Aurora Wolf

Life’s Door

by Sue Babcock

 The door stood by itself in a warped doorframe between two large oak trees, hanging from one broken hinge. Gray weathered wood showed beneath flaking green paint; a doorknob, tarnished and covered with thick black grime, dangled from a rusty bolt. Red and orange leaves, swept by cold winds, drifted against it, burying it in an autumn splendor.

It called to her, a soft whisper beckoning, coaxing. “Sarah, come hither.”

She trembled. A door to nowhere. An echo of her life, cheerless from too many dead babies, old from a marriage withered and dry. Her husband’s image, back bent, face grizzled and gray, haunted her. A face once dear and sweet, soured by years and death.

She remembered the first time she ever saw Elijah. A tall man with a powerful chest and shoulders, in a pit pulling on one end of a saw at the local sawmill. Her shadow crossed over the pit beneath the log. He glanced up, never missing a beat, as sawdust trickled down into his eyes. Shaking his head and blowing the dust away, he continued to keep up his end of the two-man saw as he smiled and wink.

The vision grew faint as she looked around at the first flakes of snow, harbinger of another long winter locked in a single room with a man who resented her, blamed her for the six crosses on the hillside outside their door.

“Sarah, come hither.”

The images of home dispersed like the leaves scattered by winds and crowded against the broken door. She gathered handfuls, some freshly fallen, others dry brown, but most decomposed from unknown ages. Bugs scurried away as she disturbed their homes, and a mouse, its pink nose sniffing every waft of air, peered up at her from its winter nest. Ground squirrels bustled and scolded as she removed more leaves. The wind whistled around her and she pulled her coat tighter. She gathered and brushed until the door stood naked in front of her. 

Her hand, independent and willful, reached out, grasped the stub of the doorknob and pulled. Nothing. Her husband’s face again filled her mind. His hateful stare, the slammed doors, the eternal silences. Maybe this door would take her away from him forever.

Four year ago, she had been pregnant once more. Five previous babies lay buried under the snows by their cottage.

“Why do you even bother to try to carry it?” Elijah said. “The healer in town can give you something to end it. What’s the point anymore?”

She looked at him, her heart caught in her throat. She had always believed he wanted children as much as she did, but now she wasn’t so sure.

“It’s a baby, Elijah,” she said. “Maybe this one will grow and thrive. How can I throw away this chance?”

“You suffer through eight months of sickness, bed ridden, unable to stand, and it’s always the same. Get rid of it now.”

“I can’t.”

It had been as Elijah had predicted. In her eighth month, after five months of lying in bed, nauseated and dizzy every time she stood, horrible cramps racked her body. The baby, a boy this time, had been stillborn. She had named him Cionaodh, which meant fire in the lands of her ancestors, and buried him by herself alongside the other five. Elijah would not join her. The day after the burial, he moved a cot into the far corner of their cottage. He worked days, ate his suppers in silence and drowned his evenings in rum.

The memory stirred an anger festering inside. She kicked at the bottom of the door, swollen from winter snows, where it stuck in the frame. She tugged again. It opened with a groan and a creak. Sarah peered through the doorway. A dark forest spread before her. Gentle breezes, warm and welcoming on her frosty hands and face, murmured among the leaves high above her. The warmth drew her through the door, and once she stepped over its cracked and bent threshold, the door closed behind her. It faded away. Vanished.

She stood in a forest, letting the warm air and soft breezes caress her skin, skin that’d seen too many winters and too much work. Breathing in, sucking the nurturing air deep within her, she walked through the dark forest until she reached a road. Her stomach lurched at the sight before her. The grayness of the road, the blackness of flowers, grasses and rocks she blamed on the time of day.

But the grayness of the people, the dozens of people who walked the road, made her palms sweat and her mouth dry. Stifling a cry, she felt in her waistband for her hunting knife. Its bone handle and long steel blade comforted her.

Throngs of gray people stared at her. They studied her and glared into her eyes. Her muscles tightened as she kept her knife ready.

