Despite the Angels - By Madeline A Stringer Page 0,13
out of breath and slowed to a walk along the line where the sea met the land, so the waves washed over their feet. They walked for an hour, to and fro, talking of the future and their plans and hopes for their child: the ‘greatest goldsmith in Crete’. The fishermen, pulling up their boats onto the sand and sorting their catches, watched in amusement and called out ribald suggestions for the cause of such happiness. When Alessia told them the real news they shouted blessings and grinned to each other. Eventually Alessia and Danthys realised that they had been out a long time, so they held hands and ran back to the workshops, where Danthys pulled Alessia into his parents’ shop.
“Mother, Father! We have wonderful news! Alessia is to be a mother!”
“Oh yes,” rumbled Bullneck, “and how does that concern us?” Alessia looked at him, startled and anxious, but was relieved to see he was beaming all over his broad face and immediately swept her into his arms in a huge embrace.
“Careful, Father, you might squash my daughter!” said Danthys as he hugged his mother. Bullneck bent down, searching in a cupboard in a corner of the shop. At last he came out slightly out of breath but triumphantly waving a wine jar.
“Kept to celebrate the choosing of our cup, but we can get another one for that. Go and fetch the others, we must drink to this.”
So after pouring a small amount of the wine onto the feet of the statue of the Mother, to thank her for her blessing, the two families happily toasted the expected arrival.
Alessia moved to live with Danthys’ family a few weeks later, because a pregnant woman should be with her man and her mother. Danthys’ mother insisted that she was the nearest thing to a mother Alessia had in Malatos, although Alessia herself would have chosen Rasifi for the job. However, Danthys’ house was not far and his parents were welcoming. Alessia still worked with Mikolos and Rasifi, so she felt included and happy. She and Danthys spent all their free time together, discussing the future and telling each other how special they were and how no-one had ever been so blessed, so beautiful, so special.
Hetrion, with whom she had travelled from her home in the west, passed the town with his troupe of bull dancers not long after Alessia realised she was pregnant and sent a messenger into the narrow streets to find her. She ran out to the road to see him and asked him to bring the good news to her family, along with a gift for her mother, a ring of gold wire that she had made herself. Alessia made sure Hetrion knew how hard it was to make the wire, so he could explain to her family. Just before the midwinter festival he returned, going east once again to dance for the festivities. This time he had gifts for Alessia, some pottery cups and plates for the baby and some baby clothes, one with slightly haphazard decoration on it that she guessed to have been made by her tiny sister. She pressed him for news, but the stories made her sad, as she knew that it would be even longer now until she saw her own family again. That evening she sat a long time holding her pottery picture, wondering how much everyone had changed. Danthys sat with her, his arm around her waist, letting her talk about them all. Then he told her stories of his mother’s people, so far away in Egypt and he described a river so big it was as important as the sea. He promised to bring her and their child there some day, to take part in the dramatic ceremonies in the temple, as he had done.
Rasifi was beside herself with joy when her daughter Elena arrived with her family to visit for the Midwinter festival. It had been two years since Rasifi and Mikolos had seen their daughter and the grandchildren were grown ‘beyond recognition, you’re all such big little people’. Elena had married a farmer from the high plains, so they brought gifts of leather, wheat, apples and carrots. They had three children, one a girl just about the size that little Paslona had been when Alessia saw her last. Alessia loved the child immediately and played with her whenever she got the chance. One of Danthys’ sisters also visited with her husband and toddler. Alessia revelled in all