Dragon's Wish

by Elizabeth Rain

  Olivia nodded, pleased with the effort. “Thank you. I smell food. Are you hungry?”

  “Starved.” I admitted. It had been a long time since breakfast, and lunch had been a handful of carrots and a few radishes left over from market. I was used to eating lunch earlier.”

  We stored our sewing and washed up before we took our seats. Charlie Thompson sat at the head of the table and gave me a polite smile when he saw me. Isla Thompson wore a pinched expression about her face as she stared down her nose at me in my crinkled skirts.

  “It looks delicious Mrs. Thompson.” I offered; my hands folded in my lap as I waited for Olivia to take the lead. No sense in doing anything to make myself look any more foolish or ill-mannered than Mrs. Thompson probably already thought I was.

  Lunch was a simple affair of ham sandwiches and salads. For dessert, we had strawberries with a drizzle of honey and a dollop of clotted cream on top.

  “So, Elspeth, what is it that your father does?” Isla asked as she passed the platter of sandwiches.

  I waited until I could swallow, my mouth full around a bite of dry ham. “Dad builds furniture on the side. He also hunts and traps and helps mom with the garden.”

  “So is that what your mother does? She works the garden to sell on market day?”

  “Well, she also grows and harvests various herbs for her medicinal apothecary. She makes tinctures and salves to help with common ailments and afflictions.”

  “Yes, well. I try to stay away from those folklore remedies. Who knows what’s really in them. I trust the Dr. In town. He knows what he’s doing and his cough tonic is wonderful stuff.” She added self-importantly.

  I refrained from adding what I thought of the doctor’s quackery. My lips twitched and I took a bite of salad to conceal my expression. The tonic in question was easily three-quarters alcohol. The only thing it had in common with what Mama made was the alcohol used to preserve it, though she often cut her tinctures with apple cider to stay away from the spirits. No wonder Mrs. Thompson liked it. But I didn’t think she would appreciate me telling her she was heavily imbibing of the wine. But I imagined she felt better when she took it, at least until morning.

  My eyes met Charlie Thompson’s as he avoided his wife’s. I had conveniently failed to mention to Mrs. Thompson that her husband didn’t share her aversion to folklore remedies. He was one of Mama’s biggest customers.

  “So, where do you attend church, Elspeth...” Mrs. Thompson continued.

  Olivia rolled her eyes, her lips pinched. “Mama, stop grilling her...”

  “I’m merely making conversation. It’s nice to have company over for a meal and I want her to feel welcome.”

  I suspected Olivia was right and Isla was really just enjoying herself at my expense. My stomach didn’t feel so hot.

  Isla continued to look my way, expecting an answer. “Well, we don’t get down from the farm every week for church. We have a small Sunday gathering at the O’Neil’s for those of us local to the mountain as it’s a way into town. But when we do attend in Salem, we’ve enjoyed services at Reverend Mather’s.”

  Isla snorted, taking a second sandwich from the platter and slathering it with butter. She ignored the salad. “That ignorant fool. Blasphemous, that’s what he is. All kinds of ideas and free thinking is what he’s about.”

  “Now Isla, we are not that person. Cotton Mathers is a perfectly respected minister in town,” Charlie began.

  “I wouldn’t step foot in that devil’s church,” she stated, interrupting her husband and setting her knife down to take a dainty bite. Her eyes remained cold and speculative on me.

  I finished half a sandwich and a small salad; not sure I’d keep much more down. I was positive Isla Thomas was exactly that sort of person.

  “I know!” she said out of the blue, as if it had just occurred to her. “I think you should come to our church next week. Reverend Parris really knows how to put on a wonderful sermon. Man knows his bible all right,” she concluded.

  My eyes widened in horror. I was all set to politely decline when I caught Olivia’s imploring gaze.

  “Please say you will. I would love to have someone else come to church with me this Sunday,” she pleaded.

  Somehow, I agreed. Father wouldn’t like it, I knew. His opinion of the good Reverend Parris was of a greedy and rigid man who knew less about God and more about the bottom of the communal wine jug than was healthy or proper.

