The Age of Witches

by Louisa Morgan

  When she had prepared everything and poured a precise amount of alcohol over the whole, she set the vial on the counter. The alcohol—she preferred to use port wine, which helped to mask the taste—would extract the essential, functioning elements of the herbs. For most herbalists, that would be the end of it. If she were an ordinary practitioner, she would cork the little vial, let it rest for two days, and it would be ready.

  Harriet was no ordinary herbalist.

  She arranged her ritual objects with the same precision she used in measuring powerful ingredients. A thick new candle in a brass holder rested behind the suspended amulet so that its flickering light would glitter on the stone’s inner threads of purple. The vial of tincture she set at the center of the tableau, and she scattered a handful of sage around it to purify the atmosphere. She set a long match to the wick of the candle, nodding as the wick caught and flamed high, then settled to a steady glow. She turned off the electric lights, casting the room into shadows that shifted before the flame of the candle.

  Harriet had only her grandmother’s oral history to know how her ancestress, Bridget Bishop, had wielded her abilities. There were two separate and dramatically different traditions, derived from Bridget’s two very different daughters, conceived of two very different husbands. The older daughter had been Mary Wesselby. The younger had been Christian Oliver.

  Grandmother Beryl acknowledged the weaknesses of an oral tradition, but she was certain of one thing: she and Harriet were descended from Mary’s line and had kept the Bishop name. Their practice, passed down over the two centuries since Bridget’s execution, was one of beneficial herbs and healing cantrips, an art adapted and expanded according to the practitioner.

  Christian’s line was a different matter. Whether Christian herself had done it, Beryl could not be sure, but her descendants had added philters and manikins to their repertoire, both meant to manipulate minds and spirits, to persuade people to do what they did not intend to do. Beryl had warned against their use. Harriet wished she had listened.

  Grandmother had also spoken, rarely, of the knowing. She herself had not possessed the ability. She was already dead when Harriet discovered she had inherited it and learned that it was sometimes a terrible thing.

  With everything in order, Harriet recited the cantrip for today’s purpose.

  Root and stem, leaf and flower,

  I command your deepest power.

  Nature’s strength unfettered be

  To set one of her daughters free.

  She stood in the dim room, a solitary, experienced practitioner. She bent her head as she waited for the sign that meant she had succeeded. The ametrine, its veins of purple vivid under the candlelight, grew cloudy, as if filled with mist. Harriet waited, five minutes, then twenty, then thirty, focusing her mind and her spirit and her ability on the need at hand.

  The mist within the stone swirled, eddying like water in a brook. It grew thinner and thinner, as if evaporating before its own energy, and when at last it cleared, the ametrine sparkled with a light all its own, as if it had been washed clean. It shone with an inner brightness Harriet felt on her cheeks, on her forehead and lips, as if a stray shaft of sunlight had found her.

  An instant later she felt it in her body. Energy shot through her bones and flesh, a jolt of power that sometimes threw her off balance. She had once inadvertently touched a wire that carried electricity from the dynamo in the Dakota’s basement to a light fixture in her bedroom, and the feeling of working magic was much like that. The wire had stung her hand, and she had stumbled back, surprised by the unfamiliar bite of it. The power of a successful cantrip thrilled through her body in that same way, making her extremities tingle with a sense that was almost, but not quite, pain. She welcomed it as a sign she had achieved her intent.

  Her tincture was ready. It would be thorough and effective, with a strength beyond that of any known medicine. It held power over life and death.

  Harriet understood and honored the magnitude of her responsibility. Sometimes, as she whispered this cantrip or one of the others, she felt the presence of her predecessors, those wise women who had come before her. Often she felt Grandmother Beryl at her shoulder. Once she had sensed the shade of Bridget Bishop herself, and that one had unnerved her, a ghost still burning with resentment over her fate.

  Harriet had been thirty when that happened, but twenty years had not diminished the impact of the memory. What had happened to Bridget was terrible, of course. She had been a simple hedge witch, pursued by the men in her town without mercy. They had convicted her as a demon and hanged her without remorse. Bridget Bishop had been different, odd, old, and alone. Her small ability was not enough to save her.

