The Witch of Willow Hall

by Hester Fox

  Catherine throws the door open, glaring at me. “So glad that you’re getting so much sleep. It’s your turn to sit with Mother. I’m going to bed.”

  “I told you I would sit with her last night but you insisted on staying with her.”

  But Catherine doesn’t want to hear it. She gives a martyred sigh and disappears to her room. I close my eyes, desperate to cling to the dozy warmth of the bed, to the memory of my fingers twined through John’s hair, of his promise that whatever must be faced we’ll face together. If not for that I don’t think I would have strength enough to swing my feet onto the cold floor and pad to Mother’s room.

  As soon as I enter, an overwhelming sense of wrongness hits me like a wave. The air is too cold, too fraught with vibration. Despite the sun outside, the shutters are closed, the curtains drawn and the room is as dark as if it were midnight. The fire alone gives off any light.

  And that’s when I see her. In the corner, beside Mother’s bed, Mary Preston hovers like some dark angel of death.

  I catch my breath, my hand on the door behind me. I want to flee, but I can’t leave Mother alone with her. “What are you doing here?” My voice cracks. “What do you want from her?”

  She turns her head slowly at my voice. The spirit is silent, but I can feel her hollow eyes trained on me. Mother is sleeping, vulnerable and small in her bed while Mary Preston’s dark veil swirls about her like a greedy fog. Then she turns back, her awful veiled face just inches from Mother’s prostrate head.

  “Leave her alone!” Before I can think about what I’m doing, I charge at the dark lady, my hand outstretched just like with Cyrus.

  But before I even get halfway across the room, I freeze in my tracks as if I’d hit a wall. Something cold grips me where I stand, preventing me from taking another step forward. My hand drops to my side.

  Mary Preston rises to her full height, hovering above the floor. “Stand your ground, child,” she says in her everywhere-voice.

  “Don’t touch her,” I growl, as if there is anything I can do to stop her.

  “You still think me foe and not friend, I see. I am not here to harm your mother. As I already told you, I was not inclined to evil in life, and death is no different.”

  Even for her horrid countenance, I reluctantly must believe her. After all, she did not harm me the last time she was here.

  “So, she finally told you, did she? I wonder that she took so long.”

  I don’t say anything. Mother twitches in her sleep and I struggle to release myself from my invisible bonds and go to her.

  “I will release you when we have finished our talk. Do not be in such a hurry.”

  It is easy for her to say, someone who has nothing but eternity ahead of them. If these are to be my Mother’s last moments, then I want to spend each one by her side.

  My heart wrenches as Mother writhes and mutters something in her sleep. The fever is worse today. “Isn’t there anything I can do for her? Can’t I save her from this?” If I’m able to twist Tommy Bishop’s leg around, or repel Cyrus through the air, surely I can cure my mother? “I want to be a healer, to help her. I don’t want to only be someone who hurts people.”

  Mary Preston’s shrug is in her voice. “There are always ways. But is that the kind of witch you would have yourself become? Are you willing to dabble in that dark end of the spectrum? It is one matter to be a healer, but another to pervert the laws of life and death. There are always consequences, as you have seen with Emeline. You brought her back, and you have witnessed for yourself the cost.”

  I catch my breath. “But...but how? I didn’t mean to.”

  “Didn’t you? You took something of hers with the intention of keeping her with you.”

  “The hair?” I ask in a whisper. When I took a lock of hers, and put mine in the coffin, it was an impulse, something I couldn’t explain, but felt I must do to keep us connected. How was I to know that my actions would have such profound consequences?

  “Yes, the hair is part of it. It is a volatile sort of magic, fraught with risk.” Her tone softens, so far as the hollow voice of a spirit is capable of softening. “Your mother is tired, child. She wants rest. Give her what succor you can with herbs, with the healing comfort of your hands, but understand that nothing is certain in this life, least of all dark magic. If she recovers, it will be because of nature’s course, or her own will. Not through spells and talismans.”

