The Ice Swan by J’nell Ciesielski

Svetlana eyed the bundles of laundry stacked in the corner of the cramped hovel and tried not to breathe through her nose. A cauldron bubbled over a fire in the center of the room, its pungent smoke wafting through a hole in the thatched roof.

“’Tis the peat that be givin’ off the smoke. Best not to keep yer eyes open too long without a blink, aye.” Mrs. Douglas, mistress of the hovel, busied herself at a rickety table set near the middle of the room. A plain woman with dark hair streaked in silver and creases lining her face, she wore the expression of a hard life, but she couldn’t have aged past forty.

“I have never heard of this peat. Is it common to Scotland?”

“We’ve it all over here in the bogs. All the dead ’uns scamperin’ or growin’ round get compressed right down together and sealed in tight with water, so they do. Good for heatin’. Burns long too.” Mrs. Douglas poured water into a teacup and stirred it with a wooden spoon. “Me man cuts peat for the distillery near Bothwell. Or did afore the war took his hand. They give him work when they can, but who be needin’ a one-handed man for cuttin’ and stackin’?”

“Too many of the returning soldiers find themselves in similar circumstances.”

“Aye. Go off to fight for king and country, they do—only their country canna use them no further when they get home. What thanks is that I ask ye after what they sacrificed?” Placing the cup and saucer on a wooden tray, Mrs. Douglas brought it to where Svetlana sat on a bench, the only seating in the room besides the bed crammed against the far wall. “Drink that right down, Yer Grace. Warm ye up, it will.”

The lady hadn’t poured a cup for herself. The few pieces of mismatched bowls and plates sitting on a shelf behind the table suggested the teacup was the only one of its kind in this humble abode. Though chipped on one side, great care had gone into painting little purple flowers on the sides.

“What beautiful artistry.”

Pink brightened Mrs. Douglas’s rough cheeks. “Me mam was fine with a brush. A real talent she passed on to my lassies.”

Svetlana took a sip of the tea. Mrs. Douglas hovered anxiously. Svetlana swallowed and forced a smile so as not to insult her gracious hostess. “What an unusual flavor.”

“’Tis heather. Same as painted on the cup. A great many uses here in Scotland.”

Svetlana took another polite sip. It wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t the sophisticated Russian taste she was accustomed to. Like so many other things, it was a difference she needed to learn and accept if she had any chance of being received in the community.

“I find myself amazed at the never-ending resourcefulness of the Scots. Russians tend to limit our creativity to music, dance, and architecture.”

“Been an age since anyone had reason to dance ’round here. Too busy survivin’. ’Twas lucky enough, I was, to take on extra services as a laundress.” Mrs. Douglas hooked her thumb at the piles of laundry. “And me man returned. Not all the wives can say as much.”

“Are the widows able to find work?”

“Some, aye, but not enough for the little mouths they need to feed. Many of them were forced to be givin’ up their jobs to the returnin’ men. I suppose ’tis the way, but some of the lasses don’t want to be returnin’ to the kitchen now they’ve a taste of the freedom.”

“It sounds as if they need opportunities to earn their own way. Especially if they are left as the sole provider for a family.”

“Aye, but take Katie MacKinnon livin’ three doors down. Her man came back, or what’s left of him, and now she’s tendin’ the bairns and him. Savin’ every coin she can to pay for his medical bills whilst hirin’ herself out as a scullery maid down at the pub.”

The back door banged open and in shrieked a pandemonium of four dark-haired children under the age of ten. Like hounds to the scent, they rounded the table and fell on the gift basket Svetlana had brought.

“Out, ye wee rascals! None of that for ye at the now.” Mrs. Douglas tried to shoo them away, but the children ignored her as they tore into wrapped sweets.

“What’s this?” The smallest girl with a long plait swinging down her back held up a wrapped parcel of cookies.

