Chapter Eighteen: Winter

 

After her banishment from the Rookery, Lily spent several days in her room, her sorrow weakening her body and eventually turning into a severe cold. Nan and the housekeeper were on hand night and day with warm stew and tea and more blankets, but nothing seemed to help. Her fever broke after the first week, but still Lily didn’t seem to improve.

The purple heather disappeared from the hills as autumn slipped into winter. Icy winds whipped around the edges of the house, creating a low ghostly moan that often reflected the tone of Lily’s heart. Her one solace on these lonely, wuthering nights was the knowledge that Strathclyde knew the truth. He knew the stories and the wonders and the joys of the forest, and somehow that eased her pain.

After some time, Lily became more active, leaving her room and joining the family for meals, but she had lost the sparkle in her eyes—she had lost some of the life that had made her Lily. She was the picture of obedience at home: she helped the housekeeper with dinner, and never gave Nan any trouble. She did her lessons and went to church dutifully. She was never cross with her brothers. But she never truly laughed either, and, worst of all, she had abandoned the moor.

Sometimes at night, Lily would imagine that the low, moaning song of the moor that whistled at her window was actually the soft tinkle of Arthur’s piano, and she would often drift to sleep hearing what she was sure was his strong baritone voice, singing her a lullaby. She dreamed often of a mouse’s tail or a rook’s wing slipping out of view around a corner, but even in her dreams she could never see their dear faces. Every now and then from the nursery window, Lily would spot a bird flying high above the moor in search of a meal, and many a day would find her sitting in her window seat, searching the edges of the forest for signs of her friends as the trees made their last offerings of red and gold to the forest floor.

Over time, Lily’s memories of the Rookery became hazy, though her love for her animal friends was no less strong. Mother came home from Aunt Sarah’s at last and busied herself with preparing the house for winter, canning vegetables with the housekeeper, and helping Mrs. May with her garden. Lily was glad Mother had come home. But Mother was not Father, and as much as she longed to share the true source of her sorrow, Lily knew that Mother would never understand. If only Father would come home...

One day in late November, Lily’s mother sent her upstairs to clean out her old toys and prepare the room for Aunt Sarah, who was coming to visit with her baby. Lily was cleaning her room dutifully when she opened her special drawer and saw her pencils and special paper for the first time in many weeks. A creeping sadness stole over her, but this time it was not an image of Arthur that rose in her mind. It was her father. She had stopped writing him when she stopped going to the forest, and she was suddenly filled with an overwhelming desire to tell him everything—the whole story, from beginning to end. 

She uttered a silent apology to Mother and Aunt Sarah, and sat down at her chair and table. For hours she sat by the fire, writing and writing. She told her father of Titus and the history of the rooks, of Arthur and his family and his tiny piano, of the owl and the jackrabbit and Arthur’s little choir, of Alistair and the hawks and the impending danger, and lastly, of the moment Arthur made her leave the forest behind. It was all there, on paper, and this time she intended to send it.

A strange sense of calm came over Lily once she had told the story to her father. She sighed deeply. It was as if he now shared her burden, her sorrow, even though he hadn’t yet read the letter. She felt that his share in her burden made it somehow lighter, more manageable—almost like it had gone away altogether now that it was in stronger, more capable hands. Lily smiled, not quite with her lips, or even with her eyes, but her heart became the slightest bit lighter, and something inside her knew that one day things would be right again.

“Lily, dear,” her mother called from downstairs before she had had an opportunity to fold the letter and put it away.

“Yes, Mother?” she answered.

“It’s tea time, love,” her mother called back.

Lily walked to the nursery door and opened it to go down to tea, but looked back for just a moment at the letter lying open on the table. And her heart smiled a little bit more.

As she walked down the stairs, stepping gently on the squeaking fourth step, Lily noticed her mother putting on her gloves. “Are you leaving, Mother?” she asked, disappointed that Mother wouldn’t be joining them for tea.

“Yes, Darling. Mrs. May has invited me to tea this afternoon. She is so lonely, poor dear, that I couldn’t resist spending the afternoon with her. I will be back before supper.” Mother smiled warmly and swept out the door.

Tea time was, unfortunately, another one of Nan’s spectacular failures. But today, Lily felt a new feeling—or perhaps a very old one—rising in her heart. Nan’s dreadful tea time had reawakened in her the very real, very exhilarating need to escape. For the first time in weeks, Lily found herself longing for the moor. But this time, instead of crumbling her cakes or insulting the horrible tea like she would have done before meeting Arthur and the rooks, she simply said, “Nan, I feel like going outside today. May I be excused?”

