Half-Witch

by John Schoffstall

  “If worse comes to worst, and the Asylum ruffians try to make you a thief or a whore, think of it as a call to martyrdom. Consider St. Lucy, a Christian girl whom the Roman governor Paschius sentenced to be a prostitute in a brothel. When she refused, Paschius had her head struck off. What Christian virgin wouldn’t want to be like St. Lucy?”

  “I wouldn’t!” Lizbet said. “I certainly wouldn’t want my head struck off.” The conversation wasn’t going at all the way she liked. “Can’t you just please tell me how to get over the Montagnes du Monde? Lord, I’ve always been good. Except for lately, that is. I say grace, I pray every night, I go to Mass with my father. I forgive my enemies. I do all that.”

  “Elizabeth, it pains me to find a good girl like you in this difficult situation. I am sympathetic. Truly, I am.”

  Lizbet swallowed the remainder of the host. Presently, she was able to breathe through her nose again.

  She had stolen the hosts because she knew she was embarking on a difficult and dangerous undertaking. God had always been a friend, willing to lend an ear, or sympathize when she had a bad day. It was true, she had never had to depend on His advice before, but she had never needed much. It was discouraging to find, in her hour of utmost need, that God’s advice sounded depressingly like that of any other grown-up.

  For all the help God was, He might as well be dead.

  Lizbet thought about throwing away the rest of the hosts.

  She heaved a sigh and started up the road.

  The sun had set. There were no street lamps here in Abalia’s slums. Shadows engulfed the road. Lizbet could hear the chittering of rats, and now and then one ran across her path. The sluggish flow of sewage and garbage down the center of the street released a stench that made her gag.

  She walked rapidly, trying to keep to the shadows. She scanned the street, and the tumbledown buildings on either side, alert for trouble. Although, if trouble found her, she didn’t know what she could do except run.

  “Hi!”

  Behind her, almost in her ear.

  Lizbet suppressed a scream. She swiveled to face the voice’s owner.

  Strix.

  Strix glared at her. “Are you going to say hello?”

  “What are you doing here?” Lizbet asked.

  “You’re so rude! I hate mortals. I hate them with a passion!” Strix said. “Why do I even have to do this?”

  “Do what? I don’t want you here!”

  “Then that’s two of us,” Strix said. She dug in the dirt with the toe of her boot. “Mrs. Woodcot made me come after you. She said I’m supposed to . . . to take you over the Montagnes du Monde.”

  “Oh! Well. Good, then! That’s good.”

  Lizbet’s thoughts were racing in many directions at once. This development was both wonderful and horrible. She was going to get to fly over the Montagnes du Monde! But she had to go with Strix? That made her want to vomit.

  A thought came to her. “Listen,” Lizbet said. “I’ve got an idea. You don’t have to come. I’ll borrow your broom, fly over the Montagnes, and come back. If you don’t want to be with me, you don’t have to.”

  This plan did not get the reception she had hoped. “That is such a stupid idea!” Strix yelled. “If I even had a broom I wouldn’t trust you with—wait a minute, we’ve got trouble.” She grabbed Lizbet’s hand and dragged her into the shadows where an unruly briar hedge spilled into the road. They crouched in the dirt beneath the briar canes. Thorns poked Lizbet through her socks.

  “What are you doing? Let go of me!” Lizbet said.

  “Shut up.”

  The touch of Strix’s hand didn’t feel like flesh, but crackly, slippery and dry, like a pile of leaves, or papers. Lizbet got goosebumps, and she tried to pull her hand away.

  Strix squeezed her more tightly. “Don’t move,” she whispered. “Don’t make a sound. I’ve got us knit into the shadows. See those two men?” She pointed up the street. “They saw you. They’re headed over here.”

  “What do you mean, ‘knit into the shadows’?”

  “Everything that’s dark and whimsical is my nation,” Strix said. “I can knit us into the shadows, the way a design is knit into a garment. It’s a witch thing.” Her face was hidden in the dark, but her voice was smirky. “Mortals can’t see us now. Not well, anyway.”

