The Burning Time (22 page)
There was one last matter of contention.
The parents of the youngest children were insistent that their babes travel with Lady Alyce. William was to ride separately, as were the other young people, and the older children would go with their own families—but the heath-folk wanted the youngest in their mistress’s keeping. In vain she argued that if she were taken by the Bishop’s men, the children would be with the most wanted fugitive of all and would therefore be most endangered. Sysok replied that the children were in danger no matter whom they accompanied, since if caught they would be taken by the Church and whipped into conversion or face the same death as their parents. Helena added that sending the children with Lady Alyce ensured their best chance to begin a new life, with or without their parents. Back and forth the debate went. No one acknowledged that the real reason for this strategy was the assumption that Dame Alyce, despite being the Bishop’s primary target, would be able to buy herself and their children greater safety.
At last she surrendered, agreeing to take responsibility for the youngest ones. It was settled that she and the seven littlest girls and boys would ride to the coast and set sail together, and that Petronilla de Meath would accompany them to help care
for so many children on such an arduous journey. There was further debate about whether one or two of the men should ride with them, but Alyce argued successfully that two women with a brood of children would appear less threatening. Since nine people would constitute the largest party of travelers—and, as John Galrussyn pointed out, the one bearing the most precious cargo, their future—it was decided that this party would depart first.
Plans, times, and differing routes were restated and rehearsed over and over, until everyone claimed to know them by rote. At last, facing a multitude of tasks ahead in the next two days, the Wiccans rose and turned to take their leave.
But Alyce raised her hand. The assembly paused.
“There is something more,” she said, and Petronilla noticed that her mistress’s hand was trembling—how unthinkable!—as she drew a parchment scroll from her sleeve. “As you know, there will be no feast this Samhain. No roasting of apples, no quaffing mulled wine. No burning of wormwood to honour the lives of our ancestors, no leaving open the burial mounds so that we may speak with the Past. No Sabbat, no Ritual. We stand here with no Tools of Art. So must we be our own Tools. Air billows our lungs. Fire heats our blood. Water flows through our tears and spittle. Our flesh is earth. We are a living Covenstead. Wherever we stand is sacred space.”
In silence, the people formed a ragged circle around her.
Turning rapidly to the east, the south, the west, and the north, she cried out,
“Spirits of Air, Spirits of Fire, Spirits of Water, Spirits of Earth, we welcome thee! The Circle is closed.”
She addressed the assembly as she unrolled the parchment.
“These words of counsel come from our own kind across the sea. How these words came to me, and from whom, is a knowledge with which you need not be burdened. But know that these words come from those who follow, as do we, The Old Ways, and who have continued to follow them through times of horror and despair. These are words of survival. They should be known to you. It is your … right.” Her voice was unsteady as she began to read, but she willed herself to continue.
We have come to the end of an age. We have come to a pause in the moonlit feasts, the bonfires, dancing, laughter, the open Pagan joy. A pause—because one day it shall return, for it breathes in the spirit, no matter how smothered
.
But not now, not for us. For us there is a new age, of suffering, secrecy, flight from enemies who are themselves trammeled in fear and ignorance
.
We have named this age ‘The Burning Time.’
Certain things must be done that our people may survive, and that the wisdom of The Craft may endure, even if it must be hidden for centuries to come
.
We have learned these lessons through affliction. We offer them to others in The Craft who may yet be forced to find them useful
.
Keep a book in your own hand of write. Let sisters and brothers copy what they will, but never let this book out of your hand—for if it be found, you will be taken and tortured. Never keep the writings of another—for if it be found in their hand of write, they will be taken and tortured
.
Think to yourself: I know nothing, I remember nothing. Chant this as poem, spell, prayer, meditation. Will yourself to believe it
.
Let the Working Tools be as ordinary things anyone may have in their homes—a cracked bowl, the stump of a candle, a kitchen knife. Let the Pentacles be made of wax that they may be melted or broken at once. Have no names on anything
.
