Witchborn

by Nicholas Bowling

  In the last room, a rat’s eyes caught the light of the flame briefly before it scurried under a bundle of fabric in the corner.

  ‘Look, Solomon,’ she said. ‘Clothes.’

  Solomon was still nosing around further back down the passage. She delved into the pile up to her elbows, and three more sleek black shapes wriggled and squeaked into the darkness.

  Here were the clothes of at least a dozen prisoners, and Alyce found that Bedlam hospital didn’t discriminate. There were rich velvet doublets and colourful silk gowns mixed with dull woollen breeches and jerkins of material not much better than sackcloth. Mad was mad, however much money you had.

  At the bottom, she found it. The yellowing smock that her mother had made for her, rolled into a ball. There was still some of the witchfinder’s blood dried on the sleeve.

  ‘You!’ said a voice behind her, thick with saliva. ‘You devil!’

  Alyce couldn’t see the man’s face by the light of her candle, but she knew immediately who it was by his slurring, his panting, by the shape of his bulk slumped against the door frame. Her old friend. She shrunk at the sight of him, feeling that familiar cold surge of fear and shame. It was like she’d never left.

  Master Kemp dropped his flagon on the floor and lumbered towards her. Alyce mustered her senses, snatched up her clothes and ducked, but he managed to grasp the back of her dress in his fat little fist. She tried to scream, but the neckline tightened around her throat to the point where she was on tiptoes, almost lifted clean off the floor. She couldn’t breathe enough to shout for Solomon. The room purpled, her pulse loud in her ears, and with every kick and punch and scratch the dress bit more deeply into her neck.

  ‘Your timing is impeccable, Alyce,’ he said next to her ear. The last syllable of her name sent spittle spraying over the side of her face. ‘They’re here! Right now!’ He giggled – actually giggled – in a way that Alyce hadn’t done since she was a little girl. ‘They came back for you! And you’ve walked right into their—’

  It suddenly sounded like someone had stuffed his mouth, and she felt his grasp loosen. She squirmed around as Master Kemp made a wobbly pirouette and rolled on to the floor. Solomon was standing in the doorway behind him, looking triumphant.

  ‘It’s not like anyone would have eaten it,’ he said.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s gone bad.’

  Alyce had no idea what he was talking about until she turned to look on Master Kemp, lying motionless among the pile of clothing with something on his head. Solomon, coming from the larder, had knocked the man unconscious with an entire wheel of cheese.

  Together they ran back to Bedlam’s east gate, and out into the street. As expected, Bishopsgate was closed, and Solomon took her to the playhouse a little further north. When the great whitewashed oval emerged out of the night, they got down on hands and knees and wriggled under its double doors. Inside, the yard was empty and completely dark – Alyce was glad when Solomon’s groping hand found hers and led her up on to the stage and round to the tiring room out the back.

  Even though she could barely see two feet in front of her face, she sat down on the hard wooden boards and unrolled her smock in her lap.

  ‘Eurgh.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Lice.’

  She brushed their tiny crawling bodies on to the floor.

  ‘Is it there?’ asked Solomon.

  She fumbled for a few agonizing moments, until her finger caught a blunt corner of parchment.

  ‘It’s there. A bit damp, but the seal’s still intact.’

  They were both out of breath, and took a moment to feel the coolness, the fullness of the air in their lungs.

  ‘What was that?’

  They both listened. There was a scratching sound, followed by an irregular flutter of wings. A bird nesting in the rafters of the upper circle.

  ‘Just a pigeon or something,’ said Alyce.

  ‘Sounds bigger than a pigeon.’

  ‘Well, it’s not big enough to be anyone following us from Bedlam.’

  ‘I hope not,’ said Solomon, rubbing his arms. ‘I was trying to tell you about those two men in the gatehouse earlier . . .’

  ‘What about them?’

  ‘Well.’ She heard him swallow. ‘The poor old governor looked like he’d been beaten black and blue. And the one with the mask—’

  ‘The mask?’

  ‘Like something from the pit, he was. Couldn’t see any of his face. Horrible long beak—’

  ‘Beak? Are you sure Master Kemp wasn’t sharing his wine with you?’

  ‘I swear! Didn’t you see them?’

