Threadneedle

by Cari Thomas

  ‘Shhh,’ she hissed. ‘Half the school’s here. Let’s go somewhere more private.’

  ‘I thought you’d never ask.’ He grinned and followed her.

  They found an empty classroom, the sound of the hallway fading to a distant murmur as the door closed. Anna unzipped her bag and handed him the bottle. He took it and looked into her eyes for a moment, searching.

  She turned away. ‘Just to be clear, this is ridiculous.’

  ‘Good. I only deal in the ridiculous.’

  ‘We agree there.’ She closed her bag and paused. ‘Why are you doing this – trying to help me?’

  He shrugged. ‘You’re Effie’s friend. She wants a coven; she needs you. I also believe you are being poisoned and I like proving myself right.’

  ‘Fine. So long as it is not on my account.’

  ‘I would never dream of trying to help you, I know how unhappy it would make you. Of course, I still look forward to you thanking me. Dark chocolate truffles are my favourite.’

  Anna shook her head with exasperation. ‘I hope you’re not right,’ she said and realized that her words felt hollow; she hadn’t truly asked herself what outcome she hoped for: one severed her from Aunt and the other from magic – her hopes, her newfound dreams.

  She hadn’t expected to see Attis again that day so when he strode towards them in the common room, a sharp resolve in his eye, her heart stopped and then began to beat in double time. ‘Poison,’ he announced, towering over their table. He turned the seat next to Anna between his fingers and sat down. ‘Bindweed.’ He looked at her. ‘I’m sure of it,’ he said, more gently.

  All eyes turned to Anna. She didn’t know what to say.

  ‘It can’t be.’ Her voice was strangled.

  ‘It is. This is a good thing. If we know what we’re dealing with, we can fix it.’

  ‘Fix it?’ Anna replied. Everything’s broken now.

  Effie released a dark laugh. ‘Your aunt really has outdone herself.’

  ‘How? How do you know?’ said Anna, eyes still fixed on Attis.

  ‘Three tests. Bindweed contains alkaloids. The dragendorff’s reagent is a simple test to detect them. They had all I needed in the chem lab: bismuth nitrate, tartaric acid, potassium iodide. The test was positive. I’ll show you again tomorrow if you need proof.’

  ‘What was the other way?’

  Attis rubbed his jaw. ‘Magic. I devised my own system of testing for it. I carved a symbol to detect the presence of bindweed onto a silver spoon and …’ He pulled a spoon out of his pocket; it was tarnished a tealy black. ‘As you can see, the silver reacted.’ Attis offered the spoon to Anna but she didn’t take it.

  ‘The third test?’

  ‘I drank it.’

  Effie looked at him crossly.

  ‘What? Anna’s been drinking it for years. I knew it would be difficult to detect a reaction with such a small dose, but I figured it was worth a shot.’

  ‘And?’ said Rowan.

  Attis shrugged. ‘I have a mild headache.’

  Anna reviewed the evidence in her mind. Magic is the first sin. Would Aunt do it? Take away my magic. Make me believe I’m weak and inept for years. Years! Anna considered the question honestly for the first time and knew that it was possible – that Aunt’s cruelty might run that deep. She felt the realization like a wrenching crack through the foundations of her life. She’d always accepted Aunt’s twisted methods because Anna trusted Aunt’s intentions, twisted as they were too – but how could poison ever be OK? It was too much, too far, too sick. Aunt had taken everything from her.

  ‘So what do we do?’ said Effie, banging the table and attracting attention. She leant in, enraged. ‘Anna is being fucking poisoned and we’re still sitting around talking about it.’

  ‘Slow down, cowboy,’ said Attis. ‘Our best option is to devise an antidote. Bindweed is an alkaloid so it might be possible to neutralize it. I just need to think of a plant that could work.’

  ‘Mum will know,’ said Rowan. ‘She knows everything there is to know about plants and everything that isn’t known too.’

  ‘Well, that’s that then,’ said Effie. ‘We’ll go to Rowan’s house this afternoon. You live in Forest Hill, don’t you? Not far away.’

  ‘I’m not going to ask how you know that,’ said Rowan.

  ‘We have this little thing called school this afternoon,’ Manda pointed out.