“Russian sweets. Tea cakes, pastila, khvorost, and sushki. Mrs. Varjensky, a lady who came with me from Russia, made them. No heather, I’m afraid.” Svetlana rose and joined the children at the table. She lifted out two small jars filled with pastes. “She’s also a skilled healer. I don’t recall what she mixed these with, but the green is for cuts and bruises, and the yellow is for headaches and fever.”

Tears shimmering in her tired eyes, Mrs. Douglas took one of the jars as if it were a golden scepter. “Thanks be to ye, Yer Grace. And thank Mrs. Var . . . Var . . .”

“Varjensky.”

“Aye, be thankin’ her too. We ain’t never had anyone think of us like this.”

“You are most welcome. Now, I must be going as I do not wish to take up any more of your valuable time.”

“Blessed me. To think I’ve had a real princess in me home.”

“I do hope you’ll allow me to come again.”

“Our door always be open to ye and yers.” The woman wobbled into a curtsy and flapped her hand at her children for them to follow suit. It wasn’t protocol, but Svetlana returned the gesture. Mrs. Douglas deserved it and every other recognition for her stalwart perseverance.

Svetlana stepped outside, grateful to breathe fresh air void of smoke once more. Wynn rounded the corner with a lanky man missing his left hand. He could only be Mr. Douglas.

“I’ll send a few men over on Tuesday to get that barn wall repaired,” Wynn said. Dressed in high boots and tweed trousers, he looked like he’d been wading in muck. “The hole is big enough for the cow to slip through.”

Not a large man by any measure, Mr. Douglas swelled with pride, bringing him nearly to Wynn’s towering height. “Appreciate yer help, I do, Yer Grace, but I can manage without troublin’ ye.”

“It’s no trouble. You’re a good tenant, as was your father before you. We take care of our own.”

Such a good man. Always seeing to the needs of others and never making a promise he didn’t keep. The honesty of his heart was a thing of unfathomable beauty. He had the intellect, wealth, and station to use those beneath him to elevate himself as so many of the so-called nobles did. Not Wynn. He shunned the pretentiousness of titles in favor of doing good and what was right. Even marrying a runaway princess when she had nothing to offer in return. Thank goodness for his stubbornness in pursuing her. She hated to think where she’d be without him.

One of the children, the older boy who looked to be around nine, streaked out of the hovel and planted himself in front of Wynn. Barefoot with dirt smearing his round face, he didn’t appear the least bit fazed to be standing in front of a duke.

“I heard ye fix broken men.”

Wynn squatted so he was eye to eye with the boy. “I do my best.”

“See lots of blood?”

Mrs. Douglas gasped as she hurried out to join them. “Charles Edward Stuart Douglas. There’s nay need for such talk.”

Wynn leaned closer to the boy. “Plenty, but it’s not good to talk about in front of the womenfolk.” He caught Svetlana’s eyes over the top of Charles’s head. Humor flickered in his eyes for a moment, then lost to a sweep of sadness. Though he’d never mentioned it after their departure from Glasgow nearly a week ago, Harkin’s ghost seemed to haunt him.

“Are ye goin’ to help my da?”

Mr. Douglas grabbed Charles’s shoulder and shuffled him away. “That’s enough, lad. No impertinence to His Grace.”

“I wasn’t pertinentin’.” Charles swooped under his father’s arm and stared at Wynn. “He lost his hand fightin’ those Hun. Can ye give him a new one?”

“I’m afraid that’s not my field of specialty—” Wynn worked his jaw back and forth as if trying to decide how much medical information to pass on to a nine-year-old. Standing, he ruffled the boy’s hair. “Never say never.”

The Douglas family waved goodbye as Svetlana and Wynn rode off in the back of their chauffeured Renault motor car. Wynn absently tucked a wool blanket across her lap before turning to gaze out the window at the bleak landscape. Hills rolled by in winter colors of gray, brown, and frozen green as the reluctant sun did little to grace them with its warmth.