  WE FOUND A PLACE IN the back pew of the church. I sat with Olivia, squeezed in between a matronly lady whose hygiene caused me to breathe through my mouth in a futile attempt to escape the smell. In the back of the church directly behind our row, others stood, their eyes feverish with excitement. My eyes didn’t linger long on the two men who stood together there, eyes flinty and cold. The Magistrates Jonathan Corwin and John Hathorne. I’d never officially met them, but I knew them from their reputations.

  Their badgering of witnesses and victims alike before cases went to trial was well known. My stomach roiled with bitter nervousness. I missed Reverend Mather’s congregation of smiling faces and simple farmers and laborers like my father. Looking around, it wasn’t difficult for me to pick out the more affluent patrons of Salem, all gathered in one place. My father would have called them all a bunch of like-minded hypocrites that liked to point fingers straight out and never turn them around.

  Reverend Parris didn’t disappoint. He came in wearing an air of self-righteous indignation that self-appointed patrons of Salem gravitated towards. At the top of his lungs he preached for nearly two hours on the sins of the flesh and the damnation awaiting all who deviated from the Bible’s magnificent word. I wondered if he referred to himself, rather than the bible, as he waved it in the air like a banner. I sat stiff as a board and afraid to move. I found my eyes wandering around the packed church, past the fiery eyes and ‘here yeas’ of the self-righteous and to the two girls that sat up front. Elizabeth Parris, the reverend’s eleven-year-old daughter, sat next to her cousin Abigail Williams, who looked to be around nine. The younger girl stared straight ahead, eyes downcast, looking scared to death. But the reverend’s daughter’s eyes wandered around the room with cool speculation, as if she were searching out any naysayers to report back to her father at a later date. Her hard eyes and pinched mouth never relaxed their vigilance.

  After church there was a picnic on the front lawn and everyone filed from the hot steamy interior seeking the welcome shade of nearby trees that dotted the front lawn. The sermon had stirred the popular sentiments of the time and I wasn’t surprised to hear the conversation take a definite turn south away from fire and brimstone and the devil’s ways to a talk of witchcraft and trials and hangings. The air of excitement the topic provoked spread nearly as fast as the hard knot that gathered and percolated in my stomach, making it nearly impossible to enjoy the cold chicken and potato salad Mrs. Thompson had packed for the occasion.

  “So, what did you think, Elspeth? Reverend Parris really knows how to deliver on The Word, doesn’t he?”

  I blanched, feeling the hard knot expand. I struggled to come up with something positive to say. “He has a lot of energy,” I managed, lamely. It was the best I could come up with.

  Isla frowned, trying to assess whether I had just delivered a compliment or an insult. “Yes well, he does a superb job of addressing the sentiment of how we all feel.

  I was sure it wasn’t how I felt.

  OVER SUPPER THE NEXT day I shared my experience in the good reverend Parris’s church. When I mentioned the two girls, Elizabeth and Abigail from the front row, Da cringed and set his fork down with a thud and frowned in my direction.

  “You know that’s where all this mass hysteria started, don’t you? The ‘Good Reverend’ is clever in pointing out all the deficiencies in his congregation and town, but for tending to business at home and his own family—not so much. To put it bluntly, Elizabeth is spoiled and difficult and throws tantrums when things don’t go according to her pl
an. Jonathon Corwin and his buddy John found willing victims in those two adolescent girls. They interrogated them, probably to scare them into behaving better for the Reverend. But it backfired. Instead, they started pointing fingers and casting blame. They accused three people of using witchcraft to cause those fits. One was Sarah Good, one of the homeless beggars that frequent the streets. Another was some old woman. But the third, Ti tuba, was a Caribbean slave who, for whatever reason, confessed to being in league with the devil and practicing witchcraft. That was all it took, and that seed of paranoia was planted. So far there are six people dead because of what those two started. There are five more on trial as we speak.”

  My stomach was hurting again. I had a thought. “What about Cotton Mathers? What does he think about all this craziness?”

  Duncan sat back, thick calloused fingers rubbing at the creases in his forehead. “I talked to him just the other day as a matter of fact. He’s beside himself over the entire affair. He wrote a letter to the court’s asking them, falling back on scripture for support, not to allow opinion and the use of spectral evidence about dreams and visions as admissible evidence. Anything stronger than speculation can ’t support it.” He shook his head, expression grave and worried.

