by B G Denvil
After her failure the night before with the enchanted road to knowledge, and the news of her loathed and adopted mother that day, alongside the difficulty of Maggs having discovered that The Rookery was a home for witches and wizards, Rosie was not in the mood for irritating stupidity and more failures, so she did not follow Dickon. Instead she walked on towards the tavern and found the door wide open to the sunshine and glowing warmth.
She did not, however, find anything there which helped her in any manner, for every single occupant, including Bob and his son Edgar, were fast asleep on the floor.
Most were snoring. Bob was dribbling a little, and one young man unknown to her was slumped in the hearth, and since he was wearing a bright red farmer’s shirt, he almost looked like a fire himself.
The man and his wife, who had been present the last time Rosie had been here, were now cuddled together, dreaming sweetly. Rollo lay on his back with his mouth wide open, and Martin was curled across him, his own hand still gripping an empty cup. His doublet was wet, and presumably the cup’s contents, probably ale, had spilled as he fell.
Another older man was snoring so loudly that he shook with each amazing roar, and elderly customer was lying flat on his face, choking on the slippery floor.
Rosie rolled him over. He breathed thankfully, but did not wake. With a final shake of her head, Rosie left the tavern and headed for Kettle Lane. She had learned a great deal about the shadow and the light over past months, but she had never seen a sleeping sickness like this before. It might, she thought, be a relief to those who had been troubled by the shadows in some way, but such a thing was not natural. There were no signs of injuries, no likelihood of a fight or other trouble. Since Dickon had recently left the tavern, she could only presume that he had left in anger, unable to get a drink, or puzzled at the floor full of collapsed bodies.
With a sigh of annoyance, she turned around yet again and walked back to the sheriff’s office.
The change was noticeable.
“Ah, my young friend Rosie,” Dickon said, standing at once. “I’m delighted to see you. Come on in and tell me how I can help.”
“I wanted to ask about Godwin’s death,” smiled Rosie.
“Young Godwin Trout dead? No, no, my dear. I was speaking to him – ah – can’t quite remember. But recently, I’m sure.”
“And his wife isn’t in any trouble?” Rosie asked.
“Gracious, no,” Dickon assured her. “A delightful young woman. I wished her good luck just the other day, you know, when she told me she was hoping for a baby.”
“And the clientele at the tavern all seem rather exhausted,” Rosie continued, “and have fallen asleep. Does that seem normal?”
Laughing with a snorting spray of delighted shock, the sheriff clapped Rosie on the shoulder. “Very funny, my dear. But since I’ve just come from there, I happen to know that’s the opposite of the truth. As usual everyone is lively and well behaved, enjoying a sunny afternoon with their friends.”
It seemed distinctly pointless to persist with questions, and Rosie turned, waving goodbye. She was not accustomed to being the one confused. It was always the humans who knew nothing, who were confused by the magical twists, the talking birds, the myriad of comfortable choices open to someone who only needed to click their fingers for a dinner of luxury and who could heal themselves of most injuries with a wave of the hand.
Now Rosie felt as though she had lost all her wiccan powers and did not understand anything at all.
She flew home and confronted her friends.
Edna replied, “Shadow work, my dear.”
“Mandrake is doing well,” Peg added. “But we aren’t.”
“And Cabbage told me earlier about the Troilus bug. But I certainly couldn’t find any little underground tunnels popping up in Piddleton.”
Twelve
It was the following morning when Rosie agreed to accompany Mandrake, Peg and Edna to the tree house and explain to Maggs just what witches did.
“She just thought it was all healing for the good folk and making the crops die from the bad ones.” Mandrake was gathering breakfast.
“You conjured up flowers?”
“I did. Very pretty too.”
“And explained the talking birds?”
“Yes, but she didn’t understand. I called Lucky, and she flew over, but we’d told all of them to shut up before, so she refused to say a word.”
Peg sniggered. “Come on then, useless young man. We’ll take you to the human and protect you while we explain to her.”
“Making her swear never to tell anyone else,” Edna sighed.
