Excerpt: The Adventures at the House-on-the-Hill

Through the night sky a chill wind blew, carrying within it smells born of far away. Moist and rich were the immediate scents of the prairie-turned farmlands that surrounded the House-on-the-Hill, as the place was called. From further off were the smells of the open plains, reminiscent of great herds and dusty land. Breathe deeper still and the sharp, crisp air from the high mountains, laced with snowfields and great dark forests, can be found. On good days, when the wind is properly aged and strong, there is even the faintest hint of the tangy ocean breeze. Ofttimes, there would be even a little something mysterious, something never named, in the wind. If anyone had discovered what it was, they never told another soul.
The House-on-the-Hill was the only place this olfactory buffet could be sampled. Within the town, the air was ladened with the heavy smokes of hearth fires, the food baking in the shops, the exhaust from cars, the sweat and work and dreams of the townspeople. These were not bad smells, nor smells to be looked down on. They were as real as the faraway scents, just more commonplace, and so Lilith would sneak up to the House-on-the-Hill as much as she could to visit Lady Gerhauld.
Everybody called the owner of the House-on-the-Hill Lady Gerhauld. Not a soul in town, not even the Postmaster, knew her full name. Only a few of the oldest townspeople ever remember when someone other than Lady Gerhauld lived in the House-on-the-Hill. They spoke occasionally of Master Thompson, but their memories of him were few, because he'd passed on when the elders were only young children. According to them, a lawyer had come, handled all the affairs, and then closed the house for several years – anywhere from three to five, depending on who told the tale. Then the lawyer came back with Lady Gerhauld and she took up the residence and had lived alone there ever since.
She's been the sort who likes her privacy, the old folks had been saying to each other for years, but she's always been polite, Lady Gerhauld has, and pays her township dues and people fairly. In Narek, the measure of a man was taken by how he paid his township dues and treated his people. Some, like the mechanic Amit and Lady Gerhauld, were held in high regard, since they paid on time and always handled those in their employ honestly. A few like Bill Duane, the pawnbroker, who were constantly late with their dues and oft abusive toward anyone they viewed as subordinate, were shunned and treated as outcast. With a steady business as the only lender outside the bank, Bill was the only one who would likely stay permenantly, since most drifted out of town before three years passed in the face of such stigmata. The criticism of the locals had hardened him, though, and honed his natural bullying nature to a very high degree. People avoided him as best they could, but when they were down on their luck and the bank unable to lend them the money, they reluctantly walked into his shop and walked away easily owing him for the next ten years. He lived like a parasite, taking from the unfortunate then demanding it back without mercy. More than one family he'd driven out of business with his high interest rates.
The year Lilith's oldest brother Seth was born, there was heavy flooding throughout the lowlands and Lilith's grandfather, Bedros, had to borrow from Duane when his farm house was destroyed and his crop ruined. The entire family worked together to help pay Duane back, but still it was seven years after Lilith had been born before they repaid the debt. To earn money, they took various jobs around the town. Bedros's daughters Taline and Epona worked in the House, while their husbands Manus and Basir assisted in the fields. Epona, or Aunt Eppi, as Lilith knew her, had worked in the kitchen at the House even before the floods. Youngest of Bedro's seven children, Aunt Eppi had always been a bit different, more quiet and reserved than all the rest, a quality that served her well in the stillness that was the House-on-the-Hill under Lady Gerhauld's keep. She was by far Lilith's favourite aunt, and Lilith's mother Maeve had always hoped that her retiring nature would have some influence over Lilith.
Unfortunately for Maeve, Lilith grew to be as wild a child as imaginable, a trait Maeve never lost an opportunity to point out was inherited from her father Sevan. When not directly supervised, Lilith and her best friend Connor would roam the town, seeking adventure and excitement, frequently to the dismay of the elders. Their misadventures were legendary. No one could forget the time the devious duo had snuck into the belfry and set a rooster perched on the highest point, so that in the heart of downtown the morning was heralded by a racous crowing that upset the visiting dignitary. He'd spent the night drinking heavily at the tavern and was to conduct some important business with the Mayor that afternoon. Instead, he awoke to the racket with his head fit to burst and began bellowing like an enraged bull. This set off howling the pariah dogs, who set off the townspeople's own pets, which in turn awoke old Ivor, who thought the town was under some sort of attack or distress. Ivor set off the emergency siren, which woke all the outlying homes and drew in those people. The noise and light and excitement did nothing to help ease the dignitary's agony, and so the negotiations that afternoon went very poorly, to say the absolute least.
