by Rhian Ivory
As I neared the village, I slowed my pace, checking in my pocket for my knife. It was still there, next to the stone ring. The river was still and empty and the pathway up to the Swan Inn clear. I heard a nightingale starting up a song as I walked up to the outline of the stable door. I didn’t need a lantern, I’d been making this journey every night for the last week.
The air tickled the back of my damp neck and I turned around, even though no one was there. I heard a long shriek, an owl scream. It flew low over my head and I ducked, even though it wasn’t low enough to hit me. I stopped when I saw the door. It was open, creaking back and forth by itself like a gift. This would be easier than climbing up the wall to the window ledge.
I crept into the kitchen. I’d never been this far in before. It was empty, all the noise coming from the main taproom; shouting, screaming, singing and laughing, all fuelled by the drinks Henry poured.
Emilia sat still in the rocking chair. She’d long since stopped cooking, there was only a small fire with a black kettle hanging on a hook. The room was full of empty plates: a devoured carcass of a chicken sat on the table along with other meats, all covered in flies, which buzzed and hummed as I moved around the room. She hadn’t been able to clear the plates away, they’d just been dumped on the table next to her. The room was a mess, food and drinks and dirt everywhere, and Emilia sat in the middle of it, immobile and for once silent, not talking, talking, talking at me.
I stopped to look at her as moonlight slunk into the room. The light softened her, making her look like a woman rather than a witch.
I moved to the windowsill, taking care to avoid the knives that stuck out at odd angles near the table edge. I inched my way to the bowl. I knew she’d have taken the ring off to wash the plates. I knew she would have drunk too much to remember to put it back on. I knew this because I’d been watching her for days, waiting out in the dark for almost a week, monitoring her every move, noting her routine. Until I knew what I needed to do.
On the windowsill was a bowl. The purse was nowhere to be seen, but glinting and shining in the moonlight was the ring. My ring. I put it on my own finger, where it sat, snug and safe. I took the stone ring out of my pocket and placed it in the bowl and next to it I put the fresh vial of medicine I’d made earlier. I removed the old one, tucking it away in my pocket, hiding the evidence. It was almost empty. They were the same shape and I’d known she would never think to check. I turned back to look at her and saw a large tankard next to her on the table. I leant over and picked it up. It was empty, she’d drunk it all.
I heard someone running past the window and ducked down by her feet, almost dropping the tankard. I crouched low and clutched it in my hand, like a weapon, hoping that they weren’t coming in, that Henry hadn’t sent one of his friends to come and check on Emilia. Their feet clomped past the open stable door and didn’t slow or stop. I raised myself up. I could hear them shouting and laughing, their voices echoing down the path. I replaced the tankard next to her and breathed out in relief.
Henry brings Emilia a tankard of beer every night, after she’s finished cooking. She puts it on the windowsill next to her ring. She tips some of the vial into the tankard, swirls it around and drinks it down. She then has a smoke and a chat through the stable door with whoever is passing, finishes the last of the ale and goes back into the kitchen to wash the plates. Once she’s finished, she puts her ring back on, ready to join Henry in the taproom and dazzle everyone with her gold and emeralds and more drink. It is the same every night, always in that order.
Every night, except tonight.
He must have been in to see her and presumed her drunk or asleep and left her to it. I hoped she was just asleep, but I wasn’t sure so I placed my hand under her nose. I’d been careful with the levels in the vial, but it wasn’t an exact science. I felt her slow, low breath tickle the hairs on the back of my hand. She was fine. Tomorrow she would wake and see the stone ring in the bowl and the fresh vial on the windowsill, but by then it would be too late. I would have left and all she’d have to remember me by would be her anger and an aching head.
I took the drawing out of my pocket and unfolded it so that when she finally woke up she’d see it. She’d take in what she’d been asking to see for so long: her future. The drawing would show her what happens to people like her, bad people who do bad things. I needed her to see what I had. See herself be led down a narrow damp corridor with chains and metal circles around her wrists, justice holding her captive. I wanted to watch her being taken away from her family, from her friends, if she has any. I drew her trapped, imprisoned, unable to defend herself with her quick words and wicked lies. I wondered how long it would take for her to realise what the drawing was showing her. I’d done as I was told, at last. I’d been a good boy and drawn her future, hers and Henry’s.
