Read Online We Will All Go Down Together by Gemma Files - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Gemma Files
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deemed unbreakable: Revenge yourselves, or die.
| two: the witch-house
(i)—the question
The proper year is 1593, but in the Witch-House of Eye, time stands still. A hot day in a whitewashed room, the eaves and low-hung ceiling stained alike with smoke, where flies pass back and forth—clots in a net of shadow—to graze shoulders held dutifully rigid, pause to sip at the corner of a sleep-slack mouth, before a hand sends them scattering again. A preacher, a proctor, two grim bailiffs with bulky arms folded tight, and a learned divine who’s happened by in lucky time to watch the show—all sit with backs to the wall, while her chief interrogator drones on and that one same clerk’s pen scratches always like a hesitant snake in his words’ wake, pausing only on the tail of each caught breath.
Items: That Alizoun Rusk was reckond by alle and sundry adept at the fashiounynge of poppets, both in waxe and in cloth, for stuffynge. That shee hadde killd both her lawful husbande and chylde unborne by this same wicked method. The last provd true, and lykewize sworn uponne.
Items: That Jonet Devize was well-known to breed imps from her skin and breathe, lyke unto pus or humours or any other sicknesse, and that her neighbours bore witnesse she hadde kept her familiars out of the way of ordinary ken, secretd in a bagge hyd deepe in her nether parts. The last provd true, and lykewize sworn uponne.
Items: That their Ring-Leader Euwphaim Glouwer, a forsworne concubine of Daemons and companioun tae satyrs, claimd alle coven-Members hadde taught their skills eache outher, shared for Eville use in pacte and compacte. For shee claimd also that they would somehow use these said injurious skills tae pay back for eache outher if a single one of them was taken, een to the least and laste drop of bloode.
Items: That both the aforementiound wytches accusd Glauce Lady Druir (of Dourvale) and Callistor Laird Roke (of Rooks-home) of takynge parte in alle similar manner of wyckednesse, as did the said Euwphaim Glouwer, unpenytente een tae the laste. These baselesse charges neer provd true at alle, being how their anely evidence lay in the three accusds ane foresworn and worthlesse testimonyalle.
God’s own men sit stiff-backed like parishoners in awe, thinking (no doubt) on their own shallow faith and little sins. Their hollow faces shine feverish with a constant fear of Hell, features blurring under pressure, as though already a little burnt around the edges.
Yet do I regret nothing,
Euwphaim thinks to herself.
For what matter how my body suffer, seeing my soul be already forfeit?
But it does pain me they killed my Sookin, my poor grimoire-keeper—though I can always fashion him again anew, as Jonet taught us both. That they stole away the babe they got on me in my catching, putting me to the Question when I was still sore from his birth. And that my vow to the Black One goes only so far fulfilled, seeing as I did not near enough malefice before they took me as I might have, given time.
She can still hear Alizoun Rusk curse them all, distantly, her words deformed by a mouthful of broken teeth: Sweet Alizoun, with her brazen stare and her wicked tongue, the sort of woman men call “witch” because she rouses the worst in their natures simply by existing, regardless of what her own true nature might be. Alizoun, who was raised always to accept nothing less than the best as her due portion, and throw her defiance like vitriol back in the eyes of any who might dare say her nay. It gives Euwphaim heart to know they have not broken Alizoun in spirit, whatever mischief they may have done her lovely body; that they cannot now, and never will. Not even when the pitch is poured, at last, and the final fire lit.
But Jonet Devize, so pale and pliant, has fallen silent, and stays so. Which is a worse hurt by far than any torment they can visit upon Euwphaim—for all that they hold her here in this thorny iron chair, a coal-fire banked beneath to
| two: the witch-house
(i)—the question
The proper year is 1593, but in the Witch-House of Eye, time stands still. A hot day in a whitewashed room, the eaves and low-hung ceiling stained alike with smoke, where flies pass back and forth—clots in a net of shadow—to graze shoulders held dutifully rigid, pause to sip at the corner of a sleep-slack mouth, before a hand sends them scattering again. A preacher, a proctor, two grim bailiffs with bulky arms folded tight, and a learned divine who’s happened by in lucky time to watch the show—all sit with backs to the wall, while her chief interrogator drones on and that one same clerk’s pen scratches always like a hesitant snake in his words’ wake, pausing only on the tail of each caught breath.
Items: That Alizoun Rusk was reckond by alle and sundry adept at the fashiounynge of poppets, both in waxe and in cloth, for stuffynge. That shee hadde killd both her lawful husbande and chylde unborne by this same wicked method. The last provd true, and lykewize sworn uponne.
Items: That Jonet Devize was well-known to breed imps from her skin and breathe, lyke unto pus or humours or any other sicknesse, and that her neighbours bore witnesse she hadde kept her familiars out of the way of ordinary ken, secretd in a bagge hyd deepe in her nether parts. The last provd true, and lykewize sworn uponne.
Items: That their Ring-Leader Euwphaim Glouwer, a forsworne concubine of Daemons and companioun tae satyrs, claimd alle coven-Members hadde taught their skills eache outher, shared for Eville use in pacte and compacte. For shee claimd also that they would somehow use these said injurious skills tae pay back for eache outher if a single one of them was taken, een to the least and laste drop of bloode.
Items: That both the aforementiound wytches accusd Glauce Lady Druir (of Dourvale) and Callistor Laird Roke (of Rooks-home) of takynge parte in alle similar manner of wyckednesse, as did the said Euwphaim Glouwer, unpenytente een tae the laste. These baselesse charges neer provd true at alle, being how their anely evidence lay in the three accusds ane foresworn and worthlesse testimonyalle.
God’s own men sit stiff-backed like parishoners in awe, thinking (no doubt) on their own shallow faith and little sins. Their hollow faces shine feverish with a constant fear of Hell, features blurring under pressure, as though already a little burnt around the edges.
Yet do I regret nothing,
Euwphaim thinks to herself.
For what matter how my body suffer, seeing my soul be already forfeit?
But it does pain me they killed my Sookin, my poor grimoire-keeper—though I can always fashion him again anew, as Jonet taught us both. That they stole away the babe they got on me in my catching, putting me to the Question when I was still sore from his birth. And that my vow to the Black One goes only so far fulfilled, seeing as I did not near enough malefice before they took me as I might have, given time.
She can still hear Alizoun Rusk curse them all, distantly, her words deformed by a mouthful of broken teeth: Sweet Alizoun, with her brazen stare and her wicked tongue, the sort of woman men call “witch” because she rouses the worst in their natures simply by existing, regardless of what her own true nature might be. Alizoun, who was raised always to accept nothing less than the best as her due portion, and throw her defiance like vitriol back in the eyes of any who might dare say her nay. It gives Euwphaim heart to know they have not broken Alizoun in spirit, whatever mischief they may have done her lovely body; that they cannot now, and never will. Not even when the pitch is poured, at last, and the final fire lit.
But Jonet Devize, so pale and pliant, has fallen silent, and stays so. Which is a worse hurt by far than any torment they can visit upon Euwphaim—for all that they hold her here in this thorny iron chair, a coal-fire banked beneath to
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