The Witch's Trinity (20 page)

14

They are not content with their own sins and perdition, but draw countless others after them.

—M
ALLEUS
M
ALEFICARUM

T
he friar returned in the morning and I was so relieved to see him that I bent and kissed his hand.

“Holy man of God,” I said as I remained crouched, “I am much refreshed to see one who embraces the lightness of Christ. I have spent such a hard night, sir!”

“Sit, Güde. And confess to me what has plagued you in the nighttime.” His notary opened the door, bringing the carved chair again for the friar and a large radish for me. I sat cross-legged on the ground at the friar’s ankles, like a child awaiting a good fairy tale. I took one bite of the radish and shrank at the desperately loud sound it made. I chewed what was already in my mouth, swallowed, and buried the rest in my skirts.

“There is a woman from the village of Steindorf,” I began. “Unlike us, she has raven-colored hair. I have seen her in years past, enjoying the merrymaking at our fests. She and her sister, also dark. One night, both Jost and I were out abroad, but in different parts of the forest. I had been put out by my daughter-in-law. I wandered up the hill—”

“Irmeltrud put you out?”

I flushed. “That isn’t the important part.”

He gave a significant look to the notary, who hovered behind his chair. “Pray continue.”

“Well, sir, I was wandering fruitlessly, hoping my son would come for me and usher me home. But instead he was checking his traps, and he found a beautiful snow-white rabbit with one black stripe. That was the sister of Fronika of Steindorf. I know not if she struggled in the trap and he had to wring her neck…regardless, that night we later feasted on her. And Fronika, angered at the sight of the hunter gathering up the rabbit, flew through the forest until she found me, to wreak her revenge. She called out all the witches, and they gathered there and tempted me with pig meat.”

“Can you name all the witches? Was Irmeltrud there?”

“No, not Irmeltrud! She is my accuser, sir. The one you spake with in my cottage!”

“I know well who Irmeltrud is,” he said. “And the others?”

“I knew them not. They were shadows in the woods. I think they were not of our village.”

“I am doubtful of that,” he said. “This village seems to be the seat of all the evil.”

“But Fronika and her sister were from Steindorf—”

“So it would seem to a simple peasant woman. But I have access to higher knowledge. I have read copiously upon this subject. The witches are full of trickery and games of perception. And you have been caught up in their games.”

“Yes, sir!” I agreed breathlessly. “I was tricked! For the book that they had, of names of souls, I never signed it and yet my name appeared in it magically!”

“Did you see the devil, Güde?”

“Yes, sir, with full, wide hooves and a man’s body. In fact, he…”

“Do not stop.”

“He had the face of my dear Hensel, departed these many years ago from the plague.”

“Was there fornication in the woods?”

“Yes, with all involved.”

“And you?”

“Yes.”

“That is grievous news indeed. For such is the seed of evil spread, through the wretched womb of woman.”

“But I am past childbearing years, sir.”

“It makes no matter!” he bellowed. “You carry the seeds within you, wicked woman!”

“But I repent most wholesomely, sir! I am glad to leave behind those women, for I never wished to be part of them. It was all trickery, to show me the face of the husband I loved. How could I resist?”

“Many have, Güde,” he said sternly.

“I am weak, Friar. There is little flesh under this loose skin. For it was as much the offer of meat as the showing of my husband that caused me to become one of them.”

“Hunger!” He laughed, a coarse sound that was hollowed in the small confines of the stone tower. “You blame the loss of your
soul
on hunger!”

I wanted to ask if he had ever been hungry—his fine, thick form did not suggest it—but I knew he would take such a question as an insult.

“Güde, since you are making full confession, I have no need of the instrument I showed you yesterday. My notary will sit with you, writing down all you say, to gather the story of your lapse from goodness. Tomorrow you shall go before the tribunal to make a public confession, and then you will be sentenced.”

My fingers clenched into fists in my lap. My neck was aching from staring up at him.
You will be sentenced….
I shifted in the dirt and rallied my spirits to ask the question that made my heart pound only to think it. But I had to ask. I had to. I began in a whimper, and started over. “Is there…is there any pardon for one who makes a full confession?”

“Not for one whose soul no longer belongs to God. You said yourself, Güde, that your name appears in the devil’s book. You are not one of ours any longer. I could not save you now if I wished to.”

“But I’m unsure of whether my name appears there!” I rose to my feet, clutching at his hands. The radish fell to the ground. “I think that too is part of their trickery! It wasn’t Hensel, sir; he’s in heaven with our Holy Father. I saw only the
appearance
of Hensel. And likewise, perhaps only the
appearance
of my signature!”

“We cannot take that risk. If you did sign, you are a contagion like the plague, and you will spread your foulness to those around you. You did rut with the devil, Güde. You admit that. The seeds are festering within you.”

“Maybe that too was an illusion! And I am an old woman. I have seen my own son and not known his name! I forget things. I cannot provide a good report of the doings of the world!”

“To ascertain that your soul is pure, we should cleanse you. Would you not prefer that to continuing your life and then burning in hell forevermore? I offer you a short amount of pain here on earth, and then release from eternal hellfire.”

“Isn’t there a way to prove I am not a witch, sir? The boiling water trial that Künne underwent? Or may I be relieved of my sins? Isn’t that why our savior Jesus Christ was nailed to a cross?”