I wanted to kick her, to hit her in her face, push her to the floor and smash her head into the ground.
But I didn’t.
I set the drawing down on the table, placing the tankard on top so it wouldn’t blow away, and left her with it. I shut the stable door behind me. I had one place left to go, one person to say goodbye to before I collected Dog and our things and left, forever.
CHAPTER 23
NOAH
I am drawing the river again. I’ve been dreaming about it too – I’m running through the water as if I am trying to get away from it, but my legs don’t work. I can’t run or jump over whatever force is stopping me. I try to climb the rapids, foamy white steps which lead to nowhere. I keep drawing it, over and over, even though it makes no sense. At the edge of the picture is a dog running fast. His legs and tail are all that’s left in the frame. He looks like he’s trying to escape from the page, like he’s running from something in the river.
‘Did someone teach you to draw like that?’ Beth asks, watching the shapes form on the page, trying her best to understand me. We are sitting under the shade of the silver birches that run along the top of the school field like a prison wall, keeping us in and the rest of the village out.
‘I don’t know, I don’t think so. I’ve always drawn like this, before I started school even. Sometimes I try and stop drawing and think about other things, but then I look down and I am doing it anyway. So I give up.’ I lift my hands up and then let them fall, as if that’s all it was, just drawing and nothing more. Something I could just throw away if I wanted to.
‘Why don’t you do something else then?’ she suggests, as if drawing is a pastime to me, something I have power over.
‘That’s why I go running. I try to tire myself out, to run and run so that when I go to bed I just crash out,’ I answer. She carries on regardless.
‘How about getting your dad to teach you photography? Hey, I know! You could learn to play an instrument. I could teach how to play the piano! I think you’d be really good at it, you’re a fast learner. My piano teacher thinks I’ll make an ace music teacher. I’d love to do that. You could just fill all your spare time with loads of different stuff, so that there’s no time to draw!’ Her brown eyes open wide as the idea hits her.
‘It’s a nice idea, but it’s not something I can start or stop. I don’t have any choice in it, Beth. If I did then don’t you think I’d have stopped ages ago? I just have to draw. Even if I fill every second of the day with something, I draw in my sleep.’ I sound like an addict and I can see she’s thinking something similar. I can hear how melodramatic my words are.
‘My mum does this really good hypno thing, you know, hypnotherapy. She does hypno-birthing CDs to stop women feeling the pain, apparently it works. No, wait, wait!’ She starts giggling when she sees the face I’m pulling. ‘I’m not saying that CD for you, obviously! She’s got loads of CDs of her voice talking and music and stuff. She gives them to her patients, well, patients who need a bit of help with sleeping properly and other stuff.’
I must have stopped laughing because she stares at me.
‘It isn’t like being hypnotised, not
like those stupid TV shows you see where someone’s made to act like a chicken, Noah. This is really different; it’s a bit like a relaxation exercise but better. I’ve used it. I’ve got the one for sleep problems. It definitely works; you can borrow it. I used to have this one dream about a witch dragging her bony fingers down my windowsill and then she’d press her bluey grey palm up against my window and wave at me. Turns out it was one of the trees scraping down the windowpane, anyway, this CD helped me go to sleep, after I made Dad cut the tree down!’ She drags her fingers down an imaginary window and does a fake cackle.
‘I can’t see a CD helping me, Beth. It’s not a case of putting my mind to something. I don’t have any control over this part of my mind. It’s like I’m on autopilot. Something else takes over and I can’t stop it. I’ve tried.’ I know she means well but I want her to stop trying to help. She reminds me of my dad always trying to fix things, just making me feel more broken.