  ‘No. I didn’t. I heard them, though.’ She fiddled with the smock. ‘They were looking for me, Solomon.’

  ‘Looking for you? What for?’ She heard him clap a hand to his mouth in the darkness as he realized what she meant. ‘God’s teeth, that was a near miss!’

  ‘They’re like the people who came for my mother. I’m sure of it. Two others came looking for me before. Different ones. I wonder how many of them there are . . .’

  ‘But why are they so obsessed? What’s so important about you?’

  Alyce turned the letter over in her hands. That question had been looming for a while now, and was getting too large to ignore.

  ‘Nothing. There’s nothing important about me. They’re just angry.’

  ‘Angry?’

  ‘Because I killed one of them.’

  HOPKINS

  They found the woman sitting cross-legged in the middle of her cell, scratching a circle in the dirt around her. Her nails were white and bone-thick. A large open eye, drawn in the same way, stared up at the visitors from the ground beyond the threshold.

  She was humming, or at least muttering something in a tuneful way, heavy curtains of grey, matted hair cascading over her face.

  John Hopkins watched her swaying gently, as though buffeted by a draught. ‘What devilry is this?’

  ‘Ah, my husband! Come kiss me, my love!’

  Hopkins ignored her, and gestured to the designs inscribed into the walls and floor of the cell. ‘Master Makepiece, do you permit your patients to practise this kind of heresy openly?’

  The governor mumbled something through his swollen lips, and the woman continued humming, or talking, or whatever it was she was doing.

  ‘Perhaps we can count ourselves fortunate,’ said Hopkins, turning to Caxton. He scuffed at the eye that had been drawn on the threshold. ‘I’d wager this woman has seen a good deal more than her fellow prisoners.’

  She barked, her breath momentarily parting the heavy shroud of her hair. ‘She’s gone she’s gone. The both of them gone. The mice have scurried away, leaving their poor mother with the hounds!’

  ‘You see,’ said Master Makepiece. ‘Her mind is broken. You’ll get nothing from her.’

  ‘Oh no,’ said Hopkins, waving a black-velvet finger. ‘This woman is one of ours. There is plenty she can give us. We just need to ask in the right way.’

  ‘For pity’s sake, sir—’

  ‘Leave us,’ he said, waving his hand dismissively. The governor opened his broken mouth again, but gave up and did as bidden.

  ‘I saw them fly over the ocean,’ said the woman. ‘The two of them hand in hand.’ She bent forwards, and began to draw a series of symbols around the interior of the circle she was sitting in. ‘Over the ocean,’ she repeated, nodding.

  ‘That’s enough,’ said Hopkins. ‘You can drop the act.’

  ‘Act? Not an act. I’m no actor. He’s the actor. Why, they’re taking to the stage even now! They have quite a show for you. It is historical-pastoral, I believe. Or tragical-historical. Or tragical-comical-historical-pastoral.’ She pointed at the two of them. ‘You know your lines, I hope? No? Why, it is no matter – you may read them in the black book.’

  Hopkins closed his eyes and breathed deeply, summoning every ounce of his patience. Killing her wouldn’t help. He’d made that mistake before, with Ell
en Greenliefe.

  He looked again at the eye, staring up at them from the dirt. ‘You are a seer, aren’t you?’

  The woman paused in her symbol-drawing to shake her head. ‘Me? No no no, I can’t see a thing. Look at my hair! I can’t see past my own nose.’

  ‘Queen Mary would find a seer most useful. You could be a great asset to her. To us.’

  The woman suddenly started laughing. ‘Queen Mary? This is new. Last time I saw her she was a librarian. She cursed me for getting my paw prints on her books. Ah, the wheel of fortune!’

  ‘You will be Mary’s subject soon enough, witch, and it would be wise to get on her right side. She can give you everything, or take it away just as easily.’

  ‘I wouldn’t want her to give me everything,’ she giggled. ‘Where would I put it all? This cell is so very small!’

  ‘Very well,’ said Hopkins, practically shaking with frustration. ‘What would you ask for?’

  ‘A kiss from your handsome friend,’ she said, pointing at Caxton. ‘What about you, John Hopkins? What have you asked of her?’

