First lessons Read online

  A Medieval Tale—First Lessons

  Lina J. Potter

  Translated by Elizabeth Adams

  Copyright © 2017 Litworld Ltd. (http://litworld.com)

  All rights reserved.

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  Contents

  Contents

  Prelude

  What does it mean to be happy?

  Chapter 1

  Secrets and Lies

  Chapter 2

  Growing and Learning

  Chapter 3

  Threats and Promises

  Chapter 4

  Determination and Discovery

  Chapter 5

  Pain and Gain

  Chapter 6

  Truth and Trust

  Chapter 7

  Plans and Needles

  Chapter 8

  Potions and Plantains

  Chapter 9

  Plots and Priests

  Chapter 10

  Hearth and Home

  Read the whole series…

  Book Recommendations

  Prelude

  What does it mean to be happy?

  Aliya stood on the train platform waiting for her parents. Her suitcase, full of presents for them, was pleasantly heavy in her hand. She didn’t care that she’d had to work nights as a janitor in a supermarket in order to earn money to buy those presents. Any job was a good job, even if it didn’t pay much.

  For Aliya, happiness was going home to the small town where she grew up. That might not be enough for some people, but it was enough for her.

  Aliya’s father was an officer in the army, and her mother was a nurse. They had traveled from base to base, raised Aliya, and finally settled in the small town she called home. Aliya’s mother, Tatiana, put her heart into her profession and taught her daughter to love it, as well. Aliya had chosen to go to medical school and was in her fifth year of training to be a surgeon specializing in abdominal surgery. When she finished, she planned to live and work at the military base where her father was posted. Her goal was to graduate and gain some experience before returning to her hometown. She liked it there. She also liked Alex, a handsome officer she was looking forward to spending the rest of her life with.

  Aliya had a printout of her grades—all A’s—folded in her purse, and she had just recently assisted with her first operation. According to the rules, she wasn’t far enough along in her program to operate, but the surgeon kept a close eye on her, and the operation was a success. It was just a case of appendicitis, but she was proud of herself and couldn’t wait to tell her parents.

  She kept an anxious eye out for her father’s old car, which soon enough came around the corner and parked. Her parents jumped out, and Aliya was hit with a wave of familiar joy. She was alive and healthy, and with the two people she loved best of all, and they were alive and healthy, too.

  ***

  A quarter of an hour flew by before Vladimir was able to get his wife and daughter back in the car and turn the wheel toward home. Their overwhelming joy was interrupted halfway home when a large truck came roaring over a hill in the middle of their lane. Vladimir swung the wheel to avoid a collision and would have managed it if another driver hadn’t stopped in the same spot on the shoulder to send a text just two hours before. That car left behind a large puddle of oil that sent their car skidding. It flipped several times before hitting a tree.

  A last, despairing thought shot through Aliya’s mind, Is this it? I don’t want to die! I want to live! Then everything went dark.

  ***

  With only the full moon for light, an elderly woman picked her way through the strangely quiet forest. She wore roughly made wooden shoes and carried a large basket.

  In the moonlight, tree branches seemed like monstrous claws, and an owls’ hooting filled her with blind fear. But the darkness did not dissuade her; she knew where she was going.

  Finally, she reached a small hut in the center of a clearing. Cheery in the daytime but in the moonlight, the stream running by the hut became the river of the dead, and the garden seemed bare and empty. To the woman’s eyes, the door to the hut looked like the jaws of a beast.

  She took a step forward. There is no way back, she thought, scratching at the door.

  Several minutes passed before it opened, and an old crone—like a fairytale witch—appeared in the doorway. Her gray hair fell uncombed around her shoulders, and a wart sat on her chin. Her once-white nightgown was dirty and patched. But it was her black eyes that distracted the old woman. They were bright, intelligent and surprisingly youthful, Like the eyes of a young girl, she thought.

  “What do you want?”

  The woman offered her the basket. “This is for you.”

  “I asked what you wanted.” The crone made no move to take the basket. From out of nowhere, a large, white cat appeared at her feet, rubbing against her legs. It looked up at the woman with red eyes. In the wavering light from the hut, the cat seemed like an evil spirit that had come from hell to take her soul.

  She did not retreat. “I want you to help My Lady.”

  “Help her? How?”

  “You know all about it, Moraga. Lady Lilian has been in a bad way for three days now. Her childbed fever will take her to her grave. The doctor came and gave her a cleansing and let her blood, but the fever won’t let go. I don’t want her to die.”

  The old witch shrugged. “But what does your lady wish for?”

  “She wants to die.” The woman looked down. “I know she does, but I…”

  The witch’s face softened. “I understand. Even with all her faults, she’s like a daughter to you. You love her. Let’s see that basket.”

  “Yes. And this.” As the woman took a purse from her belt, something in it jingled. “This is also for you.”

  “Good.”

  The witch didn’t bother to look at her fee. She put her hand under the woman’s chin and lifted her face so she could see her eyes.

