Child of Fear and Fire

by G. R. Thomas

  Margaret shouted quite suddenly. “They’re hexes!” The ground thrummed harder. Eliza shifted on the rock, but the pulsing kept in tune with her own heartbeat. She did not understand how the sisters had not commented on it.

  The girls skipped about the base of the yew, jumping up and down, grasping for hangings. Heavier rain penetrated the canopy in thick, freezing droplets. The Galdrewold shaded to the dark of night in the middle of the day. The sisters squealed, danced hand in hand, soaked.

  “What are you doing just sitting there? Come dance with us, Eliza.” Margaret yelled over the squalling weather. She picked up a large stick to poke at a feather-woven star.

  Eliza’s fingers curled into fists, affronted by the disrespect. Her hands stung. She stared at the half-moon crescents her nails had left behind. Blood settled in the creases of her palms. It darkened quickly, becoming thick and sticky. She imagined it was the blood of the sisters, and she dug into her palms again until blood oozed through the cracks of her fingers. She opened her hands, let the blood drip away. The mist recoiled; the char of the ground drank each plum drop. The fog swirled back into place, its blanket rich with shadows and movement.

  Eliza reached into her mind, searched for the strongest of the voices. Anger seared within her in a most disproportionate manner. As she shook with emotions that made no sense, the loudest voice sung above the others. Calm flowed into her limbs, and a comforting, gentle warmth tempered her rage as she watched the sisters desecrate the yew.

  “This is a witch’s tree!” Sybilla’s screech jolted Eliza’s attention from the shadows in the fog. Sybilla walked the circumference, arms crossed. “I’ve heard the rumours, the whispers of the adults about keeping children away from the forest.” She stopped and put her hands on her hips, just below the pale satin ribbon Lady Norlane forced her to wear about her waist. “They say, the ones that look like people are those that the tree has….” Sybilla stopped in her tracks.

  Eliza’s hands bunched her apron, her dry mouth wetted. Her skin tingled; a smile urged at her mouth as she watched Sybilla. Margaret and Annabelle stopped mid-dance, their arms limp at their sides. “What, Sybilla? They say what?” Margaret demanded.

  Sybilla’s fingers began to twitch, her head ticked to the right, and a growl rumbled from her. Eliza leaned backwards; she covered the widening smile with her hand. A strange excitement welled within her, it oozed through her belly and urged her heart into a faster pace.

  The wind howled. The yew remained still and silent.

  “Margy, what’s wrong with her?” Annabelle whimpered.

  Sybilla turned around in slow, jittery jerks. Her mouth agape, her eyes wide. She lunged for her sisters and screamed. Margaret hit the ground, tripped up by Annabelle. Sybilla bent over in a coughing fit of laughter, so much so, she too fell to the ground. All three slick with ashy mud, they pushed themselves back to their feet.

  “You evil witch of a sister!” Margaret yelled, slapping down her filthy dress. Margaret flicked a clump of mud from her arm, then swung her hand across Sybilla’s cheek. Sybilla pressed against the welt, her eyes thin. “Clearly, you can only jest at others, Margy!” Sybilla glanced at Eliza.

  Annabelle slithered in next to Margaret, her mouth screwed up. “If you were a doll, you would be dead, Sybilla!” Annabelle sniffed. Margaret put a finger to her lips to hush Annabelle.

  “That was not funny,” Margaret snapped. “You do realise we are going to have to hide these clothes from Mother now, lest you want a beating or worse, miss the Henley’s party,” Margaret mumbled to herself as she brushed away more mud.

  The sight of them covered in mud, less than perfect and proper, sent a darker thrill through Eliza. Where the light of prayer left her empty, something heavy wormed its way inside her. Their discomfort filled her with syrupy pleasure, and she welcomed it.

  Margaret huffed loudly, pinched her cheeks, her voice once more measured. “Now, Sybilla, that means we will have to sneak our garments to the laundry. Your behaviour causes us to venture to the cesspit where that thing lives and works.” Margaret pointed back at Eliza without looking at her. Margaret tucked her slick hair in place as best as she could and knotted a ribbon at the nape of her neck. She did the same for Annabelle and slipped back on her petite shoe that had become wedged into the sticky ground.