“These war wives and widows feel displaced now that the fighting has ceased. A circumstance I all too well understand.” Svetlana angled the fox fur trim of her coat out from underneath the blanket so it wasn’t crushed. “The armistice may have been signed months ago, but these families are still fighting the repercussions. War has dictated their circumstances, and they must find new ways to survive. I should like to help them.”

“Hmm.” Wynn continued to stare out the window. His long, capable fingers tapped against a dried patch of mud on his knee.

“Perhaps a teaching center where they might learn useful skills or trades outside the home, but then who would care for their children when they’re not at school?”

“Yes, good idea.”

“The other issue is leaving behind these jobs for days at a time because the only medical help to be found for the injured men is in the larger cities.”

“Hmm.”

Svetlana plucked at the tassels dangling from the edge of the blanket. “Mrs. Douglas gave me an interesting cup of tea. Heather, she said. I believe it’s making me sprout a horn. Like a unicorn. Is that common, being the symbol of Scotland and all?”

“Hmm, yes.”

“Wynn!”

He turned to her, eyebrows raised as if he’d been caught off guard. “Did you say something?”

“Yes, but you haven’t heard a word. Where are you?”

“Sitting next to you in the back of the auto.”

“Mentally you are somewhere else. Have been since Glasgow.”

He flinched, pain washing across his face. If only she could draw it out of him like he did so many times for those hurting. Slipping off her glove and the vulnerability it sheathed, she reached across the distance between them and took his hand. The coldness in her fingers was lost to the warmth of his. How simple a thing touch was, often shared by those wishing to establish a connection. She’d never understood the need for such unseemly indulgences and thought them best left to those of weaker character. She prided herself on solitary fortitude where everything was self-contained. She had been in control, but she had been alone. Holding Wynn’s hand, she was no longer alone. She was exposed and unprotected, but he engendered trust and faith. She would gift him the same.

Curling her fingers around his, she drew his hand to rest on her lap. “Is it Harkin?”

He jerked as if the name were a needle to him and tried to pull his hand back. She held it tighter.

“Please tell me.”

His jaw worked back and forth as he pondered his response before discarding it to consider another. “It’s never easy to lose a patient.”

A carefully selected reply that answered without answering her. Very unlike Wynn. He customarily charged into statements with the confidence of a prima ballerino on center stage.

“I imagine the sadness stays with you forever. I know you did everything you could to help him, but the control of some things remains beyond our grasp no matter how much we wish it otherwise.”

“Your faith in me is touching, though a bit off base in this case.”

“Tragedy often shakes our confidence. Once you start your work at Glasgow Hosp—”

“Glasgow Hospital has decided not to expand their cardiology department. They don’t want their sterling reputation besmirched by questionable practices.” Taking his hand from hers, he crossed his arms over his chest. With the added layers of winter clothing, his breadth was twice as large and doubly formidable. To all but Svetlana. She saw the tucking in of himself to a defensive position after having his pride pricked.

“Oh, Wynn. I’m so sorry. How terrible for you and how shortsighted of them to deny people the advancing treatments they need.”

“You sound like you’ve been reading medical journals.”

“You leave them all over the house.”

“Careful or you’ll be touted a radical.”

“If my husband can stand for surgical improvements, then so can I. A person would have to sit on their brain not to see that these studies and procedures are needed. In fact, I read the other day about a Harvey Cushing who worked as a neurosurgeon during the war and helped to reduce the mortality rate of brain injuries from 50 percent to 29 percent. Something the article called ‘brain wound care.’” Journal diagrams of the dissected brain flashed through her mind. So many parts. So many incidents waiting to go wrong. “Not that I wish you to indulge in brain work. The complications sound increasingly more than cardiology.”

“I don’t think I’ll be performing any type of surgery in the near future.”

His pride may have taken a blow, but she wasn’t about to let him stay down for long. There would be other opportunities. He was like a caged bear, useless to his true purpose, when his skills weren’t being utilized.

