“You are James Device?”
James said nothing, but gave the slightest inclination of his head.
After a moment of silence, Nowell spoke again. “You are charged with a most serious crime. That of causing the death of Mistress Anne Towneley by witchcraft. How do you plead to this crime? Are you guilty or not guilty?”
James felt the demon spirits move inside him. Not merely the one of his encounters with Sal and Duckworth, but others had joined and he had their combined power now. He could kill Nowell anytime he chose. The thought of it sent a thrill coursing through his body, and he threw back his mane of hair and laughed.
Roger Nowell’s face turned purple with fury. “Cease that laughter! Have you no idea of the gravity of the charge against you made by Master Towneley?”
James stopped laughing. His lip curled. He dared to defy this puffed-up little man. “Am I in a court of law?” He looked around him. “I see no jury.”
Nowell’s hands shook. This would be a new experience for the justice of the peace. He wouldn’t often be met with defiance. Most men cowered in his presence.
Roger Nowell addressed the captain of the guard. “Take him. Search him for the witch’s mark.”
Four guards manhandled James out of the hall and down the corridor. Halfway down they pushed open a wooden door leading to a cell and shoved him onto a long wooden table.
One of them—a young man James recognized as a miller’s son from a neighboring village—gave him an order.
“Take off all your clothes and lie down.”
James stared for a moment, wondering what they had in mind. A witch’s mark? Any unusual mole or blemish that could signify communion with a demon. As far as he knew, he possessed nothing of the sort.
He removed his boots and unfastened his shirt. Then he unbuttoned his breeches. The four men watched every move. Well, let them see what hung between his legs. He would lay odds they hadn’t anything as impressive to offer a woman.
He stood in front of them. Naked. Taunting them with a half smile playing at his lips. Yes, they were looking. And he was right. He read jealousy in those eyes.
The captain appeared, holding a sharp, pointed blade. He had a look of anticipation on his face that momentarily unnerved James. What did he intend to do with that blade?
“Hold his arms and legs,” the guard ordered. “I will search his privy places.”
Spread-eagled and held down by a guard at each corner, James struggled to free himself as the sharp point came closer. The captain thrust his free hand between James’s legs, squeezing his balls. Shards of pain flashed through his body. James gritted his teeth and his neck arched. He would not cry out. In his mind he urged the spirits to give him courage. Much more of this and he would summon demons to kill the guards. Only the thought of what might happen to his family stopped him from doing it right now.
The captain released his hold and James felt the pain ease off a little. Not for long. The captain grabbed hold of his cock and yanked at the foreskin. James bit his lip. The searing pain brought tears to his eyes. He tasted blood.
“Have to make sure you’re not hiding something from us.” The captain winked at the guards, who let out guffaws of laughter.
“Turn him. I need to inspect his arse.”
Again James struggled, but the guards had done this before. In one smooth movement, they had him spread-eagled on his stomach, and the captain wrenched his buttocks apart. He felt the unmistakable sensation of cold steel against his back. The captain had laid the spike down so he could use both hands.
Gloved fingers stretched his anus. Burning. Tearing. Violating. Before he could stop himself, he let out a yell and the guards laughed. Maybe it lasted no more than a couple of minutes, but when it ended, James felt warm, sticky wetness and knew he was bleeding. Worse than that. A smell of shit filled the air. The fingers were pulled out. The steel was removed.
“Search the rest of him.”
The guards turned him back over and began an inch-by-inch search of his body, probing through his chest hair, into his armpits and through his hair.
“You’re lucky you’re not in Scotland.” The captain leered at him. “They shave you there. Every scrap of hair from your eyebrows to your balls—your chest, arms, legs, arse, you name it. It all comes off. Can’t hide anything then.”
“Wouldn’t mind that job,” said the youngest guard. “As long as I got the women of course.” The others laughed.
“No, boy; they have women to do that,” the captain said. “You’d have to do the likes of laddie here. Have to be careful with the shaving blade though. Wouldn’t want to slip and cut off that mighty cock. There’d be ladies weeping for miles around.”
James glared at him through the throbbing, burning pain. You will regret that.
The smile died on the guard’s face. Replaced by confusion. Then fear.
Just as he deserved, James thought. They had failed to humiliate him and failed to make him cower before them. He had shown no fear. His injuries would heal. His grandmother would be proud and he could return to Alizon with his head held high, knowing he had proved himself worthy of her.
“Clean him up and get him back to Master Nowell,” the captain said. “He will grow impatient else. I will inform him that there is no witch’s mark on this man.”
Roger Nowell sat behind his desk as two guards threw James into a chair opposite—his wrists once again bound with rope.
The magistrate studied him for a moment. James continued to stare ahead, his expression steady. Only the pain of his violated body and bleeding wrists intruded on his thoughts of revenge.
Finally, Master Nowell spoke. “So, you are accused of witchcraft, yet my guards can find no witch’s mark upon your body. Master Towneley accuses you of causing his wife’s death by sorcery, yet she herself said the bad water caused her to ail and weaken. But Mistress Towneley did accuse you—in front of witnesses—of stealing from her. What say you to that?”
