Page 1 of The Knucker King

1

Chapter 1

Avice

The infant had been born to die.

Avice Gardener – midwife, apothecary, and Faerie-speaker – knew that to be a fact.

The moment she laid her brown eyes upon the newborn in her arms, still slick with birthing blood, she knew the little girl was doomed.

Avice’s stomach dropped at the sight. She carefully wrapped the panting baby in her arms, delicately covering the exposed viscera on the child’s abdomen. Avice’s mouth was suddenly dry. She licked her lips, preparing to speak, before turning her gaze to the weakened mother in the birthing chair.

Too young. The midwife observed. Still a child herself.

Catherine, the eldest sister of the new mother and the only other woman in attendance at the birth, frowned up at Avice.

“What is wrong?” she asked as she straightened up from her crouched position on the rammed earth floor. “I have had four of my own, and they all squalled the walls down the moment they were born.”

Avice clenched her jaw as she adjusted the baby in her arms. The afterbirth was still attached and bundled up in the blanket with the newborn. She swallowed, the dryness of her mouth strangling the words.

“Well?” Catherine demanded, stepping towards the midwife.

“I… The baby, she is not long for this land,” Avice tried to explain.

“What do you mean?” the woman asked. Her sharp, blue eyes narrowed. “Show her to me.”

With a heavy heart, Avice lowered the weak newborn that she had pressed to her chest. She gritted her teeth as she tugged back the blood-stained, woollen blanket.

Catherine gasped and promptly took a step backwards from her weak niece. At the sight of the external intestines, she performed the Signum Crucis. Avice knew that movement well, done deliberately to mimic the shape of the cross. Avice furrowed her brow as she watched Catherine. The woman blew her blonde fringe from her forehead before pressing her shaking fingertips there. She then touched them to her chest and brushed her hand from shoulder to shoulder, completing the ritual.

“A devil’s mark to be sure,” she whispered.

“A devil’s—” Avice looked down at the pale, cold infant in her arms. “Some babies are simply born too early, or maybe something happened to them as they came into the world.”

“I should tell the father.” Catherine looked down at her shivering sister.

Avice’s stomach twisted. “You will not,” she asserted, before looking down towards the weary mother. “We must have Goodwife Joan start her lying-in. Your sister needs to be helped.”

Avice always used the proper designation of ‘Goodwife’ for her labouring patients. It was a title earned by respectable, married ladies. For those that were obedient, submissive, and most importantly, produced children.

“I—”

“Goodwife Catherine,” Avice snapped. “You may either hold your niece while I attend to your sister or help your sister while I look after the child and tell the father.”

Joan moaned from the birthing chair. Her hair was plastered to her pale, white forehead. She blearily looked up at her sister, gaze unfocused, dark circles bagging her eyes.

Avice saw concern flash over Catherine’s face as she studied her sibling. The woman stuck her chin out, a grim determination set on her countenance.

Catherine nodded at Avice. “I will aid my sister, the Lord knows I have had enough of my own lying-ins to assist her. You…” – she glanced down at the bloody swaddle in the midwife’s arms – “…can tell the father.”

Anxiety clawed at Avice’s chest. Part of her had hoped that Catherine, bold as she was, would tell her brother-in-law of his daughter’s state. She was equally concerned about the condition of Joan. This birth was her first. It had been long and difficult. The young wife would need rest, with warmth and healthful foods to aid her recovery.

She remembered her lessons from her Great Aunt Agnes, which had included instructions about nutritious diets – the foods that peasant mothers would need to ensure their milk would come in and would assist their recovery.

Porridge. Broth. Meat. She repeated the instructions she had learnt over the ten years of tutelage. “A warm water wash. A fresh chemise and blankets. Lamb’s wool beneath Goodwife Joan to collect the birthing blood – it needs to be changed for a fresh one when it is soaked. For her meals, porridge with honey and broth from bones. Some meat and fish, slowly stewed, if it is available.”

Catherine had already begun helping her sister up from the wooden, birthing chair. Likely, it had been passed down through the women in their family for generations. A precious heirloom, where their ancestors had won or lost the battle of birthing over the turns of many seasons.