A Secret History of Witches

by Louisa Morgan

  She thrilled at the touch, though the touch of so many other beasts disgusted her. He was different, this fox. It was not just that he was beautiful, and graceful. It was more, much more. Her soul knew him. Her power flared in his presence.

  He took a step back, his eyes never leaving hers, then whirled and leaped back over the brook to disappear into the forest on the other side. The last thing she saw was that lush red-and-black tail, switching back and forth as he faded into the dimness of the woods.

  Irène brought her palm to her nose and sniffed the toasty smell of him. She knew what he was, and she knew what it meant. Her mother had Aramis. Her grandmother, Ursule had told her, had had an ugly gray cat. And she—now, surely, a witch in full possession of her power—had a glorious vulpine creature like no other. She had her fox. She would see him again.

  She leaned over the brook to look into the water again. The red echo of her mother’s palm had faded from her cheek. She straightened her hair and brushed leaves and soil from the back of her dress. She was shaking out the hem of it when she caught a flash of red among the brambles at her feet. She had almost missed it.

  She bent and tugged. As she straightened she saw that her fox had left her a tiny swatch of his fur, perhaps a dozen red-and-black hairs, long and coarse and tangled together. Irène curled them around her finger, then tucked them inside her bodice, next to her heart. With a longing glance at the woods where the fox had disappeared, she started toward home.

  But she would not, she swore to herself, be planting potatoes on this day. Or ever again.

  5

  Irène stopped doing farmwork. She stopped doing housework. She ceased all of it. The first few days her mother kept her distance, neither asking nor telling her what chores needed doing. Irène thought she might even apologize, eventually.

  That didn’t happen. They didn’t speak for three days, while Ursule, with a resigned look, took on Irène’s chores in addition to her own. Irène understood. Animals had to be cared for, vegetables had to be weeded and harvested. It was too bad, but hard things required hard decisions.

  Those first days, Ursule also came into the cottage at night and cooked their supper, as was her habit. When the meal was finished, Irène carried the dishes and the pot to the sink, but after pumping water to soak the pot, she left everything as it was.

  On the fourth day Ursule set out their breakfast of cider and bread and butter, but she didn’t sit down. She stood opposite Irène, hands on hips, and said, “So, Daughter. Do you ever plan to work again?”

  Irène felt at a disadvantage, looking up at her mother from her chair. She pushed it back and stood up before she answered. “I do not, Mother.”

  “Are you going to tell me why?”

  Irène held out her hands, which were already softer and whiter since she had stopped digging in the garden and scrubbing pans. “A lady doesn’t have a laborer’s hands.”

  “In the name of the Goddess, Irène, how do you expect to become a lady?”

  “I don’t know yet.”

  Ursule’s eyes narrowed. “Do you also expect me to wait upon you as if I were your servant? Do your chores, clean your room, fix your meals?”

  Irène shrugged. “I don’t expect it. That will be your own choice.”

  “You’re not a child anymore, Irène.”

  “Exactly what Father said.”

  “Your father was right.”

  It wasn’t easy, staring into her mother’s face that way, but Irène had decided. She was committed. She tightened her jaw, hardened her heart, and held firm.

  Ursule asked, “Are you no longer my daughter, then?”

  The answer to this question came to Irène’s lips without forethought. “I am the daughter of all our line, Maman. Of the mothers and grandmothers and great-grandmothers who have gone before. I may, in fact, be the last.”

  Ursule said, with deep bitterness, “Perhaps that would be best.”

  “Do you think so?”

  “At this moment I do,” her mother said tiredly.

  “I can’t live your life, Maman.”

  “No, I can see that.”

  “You think I’m being selfish.”

  “Yes. Shockingly selfish. But I suppose a child conceived selfishly is destined to be selfish herself.”

  “I’m not responsible for my conception.”

  Ursule picked up her mug of cider from the table, and turned away to drink it at the sink. When she had drained it, she said, her eyes on the summer day beyond the window, “It’s true, Irène. You were not responsible for your conception. Nevertheless, you owe me—and your father—your life.”