  “The trials continue as we speak. I think the effectiveness of that letter speaks for itself. The court of Oyer and Terminer continues to persecute those that fall on disfavor or who draw the wrong kind of notice from its more affluent citizens.”

  “YOU’LL BE BACK BY SATURDAY afternoon, right? You need to have time to get ready for church on Sunday, Olivia.” Isla’s pinched expression said she’d have been perfectly okay with Olivia not going at all to our humble cabin in the woods with the poor Walsh’s. Olivia slanted an eye roll and a grin my way as she climbed into the buckboard with my brother Aidan’s help.

  “Yes, Mama. I won’t forget. I’ll be fine.”

  We pulled out and moved towards home. I felt Isla’s hard eyes boring into our backs as we left. I had to admit, Isla Thompson was not my favorite person. She made me appreciate the gentle kindness of my mother even more.

  “Wow, I hate to say it, but leaving home behind for a couple of days will seem like a vacation,” Olivia giggled.

  “Agreed. I’m so glad you’re staying with us. Moses, our cat, has kittens.”

  “Isn’t Moses a boy’s name?”

  I grinned. “Yeah, well when they are kittens its kinda hard to tell, and the well, the name just stuck,” I admitted.

  Olivia giggled. “How old are they?” Olivia asked with interest.

  “Six weeks. Five of them. They are so stinking cute. Have you ever been berry picking?” I wondered aloud.

  Olivia nodded, “Yeah, but not in a long while. Mama doesn’t like to fight the mosquitoes.”

  I glanced up at the wispy clouds threading the dark blue behind them, just enough to cast a few shadows. The heat of the last few days had finally broken and the breeze added to the welcome respite from the oppressive weather.

  We pulled into the yard and got down, taking Olivia’s bag into the cabin and up the stairs to my small loft bedroom. It was tiny and I bit my lip when she stared down at my bed, trying to hide her disdain. I recalled Olivia’s soft four-poster bed, stuffed with cotton that felt like heaven to sleep on. My bed fit in the loft, barely. It was narrower and stuffed with fresh straw. Along with the small vanity my father had made me for my 12th birthday, it was the only furniture in my room. The ceiling was close overhead and we had to duck. But the shade tree over the roof and the small open window let in the breeze, and at least it was cool.

  “It’s not much. But the bed should be big enough for us to sleep comfortable.” I added, so worried about her disapproval.

  “It’s fine, don’t be such a worry-wart. Let’s drop our things and did you mention kittens?”

  I met Olivia’s eyes and we both dissolved in giggles. Kittens fixed everything.

  “I did. Let’s go see them. We can bring them out into the yard to play, I think I have some string.

  LUNCH WAS LEFTOVER bean soup and a hunk of fresh corn fry bread Mama did up in the cast iron griddle on the wood stove. “This is delicious, Mrs. Walsh.” Olivia admitted, taking a second slice of bread and half a scoop extra of bean soup, rich with leftover ham chunks from two nights before.

  “We’re going berry picking after lunch, Da. Up along the ridge.” I shared as I pushed my empty bowl away.

  Moira spoke up. “Be careful of snakes, they like those berries as much as you do for all the critters that like to hide in them.”

  “Snakes?” Olivia cried, eyebrows shooting straight up.

  “You’ll be fine,” Duncan grinned. “Just watch where you step. Most aren’t poisonous, but the Black Snakes are huge and will bite back if cornered. Relax, they won’t bother you as long as you don’t step on them. Just follow Elspeth’s lead. She’s a pro with snakes, aren’t you daughter?”

  “Now aren’t you the comedian Da? I’m an expert at finding them beneath me feet you mean.”

  I shared Olivia’s obvious aversion to them.

  “I’ll get the dishes girls; you get an early start. You get back in time you can probably whip up a batch of jam. Would you like to take some home with you Olivia?”

  “Oh, yes, Ma’am. That would be wonderful, thanks.”

  “Thanks Mama. You ready Olivia. Baskets are out front. Mama, do you have any of that ointment that keeps the mosquitoes away?”

