Free IGMS Issue 29 by IGMS Page B

really, but we don't often get it.
    He looks around the cabin while he pulls off his heavy coat and muffler, his hat and rabbit-skin mittens, and I can see that his pale eyes are sharp, missing nothing. They linger on J.R. for just a moment, but jerk back to me when I clear my throat at him.
    "Sorry," he says, a little abashed. "Never been out here before. I'm here to see the witch-woman."
    "Well, here we are," I say, just a little tartly. "What do you need?" Folks aren't expecting two girls well shy of twenty when they come here, that's fair enough, but there's no need to assume we don't know what we're doing.
    He takes the rebuke for what it is and acts mannerly again. "It's my wife," he says. "She's in a delicate way, and I want to be sure the birth is easy. We weren't expecting this one - thought we were too old for another - and the last one near killed her. I don't want my children motherless."
    I nod, because this of all things is a commendable reason to go to a witch-woman. "I've got some herbs that will ease the labor," I say, "and I can weave you a curse net to hang from the bedstead. Have you got a midwife who knows her trade?"
    "She lives in town," he says, and names a village two days' walk from here. He must love his wife, I think. "Don't know if she'll make it out to the homestead in time, come the day."
    "I'll teach you what I can," I say. "We've got some books and I've attended a few difficult births." I don't mention that I was twelve last time I did it, not even J.R.'s age, and only watching over Mama' shoulder. "Now, we ought to talk payment."
    He nods. "I've got a little cash, and eight yards of calico, and I brought a few jars of honey from our bees. That sound fair to you?"
    J.R. had nearly outgrown her summer dresses by the time fall set in this year, and I haven't had a new dress since I stopped growing. It's downright generous, is what it is, but I'm not going to argue.
    The bearded man, who gives his name as Tom Miller, helps me set up J.R.'s old truckle bed in front of the fire so he'll have a place to sleep tonight. He'll be scrunched up some, but I'm already sacrificing some of the quilts from J.R.'s and my pile, and not feeling more charitable than that. He offers to bring in some firewood and I let him, because that will give me time to weave his curse net.
    Mama's big chest of little drawers holds all sorts of things. Packets of herbs, sea glass carried far inland, bits of colored stone, twigs from rare trees. And commoner things, too: scraps of paper clipped from almanacs and catalogues, acorns, iron nails and eggshells.
    "What do you think, J.R.?" I ask her, and she tips her head to one side, considering. We make our selections carefully, thinking of the child to come.
    When Miller comes back in with the first load of firewood, I am sitting in Mama's rocking chair, my hands a tangle. J.R. is sitting on the truckle bed, sewing. "You didn't bring a lock of your wife's hair, by any chance, did you?" I ask. His hand goes to his chest, as if by instinct. "Got it in a locket, then? Or a luck pouch? Good. I only need a few strands, and some of yours. It's good to have both parents in the net - better protection."
    So far the net has leaves of chamomile and sage to ease the mother's pain, raspberry leaf and thistle for a quick and easy birth. There's a few bells, to jingle a warning if something's going wrong, and pictures of healthy children for encouragement. It looks like a crooked spiderweb in my hands, one with bits and pieces carefully knotted into it in place of flies.
    Miller fumbles with a leather cord around his neck and pulls a little leather bag out from under his layers of clothes. A luck pouch, then: backcountry magic, the kind of thing a wife puts together to keep her husband's fingers free of stray axes and his feet on the marked paths. He pulls out a lock of reddish-blonde hair and teases a few strands free. J.R. hands him her little sewing scissors to clip a few of his own. He