The Witch's Trinity (24 page)

I began to weep in the rain of refuse.

“Stop! Stop this!” cried the friar. “We are in God’s holy space. Cease at once!”

I continued to cry even as the onslaught stopped. I used my sleeve as best I could to clean myself. I glared at Irmeltrud. Of all suggestions she could make, this one was the worst: that I was to blame for this village’s suffering. How could she? She who cleaved to my son and lived within the walls of the cottage my husband built. “How could you?” I cried out to her. “How can you say that I make fields falter? I am only an old woman. I have no such power!”

She stood there, still with her hands folded, her eyes cast down.

I shook out my sleeve at her, and the aim, though unintentional, was true. A smattering of defecation hit her, full in the face. She raised her eyes to me, and I saw a curious, horrible mixture of emotions. Guilt foremost, and then, rising equally as strong, hatred.

“I am hungry too!” I cried to the women. “Do you see that I am fattened and happy while you are lean? I am the leanest of all of you! I have eaten hardly a week’s worth in the entire month past! At every chance, Irmeltrud has lessened the portion that was to be mine. I have eaten only crumbs, while you have eaten more!”

“The accused is not to speak at this time,” said the friar.

“It is only God’s will that makes the field unyielding! Blame God!” I said.

“You blaspheme,” said the friar. He turned to make sure his man recorded what I said.

“It is the devil,
through you,
that makes our village hunger,” said Irmeltrud. Her voice put me in mind of the icicles that develop from our roof. Ice cold, in the shape of a weapon.

I knew then that I would not share the
Pillen
with her. I would take both myself and drift into a fire-colored dream while her flesh melted from her bones in full agony. I was fiercely glad I had the power to help her but would withhold it. I began to laugh then, thinking of how she had spited herself.

“Do you laugh in the midst of such a severe proceeding?” asked the friar.

“I do,” I said.

“Then this showeth the force of the devil within you, that you care not for your own bodily danger.”

“You’ll burn me whatever I say or do,” I said to him, though I continued to stare at Irmeltrud in the worst, reddest hatred I have ever felt. “You came to our village to kill someone, and you were not satisfied with Künne, for she was silent upon the stake. You will burn me and my son’s wife, and her screams shall satisfy you. Tomorrow you will go to Flußstadt and burn whomever you shall find there.”

“I only punish those who are guilty,” said the friar.

“Then let us make quickness of it, so that we may find Irmeltrud’s guilt as well. Here it all is; I confess it. There was a prick upon my forehead. I am sure that is in Irmeltrud’s list of accusations. The devil with his foremost fang did bite upon me and I enjoyed the bite. All that is corrupt in me rejoiced at his marking of me. See, the mark may yet endure if it has not healed.” I gestured to my forehead and the notary paused a moment in his writing, to see if he saw the mark. He shook his head and wrote again.

“I was a friend of Künne Himmelmann, who confessed her evil and was burned at the stake for it. Do you think we were friends in village matters only? No, she shared with me all that the devil told her, and she brought me to the
Hexe
circle in the forest and bade me tarry there, to learn all the craft. There I learned how to sour Herr Kueper’s milk, for he is a sour man.”

I paused, wondering if I should go the extra step. Irmeltrud’s fists were white with pressure as she clenched her hands. Our eyes met and I felt the pure, blank loathing between us. I next looked at Herr Kueper. He nodded that I admitted to souring his milk, but his wife looked fury-filled at my calling him sour. She lifted her lips to me in a sneer, and that decided me. I
would
take that extra step, just as I wished Jost was stepping on the woodland path toward me. And why wasn’t Herr Kueper out there stepping himself, in the direst cold? Why did he stand here warm and cozy? I tasted bile in my mouth.

“Not only is he sour,” I said. I slowed my voice to earn the soft inhale of everyone as they waited. “But Herr Kueper is a witch himself! I spoiled his milk, for in the woods I saw him rutting with another witch not his wife. I wished to punish him for his betrayal. His wife is not pretty to look at, but she is fastened to him by God and troth.”

She hissed at me and he blanched.

“I know you are off to Flußstadt tomorrow, Friar. You must try Herr Kueper now, under accusation of witchcraft. I accuse him! He is of my circle!”

“She lies!” he burst out.

“Put his name down,” said the friar to his notary. Frau Kueper screamed.

“What other accusations do you have against me, Irmeltrud?” I asked. “I think I have named them all, have I not?” The air shimmered between us. It was as if the fire had already been started. I looked down at her shoes, thinking of how her feet would soon be engulfed in flames.

“There is another thing I might speak of,” she said to the friar.

“Then speak.”

“This very morning, she told me of a flight she took in the night.”

My heart stopped. Oh, surely she knew how dangerous this was to speak of!

“Irmeltrud, speak not of this. You shall incriminate him whom you love best,” I pleaded.