“Mistress Towneley was mistaken. She gave me the turfs and all the other things she said I stole.”
“And why would such a distinguished lady give so much to a common laborer?”
James gave him a long stare. He weighed up his chances. Inside him the demon spirits begged to be let loose so they could wreak havoc. James pushed them back. He would win this one alone, or maybe with a little help from his grandmother.
“Mistress Towneley was happy with the work I did for her. She rewarded me.”
Roger Nowell nodded, tapping his teeth with the quill of his pen. “And of precisely what nature was this—work—you performed for Mistress Towneley?”
James forced a smile. “Personal favors.”
“Master Device, I must ask you to be more specific. What do you mean by ‘personal favors’?”
James paused. He must surely know anyway. Or at least guess.
“She was often alone. She liked me in her bed.”
Not one glimmer of reaction showed on Master Nowell’s face. He continued to tap his teeth. James wanted to snatch the pen out of his hand.
Finally, the magistrate pushed back his chair and stood. “You know as well as I that you are guilty of this crime. Equally, you know as well as I that I have no evidence on which to prosecute you. But I warn you, James Device, I am watching you. You and your entire witch family. You will not escape for long. One day, one of you will perform some vile act that will leave a trail that comes straight back to your viper’s nest. Then I will have you and old Demdike, your mother and all her evil spawn. Have a care, for your days are truly running out. Now get out of my sight. You defile the air I breathe.”
The guards took one arm each and propelled him out of the room. They gave him cold water and a rag to wash the blood and shit off his body.
“You’re one of the lucky ones,” the youngest said. “As perfect a body as
I have ever seen splayed out on that table. Not one single mole. Not one blemish. Like a newborn baby. How comes that then? How is it you haven’t a mark upon you like normal people?”
James looked at him hard, enjoying the way the man recoiled from his gaze. Could he see the demons that crouched inside him, waiting to leap out? James smiled, feeling the blood course back into his newly freed hands. It warmed him. A river that flowed and fed him with life.
“I was born on a night with a full moon,” he said. “As pure and white a moon as man has ever seen.”
The guards exchanged glances. He knew what those looks meant. The sooner he left there, the safer they would feel.
The power surged within him. He saw a vision of his dark spirit, black, gleaming scales rippling along its reptilian body. Eyes burned with a fire so dark it consumed everything into a black pit. He smelled sulfur and acrid smoke, and a satisfied smile creased his face. The spell had been cast.
Inside Read Hall, the captain of the guard clutched his chest and fell. Dead.
Chapter Seven
Barrowford owes a great deal to the Pendle witches. It’s at the start—or the end, I suppose—of the Witches’ Trail. And without them, many people would probably never set foot in it, which would be a shame. It has everything a pretty village should. A river, an old and narrow bridge, country walks. I felt relaxed straightaway. At home even. And more relieved than I thought I would feel, to be away from home. But then I didn’t know what lay ahead, did I? If I had, I would never have set foot in the place.
I’d arrived too early to check in at the guesthouse, so I visited the Heritage Centre and learned all about the feud between the Device family and Anne Whittle and her daughter. The names of all those accused, and then hanged, flashed before my eyes and didn’t fully register. The only mercy for them was that the law had changed and they weren’t burned for their alleged crimes. Fleetingly, I wondered which of the families Dawn was allegedly related to.
In the gift shop, I selected a book on the witches, gathered up some leaflets on various local attractions, and left. The weather hung dull and overcast and, looking up, I saw darker clouds in the distance. “Rain before bedtime,” my adoptive mother used to say. Mary Blake had a lot of sayings like that. I wished she were still alive to give me a hug. I’d wished that a lot over the past six months.
An hour later, I set off for the guesthouse. Right by the bridge I saw a sign for the Witches’ Trail—a stereotypical witch, with a pointed hat, riding on a broomstick. Armed with my new book and those leaflets, that would be my starting point tomorrow.
The former farmhouse looked exactly as I’d imagined it from the photos on TripAdvisor. Stone built, with a large, black-painted wooden door. My tires crunched on the gravel driveway that extended between immaculately maintained lawns and flower borders. A mass of brightly colored flowers created an almost unbroken sea of scarlet, yellow, orange and blue. The lawn looked—and smelled—freshly mown, and a solitary sycamore’s leaves rustled in the breeze.
I was heaving my suitcase out when the door opened with a creak. A smiling woman who looked about my age appeared, right arm extended ready for a handshake.
I knew this must be Virginia Davies, who owned the place. Her long, flowing, hippie-style dress and waist-length black hair would have looked more at home in the late sixties. Eccentric definitely, but she had a warm smile and a firm handshake and I thought we’d get along well enough.
“Hello. Welcome. You must be Laura.”
“Yes. Hello. What a lovely house you have.”
Her smile became even broader. “Thank you. Come on in and I’ll give you the tour, once you’ve had chance to get settled.”
“That would be great. Thank you.”
Inside the house, the warm, homely smell of baking bread greeted me.
“What a gorgeous smell,” I said.
“Oh good, I’m so pleased you like it. Not everyone does, you know. I had a family from London who demanded white sliced at breakfast. Martin had to go down to the Spar and get some!”
