Rusalka: Background Story by Misha Kennedy
- Brookline Exhibition
- Jun 12, 2023
- 10 min read
PROLOGUE
In May, I do believe the nights last forever, and I am but a nameless woman within them; a creature of grief in its last moments.
It was nearing dawn when my father sent me out to the market. He told me that spirits did not touch children, that the lurking she-beasts would be discouraged by my youth and virtue. Yet, these reassurances did nothing to ease my nerves, and my heart still dropped when he closed the door. It was a witching season, the balmy week just before autumn, when godforsaken creatures emerged from their dwellings to roam the earth above and decry their loneliness; I was the only person who could see them, and they sensed it. My childhood was plagued by restless, unsatisfied spirits, forever waiting and watching, impassive observers of my life.
The marshlands just below our town had flooded only a few days earlier, and thus, few ventured anywhere further than the bottom of the hill. I found myself entirely alone, which filled me with a sharp and ugly revulsion towards my father; he knew how I dreaded going outside during the witching season, yet he made me go anyway.
Shades crowded me as I walked through the moors, fluttering above the wet ground in drowsy, flickering waves. Their white faces silently followed me across the marsh and I took care to look only ahead, my heart pounded in my chest, every muscle and bone within me was alight with energy. I imagined their wide, moonless eyes on my back, devouring their translucent bodies, the fear and shock I would have inspired in them. The thought burned through me. I would have been free, finally, a normal girl capable of speaking to others, seeing people and not the bloodless figures behind them.
The sodden ground eventually gave way to stone as I reached the end of the marshlands, desperate to return and be done with the outdoors and its spirits. I resolved to stay in my bed until the end of the witching season.
Years passed, and I remained tormented by ghosts. I tried to live silently, even peacefully. I avoided the other townspeople. I no longer ventured further down the hill; my windows and doors remained barred even after witching seasons. I spoke little to my family, lest I had somehow taken their voices and miseries with me.
I was a burden, an embarrassment, of marriageable age and branded a deranged witch. But I knew the truth, everyone was foolish and blind here. No matter — they did not see what I had seen, they did not feel what I had felt. I was but another wicked woman for them to condemn. My parents did not view my condition as simply as I, and their repulsion was a knife at my throat. They would have to send me off, find someone to accept their meager dowry and my hysterics soon, before the villagers prepared the stakes and readied the kindling. Martyrs always put on a wonderful show.
The day soon came. I had been in the field rooting out weeds when I first saw him, Pastor Makarov, slowly making his way to our house. He was a feeble old man, with skin like paper and sunken eyes. During sermons, he was held upright by junior ministers who flanked him at all times, as if afraid he would suddenly collapse from the weight of his own body.
I crouched low in the field and watched his shriveled, pale head bob up and down the walkway, this time, his solemn ministers trailed further behind, dressed in dark clergy robes, like a funeral procession. I scratched at my arms, were they truly coming to crucify me? I had merely entertained the idea as a joke, but now the possibility sank deep in my stomach. I would run, yes, I would be gone by morning.
Pastor Makarov eventually made it. I rubbed the dirt off my pants and moved closer to the window. My mother was sitting at the kitchen table, kneading dough, my father paced the living room, a half-smoked cigarette in his hand. A weak knock came and my father opened the door immediately, as if he had been waiting for it. My mother stood and bowed at the sight of the pastor and his ministers.
“Pastor Makarov, please come, sit. Anna will bring you food.” My father ushered the old man into the house and gestured for my mother to prepare the table. I fought the urge to make him do it himself.
“Rodion, we thank you for your kind welcome,” when Makarov spoke. It sounded as if he never had enough air, full of rasps and wheezes. “Will Margaret be with us soon? I am anxious for her to hear the news.”
“Yes, Pastor Makarov, I will get her now. She will be delighted. This is the greatest of blessings, truly.” My father hastily got up from the table and called out of the window, “Margaret,” he turned to Makarov and smiled, too widely, “just a moment, just a moment. Margaret. Get in here, right now!”
