One moment our little world was predictable, safe, ordinary: the next we were nearly immolated in a welter of flame.
Predictable, safe, ordinary: I suppose those words could be misleading. Perhaps I should explain that "predictable" meant that we knew tomorrow would be as miserable as today; "safe" meant housed and tolerably fed without outside interference, and that "ordinary" meant just that. It meant an existence we had always known, as far back as faulty memory would take us; it meant a crouching, fearful, nothing-being, prisoned, chained and subject to the whims of our mistress. She should have a capital letter: Mistress. There. For that is what we called her, the only name we knew, slaves as we were, and woe betide any who even thought of her with a small "m" for she would know, or pretend she did, and punish us, and we were so accustomed to her domination that we believed she could read all our thoughts, sleeping and waking.
We? Us? There were five of her creatures in that small hut on the edge of the forest. Slaves, I should say. I was the only one ever let out of the hut, and that for necessaries alone—a sack of flour, tallow for dips, herbs from the hedgerow—and then I was spat upon, ridiculed, even pelted with stones upon occasion by the superstitious villagers who called me her "Thing" , her Familiar. Even those intermittent forays were no freedom, for the stomach cramps hit me even worse when I was from her side, only easing when I returned, so it was no wonder that people only saw me as a humped, ugly, deformed thing. I could not even speak properly, for the only tongue I heard was an occasional command, spells and the words of my friends, the others who shared my thrall.
There was Corby, the great black crow, Puddy, the warty toad, Pisky the little golden fish and kitten-cat Moglet, and though we conversed quite freely amongst ourselves when the Mistress was out, it was a language of squawks, hisses, spits, bubbles, and more thought-communication than human speech. I told you I was held near my Mistress by stomach-cramps, and the others, in addition to cages, strings and bars were held in the same fashion, by a pain that increased by degrees of hurt the farther we were from our jailer. The origins of all these hurts were concrete enough; small pebbles or stones that clung to our bodies as though they were part of us. For me it was a sullen red stone that stuck to my navel like a crab; for Corby it was a blue chip that stopped the stretch of his right wing; for Puddy a green rock on his forehead that gave him headaches; for Moglet a crippling glass piece that was embedded in the soft part of her left front pad and for poor Pisky a great moon-coloured pebble that quite filled his starving, round mouth. Why not pull them out? We had tried and all we had got was an intensification of the pain, till it grew too excruciating to bear and we had to stop.
Perhaps the worst part was that we could not remember them being put there, nor coming to this place nor, even, who we were. Yet there were tantalizing remembrances for us all of another life of freedom without pain, in another place, another time: yet so fleeting was this recall to all of us, swift as the space between puff and candle-out, that it was only when the flame dipped and wavered and bent a little before expiring that one remembered a swoop of wings, a cool stone grotto, the rasp of another tongue on one's fur, a gnat at twilight and—another name, clash of swords, warm arms, crying . . . We all had these moments, yet even as we snatched at memory, like a snowflake on the tongue it dissolved and all form was lost. Some things we could remember, though: apparently Corby remembered us all coming, except himself; Puddy remembered me, Moglet and Pisky; I remembered the last two, but Moglet remembered only Pisky, and he not even himself. The interval between arrivals none could judge, so it could have been seven hours, days, weeks, months, years between first and last. Neither did we know why we were held thus, nor would She tell us, and all questions were answered by laughter, blows or the scorn of silence. Seasons meant little to us, cabined as we were, for we saw and felt little of sunshine or storm, light or dark, rain or warmth—the inside of the hut was always cold, a meagre fire kept burning and the one window shuttered fast, so that day or night, summer or winter were much the same to us. Sometimes birds whistled down the chimney or a hedgepig would pause on the doorstep when She was out, but always these encounters were reported to Her on her return by her Creature-in-the-corner, the broom that was her real familiar, and we were beaten for encouraging curiosity. Once, I remember, I asked a martin resting on the thatch whether it was spring or autumn, and when she heard of this from the sly, crackling spy, she had it beat me senseless.