  ‘Do you not care that Anna is being poisoned?’ said Effie and Anna felt she took far too much delight in saying the word. ‘I know your last class today is a free period and so is Anna’s. Rowan you have PE so you can get out of that.’

  Manda pouted. Rowan looked up from her phone. ‘I’ve messaged my mum; she is around this afternoon. She’s replied saying she’s excited to meet my “depends”. I think she means friends.’

  ‘That’s settled then,’ said Effie. Anna nodded but she felt hollow, imagining her insides blackened and tarred as the spoon. She remembered Aunt taking the package from the doctor when she was seven – had that been bindweed? Everything I do is to protect you, Anna. Protect and poison. Poison and protect. Punish.

  Anna reached for the Knotted Cord and found the knot containing her anger. She pulled it tighter but did not feel better.

  Rowan’s house did not belong in a city. It stood alone, a mismatched building lost in a garden, nobbly stone walls bulging against a heavy corset of vines. A green porch ran around the outside, lined with hanging baskets, overflowing pots and tinkling wind chimes.

  The door burst open and a woman who had to be Rowan’s mother started running towards them. Her nose was similarly long and her hair just as wild, only hers sported a divergent grey streak down the front. ‘My baby,’ she said, crumpling Rowan into a hug. Hadn’t they seen each other this morning? She planted a series of kisses on Rowan’s cheeks and then turned to the others. ‘I’m Gilberta, but just call me Bertie.’

  Manda and Effie were folded against their wills into similar exuberant hugs. She offered Attis a hearty handshake. ‘Well, hello! You must be Attis. Strapping lad, aren’t you?’

  ‘Mum!’

  ‘I see what you meant.’ Bertie elbowed Rowan and cackled.

  ‘MUM!’

  ‘And Anna.’ Before Anna could say hello, she was tugged into an all-encompassing embrace, Bertie’s voluptuous bosom making it hard to breathe at all. Her jumper was soft and her scarf smelt of perfume and cake batter. For a moment, Anna didn’t want to let go; the hug was so what a mother’s hug should be, a cure for all poisons. ‘Rowan has told me all about you.’ Her fleeting look of concern turned to a smile. She had round cheekbones that shone like autumn apples. ‘You must all be half-frozen, come inside right away.’ Bertie bundled them towards the front door. ‘I’ve got the fire on.’

  Inside it was hard to know quite where the garden ended and the house began – there were plants everywhere in pots of all shapes and sizes, interspersed among the shoes and wellies, coats, umbrellas, bags and broomsticks in the hallway. Family pictures dotted the walls. It smelt like the depths of a warm, fragrant oven.

  ‘I’ve baked lavender cookies, a crescent moon cake and verbena brownies. I’d watch them though, last time I ate one I slept for twelve hours. Oh, don’t bother taking your shoes off. Come on through – kitchen’s a state – who’s hungry? Don’t mind the yapping; the dogs are locked away.’

  ‘I told you she was mad,’ Rowan whispered as they headed down the corridor.

  Anna smiled. ‘I think she’s brilliant.’

  ‘Wait till you try her cakes.’

  Anna’s stomach rumbled in reply.

  Herbs trailed from the kitchen ceiling and the surfaces were covered with pots and spilt flour and the kind of homely knick-knacks Aunt never indulged in. A huge Aga gurgled in the midst of it all, hung with tea towels and clothes, a large silver pot of porridge bubbling on the top.

  ‘What are these?’ asked Manda, looking with concern at a glass ball hanging from the window. It wa
s one of many, each filled with strange substances: a green mist swirled in one; dark sludge had collected at the bottom of another; a third had moss growing along its surface.

  ‘Witch balls,’ Bertie replied. ‘They capture negative energies: pollution, family arguments, evil spirits and so forth. Useful things. Anyone for tea?’

  ‘Yes, please,’ said Anna, inspecting a ball with a sticky-looking yellow substance moving slowly inside it.

  ‘You’re going to have to be more specific than that,’ Bertie replied, opening a large cupboard stacked with colourful teapots out of which plants appeared to be growing – green leaves and flower heads poking out of lids and peeking through the spouts, vines spiralling around fat middles and dripping down the shelves. Some were more plant than pot. ‘Living teas – a lot more potent,’ she explained. ‘You all look like you need a pick-me-up. Thyme, ginger and rosehip will work wonders.’ She picked out an orange teapot with a tuft of thyme leaves escaping from its spout.

