by H C Turk
The following, familiar scenery was not longingly viewed, for I prayed to never view it again. This future was not easily believed, however, for London seemed permanent, my own attempts at departure having been so difficult that surely this current journey came with the ease of my desire, not the stress of the real. But my real life would not become proper without an ending dream, for soon we arrived at Hershford Bridge. I then discovered why our initial retreat had been filled with ease—because now it would be filled with death. I knew that we would cross the Thames only part way. We would be on the bridge when it collapsed. We would fall into the water and all survive, for all in this coach could swim except the witches. We would all survive until I drowned by being too far from the world I loved to achieve it while breathing. This would be my final nightmare by being my final event. The foreboding so weakened me that I slumped against the coach seat.
Marybelle knew. Smelling my change, she turned, but said nothing. I only waited. Waited until we drove past the bridge. Drove past the bridge without crossing. Drove past that presumed death to continue with God’s living.
My last dream in London was no nightmare. Before I could fully accept that we would not die from a bridge, we arrived at nature. Across the Thames, I viewed a landscape that had bid me before and drew me again, a breadth of wild field that seemed acceptable for my living with its lack of structures, this natural expanse antithetical to the river bank of the sinners’ side. But even if Gravesbury Reach were to become my home, I would need cross that river to gain it. Thus, it was Heaven, requiring one’s death to achieve.
God’s evolving house was expected. This aspect of London was no horror, though in returning the past to me it seemed a dream itself. The edifice had grown, but my greatest concern for this space of God was to leave it behind. As we passed, I looked to all the laboring sinners with bare backs, saw a clerically dressed man, saw a type of artist beside him seen before and smelled. I saw my betrothed’s father laughing heartily in his profession, saw him in a happy state I would never see again.
Book III: Wales
Chapter 21
Poison In The Land
The witches gained Bournchester with enough daylight remaining to find an empty portico for the night’s sleeping. Nothing fearful found us, Bournchester seeming no more than an edge of London. As I slept, I seemed in a dream because my dead sister had returned, my greatest desires were being manifested, and the extremes of my beliefs in the reality of the world were found limited; for when had last a dream come true that was not a nightmare?
Up with the sun and the earliest sinners, Marybelle and I walked until finding a carriage out for its day of work, whereupon we sought passage to our next goal, the city of Oxford. Why, this man’s very company would take us that far, though not in this local buggy. Conveyed to the driver’s office, Marybelle made arrangements while I avoided sinners. Walking nowhere as we waited for our next conveyance, Marybelle and I discovered a woman selling produce from a cart, and feast we did on cucumbers. Glutted on natural food, the satisfied youth could not resist chatting about previous theater.
“If acceptable, I would know of your living since that last instance on the sinners’ boat when I lost you.”
“From that instance shall be a gap in my telling, for the task of losing the rock and gaining land is one I cannot describe. When thoughts of that journey come, I pray God that they leave. Yet because I did gain land again, at times I feel I have complete power over God’s waters. At others, I feel the first drop will kill me.”
“No more shall I inquire of that wet journey, for I have a similar sense of water’s terror, and can imagine your survival no more than you can describe it. But I will ask of that following era, wondering how again I became part of your living.”
“This tale I will tell, in that you are either the center or the end. Once out of the sea, I continued with my old living. Peace I had, but not lasting, in that a blight on the sinners’ potato growings came which they believed was caused by witches. Many sinners and most witches of the island were killed thereafter, and this was the devil’s stroke to tell me to leave. Thus, I became a demon, the type you and I call sinner. I became a thief, and thieving is an act of sinners. But steal I did in Jonsway until with enough money to buy passage across the sea. In greater England, I deemed London the best place to go, for there lived Rathel, and you. No other witch was known to me. Poverty was ever my way, and I lived between buildings, seeking the smell of criminals. In London is Penstone Place and the thickest part of criminals. There I lived.”
“I know of Penstone,” I confessed, not mentioning my own thievery.
“The criminals have their own society. They found no interest in me. Well they know their wares, not bothering to steal from those who have naught. Near them I lived, and learned to steal better. This was aided by my smelling, in that folk and dogs for guarding I knew where sinners could not. I clothed myself decently to pass better, and lived in a building even the criminals rejected. It was marked as carrying plague before the great burning. But no witch need fear a sickness carried by rats.”
“And to what extent was I your goal?” I asked.
“In this way,” she replied, and held out both arms, encompassing entirety. “My goal was to take you and leave. No witch could I appreciate more than Evlynne, and you are part of her. And I knew you would have difficulties here, with your special nature and youth.”
“How did you find that house in which I lived?”
“Rathel’s name is no mystery in London. I needed only to dress so that people would listen when I asked of her. Then I stole enough to afford this passage, and came for you.”
“The other witch, Lucinda, you also found.”
