Mama insisted the cardinal in the pine tree out front was my dead sister. I didn’t have the heart to tell her that girl cardinals were brown—not red. 

​

But it was this that she continued to insist as we sat in the snow, digging the remaining carrots from our garden. “Thea,” she went on, rooting her fingers into the cold ground and leaning on frail bones to catch a glimpse of the bird. “Thea, look how your pretty sister pecks at that tree.” 

​

I only glanced at the bird, praying none of the neighboring villagers were taking a stroll through the woods this afternoon. I didn’t need the baker or the merchant dragging my colorful mama off to a home. 

​

“Keep digging, Mama,” I said, turning over snow and grappling with the root vegetable that appeared in the wet soil. “The more we save, the more I can sell.” I wiped icy dirt onto my smock and moved on to the next root. 

 

Mama agreed, placing three shriveled carrots in our basket. Several more followed, and when the work was finished for the day, we sorted out the worst ones and made them into a stew.

 

As we cleaned up from dinner, Mama hummed a spring song from the Book of the Angels, no doubt believing it would bring the leftover carrots luck at the market tomorrow. The sound of scraping at the door ended her song before she could get to my favorite verse—a line low and quick, about foxes who waste none of their kill. 

 

Without pause, Mama wiped her hands on her apron and opened the old door, letting in a chill. She shivered but blinked into the darkness as the door creaked on rusty hinges. Mama’s face brightened. “Lovely evening, Good Lady,” she said, turning the door open wider. 

 

I moved around the table to see, peering around the dust-colored strands of Mama’s hair. A great creature of brown and gold stood in the doorway, flicking its ears but fixating on Mama. Its eyes found mine, amber, like the sun we saw less and less of these cold days. An elk. I’d seen plenty on my way to market, traversing the open ravines or calling across the shadowed greenwood, but none with such a steady eye. The elk grunted and shifted, showing off a swollen belly. 

 

Mama gasped. “Of course, you must be cold,” she said, pulling her own jacket from a hook beside the door and placing it around the animal’s shoulders. The elk relaxed and leaned on Mama. “Come in, Good Lady, and stay awhile.”

​

I could only stare as Mama helped the elk to the cobblestone fireplace, forgetting to bolt the door. I fixed it as she helped the elk lay on our woven rug. “Stay?” I echoed. 

​

“We are forgiven based on what we have given.” 

​

If she’d thought of it, I think she would have carved that phrase into the stone floor beneath us long ago. Fortunately, the Book of the Angels also says that permanence is impermanent, and to do so might have conflicted with the devout piece of kindling’s teachings. 

​

I crossed my arms. “And I suppose this pregnant elk is my dead father then?” I asked.

“No, Thea. Don’t speak nonsense. Good Lady has someone else’s eyes, just as that bird had your pretty sister’s eyes.” 

​

I didn’t like the idea of anyone but my sister having my sister’s eyes, so I didn’t press her about it. Mama took a seat beside the elk, brushing her fur and speaking to the animal as if she were one of the village garden ladies. With a glance at the elk, I brought Mama a cup of tea for her cough and then retired to bed, finding sleep as Mama sang the spring song to our intruder.  

​

When I came back from the market the following day, Mama and the elk were gathering herbs from what was left of the garden. Beside Mama’s trembling fingers, the creature pulled leaves with her teeth and placed them into the basket. 

​

“Has she not stayed long enough?” I asked Mama. The elk tipped her ears but continued to pluck leaves and place them carefully. 

 

“Good Lady may stay as long as she needs.” 

I pulled my shawl over my shoulders and blinked away new snowflakes that fell. There was no arguing. As long as the elk could contribute, she could stay. 

​

For a month, she did take part—the elk helped Mama and I pull the remaining root vegetables, and she carried them in bags on her back to the market. On the path home, I offered her the vegetables that didn’t sell, and in return, she pressed her warm nose into my hands. In the evenings, she helped set and clean the table, carrying our clay plates between her teeth and holding them under the pump to rinse. Too often, I hoped one would crack and give me a reason to send her away, but the plates were handled with more care than even Mama or I had. In return, the elk slept beside our fire with her ever-growing belly. 

​

But soon, she could no longer help, and as I took near-spoiled vegetables into town myself, the villagers whispered and pointed. Their words carried on the wind, as ugly and rotten as the goods I hauled:

​

“Her mother let a witch’s familiar stay in their cottage.” 