“He provides relief from mortal sins only; yours is an immortal sin, by which you have lost your soul. Fire is the only purifier.”

I stepped backward in horror, twisting my ankle on the radish. I fell, shrieking in pain.

“See? That is the devil’s work there, Güde. He is working on you, even here in my holy influence.”

I panicked. What could I say? I knew I had the
Pillen
to make the burning painless, but I still feared to end my life that way, with all the townsfolk watching in hatred. I drew a trembling finger through the dirt, thinking. The friar remained silent, waiting. The sight of my finger made me think of how I numbered the stones by hand. And I had an idea.

“If I were a witch, truly,” I said, “would I not be able to fly through these stones and make my escape?”

The friar blinked. “Witches do have the power to move through wood and stone.”

“But Künne remained trapped here, as do I!”

“Are you saying to me that I condemned Künne in error?”

I sat up and hunched myself over to seem as humble as possible. “No, sir,” I said, although it hurt my every inch to say so. “I do believe Künne trafficked with the devil and his minions. You were right to put her to death. But I am unlike Künne. The spirits of the forest picked me for spiteful play. I am only an old woman, sir, and I am God’s faithful servant and—”

“Your case is most perplexing,” he interrupted. “I will consult my book and return. Tell my notary everything you saw in the woods.”

He got up and left, his robes moving like a pennant waving in a slow wind. I picked up my dirty radish and ate it as I told the notary of everything I had seen.

That night, a storm tore through the heavens. Shivering and terrified, I put as many branches into the fire as I could. Soon I would have none left. But I didn’t care. I lit up my tower until it was so bright that the lightning’s flashes barely made a difference. I became so warmed my face grew as rosy as in the days of festival dancing, when it was men and their smiles that brought the blush to my cheeks. I stared into the yellows, whites, and even blues of this fire, the curl of the flame that unfurled and then was instantly gone. This too was like magic. If a cat could stand upon my sill and vanish and be named magical, why was this vanishing not understood the same way? Perhaps this was a bit of evil we all kept in our homes unwittingly? But this was a blasphemous thought. Fire was reserved to torment those in hell, so it was a tool of God’s, not his fallen enemy. The stones of the tower took on a glaze of yellow, nearly beautiful in the flickering haziness.

The dizzying crackle of a piece of wood giving itself up to the fire…I stared and saw the reflection of each fire of my life: as I sat quiet in my girlhood carding wool and thinking whom I might become in womanhood, as I stoked it and built it with fallen tree branches I myself dragged to the hut, as I dried Jost’s hair before it after a washing, as I dried my own and watched it graying, as I spread winter garments before it to dry, as I put a kettle to boil or snow to melt…as I always dreamed, as I always watched the sparks for aught to tell me. The fire never spake, but I dreamed with it all the same. I admired it. I knew nothing else that had such power.

I touched the hotness of my face and tried to become easy with the thought of my own death, as I knew Künne must’ve struggled to. I wished the Lord might take my sleeping body. Or that a fever would take me. Or a toothache spread into my brain, like old Jutte Fink three-odd years ago. The idea of quitting this life to see Hensel again, the
true
Hensel, was actually something I longed for. I would be sorely beset to say goodbye to Jost, but it would be a pleasure to leave behind this slow and spindly body and be again robust for Hensel.

Oh, to no longer feel the cold wind seep through my garments! To never feel the pangs of hunger again! But I knew I could not bear the pain or smell of my own flesh burning.

One of our men had once ridden his horse all the way to Frankfurt and he told us of a terrible custom he’d seen in the town square. A man had been accused of theft and would not admit it. The lawmen therefore put his feet to the flame. He sat there watching his own feet burn, unable to move them as his ankles were trapped in cuffs of iron. The entire town hooted at this man as he screamed unearthly screams. The man who told us this was highly agitated, and would have intervened to help the poor accused if he hadn’t known that the mob, so gay at the man’s torment, would surely have included him in whatever tortures might follow.

“If the pain didn’t kill him,” our villager said, “he would become sick later while tramping through the mud and slops of the town on his stumps.”

I didn’t know why this story should linger with me as I went to recline on the straw, thinking that this could be the last evening of my life. More useful for preparing my mind would be the thought of Künne and the fire
she
endured.

But there was something about the Frankfurt story that stuck in my mind. It was the idea of the man sitting there, as if at leisure, watching his feet burn. At least at the stake one is elevated, alert. One’s legs are under one and ready to run, should the possibility arise.

I thought too of the cat who was a witch in beast guise. Were all cats so?

And why had I been punished for eating of Fronika’s sister? Why hadn’t she transformed herself once trapped, and used her hands to free herself? Or screamed to her sister for help? Everyone knew how hungry we all were. It was not Jost’s fault he set out a trap. Every man had!

Just then the door opened and Irmeltrud was pushed inside. She was soaking wet. She ran right at me and shook a finger in my face. “What did you say to them?” she demanded.

For a moment I was speechless.

“Answer me, you useless old hag!”

I was trying to understand. Why had she been so rudely pushed into the chamber?

“I swear, Güde, you should have died in the snow the night Jost caught the rabbit. It was horrible looking at the meat in the pan, just waiting for you. Ten different times I went to cut it up for Alke and Matern and your son stopped me. What for?
What for?
” She spat upon the ground. “And now you’ve said something to them,” she continued.