They crowded around her, poking at her and grabbing at her clothes. She beat at their hands, but more came until she could fight no more. They dragged her along with them, their eyes glowing white against gray faces. Frowns and clenched teeth surrounded Sarah. She covered her face with her hands, huddling into a tight ball, but they pull her hands away. The people spoke strange words. Yelled at her. They ripped her shirt and, their face inches from hers, screamed and shrieked.

“Who are you people? What do you want of me?” She screamed as they tied her hands with a leather thong, hobbled her feet and pushed and tugged her along the road.

A cage in their village became her home. The bars cold against her hot skin, black against the night; the cramped cage, one pace long, one pace wide, and only half her height, did not permit her to stand. It reeked of rotted food.

Late into the night people stared at her through the bars, a torch flickering dim white light just out of her reach. She huddled in the darkness as one by one, men and women, gray-skinned, gray clothed, passed by her, poking at her through the bars.

Alone at last, left behind like a vicious dog, the torch extinguished, she’d heard the door again.

“Sarah, come hither. Come hither. Come hither.”

Even as she gripped the bars, the whispers continued, shifting from soft and welcoming to urgent and brash.

“Sarah?” She started. This voice spoke from a few feet away. A thin voice, but it shattered the stillness. She peered through the bars. A slight figure shifted from foot to foot.

“Who are you?” Sarah asked. The figure froze and stared with large eyes blazing in white moonlight.

“Sarah?” it said.

She nodded her head. “Yes, yes, I’m Sarah.”

The small shape stepped closer. It tugged at something. The door to her cage sprung open.

She stepped outside, stretched her back and turned to thank her rescuer, but she was alone. Whoever, or whatever, it was had vanished.

Glancing at the dark, quiet village, she dashed through the blackness, back along the road. The only sound was the crunch of her shoe at they struck the dirt. Black trees towered over her, and blacker shadows shifted beside her.

The skies lightened, glowing white as a brilliant white sun rose, chasing dark shadows away. The road remained gray and the trees black. The whiteness revealed her blue dress and red apron. The only color in the landscape of black and grays and white.

Sarah heard the harsh hum surrounding her, washing over her.

“Come hither, Sarah, come hither, come hither.”

Two words, repeated until they echoed in her head. She pressed her hands against her mouth and then against her ears. The words would not stop. She peered between black trees and gray bushes. The door was invisible among the hues of gray, white and black that shaded the landscape. 

Around her, the gray grass rustled in the wind. Skies darkened, turning from white to deep gray, as clouds gathered and churned above her. Black trees, darker than the sky, concealed her from the glaring eyes of the people from the village.

As the clouds swelled and bloated overhead, she lurched ahead, searching the sides of the road for the door. The door that would take her back to her husband.

Did she want to go back? Back to a husband that never spoke, but had also never laid an angry finger on her. They had lived separate lives for over three years, ever since Cionaodh had been buried. She milked the cows, planted the tomatoes and cucumbers and corn. He walked two miles to town every morning, rain or shine, snow or wind, and climbed into the pit at the sawmill, relentlessly pulling at his end of the saw. She had seen how the people in town avoided him, crossed the street when he approached. She had watched him, surreptitiously standing behind piles of felled trees. He never said a word to his partner, a lean man working the upper end of the saw; he never stopped for a break except for five minutes to swallow a cold dinner. He would saw alone until his partner returned from his hot dinner with his wife and children.

How had she missed it? The dead babies had squirmed their way into Elijah’s mind. He was burdened with his own guilt for causing her pain and their childless home. Was he happier now that she was gone and he was freed from decades of worry and sorrow? Would he even want her back?

A sound from the direction of the road made her turn. Dozens of voices. Sticks beat the ground. Bushes rustled. Dogs barked.