Yet this Broom-Creature was not only violent towards us, for sometimes when the air, even inside, was sticky and hot, and it was difficult to sleep, She would take the thing into her arms and whisper to it and push the smooth, knobbed end under her skirt and it would jerk and throb until she cried out in what seemed pain and would thrust it from her, its tip swollen into the thickness of a man's fist and all glistening and wet with what looked like blood . . . But it was not real as she and we were. It was only a piece of wood bound with dried stems and twigs and she had to use words to bring it alive, the same sort of words she used to bring things into the hovel, things that were shadows so thin you could put your hand through them like smoke and yet which threw writhing coloured patterns on any surface they touched. These apparitions floated and gestured and whispered in an obscene language only she could understand and always after they had gone she became increasingly short-tempered and restless, and sooner or later would come the time when we would be caged and tied and she would begin the preparations for a Shape-Change.
In some ways I looked forward to this, for it meant that I was let out to gather plants and herbs for her spells: mugwort and valerian; comfrey and stinking hellebore; bryony and monkshood; oak galls and liverwort; fly agaric and pennyroyal. All the ingredients She used I did not know, for she had others in bottles and jars and boxes I was not allowed to see, locked away by magic words in cupboards and a chest. And of the mixing we saw little for She would go behind a curtained-off alcove at the other end of the hut when she was ready to begin. Then all we would know was the stink of dried, crushed and powdered ingredients in the smoke that rose from the blending of her concoctions, a stench that invaded every corner, lending foul odours to the dry bread we ate, the cold water we drank. We could hear a little of the muttered spells and incantations that accompanied all this and we were allowed to see all the transformation: I think having an audience for this somehow fed her overweening vanity, even of small account as we were.
She would come out from the alcove and stand in the middle of the hut, and gradually her whole appearance would change. First she would untwist her body and grow taller, then her greasy grey locks would untangle and grow lighter or darker, straighten or curl as she desired. Even as we watched she took breasts that rose firm and round, instead of flapping around her waist like empty goat-skins; her stomach flattened, her legs and arms grew shapely and hair-free; her skin whitened and discarded the liverish brown spots, the crooked, dirty nails on fingers and toes became pink and the dry, split pouch at her groin would rise, mounded with curling, moist hair. Lastly her face would take on the lineaments of a beautiful woman: gone the warts, the beard, the moustache and come rosy cheeks, sparkling eyes, white teeth and full, red lips. Then she would laugh and stretch her arms wide and her voice would come sweet and rich as she called from the air silks and fine linen to clothe her nakedness. Then she would beckon Broom, her creature, and sit astride, call on the roof to open and fly out into the dark.
But She would not forget us, oh no. The very last thing would be a spell to bind us faster than the rope, cage, chains and bars that already held us. But once She had gone we would breathe freer and stretch a little and talk, and that is when we practised conversing without the usual constraints of her presence, exchanged hopes and fears, ideas, what little we remembered of the past, and endless speculation on the immediate present. Talk of the future held small part in all this, for I found that my friends had very little conception of what it was, and I was afraid even to think about it.
Perhaps I should qualify "talk" , for it was not the sort ordinary beings would recognize, let alone understand. When I had first arrived I had talked wildly in human speech to Corby and Puddy, and they had understood nothing except the terror and distress, but in their different ways they had tried to soothe and reassure and gradually I had come to understand a little of what they were trying to communicate, and had tried to copy. It had become easier when Moglet and Pisky arrived later. Communication of the simplest kind was usually by noise; more complicated ideas were expressed by bodily position, movement, odour—in this I was way behind the understanding, let alone the expressing—but the most refined, and to me eventually the easiest to understand and adopt, was thought. A simple dialogue between Moglet and myself would use all these processes:—
Moglet:—A loud, attention-seeking mew, on a particular pitch that meant "I'm hungry!"
Me:—"Mmmm?"
Moglet:—Body position tight, paws together: "And I've been waiting ages . . ."
Me:—"Have you?"
Moglet:—A thought, like a ray of light penetrating my mind, giving me a memory-picture of what happened, cat's eye level, of course: "Breakfast was the last meal and that was only gruel and it was a long time ago when that slant of sun was over in the corner and the fly buzzed up the wall and I caught it but Puddy ate it . . ."
Me:—"Mmmm . . ."
Moglet:—Left eye blinking twice. "You're not even listening straight!"
Me:—"You'll have to wait . . ."
