Witch Born

by Nicholas Bowling

Alyce sighed and curled up like a dog. She hugged her knees closer to her body, clutching the straw figure tightly, shivering too much to sleep.

  She must have managed to drop off somehow, because the next thing she knew she was surrounded by chattering voices and thumping feet. She heard the croak of birds too, poking around in the dirt by her head.

  ‘Shoo! Get out of here!’ said a reedy, unpleasant voice, and suddenly there was an explosion of feathers, throwing dust and straw into the air.

  Alyce opened her eyes like a pair of newly healed wounds, and glimpsed a black silhouette fly to safety atop the city walls. She scowled at the whiteness of the day, and placed a hand on the top of her head. No, it hadn’t grown back.

  The city gate was now packed with bodies, men and women trudging into London with livestock and produce. A little further up the road a cart had overturned, spilling its load of root vegetables, and a crowd had gathered to watch the owner screaming obscenities at the tired, bony horse who was still straining on the harness. A sea of grubby faces, pink from the cold, surged past her, shouting, laughing, coughing, spitting great lumps of phlegm at her feet.

  There were so many of them. More human beings than she had ever seen in her life. Two, three times the number of villagers in Fordham, and that was just on this side of the gate.

  I know them, she thought, shivering. I’ve seen all these people before.

  They looked just like the faces that had hollered and cursed at her when she’d left her house, when she’d gone to the well, when she’d tried to talk to their sons and daughters. These sorts of faces had jeered while her mother burned. Unfriendly, intolerant faces. Just because they didn’t know her here didn’t make her feel any safer.

  Her frozen muscles screamed into life as she got to her feet. As she swayed and staggered, she saw an unshaven, unfed young man standing beside a handcart full of oysters, staring straight at her.

  ‘Excuse me,’ she began, her tongue feeling fat and sticky. ‘Where might I—’

  ‘I was talking to you too. Get out of here.’ It was the same voice as before. The hot stench of leeks and onions flooded over her, accompanied by a few flecks of spittle. ‘I know it’s called Cripplegate, but this ain’t a meeting place for cripples.’ He shoved her roughly to the ground, and went back to hawking his wares.

  The flow of townsfolk continued to swell. Alyce picked herself up out of the dirt as a dozen piglets swarmed around her, chased by a flustered boy much younger than her, trying desperately to herd them through the archway. The smell, the noise, the whole thing was unbearable.

  Bankside. That was what her mother had said. With or without the letter, she needed to find the river.

  She held her mommet tightly, concealed in the front pocket of her smock, and set off towards the gate. All around her, the other bodies parted slightly, their eyes glancing at her just long enough to decide that they definitely didn’t want to rub shoulders with her. She felt as though she were carrying the plague.

  Within the city walls, London seemed to have been designed and built by a drunkard. He’d carelessly erected row after row of tottering buildings, sprawling over the northern bank of the Thames in a bewildering maze of avenues and alleyways, and then, swollen with his triumph, had proceeded to claim this shambolic metropolis as his own by urinating on each and every street corner. The whole place stank.

  Alyce had only wandered a few hundred yards before realizing that, unless she ate something, she wouldn’t even make it to the river. She was so hungry. The savoury whiff of the man’s breath outside the gate had actually made her mouth water.

  The problem was, even if she’d had a single groat to her name, no one would have allowed her anywhere near their shop to spend it. Fishwives shooed her away with their baskets, grocers and bakers jeered and cursed, hounding her from alleyway to alleyway, until she staggered into an inn yard and collapsed in the damp straw of the stables. She had just managed to gulp down two mouthfuls of brackish water from the horses’ trough before an expensive pair of riding boots was kicking her back into the sludge of the main street.

  The only thing that stopped her from passing out was a new scent that reached her nostrils – something sweet and spiced. Ahead, on whatever thoroughfare she had found herself, a huge bear of a man was selling hot codlings, his stall piled high with steaming, baked apples. The man’s back was turned.

  You shouldn’t steal, said a quiet voice, as though her conscience were trapped in a well at the bottom of her mind.

  You’ve done worse, said another one, loud, urgent, ravenous.

  Alyce faltered.

  Do it.