  Irène said, without a trace of irony, “And I thank you. Now please let me live it.”

  Ursule went on with the work of the farm, but she no longer set breakfast and dinner on the table. Irène felt a grudging admiration for her mother’s compromise, but she felt no compunction. She had no more choice in this matter than Ursule did. When she felt hungry, which wasn’t often, she sliced herself a piece of bread, or dished up cold stew from the pot. When Ursule came in from her long day of work, Irène went to her room and closed the door so as not to watch her mother eating cold meat and raw vegetables from the garden.

  A week later Ursule broke the silence between them. “Could I at least,” she said, “prevail upon you to go into Tenby? We need flour and salt. Along the way you could deliver a basket of eggs to the Grange, and tell them we will need food for the hens.”

  Irène nodded, hiding the burst of enthusiasm the scheme gave her. She had read the herb book straight through, twice. She had mended clothes that needed it, and brushed her long hair until her scalp burned. She would not work, at least not in any way that harmed her hands, but she was unaccustomed to idleness, and she found she didn’t like it. “I will do that, Maman,” she said. “Let me get my hat.”

  Although they were incongruous with her dress, she wore the lace gloves Sebastien had given her. She wore her good hat, kept for the church services Ursule insisted they attend for appearances’ sake. She wiped dust from her best shoes, and clipped a couple of threads coming loose from their seams. She looked as much like a lady as she could at this moment. Under her bodice, tucked inside her camisole, was the curl of fox hair, tied with a bit of thread.

  She accepted the basket of eggs and a small purse of cash from her mother. In her slightly incongruous outfit, she set off down the lane under a hot summer sun.

  The gravel path to the kitchen door of the Grange led past the grassy paddock where Aramis’s colt was kept. Ynyr wasn’t in it, but as Irène approached, a ruckus arose inside the stables. She tried to ignore it, hurrying up the steps to the kitchen and knocking firmly. Sally, the cook, greeted her with a smile and the offer of a cup of tea. Irène pleaded the need to hurry, ignoring Sally’s surprised glance at her lace gloves as she handed over the basket, and went back down the path.

  The noises from the stable intensified, a loud whinny, the banging of hooves on wood, and a feminine shriek that could have been one of fury, or might have been one of pain. Curious despite herself, Irène turned aside and went to peek through the open door.

  Tom Butler, red faced and sweating, was hauling on a longe line, cursing under his breath in fluent but nearly inaudible Welsh. The line was snapped into Ynyr’s halter, and the big colt was alternately rearing and striking out with his hind feet. Blodwyn Hughes stood to one side, her whip in her hand. Just as Irène looked in, she brought it down with a crack on the dappled gray hindquarters, screaming imprecations.

  It was none of Irène’s business, though her mother would be furious at this treatment of Aramis’s offspring. She was about to draw back, out of sight, when the colt caught sight of her. Sweat blotted out the silver dapples on his neck and flanks, and he trembled from head to tail, but he stopped kicking. He threw his head high, and his dark eyes fixed themselves on Irène with an intensity that made her shiver.

  The cramp in her belly was becoming familiar. She presse
d her hand to her chest, and felt the talisman of fox hair hidden there. Ynyr exhaled a long, noisy breath that made his nostrils quiver. They gazed at each other, and an uncanny moment passed in utter stillness.

  Tom and Blodwyn turned as one to see what had attracted the colt’s attention. “What do you think you’re doing?” Blodwyn demanded.

  Irène took satisfaction in noting that Blodwyn’s voice was as thick and coarse as her body, though her accent was pure aristocracy. She answered, in as haughty a tone as she could manage, “I? You’re the one beating a two-year-old colt with a whip.”

  Tom loosened the longe line, and stood panting. “Irène,” he began, “you shouldn’t speak that way to Miss Blodwyn—”

  Emboldened by the magic of Ynyr’s attention, Irène lifted her chin. “Miss Blodwyn should stop whipping the colt.” She could have left it at that. But while she knew little about horses, she knew an opportunity when she saw one.