  “I will give you something—something strong. You will mix it with milk and give it to her to drink. Then, you’ll need to sit by her bed and call her by name or call her by the name you used for her when she was small. Talk to her about anything, but keep talking. If she decides to live, she will come back to you.”

  “What if she doesn’t?”

  The corner of the witch’s mouth twitched. “My remedy can bring a soul back into the body, but it won’t work if the soul doesn’t want to stay. Do you understand?”

  The woman nodded.

  “It all depends on you. If you get through to her, she’ll come back. Otherwise, she’ll be gone forever, and nothing will help.”

  The woman nodded again. “I will do it.”

  “Then wait here; I’ll bring you the remedy.”

  The witch disappeared back into her hut, leaving the woman on the step. She was still afraid of the forest noises and the trees stretching out their claws to her, but she waited for the medicine, thinking of the walk back through the forest.

  When I get home, I will do everything as the witch instructed. I don’t want to lose my girl. I will call her name—Lilian, Lily, Baby. She’ll come back to her old nanny. She just has to.

  Chapter 1

  Secrets and Lies

  The first thing Aliya felt was pain.

  And the second.

  And the third.

  Then she opened her eyes. The face hanging over her g
ave little cause for optimism. She doesn’t look like a nurse. Aliya closed her eyes. She remembered the car flipping, the sound of her neck snapping. I ought to be in the hospital, she thought, knowing it would take at least a year of rehab to get back on her feet.

  That means putting off my residency. She had been looking forward to it, especially since they had promised her a rotation in trauma. I’m probably in the trauma department now—as a patient.

  She opened her eyes again. Why is there a dusty pink rag hanging over my head? And who is the lady with no teeth who keeps bending down over me? Is she asking me something?

  “Has My Lady come around?”

  The woman’s breath was so vile that Aliya groaned and lost consciousness again.

  ***

  She felt a little better the second time she opened her eyes. She still hurt all over, but the pain was less. Aliya couldn’t understand why her pelvis ached so badly after the car accident. She remembered hitting her head but nothing that would have caused injury to her lower half. But who knows? Maybe I have a fractured pelvis. It hurts, for sure.

  The dirty pink rag was back above her head. The room stank of smoke and feces, but she didn’t feel like fainting again…yet.

  Aliya looked around the room, and what she saw made her doubt she was in her right mind. She must have hit her head so hard that she was hallucinating.

  She lay on an enormous bed in the center of a large room that had to be at least as big as her parent’s entire apartment. On one side of the room, a window showed her the forest beyond. On the other side, stood a massive set of wooden wardrobes, and in front of her bed, she saw a magnificent gilded door. Everything was pink. The walls were covered with fabric in a sickly pink color with huge gold flowers the size of cabbages. The curtains were a happy shade of piglet. The wardrobes had been clumsily painted the same shade of pink with gold accents. The room was furnished with a writing table the color of a robin’s breast with roses painted up the legs, as well as several armchairs, upholstered in the same fabric that was on the walls, and a couple of large vases full of live roses. Topping it all off—literally—was a dusty pink canopy, complete with gold bows hanging over the bed.

  It’s the perfect room for an unhinged Barbie doll. Aliya saw pink circles swimming in front of her eyes, but fainting wouldn’t be so easy this time.

  “My Lady!” The same face appeared again.

  Aliya pulled together what strength she had left and breathed out a question. “Where am I?”

  The words came out like “E… a… I?” It was a terrible attempt, but it was all she could manage.

  Apparently, the nurse’s aide (Who else could she be?) took that as permission to speak, and burst out, “My Lady, how glad I am that you’ve come around! You’ve been lying here three days. The healer came and said not to touch you. She said that your body would fight off death if it could. Otherwise, it would be your fate to follow your little one. Childbed fever has taken many women. We were afraid that the malady would get you, but we prayed hourly. With the Lord’s help, you’ll be back on your feet in no time. Would you like a sip of water?”

  A giant cup made of a yellowish metal appeared under her nose. Could it be gold? Red stones glittered around the edge of the cup.

  Aliya felt like a malfunctioning computer. Without thinking, she put her lips to the cold metal and took a sip. The water was delicious, and it was cold. Tasty, clean water without a hint of chlorine. It seemed to have been mixed with something like a cheap, boxed wine.

  What is happening to me? Aliya was afraid to ask questions. As a doctor in training, she knew there were times that demanded action and times that required silence. Holding your tongue was always a good idea; she knew that for a fact. You’re never sorry for the things you don’t say.

  Instead, she closed her eyes and frantically tried to think. Whatever else they have done to me, the gods have not deprived me of my ability to think.

  She pushed to remember more of the accident. The truck was the last thing she saw. Her father yelled, then something hit her head, and her neck snapped. Then everything went black.

  There was something in the darkness with me, but what was it? She didn’t know. So, she began analyzing what she had learned from the nurse’s assistant.

  My Lady. She was obviously talking to Aliya, but ladies were all done away with in 1917, which was a mistake in Aliya’s opinion. She would have to think about that later. For now, she was a Lady. Where in the world do people still talk like that? She had no idea.