  In fact, Strix herself was barely visible to Lizbet. She could see Strix’s hand grasping her own, but when she tried to trace Strix’s wrist and arm up to the rest of her, her eyes lost track. Beside her on the road was a tangled ball of rusty wire—the exact shade of Strix’s hair, come to think of it—a pile of dead leaves, some scraps of paper, and a knot of brown twine, but no Strix.

  The men approached. One hungry-faced and hollow-cheeked, the other thick-necked and fat-bellied. They were the ones with Carl earlier. They came to within a few feet of Lizbet. Lizbet trembled. The thick-necked one said, “I saw her. That girl. The one that went into the Grove of Frenzy.”

  “Carl’s still not back,” the other said.

  “Won’t be back,” Thick-neck said. “Not from that place. Don’t know how the girl’s back. Maybe she’s a witch herself. Maybe she lured Carl into the Grove. They do that, you know.”

  That was the same thing Mrs. Woodcot said. The unfairness of the accusation bit into Lizbet like a tooth. Without thinking, she yelled, “I did not!”

  Strix’s hand, like a pile of leaves and smelling oddly like tea, clamped over Lizbet’s mouth. Thick-neck looked straight at her.

  For long seconds Lizbet met his eyes, terrified. Then, to her astonishment and relief, his gaze slid away and went searching elsewhere. “Did you hear that?” he said to Hungry-face. “She’s here somewheres. Look behind that hedge.”

  The men stumped off. Lizbet released her breath. They had looked directly at her, but hadn’t seen her.

  “Boy, was that ever stupid,” Strix whispered in her ear.

  Strix’s hand pulled at her, keeping her in the shadows of hedges and buildings. When they had gone a quarter mile, Strix let go of Lizbet’s hand, and there she was again, although her tawny skin and clothing almost blended into the night even when she wasn’t “knit into the shadows.”

  Lizbet had been thinking about what Strix had said just before. “Did you say you didn’t have a broom?” she said. “I thought witches flew on brooms.”

  “Not me,” Strix said.

  “So you’re not a witch?”

  “I am too a witch!” Her mismatched brown eyes glared at Lizbet. “Well, almost nearly. I’m still learning.”

  “I thought you were going to fly me over the Montagnes du Monde,” Lizbet said.

  “I never said ‘fly,’” Strix said.

  “Then how are we going to get over?”

  Strix shrugged. “I dunno. Walk, I guess.”

  Lizbet stopped. “I can walk myself. I don’t need you.”

  “You can’t even get through this town yourself, without me to hide you from danger,” Strix said scornfully. She kept on walking up the road.

  That was true, Lizbet admitted to herself. All right. She’d let Strix help her navigate the dangers of nighttime Abalia, but that was it. She’d ditch Strix as soon as they were on the other side of town.

  They reached the Wall of Virtue without further incident. Several suspicious-looking characters on the road gave them the eye, but none tried to waylay them. Lizbet’s legs ached, and she realized that she was ravenous. She had walked or run for most of the day, and hadn’t eaten since breakfast. The day’s high emotions and dangerous events had sustained her, but now hunger caught up with her.

  She looked about. Lamplight shone from the windows of a grubby pothouse built in the shadow of the Wall. Voices and music drifted from its door. Lizbet worried that there might be danger for an unaccompanied girl in a place like that, but once they had ascended the
Wall into Abalia proper, it was doubtful they would find any victualer still open. Honest citizens of Abalia locked themselves into their safe stone houses at sundown.

  “Strix,” she said, “I’m going in that pothouse. I don’t know if it’s safe. Can you come with me, and knit us into the shadows if there’s trouble?”

  Strix looked doubtful. “The place is full of mortals. I can’t stand mortals. Why do you want to go in there anyway?”

  “I’m hungry,” Lizbet said. “I haven’t eaten all day.” Strix, she decided, was proving less and less help.

  “Oh, you don’t need to go in there for that. Wait a moment.” Strix crouched down. A rundown building with empty black windows faced the street here. Strix crept along its wall. She faded from sight.

  “What are you doing?” Lizbet said.