  Sybilla rubbed at the handprint on her cheek. “You two are pathetic. It was a lark, that’s all!” The fingerprints disappeared under a new flush of excitement. Sybilla’s eyes widened as she tapped her temple. “Just imagine the fun we can have?” She pointed up to the tree. “Imagine leaving one of these at church!” She laughed and slapped her thick fingers against the trunk. “Under the alter, no, on the front door for all to see on Sunday!”

  A branch cracked and dropped from above. Sybilla dove away, face-first into the slosh of the ground. It was the others turn to laugh as Sybilla peeled a fat, wet leaf from her face. “Disgusting!” Sybilla spat a clot of mud from her lips, wiped her mouth on the back of her hand. She rubbed her arms briskly to warm against the weather.

  “Brrr. It feels like it’s going to snow.” Annabelle hugged into Margaret.

  “Don’t be ridiculous, it’s just a Spring storm,” Margaret responded. Eliza realised she felt as warm as toast; she wondered if she was coming down with a fever. It could explain the murmurings in her head.

  Margaret waved her sisters closer. “Look, there are more hexes,” She looked back to Eliza. “Come over here,” Eliza rose unwillingly, moving to the right of the yew with them. Margaret split the last tartlet into three pieces and handed them to Sybilla and Annabelle. “Sorry,” Margaret smiled unapologetically towards Eliza as she ate her piece. Eliza’s stomach rumbled. The sisters chewed in brief silence, all looking up into the tree. Eliza stared at her feet, held her stomach, clawed at the nauseating rage.

  The storm set in harder. The rain thickened. It hissed through the Galdrewold, harmonised with the wind and thunder. The sisters’ dresses fluttered wildly. Annabelle lost another ribbon to the gusts. This one whisked away upon the wind, up into the tree. It snagged in its twists and curls right next to a human effigy.

  “My favourite ribbon!” Annabelle cried. “I want to go home; I don’t like it here anymore.” Her cheeks and nose were rose-red with cold. She tugged at Margaret, who was doing her best to hold her dress down. Sybilla glared up into the tree, pointing. “Look at that. Those hexes aren’t even moving,” she said.

  Margaret backed away. “I think…” she gulped and glanced over her shoulder not once, but twice, to the murky depths of the surrounding forest. “I think we should leave. I’ve…” She cleared her throat and stood taller. “I’ve had quite enough of this vastly uninteresting place.” Both she and Annabelle edged back towards Eliza, and she had a strange urge to push them both towards the tree. Instead, Eliza leaned into the gusts, the cool of it eased her feverish skin.

  “No!” Sybilla yelled, attention still on the twiggy decorations that hung as if frozen in time. “I want one of those, especially now.” Margaret glanced behind her at Eliza.

  “You… you go get one so we can get out of here. I’m wet through and want to change.”

  The whispers stopped with a suddenness that made Eliza feel a vacuous loneliness. She backed away, looking for the rock to lean on. It was gone. She spun around; it was nowhere to be seen. None of the strange rocks were anywhere to be seen.

  Her body felt sure to give way, the heat in her face drained to her toes. As her knees threatened to buckle, an invisible push steadied her. She felt something under the enormity of this ancient tree, and she was not convinced that taking something from it was anything but playing with fire.

  “Hurry up, Eliza. Get me that hex next to Annabelle’s ribbon; you can retrieve that for her as well.” Sybilla demanded.

  Eliza, still looking for the rocks, shook her head.

  “You dare to refuse?” Margaret crossed her arms. Eliza remained unmoved.
/>   “Is that how we are going to play? Well, fine then.” Margaret trudged through the mud, nose to nose with Eliza.

  “Just you remember, girl, I know what goes on in our home. I know what my father gets up to. I’ve seen him slip downstairs to the servants’ quarters. I could easily tell Mother that it is you who secrets into his rooms at night.”

  Eliza’s mouth dropped. Her thumb came back to her wrist, gouging into a scab. Hot liquid slipped into her palm.

  “Oh yes, Eliza, I can ruin your life with a single conversation. Mother believes everything I say.” Her voice was a high-pitched nervous trill, her face quivered with the fervour of the threat.

  “I’ll tell everyone you dragged us out here and wished hateful sorcery upon us. Then you will be hanging from the tree just like those repulsive things.” She pointed to the hexes, her hand shook. A red blotchiness crept up Margaret’s neck and onto her cheeks. “Climb the tree, Eliza, and get all three of us one of those things.”