So they bundled out cheerfully, balancing platters and jugs as best they could as they flew to the tree house, the door opened for them, and this time they flew in with huge smiles, lay all the platters on the table and bounced down onto chairs and stools, keeping the smiles alive.
“Well, my dear Maggs,” said Rosie. “We know you’ve discovered our special secret. I’m so sorry to have shocked you this way. I never wanted you to know, and I thought you’d just stay here safely for a week perhaps, then all would be cleared with the sheriff, and you’d happily go home to your own cottage.”
“But it seems it didn’t quite happen like that,” said Edna.
Maggs was clinging to Mandrake’s arm. “I’m really not frightened anymore,” she said in an utterly bewildered and scared voice. “But if you could tell me what I should know.”
“We will,” Peg said. “Sit down, Maggs, and enjoy your lunch. We’re happy to answer any questions.”
“I knew an old lady in the village a few years ago,” Maggs murmured. “She said she was a good witch, and she helped anybody who was sick. She made up medicines with special herbs, and mostly they made people better. Sometimes they didn’t work, but at least she tried. She was sweet too, and she told me not to marry Godwin when he asked me. She was right of course. But my mother thought he’d be good for me. She was wrong. The witch was right.”
“She sounds more like a healer,” Rosie nodded. “But witches heal too. Then some villagers claim that witches put curses on the crops, or make the weather terrible, or kill their geese. Not true. Why would anyone do such a thing? I’m sorry, but such things are just normal life.”
“The Bible doesn’t like witches,” Maggs said.
“The Bible doesn’t like lots of things,” said Edna, helping herself to the codlings. “And they tell men to go and slaughter their sons to prove how good they are. Doesn’t sound quite right to me.”
“Trust and obedience,” Maggs corrected her.
Noticing the blue flowers standing thick and tall in the blue glass vase on the table, Rosie pointed. “Forget the bad stuff. We are all good witches here. And good wizards, of course. Mandrake has always been good, haven’t you, Mandrake?”
“Umm, well – yes, yes, of course,” said Mandrake, caught off guard. “I’ll prove it. Maggs, my dearest, tell me what you want and I’ll bring it.” He was patting the small hand clasped around his arm. “Cake? Petticoats?”
“How about a handsome admirer?” smiled Edna.
“We are dedicated to helping,” said Rosie, well aware that this was not always true. “Which is why I helped you, Maggs, dear, even though there was a risk of you discovering what we were. And I don’t regret it. Your husband’s death has something very strange about it, with different people describing different things and the body disappearing so quickly.”
“And Dickon Wald becoming a crazed madman.”
“Yes. A little erratic,” Rosie agreed. “But we are determined to solve the puzzle, aren’t we?”
Both nodding eagerly, Edna said, “There are bad wizards, I’m afraid. And bad witches. But not many, and not here.”
Well, Alice and Boris had both been dealt with.
“What else do you need to know?” Peg asked.
Maggs gazed around, too muddled to think of anything. Finally she asked, “Do you change people into birds and dogs and
other things?”
With a very deep sigh, relinquishing her privacy, Rosie stood and gave a little shiver. Then she leaned over, curled her fingers into her palms and became the prettiest little white cat that Maggs had ever seen. Rosie jumped on her lap and purred. Maggs seemed to be purring as well as she stroked the cat, tickling it around the ears and scratching the deep white fur around its neck.
“But strangely, it’s an effort to talk,” said the cat, and Rosie turned back. She shook her shoulders, tossed her head and sat back down in her own chair.
Maggs did not faint. She said, “I wish I could do that. Can you do it to me?”
But Rosie said, “No. I’m sort of – different. But I could make you fly, if you held my hand.”
“And I could make you happy if you marry me,” said Mandrake.
Thirteen
Rosie flew to the farm of Mags’s brother, Alid, and walked the last few steps across the burned brown grass to the front door of the old farm house. It was last on her list.
