Witchy Winter

by D. J. Butler

  Thirty-six votes for the empire’s crown

  As the song ended, Nathaniel realized that the ringing in his ears had stopped. He held his breath and said nothing, hoping the din might have disappeared permanently.

  “Henh.” The Indian smiled. “That’s me, Chippewa. Or Ojibwe, or Anishinaabe. Same thing. I guess Chippewa rhymed best.”

  “How do you know my name?” Nathaniel asked. The shrieking sound returned, but softer than it had been.

  The Ojibwe’s face grew serious. “I’ve come a long way to meet you, Nathaniel. I need you to help my child, and I’m supposed to help you first. You see, I’ve been told you can heal my son Giimoodaapi.”

  “Are you some sort of wizard?” Nathaniel asked. He had never imagined the magical college in Philadelphia teaching Algonk adepts, but what did he know? “Or a medicine man?”

  “Oh, no,” the Ojibwe said. “I’m no Midewiwin. I’m just a man who has seen his manidoo. My name is Ma’iingan. It means wolf, in Zhaaganaashii.”

  “My name means god has given. That’s what the parson says, anyway, when he tries to get me to come to his church. In Greek, I suppose, or Latin.”

  “Maybe Gichi-Manidoo has given you a wolf then, na?”

  Nathaniel grinned. “So far, it’s better than everything else He’s given me.” He turned his head back to look up through the tree branches. “Where am I?”

  “That’s the hill Landon threw you down.” Ma’iingan pointed. “That means you’re in Johnsland. You’re out in the forest, beyond where the earl’s Irish farmers live and where his priests kill sheep.”

  “I feel very far from home.”

  “Not so far. But all distances look long to a baby in a cradleboard, na?”

  “How did you find me, and how do you know my name?”

  “I had a vision.” From his smile, the Indian might have been telling a subtle joke. “I saw my manidoo. I went looking for him so he could help my son, and he showed me where to find you.”

  “On a map?”

  “In the vision. I’ve traveled in the Turtle Kingdom before, so I know the biggest rivers and the big lakes.”

  “The Turtle Kingdom. Do you mean the Empire?”

  “Henh. All this land is Turtle Island. On account of it’s on the back of a very large turtle, which Nanaboozhoo piled high with dirt. Or a muskrat, some say. Or maybe Nanaboozhoo is a muskrat. It’s hard to tell sometimes, with those old stories.”

  “We mostly call it the New World.”

  “Henh, you Zhaaganaashii would do that. But then, you got here late, so it’s new to you. And I know your name because I heard you and your friends talking the other day. I saw you when you were hunting.”

  “They’re not really my friends.”

  “Henh. Charles, maybe, na?”

  “Yes, Charles. George is the earl’s legitimate son. Landon is also the earl’s son. He’s not legitimate, but that doesn’t really matter. They both don’t like me and they don’t have to respect me.”

  Ma’iingan’s face looked sad. “Henh. Well, I heard them say your name. Nathaniel. God-Has-Given. And for today, I think you should conclude that Gichi-Manidoo has given you another chance, because if I hadn’t come along on the path shown to me by my manidoo, you would have died a cold and lonely death.”

  Nathaniel nodded slowly. “I would have died. No one will look for me.”

  “No? Why not? You have friends. At least Charles. Maybe the earl, the man whose house you live in, na? It’s a big house.”

  “The earl won’t care. I’m just a foster child, just a mouth to feed. And Charles didn’t look for me when he could have.”

  “I think he did. But he went the wrong way. Maybe he’ll come back later and find us here, na? But for now, you lie still. I’m going to cook a rabbit. Don’t get too hungry, though, Zhaaganaashii Nathaniel, today you only get the broth.”

  The broth of a boiled rabbit sounded very good to Nathaniel. Before he could say thank you, or ask whether the Ojibwe planned to return him to the earl’s big house, he found himself drifting back to sleep.

  ~Listen to him, listen to him, listen to him.~

  * * *

  The Joe Duncan slid smoothly into place at the end of the pier. Two men working paddles up front—a German from Youngstown named Schäfer and a Haudenosaunee whose name sounded like Dadgayadoh and who wore fringed leather leggings, a red blanket over one shoulder, and a black top hat—leaped to the dock and steadied the craft.