  I think of Emeline, wandering that space between the living and the dead, herself and yet not herself. Would I condemn Mother to a similar fate?

  “No,” I whisper. “I wouldn’t do that to her.”

  Mary Preston gives a small inclination of her head.

  “Why are you here? Why now?”

  “As I said, it is a hard thing for a witch not to have someone to teach them. No longer do witches congregate in covens for fear of apprehension. We learned that lesson soon enough in my day. No, they might not string us up or drown us with rocks as they used to, but it is still a dark time for women of our ilk. It is a shame that your mother is not a witch herself and so could not teach you as you ought to have been. More of a shame still that she did not give you the book sooner.”

  It takes me a moment to understand her meaning. “You...you’re here to teach me?”

  “I am here, child,” she says, “to pay my respects to a Hale woman, though witch she is not. I am here, because it is where you are. Death, as you have seen, is not such a great divider, especially for our kind. You will not go through your journey alone. You will have generations of women behind you.”

  A lump forms in my throat, and I nod my understanding. I will not be alone, and there is a chance, however small, that my mother may come back from this.

  “Read the book, and add what you learn from your own trials. Never stop learning. A lifetime is not long enough to gather up all the knowledge of our kind. That is why we pass it down.”

  It seems an impossible task, but I realize that I’m thirsty for it. I don’t want to waste my life hiding from myself. I want to heal, to love. I want to be close to Emeline, and I can do that by being true to what I am. But for right now, I just want to sit beside my mother.

  “Will you release me now?”

  In answer, I feel the cold bonds falls away from my legs. When I look up to thank Mary Preston, she has already vanished, a lingering chill the only trace that she was ever here.

  I rush to Mother’s side. She’s twitching and fitful, her brow clouded with worry even in her sleep. When I take her hand and try to comfort her she jerks away and murmurs a jumble of nonsense. She calls for her childhood nurse. She insists that her mother is going to thrash her for making a mess of her embroidery sampler. She asks me who I am and what I’ve done with Emeline, her little pearl. Mary Preston was right; she wants rest.

  I sit helplessly, dabbing at her brow when she’s still enough to permit it, offering soothing words that I hope she can hear somewhere deep inside her mind. Eventually she exhausts herself, falling into a fitful sleep.

  Outside the rest of the world is waking up. Joe crunches across the drive to fetch firewood, and a crow’s rasping cry cuts the frigid stillness. I shift in my seat.

  “Mother, I... I expect Father will have told you I agreed to marry Cyrus. That’s changed now, everything has changed now.”

  I dab a wet cloth at her lips. Mother’s eyes move rapidly under her lids, but she’s stopped crying out. Talking is calming her so I go on.

  “Mr. Barrett came last night. He asked after you, wanted to know if there was anything he could do. He wants so badly to help. He cares.”

  The cloth trembles in my hand. John told me that we would face Cyrus together, that he wouldn’t let him publish Catherine’s letter. In the safety of his arms it had been easy to believe him, but now with my mother lying fragile and dying in front of me, nothing seems certain. />
  “Mother, I made a horrible mistake in trying to handle everything, to protect our family. I don’t know if I can undo it all without hurting you and everyone else. I know you told me I have nothing to be sorry for, but I am. I’m so very sorry.”

  I take her frail hand in mine, resting my head against her side. It might be my imagination, but as my eyes start to grow heavy I feel the tiniest pressure from her fingers. She hears me. And she forgives me.

  * * *

  When the door creaks open a couple of hours later I expect to see Ada with a bowl of broth for Mother and a cold sandwich for me, but instead it’s Father’s balding head peering in.

  He looks lost, but when his gaze rests on me, he gives me a grim nod of his head. “That will do, Lydia. I’ll sit with your mother now.”

  I rise to leave, and as I pass him, he puts a hesitant hand on my sleeve. “You’re a good girl, Lydia,” he says. He gives my arm a pat, and then gingerly perches himself on the edge of Mother’s bed. His head is bent low to hers, murmuring secret words as I quietly slip out and close the door behind me.