  Still, Harriet considered that after two hundred years, Bridget’s anger should have abated.

  It had not. It had lived on in her daughter Christian, and then in the women who followed her. For them the art was not a tool. It was a weapon. It was, as Beryl had taught, the maleficia. Frances was of Christian’s lineage, with all its dark practices, and though Harriet and Beryl had tried to prevent her from adopting dark magic for herself, they had not succeeded. The maleficia was in her blood. There had been nothing they could do about it.

  Harriet’s memories faded gradually as the light faded from the ametrine, leaving it an ordinary, polished, pretty stone. She was just reaching for the vial of tincture when that other, unpredictable element of her practice struck.

  The knowing.

  It was uncomfortable in a different way from the effect of working magic. It burst into being inside her mind with a force that made her heart thud and her skin prickle, and there was no resisting it. When it came over her, she knew, whether she wanted to or not.

  6

  Annis

  The park was warm, even at this early hour, and the unseasonable heat brought prickles of perspiration to Annis’s chest. She pulled off her hat to scratch an itchy spot on her head while Bits drank from the brimming fountain. It was too early for the carriages that used the concourse as a turnaround, and Annis thought she must be truly alone, a rare treat. She slid from the saddle, settled her boots on the edge of the bluestone basin, and steadied herself with a hand on Bits’s neck so she could look around her.

  The crest of Cherry Hill was a wonderful vantage point. To the west the lake gleamed sapphire blue in the May sunshine. To the east and south cherry blossoms blazed white against the green landscape. Annis said, “I wish I owned all this, Bits. I could walk anywhere I wanted, ride however I wanted to, with no one telling me what to do!”

  She was free of school now. She had planned to spend her spring and summer riding, researching for her breeding program, helping with the mares who would come. Instead Frances kept her busy choosing shoes and hats, looking at fabrics and trims and buttons, standing on a stool for hours for dress fittings.

  Frances was taking her to London. The whole summer would be wasted on tea parties and stuffy balls, boring people, endless empty conversations.

  She had refused to go at first, but her father had insisted. “You’ll go,” he had growled at her. “Your stepmother has gone to a lot of trouble, acquiring a letter of introduction, finding a place for you, all that sort of thing. You’ll see all the sights.”

  “I don’t want to see the sights,” she protested. “And Black Satin—”

  “Behave yourself,” he said darkly, “and Black Satin will still be here when you return.”

  It was a clear threat. She could lose Bits. Robbie could lose his job. She would go to London as ordered.

  It hardly seemed fair, her father suddenly remembering her existence. It was Frances’s doing, of course. For some reason Frances wanted to go to England, and she wanted Annis to go along, which was odd. It wasn’t as if they enjoyed each other’s company.

  Bits snorted water, spattering her habit, interrupting her thoughts. Annis brought herself back to the beauties of the crystal morning. “I know, Bitsy. You want to run, but not yet.”

>   She shook the water droplets from her skirt. Bits stamped, eager to be off for their canter. She stroked his neck, which had grown hot in the sun, and combed his silky forelock with her fingers. “Sorry, Bits. Walking only, until we’re sure that tendon is healed.” Which meant, sadly, that they wouldn’t have their run until she returned from England.

  She urged Bits closer to the basin so she could remount. She was just about to swing her leg over the saddle when someone spoke from the trees beyond the curve of the concourse. “Lovely morning for a ride.”

  It was a woman’s voice, low in pitch, unusually resonant. Curious, a little embarrassed at having been overheard speaking to her horse as if he were a person, Annis bent her knees so she could peek under Bits’s neck.

  A tall, lean woman emerged from the copse. She wore a day dress every bit as worn as Annis’s riding habit. She carried an ancient straw hat, and her uncovered dark hair was threaded with silver, like star streaks in a night sky. A basket full of greenery hung over her arm. She stepped out from beneath a canopy of cherry blossoms, and they sifted past her shoulders as if someone were showering her with flowers.