  The Joe Duncan was a big canoe, built of light wood and painted Imperial blue. As a nod to economy, the canoe did without gold trim or the Company’s seal—two stags rampant standing in a single long canoe, holding between them a shield on which was painted an outline of the courses of the Mississippi and Ohio Rivers, with a pitchfork-holding farmer standing inside the junction beside his mule and plow, and a beaver on all fours atop the shield—painted on its hull. Ironically, as the company’s only canoe of that size without trim, seal, or name, the economy made the craft instantly recognizable as the Joe Duncan.

  It was a really big canoe; Luman had seen it hold at one time fifteen adults, along with bales of furs, personal gear for all fifteen, and the “cash box,” which in fact held very little cash, but was a waterproofed chest kept inside an oiled leather bag, mostly holding papers of various sorts—trading post balances, log books, order books, and drafts for money. The drafts were negotiable, but weren’t the sort of money a highwayman would generally think of as cash.

  Very few robbers would be bold enough to walk into a bank or a goldsmith’s shop and demand to redeem stolen certificates.

  So water damage was a bigger worry than theft.

  In a pinch, the Joe Duncan would probably hold more than twenty. Now its customary crew of eight made the director’s canoe secure, and two men with long rifles sat in it, fore and aft, watching both banks of the river for any sign of a threat. Mostly, they watched the Parkersburg side of the water.

  The Imperial Ohio Company made regular use of oversized canoes like the Joe Duncan; they were hard to sink and could be portaged, which made them useful craft for a region bounded by four great lakes and two enormous rivers, and fissured by innumerable smaller waterways. What made the Joe Duncan noteworthy was that it carried one of the Company’s five directors. The other four, all of whom were men, were generally to be found in an office near the eastern end of the Ohio or even in Pennsland, or occasionally in an ornate carriage on one of the Imperial pikes.

  Notwithstanding Schmidt, the only woman of their number, spent most of her time in the west. She generally traveled by this canoe; Luman couldn’t decide whether that, too, was a matter of economy, or a gesture of solidarity with her traders, or a point of personal style, or whether perhaps she simply found it convenient to go by boat in a land of many waters.

  He still had no idea why the canoe was called the Joe Duncan.

  The eight men paddling the canoe made it secure and then waited. They were armed, as anyone not a fool traveling in the Ohio was, but they weren’t soldiers. They were porters and traders, Imperial Ohio Company men, and they were doing their best to look as innocuous as possible.

  Oldham, the man who was to remain behind, stayed with them. He whistled some Pennslander hymn Luman didn’t recognize, and stared across the river at Adena forestland.

  Luman Walters followed Notwithstanding Schmidt up the pier to Parkersburg. The afternoon air was cool and descending with the sun toward chilly; he smelled woodsmoke and roasting meat.

  Luman knew the plan and was prepared. While Schmidt carried only a packet of papers in an oilskin envelope, Luman carried all the magical paraphernalia he could, as usual, stuffed into the many pockets of his long, custom-made travel coat.

  In addition, he carried a small wooden box in one hand. The box had small air holes drilled in the top, and every few minutes it shuddered slightly in his grip.

  Other than Luman’s ritual dagger, the black-handled athame he’d had made for himself in the
cellar of the King of Prussia tavern in Cambry, they were unarmed.

  Parkersburg was a small town, a jumbled shrug of wooden buildings that started with a cluster of warehouses around the docks and then scattered out concentrically through inns and hostels and coffee shops until it became farmland. Schmidt knew just where she was going and made a beeline for the back door of a nondescript two-story warehouse.

  A boardwalk ran along the side of the warehouse, turning the corner at the edge of the building in a three-way intersection. Luman looked and saw that if he lay on his belly, he could squeeze his way under the boardwalk, and that the ground beneath it looked like simple earth.

  Perfect.

  Schmidt knocked once, but didn’t wait, opening the door and marching in. Luman followed.

  Within, a plain office: shelves of ledgers, a desk, two chairs in front of the desk. Behind the desk sat a thick-necked man with receding hair, wearing a cotton shirt printed with a paisley pattern, the pattern very à la mode among traders wishing to show their international sophistication, but the fabric too thin for the weather, and cort-du-roi trousers. He stood and smiled.

  “I don’t think we have an appointment,” he said.

  Schmidt sat down.

  Luman shut the door and did the same.