  33

  EVEN MY ABILITIES cannot prevent the blanket of snow that has accumulated and covered my herb garden over the past weeks. I trudge outside, basket on my arm, but when all I can find are a few brown and withered stalks protruding from the snow, I return inside, deflated. I’m setting my basket down in the kitchen, wondering if herbs are something that can be gotten at a market, when I remember the small store I set aside for drying for Ada. They hang in the corner from bits of string, delicate and fragile filaments of hope. Closing my eyes, I let my fingers brush through the dried bundles. Just like the day the dark voice in my mind guided me to the rue, my hands work of their own accord. But unlike that day, the impulse that draws me to the right herbs is something deeper within me. Something light and pure.

  Borage for fever. Chamomile for rest. Lavender and mint for comfort. Although Mary Preston said that if Mother recovers it will not be because of any magic, I can’t help but focusing my thoughts as I prepare the tisane, pouring all my hope and wishes for Mother’s health into the water along with the herbs.

  I bring the cup upstairs, but Mother is too weak to drink it on her own. Tilting her head up in my hand, I pour the tisane in dribbles into her mouth. If nothing else, I hope it brings her comfort, a deeper rest.

  * * *

  “Should we call the minister?”

  Catherine is standing by the window, watching the gathering clouds as she knots her hands together. Mother has lingered for two days on the cusp of death, showing no signs of improvement, though no signs of decline either. Every few hours I slip into her room with a cup of the tisane, making sure that she gets at least a few drops down her throat.

  We stopped going to church around the time the rumors began back in Boston. All those disapproving faces watching us as we walked in became too much for Mother to bear. But even before that, we were never a family with much need of God. Father’s business prospered, we were healthy, we were together. Now I wonder if we angered some divine force and are reaping our just rewards.

  I don’t think Catherine heard me and am about to ask again when she frowns and turns from the window. “I don’t know. Father certainly doesn’t care about ministers and that sort of thing.”

  “He might now,” I say, thinking of the other day, of his head reverently bowed beside Mother, his hands clasped in supplication.

  Catherine nods, for once mute, pulling a wrinkled shawl tighter around her shoulders. It’s hard to believe this is the same person whose barbed words and bitter heart have made my life so miserable. Without all her makeup and bright smiles she looks worn and old. I take a step toward her, but then stop in my tracks, teetering. This is also the person who lied to me about John’s engagement, who has systematically set out to ruin my life. It’s too late for embraces, for gestures of reconciliation, so I just say, “I’ll tell Joe to fetch the minister.”

  * * *

  When Joe comes back an hour later it’s not with the minister in tow, but John.

  “Minister’s at the Wheeler house,” Joe explains. “Baby is breech, Mrs. Wheeler wants him there just in case.”

  John turns his hat in his hands, looking apprehensive, but when he catches my eye he relaxes. “I was on my way to town when I ran into Joe. He told me that your mother... I thought I would come.” He glances at Catherine and then his gaze settles back on me, his expression full of our shared secrets. “I hope you don’t mind.”

  I thread my fingers through his. “No. I’m glad.”

  Catherine’s eyes widen as our hands link, but she doesn’t say anything, instead turning on her heel and leading us upstairs with her back rigid and eyes straight ahead.

  My legs are heavy, and if it weren’t for John beside me I don’t know that I could make it. Catherine cracks open the door, and we all peer inside, breaths held.

  Father doesn’t get up when we come in, his back to us, hunched over the bed. “It’s a miracle,” he whispers, tears choking his words. “My God, it’s a miracle.” Slowly, he turns to us. Dark bags line his eyes, his thinning black hair greasy and unkempt, but he’s smiling. I’ve never seen my father smile so broadly, so honestly. “The fever is broken.”

  And that’s when he moves to the side and we see her: Mother, propped up on her pillows, her eyes drowsy but open, her color pale but no longer splotchy with fever.