  “Hush,” came Strix’s disembodied voice.

  Abruptly, she appeared into view again. She straightened up, and ran back to Lizbet. “Here!” she said.

  Between index finger and thumb, she held a mouse by the tail. Its legs worked frantically, its sleek gray body twisting back and forth.

  Lizbet flinched back. “Ewww! What’s that for?”

  “You said you were hungry,” Strix said.

  “It’s cruel to make fun of me! I can’t eat mice!”

  “Why not?”

  “People don’t eat mice, that’s why!”

  Strix shook her head. “Mice are very good,” she said. And as Lizbet watched, horrified, she tilted her head back, opened her mouth wide, and dropped the mouse in. Smiling, she chewed a few times, then swallowed.

  “Ohhhh,” Lizbet wailed, “that’s disgusting! I’m going to be sick!”

  Strix stepped back. “Really?”

  “No, I’m exaggerating. It’s just something people say. But it’s still disgusting to eat mice.”

  “Don’t be stupid,” Strix said. “Mice are yummy. And for some reason, there are an unusual number of mice around today.” Lizbet composed her features and tried to look innocent. “Such a feast! Anyway, how do you know you don’t like them unless you try one?”

  “I am not going to eat a mouse. I’m going into the pothouse. If anything happens, I’ll run out and you can knit me into the shadows.”

  Inside, a few men and women lounged around a handful of battered tables. A old man with a twisted nose played a leaping, swooping tune on a fiddle, while a woman with a shockingly low neckline and high hemline danced in a way that you could see her white thighs above the tops of her stockings. Lizbet blushed.

  The barkeep sold her a loaf of black bread, dried beef, and a couple of hardboiled eggs. Lizbet paid with some of the pennies she had taken from her father’s study. No one else seemed to notice her. Apparently an unchaperoned urchin frequenting a pothouse at night wasn’t unusual in Abalia-Under-the-Hill.

  Outside, she found Strix creeping along the building’s foundation, still stalking mice. A pang of pity went through Lizbet. Strix was arrogant and insulting, but—

  “Here,” she said, holding out one of the hardboiled eggs. “Take this. It’s an egg.”

  Strix’s voice was haughty. “I know what an egg is.”

  “Then you know it’s got to be better than mouse,” Lizbet said.

  After a moment of hesitation, Strix snatched the egg from her hand. “Thanks,” she said, as if uttering the word caused her pain. She nipped off the large end of the egg with her teeth as elegantly as a cigar smoker guillotining the end of his cigar with a pocket knife. She must have teeth like razors, Lizbet thought. The thought made her shiver. Strix popped the egg out of its shell in one motion and caught it in her mouth. She chewed and swallowed.

  Then her mismatched brown eyes opened wide. She made little gagging or coughing sounds. Strix looked as if she had swallowed a live coal.

  “Are you okay?” Lizbet said. A terrible thought came to her. “Was the egg gone rotten? Oh, I hope not.” She wondered if she should wallop Strix on the back, the way you did to children who swallowed buttons.

  Strix glared at her. “There was nothing wrong with the egg,” she said.

  “Then what’s the matter?”

  “Nothing’s the matter. For you.” Strix almost spat out the words.

  What an ungrateful brat, Lizbet thought as they walked along. She resolved not to do Strix any more favors.

  Chapter 6

  They strode quickly but cautiously through nighttime Abalia. Save for Lizbet and Strix and the odd gaggle of night-prowling goblins, the streets were deserted. Strix had never been in the upper city. “I like it,” she said. “It’s very dreary and depressing. All the buildings look alike.”

  “I wouldn’t think you’d like it,” Lizbet said. “It isn’t at all like Mrs. Woodcot’s house. That doesn’t even look like itself. It’s like a dozen different houses having a wrestling match.”

  “I like Mrs. Woodcot’s house too.”

  “How can you like both things? They’re completely different.”

  “I like all sorts of different things. It would be boring to like just one thing.”

  However, when they went by the cathedral, Strix gave it an evil look.

  “You don’t go to church, do you?” Lizbet asked.

