Something in the Walls

Chapter Thirty-Seven

THIRTY-SEVEN

I walk back to Beacon Terrace in a daze. The streetlights are wavering, spinning almost. I feel like my legs might give way any second. I can’t seem to think straight and so perhaps that’s why, after walking through what seems like a tunnel made up of shadows and winking lights, I end up outside Bert’s house. I find myself barefoot on the cool grass of the lawn, staring up at the darkened windows. I don’t know what the Riddance involves but I’m almost certain it will have something to do with the things Bert keeps in his basement. The dress, the Devices. That head cage blotted with rust and old blood. I look around me to make sure no one is watching and then I stand on tiptoe just the way Alice had and feel along the lintel until my fingers chance upon the silver door key hidden up there. I pull it down and look around me again. I feel watched. No, not watched. Hunted. I open the door and slip inside.

Down, down to the basement. No key needed this time, the door is already open. I turn on the lights with caution but am greeted only by an empty room; immaculate, tidy, well-kept. This time, however, I know exactly where to go. I pull the dust sheet once again from the tailor’s dummy behind the shelves and stand back, staring at the Riddance dress. I run my hand over the heavy fabric, lifting the folds of the skirt and letting them drop satisfyingly back into place. I thought it was a drab, concrete-colored linen but now as I start to untie the waist straps, peeling it from the mannequin, I can see it is a faded Florentine blue. The color of spring flowers; love-in-a-mists and forget-me-nots. I hold the dress against my body, enjoying the soft rustle of the material as I move. It’s mesmerizing. There is the lightest scattering of stains on the chest, like rust spots. When I brush at them, they don’t come away.

“Put it on.”

The voice startles me and I utter a short scream, clamping my hands over my mouth as a figure steps out of the shadows under the stairs, blocking my exit. It’s Bert. In the harsh overhead lights the hollows of his temples look like pools of ink. He is wearing a long, purple robe fastened at his neck with a golden clasp, silvery hair swept back from his head. He reminds me of a Las Vegas magician and I almost blurt out a shrill, panicked laugh, not quite sane. Bert notices my expression and dusts his fingers down the velvet.

“Ah yes. My ceremonial robe. A touch grandiose, I’m afraid, but these things are worth doing correctly if they’re to be done well, don’t you think? And people do expect these traditions to be performed a certain way. I see you’re getting into the spirit of things.” He points to the dress. “You want to see how it feels to be a Riddance girl, don’t you? Put it on.”

Mina, some soft internal voice says warningly, be careful. I keep my eyes fixed on him as I back away toward the far end of the table. Bert must have already been down here when he heard me come into the house. It’s unnerving to think of him stepping into the shadows and watching me in silence. It’s predatory. A wild animal hiding in the dark of a cave.

“I know you came down here yesterday, Mina. You left traces of yourself everywhere. Smudges on the glass, the banister, footprints on the carpet. Did you really think I wouldn’t notice?”

“Bert, I just wanted to—”

He keeps talking, voice smooth and unruffled and almost idle sounding.

“You made a mess down here, though. Left everything out for me to find. I thought you were cleverer than this but you’re too far gone, aren’t you? You’re already bewitched.”

I think back to how I dashed out of the basement the previous day when Alice was screaming. I meant to come back down and tidy everything away but, of course, I never had the chance and in the chaos that had followed I’d forgotten all about it. Bert flashes me a sly grin, all dentures and pink gums. “Let’s see now—breaking and entering, trespass, theft. Murder. You’re building up quite the record, aren’t you?”

“I didn’t murder Mary, Bert. You know I didn’t.”

He gives a soft, dry chuckle. Another of those long, vulpine smiles.

“I wasn’t referring to my wife, Mina.”

I feel suddenly weak. Fear runs through me like ropes of mercury, slippery and poisonous.

Bert smiles again and nods toward the dress. “But! Accusations and recriminations will have to wait. We have a Riddance to attend, don’t we? The question is, whose ?”

I stare at him, heart ticking in my throat. Bert’s old, but fit. I don’t doubt he has a certain wiry strength, even if he can’t move fast. But that’s the other thing, isn’t it? My ankle. I hobbled down here by leaning on the handrail but to run past him, up the stairs, and out the door? Not a chance. So if I want to get out of this basement, I have to play along. Get upstairs into the kitchen where there might be knives and scissors and meat cleavers, long steel skewers for barbeques. More important, there is a phone in the hallway. I’ve seen it there on the wall and I know it works because Lisa called Bert only the previous night when she’d been stranded. All I need to do is disable him long enough to get to the phone. But I can’t do that down here. Down here I’m cornered like a rat.

