The Dust of 100 Dogs - A. S. King [29]
Emer silently replied, “Uncle Martin doesn’t let us play. He hates me. There’s nothing here but work and death. No mischief. No fun.”
Emer, you know better than to have an attitude like that. A girl like you can make such dismal things beautiful. Don’t you remember your power? Your name?
“It means nothing here. No one has ever heard of us.”
But what of the story of Emer? Do you not remember that day I told you about her? About Cuchulain?
“I remember,” Emer answered. “But the six gifts mean nothing here, either. No beauty or sweet-talking can change this horror. In fact, I don’t talk at all anymore.”
What about Seanie?
Emer lay quiet for a second. “How do you know about Seanie?”
No mind how I know. What about him? Don’t you think you can find something to say to him?
“Aunt Mary said I wasn’t to see him again. That Martin has other plans for me than to marry a dumb boy.”
She did? He does?
“Yes.”
Emer, think about the story of Cuchulain. Think about Emer’s evil father. Stop sounding so beaten! You’ve only just become a young woman and it’s your duty now to make sure you’re happy.
“Happy is a dream of the past.”
Happy is what you feel when you’re with Seanie, if I’m not mistaken, Emer, and you can’t go ignoring that, no matter how bad things are.
“I’m not allowed to see him anymore.”
Neither was Emer allowed to marry Cuchulain. You’ll find a way.
Emer didn’t answer.
Have you stitched your great cape yet?
“I haven’t made one stitch since the fire burned all of our thread and buried the needles.”
Not one stitch? How do you expect to decorate your cape if you’ve had no practice? Promise me you’ll find something to make pretty, Emer. It used to bring you so much joy. Maybe it will again.
“I’ll ask Aunt Mary tomorrow.”
Happy birthday, Mairead said, in a voice now gone sad in Emer’s head. I miss you.
“I miss you too, Mammy,” Emer answered.
She propped herself up on an elbow. Was that my mind, she wondered, or really my mother? Why did she sound so disappointed? What does she think I’m capable of out here in this barren wasteland of rocks and wind? How does she know about Seanie? And if she can speak to me now, and know these things, then does it mean she is surely dead? Though she’d given up thinking her mother might still live, Emer took this confirmation with much sadness. She thought again of Cuchulain, and tried to remember the whole story as she fell to sleep.
The next morning, she approached her aunt’s sewing basket. Trying to draw attention to herself, she rattled it and then placed it on her lap.
“Don’t touch that, Emer. Those are my things.”
Emer beckoned and Mary came to sit beside her.
“What are you trying to say? You want to learn?”
Emer opened the lid and pulled out a bunch of thread and a needle.
“Careful now, you need to know what you’re doing. That thread is valuable and expensive. Oh. You’ve done this before?” she asked, watching Emer thread the needle on the first try.
“I’ll give you a small scrap to practice on, if you want,” Mary offered, pulling the basket from Emer’s lap and digging to the bottom. “Try that one. And no more thread. You have to learn with one color. I don’t want you wasting my thread on practice.”
Emer made a few stitches and then made a few more. Mary watched, realizing that the child had done this before.
“Emer! You’re very good, you know. I tried to teach Grainne how to embroider when she was younger and she hated it. Said it was boring, poor thing. Whatever they say about us grown-ups being sent out here to suffer, I think it’s the children who’ve suffered most. My own child telling me that making pretty things was wasteful. Imagine!” she babbled, still watching Emer stitch. “Why didn’t you show me this before now?”
Emer shrugged and continued pulling the needle in and out of the scrap of fabric. Soon her aunt could make out that Emer was making the cross.
“Mary, where’s the damn girl now?” Martin yelled through the door. “The bloody trough is empty!”
“I’ll send her now,” Mary answered, taking the scrap from Emer’s hand and hiding