Chapter Two
'They're not going to like me,' Serena said. 'I just know they're not going to like me. They're going to think I'm strange and horrible and too young for you and funny-looking. Stop the bird and let me out. I'll just plummet to my death, it's for the best.' Her hands kept pinching at each other nervously; her nails had made crescent dents in her palms.
'You are too young for me,' Gadeth said, 'and the rest is bulldust and you know it. I'm worried they're not going to like me.'
'They're your family. They like you already.'
'I've been away for eight years. I've got nieces and nephews I've never met. They've all been there the whole time together and I really don't know what I'm going back to. Remind me why we think this is a good idea?' He tapped at the altimeter, which was annoying him by working perfectly and not being an excuse to turn back.
'Well, the concept was to visit your family before going back to the arms of my family. I do think it's a good idea. I'm just shitting bricks in anticipation.'
Gadeth got the kind of cough that meant he was trying very hard not to laugh at her. Serena gave him a good hard poke in the arm.
'Ow! Abuse, abuse! I can't help it you look so sweet and then you say things like that I'm laughing because it's cute. With not at, believe me.'
She gave a little sighing laugh and leaned her head against his shoulder. 'Even if they don't like you, I do.'
The house looked as though it had started quite small and grown due to popular demand. At one side the thatch of the roof looked very old; in fact, there was a small pear tree growing in it. Over what looked like a new extension on one side, it was fresher and rawer looking. On that side the eaves came down almost to the ground and three children were amusing themselves by sliding down the slope of the roof on tea-trays and crash-landing in an old and many-prolapsed straw-tick mattress. There were children of varying sizes everywhere, cheerfully scruffy but respectably clean, and they gaped up at Crash Test as Gadeth brought it down in the house paddock, slightly alarming a very fat donkey which plodded off to the far corner with a sulky air. A line of children formed along the paddock fenceline, staring with the air of expert rubberneckers. Even the tea-tray tobogganers abandoned their sliding for a really good gawk.
Gadeth climbed out and offered his hand to Serena. She took it with a little grimace and followed him down. The ground in the paddock was muddy and she was glad she hadn't worn her good dress in an effort to impress.
'Excuse me, mate, you can't leave that there,' said a man's voice. The man in question was standing just behind the children, a small barrel under each arm. He was short and stocky with a meaty sort of face, about fifty years old. 'This is private property so unless you're having some sort of equipment problem I'll have to ask you to move the boat.'
'Um, hello, Uncle Matty,' said Gadeth. Serena gave his hand a squeeze. The middle-aged man gave them both a very blank look for the space of about five seconds before light dawned.
'It's not Gadeth, is it?' he said incredulously. 'What the hell are you doing back here? No, hang on, I mean welcome back, it's good to see you boyo, but yes, what the hell are you doing back? Get out of the way, Rince, let your uncle out the gate - of course he's your uncle, he's your uncle Gadeth, that's your mum's brother, and who's this? Where'd you find her? Good on you, boyo! Get that dog, Erry, it's going to - oh, sorry love, that'll brush off when it's dry.'
Serena looked dubiously at the huge muddy pawstreaks that now decorated her second-favourite shirt, courtesy of a large, knobbly brown dog with disproportionately big feet, grinning up at her around a lolling pink tongue. Suddenly, the dog decided that it was very important to get its nose between her legs and give her a damn good sniffing. Several children squealed with laughter, and the boy identified as Erry hauled ineffectually on the dog's collar, repeating 'Bad dog, Bugger! Get off her! Bad dog!'
'The dog is called Bugger?' Serena said faintly.
'Because he is one,' said Matty. 'Look, boy, go on into the house, your mum's there and she'll be tickled to see you, I'm on my way over to the old barn with these, you picked your day, it's the big apple hooley tonight - Erry, tie the bugger up, he's not supposed to be out anyway, now who's coming with me and help with the lanterns?' He marched off, trailed by five or six kids. The rest clustered around Serena and Gadeth and went back to staring.
'You're our uncle in the army, right?' said a girl of about ten, with thick black hair in braids tied with red wool. Serena thought she could see a likeness to Gadeth; her eyes weren't the same, but they were similar, with a frank look that was very like Gadeth's.
