I could not breathe at all. My eyes sprang tears, and the arm lifted me clean up so my feet were off the ground and I had a small, cold moment where I thought I will die here – but then I thought no I will not. I was cross. I tried to scratch the arm but my fingernails were bitten so I reached behind to feel for this man’s face or ears or hair. I found his hair. I pulled it very hard, which did nothing, so I fumbled with his face and found his eyes. I pushed my thumbs right in. Eyes are soft. It felt like they burst under my thumbs and there was a yell, a holler, and he dropped me. I scrabbled away and heaved in air.
He wailed my eyes my eyes!
The mare squealed, and I coughed thickly. The man moaned my eyes are bleeding, she’s blinded me – and so I knew he was not alone. I turned. Three of them. Three more men came out of the darkness like thoughts, but I knew they were real – they were muddied and strong-smelling, and in jerkins of such thin leather and so laden up with rusted blades and ropes that I thought I know your kind…I remembered. I saw a frosty morning. I saw five ropes swinging.
I stared at them. I looked at each face as I crept back towards the mare – one had a plum-coloured face like he was half-burnt, and he beckoned to me.
Give us your purse and we’ll not harm you.
I shook my head. I was keeping Cora’s herbs for always – for all my life.
We saw it. Give us your money.
I said I have no money.
He spat into a nettle bush. He stepped towards me more. No one travels with no money. Then he took a dirk out and growled again your purse. I heard his tongue’s accent which was Scotch – I knew it well enough from pedlars on the roads who’d beckoned me. I’d bought a silver mirror from a Scotchman once because it was so pretty and Mother Pindle saw me do so. She’d spat out the word Scotchman like it was whore or plague.
I have no money!
He smiled quickly, like I was a joke to him. Then he came at me, lifted me right up and pushed me back against a tree. He struggled with me, seeking my purse so harshly that my teeth rattled, and I roared at him, and smacked his head.
Ha he said, finding it. Cora’s purse.
He tugged it free and opened it, and out they went – radish, dock, lovage, fennel, comfrey, elderflower, sage. All over the forest floor.
I cried out. I dropped to my knees to gather them. It was like my mother was sprawled on the floor too, and for a while there was silence – just me saying no no no…
Take her horse, then.
I screamed. I ran to the mare who was head-up and walking backwards, not liking this at all. I grabbed her mane but some Mossman had my leg so I could not mount her and the mare tried to carry me off, good girl. But the man had my boot, so I was stretched like on a rack and the ground was lying under me, and I knew I could not hold the mare much longer. I also knew that if I let go they would take her so I screamed I’ll curse you all! I will summon the Devil and he’ll not like this at all!
Well that was a fine trick.
They let me go like I was on fire. I hit the ground, scrambled to my feet and turned with my back to the mare and my arms stretched out like I was hiding her from them, keeping her safe. These four men could only stare at me – or rather three did, for the fourth was still crouching and saying my eyes. I slowed my breath, stared back. It was like all the forest had heard me, all the birds and insects, and I thought then, too late, that maybe saying witch-like things was foolish. I was running from witch-haters, and there were no doubt plenty more in this country. Rats can cross walls, after all. But it was said now. It was done.
Witch?
They looked at each other.
They looked down at the herbs, understanding them now.
There was a small hush, so I heard all our breathing and the rain going drip. Then they muttered in their own Scotch words. They looked on me for such a long time I felt hot, awkward.
I didn’t say yes I am – for I’ve never called my own self witch. I held my tongue and scratched the mare’s neck how she likes, to calm her.
How old are you?
I pouted. I was cross because they’d troubled her and because they’d made Cora’s herbs fall out of her purse, and now they were treading on them, which was a proper waste and sadness.
This winter will be my sixteenth I said.
What’s your business?
What’s yours? Saucy of me. I can be, and that’s Cora.
The plum-faced one considered me. An English girl? In a woman’s cloak? On a stolen horse?
Maybe it was the softness which had come into his voice. Or the half-light. Or maybe it was my lonesomeness that made me talk to him – I don’t know. But I said my mother sent me away. They call her a witch, and hate her, and she will die soon, so she told me to flee north-and-west away from Thorneyburnbank so that they might not kill me, too. I looked at the ground. These were her herbs. They are mine, now – to sell, I think, and to keep me safe. They are all I have in the world – except for my wits, and my mare.
This all came out in a rush. It was like my words were water and out they came, and now what? We all stood amongst my words like leggy birds in a stream. I was breathless, and a small part of me felt like being teary-eyed because I thought of Cora dying, but I wouldn’t let them see it.
I thought fool to myself. No one likes a chatterer. It’s best to keep your mouth tied up, but I never did it.
It was even stranger, what was next.
They did not come to me. They did not grab my purse or my mare. It was like they were creatures who put their claws away because I had shown my proper face – like how the air is always better when the storm’s come in and gone. We all looked upon ourselves, brushed our clothes of rain. I straightened out my skirts and tried to make my hair less of thatchy.
The plum-faced one said hanging is a greater sin than most folk are hung for. As if he was trying to comfort me.
I sniffed. I said yes.
He looked at me. I know Thorneyburnbank he said. Near Hexham? Does it have a cherry tree? And then he looked so sad, so empty and sad that I felt sorry for him, and had no fear at all. He looked about the ground at my herbs, and he said what can you do? Can you mend?
Some things.
Can you mend his eyes? For the poor one on the ground was still bloodied.
I said I reckon so.
How about sewing? Cooking?
These were not my best things but I could do them. I said yes.
He nodded. Mend his eyes, he said. Mend my cough and that one’s foot and sew a jerkin or two, and we’ll give you some meat. And you can rest a while.
He helped me to gather Cora’s herbs, and put them in my purse.
I followed them through the trees. I walked with the drip drip and my mare blowing her nose, and I whispered to myself, to her, to what it is that sees us and hears us – God, or spirits, or the hidden self, or all these things – this, now, is my second life.
It began as Cora’s ended.
My second, galloping life.
They were ghosts, Mr Leslie.
Not spectres made of mist,