“Number one, see if I can trace the red cup. Number two, help Maggs understand. Number three, check on Magg’s old house. Number four, visit Dickon. Number five, visit the Juggler and Goat. Then finally number six, talk to Magg’s brother, Alid.”
And she had reached number six. Rosie wouldn’t have bothered with number six, having very little trust in the opinions of humans, but evidently Alid had recounted a very different story concerning Godwin’s death, and it would be helpful to hear how his story contradicted Dickon’s.
The entrance to the farm itself was unexpectedly bedraggled. The very few other farms Rosie had seen in her life, usually when flying over them from way above, had invariably been well kept and carefully tended for whatever produce they were growing, rearing or generally hoping to increase.
An overgrown path led directly to a front door which seemed to be attempting to detach itself from its hinges. When nobody answered her knock, Rosie simply walked in. The enclosed entrance then led into a small room with limited light and one tiny window. It had, perhaps, once been cosy but was now a jumble of shadows. A young man lay half asleep on the bare wooden settle and half blinked as Rosie looked down at him.
She asked, “Are you Alid? I understand that you tried to protect your sister when she was accused of killing her brother. But it seems you are not feeling well yourself?”
He attempted to arouse himself. “True, true,” he muttered as he wedged himself up aa little on his elbows. “So where’s my Maggs?”
“I think,” Rosie said carefully, “that she is hiding somewhere safe. But she hasn’t been exonerated of her wretched husband’s murder, has she?”
“My sister,” Alid roused himself a few inches higher, “is a good girl. Wouldn’t hurt a fly.”
“But you were a witness of some kind? What did you see?”
“He saw nothing,” a strident voice informed her as someone else marched into the room behind her. Rosie turned.
“You must be Joan,” Rosie said, staring. The woman seemed older, or hard work had marked her in some way, wrinkling her skin into sunburned leather and narrowing her eyes into little more than lidded slits.
Joan nodded. “But you ain’t no one I know,” Joan said, “So how dare you come in here uninvited?”
Alid twisted to face his wife. “I invited the lass,” he muttered, which was untrue. “She was a friend of Maggs before. She was asking, and I was answering.”
“You can’t answer anything,” Joan retorted. “You pretend you saw Godwin dead, but you didn’t. I did.”
Now entirely bewildered, Alid seemed less awake, and more as though he searched for the truth which had somehow been long lost. Yet he sat up, forcing himself straighter with his hands on the settle’s arm. “I remember— ” he began, then faded off. “Something comes back. He was – dead.”
“Of course he was dead, you fool,” Joan spoke loudly, looking directly at Rosie. “I saw him outside his own house, dying on the street, a knife in his throat and blood like a fountain. I went over, At the same time the sheriff came down the street, and held Godwin as he croaked his last words, pointing and saying his wife had killed him.”
“Really? How interesting,” Rosie smiled. “And what was Godwin doing out there, just walking along?”
“How should I know?” Joan objected.
“Do you see much of him?” Certain facts were becoming clear. “Your own husband seems quite unwell? Have you called the medick?”
“He’s always been like this.” Joan glared.
But Alid shook his head. “Maybe getting old.” His face seemed twisted. “Was bright once. I remember building up the farm. It was my father’s, but when I inherited, I doubled the size. Wheat, for the milling, and sheep out on the hillside. Ploughed one field, sowed the other, third left to clover to make strong for the next season. It was making money. Good money. I was—” and he faded. The sudden confidence turned again to confusion.
And Rosie turned to Joan. “I wonder,” she said, “if you’ve been taking your ale from a nice new cup lately. A cup made of red cinnabar?”
As Alid raised one hand as a token of recognition, Joan turned agitated, clasped her hand tightly in her apron pocket and glared, pink-faced. “You’re talking the same nonsense my husband does,” she objected. “Blether and babble. I can’t afford fancy cups and have no need for them. Now get out of my house and go talk to the sheriff. He’ll tell you exactly what happened. And now Maggs has run away. That proves her guilt.”