Moglet:—Eyes glancing sideways, to the right. "Don't want to wait."
Me:— "Will a small piece of cheese rind do, for the moment?"
Moglet:—Blink with both eyes, lids returning to halfway. "Yes."
Me:—"Was that nice?"
Moglet:—Tail flat out behind, tip gently vibrating. "Very nice . . ."
Me:— "What do you want now, then?"
Moglet:—Tail gently swished from side to side, right, left, right. "More, please . . ."
Of course it was not all as easy as this. Abstract ideas like "fear" , for instance, were most difficult to express, for they did not use words for these, rather a thought-impression of what frightened them most, and it was easy to get an actual picture of our Mistress approaching the hut mixed up with an impression of her doing so, which might approximate to, say, Corby's idea of fear. None of this came naturally to us: it was just that we were thrown together in such close proximity that we formed a sort of alliance of misery—and in some queer way I believe our burden of pebbles brought us and our understanding closer together. And so gradually I forgot my human speech and could barely mutter my requests in the marketplace: my mother tongue became almost a foreign language.
Instead I would listen while Corby would tell of the grasping of sliding air under the fingertips of his wings, or soaring heights and dizzy drops; then there was Puddy reminiscing of cool grottos, buzz of fly and crawl of worm; Moglet half-remembering a warm hearth and dishes of cream, a substance none had tasted save Her, which sounded rich, thick and delicious; Pisky recalling the silk-slide of summer waters, the bright shoaling of his kin. While I held a dream of an armoured warrior, a fair lady and someone singing—but who was to say that all these were not just imaginings, for none of us could recall a place, a time, nor indeed how or why.
These respites together were all too short and sometimes not worth Her absence, for twice latterly she had returned in daylight and a foul temper, screaming at the air, the times and us. The first time she had contented herself with kicking out at whoever had been nearest, joggling Corby's perch till he fell off and emptying most of Pisky's water till he gasped. But the second time was worse. Usually she returned in the garb and looks in which she had departed, losing them only gradually, but this time she dragged herself back with the dawn in her accustomed evil form and there was a slitting to her eyes and a slavering to her mouth that boded ill. At first she had laughed shrilly and pointed at me.
"I thought of you, you ugly thing, when I cursed him! Yes, I tried to think of the worst fate I could for the accursed fool, and then the thought came to burden him with the dirtiest, most hideous creature I could imagine and you came to mind, you filthy little obscenity! Twisted, monstrous, revolting—Thing—that you are . . ." And I had shrunk back, for the venom in her voice frightened me more than anything she had done before. "Yes!" she had howled, "I cursed him, for he refused—" but she suddenly snapped her mouth shut and seizing her Broom, proceeded to beat me so hard I could not help but cry, despite my determination never to let her see how much she hurt me either physically or mentally. Then she seized Moglet and tried to throw her on the fire, but I snatched her back and hid her, mewing pitifully, under my cloak. Thwarted, she kicked Puddy out of his crock and stamped down catching my hand instead, for he had jumped into my pocket for protection. Poor Pisky was next, for she threw his bowl against the wall where it smashed and he lay helpless and flapping on the mud floor till I stretched forth my uninjured hand and popped him into the leather water-bucket, drawing that also under my cloak. Then came Corby: she snapped the fine chain that kept him to his perch and pulled and twisted at his neck until he pecked her and spiralled down helpless to join the rest of the creatures huddled under my cloak. Then she seemed to go mad, and though she now made no attempt to touch us herself, she shrieked a curse that made all the pebbles we were burdened with hurt as they never had before. And then her Broom was beating and beating at my bowed head until the blood ran . . .
That seemed to calm her, the sight of my blood, for she called off her minion and I heard her whisper, as though to herself: "No, no not yet: They must have a living home, a living body, or He will seek them out . . . Hide, hide, my precious ones, till I find the formula . . ."
For a while after that She had stayed at home and life had resumed its monotonous sameness, but I never forgot that moment of utter terror when she had lost control and we had seemed to face extinction; nor had I forgotten how my friends, for that is what they were, had all sought refuge under my cloak, as though I were in some way responsible for them all.
This action seemed to bind us all closer together in a way we all secretly acknowledged but never mentioned, which appeared to make our lives together easier and more hopeful in the days that followed.