  The shopkeeper was still talking to another customer in loud, coarse tones – he was either telling them a joke or telling them off, it was difficult to know which. She crept through the mud, her wisp of a body slipping between the loitering men and women, and laid a hand on one of the apples.

  She hadn’t counted on the flesh of the fruit being as hot as molten lead. It scalded her palm, and she yelped. The huge stallkeeper whirled around, far too quickly for a man with so much blubber, and grabbed her by the wrist.

  ‘So,’ he roared, ‘thought you’d ’ave one o’ my codlings for free, did you?’

  He snatched the ruined apple from her hand and hit her across the face. Her jaw felt like it was a few feet away from the rest of her head.

  ‘You’re no better than a rat. You hear me? A rat!’

  Through her blurred vision, she saw him raise his hand again. She winced, but suddenly heard another voice, loud and clear among the muttering onlookers.

  ‘Oh, come now,’ it said, ‘I hardly think the rats would stoop so low as to eat from your stall. There’s far better stuff in the gutter.’

  There was a nervous titter from the crowd, which had doubled since the man had started shouting.

  ‘Who’s this then? The rat’s ’usband? Lovely couple, rat like ’er and a poxy little ferret like you!’

  The stallkeeper didn’t get the laugh he was looking for from his audience, and that only seemed to make him angrier. Alyce’s saviour stepped forwards and put an arm under her shoulder. He wasn’t quite a man yet, with only a hint of a beard on his chin and upper lip, and was rather gangly, too. Under a thatch of crow-black hair – a little greasy – his eyes were surrounded by dark, purple rings. He looked like he needed a year’s worth of sleep.

  ‘It will be Christmas Day in two days’ time,’ the boy said, hoisting her off the ground like a half full sack of onions. ‘Call me a Puritan, but I don’t believe the best way to mark the occasion is by beating and starving the poor and the needy.’

  ‘The needy? Who’s needy? I’ve got a wife and children to feed!’ He thumbed to the window behind him, where an equally large woman was bustling around an oven in her apron, preparing more baked codlings to bring out to the stall. ‘How’s that going to ’appen if I just go ’anding these out to stray dogs?’

  The boy looked over the shopkeeper’s shoulder. ‘Zounds! Is that your wife? To be honest, I’m not sure she needs any more feeding.’

  The man’s face turned to thunder, and he moved to swing a great hairy arm at him. The boy skipped around, back to the stall laden with fruit, and pelted him with two apples, covering his broad, bristling face with steaming pulp.

  The giant cried out as though he had been blinded. The boy danced past him again, surprisingly nimble for someone with such long limbs, and took Alyce by the hand.

  ‘Come on, I know somewhere we can take you.’

  Alyce stumbled though, still weak, her head and face throbbing from being struck by the stallkeeper. The boy gathered her up in his arms, and half walked, half ran away from the scene of chaos he had just created.

  She drifted in and out of consciousness, her head lolling and rocking in time with his footsteps. The half-timbered faces of buildings marched past her, their roofs jutting into the white sky like rows of jagged, disordered teeth. When she felt she was going to disappear from the land of the li
ving completely, the sounds of drinking and merrymaking forced her eyes open again. They were outside a building taller than the others, and overhead she glimpsed a painted swan hanging above the door.

  The boy stepped inside. In the front room, the laughter of drinkers came to an abrupt halt. ‘Where is Mrs Thomson?’

  ‘She’s over here,’ a voice boomed from the kitchen. A stocky, middle-aged woman appeared in the opposite door. The two of them faced each other across the common room as though preparing for a duel. ‘Brought me a present, have you, Solomon? Very kind of you!’ She bustled forward heavily, and the drinkers tentatively resumed their conversations. ‘Usually when the dogs bring me some dead animal, they at least leave it on the doorstep instead of bringing it inside.’

  ‘I found her in the street. She needs something to eat and drink, and some warm clothes.’

  ‘Any particular reason why I should be feeding beggar children out of my own pocket?’

  ‘Thought you might offer a little Christian charity.’

  ‘Heavens above,’ the woman said hoarsely, and Alyce felt a rough hand on her forehead. ‘Look what they done to you, poor child. She’s half dead, Solomon. Bring her out back.’

