Chapter 4 #2
‘It is unorthodox to insult the lady of the manor, when she owns the land you live on,’ Cybil returned. She closed her eyes, took a deep breath. ‘Forgive me, I… I must attend to—I see a petitioner.’
‘Where?’
‘In the bonfire.’
‘In the bonfire?’
‘The other side,’ she corrected herself, face growing hot.
Leaving the gobsmacked Pikes behind, Cybil marched to the other side of the bonfire.
By the time she had found another place to stand, she was biting her lip in self-recrimination, hard enough to break skin.
Thicken the ice, Cybil, she told herself.
Lose not your temper. You are mistress of Harding Hall now.
By the time she had regained her composure, the dance had ended, and the revellers had broken apart.
Some were wandering around the edges of the mound in search of a new partner.
Cybil noticed a boy watching her from a few feet away—when her eyes met his, he did not drop his gaze.
He was tall, and the heat from the fire made his features shimmer and warp; unlike most of the congregation, who had looked at her with both fear and disdain, his was an expression of bashful awe.
He was her age, cherubic, with hair the colour of straw.
His cheeks were a little flushed and his eyes wide.
When he realised she was looking back, he went even pinker.
Disquieted, Cybil turned her face away. She could still feel the boy’s eyes on her.
Unbidden, she was reminded of the lord’s son, the manner in which he had leered and laughed.
She did not understand why he had done so, nor did she understand this new boy looking at her with such fascination.
When Cybil was very young, her mother had sometimes looked at her father like that—back when Bess was well enough to desire something other than mandrake.
What was there in him that had made him so compelling, that made Bess so willing to sacrifice her body for his children, her life at Court for Harding Hall?
Cybil had never felt attraction to anyone; to her, it seemed attraction was a form of obligation, and she had no interest in accruing a debt.
Shouts rose from some of the villagers further afield, and Cybil saw that a group of riders were approaching the mound.
As the group pulled their mounts to a halt, Cybil could see the reason the others had been so unsettled.
There were ten men, all mounted and dressed in military cassocks, with swords at their hips.
At their head was an older man with thinning grey hair and jaundiced skin.
His bloodless, spherical face bore an expression of such intense scorn that Cybil took a reflexive step back. The crowd fell into a tense silence.
‘Good evening,’ said the man, his voice loud and low.
‘My name is Henry Martingale, and I have been sent here by the council at Ipswich. There has been an inquiry launched into the spread of heathenism and witchery within the counties. It is the council’s command that this gathering cease at once, and—’
Immediately, the crowd fell to booing and yelling at the man, their anger drowning out the rest of his sentence.
He raised his hand to silence them, to little avail; then one of his men drew the sword at his hip.
The glint of its blade in the firelight sliced through the noise, leaving everyone in a sudden, contemptuous silence.
A witchfinder. Cybil felt ice slide down her spine.
Had Gilbert not warned them of this? That questions were already being asked?
Now the hunters were here, dogs sniffing at their doorstep.
And Cybil, complacent, uncaring, had been busying herself with books and dances.
She ought to have known better. Was she not mistress of Harding Hall now?
Had she buried her sense with her father?
‘As I was saying,’ Martingale snapped, ‘it is the command of the council, and through the council, the Crown itself. These superstitions are doors for devilry and popery, which our good land should soon cast out.’
At this there was another great hubbub of discontentment.
This man is a fool, Cybil thought, with a little relief.
Such arguments may have succeeded in London, or even Ipswich—but this was an ancient village, and its traditions, passed down through generations, were held dear by those who lived there.
To suggest that the dance was connected to witchcraft or popery would be seen as slander at best; at worst, it was an attempt by a stranger, a town dweller, to undermine the very fabric of the community.
Martingale swatted the villagers’ complaints away, as if they were flies buzzing about his ears.
‘I am a witchfinder, and I know well what such things lead to. In the town, I saw a man struck dead by witchery; I saw his limbs go black like burnt tinder, his tongue fall away, his eyes rot in his skull. Would you, good people, invite the same?’
There was a pause, then, as the crowd fell silent.
Cybil felt as if some of the villagers were now staring at her, and she thought briefly of her father’s corpse, how his tongue had jutted out of his lips in death as an oyster slips from its shell.
She recalled how the shadows had seemed to reach for her after, as if they wished to swallow her whole; and she wondered how the witchfinder would have reacted if he had seen that, also.
‘Good,’ Martingale said. ‘I am glad we are in accord. Now, then, if we return orderly to our homes—’
Someone threw a rock at him. It was but a small pebble, but as it glanced across his shoulder, he reared back as if shot. The crowd fell deathly silent.
‘Who threw that?!’ Martingale cawed, his voice rising dramatically in pitch.
Laughter erupted in response. Red with fury, he raised his hand again, gesturing to his men; more swords were drawn. ‘Disperse at once!’ he cried. ‘I have the council’s authority!’
The crowd seemed little inclined to disperse.
Cybil cast them a wary glance, and then looked back at Martingale.
If something was not done, the scene would soon turn into a riot.
She did not wish to draw attention to herself, but it was likely the witchfinder already knew who she was, by name if not by face.
And it was her obligation, as lady of the manor, to respond.
If she did not show fear, then perchance it would demonstrate to Martingale her innocence—or, at least, her strength.
She stepped forward and started walking towards the men.
The villagers parted for her, murmuring uncertainly among themselves, creating a path so that she could approach the lead horse.