And now came this day, the day that was going to change our lives irrevocably. The preceding night She had left the hut just before moon-high, and the whole of the two days preceding had been taken up with Shape-Changing. It was early autumn, for she had sent me out for a few heads of saffron which I had found easily enough and then lingered awhile at the edge of the forest gazing down at the village below. Two-wheeled carts laden with the last of the hay and straw creaked down the muddy street; children played with top and ball, their happy squeals and shouts loud in the still air; men trudged back from the fields, mattocks on their shoulders from breaking up the earth ready for the winter sowings; a woman beat out a rag rug and farther off they were burning off stubble, for the smoke curled up thin into my nostrils and stretched them wide with the acrid, sad smell that is the ending of the year. At last an extra-sharp twinge in my stomach reminded me of my Mistress and I hastened back in the blue twilight, snatching a handful of blackberries from a bush as I went and eating each bleb separately to make them last longer. I had been almost happy for a moment or two that afternoon, but there had been a cuff for my tardiness and another for my betraying, juice-stained mouth and I had gone into the corner by the fire and turned my face to the wall. And so, in a fit of the sulks, I missed that last change to beauty, with all its preenings and posturings, which to the others at least broke the monotony of their drab days. So once I heard her split the roof and disappear I was surprised as snow to find a beautiful lady return by the door some two minutes later, to fling Broom at my head with the remark to it: "No point in taking you, after all: it's not far. There'll be no point in the binding, either," and with a few words she loosened the invisible ties we were bound with, like a soaking in warm water softens dried meat. Broom hustled up next to me and rustled and chattered, so I moved away from my corner to join the others by the fire. Our Mistress paused once more before she left by the conventional door, swirling her long, purple gown: "I shall not be late," she warned. "So, quiet as mice and no tricks or I shall have you all with the cramps when I return . . ."
She looked very beautiful that night, with long brown hair the sheen of hazelnuts hanging down her back and eyes the colour of squirrel-fur. I wondered what it felt like to be beautiful.
It may seem strange that we never queried her Shape-Changing, nor questioned where she went in that guise, nor why, but it was so much a part of our lives that we just accepted it, I suppose: I do not remember puzzling over it—I was just glad that she was not there. Afterwards the reasons became clearer, but at the time we all took it as a sort of Holy Day, and relaxed. That night I rustled up some nice bone broth I had hidden away and ate it with freshish bread, sharing it with Corby and Moglet, and shaving a sliver of new-dead moth and slipping it with agonizing patience round the moon-pebble in Pisky's mouth, giving the rest, wings and all, to Puddy. I was comfortably dozing, back against the angle of the fireplace, when the door was flung open and she was back.
I could see that this time it was going to be different from any time before. She seemed to glow, to expand, to fill the whole room with a musky odour of femininity that scared me. Her eyes were sleep-puffed, satiated, and her lips full as a wasp sting and red as new-killed meat. There were scratches on her bare arms and legs as though she had run through bramble and her gown hung open on her breasts. But she seemed in a singular good humour and did not even ask whether we had behaved but whirled about the room in her ruined dress like the wind in a pile of new-fallen leaves.
"Now there was a man!" She sighed and yawned. "A village yokel maybe, but hard as iron and full of juices . . . This time there will be a child! And then you, my pets, will be superfluous . . ." We shrank back, for even in the unaccustomed mellowness of her tone there was an implied threat, even though the others could not clearly understand what she said. "I may decide however to keep you as you are for a while, slaves and servants, for Thing there at least is sometimes useful." She ran long, still-beautiful fingers through her hair, for the magic had not yet slipped away. "And of course the babe will need a nurse . . ." She mused. "I shall have to see . . ." and such was our awe of her that I believed in the immediate appearance of some infant witch, a smaller version of herself, and even peered into all the corners when one did not immediately materialize. I told the others what she had said and we huddled round the cheerless fire, trembling at this new threat, but she did not appear to notice and went into her alcove from whence we could hear her chinking glass and pouring liquid. She came out at last and drained a green, smoking mixture with every indication of enjoyment, but as she set down the drinking-flagon a couple of drops spilled on the oaken table and crackled and fizzed in the dark wood, leaving two shallow, smoking depressions.
