I wanted to laugh as I watched him shake. I had power over him. It felt good. Better than pain.
‘Tell me, who are these men that killed my mother?’
‘I…’
‘They pissed on her, did you know that?’
‘No…’
‘And they broke her arm. Do you know what that feels like?’
‘Stop.’
But I would not. I spoke the words again, made this hex mine,
‘From ash we rise, to ash we go.’
‘Please, please… I know only some of them. Sons of fathers…’
‘Tell me the names of their fathers.’ I shook and it seemed the room shook with me.
I took up more ash and let it fall gently. I pressed my toe to it and, with a cut of my foot, drew the ash to point at Croake. Fear came fast to him. His hands were on his belt. Did he mean to pull a knife? His mouth opened and closed. Stupid old man.
‘Please… I gave you shelter…’
‘Tell me the names,’ I seethed, hot as his fire.
I raised my foot above the hex, a blade ready to strike. Croake looked again to the window.
‘Why do you look there? You think you trap me, don’t you?’
He shook his head.
‘Tell me, you… you old fool.’
And I did laugh then. Like when I goaded Dill. I could not help it. But I didn’t care.
My laugh cut him, made his tears run.
‘It is true… I am a fool…’ And I sneered to watch him drop to his shaking knees.
‘What is happening? Evey?’
Dill was rubbing her eyes. She rose, looking to me, to Croake, to the ash all about.
‘What…? What are you doing?’
‘I’m hexing, Dill. Did I do it right?’ I swung my words at her.
‘No. Stop it, Evey!’
‘Go on, old man!’ I stood over him. My heart was beating so fast.
He fumbled to his belt. ‘They said they would not harm her, if I told them…’ And he brought something slowly, but it was not a knife. It was a raggy doll, that shook in his paws.
‘If I told them, if I said where to find you, they said they would not hurt her. And so I did. I told them.
‘But Alice raged at them, that she loved your mother for her learning from her, and she wouldn’t stop her shouting. And so they took her… And… they hung her from the tree.’
Croake threw his hands to his face.
‘Now I cannot stop… for seeing her swing there! My Alice! Oh, my Alice!’
My hair rose upon my neck to see him sob before that watching window. He was old, yet he cried like the babe he had lost.
I saw a little girl, blonde and bonny running into the night.
‘Alice, I’m sorry,’ he whispered.
Dill moved to cradle his head. And as he sobbed to be held, she glared to me.
I looked down to my ashen foot, like it was not mine. I felt my chest so tight, heat upon my cheeks. I had done this.
I bent and blew into the ash. My hex that was not a hex was no more.
‘There were five, but only two I know… Meakin from town. Cooper from across the valley. Army folk. And a lad, not much older than you.’ He sniffed. ‘Tom, they called him. A wicked lad.’
I watched as Dill fetched a flagon of water.
‘They have a leader. A tall one.’
I thought on that man, dropping his arm to loose his dogs.
Croake nodded, as Dill helped him to drink. How good she was. How bad I was.
‘That is only four men, Jim Croake.’ I could not hex, yet I could count.
‘The fifth was a woman, an old woman. She led them here.’ Water dribbled from his chin. ‘She knew your mother…’
Chill down my spine, like the water from his flagon.
‘What did she look like? Tell me!’ Dill stayed my hand.
‘She was crooked of back. She wore a hood, I did not see her face! I did not see!’
Gently Dill pressed him the doll.
‘That’s all I know,’ and Croake stroked its woollen hair. ‘That’s all…’
Ash trickled from my fingers.
‘Thank you, James Croake.’
He shuffled to his room. He looked to Dill, and she smiled. But he said nothing more, as he passed me, and closed his door.
The rain came down the harder, as the fire shrank to sleep.
Dill put down the flagon, not looking to me. She moved to Berry and her pups.
‘It had to be done, Dill.’
My mouth was dry. But no water was offered to the wicked sister.
‘Do you not see that?’
She turned and drew the dogs closer to her, further from me.
‘Ash is not for hexing, Evey. It is for binding.’ She whispered, yet how she stung me.
‘I don’t care, Dill! I have their names, don’t I? I don’t care about your spells! I don’t care, you hear?’
And yet I knew what stung me more. Part of me, hidden away, did care. To ask her of Mother’s words, everything I had stopped listening to.
‘I’m happy for you, Evey.’
‘Stupid, ungrateful mite! For me? For Mother you should be—’
But I could speak no more.
Dill turned. Her eyes were wet.
‘I’m sorry, Evey,’ she whispered, ‘that you’re sad. I miss her too.’
And I did not soothe her as she cried herself to sleep, and the rain dripped her words.
I’m happy for you.
She was too young to understand. But tomorrow she would have to. Tomorrow.
Meakin. Cooper. Tom. Tall One.
I had their names, to make good my promise. And now I must swear to another, beyond the window, swinging ever in the wind. A ghost for an old man who I had called a fool.
Then it came up through me like a wave, and I could not stop it, only hold to the hearth shaking, shaking, stopping my mouth to keep those sobs from filling the room.
‘I’m sorry too. I’m sorry, Alice Croake.’
I took Croake’s blanket from his empty chair.
I had no more spells to make up. No one left to hurt. Nothing to bring the lost to the hearth where I lay.
Only ash on my fingers, where my tears dropped like little footsteps in the snow.
I woke to the smell of burned wood and dust and waited for the tap tap of Mother’s stick as she limped to stir the embers.
Then I saw a scythe above a door that was not ours, and I remembered.
I had mocked a hex I had never learned, frightened an old man with a pile of ash, and goaded my sister who told me to stop.
Berry groaned, her pups mewling for her milk. Dill opened her eyes. She smiled and it was like day breaking. Though we had quarrelled in the night, she was happy in the morn. That was then, this was now. And I needed her happy this day that must be done.
I stretched to stand and Berry growled.
‘Hush, Berry dog.’
I had not seen Croake sitting like a sack by the hearth. He nodded to the table, where bread and cheese waited.
‘See…!’ said Dill. ‘You like her new name!’
My hands sought the food, hoarding to my mouth as squirrels for winter.
Dill pointed, her cheeks full to bursting.
‘Can we… take us one, Jim Croake?’
He looked over to those clamouring pups and nodded again. Dill spat cheese.