The Gallows Curse (28 page)

    
Ants
— which some call
pismires
, for they stink of piss.

    As
many swellings or warts as a mortal has, he should take that number of ants,
bind them in a cloth with a snail and burn it all to ashes and mix with
vinegar. Then remove the head of an ant and crushing the body between his
fingers anoint the juice on the swellings and they shall shrink.

    Some
say ants are Muryans or faeries who undergo many earthly transformations,
getting smaller and smaller until they become ants before vanishing for ever.
Others say they are the souls of unbaptized children who cannot enter either
heaven or hell, therefore an ants' nest must never be destroyed. And if a piece
of tin is placed in an ants' nest at just the right moment under a new moon it
will turn to silver.

    Ant
eggs can be used to destroy the love of a man for a woman, or a maid for a lad,
if they should desire that person for themselves. For mortals are fickle in all
ways but this, that they burn most fiercely with love for another when that
love is not returned.

    The
Mandrake's Herbal

    A
wisp of lilac smoke filtered up through the bright green leaves of the great
beech tree, dissolving before it could touch the pale dawn sky. Beneath the
branches, Gytha turned the wizened apple in her hand, counting the thorns pressed
into the flesh:
eena, deena, dina, das, catiler, weena, winna, was, eena,
deena.
The counting was to strengthen the power of the fetch, but Gytha
knew exactly how many thorns she had used — one to bring the girl, and one for
the babe, and now to set them spinning. She plucked the third thorn and dropped
it on to a stone in the glowering embers of the fire. It lay for a moment
before suddenly blazing into a single flame. Then almost before she could draw
breath it had vanished, leaving a tiny mound of ash in the shape of a little
grey fox. Gytha smiled to herself as she blew the ash into the wind.

    She
added a few sticks to the fire and rocked back on her heels, gazing up at the
canopy above. The sunlight trickled down through the branches, illuminating the
tiny cobweb of veins in every tender new leaf. It was a good time of year to be
living outdoors. She'd missed this.

    Gytha
sensed a movement behind her, but she didn't bother to turn her head. She knew
a lad had been hovering out of sight in the forest since first light, trying to
pluck up the courage to approach the clearing.

    At
last the boy cleared his throat. 'There's this lass.'

    He
added no further explanation, as if he thought those three words were more than
enough for anyone to expect of him. He continued to study her intently as she
mended the fire, as though he thought there was dark magic in the way she laid
the wood or blew upon the embers.

    'Can
you do it?' he finally blurted out.

    'Course
she can,' Madron said.

    The
boy spun round as if an arrow had struck him.

    'Who
was that?' he asked, looking fearfully about him. 'Was it a spirit?'

    'An
evil old spirit,' Gytha muttered.

    Then,
seeing the boy's terrified expression, she relented and gestured towards a little
bothy woven from branches and last year's bracken, half hidden under the trees.

    'Just
the old besom in there. She's blind. She'll not hurt you.'

    The
boy took several steps backwards, not at all convinced by this assurance.

    He
was one of the sons of the charcoal makers who lived most of the year deep in
the forest, tending their fires night and day. Every inch of visible skin was
grimed with smoke and burnt wood, and his clothes were many layers of mud-
coloured rags. He was a tall, angular creature, thin as a sapling that has shot
up too fast. His blond hair bushed out wildly from beneath his cap, grazing his
shoulders. He fidgeted restlessly like a child, but the sparse growth on his
lip and chin suggested he might be older than he looked.

    Gytha
sighed. 'So, this girl you're in love with, when did you last see her?'

    With
another fearful glance at the bothy, the lad wrenched his attention back to
Gytha.

    'At
Michaelmas, at the Herring Fair on the isle of Yarmouth. M'father took us there
to sell the charcoal to the ships. M'father and brothers sent me to buy us some
supper first day and there she was, walking up the length of the sand selling
oysters from a great pannier on her back. I went back the next day, and the
next, to buy oysters, twice sometimes, till m'brothers said they were sick of
the sight of them, but then I went just to stand and watch her. She was ...
like a queen, her hair ... it was sparkling all over like she was wearing
jewels. When I told her, she said they were fish scales blown there by the
wind, and she laughed and these two little dimples —'

    'Did
you tell her you loved her?' Gytha interrupted, knowing from experience that
love-lorn youths can easily talk to a woman about their sweethearts all day,
given any encouragement.

    The
boy hung his head and scuffed the deep leaf litter miserably with his bare toe.

    'You
didn't.' Gytha said.

    'But
this year when we go back I'll do it. I will this time, only
. . .
what
if she's fallen for another afore I can tell her. . .'

    'Then
you'll need something to make her fall out of love with him and fall in love
with you.'

    'Can
you give me something that'll make it happen?' the lad asked eagerly.

    'I'll
need something of hers to use in the charm. Do you have anything that she's
touched or worn? A lock of this wondrous hair of hers? A scrap of ribbon?'

    The
lad hesitated, then reached into his shirt and pulled out half an oyster shell
that dangled round his neck from a bit of twine.

    'She
opened this herself and poured the oyster into her own mouth. Then she threw
the shell away. But I picked it up and kept it,' he said, touching the flaking
shell as reverently as a holy relic.