She, however, looked more beautiful than ever, and as soon as she had drunk her fill she went over to her couch under the shuttered window. "I shall sleep long during the next few months, Thing, and you will have to keep the place tidy and provisioned. I want no disturbances, no undue noise, and I expect the stock-pot full if ever I wake and am hungry." She reached beneath her pillow for some copper coins and flung them to the floor, watching me scrabble in the dirt. "That should last till the turn of the year, if you are careful. Buy the cheapest you can find, remember: I am not made of money. Gruel and bones will do fine for you," and she yawned and lay down on the couch. "I shall want you to go out at first light in the morning: there is one more mixture I have to complete. Bring me ten drops of blood from a boar; three heads of feverfew and twelve seeds of honesty. Oh, and six fleas from a male hedgepig not more than six months old. You may wake me when you return," and with that, perfectly composed, she closed her eyes, her beautiful lips parted, and she started to snore as she usually did.
We looked at one another, afraid of being vocal, concentrating on thought, but were too frightened, too confused by the turn of events for the refinements we had so carefully practised. All I had from Corby was: "Oh Hell! Hell! Witch brat—that's all we need!" Puddy said "Shit!" and nothing more, but he was never a quick thinker. Moglet mewed that she was frightened and Pisky rushed round and round his bowl, talking to himself backwards, the thoughts and sounds bubbling up in little pops through the gaps between his stretched mouth and the moon-pebble. I tried calming thoughts for them all: grass, trees, lakes, rivers, wind, sky, stars, dark, sleep . . . And gradually they quietened and we settled into an uneasy doze.
As first light pinched through the edges of the shutters I blew the embers of the fire into a blaze and swung the gruel pot over the flames; it needed no salt, for as I mixed the oatmeal and water the miserable tears dripped from the end of my nose. I sensed change in the air and did not want it, for always change had been for the worse. My little friends stirred in their sleep; Corby creaked and hunched his feathers; Puddy glugged, his yellow throat moving up and down; Moglet stretched and mewed in the stretch as though her muscles hurt, but her eyes remained shut; Pisky's tail waved, once. In that quiet time, apart from my silent tears, I suppose we were at peace.
I went out while the dew was still on the grass and spiders' webs hung with diamonds. I found the pearl plates of honesty and harvested the black seeds, one from each pod; withering head of feverfew, with its pungent leaves, grew near the hut; an obliging hedgepig curled from his coat of leaves in the roots of an oak, only too glad to lose a few fleas at hibernation time. I tickled his coarse, ticked fur stomach and rolled him back into his hole with thanks, then set off for the village since wild pig were uncertain at the best of times, even though now was acorn-harvest, and I should have better luck with one of the domestic ones. A quick and relatively painless nick on the ear should do the trick and I had a pocketful of beechmast and acorns for sweeteners: in my experience one never took without giving, for that would upset the balance we all lived by. As I crept down the narrow path to the village I took care to keep well out of sight, for as I said before the peasants mistrusted me as a representative of my Mistress and would not hesitate to harm me if they could, especially if I was not buying anything. I found a convenient sty and struck a bargain with the boar, for my time with the others had given me a primitive understanding of all beast-talk and certainly enough to bribe a pig. I nicked his ear neatly enough and dripped the blood into the little glass phial I carried. The drops were slow in coming for it was a cold morning and I fed the pig a few more acorns to keep him still.
He whiffled contentedly. "Mmm . . . make a nice change, these do. What's your old woman been up to then? They say as she's gone too far this time . . ."
"How?" I questioned. Six drops; better make it seven.
"Seems as she rogered young Cerdic to death last night. Sprang on him and tuckered him out in five minutes . . . Mind you, these humans ain't got no stamina. Now I, I could tell you a thing or two about that . . ." and he rumbled away for a moment or two about servicing the sows they kept for him but I wasn't listening.
"He's dead?" I remembered the lad, bonny and brawny in the fields at haying, from my lonely spyings. Was that what my Mistress had meant, with all her talk of witch-babe? Had She taken man-seed into her body and now hoped—but she couldn't: she was too old. But then, her spells were strong. And was this what had happened on those other times, when she had returned angry and frustrated? Was this because her spells had not worked on those others, whoever they had been? My mind was in a whirl; why had she to kill that handsome young man, especially when he had obviously pleasured her so well? "Dead, you say?" I repeated.