  Margaret dragged Eliza by her sleeve towards the yew to a place on the trunk gnarled with cankerous spines. “This looks a good foot up.” Margaret pushed Eliza right up to the trunk. Bewitched tree or not, this was not one that invited a person to climb.

  “Hurry up, or I’ll make you,” Sybilla picked up a stick as thick as Eliza’s arms. Eliza shook her head again, partly to refuse, partly to shake away the voices excitedly urging her forward.

  Sybilla lunged. The wind gusted harder, a wilder howl to its song. Sybilla lost her balance; the branch glanced off Eliza’s knee instead of her head. The sting was tolerable, Sybilla’s fist that quickly followed through into her stomach, not so. Eliza bent over, coughing through the deep ache in her belly. Her nostrils were tight as she sucked hard for air, to quell the pain, to subdue the need to lunge back.

  Eliza raised her head just as Sybilla yelled through her teeth. “Get me one of those hexes, or you will regret this more than you can imagine.”

  Eliza clutched her middle and sank to her knees. At any moment, her belly could expel its contents, and she swallowed back the burn that threatened more humiliation. Her thoughts were a chaotic mess. She curled her fingers through the mud; it was cold on the surface, strangely tepid underneath. She clawed in until her fingers could push no further. She felt anchored to something and wished to be swallowed up by it, warm and safe. But the wind blew ever harder, and the rain slapped her senses back.

  Eliza peered up the length of the tree as she pushed herself to her feet. She grabbed the trunk for support. For a split second, her vision blackened; she smelled smoke, heard agonised screams. Eliza leaned her head against the yew until the hysteria passed. She rubbed her right ear, wishing it away. She felt sure now that she was entirely insane. The voices did not abate, solidifying her theory of madness. They niggled away, relentlessly, incoherently.

  “It’s getting colder Eliza, hurry up!” Margaret yelled. Eliza could feel the sisters close behind. She could not run, she could not fight, she had to comply, so she placed one hand on the trunk, in between the shards of bark.

  Eliza moved unwillingly, pushed by the return of fear, urged by delirium. She felt sure she may choke on her own heart, yet a glance over her shoulder told her that her only retreat was now cut off by the sisters who blocked the small bridge, eyes wide with excited terror.

  Thunder cracked overhead. If it was any darker, it would be night. The wind smelled more rancid, of fire and rot as she got her first foothold and looked up. A bolt of lightning pierced through the canopy; a shadow dashed amongst the branches. Eliza hoped it was a squirrel. She held on tight, hugged the trunk, looked up again as another flash lit the recesses. A moss-covered face peered down at her. Obsidian eyes glistened at her for a fraction of a second, and in the next flash, it was gone. Her breaths were heavy, short, sharp gasps. She could not move. Terror was above and below her.

  “Faster, Eliza!” Margaret yelled.

  She could not slow her breathing, she was sure to collapse, yet she felt a warmth press upon her, urging her up a notch higher. As another rumble roared overhead, Eliza peered hesitantly up to see shadowy arms reach down to her.

  The sisters or the tree? Fear tremored through her fingers, and she dug them in harder to keep her grip. Was it the sisters’ threats or the force she felt guiding her? She repeated the question over and over, not noticing her feet had moved until her hand touched the crook of the bough.

  “Hurry up!” Margaret yelled again through gritted teeth. “We are going to freeze to death!”

  I wish you would, Eliza thought, unable to look down to the ground without feeling giddy. Fog snaked up the tree; the wind edged her torso against the rough bark. The shadowy hands guided her along the length of the bough where the hexes hung. Eliza held on against the storm’s wrath. She gritted her teeth and slid an inch at a time. The tree creaked, the air howled, the rain seemed to sink beneath her skin and flood her soul.

  The bark was slippery; the thunder made her cower with each cracking rumble. Her arms and legs encircled the branch so tight they began to cramp. The sisters continued to scream their impatience below, yet the voices at least had quelled so she could concentrate. Eliza pulled herself forward, following the course of the shadow hand. It drew her toward a human effigy; she reached for it but slid and grasped the bough, hooked one boot back over it and steadied herself.

  “I want the star.” Annabelle screeched far below, yet the shadow hand caressed the effigy, urging Eliza towards it. The fog curled around it, immobile and unaffected by the storm. “Eliza, we will leave you here if you don’t hurry up this instant!” Margaret yelled, and the sisters began retreating, windswept back across the bridge.