Martingale looked at her, and as she neared him, some of his confidence began to fade; he could now see the richness of her clothing, the pearls at her neck, the sternness of her expression.
‘Good evening, mistress,’ he said, shifting uncomfortably in his saddle.
‘My lady,’ she corrected him. ‘I am Cybil Harding, lady of Harding Hall. You said you are a witchfinder?’
‘I—I am.’
‘And what authority does that title grant you?’ she asked. ‘Are you sheriff? May you make arrests without evidence?’
‘The council in Ipswich—’
‘Does the council ride with you?’ she demanded, gesturing to the men behind him. ‘Have you any proof, sir? Do you carry their seal?’
He spluttered. ‘N-not on this occasion, no.’
There were mutterings from the crowd at this.
Invigorated, Cybil continued. ‘My father was once alchemist to the queen herself. Shall I write to Court, perchance, and tell them that at the first festival I have attended since my mourning was ended, after I spent weeks praying for my father’s soul, a witchfinder from Ipswich ordered me to go home? ’
It was an absurd and empty threat, but Cybil spoke with such certainty that Martingale blanched, and even his guards looked a little nervous. ‘My lady, I meant no offence,’ he replied.
‘And yet, I am offended.’
He bowed his head. ‘I beg your pardon,’ he said, through gritted teeth. ‘But it remains that this gathering—as benign as it may seem—could be repurposed with mal-intent. This is a pagan ritual, disguised as a godly one, and I am obliged to—’
Another rock was thrown. This time, the perpetrator was clear: it was the old man whose drum had accompanied the dancers.
He held his tambourine in one hand, and the other was raised in the aftermath of the stone’s throw.
He implicated himself further by yelling a garbled stream of local dialect at the witchfinder, including a number of colourful curses, all accompanied by a gesture so obscene Cybil could not help but giggle.
She tried to hide her laughter behind her palm; she failed, and Martingale gave her a disgusted look.
He turned back to his guards, gesturing toward the old man.
The guards slipped off their horses and reached for their swords.
Martingale might have thought this would cow the villagers into submission, but most of them were drunk, and those who were not had been buoyed by the old man’s defiance.
The crowd quickly became a rabble, shouting curses at the witchfinder.
Someone threw another stone, and soon pebbles and rocks were flying in a tempest through the air.
Cybil made to the side of the crowd, covering her head with her arms.
She thought, They are going to get themselves killed.
She looked back at Martingale, still sitting on his horse.
He had dropped the reins, his arms flung up to cover his face and shield it from the pebbles.
The solution to the problem seemed clear enough.
Cybil wove around the edge of the crowd and gave his horse a sharp tap on the rump.
It was already skittish from the stones, and it squealed loudly before taking off.
Martingale made a desperate grab for the reins, and he narrowly avoided being flung from his mount as it swerved away from the mound.
Still, he was so shocked that he shrieked like a child.
This alerted his guards, who dove for their own horses, fearful that they might bolt, also.
Those who were fast enough leapt onto their mounts and chased after Martingale.
Cybil felt triumph burning in her throat and fingers; she had not realised that she could feel this way, feel powerful, feel useful—
But the rabble were throwing dirt and stones after the horses and their riders. Cybil—who was now standing in the place where Martingale had just been—was hit in the face by a large clod of mud, intended for the now-absent witchfinder.
All was suddenly and terribly silent. Cybil could feel mud dripping from her cheek and running in rivulets down her neck.
It pooled in the folds of her ruff and clung to her pinned-up hair.
She went to wipe some away. There was a small pebble embedded in the dirt, and it scraped against her skin, scratching it. She winced in pain.
They were all watching her, none speaking.
There was no acknowledgement of what she had done, driving the guards and Martingale away. Cybil was standing there in her silks and her pearls, dirty and humiliated. What a fool she must have looked. She rubbed again at her face, her palm going brown with mud as she did so.
The silent shock of the crowd was somehow worse than if they had laughed. Many seemed more contemptuous than pitying. One woman, sneering, made a sign to ward away evil; Cybil did not know if it was in response to Martingale or to her.
‘Lady Cybil…’ a woman said, stepping out from the crowd.
She was dark-haired, her face gentle if slightly afraid—Jane Lennard, the housemaid.
Of course she would be here: they all would, all the servants—Cybil had released them for the festival.
And this realisation, somehow, was the most awful of all.
Cybil felt her eyes prickle. She understood, with shame and astonishment, that she was near to tears.
Shoving her way through the crowd, she walked away from the mound.
They all turned to watch her leave. She dragged her fingers through her hair, scooping away mud and detritus, flinging it to the ground.
A single, traitorous tear managed to escape before she was able to control herself.
It carved a canyon through the dirt and lead paint on her face, a burning trail in contrast to the coolness of the air.
It does not matter, it does not matter, it does not matter, she thought. It does not—it does not—it does not—
In her wake, the crowd remained silent.
Cybil ignored them. She kept walking until she reached the hitching post; then she paused and cursed beneath her breath, another set of tears welling. Her horse was gone.
Clearly, she had not tied the hitch securely enough.
But Charmeuse was Cybil’s favourite palfrey, and usually as loyal as any horse could be.
She would not have gone far. Cybil swallowed the scream building in her throat and tramped into the woods.
Once I find her, she thought, I shall unlace my stays and ride like a man back to the Hall, and never come to one of these thrice-damned dances again.