“It proves she doesn’t want to be arrested and spend days in a filthy dark cell before facing the gallows,” Rosie said. “And Dickon talks the same belligerent rubbish that you do.” She looked down with sympathy at Alid. “Look after yourself,” she said. “I shall be back to see you again soon,” with a brief warning glance to Joan, “and please be absolutely sure of one thing. Do not, ever, drink from a heavy red cup.”
“I’ve seen it,” he muttered, “but won’t drink. The thing stinks. Makes ale taste like sewerage. But she does,” and he raised one trembling finger.
Unsurprised, Rosie nodded. “And you must have done so at least once, or you wouldn’t know the taste.”
“Once. Only once. Made me sick. But she likes it.”
Rosie sighed. “I will come back,” she announced, looking more to Joan than to Alid. But she heard Alid’s voice behind her as she left.
“Tell Maggs.”
Rosie turned. “Tell her yourself. She’ll be proved innocent and come back soon. And you have to be well. Be careful – be wise. Or go to live in Magg’s cottage and leave your wife.”
“I have to look after the farm—” his voice trailed off.
Joan marched beside her as Rosie left. At the door as the sunlight burst suddenly, a blinding contrast to the darkness inside. Rosie pointed, stating, “It doesn’t look as though anyone is looking after the farm. The weeds have taken over.”
“You’re an ignorant fool,” Joan sneered. “The farm’s over there. This is the garden path, no more, and doesn’t matter in the least.”
“Really?” Rosie gazed around her. “And that little donkey over there in that field, peering at us over the fence, poor thing. I can see its ribs from here. And it’s still tethered to a cart.”
“Mind your own business,” Joan shouted into her ear, and pushed her out onto the path.
Normally Rosie would have permitted no human hand against her, but she was too busy rubbing her ear, scalded by Joan’s voice. She wandered over to the fence where the small donkey stood, and raised her hand, stroking its neck. She felt the protruding bones and shuddered. “Have you ever been fed, little one?”
At the magical touch of her hand, the animal looked up with sudden hope. Rosie smiled back, waved her hand again, and the heavy iron grip of the cart’s long arms fell away, releasing the donkey from its weight. Now she could see the two smears of raw grazed flesh where the cart handles, too tight, had rubbed the donkey’s haunches. Rosie then produced two large fres
h apples, both cut in half, and fed the wretched sack of bones before her.
“I have never even touched one of your kind before,” she told it. “But it seems you need even more comfort than that poor young man in the house.” With terrified eyes, moist and seemingly desperate, it took the apples and munched. Again, its face flickered with hope.
Turning away, Rosie walked towards the street along the overgrown path. Then briefly she looked back. The donkey stood where it had been, its tail mangy and limp between its back legs, its bones trembling slightly and its head low, gazing down to where drips of apple juice had fallen to the burned grass. It seemed to have lost hope once more, but it licked at the grass for the last drip of food. The bones of its spine stuck up in a ridge of tiny lumps, and the stripes of its ribs were outlined. The bones of its pelvis stuck out in a pathetic hollow, and the back legs were like sticks of twig.
Immediately Rosie strode back, leaned over the fence and gently scratched the top of the donkey’s head. Its hair was short and felt more like the scrubbing brush which she had once used daily on her mother’s orders. Now she whispered to the donkey, “Blanket party and two carrots.”
The donkey’s eyes glazed as it ate the carrots. Its hair was thickening, looking cleaner and softer, and suddenly the short, muddled fence of wood, scrub and piled stones moved aside, creating a wide gap.
“It will take a deal more food to bring you back to life,” Rosie told the donkey. “You are starved, poor little creature, and worse, perhaps, than Maggs was when I rescued her. So why not you as well, dear? But you have a remarkable lack of wings, so we will have to walk.” She summoned three more carrots, and the small animal followed her as she walked, holding each carrot out behind her.
Walking considerably more slowly than she would have preferred, they ambled back towards the road, Rosie’s hand constantly behind her with a variety of tempting foods. Celery followed carrots, large shrub stalks and leaf, followed by apples, large handfuls of hay and back to carrots. With intense concentration but little energy, it followed, munching as it walked.