If you are taken, tortured, and confess, deny it afterwards. Say that you babbled under the torture. Drive this into your mind. If the torture be too great to bear, then say: “I will confess. I cannot bear this torment. What do you wish me to say? Tell me and I will say it.” Hearken well: There is no blame in striving to survive. There is no heroism in embracing pain. If they force you to confess impossibilities—flying
through air, consorting with devils, sacrificing children, eating human flesh—say simply: “I had evil dreams, I was not myself, I was maddened.”
But herein lies the heart of the lesson:
Name no others.
If you betray others, there is no hope for you, not in this life or in any Mystery that yet may be to come
.
If you be condemned, fear not, for The Craft has its ways
.
If you are steadfast, you may be helped to escape
.
If you are sentenced to the pyre and yet remain steadfast, potions will reach you so that you will feel naught. Instead, you will pass through death and slip like the babe from the womb into what lies beyond, the Abyss into which all things fade and from which all things arise
.
Alyce’s voice broke. She paused, to regain her control. Then she touched the parchment to a candle, watched it crackle and flame, and dropped it to the cellar floor, grinding the ashes underfoot. Only now could she look up at the surrounding faces, only now see that each face was as filled with hope as with fear. So it had been worth telling them the truth.
“The Burning Time is come upon us in Ireland,” she said. “So I cannot bid you Merry Part until we meet again. But this
can I say: may we Merry Meet soon in a safe land, my people. Until such time, Blessed Be. And remember:
The blood of The Old Ones courses our veins. The Forms pass. The Circle remains
.”
She flung her arms wide, her torch-cast shadow spreading like a massive brood hen, wings extended, across the cellar walls.
“Earth! Water! Fire! Air!”
she cried,
“Recognize thy children and protect them!”
Slowly, the shadow folded its wings.
“
The Circle is opened
,” she said.
As the people filed silently up the cellar steps, no one looked back. No one saw her shoulders sag and her head droop, as if life had drained from her.
No one heard her whisper, the words evaporating into the dank air.
“The Circle is broken.”
LEAVETAKINGS
THAT NIGHT WAS SLEEPLESS
for most of the people of the Kyteler estate—especially Lady Alyce.
At dawn the next morning, she flung open her treasury and distributed gold coin and plate among her people—to keep them on their journey, in case they needed to offer bribes, and as insurance should they miss the arranged first meeting in Wales or, later, in England. Her own ancestral jewels—unworn for years but for the few items she’d donned in her recent masquerade in Kilkenny Town—she placed in a casket; these would buy security and lodging for herself, the children, and their parents, once safely across the sea. The only other possessions she packed were her writing materials and her Working Tools, placed in a second casket along with her Grimoire and a few other books—although choosing from her considerable library brought her to tears. Decades of study and practice were already packed in her brain, and she could reassemble her medicinal closet anywhere herbs and flowers grew. The brown woolen shirt and trousers with a man’s
leather jerkin she would wear should be sufficient wardrobe against the late autumn chill, along with her black cape of boiled wool so tightly woven it resisted rain.
That night, most of the peasants trooped dutifully into Kilkenny Town for the mummers’ performance, striving to act relaxed and entertained while their hearts were cramped with fear. They could not help noticing more men-at-arms than usual patrolling the streets, yeomen now wearing tunics emblazoned with the coat of arms and stylized crucifix that denoted the Bishopric of Ossary.
The following day seemed to pass with frightening speed as well as drag with agonizing slowness. The castle’s pantries were raided to assemble parcels of meat, cheese, bread, and onions, plus a flagon of wine and one of water for each traveler—each of whom also received one of the soaked, dried, stiffened shirts Alyce had made. The stables were opened so that anyone who lacked a swift horse or solid cart could choose what was needed. Some of the peasants made personal pilgrimages far out onto the heath, where generations of forebears had been buried, for one last visit to a particular grave. Others busied themselves trying to cram their worldly belongings into small wagons. Young lovers clung to one another, weeping, pledging devotion. Elders shook their heads at having lived to witness such a day descend on the Tuatha de Danaan.
