurred, teary eyes. Sometimes Pa reads to him even though he can’t make sense of the story he’s telling. The whole world is far away.
He’s too tired to chew the soft insides of the bread Ma feeds him — even when the bread’s soaked soft with vegetable broth— so she chews it for him and spits it down his throat like mother birds. If he could, he’d fight her off.
He wets the bed because getting up is too much work. He doesn’t mean to. And he cries and says he’s sorry. And he doesn’t remember being bathed, just being bundled into a towel afterwards.
He falls asleep, and dreams again.
Ma holds Caroline to her chest and sobs. Caduceus is tiny-small, in Auntie Corrin’s arms, Calliope holding onto her skirt. Colton’s tall enough to reach the kitchen table, and he’s crying too.
Pa wraps himself around Ma, around Caroline, big shoulders shaking.
There’s blood on the floor, blood in between the floorboards.
In Ma’s lap and on her hands.
She sobs and sobs and sobs.
Ma’s voice seeps in slow, whispered — hazy.
“Please… Please, Wildmother. Don’t take him from me.” She gasps, desperate and teary. “Please.”
“Sister,” whispers Auntie Corrin’s voice. There’s a shushing and another weight on the edge of the bed. The shushing keeps going for a long moment.
Pa’s voice whispers, further away. “Constance?”
His heavy footfalls cross the floor to besides the bed. There’s a sob and the rustling of a hug.
“I can’t. I can’t lose him. I can’t bury — Not again… Not again.”
There’s quiet for a long time. Such a long time.
The line between living and gone —with Wildmother— suddenly feels so very thin.
Maybe, Caduceus thinks, I won’t wake up next time.
Maybe I should be scared.
He’s too tired to be. Ma is so sad, though.
“Stay with him tonight,” says Auntie Corrin. “I’ll prepare something for next time he wakes.”
“Alright,” Ma replies.
“Keep praying to Her, sister.”
“I will.” Ma sounds like she’s been crying since the last time the snow thawed and the blossoms bloomed. “You too?”
“Of course.” Auntie Corrin’s light footsteps fade, gone into the other room.
Ma sighs. Pa says something too quiet, too muffled, to be understood, his voice a low rumble. There’s the sound of a kiss and an unsure It’ll be alright, before Pa is gone too.
The bed dips besides Caduceus as Ma climbs fully onto it, pulling him close and pressing her palm to his forehead.
There’s a shaky breath. “Melora, please.”
Ma’s smell is earthy-warm and sweet, like moss and milk and honeysuckle. She wraps round Caduceus like fox-mothers cradle their cubs, fingers in his hair.
She was buried in the garden, when the still-healthy Savalirwood turned gold and red. When the leaves were falling.
When she died all the honey-coloured candles went out, smoke swirling in the darkness.The offerings filled with fly eggs and melted into blighted purple-black and white-fuzzed masses.
She was buried in the garden, in the soft earth between the birch and willow. It was morning then, the dew sticking to their fur and beading in their braided hair, coming undone.
Ma and Pa kneel over the grave and pray as Auntie Corrin lights dry rosemary, fir and rowan aflame and blows on it till it’s smouldering. She’s given Caduceus a rosemary sprig and he holds it between his paws, tossing it into the grave like Colton and Calliope.
Caroline’s face is pale against her shroud, now speckled with herbs and dirt; besides her Ma had laid her berry-stained doll and quilt. She presses a final kiss to Caroline’s cold forehead and climbs out from her grave.
Next time Caduceus wakes he is laying on his back in a bed of damp moss, bathed in dim, winter sunlight. His head is rested on something warm. He looks up slow, to see Wildmother staring back at him from above. All her hair is gold-brown, and it is full of plants. He blinks and she is gone. Instead she is Ma, hair from her braid fallen loose, fluttering in the soft breeze. Caduceus realises then that his head is rested on her lap, her kind hands cradling his neck. And she’s crying. The tears land on his own cheeks.
“Ma,” is all he manages to say. His chest hurts deep inside.
There’s a ripple of cries, relieved sounds all around them.
Caduceus stays looking up at Ma. Maybe he’s crying too now.
She shushes him, tells him: “It’s alright, honey. You’re alright.”
She bends to press her forehead against his.
“You’re alright.”