"As firewood. Seems they're all cut up about it; say she's gone too far this time." His fanged mouth nudged me, none too gently. "Got any more?"
"Of course." To retreat safely from these razor-backed horrors, a precarious domestication a few generations back having done little for their manners, always required a diplomatic withdrawal. I threw down the rest of the mast and nuts and scuttled back over the fence.
"Where have they put him?"
"Huh? Oh, the dead 'un. Square. There's a meeting. All there. Come again . . ."
Stoppering and pocketing the phial, I crept cautiously round the back of the houses till I could see, between the washerwoman's and the whore's, that rectangle of trampled earth they called the Square. Sure enough the place was crowded, and there was talk I could not hear so, not daring to approach directly, I made a leap for the thatch of the washerwoman's house, luckily only a few feet from the ground at this point, and crept up among the straw till I could both hear and see without fear of discovery. Glancing sideways at the next roof I was glad I had chosen the one I was on, for the whore's roof was all rotten grey straw and loose with it; I could see an old nest or two and the roots of sear vervain: it would not have held me for two breaths.
Below me was a lake of people, heads bobbing like floats, and an angry hum of voices, a hive disturbed. In a space in the centre was a bier, roughly fashioned from larch poles and skins and the body of Cerdic lay disarranged upon it. His clothing was rough, homespun of course, but the young face held an unworldly look of disillusion and, strangely enough, an air of peaceful exultation too, at odds with the rough, uncomprehending features of the villagers surrounding him. The talk confused me, for I was not used to such a babble, but the gist was of witchcraft and revenge. They led forward a young woman, pretty enough, and she cast herself down weeping by the bier, clasping the careless dead hand of the young man and carrying it to her mouth, kissing it feverishly, and sobbing the while in an uncontrolled burst of emotion that made me hot all over.
I moved away, sliding back down the thatch till my feet found the ground, and crept back home, thoroughly bewildered and with a horrible feeling that something nasty was about to fall on my head or leap out and bite my ankles. The air was very still, as if everything was holding its breath, waiting, and I found myself glancing over my shoulder every few yards; I couldn't get back quick enough.
Back there, there where we all belonged, I tried to tell the others what I had seen and heard but it was only Corby and perhaps Puddy who understood. "Always like that when they turn the corner," said the former. "Turn a corner and see Death staring 'em in the face. Gets 'em all, one way and another. Know it's long past childbearing time but reckon a touch of magic might make the difference. Think they'll renew themselves. Seldom works, but I've heard tell of a deformed mippet born of an old witch. Nigh unkillable, too. Pity She couldn't keep it off'n her own doorstep, though; sounds as though she's stirred up a hornet's nest down there. Could mean trouble for us all . . ."
"Water," said Puddy. For a moment I thought he wanted a sprinkle from the water jar, but he continued his thought a space later, as was his wont. It was sometimes a little irritating waiting for a toad's thoughts, although they were usually worth having. "Don't like it. That and fire . . ." He appeared to meditate. "Best things for killing them off."
A hiss from Moglet alerted me as the Mistress yawned, stretched and rose from the bed in the corner. She still looked remarkably young and beautiful, so much so that I forgot to duck as her ringed hand slapped my cheek.
"Well, where are they? The things I sent you for?"
Humbly I offered my gatherings. She picked them over grudgingly, then took them over to the alcove, where we could hear her chopping and pounding and mixing during a long afternoon, while we huddled together, not sure what the next hours would bring. Twice I tried to tell her what I had heard and seen in the village and twice she stopped me, the second time with a jar hurled across the room and a threat that she would get Broom to beat me if I disturbed her further. "I am not interested in what those peasants do or think," she said, so I held my peace.
When it was dusk within and near enough outside I lighted a tallow and stirred the omnipresent stew; putting bowls by the fire to warm, I opened the earth-oven and took out the day's bread, standing it on end to cool and tapping it to make sure it was cooked through, for the oven was very slow. I fed the others surreptitiously, with an eye to the alcove and ear to the mixings and a nose pricked against the unpleasant aromas. When they were satisfied I gestured them back to their boxes, crocks and perches, for all day we had been uncharacteristically free to move and I did not want her reminded we were comparatively free.