‘But Mum does serious ones too, for smokers and other stuff, like OCD. You should ask her to make you one, not that I’m saying you’ve got OCD or anything. You know what I mean, don’t you? You know for people who can’t stop.’ She looks awkward, as if she might have overstepped the mark and hurt me with words like OCD. I wish I had OCD or even that I smoked and needed to give up like Theo. These sound like simple things to sort out, in comparison anyway. If I thought a CD would send me to sleep and fix it all, I’d go and get one today, but I knew there was no way. No way.
I unclench my fists and breathe in and out quietly. I need to explain it better, but it isn’t an easy thing to talk about. I feel like a fraud because I’m not giving her the full story. If I told her everything, told her what I did that day, then she’d know that there’s no magic wand to wave here. Some things can’t be fixed and I’m one of them.
‘It’s like I’m underwater. It takes over my brain. Sometimes I forget to breathe out properly and I’ll do a massive sigh and nearly choke. It’s like resurfacing after you’ve done a dive. You don’t quite know if you’ll make it back up to the top in time. But when you do the relief is huge.’
She’s really trying, leaning forwards into me, listening to everything, playing with her necklace. She’d put the other stone on there too, the one I’d found in her garden. Beth opens her mouth to offer another solution, but I can’t bear to hear her eager voice full of hope and happiness and answers.
‘Look, Beth, I’ve tried to stop drawing before, but I can’t, OK? I’ve tried really hard. It might sound strange to have a talent or gift and then want to fight it, but I do. I feel like I’m the only one in the whole world. Like I’m marooned by these images flying all around me, but I can’t catch them quickly enough to make sense of it all…’ I can’t tell her what I mean. I don’t have the right words.
I stop drawing and close my art book, trying to shut away the storm that’s building, but she’s still watching me, ready to keep going until she comes up with an idea that’ll work. And I don’t have the heart to tell her to stop.
I get up and start walking quickly down the field, pulling her along with me. She has to run to keep up. I need to get back into school and a busy hallway full of people calling ‘Shut up!’, ‘Tuck that shirt in!’ and ‘Walk, don’t run please!’ I want to be pushed and shoved in the corridor as I try to get my stuff out of my locker for the next lesson. I need to not think. Not to hear everything in my head going round and round like a washing machine on an endless spin cycle.
CHAPTER 24
BLAZE
I didn’t know which unmarked grave was hers, so I visited all the paupers’ graves. I placed damp ox-eye daisies on all of the nameless mounds and said a prayer for all of them, all the lost souls from the workhouse and worse places. They rest on the other side of the graveyard wall, not allowed in the holy ground where those with money lie in perfect peace. The boundary wall divides the two and I knew on which side of it I stood. I knelt down on the soil and wet grass and said goodbye to Maman. I took off the emerald ring and hung it on my necklace next to her sacred stones, pierres sacrées. I knew they would keep me safe.
I tucked the necklace out of sight, crossed myself and asked for her blessing before I left. I knew she would want me to find my way back to her home. I left the church grounds and chose to walk down the long path past the Manor House for the last time. I stopped by the long pond and watched the rainbow fish darting about, quicksilver comets of light and colour. I walked on, touching the tall herbs in my mother’s kitchen garden with the tips of my fingers one last time, releasing the scents and smells that reminded me of her into the air. I stood in the moonlight and looked up at the old Manor House, the place where we were once happy, and felt that this was the right decision. To leave.
I wanted to see the world, to see her world, a place I’ve only ever visited in stories. It’s time.
Everything changed tonight for Dog and me.
I walked under the arbour away from the Manor House towards my hidden hut. But the stillness didn’t last.
My door was broken, hanging by a hinge in the breeze. One of the panels was smashed in and the window was cracked. Something was lying across the threshold and the door creaked back and forth, banging into it, unable to shut. I knew I shut it when I left. I always did because if I didn’t the heat made it bigger and then it would never shut again. I looked about for Dog, clicking my tongue, but I couldn’t see him in the dark. My hand went into my coat pocket and wrapped around my knife. I tested my finger against the blade. I took care to keep it sharp.
