by B G Denvil
Some chirped their own greetings, but the words were high pitched, and the three careful humans did not hear.
Soon Alid and Dickon were entirely tipsy, but Joan, was sitting by the wall, the smile almost splitting her face as she watched the bats sweeping past, the birds twittering and cawing from above, the donkey snoring, Twizzle doing his kookaburra interpretation while the pretty little squirrel sat on Rosie’s shoulder as she danced.
Cascading sleeves and heavily embroidered hems shuffled their own melodies, the click of shoe soles against the floorboards, and the laughter of every dancer. The bats continued to race, weaving through the reflections of tiny flames in silk and satin.
After hours of unfading energy, Maggs and Mandrake whispered to each other and finally to Rosie. It was time for bed. She immediately offered to take them over to their new home. Since neither had known that a new home existed, both were excited, and Maggs was even more excited when Mandrake took one of her hands and Rosie took the other, and she was flown over the thatched roof, over the tree tops, over the roof of the tree house where Maggs had been staying, and eventually to the front door of a newly built cottage with its own thatched roof, a couple of windows surrounded in the late blossoms of briar roses, with other flowers along the front.
Rosie ushered them inside, where they discovered a haven of comfort, thick with rugs and cushioned chairs, a huge inglenook fireplace which would just need a finger flick to light once winter arrived, a bedchamber with a soft pillowed bed curtained and tessellated in emerald green, their own private privy in the garderobe, and a myriad of other comforts which Maggs couldn’t even name.
Leaving them to their wedding night, Rosie returned to The Rookery and sat to watch the dancing, listen to the music, wave to the bats and birds, and talk to Peg and Edna.
“Does it make you wish you could fall in love and marry some gorgeous human male?” grinned Edna.
“Not in the least,” Rosie answered without hesitation. “Not even some gorgeous wizard. I’ve sort of thought about it in the past, and I used to like the idea of falling in love, though I always chose a horrible mistake to fancy. I don’t want that funny thing called romance anymore, and I certainly don’t want any man of any kind to start thinking he’s my master.”
“Wizards don’t do that,” Edna shook her head. “Especially a ninety marrying a ninety-eight.”
“And what does romance mean anyway?” demanded Peg. “Giggling and fluttering eyelashes. I can’t see the pleasure in that.”
“There’s that stodgy daft sheriff still wants you,” Edna pointed out, nodding at Rosie.
But Rosie didn’t nod back. “He’s not in the slightest attractive,” she frowned. “What I ever saw in him at the start, I’ve no idea. I’d sooner have Montague.” She didn’t confess that she’d liked him too at one time.
Edna and Peg both laughed rather loudly, since Montague, although handsome in his own disapproving way, was the one wizard nobody really liked. “You’d really need a magic charm to get that one,” sniggered Edna. “Though I’ve been just as stupid many years ago. I really wanted Whistle, but he was one of those many wizards who don’t know that females are any different to males. Whistle just thought I was a friend with a magical grade even a touch higher than his own. Well, now he’s such a cuddly little squirrel, I think he’s even more delightful.”
“You have the squirrel, and I’ll keep the donkey,” said Rosie. “And Peg, you can have Dodger and Cabbage.”
Indeed, she no longer admitted, even to herself, that a faint yearning still floated at the back of her mind and a tiny wish to cuddle her own baby.
It was a long time before Rosie wandered off to bed, flying out to her rooms at the back of the house. Here there was absolute peace, and although everything at the church had started that morning, there was now a mist of silver moon glow and a snowscape of stars in the sweep of black sky, each reminding Rosie of a thousand things she still wanted to do.
Copplestone Curse
One
I remembered my adopted mother once being so pleased to have had a couple of free rooms to rent after she had murdered one of our residents.
That was a while ago, and it was now me who owned The Rookery, but I found that needed more room too, though I hadn’t yet succumbed to the temptation of slaughtering any of our old-timers.