That was just one of Lilith's disaterous deeds, for she had many many more, alone and with accomplises. Her two older and one younger brothers occasionally got into to trouble, but Lilith seemed determined to make the most trouble possible in her short years. Maeve often lamented over the fact that her only daughter was wholy tomboyish, since Lilith cared neither a whit for the clothes she wore nor the condition of her own skin, which was frequently brown, not from the sun but rather from the layers of dirt and grime. Early on Maeve learned to never put Lilith in her best garments and let her roam free, even on holidays, because the wonderful clothes would be torn and filthy within minutes. Instead, Maeve practically needed a leash to restrain the impish child, and so holidays were met with fierce resistance and much anguish; tears, threats, and cajoling were required for something as simple as school pictures. Never mind the actual horrible holiday dinners, when the family would gather in Bedros's farmhouse for a night of good food and company. The fighting and stress preceding that most dreaded event, for Lilith anyway, would actually put the goats off milking and the hens laying.
Bedros lived not far from the House, some small ways north and east of it, closer to the river and the flood plains, if not precisely on it. When she turned six, Lilith discovered she could escape from the constraints of familial gatherings by dashing up to the House on whatever errands were needed for Aunt Eppi. Her message and errand always changed, but her instructions were oft the same: take this straight to the kitchen and tell Epona such-and-such and DO NOT BOTHER LADY GERHAULD, Lilith! For a over year, she never met or even glimpsed from a distance Lady Gerhauld. Connor and Lilith would have deep discussions whenever the rains came and trapped them. Their conversations would often go like this:
"What do you suppose the Lady looks like, Connor?"
"I've seen her, Lil; she's tall and important-looking, like a queen."
"How could you know! You've never have seen her!"
"Yes, I have! I saw her the time when we were running away from Maybell 'cause we'd let the snake go in her living room. You ran toward the stone bridge and I went through the alley by the post office and saw her going in there."
"Then why doesn't she come to town more? I bet she's horribly disfigured, with crooked arms and legs and a big fat wart on her face like a witch! She probably eats little kids and casts horrible spells. Curses like, that shrivel up your nose and bring the rains and stop the hens a-laying."
"Your Aunt Eppi says she's a real dignified lady and just likes her privacy. Says there's nothing wrong with liking a bit of quiet and peace."
"Yeah, well, Aunt Eppi is probably under her spell."
"Else your Aunt is just scared o' her."
"Aunt Eppi ain't scared of nobody! The Lady can turn people into toads, you know. Like the fat ones that live under the stone bridge."
For over a year, Connor and Lilith would pause here, considering.
"Those toads are probably out just now, you think?"
"Should be, by all accounts, Lil."
"I bet a big fat warty one would get Maybell really upset."
"My Gram says I'm to leave Maybell alone. . . Perhaps the Sarosh living room could use a toad."
"Well, they got that big old fish tank with only two fish in it."
"Those poor fish could use some company."
"I agree. I just hate to see anything suffering, don't you, Connor?"
"Yep, we'd be just cruel to let a poor critter suffer. Even fish."
Typically, Lilith and Connor departed then from their shelter, regardless of the precipitation. The only things that changed would be the animal Lady Gerhauld in theory turned people into, or else their intended victim or victims. No single household was safe from their "acts of kindness", except the House-on-the-Hill. Not a soul in town dared defile that sanctity, not even greedy Bill Duane. The church and mosque couldn't boast even of that record. Though infrequent, those buildings were pranked irreverantly, most times by Lilith and an accomplice. Through it all, the House-on-the-Hill was invoilate.
Which is not to say the children avoided it. The property was at the southern edge of town, surrounded by huge oaks with boughs spreading majestically over a leaf-strewn floor. Their domain seemed almost magical, with a glow of green light falling through the leaves to illuminate the shadowed ground clear of most brush save a few shade loving bushes that grew infrequently and produced strange and sweet flowers that grew nowhere else. Occasionally a beam of sunlight would break through, creating a brilliant gleam that dust specks and carefree children danced through. Birds called from the tree tops in the morning, but the afternoon was usually silent. Even Lilith and Connor spoke in hushed tones in deference to the dignity of this most sacred place.