  Hopkins paused. He hadn’t told her his name. He’d dealt with seers in the past, but the dark corners of their knowledge never became any less unsettling.

  ‘I know what she’s promised you,’ she said sadly. Then a sharp intake of breath. ‘Poor man. Poor, poor man. She will never let you go. She will punish and punish until there is nothing of you left.’

  She knew. She knew what the crones had done to him, the bargain he’d struck with the Queen of Scots. He made a move to grab her, to silence her.

  ‘Be careful, John Hopkins.’ The woman’s voice was suddenly deep and clear. She gestured around her. ‘You cannot cross the circle.’

  ‘Can I not?’

  ‘It will be agony.’

  ‘Agony?’ said Hopkins. ‘My dear, to feel anything at all would give me untold pleasure. I welcome agony. I long for it.’

  He reached over the line of runes, and his flesh sang with pain. He could feel the skin of his arms blistering, but he didn’t care. Was he gritting his teeth, or was he grinning? He didn’t know himself.

  He seized the witch by the hair, and dragged her out of the cell.

  Alyce sat on the corner of her bed in The Swan, staring at the folded, slightly stained piece of parchment. Her fingers lightly traced the hard, lumpy circle of purple wax that kept its contents sealed away. Her mother had sealed this letter with her own hand. What was she trying to keep from her?

  ‘Still haven’t opened it, then?’

  Alyce jumped up, dropped the letter, and turned to see Solomon hovering expectantly by the door to her bedroom. She folded her arms.

  ‘You might have been a gentleman and knocked.’

  ‘The door was open. Most respectable ladies lock their bedchambers.’

  ‘Yes, well, I am not a respectable lady any more than you are a gentleman.’

  ‘May I come in?’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  After their sleepless night at the Curtain, Alyce and Solomon had crept back into London through the morning mist, back to The Swan, like a pair of guilty lovers. And, predictably, Mrs Thomson had been waiting for them.

  The innkeeper had slept just as little as they had, worrying herself sick, imagining increasingly grisly fates for poor Alyce, lost among London’s dark, crooked alleys as she searched for a bag of flour. When they had stepped through the door, Mrs Thomson leapt off a stool next to the common room’s fireplace, and pulled Alyce into a punishing bear hug. They’d told her at least a half truth: that Solomon had taken her to see the Curtain theatre and they’d been locked out of the city, and had to sleep backstage. Mrs Thomson had reprimanded her over a breakfast of eggs and freshly baked bread, and made a cast-iron pronouncement – Alyce was forbidden from leaving the inn until Mrs Thomson had decided she was well enough.

  That had been over two weeks ago, and still the innkeeper would not heed Alyce’s pleas. She was well-fed, well-rested – even her hair had grown back a bit, although it was so short and so red and so tightly curled it looked like she was wearing some sort of outlandish copper helmet. She’d finally been able to pluck a few hairs to add to her mommet too, and with the doll complete and tucked into her bed, that familiar feeling of warmth and well-being followed her everywhere. It almost felt like she was home.

  But still, she was not allowed out into the city, and the innkeeper kept her busy enough with the cleaning and the cooking and the brewing that she would barely have had time to slip away if she wanted to. She had forgotten all about Alyce’s letter, apparently, which Alyce was glad about.

  No such thing as witches. That was better than hating witches, and wanting to see them burnt at the stake, Alyce supposed. But she still didn’t feel like she could completely trust her. She didn’t feel like she could trust anyone.

  Apart from Solomon. He still came to visit. He seemed quite unruffled by the revelation that she was a murderer – in fact he had even gone so far as to suggest that she’d done the right thing. Even after that, she had expected him to disappear and never see her again, perhaps to inform one of the city’s constables or watchmen of her crime and have her hauled off to the gallows, but he had returned the following day eager to continue the search for John Dee. Her secret, it seemed, was safe between the two of them.

  ‘To answer your question, no, I haven’t opened it.’

  ‘Aren’t you even curious?’

  ‘Of course I’m curious. But it’s not for me. It’s for John Dee. I’ll just have to wait until I’m allowed to go to Bankside.’

  ‘Good luck with that. He’ll be dead by the time Mrs Thomson lets you out on your own again. Zounds, you’ll be dead, Alyce. Just have a quick look.’