  The woman walked through the drift of blossoms with a grace that belied the silver in her hair. Annis found something elegant about her, though Frances would have sniffed at the stranger’s shabby clothes.

  Intrigued, Annis loosened her grip on Bits’s reins and inched along the rim of the basin to show herself. “Good morning, ma’am. I thought I was alone up here.”

  “Do you need help getting into the saddle?” the woman asked. Her voice carried easily through the percussive rustle of leaves, as musical as the birdsong filling the park.

  Annis said, “No, thank you. I always stand on the edge of the fountain.” She jumped down so as not to seem rude, and because there was something about this woman that made her want to meet her. To hear what she might say.

  “Ah. How practical.” The woman walked closer. “It seems your steed is cooperative.”

  “Oh, he is. He’s the finest horse in New York City.”

  The woman’s lips curved. “He must certainly be the most fortunate.”

  “I hope so,” Annis said. “I do my best for him.”

  “Well, then. You are both fortunate. And what is your horse called?”

  “Bits. That is, his proper name is Black Satin. I’m starting a bloodline with him.”

  The woman tilted her head to one side, and her fine gray eyes sparkled with interest. “Are you indeed? That’s most interesting. A worthy ambition, I would say.”

  Annis grinned. “Thank you. Most people are shocked that I would be involved with such an activity—breeding horses, I mean. Everyone says it’s unladylike.”

  “I suppose it is. But being ladylike is so tedious, don’t you find?”

  Annis laughed. “Oh, I do! Decidedly.”

  “And what do your parents think of your endeavor?”

  Annis shrugged. “My stepmother thinks the whole thing is vulgar. My father says I’m a horse-mad girl and I’ll grow out of it, but I won’t. I’m young, but I know what I’m doing. Bits throws wonderful foals when he has the right mares. Everyone will clamor for one of them.”

  “Your enthusiasm makes me wish I were a horsewoman.”

  Annis said, “I do love horses. I love riding, too.”

  “And no sidesaddle, I see.”

  “Heavens, no! I only ride a cross saddle.”

  “I expect that draws attention.”

  “Oh yes,” Annis said with a sigh. “Everyone is scandalized, but truly, the sidesaddle is a ridiculous invention. Dangerous.” Annis pointed to her saddle. “This was custom fitted for Bits and me, and it’s perfect. The balance is all wrong with a sidesaddle, both for the rider and the horse. It’s fine for showing off fancy riding habits, but it’s terrible for real riding.”

  It was a long speech, and something of a lecture. Annis’s cheeks warmed at the realization, but her new friend was nodding with an expression of interest. “I’ve often wondered about that. It’s a safety concern, surely. I wonder who thought of it in the first place?”

  “Someone who hated women,” Annis said with asperity.

  The stranger laughed. “You’re probably right.”

  Annis lifted her head and saw that the sun had risen above the woods. “Oh, it’s getting late. Robbie will be worried about us.”

  “Robbie?”

  “My stableman. Bits has a sore tendon. Robbie might think it has gotten worse and come looking for us.”

  “And what does one do for a sore tendon?”

  “I made a poultice of witch hazel, with comfrey and a bit of bay laurel. I think it helped, but it takes time.”

  “You’re quite right. Healing does take time, but that’s a good combination. You might add some dried gingerroot, ground very fine. It’s helpful for cooling inflammation.”

  Annis raised her eyebrows. “Do you know something of herbs?”

  “I do, rather,” the woman said. “As it happens, it’s my profession.”

  “How wonderful! Gingerroot, then. Where can I find it?”

  “Try the herbalist on Elizabeth Street. She seems to have everything.”

  “I will! Thank you for the suggestion.”

  “You’re most welcome. And now perhaps you had best start back, since you have some distance to go. We don’t want your Robbie to worry.”

  “Yes. You’ll have to excuse me.”

