Alys crossed herself in a small gesture between her breasts. Morach would have mocked if she had seen.
‘And if they can pay for a spell then they can pay for good food and clean water,’ Morach said fairly. ‘The chances are that they are stronger before the sickness takes them. The rich are always blessed.’
‘What if it fails?’ Alys asked.
Morach’s face hardened. ‘You had better pray to your Lady that it never fails,’ she said. ‘If it fails then I can say that they have been bewitched by another power, or the spell has failed them because they did not do it right. If it fails I go at once to the heirs and try to buy their friendship. But if they are vengeful and if their cattle die too, then you and I stay away from Bowes, keep our heads down, and keep out of sight until the body is buried and people have forgot.’
‘It’s wrong,’ Alys said positively. ‘At the abbey we followed old books, we knew the herbs we grew, we made them into tinctures and we drank them from measured glasses. This is not herbalism but nonsense. Lies dressed up in dog Latin to frighten children!’
‘Nonsense is it?’ Morach demanded, her quick anger aroused. ‘There are people in this village who will swear I can make a woman miscarry by winking at her! There are people in this village who think I can kill a healthy beast by snapping my fingers over its water pail. There are people in this village who think the devil speaks to me in my dreams and I have all his powers at my command!’
‘Aren’t you afraid?’ Alys asked.
Morach laughed, her voice harsh and wild. ‘Afraid?’ she said. ‘Who is not afraid? But I am more afraid of starving this winter, or dying of cold because we have no firewood. Ever since my land was stolen from me I have had no choice. Ever since my land was taken from me I have been afraid. I am a wise woman – of course I am afraid!’
She put the pestle and mortar to one side and then spooned the dust into one scrap of paper and then another, her hands steady.
‘Besides,’ she said slyly, ‘I am less afraid than I was. Much much less afraid than I was.’
‘Are you?’ Alys asked, recognizing the note of torment in Morach’s voice.
‘Oh, yes,’ Morach said gleefully. ‘If they seek for a witch in Bowes now, who do you think they will take first? A little old woman with a few herbs in her purse who has been there for years and never done great harm – or a girl as lovely as sin who will speak with no one, nor court with any man. A girl who is neither maid nor woman, saint nor sinner. A girl who is seen in Bowes very seldom, but always with her cloak around her shoulders and a shawl over her head. A girl who talks to no one, and has no young women friends. A girl who avoids men, who keeps her eyes down when one crosses her path. It is you who should be afraid, Alys. It is you who they see as a strange woman, as someone out of the ordinary. So it is you that they think has the skill to cure the vomiting. It will be you they praise or blame. It should be you who is afraid!’
‘They cannot think these are spells!’ Alys exclaimed. ‘I told you from the start they were prayers! You asked me to write a prayer and I did! They cannot think that I do magic!’
‘Go on!’ Morach gestured to her impatiently. ‘Write some more! Write some more! I need it to wrap these doses. It is your writing, Alys, that makes the powder work. Ever since you came back, the fennel has cured the vomiting. They say you are the cunning woman and I am your servant. They say you have come from the devil. They say that the singed corner of your robe was from the fires of hell – and that you are the bride of the devil.’
‘Who says?’ Alys demanded stoutly though her voice shook a little. ‘I don’t believe anyone says anything.’
‘Liza – Tom’s wife,’ Morach said triumphantly. ‘She says you’ve tampered with Tom’s sleep. He names you in his sleep – a sure sign of hexing.’
Alys laughed bitterly. ‘Oh aye,’ she said tartly. ‘He is calling me to rescue him from her sharp tongue.’
‘Curse her then?’ Morach’s face was bright in the shadowy cottage. ‘Try it! Curse her to death and make Tom a widower, rich with her dowry, so that he can return to you and you can use your roughened hands on his land where you will see the benefit. She’s a useless, spiteful woman, no one’s friend. No one would miss her.’
‘Don’t,’ Alys said quickly. ‘Don’t speak of such things. You know I would not do it and I don’t have the power.’
‘You do have the power,’ Morach insisted. ‘You know it and I know it! You ran from your power and you hoped your God would keep you safe if you forgot your skills. But here you are, back with me, and it is as if you were never away. There are no safe nunneries left, Alys! There is nowhere for you to go! You will stay with me forever unless you go to a man. Why not Tom? You liked him well enough when you were young and he has never loved another woman. You could kill Liza. You should kill Liza. I can tell you the ways to do it. Hundreds of ways. And then you can live soft in Tom’s farmhouse, and wash every day as you long to do, and even say your prayers, and think of how we would eat! A little spell and a great difference. Do it, Alys!’
‘I cannot!’ Alys said desperately. ‘I cannot. And even if I could, I would not do it. I have no power but my learning from the abbey. I will not dabble in your spells. They mean nothing, you know nothing. I shall never use your skills.’
Morach shrugged her shoulders and tied the twists of powder with a thread. ‘I think you will,’ she said in an undertone. ‘And I think you feel your power in your fingertips, and taste it on your tongue. Don’t you, my Alys? When you are alone on the moor and the wind is blowing softly, don’t you know you can call it? Bid it go where you will? Blow health or sickness? Wealth or poverty? When you were on your knees in the abbey, couldn’t you feel the power around you and in you? I can feel the power in me – aye, and I can feel it in you too. The old abbess saw it clearly enough. She wanted it for her God! Well, now your power is freed again and you can use it where you will.’
Alys shook her head. ‘No,’ she said determinedly. ‘I feel nothing. I know nothing. I have no power.’
‘Look at the fire,’ Morach said instantly. ‘Look at the fire.’
Alys looked towards it, the banks of badly cut peat glowing orange, and the burning log lying on the embers.
‘Turn it blue,’ Morach whispered.
Alys felt the thought of blue flames in her mind, paused for a moment with the picture of blue flames before her inner eye. The flames bobbed, flickered, and then they burned a steady bright periwinkle blue. The embers glowed like a summer sky, the ashes were a deep dark violet.
Morach laughed delightedly, Alys snapped her gaze away from the fire and the flame spurted and flared orange again.
Alys crossed herself hastily. ‘Stop it, Morach,’ she said irritably. ‘Stupid tricks for frightening children. As if I would be fooled by them after a childhood with you and your cheating arts.’
Morach shook her head. ‘I touched nothing,’ she said easily. ‘It was your gaze, and your mind, and your power. And you can run and run from it as fast as you ran from your holy life. But the two of them will keep pace with you forever, Alys. In the end you will have to choose.’
‘I am a nun,’ Alys said through her teeth. ‘There will be no magic and dark skills for me. I do not want them. I do not want you. And I do not want Tom. Hear me now, Morach, as soon as I can leave here, I will go. I swear to you that if I could leave this very night, I would be gone. I want none of it. None of it. If I could, I swear that I would ride away from this place now and never come back.’
‘Hush!’ Morach said suddenly. Alys froze into silence and the two women strained their ears to listen.
‘Someone outside the door,’ Morach hissed. ‘What can you hear?’
‘A