  Blodwyn stood agape as Irène walked toward the horse with a calm, steady step. He was almost as tall as Aramis. Her head reached only the peak of his withers. As she came near, he dropped his head to press his muzzle into her gloved palm. “There now,” she said, casting a sly look at Blodwyn from beneath her eyelids. She noted with satisfaction that her own eyelashes were twice as thick as the other girl’s. “This is how you deal with a sensitive animal.”

  “Sensitive!” Blodwyn exploded. At the sound of her voice, Ynyr took a step back, tossing his head, his eyes showing their whites. His hocks struck the stall gate behind him, and he began to tremble again.

  Irène was no horsewoman, but at this moment Ynyr was not a horse. He was much, much more.

  She turned to the horsemaster and took the longe line in her own lace-gloved hand. Limply he gave it up, avoiding his mistress’s eyes. Without looking at Blodwyn, obeying her instinct, Irène led the colt out of the stable and around to the paddock gate. Side by side they went through, and walked the fence line for a few moments. Her soft shoes sank into the grass. Ynyr stepped close beside her, his wide hooves careful of her small feet. His trembling eased the moment he was away from the stables. She kept a hand on his neck, though her glove would be stained. Only when he had begun to cool down did she coax him to lower his head so she could unclip the line. She stepped back then, and watched him trot away from her, circling the paddock once, twice, dipping his elegant head in her direction.

  Irène took care to lock the gate as she left the paddock. Blodwyn stood just in the doorway to the stables, flicking her whip and scowling. “How dare you?” she snapped. “I’ll be telling Papa about this, I can promise you!”

  “It’s clear you can’t handle a Shire,” Irène said. She herself had never done it, either, but she had no intention of sharing that knowledge with Blodwyn. “Will you tell him that? Perhaps your papa could find you a pony. Something you could manage. An easier disposition.”

  She didn’t look back as she walked away, but she heard Blodwyn sputtering complaints to Tom. Irène hurried, wanting to get away before either of them could delay her. She wasn’t quite sure herself what had just happened, but seeing Blodwyn’s cheeks burn with embarrassment had given her intense pleasure. As she strode out to the road, she saw the flicker of a red-and-black tail in the shadow of the woods. She glanced in that direction, smiling. He was there, aiding her magic, nourishing her power. He followed her, flashing in and out of the trees, until she had to turn onto the road to Tenby.

  6

  Mabon came around again in its due course, and by the time it arrived Irène’s hands were even softer and cleaner than her father’s. Her skin had regained its childish pallor, and her hair, from being brushed often, was a mass of shining black curls. She had eaten so little over the summer that her waist was more slender than ever.

  Ursule had grown thinner, too, but with her the condition had less appeal. The tendons on her neck and hands stood out, and her cheeks were hollow. Once or twice Irène felt an unwelcome stab of sympathy for her mother, but she gritted her teeth against it.

  They descended to the root cellar an hour before midnight, the only thing they had done together since Irène’s birthday. Ursule set out the herbs, and Irène sprinkled salted water. Ursule lit the candle and uncovered the stone.

  All was as usual with their celebration, except that Irène’s belly writhed with pain as Ursule chanted. At the end, when Ursule spread her hands over the stone and spoke her special plea, Irène stood close, leaning over the crystal to see. Sebastien was there, half-hidden in a cloud of smoke, his harp on his lap, with people around him. “Playing,” Ursule sighed. “I wish I could hear him.”

  Irène’s white hands lifted as of their own accord, and gently pushed Ursule’s weathered ones aside. She hadn’t made a deliberate decision to do it, but as she spread her fingers over the crystal, in the same way her mother always did, the pain in her middle spread and thinned until her whole body felt achy and hot. She closed her eyes, feeling heat running through her blood, expanding from her bones, radiating from her fingertips.

  When the sound began, a thin, ghostly echo of the music Sebastien must be making, Ursule gasped, and staggered so that her scarf slipped from her head and drifted to the cold floor.