“Okay, Bert,” I tell him, holding up my hands. “I’ll put on the damn dress.”

He graciously turns away as I peel off my clothes, stained and crumpled and stiff with sweat. I catch a glimpse of my ankle, swollen and starting to bruise. I don’t like the look of that bruising, don’t like it at all.

The dress is designed to open up like an apron and be wrapped around the body, secured with long straps of material about the waist. I step into it, strapping it around me. The pale blue fabric drops away from my breasts like liquid and when I move, turning slowly around so the full skirt circles out, the material whispers to me in delight. My fingers carefully tie a bow at my waist, cinching it in. I almost gasp at the sensation of constriction, it’s muscular somehow. Color flares in my vision, the room seeming to take on a clarity that is almost supernatural. No wonder so many girls wanted to wear it, I think. It’s magical. The throb of my heart is slow and steady as I lift the necklaces one by one from the dummy, taking care to hang them from the shortest to longest so they don’t tangle around my neck. It’s heavy work, the stones rattling against each other with a sound like dice being thrown. By the time I lower the last one over my head, I can barely stand, yet it is a peaceful, almost meditative feeling, the weight bearing down on me. At the far end of the room is an old fly-spotted mirror, silvery with age. I stand in front of it and my breath catches in my throat. I look like a painting, some old master rich in shadow and shade, my hair coming undone, high spots of color in my cheeks. I am a pre-Raphaelite, bruised and heavy with love. I am strung with the bones of the earth around my neck. I am beautiful.

In the misty reflection a subtle movement catches my eye. Just for a second, I think I glimpse something pressed into the farthest corner of the ceiling; tilted, grinning face, bruised knees, blackened tongue. Then, gone. I catch that sweet scent again, iron rich; candied almonds and spoiled meat. It curdles in the air like bad words softly spoken. When Bert’s hands slide around my waist, I almost scream. They wind around the straps and begin to adjust the knots, his breath rasping in and out of him, his exhalations hot against the back of my neck. I am suddenly mute with dread. Bert pulls the knot so tight I clutch my stomach, sucking air in. I’m forced to lean forward, trying to create a space for my ribs to expand.

“You’re hurting me! Bert!”

“The combined weight of those stones is precisely five point seven kilograms,” he whispers, as if I haven’t said a thing. “That’s how much it took to weigh down the original witch back in the seventeen hundreds.”

“Weigh her down? For what?”

“Her Riddance, Mina.” His eyes glitter dangerously. “Those women didn’t want to stand still.”

I stare down at the dress. The rust spatters are a fine spray, a constellation across the soft blue fabric. A spray of arterial blood, perhaps. Something is caving in inside of me, some vital prop shaking loose. I can feel it. I force my nails into my palms until they dig bloody grooves there, pain lighting up my brain, forcing my eyes wide open. I need to be thinking clearly if I’m getting out of this.

“I need some air, Bert. I feel like I can’t breathe. Please.”

Bert steps aside with a gallant sweep of his hand and I have a moment to consider just making a break for it, figure I can maybe get as far as the hallway before he brings me down, but as I turn, my injured ankle makes a sound like grating rocks and a shard of pain races up my leg. The hagstones clatter against my chest as I make my way up the stairs and by the time I reach the kitchen, one hand propped on the doorpost to prevent myself from collapsing, I’m sweating, my teeth gritted in effort. My heart sinks when Bert closes the kitchen door behind him before crossing over to the dining table. There, three boxes are laid out with the lids removed. The Devices have been unwrapped.

“It’s a shame you didn’t think to come to me and ask me about these, Mina,” Bert tells me. “I would happily have shown them to you. These Devices belonged to my ancestors, a long time ago. They were used as instruments of righteousness. The scold’s bridle and the heretic’s fork, the witch pricker and the pincers. They were all necessary. They all had their place.”

The hagstones anchor me to the spot, unable to move. Bert’s eyes are dark with desire, or something akin to it, as he plucks a grape from the fruit bowl on the table and tosses it into his mouth with a practiced flick of his wrist.

