Chapter Eleven
Sybil
Sybil didn’t spare a thought for her own safety as she swept onto Brixton’s back and left Brackenmere Manor in search of Jacinda.
Her horse required no guidance as he trotted onward with purposeful intent. Like Kat’s little red squirrel and Edith’s woodlark,
Brixton was imbued with the same gifts as the daughters of the earth.
He thundered down the path of his own accord, his pace every bit that of a horse once employed at the king’s races. As Sybil
feared, they turned toward Bury St. Edmunds. The sky above the town congealed in a dark, angry storm, wind tugging in every
direction as they neared.
This was no ordinary squall, but one manipulated by a woman of great power.
One who did not know how to control what roiled inside her in a blend of unfettered strength and unbridled emotion.
Sybil only hoped she could find Jacinda before others took notice.
Even before Sybil crossed the town gates, she caught the angry cries of a mass gathering.
Memories of the pestilence slammed into her. When barley was needed to feed the poor and too many brewers were forced to shutter
their doors. A mob gathered, angry, violent, in want of ale, the potent sort from brewhouses that numbed their pain, dimmed
the brilliance of their loss.
Homes and shops were ruined that day, and more than a few people injured.
A mob was a dangerous thing indeed.
And now they had gathered once more, the jostling swarm visible as Sybil traveled through the massive arch of Eastgate Street.
People clustered the trail to Angel Hill before the crumbling abbey, torn apart by King Henry’s wrath against the Catholic
Church a century before. Where once pilgrims gathered to witness St. Edmund’s relic, now a new crowd formed. One inflamed
by a handful of desperate years plagued with pestilence, low harvests and starvation, religious strife, and political upheaval
that left their country warring against itself.
Witch.
A word cut clearly through the din. A single, simple word, barbed with a need to control any woman who lived her life without
a man to keep her in order. Women who learned too much, whose wealth and land were their own, women with tongues that would
not still when challenged.
Hag.
Devil’s servant.
Witch.
Lightning split the sky above.
Brixton remained steadfast despite the chaos and the unnatural storm whipping the world into confusion. Sybil was not so calm, her mind racing through the horrors of the past and what could unfold in the present as she frantically searched every face they passed.
Where was Jacinda?
A kestrel sat atop a cart, shifting restlessly from foot to foot.
And where there was the kestrel…
A glint of red-gold hair showed in the crowd.
Sybil leaped from her steed, leaving him where he stood, secure in the knowledge he would not wander off, and hastened toward
Jacinda.
She grabbed the girl’s arm, and Jacinda turned to her, eyes wide in her small pale face.
“We must go,” Sybil said quickly.
Jacinda shook her head.
Kill the witch.
Thunder growled overhead and lightning flickered in the rolling black clouds.
“Cease at once,” Sybil said under her breath.
“I can’t.” Jacinda’s lower lip trembled. “I can’t.”
She reached for the girl’s hand. A current buzzed over Jacinda’s skin with an energy that nearly burned Sybil’s fingers. Sybil
did not let go. Instead, she pushed her focus into feeding her own energy into Jacinda’s.
The connection between them opened Jacinda’s emotions to Sybil, the same churning wild storm inside as brewed in the sky above.
“Concentrate,” Sybil soothed.
Jacinda’s shaky breath grew even and the burning power on her skin cooled.
With a low rumble of protest, the clouds slowly broke apart.
The kestrel made a soft chittering from where he remained perched on the cart.
But even as the intensity of the storm abated, a new charge crackled in the air, and the crowd surged forward. Jacinda dropped Sybil’s hand as they both followed the stares.
A woman staggered down the middle of the street. Her bare feet caked with dirt, her face obscured by strands of stringy gray
hair. Mud coated her cloak, making its color and design indistinguishable.
Sybil gaped in mute horror at the poor woman bent beneath her suffering, wilting beneath the hatred of the inflamed mob.
“Hang her,” someone shouted.
Cheers of approval chorused the suggestion.
A man beside Sybil lobbed what looked to be a potato toward the woman. It exploded with slick brown rot. “Hag.”
The kestrel turned his head toward a lone bird following the woman’s progress.
A woodlark.
Recognition slammed into Sybil.
The persecuted woman turned, revealing a familiar face, confirming what Sybil already knew.
Edith.
A hand gripped Sybil’s arm, so tight, so fearful, it could only be Jacinda. “Help her.”
Temptation ensnared Sybil—to do something brave and stupid. And entirely useless.
No.
The word resonated in Sybil’s mind, Edith’s voice as clear as if she’d spoken aloud.
“She’s hideous,” a woman cried. “Foul creature, lured by Satan!”
And there it was, the accusation that homely features were manifested by the evil inside.
Edith had been plagued by warts from an early age, immune to every application she tried. Vinegar washes in moonlight, garlic and bacon and pig’s blood, even potatoes that had been rubbed over her skin and then buried. Those potatoes decayed into the ground long ago, but the warts remained.
As a result, the world had been cruel to Edith for her lack of beauty, and that viciousness bore its mark upon her, leaving
her withered.
But for all that hatred, she gave only love.
The gnarled hands that curled around her filthy cloak had tended to those forgotten by the rest of the town. The gaze that
had lowered in shame at the crowd’s jeers looked upon others without malice or judgment. The back bent protectively forward
had toiled in a garden for those who could not provide for themselves.
Witch.
Hag.
Sinner.
On and on, the accusations flew as the pitiful progression of a good woman being defeated by the evil of a mob slowly crept
by.
The weight of a stare pulled Sybil’s gaze across the street where Kat stood, her flame-red hair bright against an emerald
green bodice. Like Sybil, she did not move.
One of her children had his face pressed into her skirts, her hand secure on the center of his back. Protective.
The sheen of Kat’s tears mirrored Sybil’s own turmoil. Guilt. Shame. Horror over the necessity of their impotent silence.
Down the road, someone shoved Edith, sending her sprawling. A man lunged forward—not to offer aid, but to land a kick to her
ribs before the guard could issue a lazy threat to leave the prisoner be.
Then they turned up Cook Row, toward the old jail, and Edith was gone.
The crowd dispersed and Sybil clasped Jacinda’s hand in a way she had not done since the girl had been a child, yet Jacinda did not protest as she would on any normal occasion. Together, they picked their way through the lingering crowd until they reached Brixton.
Sybil turned to Jacinda to lift her onto the horse. But the girl did not move and instead choked out a sob, beginning to cry
in earnest.
Overhead, the sky split open and rain poured down as the earth wept for Edith.
As it would soon weep for the many women who would follow, for Sybil understood more than she wished to share with Jacinda.
The arrests had only just begun.