She ran, ever deeper into the black forest. Gray light filtered through dark canopies of leaves. Gray plants. Gray berries on gray vines. Her heart hammered against her chest. She panted and gulped air. A flash of blue caught her eye. Her cloak. She’d taken it off when she’d passed through the door. She pushed her legs harder. It lay on the far side of a ravine. Skidding down the ravine, she slipped into a deep hole. Fingers clawed at the dirt, the steep walls, but she could not climb out. The dogs, louder now. The voices angry.

Sarah pulled her knife out as one of the gray men scrambled down the embankment. He raised his stick. Swung. It smacked across her head. The force threw her backward. The man stepped forward, lifting his club again. She gripped her knife and dodged, moving into his swing. The knife cut through his gray shirt and across his chest. Dark gray liquid flowed from a long gash. She lunged and thrust. It bit into his side. He doubled over and dropped his club.

A rope dangled in front of her. She looked up. The slight figure stood above her. Without hesitating, she grasped the rope and clambered out of the hole. Her cloak lay a few yards further but she still could not see the door.

Even as she spun around, the shape walked away from her.

“Wait, don’t go.”

The figure turned and looked at her. A young boy. She stared at his pointed ears, his shaggy hair, a mousy color as if brown had been left too long in the rain, and his faded green cloak, a green threatening to disappear into the grayness around them. Sarah gulped. She wrapped her hands across her chest, trying to control the hammering in her chest.

“What, who are you?”

A gray-blue light shone deep within unblinking eyes. “Fionnlagh. I’m the guardian of the rainbow. But centuries ago, it dried up and the wind blew it under the door. Soon, I will be like the humans here, colorless and angry. I need you to open the door, to let our rainbow back in.”

“What about the world on the other side of the door? Will it become like this?”

“It has its own rainbow. My brother Cionaodh guards it.”

A cry caught in her throat at the mention of the name of her last baby. “Why me?”

“My brother is not your Cionaodh. My brother, like me, has been in your world for decades, ever since the rainbow first appeared. But the name was what made me sure you were the one.”

“I will try,” she said. “Where is the door?”

He pointed and Sarah turned. A rectangle of gray appeared out of the mist of blackness. Tugging at its doorknob, throwing her entire weight against its stubbornness, she swung open the rough grey wood panel.

Color flooded the doorway, a tidal wave threatening to sweep her away. Sarah jumped back. Trees turned brown and green, flowers bloomed in yellow and pink and purple. Gray washed from the grasses as greens and yellows spread over the forest floor. As Sarah watched, the color cascaded over the small elf; brown in his hair intensified, his green cloak glowed with the color of emeralds. The surge of color expanded until it touched the sky, scattering gray clouds. A blue so bright it hurt her eyes stretched beyond her sight.

“The door said you’d come, sooner or later.” Fionnlagh walked towards her. “Others have come through the door, but not for a century or more. The grays confused them, drove them mad. They did not survive. The door said you would never survive either, would never return with our rainbow. I knew you were the one, though.”

“Sarah, come hither, come hither.” Each repetition was more urgent than the last.

The elf took Sarah’s hand and led her back to the door, now gleaming the same emerald green as the elf’s cloak in the golden sunlight, as a throng of people approached. Their eyes wide, they stared at her and at the door and the world around them.

She hesitated. The warm air and gorgeous forest charmed her. She no longer feared the pale, tall natives here. With Jason’s help, she could learn their language, live among them. Could she return to Elijah and his silence? She knew the answer before the question finished forming. She could not abandon her babies. She could not give up on Elijah.

She stepped over the threshold and the door shut behind her. Winds howled, the frigid air slammed into her. A voice, this one deep and familiar, resonated through the forest. “Sarah, where are you?”

The wind whipped her long dress around her legs as she stumbled towards the sound.

“Please, Sarah, come home.” His voice sounded far off and raspy, as if from yelling too long and too loud. As if exposed to cold and wind for hours.

Even as she struggled forward, her husband, a thick woolen blanket wrapped around broad shoulders and a straight back, appeared out of the murk. She paused, studying him. A fire burned in his once-faded green eyes, his face glowed pink from cold, worry-lines riddled his brow. He held open the blanket, welcoming her with his warmth.