'That's me,' said Gadeth. He looked thoroughly intimidated by so many small relatives in a body. 'I, uh, well, I'd better get on into the house and say hi to everyone - come on, Serena.'
'Are you in the army too?' Erry asked Serena.
'They don't have women in the army, thicko,' said the girl, who as self-elected spokeswoman seemed to resent the interruption. Serena and Gadeth picked their way through the crowd, heading for the front door. The steps in front of it were ranked with assorted boots and bits of gear, buckets and secateurs and children's outdoor toys. The door itself was propped open with a brick. Just inside was a sort of hall-cum-cloakroom which was even more cluttered, stuffed with coats and bags and hats and a gently asinine-looking stag's head with more of the same hanging from its antlers. A small child of indeterminate gender pushed open the door that led to the rest of the house and peered round it at them before turning back and yelling 'Nan, there's a strange man in the hall and a boy with all mud on!'
'I don't look like a boy in this, do I?' Serena hissed, tugging at her shirt, staring at her trousers - well, Gadeth's trousers, cinched at the waist and with the legs turned up. 'All right, I probably do. Damn damn double damn.'
'You look nothing like a boy,' he said. 'It's half dark in here and what does a toddler know? I wonder whose he is?'
An older woman put her head round the door and looked at them suspiciously for half a second before her face lit up.
'Gadeth!' she cried gladly, and rushing at him, hugged him round the neck.
'Mum!' Gadeth replied, dropping Serena's hand to hug his mother back. Serena stood back against a sort of hedge of oilskins, in a cloud of linseed-smell. They looked so happy; they were the sort of people you could see instantly belonged to each other. Their faces were not much alike - she remembered he had said he resembled his father - but their smiles were identical, the same warmth.
'How are you, Mum?' Gadeth asked.
'I'm wonderful - my heavens, look at you, my boy's so big now. Well, at least they must have fed you properly. Two months without a letter! What's wrong with you?' She swatted at his hair.
'I've been busy! I did write and say I was all right as soon as we were sure it was peace.' Gadeth was beaming, enjoying being told off by his mother again.
'Oh yes, dear Mum and Dad, I am alive with no new bits chopped off, more later, love Gadeth. That was very reassuring.'
'That's pretty much a direct quote too,' Gadeth said over his shoulder to Serena, who Mrs Finn had not properly noticed until then. Now she turned and looked, and her eyebrows went up.
'Well, for goodness' sake, this isn't a boy,' she said. 'Isn't Dace a little silly. What's your name, my dear?'
'Mum, this is Serena Schezar,' said Gadeth. He took Serena's hand, pulled her forward out of the oilskins, put his arm round her shoulders, displaying her with a kind of shy pride. 'You remember I told you about my commander, about the Boss? She's his sister, and she's, well, we're'
'You're the girl there was all that fuss about in Pallas?' Mrs Finn frowned a little. Ohshit, thought Serena. She felt Gadeth's arm tighten, heard him draw in his breath.
'I was so glad to hear that you got off - I mean, that they realised they had the wrong person. Gadeth's told us so much about your brother and what he did for him, and when I heard about that business I just said to Lil - that's my sister-in-law - I said I don't care what they say about her, if she's the sister of a man like that they should give her a chance. Blood tells.' She smiled at Serena, who smiled back in a flood of relief.
'And aren't you pretty. Now is he being nice to you? You must come into the kitchen - you don't have to hang onto her, Gadeth, let her walk, goodness knows you can't get through all these coats two abreast, what must it look like to you, dear? I expect you're used to things being much nicer you stayed at the palace, didn't you? Oh dear, did the dog jump up on you? It'll brush off when it dries. Here we are! Sit down there - see if you can find room for your elbows - it's all go today, we're getting ready for the Apple Dance.'
Mrs Finn guided Serena to a seat by a cluttered table in an airy, sunny, chaotic kitchen. Six other women were hard at work mixing and baking; two little girls were fully occupied cutting out cinnamon biscuits with the rims of drinking glasses, from dough rolled flat on the tabletop. The child Dace was under the table hitting a pot arhythmically with a spoon. The little girls kept stolidly cutting out circles while all the grown women yelped at the sight of Gadeth and ran to hug him; they were obviously an affectionate family and Serena felt a little left out of the general yelling and embracing. It was so strange to see him among people he belonged with but that she didn't know; strange to see him being a son and a brother and a nephew and, in the case of a tiny old woman who had popped out of a rocking chair in the corner and was forcing him to bend double so she could pinch his cheeks and kiss his forehead, a grandson. It was nice though; it was sweet. She managed to catch his eye over the shoulder of an obvious aunt who was making a great fuss of him, and he grinned at her, embarrassed but happy. She felt one of those little giddy rushes of love that crept up on her every now and again with him, and took her breath away.