  “Certainly not,” Strix said.

  “You’re not an . . . atheist?” ‘Atheist’ was about as bad as it was possible to be, in Lizbet’s opinion. Worse than being a heretic. Even worse than being a Mussulman or Hindoo or fire-worshiper.

  “Nope,” Strix said.

  “That’s a relief,” Lizbet said.

  “I believe in God,” Strix said. “I just don’t like him.”

  “I like him very much,” Lizbet said, “although we do have our quarrels now and then. My name means ‘Consecrated to God.’”

  Strix said, “My name is the name of an ancient demon that flew in the sky at night, and ate the flesh of mortals. It had its feet on top and its head on the bottom, instead of the usual way around. What does ‘consecrated’ mean?”

  “It means my life belongs to God.”

  “That’s awful,” Strix said. “What are you planning on doing about it?”

  “I’m not planning on doing anything about it!”

  Strix shook her head. “If it were me, I’d be fighting to get free. It’s awful to have one’s life owned by someone else.”

  “You don’t understand—” Lizbet began.

  Strix glared at her. “I understand perfectly,” she said, with such venom in her voice that Lizbet thought it wisest to drop the subject entirely.

  As they climbed eastward through Abalia’s rising streets, the buildings gradually became farther apart, and the Avenue of the Famous Virgins decayed from cobblestone, to brick, to gravel, to rutted earth. Before long they had left the city behind and were walking through hilly countryside, the lights of Abalia far below. The dirt road ran between high banks, where the night wind hissed through the grass. Sometimes Lizbet and Strix passed a wooden gate to a farm road. It was full night. The moon shone brightly.

  When Lizbet was too tired to walk any farther they stopped at a farm where they found an unsecured barn. The barn was full of cows, and the floor was sodden and stinky with manure. However, the haymow was dry and a suitable place to rest after they had shooed out a few chickens. Lizbet hoped the chickens’ annoyed cackles wouldn’t wake the farm’s owner.

  Lizbet snuggled into the hay as best she could. In the distance, wolves howled. Lizbet had intended to tell Strix she didn’t need her company as soon as they had left Abalia behind. But listening to the howls in the darkness, and wondering what other dangers might be ahead in the mountains, made her reluctant to send Strix away just yet. This ‘knitting into the shadows’ business wasn’t perfect, but it was better than nothing.

  Strix was still up, a dark silhouette in the moonlight, fussing with somethin
g in the middle of the haymow floor. “What are you doing?” Lizbet asked. “Aren’t you tired? Go to sleep.”

  “I’m making watch horses.”

  “‘Watch’—huh?”

  Strix put something down in a puddle of moonlight on the plank floor. A straw animal, no bigger than one’s hand. Lizbet could even make out details of the ears and mane, the powerful muscles of the thighs, the luxuriant tail. It really did look like a little horse. Lizbet was impressed, in spite of herself. She loved dolls, she missed her own already, and to find that Strix had skill in doll-making made Lizbet think a little better of her. A little.

  The straw horse whinnied—a tiny, plaintive sound—reared, and trotted across the floor, its head bobbing.

  “Eeeeee!” went Lizbet. She flinched away.

  Strix’s hand was immediately over Lizbet’s mouth. “Shut up! You’ll give us away!”

  “What . . . how . . .”

  “To watch over us. To let us know if anyone comes.”

  “But how . . . ? How does it . . . move?”

  Lizbet couldn’t see Strix’s expression in the darkness, but her voice was proud and snooty. “Witches make things. We break things apart. We make new things out of the pieces. Magic. Don’t bother your head about it. It’s quite beyond the understanding of mortals.”

  Biting her tongue against an angry retort, Lizbet burrowed more deeply into the straw. Her anger was no match for her fatigue, however, and she was asleep before she knew it.

  Lizbet awoke to the sensation of mice tap-dancing on her face. No, not mice, it was one of Strix’s ‘watch horses.’ Before she could react, she felt Strix’s hand, like a pile of leaves, over her mouth, and her other hand grasping Lizbet’s own. By now Lizbet knew what that meant. She held as still as she could.