  In the sudden warmth and noise of the inn, everything took on a delirious, dreamlike quality. Cradled in the boy’s arms, Alyce seemed to float through to the kitchen, past the maids and the cooks, into another, smaller room, where she was laid carefully in a chair.

  The innkeeper surveyed her in the candlelight, and her red, leathery brow creased into a frown.

  ‘I reckon I got something for her,’ she was saying. The boy named Solomon swam in and out of focus. ‘But we need to keep her awake.’

  She heard rustling, and the crunch of a pestle and mortar.

  ‘Keep her awake, Solomon! Talk to her, do something!’

  ‘It’s all right,’ he said, looming over her. ‘You’ll be all right.’ Then he leant in until he was right beside her ear. ‘I’ll keep it safe,’ he whispered.

  Keep what safe? The effort to speak was too great. Alyce parted her lips, then promptly passed out.

  HOPKINS

  There was no shelter in the graveyard. Perched on the top of an ancient tumulus, the wind and rain had scoured it mercilessly, wearing away the headstones’ inscriptions and leaving them bleached and faceless. The graves hadn’t been arranged in any particular order, it seemed – some leant at impossible angles, others were being reclaimed by the boggy ground, grey crowns of stone still just visible above the surface, gasping for air.

  A graveyard, not a churchyard. There was no church to be seen. Just the earth, the sky, and the dead.

  There were two figures among the graves that night, one a man, the other something different. They waited patiently in the cold, perfectly still, a rime of frost forming on their cloaks.

  ‘Don’t know why she couldn’t have just met us at a tavern,’ muttered John Hopkins. ‘I’m going to lose a finger out here.’ He closed and opened his hand, rings clacking under his gloves.

  The creature who had once been Caxton made a creaking noise, and pointed his long, leather crow beak at Hopkins. He stared at him with blank, perfectly circular glass eyes. He was completely silent. Hopkins couldn’t even hear him breathing.

  He spoke again. ‘When she arrives – if she ever arrives – let me do the talking, won’t you?’ He permitted himself a laugh. The silent creature stared at him a moment longer, and then turned his grotesque birdlike head back to the centre of the hill.

  Hopkins twisted uncomfortably, feeling the numb, tugging sensation around his wound. It was like that cursed girl’s knife was still in there. Sometimes the phantom blade seemed to nudge the base of his spine, sending pain shooting up to his neck and back down again. Dead flesh healed slowly. Still, it was probably nothing compared to the agonies Caxton was suffering.

  The Doctor had lived up to his reputation in the miracles he had performed, but he’d taken his time about it. While Hopkins had been able to sew himself together like a ragdoll, Caxton’s affliction had needed more attention. In the cellar of some godforsaken crossroads tavern, the Doctor had worked day and night to contain Ellen Greenliefe’s curse, which had already spread beyond the man’s lips – but the ‘cure’ had taken longer than expected and the Doctor’s techniques had left Caxton, well, somewhat changed. Now they were days behind the girl, and this unexpected meeting with his mistress would only delay them further. Still, to deny her an audience would have been unwise.

  It was midnight when she came.

  They glimpsed her face first, passing among the headstones like a full moon behind clouds. For several minutes, it seemed to hover disembodied, a pale will-o’-the-wisp threading its way through the darkness, until she emerged into the clearing in front of them. Her features became more distinct, and might even have been called beautiful, were it not for the black emptiness of her eyes.

  ‘Your Majesty,’ said Hopkins, bowing fractionally.

  ‘You lost her, then.’ The sound of her voice somehow made the air colder still. It started to snow.

  ‘I wouldn’t say lost. Lost suggests that we had her in the first place.’

  ‘You lost her, and then you demanded the Doctor come and tend to your wounds.’

  ‘Your Majesty, I demanded nothing. Caxton sent word to the palace—’

  ‘Do you know how difficult it is,’ she interrupted, ‘for the Doctor to leave the Court in secret? Without raising suspicion? Do you know the risks I am taking, coming before you like this?’

  Hopkins was silent. Caxton lowered his head.

  ‘You disappoint me,’ she continued. ‘You have spent your whole life hunting and murdering witches with such masterful skill, and now you are outwitted by a single girl. It wasn’t for this that I saved your life, John Hopkins. You are meant to be helping us now, not leaving our plans in tatters.’