  Everything else is forgotten. Catherine and I fly to either side of the bed, burying our heads in her neck, kissing her and smoothing her hair. All the little things I never thought I’d do again. All the things that I feared would be robbed from me forever.

  A smile curves her thin lips. “My darling girls,” she murmurs.

  Delirium washes through me, a sensation so alien that I hardly know what to do with myself. Mother’s still here. She’s still here and the fever has broken. Was it the herbs? The desperate pleas and wishes I cried into the tisane? Mother’s quiet fortitude winning out over the illness? Or was it simple luck? It doesn’t matter. I take up her hand in my own, pressing it against my cheek.

  “Careful,” Father warns, hovering over us. “She’s still weak.”

  I’ve never seen Father so concerned, so...so present, and I find myself unable to do anything other than nod, and slowly get up with Catherine.

  There will be time later, Mother’s eyes seem to assure me.

  Reluctantly, I throw one last glance over my shoulder as John gently guides me from the room. Oh, how I pray she is right.

  * * *

  Time slows down to nothing. A day passes, I think, maybe it’s two. Catherine and I take turns sitting with Mother, making sure that she has everything she needs, watching out the sides of our eyes with cautious optimism as she continues to grow stronger and stronger. John comes and goes under the pretense of stopping on his way to town, but I see him bringing Ada baskets of food so that she won’t have to brave the snow to go to the market, and in the early morning hours I hear him outside helping Joe bring in firewood.

  I stand at the window, watching a scarlet cardinal and his drab mate as they flit among the naked winter branches. Every time that I hear a noise upstairs, I jump, ready to fly to Mother’s bedside and find that she’s relapsed into fever. Mary Preston said that if Mother somehow recovered it would be because of her will and nature’s course. But how can I be certain that she won’t relapse? What if Mother’s will fades after all, or nature’s course takes a cruel turn? We should bring her somewhere warmer, somewhere with better doctors and all the conveniences of a city that she might need.

  “Lydia.” John comes up behind me at the window where I’m chewing my nails ragged. He gently lowers my hands. “Whatever you’re worrying about, stop it. If anything needs to be done, I’ll take care of it.”

  My first reaction is to shrug him off, to insist that I can manage myself. But hi
s warm hand hovering at my waist reminds me that I don’t have to anymore. I give him a weak smile. “I don’t know what we ever did to deserve you.”

  John pushes my hair behind my ear, then lets his hand linger along the line of my jaw. His gaze warms me to my core, temporarily banishing the dark clouds of the last few months. “Oh,” he says with a glimmer in his eye, “you didn’t think my services came free of charge, did you? My bill will be arriving at the end of the month. Cash would be preferable but I suppose I could make do with services rendered.”

  My smile spreads. “Oh? And what kind of services would be acceptable?”

  He tilts his head to the side in consideration, then meets my eye with a wicked grin. “A gentleman doesn’t like to say.”

  I can’t stop the giggle that bubbles up in my throat, but just as fast I push it down again. Mother is upstairs, still ill. How can I laugh right now?

  John catches my chin in his hand. “Did you know, you have the most charming little dimple when you smile?” He touches one finger to my cheek. “Right here.”

  “Mother used to say that’s how she knew when I wanted something. My dimple would come out.” My voice catches on that tender word, and without saying anything, John pulls me into his embrace.

  His arms tighten around me and I close my heavy eyelids. How good it feels to lean into him, to not have to say anything, to know that he shares the dizzying waves of concern and joy that crash over me in turn.

  The door slams in the front hall, followed by raised voices. I stiffen in John’s embrace, and a moment later I find out just how far and fast my heart can drop.

  Cyrus stands in the doorway, Ada skidding to a halt behind him. “He wouldn’t wait, miss! I tried to stop him—”

  Cyrus’s eyes are bloodshot and he sways on his feet as he barrels into the room, bumping into a table and nearly knocking off a vase. He stops dead in his tracks when he sees John and me. “Jesus have mercy.”