“Pay no heed to Glasgow. There are plenty of other hospitals in need of your skills. We only need to apply to them.”

Wynn took a deep breath, then slowly exhaled. “In the meantime, Thornhill will become my priority. After Father died, Hugh had a list of improvements to be made, but then the war . . . It’s past time attention was paid the estate. As duke it’s my responsibility. Why are you frowning? I thought you’d be pleased after claiming I was deserting her.”

“I never said that. I merely do not wish to see you abandon one responsibility for the other.”

“I haven’t abandoned anything.”

“You are both a duke and a surgeon. I want to help you find equal footing as both.”

He rotated on the seat to look fully at her, pinning her like one of his patients strapped to the operating table under the bright light of inspection.

“Why is it so important to you that I strike this balance?”

“Because there is much good to be done without the seal of approval from a medical board. There are so many people right here in need of help, some of the same people that stuffy medical board refuses to lift a finger for because they are deemed untreatable or lacking in funds.” She bristled at the memory of those families waiting in Glasgow Hospital and the Douglas family scraping to get by. “We have the responsibility to ease the suffering of those around us. Perhaps not in a fine city hospital, or with the blessing of your colleagues, or even for accolades, but that does not mean the endeavor is any less worthwhile.”

“That’s one of the things I fancy most about you. Cut to the heart of the matter.” He half smiled, then looked down at his hands. “Do you think I’ve allowed my ego to overshadow what good I’m supposed to be doing as a physician?”

“I think if you are not careful, pride may overcome what is right by your patients.”

“If it hasn’t already. Being a physician was all that mattered to me, and now . . .” He spread his hands in an aimless gesture. “I never wanted this mantle of duke, you know.”

“But it is yours to bear now. All you must decide is if you will smother yourself in it or use its generous folds to help others. A privilege, I believe, that also exists in the hands of a physician.”

“You seem to have given this a great deal of thought. More than me, I’m ashamed to admit.”

She studied the pattern of lines and checks on the blanket. They started smooth and unbroken until bisecting with opposing lines to weave a new pattern. Much as the threads of her life. They’d woven a silken path until revolution knotted her to a different line twisted with war. Another pattern. And then there was Wynn, striking bold and straight to tie up the loosened threads into an unexpected weft. She traced the thick blue line that drew the eye beyond all other drab colors.

“You have given me so much with no payment asked—”

“You’re my wife. No payment is required.”

“I wasn’t always your wife. Now that I am, my gratitude can better be expressed in ways of supporting you.”

“And I wish you would stop thinking of our marriage as a series of transactions and payments.”

“A difficult request considering it’s all I know of marital matters. That, and I am to smile and oblige you in all situations.”

His hand stole over hers, his fingers twining between hers. “Let me guess, your mother told you that as part of the perfect princess training.”

“All mothers tell their daughters this. It makes for a smoother running household.”

“Since when has anything between us run smoothly? You’ve never withheld your opinion from me before. I don’t want you starting now.”

He was rotating her wedding band, and her thoughts were spinning right along with it. They blurred faster and faster until her carefully attached reservations cast off and the guarded questions to which she only ever surrendered in the loneliness of silence rushed out.

“Then what do you want from this marriage?”

If her bluntness surprised him, he didn’t show it. Nor did he take long to consider it.

“A chance to move forward. With you.” His eyes darkened, like the glowing heart of an emerald under moonlight. Mesmerizing and tempered on the cusp of passion. “What do you want, Lana?”

She took a shaky breath that mimicked the tripping of her heart. Surprisingly, she didn’t need long to consider her own answer as the words came from her heart without complication.

“I think I would like that too. My whole life has been rooted by obligation and expectation, yet I tire of the stillness. I wish to see what exists beyond the borders. With you.”

The back of his fingertips traced her face, blazing a path from her cheek, along her jaw, to her chin and curving around the other side. With each pass he closed the distance between them, leaving mere inches between his lips and her need to claim them.