  Annis maneuvered Bits closer to the fountain, stepped up onto the edge, and swung her leg over the saddle. She fitted her boots into the stirrups and lifted a hand in farewell as she pressed the reins against Bits’s neck. She glanced over her shoulder just as the woman faded among the cherry trees, her dark silhouette melting into the curtain of white.

  “I believe we’ve made a friend, Bits,” Annis said. She felt the spring in his step, the urge to go faster, but she held him in. “Gingerroot, Bitsy. That will help.”

  She wished she had asked the woman’s name, even asked where she lived. It had been marvelous to speak with someone of her own sex who was interesting. And now she was being dragged off to England for long, boring weeks and would probably never see her again.

  Annis’s bed was strewn with satins, silks, and brocades, with the occasional splash of organza. Layers of cream, yellow, and pink shimmered in the afternoon light, and jet and crystal beads flashed from the pile of tea frocks and day dresses. Frances had insisted Annis try on every single garment before it was packed, and Annis felt as cross as an alley cat.

  Frances, seated on the dressing-table stool, didn’t appear to notice her mood. She regarded the mound of clothes with satisfaction. “It will do,” she said. She was cheerful this afternoon, with her cat-that-drank-the-cream smile, her lips curling at the corners, her eyelids half-lowered. “They aren’t Worth creations, of course. George refused the expense of a trip to Paris, but my dressmaker did well, don’t you think? Most of these are convincing copies.”

  “What does it matter? No one in England will care what one American nobody wears.”

  Frances looked up at her, her eyes narrow and cool, more catlike than ever. “You will not be a nobody, Annis Allington. I will see to that. We have a lovely letter of introduction, and I want you to look well at the teas and parties.”

  “I hate teas and parties.”

  Unperturbed, Frances rose and stroked one of the silk gowns. “But I do not.”

  “I’d rather see the museums, since we’re going to be there. And Westminster Abbey and Buckingham Palace.”

  “We’ll see all of that, in time,” Frances said airily. “Didn’t I say?”

  “You didn’t, Frances. Have you even bought a Baedeker or a Murray’s?”

  “We won’t need guidebooks. The people we meet will show us about.”

  Annis waved a hand at the profusion on her bed. “I suppose all of this is going aboard the Majestic, and a matching pile for you? There won’t be any room for us.”

  “Of cours
e there will,” Frances said. “We’ll keep what we need for the voyage in our stateroom, and the rest will be stowed away until we reach Liverpool.”

  “But what about Antoinette and Velma?”

  “They’ll share a cabin in second class. Maids and valets have their own dining room. They’ll enjoy themselves.”

  Velma was smoothing one of the tea frocks, readying it to be wrapped in tissue paper and folded into the waiting trunk. She glanced up and then quickly away, but Annis caught her look of anxiety. “Velma? What’s the matter?”

  Velma shook her head and stared, wordless, into the folds of powder-pink silk.

  Frances said, “Annis, let it go if she doesn’t want to talk about it.” She pulled a cream-and-pink shawl from the bed and held it out to Velma. “This goes with the pink silk.”

  Velma, looking miserable, took the shawl and began to fold it.

  Annis worked her way around the trunk to her wardrobe, where she slipped out of her dressing gown. She pulled out a shirtwaist and skirt and began to work her way into them.

  “Velma, help your mistress,” Frances ordered.

  “She can’t do everything at once!” Annis protested, even as Velma obediently laid the shawl on top of the trunk and came to help her with the buttons of her shirtwaist.

  Frances gave a contented sigh and dusted her palms together as if she had just completed a job of work. Annis nodded to Velma to go back to her packing and bent to pull on her shoes.

  Frances said, “Take care with your jewel case, Annis. You need to plan. You’re going to want simple earrings and necklaces for daytime, but fancier things for the evenings. Do you have pearls? They would go nicely with the ivory brocade.”

  She was gone before Annis could tell her that she couldn’t remember if she had pearls or not. She wore almost no jewelry, since it got in the way of her stable chores. Most of what she possessed had been her mother’s. She wiped dust from the lid of her jewel case as she said, “Tell me now, Velma. What are you worried about?”