“Near Rathel’s house. As I moved there one day to study your site, I smelled that a wild witch had been there, not you. That night, I returned in hopes of gaining her. When Lucinda came, I had difficulty convincing her I was the witch, with my salve of no smell. But I did, and was told she awaited you. I remained with her, but you did not come—the nightwatchmen came, and we had to flee. Lucinda ran away like a natural creature, whereas I hid like one social. The rest you must know. And for you I returned in the brightest light to be unseen by sinners looking for concealed demons. But I smelled you to be most sickly. This had me feel good, for witches recover, and inside a house you would be safe. When you were smelling better, I made complete my plans, then came for you. And we are here.”
This tale was astounding to me in its ease, and though I was filled with curiosity, I retained my questions. Since Marybelle asked nothing of my own, longer and more complex life in London—no queries even as to my scars—I remained silent. Then I felt some dejection. Had I not failed in London from being less of a witch than Marybelle? How ironical that she had succeeded by being a complete witch and thus undesired by sinners, whereas I was so popular as to have entire families living their lives about my center, my end. But I was equally popular with Marybelle, and thereby had been saved, saved from my own killing. And though somehow I would thank Marybelle, first I praised God for a witch’s love.
Far from the carriage station we walked, as though practicing the great distance we would ultimately travel without aid of horse. Nevertheless, we did not fail our schedule. Schedule, schedule. When the sinning passengers converged on their conveyance, the witches also approached, though called for from afar by men concerned with our failing their, er, agenda. As we boarded, Marybelle pressed herself against me to preclude my being sexually aided. Then we repeated our previous day, journeying in a large coach out of the city, through nearly wild land and to Oxford. This great village we gained with daylight enough for Marybelle and me to find a vacant commons for our sleeping. And a chill I had that night, though not from the cool dew; for I felt myself wild, felt myself disbelieving the complete ease of our passage away from Rathel and to God, away from fears and toward fond wishes. About us were trees and bushes, the sound of nesting birds and numerous bugs, the smel
l of a snake. And to think the remainder of my life might be so fine—except for the drunk passing and coughing and pissing near enough for us to smell and hear nothing else. Up in the night myself to defecate in the chamber pot of a grass thatch, the next morning feasting on squash in the streets, find a coach, then to the business of true wilderness.
• • •
“But, Madam Burns, without arranging aforehand, I cannot carry you where you would go this day. The morning next, however, I can have my elder son tote you in his wagon. But you must be as hardy as you say, for you must ride behind with cockles and ported barrels. You are fortuitous, though, in that he goes to Whitford but fortnightly. But no farther. This place is what you seek in being as far west that we carry. Therein you are sure to find farther conveyance if you’ve a mind to take you over the Wye River and into Wales.”
“To gain this Wales, sir, we must cross a river and a bridge?”
My speaking was unexpected, for I had been described as having too damaged a face for conversation. Not even Marybelle presumed my words, she and the man of vehicles turning to look at me as I stood apart from the pair doing business at the sinner’s desk. But I was not so far away as to cross rivers peacefully.
“And no, miss,” the male answered. “In fact, the difficulty with crossing the Wye is that no bridge is there. Thus, a place narrow and shallow enough for a wagon’s fording must be used, and they be rare. One is near to Whitford, for that’s how towns grow near rivers. But my wagon so swells up in the axles when wet that it would be ruint with such a crossing, so I must thank you, but no. Surely, in Whitford you will find a more sturdy or less valuable wagon to get you across into this part of Wales, which is not well lived in by folk. To Whitford will be no road, only trail. Beyond that is the Cambrian Mountains. Only donkey or feet will allow you to approach them. But, madam, I can help you little with that living of your life.”
• • •
“Two days is too long to sleep in the commons without being caught as vagrants, then found to be witches. Thus, within a house we should stay.”
Rooms to let for weary travelers? was our query to random sinners. Soon we were directed to an old couple willing to take in decent persons especially if female with a bit of funds. Scarcely could I imagine any person so social as the Rathel, her friends, or the Dentons accepting strangers for the night. Of course, those wealthy folk were in need of no extra coin, and had tremendous difficulty applying generous concern even to their own families.
“Oh, how apologetic we are to burden your doorstep with our presence, good missus. But Mother and I traveling to Scotland to be with kin find that no conveyance shall we gain before two days, and therefore require any simple spot to situate ourselves through the night as great God watches over our sleeping, and harsh would be the streets and doubtless unlawful for our resting. Therefore, we thank you greatly for the bedding that you graciously provide, and bless you through Jesus. To display my appreciation, I shall burden you no more with my speaking, in that I require respite from movements of my head due to a terrible accident that yet brings pain after a few sentences—see?” the young lady said, and lifted her veil, up to the tidy room for the night, no thank you for the food either because we’ve recently eaten or would vomit to have that grease within us, only one of the two comments made by the girl, take her non-mother upstairs and wait for Thursday.
Out the next morning after thanking the missus, but we’d be taking no meal and especially no mead in that our faces were too sore for the eating, including that of the mother—see? Then to the streets of a more significant version of London than little Bournchester, Oxford having cathedrals and gardens of its own, though none tremendous, an open market providing us with vegetables to feed us for days; for though soon to be in the wilds, we might require some time to become adjusted again to morsel of whelk. To the sinners’ house for the waiting, into our hole for another day and night in which we mainly slept to accumulate our energy, eventually to the man with the wagon, all as per schedule. Schedule, schedule.