I looked all around me. There was no one in the dark garden.
I was on my own.
But my stomach told me something smelt wrong. The stench got stronger as I took each slow step to my hut. I put my hand over my mouth, gagging. The smell of sick was in the air, but there was a sharpness to it, a smell I didn’t recognise. I breathed in deeply, through my mouth rather than my nose, and forced myself forwards. Whatever was behind the door was waiting for me, but before I could open it, I tripped over something solid. I shouted out a sound, a frightened noise, and held my hands up ready for an attack, but no one moved. I looked down at my feet and my eyes made out a shape.
A body lying motionless.
I dropped to my knees. Dog was lying across the doorway and he smelt wrong, unnatural, and was breathing every other breath. His tail didn’t move as he saw me, as he smelt me. It didn’t thump up and down. I put my hands on his stomach and he groaned weakly. I whispered, telling him I would help him. Around his muzzle dripped a green foam and the wrong smell came from inside his mouth. I heaved as I put my nose to his, to try and guess the smell. It was garlic but that didn’t make sense. Garlic wouldn’t make Dog ill. He must have eaten or drunk something else, something poisonous. I had to get it out. I hooked my finger gently into his soft mouth to clear it and he growled low at me. I patted him gently over and over on his shoulder, to show him I was going to help him, I would make him better. I told him I would never hurt you. He lifted his head awkwardly and in the moonlight I could see his eyes. They were tired and his face was crumpled. It was a struggle for him to keep them open.
I looked past him into my hut, ready to get the medicine that would make him better, but everything was on the floor. My small table was upside down and my stool was broken into sharp splinters. The rush mat I slept on had been burnt to ashes. All my herbs, vials, pots and small bowls were smashed. The floor was covered in basil, ginger, chamomile and fennel and I could smell something else, something sour: piss.
There was nothing left for Dog. It was all gone, stamped into the floor, ruined and wasted. What could I give him now? How would I save him? I started to get up, to try and find something to heal him, anything, but he put his heavy rough paw on my knee and I didn’t move an inch.
His big cracked paw was hot and damp. The black nails were long and scratched at my skin as his legs twitched and shook violently. I touched his nose, which was dry when it should have been damp. I held his big bla
ck head in both my hands, like the heaviest weight, and looked into his eyes as he whimpered and whined softly. I told him I love you. I told him to hold on, just wait.
But he couldn’t. His dark eyes closed and I knew they wouldn’t open again. His last breath went in but didn’t come back out.
CHAPTER 25
NOAH
When we get back to Beth’s, we watch Edward Scissorhands again, quoting lines to each other as they said them on the screen. I hold Beth’s copy of The Corpse Bride in one hand and my copy of Beetlejuice in the other, but Beth shakes her head chanting, ‘Homework, homework, homework,’ at me and as we’re in her house I can’t really argue.
‘Were you even listening to Mr Bourne in History?’ Beth asks. I shrug at her. ‘Did you hand your form in for the History trip?’ she continues and I shake my head.
‘Where are we going?’ I ask. I’d drifted in and out a bit in Mr Bourne’s last lesson.
‘Noah! He’s been talking about it for weeks. We’re going to the workhouse in Halstead. You have to get your mum to sign it or you’ll have to stay at school and there’s no way I’m going on my own. Not with Eva the way she is at the moment.’ Beth looks uncomfortable.
‘OK. I’ll get Mum to sign it tonight. I swear, I’ll remember,’ I promise her. I wouldn’t let her go on her own and a trip would make a nice change, even if it was educational.
‘So I take it you weren’t listening to anything Mr Bourne said, then?’ Beth asks.
I hold my hands up in surrender as she fills me in. Turns out the most well-known tragedy to take place in Sible Hedingham began with The Swan Inn swimmings. As part of our History module with Mr Bourne, we were learning about our village’s past and following our family trees. We’d found out that several members of the class, not me obviously, but Beth and a few others, could trace their ancestors back to Halstead Workhouse, Hedingham Castle, Melford Hall and other key historical sites.