​

“No, you misunderstand, the beast is her mother.” 

​

“Poor girl, with a heretic for a mama.”

​

The vegetables did not sell. I carried them home in a new snowfall, slipping on ice all the way up the path. I returned to the cottage and replaced my cold, wet smock with a dryer one. The vegetables were frozen, but I cooked them silently, cursing the little red cardinal that landed on the windowsill beside the cooking fire. It pecked a tune on the warped glass, and Mama took a seat beside me on the stone floor, leaning her head on my calf and singing the spring song in a creaky voice as she twisted a set of cheap wooden beads around her neck. Her voice should have sent the cardinals and any other birds nearby into hiding, but like me, they didn’t mind it. 

 

When I finished the chore, I sank beside her and laid my head on her lap. She was warm, and my only thought was that there was no other place like this. Not in Mama’s Book of the Angels. Not in the world.

 

I woke the next day to a blanketed, angry sky. Mama and I spent the morning boarding up the windows and the evening huddled beside the fire with the elk, bundled in blankets and listening to the whispers of snow meeting the earth. Through the cracks in the wooden window boards, the snow reflected the light, still falling in tufts. Silence surrounded our cottage. The Book said snow was the feathers of angels gifting the world a night of beauty. I said I could have gone to market today. 

 

“Feeding three is hard enough,” I said as Mama leaned her head on my shoulder. The elk was asleep and we had our feet tucked under her warm belly. Between the cracks, the snow looked violet. “What will happen when we must feed four?” 

 

“We will get on.” Mama took my hand, entwining her cold fingers with mine. 

 

“How can you say that?” Tears pricked my eyes, but I wouldn’t let them fall. What a waste of water. “The animal must go.” 

 

“Thea.” She looked me in the eye. “We are forgiven based on what we have given. Even when we have little.” 

 

Mama read me and my sister the Book when I was eleven and Papa was still alive. Her voice was creaky—old, even then—and she sat with each of us tucked under one arm. Papa leaned on the windowsill, raising a skeptical eyebrow when she wasn’t looking, but closing his eyes to listen as she spoke all the same. I’d never heard even when we have little until now. 

 

The next several nights as the blizzard raged on, my dreams were warped and distant, and I woke several times to see the fire flickering, elks and cardinals dancing in the shadows. My pretty sister’s eyes winked at me. 

 

On the final night, I pulled off my blankets and stood. As Mama and the elk slept, I crept to the windows we’d unboarded that morning and stared at the layers of snow shining like glass under the moon. Mama might have prayed. I doused the fire and climbed back under the blankets. If the elk did not freeze before morning perhaps she would at least consider leaving for good. 

 

Mama woke me with cold fingers on my cheek. She blinked in the early light and coughed. My eyes found the window, looking out to where a little red bird sat in the snow. Beside the window and the unlit fireplace, the elk’s belly heaved under layers of wool blankets. 

 

I gasped, spinning out of my bed. “Did the elk sleep with your blankets all night?”

 

Mama gave a weak smile. “The fire keeps me warm enough.” Her fingers shook. “But tonight it went out.” 

 

I took her hands, trying to warm them, but she pulled away and went to the pot of leftover soup, heating it over the fire. She offered a bowl to the elk who only gave a concerned grunt. Mama set the bowl down and took an unsteady step. Her thin smock looked too big, her eyes and cheeks too sunken. I ran to her, but I was not strong enough to keep her upright myself. Good Lady turned out from her blankets, trotting to us on wobbly legs. Into bed Mama went, and I covered her with my own blankets as she shook. 

 

It was two days later, with the Book at her side and my hand in her hands, that she died. 

I did not go to market. I cooked what we had, and when my eyes turned fuzzy and my fingers slipped on the vegetable knife, Good Lady pressed her nose to the cut and grunted something soft. Something like a song. 

 

I sank to the floor and Good Lady put her head in my lap, not minding when I sobbed fat tears into her fur or choked out too many pleas to count. The cottage looked smaller. The snow outside melted, water wasted. My stomach raged and swirled like blizzard winds. 

 

Days later, Good Lady gave birth. I kept the fire going and brought as many towels and blankets as I could find. When all was done, Good Lady lifted the calf onto my lap and licked a tear from my eye. The cardinal at the window pecked a tune for the newborn. 

 

I took her into my arms, looked into my pretty mama’s eyes, and hummed a spring song.