The Witch Within
Authors: Iva Kenaz
The Witch Within
A
Novel by
Iva Kenaz
Copyright © 2014 Iva Kenaz
(a.k.a Iva Stojakova)
All rights reserved worldwide.
No part of this e-book may be copied or sold without the author's consent.
Edited by:
Judi Blaze and Katrina Sisowath
DEDICATION
For my guardians and guides, who help me write,
for Gunni and Max, my mom and sister,
for Talitha
and those who also seek the witch within,
with gratitude and love
Introduction
Throughout history, parts of Bohemia were considered cursed, uninhabitable, therefore hidden away and patrolled by the church and the egregore of the cross that concealed the abstruse landscapes. But in the pre-Christian era, those places were considered sacred and provided thresholds to other dimensions, the worlds of fairies, natural spirits and the dead.
During the dark ages, when the outburst of witch hunts spread over central Europe, the places were more feared than ever and anyone who dared to explore them was ghastly punished. The spirits grew desperate, calling for the attention of those who could still hear them.
Although this story is based on the latent history of the Bohemian lands; the plot and the characters are constructed, shedding light on the long-gone mysteries.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter 6 – Temple of my Ancestors
Somewhere in South Bohemia, sometime in the 16
th
century
I'm running, remembering to breathe, struggling not to stop before I reach the ancient trees. I yearn to forget, but I keep recalling the humiliation, the curses, the pain, the fear, the embarrassment, the ridicule, the sticks and stones, my hurting bones, the painful bruises, the belligerent faces of the people who kicked and slapped me, the cloud of their hissing voices over me, and then my father’s hand lifting me up. The distance in his face! And the horrid realisation that he’s not going to stand up for me. He’s just going to silently drag me home because I’m an embarrassment. And then it stings me again – how they hate me. How they all hate me! I remember the apple that hit my head. A dark red one fully matured. It fell to the ground, got stomped on and crushed and I felt sorry for it, because it was also forsaken. Then the malicious face of the old woman who knew nothing about me, yet pronounced me to be a witch!
I'm running along the harvested fields, desperately trying to shake off the feeling of inequity and let down, yet I know it will persevere. Flashes of yesterday’s horror keep drifting through my mind. Will those painful images torment me for the rest of my life? The sadness in my father’s eyes, my sister’s piercing judgemental expression, my mother’s disappointment. They all renounced me; they silently approved all the lies. How could they suddenly all become strangers? How could they turn into ice when they used to feel so warm? How could they suddenly call me a heretic! Have they already buried me in their minds or do they still want me dead? Their ashen motionless faces concealed the truth.
I knew with incontrovertible certainty that they were going to bring me to the local court the next day, to satisfy the crowd that now knows and calls for justice. Justice. I used to believe in that word, I believed there was such virtue in people, but I have awakened from that naive delusion. There is no such thing as justice, there is only judgement. And I received far too much of that yesterday. But God knows that I have judged as well, many times in my life. I even judged my own grandmother when my mother told me she was a witch. I wanted to know her side of the story, but there was no time, she fled before we could talk properly. They were eventually going to stone her to death or burn her at the stake and so she had decided to take off before the hatred culminated. I knew where she was going to hide, but never told anyone. Her shelter lies in the land that everybody fears the most, the forested space that no sane man would ever dare to visit. The Cursed Lands. The lands I’m heading to. I have woken to that distant night, the one that I once shunned to the web of time. The night that my grandmother visited me for the last time.
She came to the window of the room where my siblings and I rested, whispered a prayer and placed a white quartz stone that she had been wearing on her chest onto the small crack above the window sill, because she believed it would protect us. I couldn’t sleep that night and I noticed her standing there, her abundant silver white hair glistened in the moonlight.
She was glad that I was up and instead of placing the quartz above the window, she placed it into my palm. Then she locked her eyes with mine so intensely that I knew at once—she was trying to carve the message into my heart:
“You know where I’m going. One day you will have to follow me. I will give you a sign when the time comes. Do not fear the Cursed Lands, because together we have the power to lift the burden of the curse and free our kin at last.”
Then she walked away into the darkness and all that was left of her was the white quartz incised with a six-pointed star. It still held her warmth and that warmth spread over my skin and sunk into my veins, dissolved into my blood and concealed her strength within me. I’ve never worried about her since, I simply knew that she was going to be all right. Yet I was confused by the gossip and the harsh assumptions of other people, including my father. My mother never stood up for her, she was ashamed to be the daughter of the hated outcast, the wild woman that dared to enter the Cursed Lands and thus was swallowed up by infernal flames. Now I understand my mother more than ever. She was simply afraid. Afraid that one day she wouldn’t be able to hide her heritage. Was our family gifted or cursed? To her it certainly was more of a curse and she probably also feared that one of her daughters might awake that curse.