  She refocused. You’ve been lying here three days. After an accident like that, Aliya wouldn’t be surprised if she’d been lying on her back in a coma for twenty years.

  The healer had been there. What the hell kind of facility has healers instead of doctors and nurses? Even if I were in Africa, there would be Red Cross doctors, and this doesn’t look like Africa. It’s too cold, and the sky outside is gray. Healers aside, why did they wait for me to fight off my “malady” in the age of antibiotics? You just give your patient a mega-dose and watch the bacteria die off.

  And what did the woman say about a little one? Did she mean a baby? Aliya had only slept with Alex a few times over the holidays, and they had been extremely careful. She wanted to finish medical school, and he was expecting to be promoted to major, so they wouldn’t get married until they reached those targets. Plus, she had had her period several times since then, right on schedule. I would know if I were pregnant. So what “little one” is the woman talking about?

  However, if she’d given birth that would explain the severe pain around her pelvis. But how is that possible?

  Aliya had two imaginable explanations for everything. The first was simple. She walked away from the accident, got married, got pregnant and gave birth, and now, because of the stress of postpartum fever and clinical death, she had forgotten everything since the accident and would have to start all over again.

  There was a second explanation, but it seemed beyond belief… Her roommate at medical school was a Tolkien freak. She was into role-playing games and believed in parallel worlds, and her half of their room was littered with fantasy books and posters. Aliya knew how Ella would have explained these strange circumstances.

  She would say I’m in a parallel world and have to find my way back. Aliyah shuddered at the thought. It defied all the logic instilled within her. And besides, if I am, indeed, in another world, I’ll probably never find my way back! I’m much more likely to die a rapid death without antibiotics. Everything in this room is a potential germ factory—by the looks of it, the fancy cup I just drank out of has never been washed, and the old woman hasn’t seen a bath in her lifetime.

  In the end, Aliya decided not to say anything. That seemed the safest course of action. She remembered the Inquisition. Those priests would have known exactly what to do with visitors from other worlds. They’d test her to see if she was an associate of the devil, and that meant going for a swim with a heavy rock tied around her neck. If she managed not to drown, then she was guilty, and the devil had helped her. And if she did drown, they’d say, “Too bad, she must have been innocent. Let’s pray for her soul and thank God for knowing best.” Fun times all around.

  What if this is all a bad dream? Aliya didn’t want to drown or be burned at th stake, even in a dream—even as an act of faith. She didn’t care what world she was in or what planet it was or what century. Judging by the fact that there are no mirrors, it has to be no later than the 15th century. She didn’t care about anything but her health. She needed to sleep and get her strength back.

  Sleep. Aliya gave a deep sigh and started counting sheep. She was asleep by the time the sixteenth sheep jumped the fence.

  ***

  Aliya got her second shock when she woke again. After she opened her eyes, she drank some water and realized she needed to pee. Her trusty nurse, who stank worse than ever, pulled back the blanket and stuck some kind of medieval pot under her patient.

  Aliya was about t
o protest until she caught sight of her body. That. Is. Not. My. Body. Her whole life, Aliya had had dark hair, olive skin, and gray eyes, and she’d never been over a size 8. Which is a perfectly average size when you’re five and a half feet tall. But instead, lying on the sheet, which should have been washed a month ago, was a doughy, fair-skinned body that looked like it took a size 16 or more. The body’s dirty nightgown had ridden up, and she saw that she was a natural blonde.

  Aliya fainted dead away, but that didn’t keep her from peeing in the pot.

  ***

  When she opened her eyes again, the sun was up. She still felt awful. Her mouth was dry, and her head ached. She felt nauseous. And she preferred not to think about her perineum. If she had, in fact, given birth recently, the baby must have been a giant porcupine.

  Someone was holding her hand and talking. “…Visa Hadson’s ewe threw a two-headed lamb. The medicus, the same one who came to see you, went to look at it and said that he would stuff it and send it to the King’s Museum of Curiosities. By the way, he promised to check on you today. Oh, please don’t die, my girl! Just don’t leave me! I nursed you and carried you in my arms and raised you, and I raised your father, too! You’re all he has, his only flesh and blood. And you’re all I have. I know you want to go back to the earth as your mother did, but he won’t survive without you. Your husband may be an earl, but he’s a villain! Here his poor wife is on her deathbed after trying to give him a child, and he’s back in the capital carousing with whores. I steeped a piece of gold in holy water for you so that you’d be even more beautiful after giving birth. Please get better, my precious angel! I can’t stay here without you! Who would look out for me if you weren’t here?”

  The woman’s words dissolved into unintelligible muttering.

  Aliya didn’t know anything about a Visa Hadson, but she assumed it was a person. She (or he) has a sheep, which makes her (or him) a person, right? The medicus (Is that a colleague? Why “medicus” instead of “doctor”?) is planning to stuff it and send it to the King’s Museum of Curiosities, which makes no sense because if I’m still in Russia where I belong, there have always been tsars instead of kings.