It wasn’t the money I needed; it was the space, and since Mandrake had surprisingly married a human, and we had managed to create a cottage for them out in the grounds, I felt we could possibly build something even bigger and better, and really produce more space.
Getting that pretty cottage fixed up had actually been easier than I’d expected. My good friends Peg and Edna had helped, of course, and Mandrake and his human were clearly very happy there. But more than anything, I had enjoyed the creating and found it enormous fun, so the idea of doing it again was tempting.
Our tenants were a wealthy lot on the whole. If you had magic abilities, then you could produce a few coins whenever you needed them. The trouble with magically created coins, they were apt to disappear just when you wanted to spend them. When The Rookery was first left to me, I had discovered a large chest of gold, silver, and coins galore. However, depending on what I wanted to spend and why, I sometimes found myself short of cash. There’s nothing worse than sitting at the local tavern, drinking two cups of excellent wine alongside your friends, and then when you came to pay, the money dissolved in your hand.
But it really wasn’t more money I wanted. It was something I had only recently discovered which had upset me enough to want to do something about it.
Trotting past the church in Little Piddleton, I had seen a young girl sitting on the cobbles, tearstains on her face and her grubby little hand stretched hopefully out to strangers.
This was most definitely the first time I had seen such a thing. The village was a quiet and cosy place, where even the local sheriff was a friend. If any person—human, of course—became wretchedly poor, then the community would help. Admittedly I had led a somewhat sheltered life so far, not always in a good way I should add.
But here was a girl, almost a child, looking starved and miserable. So I stopped and poured a handful of coins into her hand.
Then as I walked on, I heard her running behind me. Her voice was puffed and breathless. “My lady, I can’t accept all this,” she gasped. “It’s too much. You are too generous.”
That was taking good behaviour too far. I turned to say something encouraging, or even to ask where she was living, when I realised something.
For a witch, it was always comparatively easy to recognise anyone else with magical powers, even if those powers were fairly weak. I immediately recognised this girl as another witch, although I couldn’t recognise her strength, and it was clear that in the same instant she also sensed me.
“You are clearly in trouble and in far more need of it than I. What happened?”
“I’m Fanny,” she whispered back. “But I mustn’t bother you, lady. I can tell your power is very strong.”
“Which makes it all the easier for me to help you,” I pointed out. “My name is Rosie. I own The Rookery. Have you heard of it?”
She was quite pretty, but the tearstains hadn’t disappeared, and on top of her expression of misery, she looked plain scared. “Why are you so upset? I can help. I will help. But as a witch, surely you should be able to help yourself.”
I suppose I was a bit sharp, but I couldn’t understand why a young witch, of all people, was in such a mess.
But then she bent towards me and whispered, “I was cursed.”
I was ashamed of myself afterwards, but I confess that at first I shrank back a bit and even shivered. Since it was a boiling hot September day, that was stupid, but I did it.
“Why?” I said. “And who?”
But Fanny shook her small tousled head. “I don’t know. I heard the words in my sleep. I even wondered if I dreamed them and actually ended up cursing myself, but surel
y that can’t be true.”
“Number one,” I said, “no one can curse themselves that I’ve ever heard of. I’m sure it’s not possible. Number two, if you had, surely could take it away at once. Number three, I think you’d know the witch who did it, since cursing someone you don’t know is totally ridiculous. How long have you had this curse?”
“Nearly a year.” She was still whispering. “I used to live in Copplestone on Hill, but the locals threw me out. They said I was a beggar and made their town look like bad.” She looked ashamed and stared down at her bare toes. “I had a good home, and my father was a tailor. But when he died I was so miserable and hardly ever went out. Then – suddenly – this curse. My home started to fall around me. I had no work, and as a seamstress, no one would hire me because I looked like a ragged wanderer. No one wanted to help.”
That town was a sniffy place with pretentions of grandeur entirely undeserved.