  Moira nodded to the back of the counter in the kitchen where a long row of jars were lined up. She wrote their names and purposes on the lids in wax crayon. I grabbed a small jar that was about half full with a light green ointment.

  “Yarrow and Sweet grass salve. It smells wonderful and helps keep the mosquitoes away like a charm.” I opened the jar and took a generous amount out and rubbed it between my hands, applying it to any exposed skin. Olivia looked skeptical.

  I giggled. “It’s just a mixture of repellent herbs.” I held my hand out for Olivia to take a whiff.

  Her face lit in a smile as she dipped her own fingers in. “That smells citrusy!”

  From the porch, we grabbed two baskets and headed up the trail.

  “How far is it?” Olivia wondered. A light breeze whispered through the trees, lifting the fine hairs at our napes with the cooling breeze.

  “About a half-hour walk is all.” I looked at the blue sky. “We need to make it back before this afternoon to beat the storm.”

  Olivia laughed at me. “There isn’t a cloud in the sky. It will not rain,” she added skeptically.

  I gave her a slight smile over my shoulder. “Wanna bet?”

  Olivia’s nose notched up a bit in the air. “You should know, gambling is a sin—” her eyes twinkled. “—that’s why the loser washes and sorts the berries,” she stated, haughtily.

  We dissolved into giggles. “I’ll take that ‘bet’.” I challenged.

  We slowed down, careful as we neared the patch. Snakes weren’t the only thing to worry about in a raspberry patch. The dark purple fruit was a favorite of the black bear that called the mountain home. But not today. We had the patch to ourselves. The bushes were loaded and in no time at all we were stuffing our baskets with the plump purple fruit. More than a few made it past berry stained lips. “These are so good. I can’t remember the last time I could get out to pick some. Outdoor activities aren’t exactly my ma’s favorite pastime.” Olivia admitted.

  I refrained from mentioning that I was sure anything that involved moving off the stool and working was not on Isla’s top favorite list of things to do.

  “How is that bug ointment working? Getting bit any?”

  Olivia smiled her way. “Not a one. It’s great.” I smiled at the older girl, a smear of juice across her cheek and her hair coming loose from her bun to straggle along her chin. She kept pushing it back, but it didn’t help. It was the filthiest I’d ever seen the city girl. I thought it added, rather than detracted, from her plump prettin
ess.

  I looked at my basket, near overflowing with ripe berries. Olivia’s wasn’t there yet, but between the two of us, we had enough to make at least a double batch of jam. I opened my mouth to suggest we head back when an immense shadow moved over our heads, blanking out the brightness of the day for a couple of seconds. Along with it came a whirl of twisting wind, swirling against our bent forms. The shock of it made us look up in surprise. The sudden contrast in lighting forced us to squint.

  Before Oliva could make out what it was it was gone. “Wow, that was some cloud! Maybe we will get that rain. Crazy how quick it moved.” Olivia looked at me, holding onto my basket of berries with white knuckles, my mouth pinched into a thin line of anger. I hadn’t missed the flash of that scaled tail before my foolish brother Aidan disappeared from sight. Of all the idiotic foolishness.

  “Elspeth? What is it, what’s wrong? That was a cloud, right?” Her eyes fell to my hand’s, covered in brown, flaky blotches. “What’s wrong with your hands?”

  I looked down at them in alarm. I sat the basket on the ground beside my feet and rubbed briskly at the backs of my hands and wrists. “Nothing, sometimes the heat brings it on. Psoriasis, a skin condition. It comes and goes.”

  Olivia looked at me doubtfully, but she said nothing to pursue it.

  I took a deep breath and then a second one, trying to calm myself down. When I got my hands on Aidan. Never mind that; father would kill him for me.

  I picked my basket back up. Most of the telltale dark splotches had faded back to my normal skin tone. Light cream with a smattering of freckles. “Let’s go. I’m sure we have enough berries for jam, and I’m thirsty. Wait til you taste Mama’s cold mint tea. She makes it fresh every day and keeps a jug to cool in the cellar. It’ll really hit the spot.”

  “Tea sounds excellent. Besides, I’m ready to sit at the table while you wash the berries. I still don’t think it’s gonna rain.”