My Swordhand Is Singing Read Online Free PDF Page A

Her head was up, her raven hair falling in ringlets across her shoulders.
    Once again Peter struggled with the song. It made no sense to him. He still couldn’t understand why the shepherd behaves the way he does. He hears he’s going to be killed by the other shepherds, maybe jealous of his youth, or his handsome looks. So much, so easy. But then he does nothing. He doesn’t run away, or hide. He doesn’t fight. He accepts his death, and concocts that story for the lamb to tell his mother. That he married a princess from some distant land. Peter, who had never known his mother, could nonetheless understand wanting to protect a loved one from the painful truth. But he couldn’t understand anyone’s accepting his own murder so readily. Unless maybe it was the only way to such great beauty.
    Such beauty as the cosmic princess from the song—
    Suddenly Peter was aware that the Gypsy girl was looking straight at him, fixing him with a stare that was powerful, yet at the same time utterly devoid of emotion. He was unable to look away, and now the three caravans and the wagon pulled to a halt in the center of the square, and the musicians struck up a different, livelier tune, one that leapt to the beat of the drum. It was an instrumental piece, and the girl sat down in the wagon, no longer looking at Peter, though he could do nothing but look at her.
    “I hope you don’t think she’s more beautiful than me?” said a voice behind him.
    He turned to see Agnes looking up at him, smiling.
    Even as he spoke he knew she had only been joking, yet some foolishness inside answered for him.
    “No, no,” he said quickly. “Of course not. I was just admiring the song, that’s all.”
    Agnes stopped smiling.
    “It was the song you were admiring, was it?”
    Peter shuffled awkwardly. He looked down at Agnes, her short brown hair framing that pretty round face, those gray eyes and that little nose.
    “How are you, Agnes? How’s your mother? I haven’t seen you for a while.”
    “That’s because you come to the village only when it suits you.”
    “Agnes, I’d come more often,” Peter stammered. “I’d come to see…”
    He stopped; he didn’t have the courage to say it.
    “I know,” Agnes said, and with a jolt in his heart Peter thought she had guessed what he was about to say. But she hadn’t. “You’d come more often if only you weren’t so busy, if only your father let you, if only you had the money.”
    “Don’t, Agnes,” Peter said. “That’s not fair. You don’t know what it’s like.”
    He’d said the wrong thing.
    “Don’t I?” she cried, her voice high and uneven. “Father died less than a month ago, Mother’s stayed in her bed ever since. I have all the work to do and I must look after her too, and you think I don’t know what it’s like?”
    She turned and hurried away.
    “Agnes,” Peter called. “Wait! Please?”
    People were staring; he ran after her for a few steps, then faltered.
    “Agnes,” he said quietly, but she had gone. He could tell the air what he wanted to say, but what was the point?
     
    He turned and looked at the Gypsies again. A crowd had gathered, and some were even throwing a little money into a hat that a child was taking around.
    Peter smiled bitterly. It would not be too strong to say he was unsettled by the Gypsies, but he felt some empathy with them. Here were the villagers, happy to listen to their music, happy even to pay for it; yet there was a contradiction. Peter knew that the Gypsies would not be allowed to stay in the village overnight but would have to pitch somewhere outside it when darkness fell. They were tolerated, not trusted.
    He understood how that felt, and more besides. Something about the Gypsies spoke directly to Peter’s heart.
    Night was falling as he trudged toward home through the snow. As he walked, his pockets jingled with the money he had collected. Now all he had to do was keep Tomas from drinking it all, as well as explain why the