  If panic was not already the commander of Eliza, it surged forwards like a dictator. It competed with the shadow, took control and made her clutch frantically for a star hex just a little further out. She slid along painstakingly slow past the effigy. She ignored the shadow that urged her to it. The bough thinned; her grip more perilous. The voices returned, screaming in her mind, angry as she rushed for what Annabelle wanted.

  There was another crack, but it was not thunder. The bough lurched. Eliza screeched. Her bloodied nail beds dug under the bark as the branch cracked again under her weight. She reached for the star-shaped symbol, just an inch or two from her fingertips.

  “Grab it now!” Sybilla shouted. Eliza gripped the tree for dear life as the bough wobbled up and down. She was closer to the effigy, but she knew that would not do. Eliza readjusted her legs and scooted another inch as the rain pelted harder. Panting through her nose, she blotted out the voices. They were not of any use as she clung for her life. She was utterly terrified.

  With the sisters screeching at her and blinded by the driving rain, Eliza reached again for the star. It was blurry; she blinked the rain away, or tears, or both. Lightning flashed and struck near the tree. Eliza heard a snap. The sisters screamed; the branch shook and shuddered. Eliza gasped; her body clenched. She clung desperately, but her weight swivelled her around and she slid underneath the branch. Legs crossed over the branch, fingers slipping; she gulped heavily for breath. Every muscle was on fire. The blur of the hex was right above her head; she made a last grasp for it. Eliza no longer heard the sisters, she did not feel the rain, the wind was a memory. All she remembered was weightlessness until the bough crushed her against the ground.

  “For the love of Jesus Christ himself!”

  Hands pressed against Eliza’s forehead; fingers touched the pulse in her neck. Something warm draped over her freezing body.

  “Eliza? Can you hear me, child?” Mrs Embrey sounded breathless.

  “Least she’s breathin’,” It seemed to be the gardener’s voice. Eliza could smell fresh grass and manure mingled with sweat.

  “Those blasted girls, they’ll be the death of her,” Mrs Embrey’s voice quivered with anger. Eliza moaned as someone lifted her from the ground. Her body was moving, but to where she did not know.


  “Surprised she’s alive, Mrs E. Took all me might to get that there branch off of her,” the gardener said.

  Eliza groaned. Her chest hurt; everything hurt. “There, there. Let’s get you back home and to bed now.” Mrs Embrey cooed. Eliza managed to open one eye a slit. Everything was dark, the forest quiet but for the odd chirp and rhythmic crunch of footsteps. Both eyes flickered. She squinted up to the person carrying her. The mossy black-eyed face stared back. Eliza slipped backwards into oblivion.

  †

  The last thread of faith dissipated in her dreams that night. It dissolved as her injuries drew her from the comfort of sleep. Eliza quite plainly awoke with no belief in God. As her eyes peeled open to a room of shadow and firelight, the voices enveloped her, the loudest whispered deep in her mind. The flame has been lit. A rapturous heat slid down her body and blossomed into bliss. A smile pinched the bruises on her face.

  An owl squawked as she slid her toes to the floor. Both legs cross-hatched with scrapes, her left arm and head were bandaged. Despite this, the heaviness in her joints was tolerable, and she stood up and stretched. Moonlight struck across her room until halted by the shadows that were a denser black in the corners, creeping out along the walls. She squinted, sure again, something moved to the right of the door, but then the babe cried upstairs; a long colicky howl. Feet lumbered about overhead. Doors opened and closed, but the cries continued.

  Eliza looked back to the corner. There was nothing, yet there was something. An unseen presence, a weight upon the air, however, it did not feel malicious. Despite this, her heart thundered against her ribs, and she backed away until her legs hit the edge of her bed. The distinct heavy tang of wet leaves, the smell of the garden after a spring storm, wafted about her. She sniffed under her arms, but she smelled of Mrs Embrey’s lavender soap.

  Her fingers curled around the bedpost; she sat and stared hard into the corner. The hearth burned brighter with no addition of coal. Amber hues ate at the shadows, and she saw something; she definitely saw something shiny and black in the corner to the right of her door. It was looking at her. Something reached out from the umber. It sliced through the moonlight that struck the door, along the wall, towards Eliza.