“I don’t suppose you tried to take the curse off? I’ve never tried it, since I’ve never been cursed, but they say you need to stand in water up to your waist, turn around three times and say, ‘I banish this curse to the skies,’ over and over again until it works. Depending on your magical strength, of course. So what grade are you?”
That was rude too, and something you shouldn’t ask a witch or a wizard unless it’s a close friend. But I needed to know as it could make a big difference.
“I used to be a seventy-seven,” she said with a hopeless sniff. “But I’m sure I must have fallen, and perhaps the curse has brought me down to a ten or something, because now nothing works.”
But I could smell her magic. She certainly had some.
“Interesting,” I said. “Well, you’d better come home with me. We have a spare room. Quite a nice one too, used to belong to a seventy-eight who just got married and moved out of the main house. So keep that money I gave you and follow me. Can you fly?”
“Not anymore,” she said, hanging her head in shame. “I used to enjoy flying, but now the curse blocks me.”
“Oh, very well,” I said. “Hold my hand, and I’ll fly you.”
I took her hand in mine. It was small, very cold and very thin. On such a hot day, it felt quite strange. Naturally we had to walk out of the village first, or the humans would have seen us flying – not a good idea!
I pulled her up with me, the breezes pleasant in our hair, and flew directly to the Rookery. She sighed as we landed.
“It’s been such a long time since I was able to fly anywhere,” she said softly. “Thank you for allowing me to experience it again.”
Back at the Rookery, common sense finally kicked in. Flying often gave me a chance to clear my head. So we both stood in front of the large, somewhat bedraggled, building, with its attics and extensions, wobbly windows of all sizes and numerous staircases, some winding and some straight, which occasionally popped their heads outside. I pointed up, down and around.
“This is our home, we call it the Rookery,” I introduced her, as if lord of the manor. “Your room will be on the second floor, and quite easy to find. The privies are on that side towards the back, and the well is on this side, towards the back. The kitchens are on the ground floor – and guess what! – also towards the back. But we have a wonderful wiccan cook called Issa, and there are a couple of girls who serve in the dining room. The main hall is where we all gather, of course, and there are comfy chairs, loads of stools and cushions, small tables and a big fireplace. But it’s not in use while weather’s still beautiful, sometimes if everyone is too lazy, we just use magic to warm the place anyway. So welcome home, Fanny, dear. Settle in, and then we’ll try and sort out this curse business.”
I showed her up to Mandrake’s empty room, and she was astounded. “Even more gorgeous than my father’s old house.”
Frowning, I asked, “He was a wizard too?”
“Yes,” she nodded, “but not a strong one. He was a forty-four, and was so excited when I was born much stronger. But my poor mother died when I arrived, perhaps because she wasn’t a witch and giving birth to a seventy-seven must have been painful, poor darling. So Papa brought me up and we were happy. Until he died.”
“Suddenly?”
“Yes,” she muttered, almost in tears again. “I came home with the shopping for supper and found him quite dead on the floor. I was so upset. And then everything else went wrong. It kept getting worse and worse.”
“Sounds as if the curse hit both of you,” I decided. We stood together in the room I was giving to her, andI showed her a few things. “The bed doesn’t make itself,” I explained. “If you can’t magic things, then you have to actually do them. There’s boxes under the bed for you to hide stuff. That mirror lets you talk to yourself and helps to work things out, and the window opens if you look out of it and click your fingers. Try not to do it by mistake in the pouring rain. There’s paper and an ink pot and two quill pens. The feathers are from our own crows. They stick around all year because they know we feed them. There’s owls under the thatch and bats in the roof cavity. They all talk. And you’ll hear the kitchen bell when it’s time for dinner and supper and of course breakfast tomorrow.”
Dinner and supper would certainly help, since she was such a skinny little witch, very young, perhaps sixteen I assumed, and now little more than a grade fifteen.
Sadly, she reminded me a bit of my donkey, rescued from death by starvation.