Nan looked up from her cake, stunned. Lily had barely spoken, much less attempted to leave the house on her own in many weeks. Nan was so shocked, she could only manage to say, “Yes,” and, “Be sure to wear your coat.”

Lily donned her black duffle coat and her white gloves and, for the first time in what seemed like ages, breathed deeply the brisk air of the moor.  She walked slowly up the lane toward the stone boundary wall, scrambling stiffly to the top. She stood on the low wall with her cozy home and her letter to Father and her sorrow behind her and looked out over her great, wide, beautiful moor. Snow had fallen the night before, blanketing the gray hills and turning them into glorious mounds of double cream. The sky was a brilliant shade of blue and the sun sparkled through the frigid air. A bird sang somewhere in the forest, and suddenly Lily’s heart began to soar. She was free!

 She flew from the boundary wall and landed with a light thump in the snow. She ran up and down and up and down over the hills until the village disappeared behind a rise, the wind whistling in her ears and causing her eyes to water. A sea of white billowed around her. She spun around with her arms spread wide and laughed a deep, hearty, healing laugh, then she flung herself to the ground, rolled over on her back and closed her eyes. The sun kissed her smiling face ever so gently and she listened to the snow creaking beneath her as it melted from her body heat. The crisp air stung her nose and throat as she took great deep breaths, and all was silence and peace.

For a long time, Lily lay on the hillside, reveling in her freedom. But soon her mind drifted to India and her father. She wondered if he would ever come home. And then, perhaps inevitably, her mind found its way to Arthur and the forest, and she wondered if she would ever go back. The old sadness began to overtake her, so she opened her eyes to ward it off, and as she did, she saw a black speck circling high in the sky. She thought of Titus, and the day she had met him in this very spot, and she wondered, hoping against hope, if he might be coming to see her. She sat up, looking into the sky as the black speck grew larger. She was about to shout, “I’m here, Titus, I’m here!” when she realized as the speck drew nearer the ground, that it was growing too large. That was not a rook. It soared overhead, still very high, but as it did, Lily realized two things at once: that bird was a hawk, and it was headed for the forest.

She lay very still until it had passed her, and the moment it did, she leapt to her feet and faced the forest, squinting to see past the glare of the sparkling snow. A chill shot through her body, but not from the cold. Just where the Rookery would be, twenty hawks circled very, very slowly, poised for attack.

Lily’s heart nearly stopped as she watched the hawks circling the Rookery. She looked around frantically for someone, anyone who might hear her cry for help, but of course no one was there. She was alone on the moor, as always. She thought about going back to get Strathclyde, but surely he would tell her to stay away from the forest. She thought about fetching her brothers, but they would only make fun of her. Her friends were in danger and no one could help!

Promise or no promise, Lily felt that she had no choice. She had to get back to the Rookery. She had to get to Arthur and Titus. She had to help!

Lily ran as if her life depended on it, and she truly believed that lives did depend on it. She thought of all the animals in the Rookery, playing games or perhaps having another Tea Time, and wondered if she would get there in time to warn them. She silently prayed like she had never prayed before, asking desperately for protection for her friends. Asking for a miracle.

Lily reached the edge of the forest near an old, gnarled blackthorn hedge. Its leaves had fallen to the ground, leaving the tightly twisted black branches bare and treacherous. The place she normally entered the forest was on the other side of the hill and it would take several minutes to get there. Lily was forced to stop and choose. She could either try to climb through the hedge and make a straight line for the Rookery, or she could waste precious time and run to the place where she knew the Rookery path would begin. Frantic, she tried to climb through the hedge, thinking that the straightest path was also the best, but the blackthorn’s branches were too sharp and too tightly twisted to let her through. She tried again and again, but she simply couldn’t get through. Then, like a long forgotten dream, she remembered Arthur’s voice: “Can you promise me that should you ever find yourself alone that you will stick to the path?” She had promised that day, and broken her promise with terrifying results.

“What a wretched girl I am! Have I learned nothing?” she thought, climbing from the hedge, ashamed. She ran frantically over the hill, toward the path she knew.

She entered the forest at full speed, and hurtled along the familiar path with the wind at her back. The forest looked much different under the fresh blanket of snow, but she knew the path well enough to follow it even in these conditions. She was, for the first and last time, relieved to come upon the familiar briar patch and practically slid into the small hole beneath it, across a sheet of snow. Without a hint of complaint, she tore through the tunnel on her hands and knees, but before she came through the other side, a chilling sound echoed through the forest—the collective cry of what sounded like a hundred hawks. It could be nothing else. Her heart froze with fear, but her arms and legs wouldn’t stop. She emerged from the briar patch, leapt through the intertwined trees and practically stepped on the spade as she raced for the Rookery. She only hoped she wasn’t too late.