Excerpt fromThe Beast Is an Animalby Peternelle van Arsdale
One
Nights were long for Alys.
And they were always the same.
Her mother washed her and dropped her flannel nightshift over her head.
She tucked Alys between linen sheets and under wool blankets that felt heavy on Alyss restless limbs.
Then came Alyss night-long entrapment by darkness and quiet and the absence of sleep.
Alys looked longingly after Mam as she left the room.
Alys imagined her father sitting out there, pipe in mouth, toes near the fire.
She could hear them breathing.
Mams soft sighs, Dads snores, a moan.
Alys was seven now, and shed been this way for as long as she could remember.
She dreaded the night.
If only she were allowed to get out of bed.
It was the knowing that she couldnt get out, that was what made sleeping so impossible for her.
Told to lie still and sleep, Alys felt the strongest urge to do exactly otherwise.
Her eyes instead flew open and stayed that way.
Alys could not do this.
Alys decided that this night would be different.
She would make the night her own.
She waited long after silence fell, just to be sure.
Then she dropped her feet to the cold wood floor.
She found her woolen stockings and boots, a wool overdress.
She was not a child who needed to be told what to wear.
Mam always told Alys that she was sensible that way.
Alys wasnt being sensible now.
This wasnt the wisest night for her to wander.
She knew this, and yet she couldnt stop herself.
Alys was sad about Mams chickens.
They were so sweet and warm in her lap, and they laid such nice eggs.
Alys had heard her parents talk about the farmer and his wife, the ones who were dead.
They lived way out on the edge of the village, nearly to the forest.
And then Dad said that just because you had married one witch, didnt mean you had married another.
Then Dad had given Mam a look, and Mam realized that Alys was listening, and well .
that was the end of that.
Alys, in fact, had never been afraid.
Her favorite nursery rhymes were the scary ones.
The ones about The Beast sucking out your soul and leaving behind nothing but gristle and skin.
Those were the ones Alys liked best.
The air was chill and moist and open around her.
And the sky, oh the sky.
It was awash in stars.
Alys looked up at the sky, felt lifted up by it.
Standing in Mam and Dads kitchen yard, Alys began to feel hemmed in again.
And she knew that through the darkness rose their neighbors houses.
And Alys knew where just such a field lay.
Her legs carried her through the dark.
She held her arms out to either side, felt the night air float over and around her.
She was alone but not lonely.
In she walked, feeling the long grass brush her skirts, scratch and tickle even through her stockings.
No longer could she feel any kind of structure around her.
When she reached the center of the field, she looked up again at the stars.
The sky was an endless bowl tipped over, the stars pouring down on her like grains of light.
She opened her eyes wide to take them in.
She felt them before she saw themthe women.
It wasnt that they made a sound.
But they did have bodies, she saw.
These women made of mud and leaves.
And still Alys wasnt afraid.
Alys had never seen women like these before.
They werent village womenat least not from any village that Alys had ever heard of.
They didnt even look like travelers.
Travelers were odd-looking sorts, but these women were odder.
They looked, it occurred to Alys, more like trees than women.
They were still girls.
Older than Alys, but maybe not so much older.
Not mothers, certainly.
What is your name?
Only one of the girls said it, and yet it seemed like both of them did.
Alys felt a kind of energy pass through her shoulders, a shivery thread connecting their hands.
Alys, go to sleep, the other said.
But no, Alys thought, that wasnt what she wanted.
She sent the curtain flying up again, opened her eyes wider.
But I dont want to sleep, Alys said.
There is no fear in this one, Benedicta.
The girl sniffed the air around Alys.
She had been sniffed by Gaenors dog just like that.
No, there is no fear, Angelica.
Alys had never heard those names before.
She thought they were beautiful.
And there was something beautiful about these owl-eyed girls, their long dark hair tangled with branches and leaves.
Then they left her.
Just as quickly as they came, the girls floated on.