'Everyone let go of Gadeth and get on with your jobs!' Mrs Finn declared, clapping her hands briskly. 'We don't have any time to lose. In fact, I'm sorry to put you to work as soon as you get home, but your father's been complaining all morning that there's no-one free to dig the last bits of the big stump out of the bank and if it doesn't get done he'll be impossible all evening - could you see about it, pet?'
'What big stump?' said Gadeth, looking confused.
'After your time,' said a young woman who was probably a sister, beating egg whites as she spoke. 'The marler tree bought it in a thunderstorm a couple of weeks ago - split right down the middle - and Dad's been chopping it down and grubbing it up in bits whenever he's had a free moment since. He thought it might fall on the house. But he's been so busy with the harvest and the pressing that the stump's still in there. You'll probably need to pull it out with Jule.'
'Jule?' repeated Gadeth, looking more confused if possible.
'The donkey,' said the aunt - probably Lil. 'She's new. Get one of the kids to show you how to hit her.'
'I liked the marler tree,' Gadeth said plaintively. 'And what happened to Gus the draught horse? He's not dead, is he?'
'Don't be dramatic,' his mother told him. 'Your brothers have got him out in the orchard. Go on, pet, we can't have you underfoot in the kitchen, a hulking big thing like you, go on.' She shooed him towards the door.
'But Serena!' Gadeth protested.
'We'll look after her,' called the sister, and Mrs Finn shut the door on him.
'All right,' said a muffled voice from the hall. 'Bye, then. You haven't seen me for eight years, so BYE! I'll just go and do backbreaking manual labour. When I'm dead you'll be sorry.' Serena could hear him stomp off; he had sounded good-humoured enough but she wished he hadn't gone. One of the glass-wielding little girls was watching her gravely; the other was surreptitiously eating raw cinnamon dough scraps. Under the table, Dace had gotten to his or her feet and was leaning heavily against Serena's leg. She felt swamped.
'Well!' said Mrs Finn brightly. 'We should find you something to do, shouldn't we?'
'I'm afraid I don't know how to cook,' Serena said. 'I mean, not baking. I just know how to cook things on a fire. The fanciest thing I can do is damper with jam rolled up in it.' And Gadeth taught me that one.
'Well, a grand lady like you wouldn't need to know how to make her own cakes, would she?' said the sister cheerfully. 'I think it's so nice that Gadeth's going to marry above himself. I'm Miria, by the way.'
'We didn't say we're getting married,' Serena said, and blushed. Not that there's any reason to marry, except to be respectable what would Lady Kerrell call it, probably 'living in sin.'
'You don't need to be modest,' said Lil. 'If he brings you home to his family we all know what that means. And no offence to your family, dear, but I wouldn't say Gadeth's marrying above himself. You're getting a good boy there. Anyone should count themselves lucky to have him.'
'Lucky, when he runs away to join the army!' Miria exclaimed. 'Auntie Lil is just soft on him, she always has been.'
'I do feel lucky,' Serena assured Lil, 'very lucky. He's the sweetest person I ever met. He's a credit to all of you.' Did that sound phoney?
'Well he must have changed since the last time I saw him, because he was a stroppy little bugger then,' said Miria.
'Language, young lady,' said Mrs Finn, taking baked pies from the oven and putting new ones in like clockwork. Some of them, by the smell, were the prize-winning apple variety.
'I'm five times five with three children, mother dear,' said Miria. 'And all of them say bugger every day because of that awful dog of Uncle Matty's.'
'Well, I told him not to call it that, but you know what he's like,' said Lil. 'Matty never has known when to let go of a joke.'
'Can you make sandwiches, love?' Mrs Finn asked, clearing away the last of the biscuit dough. The little girls had finished cutting and were carefully sliding the baking sheets into the oven over the pies.
