Chapter Five -- "The Bloody One"
There was an interruption of Danka's studies from the end of September until the end of October. The Church staff, like everyone else in the country, had to put forth all of their energy into harvesting and preserving food for the winter. The men hauled bushels of firewood and charcoal, along with fruit, vegetables, and vinegar to the women's residence throughout the month. The women toiled to convert fruit into preserves and pickle as many vegetables as possible. Danka was familiar with the fall harvest routine, but it was nice to have a large well-supplied kitchen as a workspace and decent food and seasonings as ingredients.
In the middle of October, Danka received a nickname from the Temple's top Clergywoman.
Among the students and penitents, she was the only one that had no qualms about slaughtering animals. Danka's lack of sympathy towards livestock served her well in a household of squeamish companions: every time someone showed up with an animal the others were very happy to turn over the task of killing it to the newcomer. Chickens, rabbits, sheep, pigs...it didn't matter. The young peasant was quick with the knife or the cleaver and the animal was dead before it had a chance to realize what was happening.
Danka received her nickname on an occasion when the Senior Priestess visited the residence, immediately after she had killed and gutted three pigs. The penitent was a savage sight at the moment, standing with a large knife and her body and face completely covered with blood. She immediately knelt, but the Priestess was so amused that she ordered her to stand up and return to work.
From that moment, Danka was known as "the bloody one" instead of "the new visitor". Receiving an identity from the Senior Priestess was an important accomplishment, because it demonstrated that the Clergy members had fully accepted the new penitent as a member of their community. She was not "new" anymore. The danger of anyone questioning her Public Penance had long passed.
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The coming winter became more of a hardship for the penitents as November passed and the weather became increasingly colder. The seminary students put on their dresses, but the penitents did not have that option. No matter how cold it was outside, they were prohibited from wearing any clothing. In theory the restriction included shoes, but in reality none of the Clergy were so cold-hearted that they would force penitents to walk around in the snow with no protection for their feet. Danka still had her boots and for the first time in four months was allowed to put them on.
Danka's world shrunk considerably after the first snowstorm. She and the other penitents spent as much time as possible in the kitchen, the only warm spot in their residence. The only other place to go was the study room, which had a fireplace. So...when she was not working, Danka read the books that the seminary student had assigned.
"The bloody one's" lessons resumed after the fall food-preserving rush had ended. The seminary student was as determined to teach as the penitent was to learn. She had mastered basic reading, so now it was time to move on to calligraphy, arithmetic, and the use of the abacus. During December, the penitent's mornings were split between the three topics. She enjoyed arithmetic and learning the abacus, but hated calligraphy. Her clumsy hands rebelled against the art of fine writing, so the penitent decided to ignore writing and concentrate on math. By the end of the year Danka had mastered adding and subtracting.
The seminary student was not pleased. She was determined to force the penitent to learn how to write cursive, because Danubians did not consider a person was truly literate without having that skill. She came up with a plan to force Danka, on her own, to want to switch over from writing block-letters to formal script. The winter solstice and new year were approaching, along with Christmas. (The Old Believers were not enthusiastic about celebrating Christmas, but there also were True Believers living in Starívktaki Móskt, so the Temple included Christmas in the December celebrations to keep everyone happy.) The multiple celebrations meant that lots of hymns and announcements had to be written on parchment and passed around. The seminary student volunteered to write out a portion of the announcements and tasked "the bloody one" to assist. Danka was directed to write page after page of lyrics. For several days she struggled to keep up writing in her usual block letters. Certainly her ability and comfort writing block letters increased with all that practice, but she was unable to keep pace with anyone else. She regretted not having learned calligraphy as she watched the seminary student and her companions write out page after page with relative ease. As Danka labored in frustration, the trainee glanced at her with an expression that clearly stated: "Now you can see why knowing how to write is important. This time, I'm not going to offer to teach you. When you are ready, you will have to ask."
Finally Danka did break down and asked to restart the calligraphy instruction. While the change of attitude was too late to help her during the preparation for the December festivities, she was determined that the following year she would not have to go through the embarrassment again.
She paused. The following year...was she planning to still be with the Temple that far into the future? So...what would the following year bring for "the bloody one"...the girl with the knife...the outcast...the former peasant...? Where would her Path in Life take her?
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The new year came and went. The final round of religious festivities was followed by several feasts that offered "the bloody one" the chance to try several foods she had never tasted before, including imported nuts, dates and figs. There was endless singing, poetry readings, and listening to music. For the first time in her life, Danka actually had fun during the end-of-the-year holidays.
Considering her alternatives, she began the new year under seemingly ideal circumstances: she was well-fed, living in a safe place, and rapidly making up for her deficient upbringing. The final task of learning how to write cursive was daunting and hugely frustrating, but she forced herself to push forward, knowing that her mentor had gone through great effort to obtain parchment and ink for her practices. The winter passed with her sequestered in the reading room, painfully writing over paper that already was covered many times over with letters from previous practices, or working on the new mathematical topics of multiplication and division.
When she was not practicing, Danka was reading. She now had the ability to read directly from the holy books of the Danubian Church. She memorized some Psalms from the Christian Old Testament, as well as key passages from the Book of the Ancients and the Book of the True Path. She could read the text from hymns, which helped her during the Temple's singing practices. In March, Danka's mentor handed her a book that described all of the important places in the Duchy, including areas in Lower Danubia that had been lost to the Ottoman Empire. Danka didn't have a clue what the Ottoman Empire was, so the apprentice handed her another book about Danubia's history. Now, this truly was amazing, being able to learn about different times and different places without actually going there.
The descriptions of cities like Danúbikt Móskt, Sumy Ris, and Rika Chorna made "the bloody one" anxious to see them. They sounded like fascinating places, with all those people and stuff to look at.
