Chapter Forty-Nine: Outside the Temple Precinct (Part II)

"Le Necropoli Vaticane".

Petro looked at Tsuga in complete and utter shock. "What?"

His stomach did a few odd things while his mind did somersaults. This was unexpected. He felt like everything he thought was true was false – Tsuga wasn't some sweet little priestess who had grown up protected by the temple, and she wasn't the hard-working, determined, but naively innocent young woman he had thought he had seen. She had done things she shouldn't have; and there was – or had been - a child, to prove it.

"Shh!" Tsuga said, glancing around the room. Fortunately, no one had noticed the two of them, sitting in their quiet corner. "Please, it isn't - it isn't something I like to talk about."

“Was that the other person – the other person, besides Flora Salix - that you loved but couldn't save?”

Tsuga nodded, then turned her attention back to her beer. Petro waited expectantly, waving one of the barmaids to come and refill Tsuga's mug when he realised she had set it down empty. He felt strange. Dizzy, maybe even a little nauseous – but his burning desire to know the whole story was stronger than his nausea. Tsuga sipped at the beer, then finally wiped the foam from her upper lip.

"It was one of those men I was telling you about. The ones who will give you somewhere warm to stay, and food to eat, if only you'll give them something in return. He was the only one, actually.”

Petro nodded, indicating to Tsuga that she should go on. If this story were true, at least there was only one man. That was easier to deal with than the alternative.

“I was - I was sixteen, and naïve, and hunger really does make you do things you wouldn't have dreamed of otherwise. My brother, who had raised me since I was small, had died in early autumn. I was alone, and hungry, and it was beginning to grow cold and – and I – I acquiesced. If I had only waited a little longer, maybe I'd have managed, somehow. After all, it was less than a year later the Florae found me, and somehow decided that I was clever enough to be useful to them. Clever enough and unhappy enough, perhaps."

Petro looked down at his mug of beer, shaking his head at the thought. She had been little more than a child, herself, then. And not really like the women he had wanted to visit. Those women were prostitutes, yes, but a prostitute was a businesswoman of a sort, and protected by the law. It sounded like poor little Tsuga had almost sold herself as a slave – she had catered to some man's whims in exchange for food and a roof over her head, without holding any rights of her own, as a married woman would. It was hard to imagine someone as determined as Tsuga being frightened and hungry enough to agree to that.

It occurred to him that, despite her past, Tsuga had still turned him down. Repeatedly. Even when his intentions had been totally and completely honourable. He frowned as jealousy hit him like a wave. But like a wave, the jealousy receded. She been desperate, and young, and foolish in her past. In the present she behaved, well, properly. He suspected the more grown-up Tsuga was as sensible and loyal as she seemed.

"But what - what happened to the baby? They didn't take him away from you, did they? The Florae, I mean?" He hoped that was what had happened. He didn't want to hear there was a child waiting for her somewhere in that temple complex. That would complicate things in a way he wasn't sure he was prepared to deal with.

Tsuga shook her head. "No, oh no. And 'she', not 'he. It was a girl. I would not have joined the order at all, if I had a child to care for. But no, she - she died.”

“Oh,” Petro said, his voice dull. 'Died' could mean 'abandoned outdoors and wasn't found quickly enough'. Or it could just mean 'killed'. He wasn't sure he wanted to know which it was. It was hard to believe that Tsuga would allow a child to be hurt – Petro's stomach ached, badly.

“Do you know the worst part?” Tsuga asked, apparently wanting to lay the whole story bare before him, “The worst part is, I didn't want her. The man who fathered her didn't want her either, of course. When I realised what was the matter with me, I laid down and I cried. I cried harder than I did when my big brother died. “

“You were unhappy.” Petro said, sounding stupid to his own ears, but unable to come up with something more coherent. His heart was pounding. Tsuga seemed not to notice.

“Even before I told the man, I knew he wouldn't want a child. And I was right. He threw me out. Immediately. So I was all alone. I thought that the baby was the cause of all my troubles, and in a way, I suppose she was."

Petro, his face pale, knew he had to ask.

"What did you do, Tsuga? Did you – you didn't hurt her, did you?" He could not bring himself to say 'kill'.

"No! How could you say such a thing? I loved her! She fell sick. It was autumn again by the time she was born. I thought to myself, that maybe I could do it, maybe I could manage. I would sell myself as a slave on the promise that the baby would be fed and remain free. I would run away and live like a wild goat in the mountains. I would manage to find a man who would take a woman with a baby that wasn't his. Something.” Tsuga took a deep breath, then continued.

“I would feed her, and keep her warm, and she would me, and everything would be all right. But she - she fell sick and she died. And I - I was alone again." Tsuga stared into her beer mug, her eyelashes glistening with unshed tears. She sniffled, twice, but did not cry.

Petro sipped his ale thoughtfully. Tsuga was a proud woman, one who didn't like to show weakness. She was only just managing to keep herself from crying over a loss that had occurred seven or eight years ago. And her silly plans sounded like the determined, gutsy girl he had come to know. He believed her when she said that she had loved the child. He felt relief wash over him, as Tsuga continued.

“I buried her, and I didn't – I didn't even have any little thing, an egg or what have you, to put in her grave. You're supposed to put something in a baby's grave. She has nothing to show the gods to prove that she was loved.”

Petro sat perfectly still, staring at the table top. After what seemed like an eternity, he came to a conclusion. He still liked this woman. All the things that appealed to him were still there. She was still cute and determined, hard-working, and good with children; and she was still that odd mixture of prickly and sweet. He had been willing to forgive her the man; he couldn't hold a long-dead child against her. Not when she had loved the child. And he felt badly for her – oddly protective, in fact, as though he could somehow fix things for her.

Petro sighed quietly, then said, "I'm really sorry, Tsuga. I wish it hadn't happened like that."

Tsuga shook her head, "I know I was an awful mother, but I - I miss her. I miss her all the time, and nobody knows and nobody cares. Which is my own fault too, of course - I never tell anyone about her."