“Your wife didn’t like them, though, did she?” I surprise myself by saying. “Mary didn’t want the Devices in the house. That’s why you had to hide them down there in the basement. Turns out you became quite adept at hiding things from her, didn’t you? For a time, at least.”

He spits grape seeds into his palm, still holding on to that soft, wry smile—but is it becoming slightly strained or is that my imagination? I hope some part of him is starting to squirm. The thought makes me feel braver and I step closer toward him.

“Mary had the measure of you at the end, didn’t she? I can’t imagine the effort it cost her to try to get my attention.”

Bert looks up at me, one hand sliding behind his back. Uh-oh, I think.

“Mary was very sick. Her death is a blessing in many ways. I’m sure you understand that more than anyone, Mina. Sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind.”

“But that’s not why you did it, is it? You didn’t kill her to alleviate her suffering. Because you did kill her, Bert, that much I knew the minute I saw her. The way she was lying, her eye filled with blood—that’s called ‘petechiae,’ by the way. That’s the scientific term for it. I’m told it’s useful when diagnosing the cause of death in choking or strangulation cases.”

My voice is steady but inside I’m screaming, Run, Mina, run, RUN! My eyes scan the kitchen for something I can pick up to use as a weapon, a doorstop, a frying pan, anything. I keep talking, keep letting my mouth run. I need to keep him distracted.

“That’s why you asked Alice to come over here last night—so that fingers would point at her when Mary was found dead. You knew it would be easy, especially so soon after the news about Vicky and half this town already convinced there’s something wrong with Alice Webber. Only I messed that up for you, didn’t I? I wasn’t meant to be here, but I was. I was. And I found out so much about you, Bert Roscow.”

I take a step away from him. I want to be out of range whenever he comes out swinging. Because he will, I know that much.

“How do you think Mary felt when she discovered the photographs, Bert? Do you think she was shocked? Surprised? Or do you think some awful part of her had known it all along?”

I watch his face twist sharply, his chin pull back into his chest. He is silent and frowning. I keep going.

“You know, you’ll go to prison for this. All these girls were underage.”

“The problem with Riddance girls, Mina, is that they’re liars. Thieves. Runaways. The Riddance isn’t a panacea, it can’t fundamentally change who they are. Under the skin they are still rotten.”

I blink, stunned. Because he’s right of course. The pyromaniac, the pregnant teenage mother, the girl hearing voices? Who would have believed these feral young teens? Who would have listened? And who would have cared enough about them to do anything?

“You wouldn’t have made a Riddance girl, would you, Mina? Or maybe you would. There are so many ways a person can be out of control, don’t you think? Appearances are so often deceiving. Take Mary for instance. When we first started courting, I called her ‘dollybird’ because she was so fair and blond and tiny, just like a little doll. She was perfect, God, she was perfect. When the police brought her home three weeks after we were married, I naturally thought there’d been some sort of mistake. When they told me she’d been caught stealing, I’d laughed at them. The idea of it was so absurd! My Mary? In the pharmacy, they said. They’d made her empty her bag out onto the counter. Hair spray, perfume. A bar of soap. Later I asked her why and you know what she said?”

I shake my head.

“That she couldn’t help it. She told me it was as though something had taken over her. I wasn’t too worried then. About the Devil. About the way he makes some girls act up. He wouldn’t do that to my Mary, I thought. Still. I kept an eye on her and sure enough it happened again. This time she was charged. An eight-pound fine for taking a one-pound lipstick. I didn’t know what to do. We had the money to buy the things she was stealing but it was like she had no control over it. It was a compulsion. Well. I knew all about that. Knew all about how the Devil works when he worms his way in. I pleaded with her to stop. I told her she’d end up in prison. I thought the shame of it would kill me. What broke me was finding the shoebox under the bed full of all the things she’d stolen and got away with. A hoard. Books and records and jewelry, makeup and stationery. There was even a key ring in there from Majorca where we went on our honeymoon. She’d taken it right out of the gift shop while we’d been walking around. She couldn’t look me in the eye when I found it. Tried to tell me she had a condition, that the doctor had told her she needed pills. But I knew we were past that. I knew what she needed.”

His eyes have darkened, glittering dangerously.