  ‘No! I’m not going to break the seal and ruin everything.’

  ‘We can reseal it. Mrs Thomson has sealing wax in her study. You just have to be careful when you open it. Here, let me show you . . .’

  Then Solomon was slipping his little finger under one corner of the parchment, and Alyce was doing absolutely nothing to stop him. If she let him do it, she was without fault, wasn’t she? Her conscience scoffed somewhere in the back of her head.

  ‘Hum . . .’ Solomon sighed through his nose. ‘Do you have a hairpin?’

  Alyce gave him a withering look. ‘Do you really think this,’ she said, pointing to the curling tufts on her head, ‘needs hairpins?’

  ‘No, I suppose not. Any sort of pins?’

  ‘I think Mrs Thomson keeps some sewing materials in here,’ she said, getting off the bed and opening a chest of drawers tucked under the room’s one grimy window. After a little rummaging, she returned and presented him with a single needle pinched between her thumb and forefinger.

  ‘Perfect.’ He took it with a grin. Alyce watched him manoeuvre the sliver of metal under the edge of the letter, and realized she was rigid with excitement. She was barely breathing. Solomon worked slowly, delicately, his tongue poking out of the side of his mouth, until the seal popped unbroken from the front of the parchment, just leaving a small discoloured circle where it had been pressed into its surface. He picked up the wax and laid it carefully on the bedside table.

  ‘Don’t lose that,’ he said. ‘We can use it again if we need to reseal it. Here.’ He handed the letter to Alyce. ‘I don’t think I should be the first one to read it.’

  She unfolded it as though the whole thing might disintegrate if her fingers moved too quickly. Before she had even tried to read what was written inside, she was frowning.

  The letter was nonsense. More than nonsense – indecipherable. Half of the symbols were from no alphabet she’d ever learnt. She remembered her mother inscribing them into stones and trees, sometimes into the earth, circles within circles around a fire or a grave. Now Alyce cursed herself for never asking what they meant.

  ‘What is it?’ asked Solomon. ‘What does it say?’

  Alyce shook her head. ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Nothing?’


  ‘Nothing that I can understand, anyway.’

  ‘Let me see.’

  Alyce held one side of the letter, Solomon the other, and both of them stared blankly.

  ‘I’ve seen these before,’ Solomon said. ‘When my mother was taken away, they found these all over our house. Under the beds. In my father’s desk. Pages and pages of them stuffed in her clothes.’

  ‘Do you think John Dee will be able to read them?’

  ‘Well, if he’s a hangman I wouldn’t have thought he could read anything. Executioners aren’t the brightest bunch, are they?’

  Alyce shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’ Abruptly, she turned to Solomon and gave him a penetrating look. ‘So your mother definitely was a witch, then?’

  ‘No such thing as witches, Alyce. Didn’t you listen to Mrs Thomson?’

  ‘Yes there are. We both know it. We were raised by them. You said it yourself, your mother had unusual interests.’ She looked at the letter again. ‘It’s funny. I’ve spent my whole life thinking everyone else is unusual. I could never understand why they all went into that big building every Sunday and prayed to something they couldn’t see, who never seemed to help them. They were always miserable. But the things my mother spoke to . . . the trees, the animals, the moon. The dead. They’re real.’

  She looked up to see that Solomon’s face had become tense, the dark rings around his eyes suddenly more pronounced.

  ‘The dead?’

  ‘What?’ Alyce had the creeping sensation she had said too much. Perhaps she’d been wrong to even trust Solomon. ‘Didn’t your mother ever speak to the dead?’

  ‘I don’t – I don’t know.’

  ‘The dead are everywhere. All the time. On the Other Side. Sometimes they come into our world, and it’s up to witches to send them back again. Plug up the holes, as it were.’

  Solomon looked at her curiously, as though wary she was making fun of him.

  ‘The Other Side?’

  ‘We never see it, but it’s always there. Like a shadow of everything. But the shadow . . . is always cast directly behind the thing itself, however we look at it. So we can never see the shadow.’ This was how her mother had put it, but Alyce could feel her own brow wrinkling even as she tried to explain it.