    Gytha
was sure he was blushing beneath the grime. She pressed her lips tightly
together to keep from grinning. Men, like dogs, hate to be laughed at. She held
out her hand.

    'If
she's eaten from it, that'll do fine. Come back at sunset for the charm.'

    Gytha
knew that the affair was as doomed as the salmon and the swallow who fell in
love. The lad was a creature of the forest; the girl belonged to the sea, so
where would they build their nest? But the young foolishly believe love can
overcome all obstacles.

    'You'll
not lose the shell?' the lad asked anxiously.

    'I'll
guard it like pearls.'

    The
boy carefully placed the oyster shell in her hand and bounded off.

    Gytha
turned the shell over in her hand, caressing the smooth iridescent lining. She
tilted it to the sun, watching the silver, blue and pinks flash across its
shining surface like minnows in the brook.

    'You
going to use the same charm as you used on Sir Gerard?' Madron called out.
'It'll not last. I told you to use Yadua then, but you wouldn't listen.'

    Gytha
rose angrily and crossed to the bothy, glaring down at the old woman who lay
inside, propped up on a bed of dried bracken.

    'I
told you, I used no charm on him. He wanted me. He would have taken me as his
wife, had it not been for his mother.'

    Madron
wheezed with laughter. She turned milk-blind eyes towards Gytha, sensing
exactly where she was standing.

    'He
was happy enough to bed you, lass, but a man of his blood doesn't wed a cunning
woman, not even a free-born one, less he's witched. I warned you, it'd take
more of a snare than your spread legs to catch a stag like him.'

    You
never wanted me to have him,' Gytha spat at her. 'Afraid I'd leave you to rot
alone in your cottage with no one to cook and tend to you.'

    'You
were too old to be mooning around like a love-sick maid. Besides, you were
quick enough to get your own back when Lady Anne stopped him coming near you.'

    Gytha's
head whipped up. 'I only spoke the truth.'

    You
did that all right, but did the truth need to be spoken?'

    Gytha
turned away, striding out through the trees with little idea of where she was
going except to get far away from Madron's words. But she knew she could never
do that. Madron had used those same words twenty years ago and they had
burrowed deep inside Gytha like a tapeworm and would not release their grip.

    Gerard
had loved her once. She was certain of that. She had been his first love, older
than him by six years, but what did age matter, they told each other. She had
led him in his first tentative fumblings, their bodies pressed close together
in the warm damp grass on a hot summer's evening.

    But
after a few meetings it had been him who'd taken her with a frenzied
wonderment, as she helped him discover every secret pleasure of her body and of
his. When they rolled from each other exhausted and utterly satisfied, they had
lain there staring up at the stars through the trees. He had taught her names
for the constellations, names that were foreign and strange, that he'd learned
from books:
Virgo, Leo and Scorpio.
She had taught him her names, handed
down for generations, familiar, comforting names:
The Path of the Dead, the
Plough, the Swan.
And they listened to the owl calling to its mate, the
nightjar and the vixen screaming, until he took her in his arms again and they
heard nothing and saw nothing but the fire in each other's hearts.

    After
his mother found out, he did not come to her for many weeks. When he finally
appeared, Gytha had been overjoyed to see him, adoring him the more for defying
his mother. She'd come running towards him and flung her arms about him,
kissing his neck. But he had held her by the shoulders, thrusting her away from
him.

    'I
cannot. I came only to tell you that I am to be wed as soon as my father
returns from the Holy Wars. I thought you should know. I was betrothed when I
was a child.'

    'Betrothed?'
she repeated, stunned. 'All this time you were whispering your love for me, you
were promised to another woman?'

    He'd
had the grace to look uncomfortable. 'I barely know the girl. We haven't met
since we were little children. I thought you would realize all men in my
position .. . Besides, you knew we had no future together, it was just a
pleasant way to pass the time.'

    'Pleasant!'
she shrieked at him.

    He'd
tried to stop her raging torrent of words with his fingers, but she bit them,
hard enough to draw blood. He swore, clamping his hand under his armpit. He
said other things, words that were meant to soothe and mollify. But she did not
hear any of them. She did not
want to
hear any of them.

    After
he left, she had raged and cried, planning spells and poisons, curses and love
charms in equal measure, but in the end she had done none of those things.

    Madron
was right, she could have bound him to her with Yadua. She could have witched
him so deeply he would have married her in defiance of a whole army of mothers.
But what use is it to win a man by magic? What joy is there to lie in his arms
realizing that he only holds you because he has no choice, and knows not what
he is doing? What contentment is there to wake every morning wondering if this
will be the day when the enchantment fails, and that when he opens his eyes and
looks at you, you will see only hatred in them?

    No,
Gytha couldn't soothe her pain like that. In the cold grey dawn, after many
sleepless nights, she could think of only one thing to avenge the hurt she
felt. It would not bring him back to her, but it would punish him far more
cruelly than any earthly power could devise. For as Madron had always taught
her — the taste of revenge is far sweeter than love.

    Luce
led Elena towards the first of the entertaining rooms, as she called them. She
flung the door of the chamber open and set about pushing wide the shutters to
let in the early morning light.