“Mary had her Riddance, right out on the Green. The whole town came out to watch. I remember seeing the flames of the bonfires reflected in her eyes, big and round as mirrors. She wore flowers in her hair and rings on her fingers and she never stole a damn thing again. We chased the Devil right out of her, we drove the witch away. All these Riddance girls, I tried to warn them what was coming. I tried to tell Lisa, when she was pregnant with Alice. She was a good girl, very athletic. So much promise. You wouldn’t have known she was a whore, how easily she gave it up as soon as she realized the power she had over those poor boys. Fern was manic, uncontrollable. Starting fires just to watch things burn. She frightened me and it was wonderful. I was almost sorry to have to force it out of her.”

Bert reaches out and picks up a peach from the fruit bowl, pressing it to his nose, inhaling.

“But Alice—Alice is different. There’s something almost otherworldly about her. People making pilgrimages across the county just to stand outside her door. There’s witch blood in her. My ancestors would’ve strung her up and watched her dance till her neck snapped.”

He takes a bite from the peach, huge and greedy. The juice slowly runs down his chin.

“This is what I love about the summer, Mina. Everything is so ripe. ”

I catch the fragrance of the peach; that bright, clear scent like running water. Bert squeezes it in his hand until his fingers dent the flesh.

“So soft,” he continues, in his gentle voice. “And look how the juice runs, Mina, when you break the skin. You could almost crush it completely. They bruise so easily. They all do, in the end.”

His tongue flicks out—wet and pink and quivering—and licks peach juice from his wrist, watching me carefully. Another step forward. Now he could reach me, if he swings what he is holding in that hand. A paperweight maybe. A hagstone. A short, stubby blade that will rip into my neck. I brace myself to move.

“You have something of mine, Mina Ellis.” He looks at me calmly. “I’m going to need those pictures back, there’s a good girl.”

“I don’t have them.”

He sighs with something like regret.

“Where are they?”

I hold on to his gaze, even though it feels as though my insides have turned liquid, even though it feels as if my voice is small and lost and frightened.

“I don’t know. Maybe I lost them.”

“Mina, being a journalist taught me many things. One of those is how to tell when a person is lying. I learned that very quickly. Another was that there isn’t a policeman who doesn’t have a price. Any idea how many contacts I have in the force? How many old friends owing me favors? All it took was a single phone call.”

Distantly, a boom. Thunder. The heat is building, stifling as a damp flannel over the mouth.

“They questioned you, didn’t they? After your brother died.”

“It was routine,” I say automatically. My heart is beating an erratic rhythm in my chest.

“Oh, Mina. I think we can dispense with all this”—he flaps his hand idly—“ politeness. After all, you’ve accused me of killing my wife.”

He steps up to me, putting the peach gently to one side. His hand slides out from behind his back. He is holding one of the Devices, the one which looks like a long, slender needle with a worn wooden handle.

“This is the witch pricker,” he tells me. “It has broken stronger women than yourself, Mina Ellis. When I introduced it to Alice, she cried out like a wounded animal. Do you know what it’s used for?”

I shake my head.

“This particular pricker was used by one of my Puritan forebears as a test for witches. I’m told he drove it through the skin all the way to the bone. In the old days it was believed that a witch had a place on her body that was devoid of feeling and nerves and would not bleed when pricked. Let’s see if we can find it, shall we, Mina? Let’s find out. Let’s see how deep it goes before you confess.”

He grips my wrist in a surprisingly strong, manacled grasp, resting the tip of the pricker against my forearm. I can see the dent it makes in the skin as he applies slow pressure.

“Your brother, Eddie. He was quite the star pupil by all accounts. Very bright. Very driven. It’s no wonder he held out as long as he did toward the end. That tenacity is inbuilt in some people, isn’t it? Such a shame he was robbed of that future.”

“Pneumonia killed him. It was”—I gasp in pain as the needle draws a bead of blood—“th-the ice.”

“But why was he on the ice, Mina?”

I stare at him. There is a tingling sensation in my hands and the backs of my eyes, a feeling of pressure surging. I have to bite down on my tongue to bring the room back into focus. A voltaic flicker of lightning and all the lights lower for a second. That buzzing, is it in my head? I don’t know. I don’t know.

“It wasn’t my fault. Dad said Eddie would have gone to save anyone. A squirrel even, if it was stuck. That’s just who Eddie was.”

“But it wasn’t just ‘anyone’ and it wasn’t a squirrel, was it, Mina?”