“After meeting you, it’s a good thing I specialize in heart troubles. I feel I’m about to lose mine.”

In that instant the strength of his emotions overwhelmed her, plunging her to heady yearning. She gathered her courage to receive them as the tide swept her away to deeper currents from which he beckoned. He was not for the faint of heart. She’d never fainted a day in her life, but she felt light-headed.

She tilted her head as his warm breath fanned her face. His green eyes dissolved to desire, taking her right along with him. Finally, she would know what it was like to kiss her husband.

The auto jerked to a stop and the door opened to a blast of frigid air. Svetlana jumped, knocking Wynn in the face with the brim of her hat. Embarrassment scorched through her, but she quickly cooled it by flicking the blanket from her lap. No one, aristocrat or servant, was about to make her feel guilty about the almost kiss. Proper decorum was too cumbersome for the back of an auto. Especially when one’s husband looked as Wynn had.

“Welcome home, Your Graces.” A footman stood holding the door open with his eyes staring politely ahead.

Grunting, Wynn unpeeled his arm from around her and whacked away the stiffened peacock feather threatening to take his eye out.

“Impeccable timing, McNab.” He glared at their chauffeur. “Drive slower next time.”

McNab bobbed his head from the front seat. “As Your Grace wishes.”

Wynn climbed out and offered his hand to help Svetlana down, then hooked her hand into the crook of his elbow. They crossed the gravel drive to the gloriously imposing presence of Thornhill. With the tumultuous gray skies behind her, the castle resembled a medieval lady rising on her solitary throne of steel.

“Did you mention something about war widows and wives?”

So he had been listening. Or partially listening. Svetlana lifted her heavy black skirt and stepped over the mud puddling at the front entrance.

“Perhaps a charity ball. We’ll send invitations to the neighboring gentry and all proceeds will go to the war benefit.”

“It’s not feasible to write all the affected families a cheque.”

“No, but perhaps it can ease their immediate suffering while helping to establish a more permanent venture. Such as a training center. Of course, that only alleviates half of the problem.” It would take time and thought to devise a more concrete plan of action, particularly time when her thoughts weren’t consumed by wanting five more minutes in the back compartment of the Renault.

They shrugged out of their overcoats, hats, and gloves and handed them over to the waiting servants who would whisk them away to be brushed free of possible dirt and stored among cedar closets lined with lavender sachets. It felt good to be wearing tailor-made, clean clothing again. Any scuffs were buffed out. Holes were immediately mended. Inches taken in or out. How had she survived last winter with barely a shawl on her back? A patched shawl that too closely resembled Mrs. Douglas’s. First thing in the morning Svetlana would put together a donation box of warm items to be distributed in the village.

Their butler, Glasby, glided across the floor of the Stone Hall, so named for the smooth river stones lining the three-story space that always set guests’ jaws dropping. He held out a post platter stacked with several envelopes.

“Her Grace the Dowager Duchess is having tea in the library along with Princess Marina and Mrs. Varjensky.”

“My mother has not joined them?” Svetlana asked.

“No, Your Grace. She claims a headache and is resting in her chambers.”

“Another protest at the lack of a proper samovar, no doubt. Thank you, that will be all.”

Inclining his head, Glasby glided away as Wynn filed through the post. Svetlana scanned the addresses on the envelopes, hoping against all odds that she might see a familiar script written from Father or Nicky telling her they were alive. Or Sergey. She’d all but convinced herself that she’d imagined seeing him on Armistice Day outside the Paris townhouse. But no letters ever came for her.

She brushed off her pang of sadness. “Shall we go into the library?”

“I’ll join you later. I have a few things to attend first.” Wynn strode toward his study with a thick cream envelope stamped with a London address clenched in his hand.

“Is anything the matter?”

Entering his study, he closed the door without a backward glance. The sound of the shutting door reverberated among the river stones, echoing back the loneliness of the hall in which she was left.