I left her alone, imagining that she needed privacy to settle and find some happiness, or collapse in misery, whichever way she was inclined. Probably misery under the circumstances. While I marched off to find Peg and Edna.
“You’ll never guess,” I told them.
“What’s her name?” asked Edna, which was so annoying. She always seemed to know everything.
“Fanny Jinks,” I said. “A very weak grade, I imagine, but she was born strong. She’s – ” I lowered my voice, “—cursed.”
Edna and Peggy stared at me, followed by concurrent gasps of, “Wow,” and “Never,”
“She doesn’t know who by,” I went on. I told them the full story, not stinting on the drama. “Well,” I added, “Copplestone on High is a pompous little town that loves showing off its two posh shops and its flashy gates. So they gave Fanny no help of any kind and finally made her leave. She looked like a terrified and half dead starling being pecked by ravens.”
“Poor little thing,” sighed Peg. “I must go and give her a cuddle.”
“I’m more interested in the curse,” said Edna. Typical. But just what I wanted anyway.
I looked around, “Have any of you known anyone who was cursed before? Or anyone sending a curse?”
No one had. Even my adopted mother, who although had got herself wrapped in the shadow side, hadn’t practised curses that we knew of. Well, she couldn’t have done it, of course, since she was also a rather weak grade.
“To lay a curse, I believe you must be a high grade wizard,” said Edna, which was just what I was thinking myself.
“No one from here, though,” I said. “Or we’d have known, surely. Our people tend to stay in Little Piddleton, and any of our lot nasty enough to send curses would have already been involved in that red cup affair.”
Lots of nodding and agreeing happened as Peg whispered, “Whistle wouldn’t, would he?”
“Whistle’s a darling, and you know it too,” I said, slightly cross.
“Yes, yes.” Peg apologised. Peg and Edna were my two special friends, but Whistle had always been the one I adored and admired. He was dead now since my adopted mother had arranged his murder, but that hadn’t stopped him visiting.
“Well,” said Edna, standing up and pressing down her infuriating and over-decorated straw hat onto her bright red curls. The curls disappeared beneath the tumbling flowers and hundreds of feathers. “I shall go to the girl’s home in Copplestone on Hill, and I hope you’ll both join me.”
“And Fanny,” I pointed out. “But I must magic her up some decent clothes an
d do her hair and make her look more special. I’m sure she feels out of place.”
Two
We stood around her in a circle, and each of us produced the alterations needed.
Fanny, as nervous as a new laid duckling, turned and twisted as we directed. She couldn’t see herself yet, but she was staring down at the bits and pieces we were creating.
I turned her ragged, colourless and undyed smock into a creamy satin gown, high-waisted and sweeping down to her ankles. Peg designed a very attractive round neckline with frills of a white linen shift tucked within. Edna had fun with the sleeves. The inner sleeve was the same creamy satin as the gown, tight to the wrist, but the outer sleeve was wide and swept to her knees, with a small blue tassel at the end and blue embroidery all the way around the cuff.
I added white knitted stockings and little grey leather shoes, and plonked a navy velvet cloak over her arm. Then Edna finished her off with a little band of starched white holding back her loose hanging hair.
We all looked pleased and finally allowed Fanny to run to the mirror and see herself.
With an open mouthed gaze, she burst out crying. I was getting accustomed to the tears. The past year of life must have been utterly wretched.
“Right,” Edna said. “Off we go. We can fly to the bottom of the hill quite safely, I think. But then we’ll have to walk that horrid steep hill.”
At least we could fly the five miles between us and them. No one would see us, since it was unlikely that anyone would be trotting along all those miles. We country folk were inclined to call anyone from two villages away ‘foreigners’ and would only travel to another village to see an aged parent or visit a special market.
Flying kept me fit and muscular but didn’t do much for the legs, so climbing the wretched hills was exhausting. Once we reached the top, Fanny was so keen to rush into the town centre and get herself seen as beautiful and rich again by those who had hounded her out, that she swished her skirts and smiled widely at everyone.