"Supper is ready, Mistress," I said timidly, but as she came from the alcove I saw with horror that her beauty had faded by ten years while her smile showed that she had not consulted her mirror recently. What had happened to the magic she was convinced would keep her young forever now she was pregnant of a witch-child? And was she indeed? My eyes went to her swelling belly: she seemed some three or four months gone, and that in less than twenty-four hours.
"Nine days!" she said triumphantly, her eyes following my gaze. "Nine days, that is all! And then you will have a new Master, you miserable worm . . ." Her mood changed as she took the bowl and bread, well over half of what I had cooked. "What do you mean by giving me these slops? My baby needs good, red meat and fresh vegetables and fruit, and wine to strengthen his blood! Why did you not prepare such?"
"But Mistress," I faltered, "you told me to—"
I got no further for her free hand shot out and gave me a stinging slap. Holding my hand to my reddened cheek I backed away.
"Go now, and fetch me a rich pie from the village and a flagon of their best wine." She reached into one of her boxes and spilt coins, silver coins I had never seen, in a stream onto the floor. Scrabbling to obey I pocketed ten, twenty even. I knew my task would be difficult, or well-nigh impossible, at this time of the evening, for it was now dark and the villagers would equate me with the darkness and chase me from their doors—but which was worse, their vindictiveness or hers? And there was the dead man . . . I hesitated.
And even as I did so, everything began to happen at once.
There was a thump, as some large object struck the door and a crash as stones rattled against the shutters. Starting back I whimpered with shock and fright, my hand still tingling, for it had been on the latch when the door had vibrated under the blow. For a long moment my mewlings were the only sound in that confined space, then there was a voice outside; ragged, scared, but still truculent.
"Come out, Witch! Come out and meet your accusers!"
For a moment the stillness inside was intensified. Then my Mistress hissed like a snake behind me and, turning, I saw such a look of evil on her face that even I, inured as I was, cowered flat in terror. But her look was not for me, and her voice, when it came for those outside, was honey-sweet, though I could see her hair and fingers writhe like snakes.
"Who calls so late, and on what errand?"
"You know who's here, and why!" came the answer. "You knows what you've done, there were those that oversaw. Time's come to pay for it!"
She hissed again, but her voice was beguiling still. "I know not of what you speak . . . Has someone been hurt? Perhaps my medicines . . ." but even as she finished speaking she was muttering under her breath spells I had never heard even the echo of before. All at once the pretence of beauty was gone and her body resumed its usual hideosity—all except her belly. Her fine clothes dropped to the floor but her stomach seemed to swell visibly—a smooth, rounded mockery in that ancient frame. She caressed it with her fingers, still spell-making—the gnarled, dirty fingers were an obscenity against the youthful mound she touched.
"Grow, grow!" She muttered. "Grow, my manikin! I give you my strength, my lust for life—Make it not nine days, nor even nine hours . . . Not five, not four, not even one! Less, less!" and her voice became louder with the repeated rhythms of some incantation in a strange tongue. "Help me, help me, Master, and he shall be yours!"
Of a sudden it grew deathly cold and a foul stench filled the hut. I crawled back to the fireplace unregarded, to cower against the hearth where the fire now burned blue and heatless. Outside the clamour rose; more voices, more stones, and a flicker of flame blossomed behind the gaps in the shutters. They were firing the hut! Now there was a scrambling outside, another thump above our heads this time, and a tearing at the thatch on the roof and an ominous chanting.
"Burn the witch! Burn the witch!"
The smell of smoke filled my nostrils. There was a crackling, a flaming of tinder-dry straw roofing and the voices grew louder, a chant to rival my Mistress's mouthings.
"To the stake, to the stake! Burn the murderess, the witch!"
But my Mistress continued her spells, louder now and even louder till I covered my ears and shut my eyes, pressed back against the back wall of the hut as far as possible from threat and danger. It was cold; it was hot; flames shot up, smouldered down, till it all grew as regular as my pounding heartbeats and I was afraid as I had never been.
And there my life might have ended, choked by smoke and charred by fire, but for one thing—