I was just six years-old when my grandmother fled. I couldn’t understand why people thought it was strange that she used to go out into the woods at night to absorb the moonlight or that she walked barefoot over the meadows in the mornings to soak up the sunlight. I often accompanied her when she bathed naked in the remote river at sunset or when she would gather herbs during a full moon. I liked our secret trips; they always had the scent of a festive adventure.
But ever since my grandmother fled, my mother warned me to forget about her and about everything that she had ever told me or taught me. She said that it was all wrong and encouraged me to be a humble, quiet girl, just as she was, to simply say my prayers every night and beg the Lord to cleanse my soul of her influence. She said that she had had to do the same when she met my father; she had to become a normal girl and banish all of her mother’s unwelcome teachings. I did what she told me without questioning it, because I was just as afraid as she was. And so I slowly buried all my memories deep down into those secret corners of my heart. I have always felt guilty about missing grandma, but not anymore. Now I desire to recall all of those memories, all of her precious teachings, for now I know that she was not a witch, she was just as misunderstood as I am.
*
I stumble and stagger for a while, but manage to keep on running. I have never run so fast in my life. I keep turning back, still not fully grasping the reality of the moment. How hard it is to say goodbye to the life I used to live, although yesterday it felt as though I didn’t belong there anymore, like an unwelcome spirit, a demon who would eventually be brought to an exorcist and sent back to where he belonged— to hell. It felt like I had already entered hell, trapped in the dim corners of the house, the dismal corners of my soul, trying to find a way out, clinging to any sign of light. I kept assuring myself that love would conquer hatred and that the silly misunderstanding would be cleared up eventually. I was hoping that at least my mother would come to me and tell me that she trusted my side of the story. Trusted that I was really only trying to help and that help had simply failed. That I was going to bring life, not death, to my poor little brother, whom I had loved and cherished since the day he was born. Such a pure soul, little angel...I couldn’t just let him die! He had his whole life ahead of him. How could we just sit and wait for God to take him away, when help was right there within reach? I’ve tried to be like my mother until now, suppressing the urge that I was born with, the urge to help others, the urge to appreciate the knowledge of my grandmother and her ancestors, the lore that is inherent in our blood. I have tried hard to suppress it all, but love is stronger than fear. The little angel needed me and I had to help.
My mother didn’t come to calm me down last night, neither did my sister, and so I struggled to fall asleep, hoping that the next morning I would awake and realise that it had all just been an awful nightmare. That my brother was still alive, that he had never been mauled by that wolf and that I’d never had to use the potion and the healing methods of my grandmother. But instead, I had a vision of a deer, a tall majestic deer in the middle of the beautifully colourful September forest, wooing me in the hope I’d follow him. I knew it was the deer my grandmother had once saved. He has been grateful to her since and whenever they met, he would look at her the way he had looked at me in that vision – wisely and amiably. Then I heard my grandmother’s anxious cry:
“Now is the time, Talitha! Run!”
And so I keep on running and pass another field, the one not yet harvested. I still turn occasionally, haunted by a strange hunch that someone is following me. But if it is so, then it must be just a mirage, a lost spirit or a lurking demon waiting for an opportunity to enter my tortured mind, because I'm nearing the lands of the cursed. No living man would follow me all the way here, I refuse to believe that. As I glance back one last time, I try to inscribe the image of home into my mind. The dismal village covered in morning mist, still so quiet, only a few occasional roosters crowing. People are still asleep, peaceful in their dreams. What makes them awake from the wondrous dreamlands and start creating living nightmares? What makes them behave so cruelly when they seem so beautifully calm when they are asleep? Unstoppable tears start flowing down my cheeks until they reach my palms, my clothes, the ground.
I cover myself in the dark brown cloak that I stole from my sister. I can’t help myself, I feel so lonely and disappointed. I used to think my family was my world, my haven, my joy. I used to admire my father and trust his opinions, decisions, and humbly obeyed his rules. Now I doubt everything he believes in. He claims it’s the only good, but why does it seem so ill to me? Why is it sinful to use healing herbs if one is sick? Why is it devious to use my hands if I know they have the power to transmit my love? Why was my grandmother a witch in his eyes if all she ever did was help others? And why was she considered ungrateful? She never took anything from nature without saying “thank you.”
I used to look up to my mother, her peaceful and warm presence. I always thought her selflessness and submission were her virtues. I believed that every woman should be so modest. But now I'm not sure any more. For what do we have voices and tongues if we are not allowed to speak? For what do we have our hearts if we can’t even dare to feel? For what do we have our eyes if we are forbidden to see?