I stood silently for a while. It was a beautifully warm night, the full moon illuminated everything. I contemplated running away right there and then, starting anew, free of the growing unease in my chest. I was still just a girl; whatever was coming, I knew it wouldn’t be fair. I slackened my fists and walked inside.
They will take me as I am, I thought to myself, or not at all.
“Ah, Margaret, how lovely you have become.” Makarov shuffled over to greet me, his thin, clammy hands were cool and damp against my cheeks. I clenched and unclenched my jaw. I wanted to hurt him and his ridiculous ministers, who observed the whole affair with bored, dead eyes.
“Pastor Makarov,” I spoke through gritted teeth, he tried to touch my face again, and I made a show of sitting at the farthest end of the table. My mother fixed me with an eager gaze, and I felt sick.
“Margaret, your parents and I have settled on the dowry for your hand —”
I stopped breathing, it felt like the marsh all over again. “What do you mean, settled?” “Margaret.” My father inhaled another cigarette, pointing a misshapen finger at me, “Now, you’re being dumb, Pastor Makarov here is doing you a favor.”
“Honey —”
“Enough! Anna, you know what they say about her,” he looked at me now, his eyes and words bulging with disgust, “they call you a witch, Margaret. A freak, Rodion’s stupid girl-child, came back from the lowlands with the devil upon her tongue. I don’t want you to say another word, you’ve got no right. No right, you’re a godforsaken fucking problem, Margaret, you should be thankful anyone even wants you.”
The silence was sickening. I felt it rising in my throat. They all watched me, wide, black eyes — I deserved it, everything my father said was true. Was I not a freak, running home mute and manic with my fantastical visions? Like another Cassandra, fated to speak ugly nonsense, spurned for it.
“Can pastors even get married?” I said dumbly; I had nothing else to say.
“Well, I —” Makarov flushed red, a withered old fool.
“You don’t have to answer that,” my mother smiled oh so graciously. Traitor! I thought to myself, traitor! “She’s just nervous, let me fix you all plates. Margaret, come here and help me with these.”
I stalked to the kitchen counter besides her, hateful. I wanted them all to feel how furious I was, could be. My mother looked at me, sidelong, and squeezed my hand. “Margaret,” she whispered, “there is a satchel beneath your bed with clothes and your aunt Lenora’s address. It takes one night through the forest to get to her house. Do not stray, always follow the pathways.” She squeezed my hand harder, “if you hear anything, you mustn’t look, do you understand me, Margaret?”
“ Mom —” “What is taking you both so long?” My father’s rough voice came from the dining room.
“Go, go,” she hissed, “Margaret is just going to go clean herself up for our guest’s sweetheart. Come on, Margaret, off you go.”
It happened gradually - all the air seemed to gather and narrow into the shadow of a figure, settling in the middle of the grove, translucent at first, gauzelike, eventually growing in density and pigment until a young woman appeared in its place. I could not place my thoughts in that moment, nor can I recall them even now; she was astonishingly frightening, and her face will forever be etched upon my mind. It was like nothing I had ever seen before, gray and skeletal, a death mask. Her mouth grossly distended, caught in some terrible, shrieking cry, and her eyes, her eyes, a gaping, all-consuming black; she slowly twisted her head towards me. I did not breathe. I could not move. I was certain she meant to kill me, so I waited, struck dumb. Then, all still, all silent, she began to writhe and tremble, laughing. I watched her mouth split into a wide, black grin in awe.
“Margaret.” The woman turned her smile at me, eyes black and unblinking. A table appeared in front of us, then two chairs. She beckoned me forward, “please, sit.”
I wanted to cry, run. A deafening hum filled my head, this wasn’t real, it couldn’t be real. I tried to recall my last steps. I had been in the forest. I had followed the path; I did not stray. So, how did I end up here? Something was missing but I could not place it. The countless ghosts of my childhood had finally forced their way into my mind. It was but one long and ugly dream, I thought to myself. Soon, I would wake and be done with the illusions, no more.
“You are not dreaming.”
“What—?”