  Irène opened her eyes to see her mother half-bent, her hands still extended as if she had forgotten to lower them, her lips parted in wonder. They listened, the two of them, straining their ears to find the thread of song. When it ended, and Irène pulled back her hands, the image in the crystal shimmered for a moment, as if someone had put a finger into a reflective pool, then disappeared.

  Ursule lifted hooded eyes to her daughter. “Your power,” she said in a hoarse voice.

  Irène stood erect, her body afire with it. “Yes!”

  “When?”

  “My birthday.”

  “You didn’t tell me.”

  “No.”

  “But why?”

  “I didn’t think you would be happy about it, Maman.”

  “Not be happy! Part of my duty, part of my reason for being, is to pass on the craft! I had thought, perhaps …”

  “You thought I didn’t inherit,” Irène said, and smiled. “But I did. And I think my time has come.”

  Ursule said, with what Irène mistook at first for humility, “It appears that it has.” She stepped back from the crystal and bent to retrieve her fallen scarf. When she had replaced it on her head, she nodded toward the stone. “Shall we find out?”

  When they emerged from the root cellar, the night was very far gone. The stars had already begun to fade in the east, and the wind bore the chill of autumn. They were at the doorstep when Irène saw the fox’s yellow eyes gleaming at her from the edge of the wood, on the opposite side of the lane. She drew a little breath, catching Ursule’s attention.

  “What is it?”

  Irène didn’t answer, but she pointed.

  “What’s that?”

  “It’s a fox. A magnificent red-and-black fox.”

  Ursule exhaled a long, slow breath. “So. Your spirit familiar has appeared as well.”

  “Yes.”

  When her mother gripped her shoulder with her hard hand, Irène didn’t pull away or object. It was a gesture of respect, because a spell had come to her and she had spoken it, though neither of them was sure what it meant. Ursule spoke in a low voice, close to her ear. The fox’s ears pricked higher at the sound of her voice. “You will be stronger than I, Daughter. Take care with the craft.”

  “I mean to use it.”

  “I know. But remember what my own maman taught me: if you practice the craft, you will pay a price.”

  “It will be worth it.”

  “By the Goddess, I hope so.”

  They parted then, Ursule to her labors, Irène to her idleness. She paused in the kitchen to make a cup of tea, then carried it into her bedroom. She set the teacup on the rickety stand that served as her bedside table, picked up her hairbrush, and sat on the edge of her narrow bed. As she began to brush
, she pondered the words of the spell that had come to her. Come through her, really. She wondered if other witches had that same experience, or if hers was unique.

  Mother Goddess, hark to me:

  Farmer’s wife I will not be.

  Free me from this harsh estate.

  Guide me to my better fate.

  Ursule, standing beside her, had seen the flicker of light in the crystal, inchoate but unmistakable. She had reminded her, in a whisper, “Three times three times,” and Irène had repeated the spell, counting the repetitions on her fingers. The dark cellar, she thought, was a poor temple. One day she would create a better one, and her rites would have the majesty and ceremony they deserved.

  For today, she could only wonder how her spell would be made to work.

  She was sure it would. She felt it. And though she had abandoned her mother to the endless work of the farm, she would not feel guilty. She was fighting a war, a war for her life. In any war, sacrifices were unavoidable.

  She heard the clank of the garden gate in the stone wall, and left her bedroom to go to the kitchen window. Ursule, gray hair straggling beneath her straw hat, started down the lane toward the Grange, a basket of squashes and potatoes over her arm. Irène watched her, noticing her uneven hem, the canvas apron stiff with garden dirt, her plodding step in her heavy boots.

  A moment later she realized this was the time she had been waiting for. If Ursule was off to the Grange kitchen with her produce, she would be gone at least two hours. Sally always gave her a cup of tea and a couple of biscuits in exchange for a nice chat. There was time to get down to the cellar, study the recipe, and collect the ingredients.

  She grabbed an apron on her way out the door, to keep her best dress clean. She hurried, shoving up the slanting door, scrambling down the steps. She decided it would be faster to carry the grimoire up to the kitchen, where the light was good, and write out the translation of the Old French. Surely Ursule could not object now? She had proven herself. It was her right.