“Really? How could they not like freshly baked bread?”
Virginia shrugged her shoulders. “I think it was the children mainly. They weren’t used to it and the parents weren’t going to say no to them.” She laughed. “Kids, eh? Tail wags the dog these days!”
She led me through the hall. The house was seriously old. Fifteenth or sixteenth century. Original, blackened timbers and freshly painted white walls were embellished here and there with sepia photographs of Barrowford in the old days.
Virginia took me up a winding staircase. Everywhere I looked I saw quality in the furnishings and decorations. Someone cared about this place enough to spend a great deal of money on it.
“How many bedrooms have you got?” I asked.
“Six. Four on this floor and two upstairs. We live on the ground floor. Beyond the kitchen.”
“Have you been here a long time?”
Virginia stopped and inserted a key into the lock of number 4. She opened the door. “About four years now. It lay empty for a long time before that.”
I followed her into a room furnished in my favorite art nouveau style. If I had been asked to design this room, I would have done it this way. “This is lovely,” I said.
Virginia smiled. “Sorry there’s no bath with this room, but there’s a power shower so you shouldn’t have any problem with hot water. We had all the plumbing replaced when we took it over. They still had all the old lead pipes, a leaky boiler, and every time you turned on a tap, the whole place rattled. It sounded like an army of ghosts clanking their chains!”
“I should imagine there are miles of pipes in a place this size.”
“Oh goodness, yes. And you wouldn’t believe what the builders discovered when they were doing all the work. The place had fallen pretty much derelict and, of course, it’s hundreds of years old. They demolished an interior wall, and inside, they found a mummified cat.”
I wrinkled my nose. “Gross!”
“I know. Horrible, isn’t it? Apparently it was quite common in the Middle Ages, and for a couple of hundred years after, to wall a cat up in a house to protect it from evil. Especially witches. This is an area steeped in stories of sorcery, spells and witchcraft.”
“Yes; that’s partly why I’m here.”
“I guessed as much. People tend to stay here either for some serious walking up Pendle Hill or for the Witches’ Trail. You haven’t come equipped with hiking boots and multiple waterproofs—unless that suitcase is actually a Tardis—so you’re here for the witches.”
I smiled. “The only problem is I know so little about them, other than some vague memory of reading Mist Over Pendle when I was about ten. But I’ve bought a book today at the Heritage Centre, so I thought I’d use it to fill in all the gaps.”
Virginia pointed to my carrier bag. “Which one have you got?”
I handed it over.
“Oh yes, Wicked Enchantments. I like that one. The author’s really done her research but she also makes it readable. Some of them are dry as dust, but this one’s much better. You’ll get a real feel for what it must have been like for people caught up in those witch hunts. Mostly they were poor folk scrubbing away at whatever they could to make a living. The old women knew a thing or two about herbs and how to make potions, and as for the rest, there were scores to settle. Same as everywhere else. Eighty years later, history repeated itself in Salem. They even used the transcript of the trial of the Pendle witches as a template. Imagine that! So that’s two massive miscarriages of justice for the price of one.”
“People are afraid of things they don’t understand.”
“That’s true enough. I did think it odd that the last government wouldn’t grant a pardon to the Lancashire witches though. I mean, they’re busy apologizing to all and sundry for previous acts of injustice, so why not let th
ose ten innocent so-called witches off the hook and clear their names?”
I didn’t want to get into any lengthy political debates. Right now, I wanted to unpack and then go for a walk. I felt comfortable here and wished I’d booked longer. Well, why not?
“I know I’m only down for three nights, but could I add on another two by any chance?”
A grin broke across Virginia’s face. “Wow, and you’ve only just got here too. I’d better grab you before you change your mind. Yes, of course you can. Pop down when you’re ready, and meanwhile I’ll get your booking altered. Let me know if there’s anything you need.”
She left me alone and I opened my suitcase. Once I’d unpacked, I stood by the window and looked out over the front garden and drive. Three other cars, including a Land Rover, were now parked and formed an orderly row next to my silver Mondeo. I opened the window a crack and birdsong floated in, along with that freshly mown grass aroma I’d smelled when I got out of the car. Peaceful. Relaxing. Already I could feel my tensions releasing.
“Just what I needed, Rich. If you came back now, you might even recognize me.” Again, sadly, I heard no answering echo in my head. But at least this time no tears welled up in my eyes.
Virginia greeted me as I wandered into the dining room. “Ah, there you are. Everything okay?”
“Perfect, thank you,” I said. “I’m quite certain I’ll sleep well in that bed.”
“I haven’t had any complaints so far. I didn’t put you in number 3 because I didn’t know how you felt about ghosts.”
Seriously?
I must have looked bemused because Virginia leaped in with an explanation. “I imagine every house this age is haunted by something. To date, five different entities have been reported. Some are here all the time and others are in visitation. They come around once in a while. One always appears on Christmas Eve. We lost a cook because of it—and the guesthouse was full too! I won’t forget that in a hurry.”
“Whatever did it do to her to make her leave?”
The Pendle Curse Page 7