'Oh yes. No problem.' Serena had to raise her voice slightly, because the woman was disappearing into a larder and returning while she answered.
'Right then,' Mrs Finn said, plunking down a basket of loaves and dealing out bowls and pots of different fillings, along with butter and mayonnaise and mustard and horseradish. 'Get cracking on those - just make as many as you can and fill them however you like, no-one will really notice what they're like. The important thing is to get some bread into them along with the cider.'
'Aim for interesting colour combinations that will look good in vomit,' said Miria.
'Just ignore her,' said Lil. 'She's got the pip because she's expecting again and not supposed to be dancing tonight.'
'Oh, congratulations,' Serena said. Now she was looking for it, Miria was bulging at the waist rather; it hadn't been immediately obvious because of her loose dress. She started cutting and buttering slices of bread; once she had a pile of them she would start putting them together.
'Thanks,' said Miria. 'A warning before you marry into this family - we are horribly, horribly fertile. If you don't like children, run away. Run faaaaar away now.'
'No, I like children,' Serena said. 'Me and this little one seem to be getting on well - he's been hanging onto my leg for the last ten minutes.'
'I'm afraid Dace does that to everyone, dear,' said Mrs Finn. 'Just prise him off if he's bothering you. I'll tell you what works well - hold the whole loaf, butter the cut face, then cut it off as a slice. It saves time.'
'What exactly is the Apple Dance?' Serena asked. She was beginning to feel more comfortable, which was odd since she'd never been in a situation anything like this before. Perhaps it was because these people reminded her of Gadeth; there was a slight presence of him even though he was out of the room.
'It's our little rural festivity,' said Miria. 'It's just a harvest dance. End of summer, get the apples in, crack open last year's cider and have a hooley. Lots of fun during, a hell of a lot of work before and after. Most of the men are over at the old barn getting things set up - taking the doors off the hinges and putting them down for a dance floor, that kind of thing. Everyone comes in from town and the local farms. It spills out of the barn and all over the river paddock - and of course, at least three people fall in the water every year, but thank heaven we've never had a drowning. Lucky you, getting to see clan Finn with its hair down first thing. After this, nothing we do will surprise you.'
'You're making us sound like lunatics,' Lil scolded her. 'It's just a nice village party, pet. Everyone's worked hard this year and we're rewarding ourselves, not to mention thanking our lucky stars that the war didn't come here. And it'll be lovely to have you here too. I'm not being rude, but is that your real hair colour?'
'Um. Yes.' Serena tucked a loose strand behind her ear; there were always loose strands curling around her face now that it was longer.
'Were you sick when you were a kid?' Miria asked. 'Cousin Jay had rheumatic fever and his hair went a bit like that; lots of grey in it when he was still young.'
'Well,' Serena began, then decided it was easier than explaining properly, and anyway, it was true, figuratively speaking. 'Yes.' Grey when I'm still young Gadeth says it's silver and gold together, and calls me his treasure, but then again, he would. They must not know the whole Dilandau story. I shouldn't assume everyone I meet does.
'It's got a lovely curl in it,' said Mrs Finn. 'Very nice. Are twisty braids like that the fashion in Pallas now?'
'Not really - I just do it like this to keep it out of my way.' The matter of Serena's hair was something of a sore spot with her; it had grown so fast at first that it had positively scared her, then settled and almost stopped growing at a length just past her shoulderblades, so it wasn't even consistent in its weirdness. She kept wondering if it was going to do it again. Everything else about her body seemed to be running normally, even her periods, which had frightened her so much at first, but the hair was a worry. Gadeth just thought it was beautiful; he kept playing with it whenever they were sitting or lying quietly together, in the same way as Serena liked to trace patterns on his chest or his back with her fingertips. He'd wind it round his fingers or make it into loops and twists; in fact the braid she was wearing it in was sort of his invention, since he'd found a way to make it like a spiralling rope. For her own part, she would have been equally happy to bob it off short again, but as long as it pleased him she would leave it long.
'Well, you must teach me how to do it that way,' said Miria. 'I'd like to try it myself.'
'I'd be happy to,' said Serena. The kitchen air was full of mouth-watering smells, heat from the oven mingling with sunshine streaming in at the windows. It was one of the nicest places she had ever been in, and she was beginning to feel that she belonged. I could be part of this family.
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