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Authors: Karen Maitland

The Vanishing Witch

BOOK: The Vanishing Witch
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Copyright © 2014 Karen Maitland

The right of Karen Maitland to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

This Ebook edition first published by Headline Publishing Group in 2014

All characters – apart from the obvious historical ones – in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons,
living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Cataloguing in Publication Data is available from the British Library

eISBN: 978 1 4722 1502 4

HEADLINE PUBLISHING GROUP

An Hachette UK Company

338 Euston Road

London NW1 3BH

www.headline.co.uk

www.hachette.co.uk

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright Page

About Karen Maitland

Praise

About the Book

Also By

Epigraph

Cast of Characters

Proem

Prologue

September 1380

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

October

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

November

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

December

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

January

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

February

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

March

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

April

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

Chapter 31

May

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Chapter 38

Chapter 39

June

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Chapter 43

Chapter 44

Chapter 45

Chapter 46

Chapter 47

Chapter 48

Chapter 49

Chapter 50

Chapter 51

Chapter 52

Chapter 53

July

Chapter 54

Chapter 55

Chapter 56

Chapter 57

Chapter 58

Chapter 59

Chapter 60

Chapter 61

Chapter 62

August

Chapter 63

Chapter 64

Chapter 65

Chapter 66

Chapter 67

Chapter 68

Chapter 69

September 1381

Chapter 70

Chapter 71

Chapter 72

Chapter 73

Chapter 74

Epilogue

Historical Notes

Timeline of the Events of the Peasants' Revolt

Glossary

About Karen Maitland

© John C. Gibson

Karen Maitland travelled and worked in many parts of the United Kingdom before settling for many years in the beautiful medieval city of Lincoln, an inspiration for her writing. She is the author of
The White Room
,
Company of Liars
,
The Owl Killers
,
The Gallows Curse
and
The Falcons of Fire and Ice
. She has recently relocated to a life of rural bliss in Devon. To find out
more, visit
www.karenmaitland.com
.

Praise for
Karen Maitland

‘Karen Maitland neatly captures the spirit of primitive superstition’
Daily Express

‘Passion and peril. A compelling blend of historical grit and supernatural twists’
Daily Mail
on
The Falcons of Fire and Ice

‘A ripping tale . . . full of colour and detail’
Daily Telegraph
on
The Gallows Curse

‘Scarily good. Imagine
The Wicker Man
crossed with
The Birds

Marie Claire
on
The Owl Killers

‘Combines the storytelling traditions of
The Canterbury Tales
with the supernatural suspense of Kate Mosse’s
Sepulchre
in this atmospheric tale of treachery and magic’
Marie Claire
on
Company of Liars

About the Book

The reign of Richard II is troubled, the poor are about to become poorer still and the landowners are lining their pockets. It’s a case of every man for himself, whatever his status or wealth. But in a world where nothing can be taken at face value, who can you trust?

The dour wool merchant?

His impulsive son?

His stepdaughter with the bewitching eyes?

Or the raven-haired widow
clutching her necklace of bloodstones?

And when people start dying unnatural deaths and the peasants decide it’s time to fight back, it becomes all too easy to spy witchcraft at every turn.

By Karen Maitland

The White Room

Company of Liars

The Owl Killers

The Gallows Curse

The Falcons of Fire and Ice

Liars and Thieves (novella)

‘The children born of thee are sword and fire,

Red ruin, and the breaking up of laws.’

The Idylls of the King
, Alfred Lord Tennyson (1809–92)

‘So hideous was the noise, a benedicite!

Certes he, Jack Straw and all his meinie,

Ne made never shouts so shrill

When that they would any Fleming kill.’

A reference to the Peasants’ Revolt in
The Canterbury Tales
Geoffrey Chaucer (c.1340–1400)

The scrupulous and the just, the noble, humane, and devoted natures; the unselfish and the intelligent may begin a movement – but it passes away from them. They are not the leaders of a revolution. They are its victims.

Under Western Eyes
, Joseph Conrad (1857–1924)

Cast of Characters
Lincoln

Robert of Bassingham
– wool merchant and landowner in Lincoln

Jan
– Robert’s eldest son and steward

Adam
– Robert’s twelve-year-old son

Edith
– Robert’s wife

Maud
– Edith’s cousin

Beata
– Edith’s maid

Tenney
– Robert’s manservant

Catlin
– a wealthy widow

Leonia
– Catlin’s thirteen-year-old daughter

Edward
– Catlin’s adult son

Diot
– Catlin’s maid

Warrick

Widow Catlin’s late husband

Hugo Bayus
– elderly physician

Father Remigius
– Robert’s parish priest

Fulk
– overseer at Robert’s warehouse

Tom
– Robert’s rent-collector

Hugh de Garwell
– member of the Common Council of Lincoln and former Member of the Parliament

Thomas Thimbleby of Poolham
– Sheriff of Lincoln

Matthew Johan
– Florentine merchant in Lincoln

Master Warner
– Adam’s schoolmaster

Henry de Sutton
– a boy at Adam’s school

Sister Ursula
– nun at the Infirmary of St Mary Magdalene

Godwin
– a seafarer

Greetwell (a village on the outskirts of Lincoln)

Gunter
– a river boatman

Nonie
– Gunter’s wife

Royse
– Gunter and Nonie’s fourteen-year-old daughter

Hankin
– Gunter and Nonie’s twelve-year-old son

Col
– Gunter and Nonie’s four-year-old son

Martin
– rival boatman

Alys
– Martin’s wife

Simon
– Martin’s son

London

Thomas Farringdon
– leader of the Essex men

Giles
– rebel from Essex

Proem

Legend tells that seven hundred years before our story begins . . .

. . . in the days of the Saxons, in the kingdom of Lindsey, there was Ealdorman who had a beautiful daughter, Æthelind. She was famed throughout all her tribe not only for her knowledge of herbs and healing, but for her ability to tame animals. There was no bucking horse that would not grow calm when she fearlessly laid
her hand upon its flank, or a savage dog that would not roll over like a puppy when she approached.

One day when she was out in the forest gathering herbs, the men were hunting a wild boar that had killed several villagers and trampled their crops. As their hounds trailed after it, they saw to their horror that it had changed course and was charging straight towards Æthelind. When she grasped
its lethal tusks, it laid its great head meekly in her lap, and there remained until the huntsmen came to slay it. In gratitude for her bravery, her people gave her an amulet for her cloak in the form of a golden boar’s head studded with red garnets.

Æthelind’s reputation spread far and wide and many noble Saxons came to ask for her hand in marriage. Her father finally agreed to give his daughter
to the son of the king himself, a match that would bring great honour to his hall, peace and prosperity to the tribe.

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