In that long, heavy cloak Bert seems bigger, heavier somehow. Like he could crush me underfoot. He puts his forehead against mine, the witch pricker cold on my skin, slicing me open. “It was you. ”

It’s as though I’ve swallowed a shard of ice and it is sliding down my throat, lungs crackling with frost. I’m shivering. Slow down Mina the ice is black, Eddie had shouted, but I hadn’t listened, had I? The crack beneath my feet so loud that rooks had risen into the wintry air like burning leaves.

“I’m told in the police interview you were very nervous. You shook all the way through it. No tears, though. No sadness. Funny, that.”

“I was broken. I was beyond tears.”

“I’ll bet you were. Like I said, it hurts to see the ones we love suffer. So much better sometimes to do what we must to ease their pain.”

I’m crying. I can feel the tears swell and sting, the soft, velvety punch of emotion in my chest and throat, that rising sensation like I’m lifting off the ground despite the hagstones tethering me. My mouth moves but no sound comes out. Bert nods, his voice gentle.

“Oh, Mina.”

My knees give way, suddenly and completely, and I slide bonelessly to the floor. The sound of the stones around my neck is a rattling applause. Bravo! Bert stands over me, his head tilted to one side.

“Ah-ah! No tears, Mina. Eddie wouldn’t want that. Come on. Up on your feet.”

“I can’t.”

I hate the way my voice sounds. Weak and needling. Bert eases himself into a crouch beside me. I can hear the joints in his knees pop, the long sigh. His eyes bore into mine with an agitation that borders on excitement.

“Now we could sit here all night and blackmail each other, but I rather think we’ve reached a stalemate, don’t you? Besides, I’m old, Mina. Old and widowed, with no family. I’ve lived in this town my whole life and I’ve helped a lot of young girls who’ve strayed off the path.”

He leans closer, smelling like incense and metal, like the thuribles they use in my father’s church, speaking in a low, rough whisper. “I’ll be a long time dead before this town turns on me, Mina Ellis. Now give me the photographs before I do something you’ll regret.”

I spit. I do it the way Vicky Matherson had, through a V shape in my fingers, hitting Bert on the temple. A spew of white foam slides down toward the outer corner of his eye and his face darkens with what I first mistake as anger. It is only as he drives the pricker into my arm that I recognize it for what it is—loathing. Then, the pain. I see stars, blinding-white flashes. It feels as though the whole of my lower arm has been dipped in molten lead from wrist to elbow. I hiss through clenched teeth, eyes streaming as Bert pulls the pricker free and a fat droplet of blood blooms on my skin. Already I can feel the wound throbbing.

“They used to strip the witches naked but I don’t think we’ll go that far, Mina,” Bert says, tugging at the knot on my dress. “I think once we find the right spot you’ll remember where you put those photographs very quickly.”

My skin crawls as I feel the cold press of his fingertips on my ribs. I try to pull away but Bert is wiry and strong and, with the stones around my neck and the hot throb of my shattered ankle, I can barely move an inch. He shushes me, feeling along the long lines of my ribs, hooking his fingers into my damp armpit.

I gasp as the cold metal tip pierces the skin there. It is a bright, exquisite pain that forms a collar of white heat around my shoulder. Bert shows me his teeth, his nostrils flared as his hand jerks and I curl up, winded. His eyes are hard and glazed like hagstones in the rain.

“Bert?”

It’s a small female voice, coming from the doorway. Bert’s head snaps up. His eyes seem to clear and focus. His hand loosens his grip on my arm and slowly, slowly he draws the pricker out from my armpit, leaving behind a hot, metallic sting. Blood is already oozing down my rib cage, the side of my breast. I clamp my hand there and look up to see Alice standing in the doorway. She stares from me to Bert, wide-eyed.

“What’s happening?” She steps into the kitchen. “I thought you were bringing the dress to our house?”

“Change of plan, Alice,” Bert says sharply, using the breakfast bar to straighten up. The pricker hangs from his loose fist, a fat droplet of blood swelling at the very tip. “I found the witch.”

“What do you mean?” Alice asks. She is staring at me. “Why is Mina wearing the Riddance dress?”

“The witch is in Mina,” Bert says, pointing the pricker at me. “It must have crawled inside her while she slept.”

“Mina?” Alice’s timid, cautious voice filters through the muffled waves of pain. “You all right?”

