Ward of the White Worm

The grey light outside was filling the coach, and the rain continued its lethargic assault on it. The turning wheels were audible as they hit rock, stone, or muck. Inside it was warm and dry in spite of the rainy atmosphere around the coach. The two occupants were rather quiet, Miss Marsh had her eyes firmly affixed to her book. Olli was silent with a chest full of squirming worms. She leaned against the seat’s back and closed her eyes.

When she had woken up that morning, far earlier than she was used to, it was as usual with Motzy being her waker-upper. She had helped Olli out of bed, and they both kneeled together to pray. The prayer had been short, and Olli had already memorized it into a rote repetition that she did recall the words of but not the meaning. But so long as she said the worlds, Motzy seemed pleased and as long as Motzy was pleased then Olli felt at peace with herself. After she had her breakfast (which was bread, a small bowl of porridge that was ‘enlivened’ with two sad looking berries, and tea), Motzy had then given her a small package.

“This is a gift,” she said, smiling.

Inside the box was a whistle made of scatherbone wood, a little longer than Olli’s finger, with a long thin leather strap around its end. The whistle itself had been carved with a tiny pattern wrapping around it that she could barely see even when she pulled it up nearly right against her eyes. “Oh, thank you?”

“It’s from the Neighbors,” Motzy had said. “If you are in trouble, just blow on the whistle. No matter how far you are from the Scatherbone Forest, help will come.”

She now had that whistle packed into her luggage.

Olli trusted Motzy, and felt she would never give her something dangerous. But Miss Marsh had said to not accept gifts from Neighbors. Motzy would not give her anything dangerous, she was certain. But Miss Marsh seemed to know a lot about the world… but…

She thought about it more deeply. Miss Marsh had only said not to accept gifts from Neighbors, but she had not said anything about a gift from a person like Motzy that was originally from a Neighbor. That should be fine, since it was not technically from the Neighbors! It was from Motzy!

With that quandary solved, she sighed heavily and opened her eyes.

The confines of the coach were dark. There was a woman sitting in Miss Marsh’s spot, although Olli could see nothing of her upper body except a vague darker shape within the shadow that already cut across half the coach. Yet even here, it seemed like her head was a bleeding blotch of deeper shadow that was leaking into the shade around her. Her hands were set neatly in her lap, resting on the elegant blue skirt of the dress.

“Why won’t you look at me?” She asked.

“I-I am looking at it,” Olli mumbled, caught somewhere between fright and a strange calmness. It came from outside of her, like a large warm blanket wrapped around her heart.

“But you will not Look at me, I See you and yet you do not See me?”

“I can see you right now! Who are you?”

“I am your Mother, Olivia,” she replied softly.

Olli’s mind was filled with a faceless ashen shape for a moment, a memory blurred by distance and something more. But this shape was different from the one in front of her, and Olli felt a deep antipathy from it that made her push the image away quickly. “I don’t know…”

“How could I not be your Mother? I brought you into this world, is this not what mothers do?” She asked, still speaking with the same soft tone. “I want to care for you, to see you grow, is that not what good mothers do?”

“I…” Olli was not sure what she wanted to say. She was still within that strange place of natural fear and unnatural calmness.

“The Worm is well meaning, but he fears what may happen. But Maya is still here. Maya is with me,” she spoke. “All of my Children, even you, will be with me. No matter if mortal clay fails.”

“Olli!?”

Olli opened her eyes. The sky was covered in deep dark clouds, but there was no rain. Only a strange sticky coldness. Miss Marsh’s face was hovering like a pale sun, eyes wide, with Theodore and Mister Burke’s heads further out.

“I have the salts!” Someone called out nearby, it sounded like Mister Stewart.

“No need,” Theodore said. “She’s awake.”

“Huh?” Was all that Olli could force from her mouth.

“What did she eat this morning? Did she eat? I know Motzy would feed her, maybe it was the weather? Let us get her inside and into bed.”

She was bundled up in Miss Marsh’s shawl, and then she realized she was being held in her lap. The woman’s eyes peered down still at her worriedly, and then Mister Burke reached down and lifted her up.

Olli did not feel ill, only confused. So confused she did not protest at all at being carried into the Inn on the Moor.