  Anna wandered through into the dining room, looking at Rowan’s many family pictures, all of them happy and vivid, trying to imagine what it would be like to have an older brother and younger sisters. Bertie bustled out of the kitchen with the steaming teapot, followed by Attis holding a large tray of mismatched teacups and slices of freshly cut cake. ‘This way!’ she shouted.

  The lounge was all sofas and rugs and blankets, a fire snapping in the grate. It smelt divine, sharp as a pine forest, with other herby scents running through it in little rivers.

  ‘I throw in bundles of rosemary and sweet grass.’ Bertie sat down on the sofa next to Anna. ‘Help yourself to cake and then you can tell me why you’re all here instead of at school. Have a bigger piece than that, dear, you’re skin and bone,’ she said to Manda. ‘You two, don’t sit over there, there’s enough space on the sofa. Come on, trust me.’

  There was clearly no space for Effie and Attis, but they did as Bertie instructed and somehow, although Anna couldn’t exactly describe how, the sofa appeared to expand as they took their seats. Once they were all on, there was plenty of room. Anna had never liked a house as much as this one. She sipped the tea, its gingery warmth filling some of the emptiness inside her.

  ‘So,’ Bertie prompted.

  ‘Anna has been consuming bindweed for nine years. We need a cure.’ Effie gave her a challenging look.

  Bertie frowned. ‘Don’t beat around the bush, do you? Sorbus has told me that much already.’

  ‘I’m sorry, who is Sorbus?’ said Effie.

  ‘MUM!’ cried Rowan.

  ‘Oh. I’m not meant to “out” her real name.’

  Effie sniggered. ‘Sorbus Greenfinch is your name?’

  ‘My parents weren’t content with naming us after plant life, we had to be named after their official botanical names. My life was a tragedy from birth.’

  ‘Sorbus – I mean Rowan, you’re lucky to have such a beautiful, magical name,’ said Bertie. ‘It’s said the first rowan ash appeared when a fork of lightning struck the earth.’

  Rowan rolled her eyes. ‘Can we get back to Anna?’

  ‘Well, of course, but I’m waiting on you for that. I’ve gathered the facts but how or why this poor girl is being harmed in such a way I have yet to ascertain, if anyone would be so kind …’

  Silence followed. Effie went to say something but stopped.

  ‘I see. Well, I don’t feel comfortable devising an antidote for something I don’t have any context to.’

  Anna thought about telling her the truth, but then Bertie might feel obliged to ring Aunt to discuss the matter – she couldn’t risk it. She turned to Bertie. ‘Can you imagine any context where feeding me bindweed is OK?’ She studied the formation of wrinkles under Bertie’s eyes, like the veins of a leaf.

  Bertie smiled kindly and they deepened. ‘No, my dear. To prescribe something like that against your will is, to my mind, abominable.’

  ‘If that’s the case then there’s no harm in giving me the antidote. If I’m not truly being poisoned then it presumably won’t hurt me and, if I am, then I get my free will back. No harm done.’ Anna surprised herself how calmly she could talk about her apparent poisoning.

  Bertie gave her a sad look that almost broke through her defences. ‘OK, my dear. I can’t argue with your logic, but, Anna, if someone is doing this to you it’s wrong – perhaps I can help.’

  Anna felt the tear within her beginning to open. She took a deep breath. ‘You can’t. I just need you to help me. Please.’

  Bertie sighed. ‘Of course.’

  ‘Do you do this often?’ said Attis, eyeing another piece of cake. ‘Cure people?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ replied Bertie, putting a slice on his plate. ‘As a member of the Wort-Cunnings I’ve been practising botanical magic all my life.’

  ‘Who are the Wort-Cunnings?’ Anna asked.

  ‘The largest and oldest grove dealing in the language of plants.’

  ‘What’s a grove?’

  ‘Rowan, are you not teaching these girls anything of the magical world? A grove is a collection of like-minded witches who practise the same magical language. Multiple covens might belong to one grove or it might have only a few members. The Wort-Cunnings are a friendly, all-are-welcome sort of rabble. We used to have a huge membership, but now it’s falling year on year. Witches these days aren’t so interested in plant magic – too slow for them, too much to learn. There are lots of other groves out there which also deal in plants, many offshoots – pun intended – that are more focused on a particular aspect of botanical magic, but we do it all. No, I’ll pour the tea!’ Bertie startled Manda, who had picked up the teapot and released a few drops. ‘Only one person should ever pour from the same pot or there’ll be a falling out within the year.’