I look up at her, peeling my lips back into something approximating a smile. It doesn’t reach my eyes, but that’s okay, it’s okay. I just need to get through to her.

“Alice, you have to go and get help. Find Sam. Tell him—”

“Did you hear what I said?” Bert lifts his voice, smoothing back his hair with his free hand. “The witch has found a way in. It’s been using Mina all along.”

My head switches around, sees Alice’s mouth drop open into surprise.

“Don’t listen to him!” I hiss, blood blooming on the side of the dress.

Bert talks over me, voice strident. “It’s trying to trick you, Alice. It’s what it does. It’s what they all do.”

My skin feels tight and hot and agitated, and I struggle to get to my feet, pressed back down into the earth by the heavy stone necklaces. My voice is high and hectic, striated with fear.

“Alice, go and get Sam, please! Bert’s lying.”

“Come on over here and see for yourself,” Bert says, and I realize with horror he is holding out the witch pricker to Alice. “Don’t be afraid. We’ve got it now. It’s trapped.”

His eyes rest on me, bright and hungry.

“Alice, for God’s sake—”

“She’s bleeding,” Alice says, pointing at my arm. A thread of blood winds about my wrist from the puncture wound just below my elbow.

“That’s because it is clever, and it is trying to trick you. But sooner or later we find the spot, don’t we?”

I have a moment then, remembering the conversation with Sam in the café light-years ago, in a time when there was no curfew or witches or pyres on the Green. Sam, telling me that Alice had developed a ‘pinprick rash.’ How she’d complained of pains in her sides like needles being pressed there. How long had he been trying to convince Alice that she, too, felt no pain from the witch pricker? How long for her to start to believe it? I twist around, struggling to stand, but Bert puts a hand on my shoulder, pressing down hard enough to make the joint in my neck crack. The blood on my wrist is tracing a line down toward the tips of my fingers.

“Alice, whatever he’s telling you, whatever he’s done to you, he lies. He killed Mary, Alice. He’s dangerous and you have to get help. Please!”

“Can you smell that, Alice? It’s the witch, rotting Mina from the inside out. It’s all over her. Can’t you smell it?”

Alice’s nose wrinkles. “I guess,” she says slowly.

Bert nods, sadly. “I told you. It’s taken root in her.”

My mouth is very dry, vision blurred. I claw at Bert’s restraint as Alice moves closer. I scuffle for purchase on the linoleum. He continues to hold the witch pricker out, his hand steady.

“I don’t want to,” Alice says quietly. “I don’t want to hurt her.”

“It doesn’t hurt them. You know that, don’t you?”

I watch with dread fascination as Alice reluctantly lifts her hand, hesitates, then grasps the witch pricker. Bert turns it carefully so the blade is pointed outward, mindful that she holds it the right way. The look of vacancy on his face is terrifying. I am frozen to the spot.

“She doesn’t look like a witch,” Alice says uncertainly.

“That’s because it wears a human cloak,” Bert replies. “You’ll be next. In the night you’ll wake and find the Devil in your throat. Do you want that?”

“No,” Alice says tearfully.

“Don’t listen to him!” I urge her, as pain radiates from my armpit in tight, muscular waves. “It’s me, it’s Mina!”

“Look at her, Alice. Really look at her.”

Bert pulls my hair until my face is tilted up to the ceiling. I’m pale and breathless and wild-looking and something in Alice’s face is frightening me. She believes him. Alice grabs the handle of the witch pricker with both hands as if she is going to drive it into my skull.

“It wants you to hesitate,” Bert continues in the muffled silence, almost drowned out by my frantic, panting breath. “The longer you wait, the better as far as the witch is concerned. It has more time to think of all the ways it will dig into you when it has the chance.”

I see Alice tighten her knuckles as she steadies her grip. Her eyes widen.

“I’m sorry, Mina,” she whispers and then she drives the witch pricker into the top of my thigh. The shock makes me gasp and I twist violently. Bert’s hand is tangled in my hair and there is a ripping sound as strands are tugged free at the follicles. I look down at where Alice has jabbed the pricker but there is something wrong. Different. There’s no pain, I think calmly. There’s no blood. Alice frowns, pulling the pricker out of my thigh. I lift the material slowly and study the place it went in. There is a small, red mark, barely visible. Nothing more. I rub at it, confused.

“You see?” Bert says with mocking triumph. “The witch’s mark. I told you.”