  “My name is Notwithstanding Schmidt. I’m a director of the Imperial Ohio Company.”

  “Mrs. Schmidt.”

  “Madam Director.”

  “Yes, Madam Director.” The thick-necked man swallowed but then relaxed back into his chair. “I’m Reuben Clay, I’m Foreman of the Stevedores Association in Parkersburg.”

  “To hell with the stevedores.” Schmidt laid her oilskin packet on the desk.

  Clay looked at the packet and smiled. “I thought maybe you had come because the Imperial Ohio wanted to conduct some business here.”

  “We do. To hell with the stevedores. I’m here because you’re the first man among the Hansa of Parkersburg.”

  Clay smiled. “Director…”

  “Don’t waste your time denying anything. And don’t cavil about titles, because I don’t know your Hansard title and I don’t care. Grand Mufti Hansard of Parkersburg, that’s you. I knew your predecessor in this office and I know your game. You run this town and all the traders in it.”

  Clay spread his arms. “The Lord Mayor…”

  Schmidt didn’t budge. “You run this town, like Tup Jenkins did before you.”

  Clay dropped his arms, sucked at his lower lip, looked from Schmidt to Luman and back again, and finally nodded. “Yeah. I run this town.”

  “You and I know the truth,” Schmidt said. “We trade in life.”

  The Hansard raised an eyebrow. “How do you mean?”

  “Money,” Schmidt said. “Wealth. It’s a mere abstraction for power, and specifically the power to purchase. Others may think you and I trade in money, but in fact we trade in the power to have food when one is hungry, the power to shelter within four walls from winter’s blast, the power to have shoes on our feet. The power to live.”

  “Director Schmidt, you are delightfully philosophical, but a little indirect.”

  “The Emperor’s enemies in the Ohio, the Cahokian rebels and other Ophidian traitors, continue to thrive.”

  “I’m not a condottiere, Director. My men would fight to defend a cargo, or collect a tariff, but I can hardly go to war with Adena.”

  “The Emperor doesn’t require it. As I was explaining, we’ll strike at the lives of the Emperor’s enemies in another way. From now on, Grand Mufti Hansard, you will not sell to any representative of any power in the seven kingdoms.”

  Clay squinted. “Would you like to know my actual title? As opposed to calling me that bit of pseudo-mussulman nonsense?”

  Schmidt ignored the offer. “You won’t sell to any Firstborn. You won’t sell to any person you have any reason to believe will sell to any Ophidian.”

  “I can’t decide to blacklist purchasers on my own. I’ll be violating the Charter. The whole League will know it because Parkersburg will wither and die. I’ll be removed, at least.”

  The box Luman carried thumped once, in sympathy.

  “You will continue to sell,” Schmidt said. “I will leave an Imperial Ohio Company Trader here, and he will buy any goods you cannot sell to children of Eve. These are the rates he’ll pay, eighty percent in bank notes redeemable in Philadelphia and twenty percent in silver.” Schmidt opened the string catch on the oilskin packet and removed the first document, a three-page list of prices.

  Clay took the list and scanned it. “These prices are…a little low.”

  “Yes,” Schmidt acknowledged, “but only a little. You can make it happen.”

  “True.” Clay set down the list. “But I’d rather sell to the Firstborn.”

  Schmidt removed the second document from the packet. “You will sign this agreement. You see that there are two copies; I’ll keep one. So long as my agent is satisfied that you are keeping the terms of our agreement, he’ll remit to you a douceur of one percent of all purchases he makes, in specie.”

  “Remit to me…or to the Hansa?”

  “That will be your decision,” Schmidt said.

  Clay looked to Luman. “And is this your agent, then?”

  “No. My agent is Ira Oldham; you’ll meet him. This is my wizard.”

  That was Luman’s prompt. He carefully settled his spectacles on the bridge of his nose. Then he opened the box and reached in to grab the sleepy and confused bat inside.

  “Your copy of the agreement is your insurance,” Clay said. “It’s a threat. You’ll blackmail me.”

  “Only if you stop cooperating. And as long as you cooperate, you’ll be paid.”

  The bat squeaked a strong objection at being gripped, but when Luman pressed the tip of his athame to its left eye and popped the eyeball out onto the table, the bat screamed. Its cry sounded almost like a child’s.

  “Gott in Himmel!” Clay cursed. “Must he do that in here?”