From Alyce’s perspective, however, the heath-folk were handling their leave-taking with an aplomb that again surprised her; she had assumed that being wrenched from the land would devastate her peasants utterly. But she had little time to mull this or anything else. Scheduled to depart first, she was a blur of movement—ensuring that everyone had gold coin, food, warm clothing, and means of transport.
By late afternoon, the youngest children began arriving in the castle courtyard, brought by parents doing their best not to weep and alarm the little ones. Fortunately, all the youngsters felt at home with Petronilla and even with Lady Alyce, since both women had tended or sat with them when they were sick. Still, the tangle of seven children under the age of six, gathered for a trip, was impressive.
Alyce had already bidden private farewells to the adults one by one, double-checking as she did so that each was properly equipped for the journey. She had pressed on each traveler a pottle of grapeseed paste for skin wounds, and a pouch of cloves, ginger, peppermint leaves, and pennyroyal, for seasickness. She had reminded Helena to bring a distillation of sage to dry up her breastmilk temporarily, since Dana would be traveling separately and having to make do with watered goat’s milk sipped from a flask until they reached the Welsh coast and she could rejoin her mother. Having to abandon larders abrim with the harvest enraged Alyce, who continued to think of
more items everyone should pack. Having to abandon the animals pained her even more, and she kept trying to think of ways to ensure the creatures would not be maltreated by those who might try to seize her holdings. The cattle and sheep were impassive creatures of habit. But she let the goats loose to wreak their natural mischief throughout the countryside—first saying a personal farewell to Greedigut, who gazed at her through white-lashed amber eyes, tolerated her embrace, and accepted a basket of dried rosebuds as a farewell dinner.
Prickeare’s fate bore its own small tragedy. An elderly cat could hardly travel with seven children and two adults in a covered cart and then aboardship. Nor could he be left behind, since he was sure to be tortured to death by those who knew him to be Alyce Kyteler’s cherished Familiar. There was only one thing to be done. The night before departure he had slept against her heart, purring on the beat of it and in rhythm with her breathing. Then, the following afternoon, unable to stop the tears running down her face, she had fed him the nightshade distillation that would cause no pain. She knew that he sensed what was happening. He walked about a little, but soon began to drag his hind legs. Then he could lift his head and front body only with difficulty, yet his jade eyes followed her everywhere. She picked him up and cradled him against her breast. He curled in her arms, gazing into her eyes, purring, understanding and forgiving everything. Then he
drifted into a doze, and while she clasped his deepening sleep against her—the featherlight triangle of his head resting cupped in her palm—she could feel his ancient, loving heart slow, and then stop. She sat holding him this way as long as she dared. Then she carried his little body outside and planted him in the kitchen garden—in a particular spot where he had loved to lie sunning himself, nibbling the herbs and savoring the additional thrill of being able to flatten the lettuces at the same time.
It was there that Will found his mother, kneeling, slumped back on her heels, hands lying helplessly in her lap, weeping. The sight of her so defenseless thawed his last residue of resentment, and he knelt, too, flinging his arms around her.
“Oh Mum,” he cried.
She reached for him and held him tight.
“Will. My dearest Will,” she murmured. Then she leaned back, the better to perceive the soft young manhood in his face. Slowly, she examined the familiar features as if to imprint them indelibly on her sight, not knowing when her gaze would next trace the smooth slope of that cheek, the curve of that delicate nostril, the fine browngold hair of that eyebrow.
“Do you remember,” she said, sniffling and trying to clear her throat, “when you were little?”
“Yes,” he answered, clasping her more tightly.
“You were always there for me, through all the husbands—you, my joy, the one constant object of my love. You never really knew your father, of course … well, that was both loss and blessing. Then Adam complained that you were such a beautiful child—your green eyes, and your locks were red-gold then—too beautiful to be a boy, he claimed. He envied you, in truth—though beautiful you were. But for me, it was your glad spirit that was such a gift. You were my young knight, remember?” Will nodded, working to hold back tears.