She thought he ought to do it. She thought he ought to move out there and become a farmer.
His smile when he looked at her was meant more for him than it was for her.
“D’you find that funny?” she asked.
“No, not at all,” he said. “I just think you’re beautiful.”
They walked for a long time without saying anything. They stopped by the bridge.
“It’s late already,” she said. “I think I’d better be getting home. I can’t stay out all night every night.”
“Have you told anyone about me?”
She shook her head.
“Have you shown the ring to anyone?”
She shook her head again.
“You don’t wear it at home?”
“No,” she said. “Not yet.”
“I can understand that,” he said.
There was a pause. Mainly to fill it they began walking again, across the bridge, along the road.
“If I move out to the fjord,” he said, “would you come with me?”
She nodded.
“You know what you’d be doing, don’t you?” he said.
She raised her eyebrows and looked at him. She was about to give him a sarcastic reply, she thought he was making reference to the fact that she was so young, but the expression in his eyes was candid and just slightly inquiring as it met hers, and she realized he’d meant something else.
He’d been thinking of who he was. If she knew what she’d be doing going with him.
“No,” she said. “To be honest, I don’t.”
“But you will nevertheless?”
“I think I will. No, I know I will.”
They stopped.
“Well, we’re back here again,” he said, and smiled.
She had run over the fields on her way home. She felt guilty for being out so late, especially as her father had just returned, but it was happiness she felt most of all, mixed with a kind of solemn earnestness, because he’d asked if she’d go with him, to a farm out by the fjord, and she’d said yes.
She hadn’t even hesitated.
And she still didn’t hesitate. She had to follow her heart in this. And her heart said yes, yes, yes.
She walked the final hundred yards, so that she wouldn’t be breathless when she got in. The feeling of him was still in her body.
Could they see it, she wondered?
That she was radiant?
She smiled. Of course they could see it. But they didn’t know the cause. They didn’t know who he was, and they didn’t know what he was doing to her.
She saw the kitchen was in almost total darkness, but wasn’t alarmed by it; even though it was unusual, there was nothing to prevent them dousing the light there and seating themselves in the living room for once.
She took a deep breath, opened the door, and breathed out again. Her heart was still pounding with elation. She bent down and pulled off her shoes, placed them tidily by the wall, stood up and took off her coat, hung it on the peg. Something within her registered the complete stillness of the house, but even that didn’t cause her to react, she just turned the handle of the door and went into the kitchen.
Her mother, father, and Noah had been sitting around the kitchen table when she came in. They’d looked at her gravely, and the first thing that crossed her mind was that they knew everything.
Perhaps they’d even seen them together.
She smiled tentatively.
“What’s happened?” she asked.
“Barak is dead,” said Noah.
She hadn’t met Javan since it had happened. They had agreed to meet today, but he would understand why she hadn’t come. And he would understand that she’d hardly even thought about him.
Barak was dead. Noah had gone. And her father had said that Javan wasn’t to set foot on the farm. That meant that she would have to leave as well. She put her head in her hands. Then she raised it again and looked across the dusky river valley, at the lights that flickered above the wooded hills far away.
He’d been agitated when he’d said it, she thought. He didn’t know Javan, and if he had, he’d never have said what he had.
On the other hand she’d never yet known him take back anything he’d said. He didn’t want to set eyes on Javan. That would continue to be the case. So how could he get to know him?
She picked at the dry, decaying wood with one hand. She’d still had his seed inside her while she’d held Barak dead in her arms. She must bear that shame. But the disgrace of it also colored her relationship with Javan. Perhaps it wasn’t right. Perhaps that, too, was shameful.
She had obeyed her father in everything up to now. Maybe she should in this as well.
Perhaps he was right after all.
She rose and walked to the edge of the mountain, drew in a shuddering breath.
Somewhere in the darkness in front of her she heard the sound of wing beats. She followed the sound with her eyes, and just as she caught sight of the black shadow gliding through the air, it turned its head toward her, and she caught a glimpse of its yellow eyes.
It was an owl.
It must have landed in a tree lower down the slope, for a moment later she heard it call.
Hoohooo. Hoooo. Hoohooo.
Then there was silence.
She found it eerie. It was as much as she could do to turn her back on it and leave the place. It was no mere chance that it had flown by just then. Nor that it had hooted three times. Both were an omen.
But of what?
She hurried down the hillside, looked warily about as she walked along the path through the forest, broke into a run as she came to the cultivated ground.
The owl had been an omen. But did it concern her, or the place she was in? Was it telling her she should go, or that she should stay?
When she reached the orchard, the door of the house opened. She halted. Her father’s figure was framed in the light that fell across the farmyard. He leaned forward and threw the water from a cooking pot over the ground. The steam from it continued to rise long after he’d gone back inside.
She couldn’t decide now, she thought. She’d let time lend a helping hand.
Time would have to help them all.
A fortnight later she left. It was a brilliant autumnal day; the sun shone from a blue sky, the forested slopes were aflame in reds and yellows and greens. No one said good-bye to her, she walked alone across the fields toward the mountains, and all she’d been able to take with her were a few clothes in a pack on her back. Javan was waiting below the old feasting place, and there was a song in her heart.
They followed the rapids up and reached the far end of the lake by lunchtime. They took their first rest on a projecting rock by the shore. They had their second once they’d crossed the moor and were standing at the top of the mountain that fell steeply to the fjord. With their legs swinging over the lip, they sat eating the second half of their provisions. Above them was the dark blue sky, below them the dark blue fjord, and where the two came together, a black, perpendicular rock face reared up. They would see it every day, she thought, it stretched the full length of the opposite side of the fjord, and where it ended the sea began.
If they were to get down before darkness was fully upon them, they had to hurry. They’d sat here too long already, Javan said, and they got up, put on their packs, and began to walk again. An hour later they were down by the fjord. Apart from the faint light of the moon, it was pitch-black around them. But it wasn’t far now. And he knew the way well, and led off along the fjord, on an undulating road that was sometimes a bridleway, sometimes a path, and sometimes an animal track. She had no idea how long they walked, or what the country around them looked like, but she was so tired that it didn’t matter anyway.
The path had risen for a while, and they again found themselves above the level of the fjord when Javan turned to her.