  “Yes,” Schmidt said. “He must. I trust the agent I’ll leave in Parkersburg, but I also suspect you’ll try to subvert him, or try to sneak around him at the margins. So I need a second mechanism to watch you.”

  Clay frowned in distaste. “What would that be, a blind bat?”

  Luman popped out the bat’s other eye. The creature trembled with pain and fear in his closed fist, and he indulged in a moment of sorrow for the innocent bat.

  Then he broke its neck.

  He reached forward to lay its corpse beside the oilskin. This was pure theater, and theater agreed with Director Schmidt in advance. It worked; Reuben Clay stared at the eyeless bat as if it were a murdered baby.

  In truth, Luman himself felt a little ill. Was he really cut out to be a wizard? Did he really want to do this?

  “Luman will enchant this town so that we can keep an eye on it. He’ll know immediately if you cheat on our arrangement. He’ll know immediately if you act to cancel his spell. He’ll know immediately if any harm comes to my agent.”

  “This isn’t a deal,” Clay said. “It’s a prison cell.”

  “In which you will personally get rich. So long as you can keep quiet. And if things go wrong for you here, you know that any friend of the Emperor can expect to find a warm welcome in Pennsland.”

  From a coat pocket, Luman extracted a lump of uncooked bread dough. He had mixed the dough himself two days earlier in an iron pan, swishing wheat flour, water, and a nubbin of old sourdough together with his bare fingers, then left it to rise in his lap. This or orange beeswax were the two basic modeling clays preferred by his Memphite spells. Sometimes the substances could be used interchangeably, but Hecate definitely preferred bread dough.

  And the sacrifice of living creatures, damn her.

  Luman began to stretch and shape the lump.

  “What’s he doing?” Clay asked Schmidt.

  She shrugged. “He’s a bit of a thief, as magicians go. Steals one thing from the brauc
hers, something else from Memphis, a third spell from some Haudenosaunee witch. I never know exactly what he’s doing.”

  Luman had shaped the dough ball into the form of a tailless dog, and he now stood the little animal on the desktop. “Thief is such a harsh word. Couldn’t we say that I borrow other people’s craft?”

  “You aren’t borrowing if you don’t give it back.”

  Luman snorted, digging in another pocket for a clump of black dog’s hair. The hairs had cost him a bite and a minor infection, but it had been worth it to harvest as much hair as he had from that shaggy black hound in Pittsburgh. At least he hadn’t had to kill the beast. “You can’t give back knowledge, Director. Think of me as an explorer of the arcane world, a man willing to take on any initiation or pursue any course of study, no matter how dark the road or how recondite the learning.” He stuck the hairs onto the dog’s rump, twisting them to stick them into the dough and fashion of them a dog’s tail.

  “For the good of the company,” Schmidt said.

  “And our investor, the Emperor.” Luman cut an open mouth into the dough dog’s head. Then he gouged tiny eye sockets into the dog’s face and inserted one bat eyeball into each.

  Reuben Clay shuddered. “You two are unarmed. You’re alone, except for your traders, and they’re ten minutes away, by the river.” He reached under his desk and came up with a polished flintlock pistol, which he rested on the table, pointing between the two of them. “If I simply shoot one of you now, within moments my men in the warehouse will be in here with clubs and knives to subdue the survivor.”

  “True,” Schmidt agreed. “And then the five hundred Company Regulars following us downriver will arrive tomorrow morning. Not finding my agent here to give them the signal to stand down, their orders are to raze Parkersburg to the ground.”

  “You would make war on the Hansa?” Clay frowned.

  “Not at all. I would buy Hansa goods and pay you handsomely, Grand Mufti Hansard of Parkersburg, to allow me to do so. Some of your traders will make a little less money than they used to, but the Pacification is expensive, and I have to be careful how I allocate my funds. If you can’t find it in your heart—or rather, your interests—to be enriched, then Parkersburg will be destroyed, and multiple eyewitnesses will swear up and down that it was Firstborn warriors in the livery of Adena who did it. My men will have to procure the corpses of a few Adena fighters for verisimilitude, but that’s easily done.” She leaned forward, over the desk. “In fact, I imagine my soldiers would be very happy to do it. They’ve all just been let out of Imperial prisons in Philadelphia, Trenton, and Baltimore in order to enlist. They may have some rage they’d like to express.”