Chapter 13

The thing Apolline loved most about the forest was how alive it was – the breath of wind passing through the trees, the rain falling to nourish the ground, birds calling to one another, and animals living, breathing and dying. It gave her strength and life.

The seeds Apolline had planted when she and Gilles first arrived had produced a good crop of onions, spinach, carrots and sweet mangetout, which would be a welcome addition to the table during the long winter, aided by the little coin she brought in from her herb craft. It may be a hard life, but she had never felt more alive. She had been as good as dead in Lyon, where even her dreams had abandoned her. But here, she could finally breathe. Perhaps the first full breaths she had taken since she was a girl.

The forest had been good to them. She knew how to find edible mushrooms, roots and tubers to supplement the meat that Gilles caught – or scavenged. She flavoured the food with her herbs, knowing well which ones were best for food.

More and more people from the town and surrounding villages had been coming to the cottage for her skills since her and Gilles’s arrival months ago. It was both a blessing and a curse. Word of mouth could be a dangerous thing. All it took was one sullen wench or pox-ridden bastard to accuse her of causing their ills and it would be to the stake with her. She took extra care; she even turned some away. They didn’t all smell right. Corruption and rot had a particular stink, and she was good at sniffing it out.

Apolline and Gilles both stayed away from the town. They’d had enough of crowds, of people who stared at his size, at her strangeness. It was the desire for peace and solitude that had brought them together. They craved it.

At least, that was what she had craved until Sidonie Montot had come back into her life, with her golden hair and her yellow eyes, the scars she tried to hide. Scars that ran deep inside her, more than what was visible on the skin. Despite the years, Apolline had known her the moment she laid eyes on the woman who’d once been her childhood friend. In the time that had passed, Sidonie had grown, but she’d lost part of herself. No matter. What was lost could always be found. What was empty could be filled. And their paths would cross again. She knew it as surely as a bird could fly. After all, Sidonie had left her man in Apolline’s care. In truth, she could have taken the man with them to Dole. But Apolline had wanted a reason for Sidonie to come back. The man had been gone by the morning anyway – snuck out of the cottage without so much as a by-your-leave. She had sent Gilles after him, but his tracks disappeared by the road and Gilles knew he shouldn’t venture too far from the cottage.

Apolline had just returned from harvesting herbs when two men arrived on horseback, one old and one young, wearing the uniforms of gendarmes.

‘You live here?’ the old one called to her as they dismounted. He looked to be in charge.

‘I do.’

‘Is your husband here?’

The young gendarme gave her an appraising look. A familiar look. She lowered her eyes to the ground. Never give any sign of interest or they will take it as an invitation. ‘He’s out hunting.’

‘And what are you doing?’ he said, gesturing at the basket of herbs in her arms.

‘Making supper.’

‘Do you do anything else with those herbs besides cooking?’

‘Put them in the house. Makes things smell nice.’

‘I heard you dabble in some healing.’

She kept her face as still as possible. ‘A little. Don’t know much.’

The older man crossed his arms. ‘Gendarme Soret? What is it that Capitaine Vasseur said about the wise woman?’

‘He said she knew enough to heal a young man. That he would’ve died without her help, lieutenant.’

‘I don’t think I did much,’ Apolline hedged.

The lieutenant raised himself to his full height, for she was a tall woman, even though she hunched her shoulders to try and appear smaller, a habit drawn from experience. Make yourself small, not a threat, and they might just leave you alone. And pity the woman they come upon next.

‘Aren’t you scared, out here on your own?’ the lieutenant asked her.

‘My husband’s not far.’

‘Close enough that if you were to scream, he would hear you?’

A warning. She had to be careful not to provoke him. ‘Yes,’ she lied.

She’d felt the strings that held her cap tight against her head coming loose while she was out foraging. The lieutenant tugged at one of the strings now and pulled the cap from her head.

‘Well now, that’s interesting,’ he said, looking at the side of her head, at her missing ear. ‘You’ve got a past, haven’t you? Be careful, because your past will find you, no matter how far you run.’ He threw the cap at her feet. ‘Come, Gendarme Soret. Time to go.’

She kept her head down until they were gone. Then she picked up her cap, fetched her broom and swept the ground where they had stood and the tracks leading back to where they’d tied their horses.

‘My home, my land,’ she muttered over and over again until she’d swept away all trace of them.