  ‘How many groves are there in Britain?’ said Anna, fascinated by the magical world unfurling around her. Are the Binders a grove?

  ‘Oh, hundreds, I should imagine. Nobody particularly keeps count, except maybe the Seven,’ said Bertie cheerfully and then her smile dropped. ‘I still can’t quite believe what happened …’

  Effie perked up at the mention of the Seven. ‘Do you know who killed them?’ she said.

  Bertie put down her mug. It shook a little against the table. ‘No. Another grove perhaps.’

  ‘What grove could be powerful enough to kill the Seven?’

  Bertie couldn’t answer. ‘I don’t know. There are many mysteries in the magical world.’

  ‘But I thought they were here to protect us all?’ said Manda.

  Bertie smiled. ‘They are. The Seven. Descendants of the Great Spinner. Keeper of the Moonsongs. The spinsters. The virgins. Whatever you choose to call them, they are the witch grove above all witch groves and protectors of the first languages. You have to understand, girls, in the magical world we don’t have leaders, or courts, or any kind of judicial system – there are only the Seven. It is they who keep the balance. It is what they were doing that night. I don’t know much about the Seven’s movements or their magic but I know they perform an annual ritual of protection to keep the magical world safe. It’s why they were there, in the centre of the capital, in Big Ben—’

  ‘But they were killed while doing it!’ Manda cried. ‘Surely that’s not a good sign.’

  ‘No, indeed. But what we must remember, my chickens, is that they can’t truly be killed. They will return and protect us once more from … everything we need protecting from. More cake?’

  ‘From what? When will they come back? How can we meet them?’ Effie’s eyes had gone wide as dark moons.

  Bertie looked at her watch. ‘Are we talking about the Seven or are we helping Anna? The girls will be home from school soon.’

  ‘Fine,’ said Effie irritably.

  ‘To the garden then! We’ve got a tisane to make,’ said Bertie, springing off the sofa with surprising energy.

  They bundled out of the back door through an obstacle course of wellies. The light was almost gone outside, the s
ky a dusky pink, dusted with clouds. A small toad hopped across the path in front of them. ‘Pink sky on all sides and a yellow toad, it’ll be a fine day tomorrow again.’ Bertie breathed in the air briskly. ‘Let’s get some light on out here.’

  She clicked her fingers and the garden was suddenly transformed, lit by lanterns and strings of fairy lights, and Anna realized with a gasp that several tree trunks were also aglow with a faint, silvery light travelling up their trunks, down their branches and into the veins of every leaf.

  Bertie smiled. ‘A special breed of silver birch.’

  Anna had never seen a garden like it – no flower beds, no paths, no lines, nothing was restricted and yet there seemed to be a kind of order to it all, an agreement among the living things of where they ought to be and how much they ought to grow. The lights brought the swirling, shadowy textures to life. A small stream ran down through the centre, whispering to itself.

  ‘Your garden is so beautiful,’ Manda exclaimed.

  ‘It is? How disappointing. It was not my intention,’ Bertie replied.

  Anna was still marvelling. ‘But it’s so open,’ she said. ‘What if someone saw?’

  Bertie smiled. ‘No one is looking for magic any more, my dear. No one sees beyond their own nose – or their phone for that matter.’ Bertie made it all sound so simple – there was magic and it was as natural as any living thing. It didn’t have to be hidden away like some sort of sickness. She hooked arms with Anna in the same way Rowan so often did. ‘So tell me how you feel, chicken, day to day?’

  ‘Fine,’ Anna replied. Bertie gave her a penetrating look. ‘I guess – I don’t sleep well. I’m tired a lot and I sometimes feel, I don’t know, like I’m fading away.’

  Bertie frowned then nodded with brisk concern ‘Let’s wander and see what the plants say.’

  Attis coughed and stepped in sync alongside them. ‘You don’t already have an antidote in mind then?’

  ‘Oh, I have several in mind but there’s no point going any further before seeing what the plants think.’ Bertie bent down and dug her hands into the soil, rubbing it through her fingers.