“You think you are dreaming. You are not.” She snapped her fingers and a plate materialized before her, a swollen, red heart at its center, “I am Death, Margaret, we have long been acquainted.”
I gripped the edge of the table. What was going on - had I truly gone mad? I could feel my nails begin to bleed into the wood, numb. “Death? Am I dead, then?”
“Not dead,” she spoke softly, “just asleep. I am here to give you an offer. I do not do this often; a place to rest, if only you agree to listen.”
I nodded, not daring to speak. She was unlike any ghost I had ever encountered; the wordless, pale-faced apparitions that did little more than observe. I saw it in the dagger of her eye, the deliberate monotony of her words. A being far removed from the constraints and futility of our world, simply passing by.
“You run from something that cannot be escaped. Your aunt will turn you away when you arrive at her door. Humans are violent by nature, crueler even than us. To them, you are another girl with god for a tongue. When that rotting priest finds you, forces you to wed, then what? A dog on its leash, be a dog with teeth.”
“What would you have me do?”
“Clever girl,” she smiled and wiped her mouth in a macabre show of formality. I wondered if it was truly blood that colored her skin in those fleeting moments, or if it was simply a display of sorts. A guise of relatability. “I offer you a choice. It is really no sacrifice, only an action to be done. Their hearts for your freedom. They are searching for you, Margaret. They will find you in the forest, and they will have your head. If you suffer, I suffer, you do not understand this yet, but you will. I ask for little, something to satisfy the hunger.”
“You want me to kill them? I can’t, I can’t, I —”
She frowned and picked out what looked to be a tendon from between her teeth. “That would be quite tasteless, Margaret.” I was nauseated. Tasteless? The word had a laughable connotation at this point.
“What is it that you want?”
“Do not be stupid, the body means nothing to a soul. The deed itself is like a gift of freedom. Don’t you see? They hunt you, so hunt them.” She looked at me. We looked at each other. Her face was a hideous reflection of my own. “I will give you an eternity,” she sounded desperate, almost sad, “but you must give me this.”
She stood, then, and offered me her hand.
I took it.
A creature roams the forest. I see my ragged frame through the trees. The bones beneath my feet, skin in my teeth. The pastor’s men arrive in a blind huddle, groping the brushwood and undergrowth, looking out into the dark with dilated eyes. I watch them seek. I smell the hearts beneath their tunics, the warming rush of blood. The first is a farmer’s son; he is shocked when I appear beside him, and I drink the moment in, seizing a lock of his hair — slick, dark strands fall from his head in clumps and he twists away from me, howling in pain. The second is a distant cousin of mine, who screams and screams, the noise is deafening, like an animal in the midst of burning. I take the heart, dark blood spills from his mouth onto my face. My teeth grow thin and spired as knives but I do not mind. There is a third, and a fourth, they appear and disappear when I reach for them. The gentle weight of their limbs soon fills my stomach, flesh tastes like dust, yet it is never enough. Days pass, years. Their fear is satiating, delicious; I disgust myself, humans disgust me, forever spilling into my arms, these deadfall traps.
EPILOGUE
Somewhere down below, the men carry my limbs to the shore and build a pyre, their cold hands will stay with me when I wake. Celebration always follows after it is done, when nothing remains on the sands except a smell of smoke; these fools think burning me will keep them safe, but they must watch for their daughters and their wives, for we are all wicked women, with hair like blood, love is never enough.
The procession continues, skin cools and hardens. My body is too far now to reach, so I must watch from a distance. The men fall to their knees before the pyre as it burns. I hear them weep and moan like hounds, even in death.
God turns away from me as he slips through the sky. I am yet another woman with hate in her chest, a martyr like his mother. I will reach for him in each growing flame, his strange face upon the moon, the nocturnal eyes with which he possesses and unmakes the world.
The swell of the sea touches near, the last of the pyre has been burned away, the men force my ashes into the ground and leave with the promise of wine deep in their throats.
when I wake:
a nameless woman,
like rage preserved in amber.
we begin again.
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