*  *  *

The paper dropped to Wynn’s desk as if the report were written in damning lead ink. All feeling drained from his legs, and he sagged into his chair like a boneless bag of abject emptiness. The slivers of hope he’d clung to on the precipice of despair had sharpened to knives with each word of the report, twisting deep and thoroughly gutting him.

A glutton for agony, he read the damning words again.

Coroner concludes death of Lieutenant Harkin caused by operative trauma under care of Dr. Edwynn MacCallan with crisis arising several months post operation. Ill-advised surgery was undertaken without physician gaining further consent from supervisor and patient.

Despite agreed upon medical practices of the hospital, Dr. MacCallan proceeded to his own advantages and ensured his reputation for aggressive and malignant theories which prove detrimental to the sacred oath of caretaking.

“Aggressive and malignant.”Daggers into his soul.

They now thought him an arrogant butcher with no care of destroying those entrusted to his care, as if his Hippocratic oath meant nothing. As if he didn’t mourn every life that couldn’t be saved. Did they truly think his arrogance stripped him of human decency in the delicate balance of life and death?

He dragged his hands through his hair as his mind railed against the accusations. Harkin had shown no signs of post-op complications, although many could lay dormant for months. Wynn yanked open the desk’s bottom drawer where he kept correspondences and pulled out the third envelope down. A letter from Harkin dating two weeks before his death stating that the physicians at St. Matthew’s Hospital in London had cleared him with a full bill of health. Surely if a complication had lain dormant, they would have discovered and diagnosed it.

Despite the letter’s false claim, Wynn had made sure to gain Harkin’s permission before the operation. He had been scared, as most patients were, but never once had he voiced disagreement.

A thick absence of feeling coated him from scalp to foot, blocking sound from his ears and sight from his eyes. All sight except the black words. Their tyranny could not be hidden from the cold light streaming in through the window nor the slamming closed of his eyelids. They taunted him in the darkness, searing into his brain. If only Hugh were here. Where are you, brother, when I need you most? We always looked out for each other and now the wolves are set to devour me.

“Wynn?”

Wynn’s eyes shot open. Svetlana stood in the doorway.

“I am sorry to disturb. I did knock.” Head tilted to the side, eyes softened, corners of the mouth slightly pulled down, hesitation in the stance. She was worried. About him. “Is everything all right?”

He wanted his ice princess with her haughty expression and raised eyebrows. The glacial slant of her nose where woes dared not fall lest they slip off to their deserved doom. The arctic chill in her eyes that frosted demeaning circumstances and stamped them beneath the ice where they belonged. That beguiling creature would at least challenge him to exert all his willpower to thaw her with a smirk here and a teasing comment there.

Instead, his willpower was nearly crippled by her look of near pity. He would not be that to her. Whatever it took, she would not witness him crippled by his own arrogance and failures.

“The coroner sent his final report on Harkin. A formality.” The words slipped out before he could stop them. He grabbed the letter and shoved it into the bottom drawer.

Sadness and relief flitted across her face. Wynn’s stomach twisted. What did it cost the soul to lie? Mere fragments breaking off until its existence was nothing more than a hollow shell? Could he learn to live on the meagerness that remained? Could his future with Svetlana exist on it? Would he be able to survive the guilt?

But so much had been taken from his wife; he could not bear to see her suffer further because of him. One day he would tell her the whole truth, but to do so now would only cause her unnecessary pain. He believed she would understand the reason for his concealment when the time came. She had not agreed to become his wife in exchange for a life of disgrace. He had wanted only to save her from that in promise of a good life. He would salvage whatever remained of his reputation and force his feet to tread the path demanded of him. He would give Svetlana the life of happiness she deserved.

“Will you come and have tea with me?” she asked.

“Nothing I’d like more.” Coercing a smile, Wynn stood and shut the drawer, but not quick enough to erase the letter’s final lines burning him with shame.

Edwynn MacCallan is thereby stripped of his medical services and doctoral titles pending a formal investigation of actions.