He relished me at once. Though decently cordial, this elder son was fully adult and proceeded to waft out that sub-belly smell of sinning males upon first sensing me, despite being accompanied by his dour wife. Most anxious was the husband to aid me into the wagon beside his inhuman cargo of cockles. Most forward was I to walk within a handsbreadth of this male to speak as he deserved.
“Sir, one of your hands on my buttock and I shall bludgeon you with this face,” I whispered, and raised my veil. Under my own motive force, I climbed into the wagon, the father wondering why only Marybelle’s entry was aided, wave good-bye, the wife soon complaining to her husband about a cargo to starve them were it not for the persons’ fare behind and how their clothing seemed too fine for such coarse riding, this samesaid pair drawing stares from sinners on the streets who wondered of us amongst the shellfish, through Oxford and out.
Thus began a journey lasting days. Even the first hours removed from Oxford were a thrill for me, in that our travel was through a land bordered by no buildings. The road was packed soil, not piled stone, and led through an expanse of fields with no sinners and none of their noise, which was stunning. The silence of God’s wilds was not to be found in the greatest city green even at night, for therein even a frog’s croak reverberated against buildings and struck back harshly. But in the open, all the sounds were soft, the wagon’s creaking the last aspect of sin heard, one soon to be vacated. I also sensed a lack of stink. Though the city smell was yet in my nose, the stench of effluent and smoke haze was replaced by fragrances of sap, small animals, and blossoms. I then gained a foretelling of even superior experience; for once away from cockles and males, would we not be in Heaven?
We soon came to humor, for I smelled water. Ahead was a river to cross—but, no, I saw a creek. Sodden logs had been secured across the bed, affording the wagon a stable path, a shallow path not swelling the axles. As we entered the water, I cackled, the driver turning in wonderment of my sound. Laugh I did at this water I could safely leap into, water that would offer no threat if the wagon collapsed. The additional runnels in our days of travel brought me such high spirits that I fondly anticipated them, for here was relief from dreams of wet subjugation. Here was the true beauty and value of God’s water: not in drowning the witch, but in refreshing her.
As though boasting to myself of our escape, I attempted to smell the sinners behind; and, yes, there was a city, but not London. Oxford I could smell, but the same as a person, land areas are individualistic, and London was not within my senses. And London was my home. Then within me peaked an emotion that I had been bearing long: the loss from being removed from normalcy. So abruptly had I left my established life that I felt lost. As we continued moving away, ever away, the fact of my having abandoned all contact with London by having lost its every scent was a blow to me as though I had lost a friend. And truth be known by God, friends I had lost there. Only God, however, knew how many.
• • •
We rested in the day’s center, the driver and wife sharing their bread and water. Marybelle and I offered beans, which the sinners preferred cooked, thank you. Graze the horses in a natural land not wild enough to satisfy me, not with that wagon and those sinners present. Had I been in the near-wilderness so long as to acquire indulgent sensibilities? After another day’s journey, would nothing please me but Man’s Isle? This demeanor soon ended, for after loading ourselves into the wagon and proceeding, approaching night brought a new smell of society, for ahead was a town. After gaining this settlement, the sinners parked near a barn to bed the horses and themselves for the night. Even the conveyed ladies were provided with a louse-infested cot, a good night’s sleep with no misery from the bugs’ biting us and not the first male slipping in to examine me tactually.
Up the next morning, out of the town and into extending wilderness, though not wild enough for a witch as long as sinners could infiltrate the land with horses and a bit of easy riding. This day wa
s repetitive of the previous, including resting in the middle and gaining a village at day’s end, one smaller than those before: our goal of Whitford. Jonsway’s edges were reminiscent of this village: sparse, unsophisticated buildings not arranged with the formality of London and its paved streets. Few people were seen, the best dressed of them no more social in their attire than Elsie. The moderate gown I wore—with its velvet surface and full petticoats to promote a lady’s shape—made me a cipher, especially since I was a wagon’s cargo.
So small was Whitford as to have but one church and no glassblower. Similar to great London, this settlement was situated on a river. The driving couple would not cross this water, however, for Whitford was their end. Off to their home outside the village after securing for their passengers a shed for sleeping, thank you everso and up the next morning for business, walk to the market where farmers gathered to exchange goods. There the witches sought transport to Wystghllaenniomb. One staring farmer offered to convey us to the village for a fee if only he could comprehend.
“I see ladies too finely dressing to be in the hill land of Wales. If you’ve kin there, why are they not named nor here to meet you? If you lived there afore, why is it I, who’s been here an ever, have not seen—”
“Excuse me, sir,” I interrupted, “but we have difficulty replying, in that being from London, we are unaccustomed to such rude intrusions into the personal affairs of ladies.”
The farmers surrounded us, though all were hesitant to approach our veils. All of them wondered of our apparel, these people so innocent of society as to find Marybelle’s common weave equal to my hand-hewn piping.
“Might any gentle person be amongst you to convey us to this village and receive from us a grateful payment in metal coin as well as our kindest wishes and blessings of God?” I asked of all.