  A bitter, empty laugh rang through Hopkins. Saved your life. He’d had no life to save, not by the time she’d bartered for his services.

  The nightmare had begun a year or so back, and he’d never woken up from it. It should have been simple, routine. A gaggle of crones in Norfolk – witches, all of them. But there had been more than expected, and he’d been careless, let himself get captured. For weeks they had kept him prisoner, cursing his mind and body, reducing him to a living death. His flesh had turned cold. Justice, the crones had called it. They wanted him to feel, in the marrow of his bones, the death of every woman he’d ever tried and executed. And all the while his God, whose work he had faithfully performed for so long, looked on and did nothing.

  Instead, this woman had come to his rescue. He still remembered the first time he saw her, bizarre, dreamlike – a phantom, like now, standing regally before him amidst the bones and the filth in the crones’ hovel. Not just a woman. A queen. Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots, come to claim him as her servant. At the time he thought he had lost his mind.

  ‘Perhaps,’ she continued, as he tried to banish the memories, ‘you are failing on purpose? Perhaps you still find the idea of serving a witch distasteful? If that is the case, then I can always send you back to Norfolk. I am sure I can recruit another witchfinder – less skilled, maybe, but more willing.’

  Hopkins’ jaw twitched as he ground his teeth. ‘That will not be necessary, Your Majesty,’ he said. ‘Besides, all is not lost.’

  She glared at him. Her eyes looked like holes in her head.

  ‘Firstly,’ he continued, when she did not reply, ‘Ellen Greenliefe is dead. Which means your enemies are one fewer.’

  ‘Ellen Greenliefe was a simpleton. There was no need to kill her. She could have been turned. But go on.’

  Hopkins took a couple of breaths to calm himself.

  ‘Secondly,’ he said, ‘the girl’s trail has been easy to follow. She stopped in every village on the way to London. It is regretful that our injuries set us back, yes, but once we reach the capital, she will be trapped.’

  Mary Stuart breathed
in deeply, and the whole graveyard seemed to shudder.

  ‘London.’

  ‘Ay, Your Majesty.’

  ‘Queen Elizabeth is in London. What then?’

  ‘I hardly think—’

  ‘What happens when they find each other? She might put her in a ship bound for the Continent. Exactly how big is this “trap” you speak of?’

  ‘They will not find each other.’

  ‘Make sure of it. If the girl escapes, all is lost.’

  She paused, flurries of snowflakes gusting around them.

  ‘I am weak,’ she sighed. For a moment, her oddly translucent features seemed to disappear completely. ‘I shall contact the good Doctor again. We may need his help, if the girl gets too close to Elizabeth. If she slips through your fingers again.’

  ‘I assure you, Your Majesty, she will not.’

  ‘I hope so, for your sake, John Hopkins. If events fall as planned, I shall be able to oversee your progress in person very shortly.’

  One of Hopkins’ eyes twitched. ‘In person?’

  ‘In the flesh. And I expect the girl to be in our hands by then, to help with my succession to Elizabeth’s throne.’

  ‘Yes, Your Majesty,’ he said. ‘I understand.’ He bowed slowly.

  ‘Very well. Then do not fail me. Remember that your life belongs to me now. It will give me great pleasure to drag out your miserable existence until your debt is paid.’ She extended a thin, spectral finger towards him. ‘Think on your sins, John Hopkins.’

  Then Mary Queen of Scots turned and drifted back through the gravestones, leaving no footprints in the snowfall.

  The innkeeper had taken Alyce to The Swan’s smallest room, up in the gables, and she’d slept right through Christmas Eve and Christmas morning. Her dreams had been troubling. Visions of Bedlam, of the witchfinders, of her mother, came and went in a leering parade. She had imagined a giant black bird, too, watching her through the window, her memory of it so vivid she couldn’t even be sure it was a dream.

  In the evening of Christmas Day, she had been woken by the sounds of singing and dancing and the roaring of the Master of Revels, and Mrs Thomson had brought her bread and some fatty soup, which she had barely managed to keep down. There had also appeared a little slice of spiced mince pie the following evening, which the innkeeper had saved specially for her. Alyce felt sad to leave it untouched, and in the morning it had disappeared from the bowl at her bedside.