I listened in disbelief as she continued. “Last night, as I slept the sleep of the innocent, she took the form of an owl and flew through the woods to find the hunters’ party.”

“No! False!” I interrupted her. Did she not understand what she was about to say?

“Which she indeed found!” she said. “All in the form of wolves!”

There was great outcry. All swarmed forward to hear this treachery, that the men of the village were transformed into wolves. I heard a thud as the baker’s wife hit the ground in a dead faint, her skull knocking the hard dirt. Everyone was shouting. Soon I couldn’t see Irmeltrud for the bodies between us. And above all the din was the friar’s voice asking for calm so that the proceedings could recommence.

“What say you?” a woman screamed. “Do you mean all our menfolk are witches?”

“You wicked whore!” cried another. “The men are only seeking food for us!”

There was tremendous spitting, and though I couldn’t see Irmeltrud’s face I knew she was sopping wet from all the women’s mouths.

“She tells a witch’s lies!” I called out, and this cry was undertaken by two women nearest me. Although I had feared the worst, that Jost’s return would be marked by the friar’s seizing of him, it had turned the other way. No one would accept that all the men were guilty. They would gladly see Herr Kueper burn, and Irmeltrud and me in particular, but they would not accept Irmeltrud’s tale. Therefore she told a witch’s lies.

Soon it was taken up as a chant, and I was reminded of how we all used to intone the prayers of the mass together, but back then our voices were quiet and sober; now they were lusty and in great fervor. “She tells a witch’s lies! She tells a witch’s lies!”

I closed my eyes and smiled at the shouts. I had become a vindictive old woman indeed, but when would I have time to repent? I’d be burned in an hour hence, and all my shame would burn with me. Ha ha!

They fell upon Irmeltrud, slapping her and wrenching at her skirts. I was shocked at the sound of skin’s mistreatment. All the touching in my long life was barely heard: caresses, long strokes. I took a fierce gladness in the rude sounds.

Finally, the friar succeeded at calming the group. “I am ordained to complete these proceedings, and we have yet another accused to question. Please! Sit yourselves upon the benches or stand a respectful distance away!”

Because they were all deadly curious what might now happen to Irmeltrud, they did as he asked. I saw my own pleased smile mirrored on all their hateful faces.

I looked out over them and saw poor Alke and Matern huddled on the bench, their heads hidden. It was an odd posture, almost as if they were crumpled in sleep, but they did not look relaxed. Frau Zweig laid a hand on each. I looked also for Herr Kueper and didn’t see him. Nor his wife. “Friar!” I called, malicious in my power. “I believe the Kuepers took advantage of the clamor and have fled!”

Whom had I become? Who was I? I pushed these thoughts to the back of my head. Jost would never have to see me this way. I would be dead and gone and any tales told of me he would never believe.

The friar dispatched his notary and another man to find the Kuepers, and since the ceremony could not be recorded, we all simply waited. Now that the view was clear, I could again see Irmeltrud’s face. Unable to stand, she had shrunk onto a bench in front. She was sobbing. Her skirts were torn. The villagers had done more than spit.

In the silence as we waited, I thought again of Jost’s feet stepping in the snow. First the left and then the right. Then again. Cycle. Everything was cycle in our woods. A woman dies in childbirth, but her eldest daughter conceives. The beetle is eaten by the bird, which is eaten by the man. Who dies as his baby bawls in the cradle. And then a wondrous image took to my mind. Instead of the slow, plodding man step, I saw the swift trot of a wolf’s paw. Ah, yes! For as much as a man struggles in the snow, a beast skims along the surface easily. Quick joy seized me. The wolf could do more than trot, it could run! It could make a journey in minutes that took a man an hour. I took up again my prayer.
Thank you, wolf. Thank you for your speed, for your cunning paws. Thank you for your strong muscles to stretch the legs and make them fast. Thank you for your breath, heaving into the air as frost.

What did I care if he came as a wolf? As long as he came!

They were not long in returning, for the Kuepers had been foolish enough to try to pack up blankets and whatever else they might, rather than fleeing at once to the woods. In great shame they were brought back and put on the bench next to Irmeltrud, their hands tied together as if they were oxen of the same yoke. I looked at their terrified faces and felt no guilt. Hadn’t they done the same to me? Frau Kueper tried to catch my eye and beg with hers. I looked her full square in the eye and might have shrugged for all I felt.

“We will recommence now,” said the friar. “I am gravely concerned for this village. You have defiled this inquisition, all of you, with the excrement of your own bodies. Among you sit more to be accused, I am certain, for it seems Künne’s unholy influence was duly worked among all of you.

“Now, Irmeltrud, wife of Jost, was listing the crimes for which she accuses Güde. Do you pick up, Frau, and continue what you say.”

“She said she flew out in the night in the form of an owl and saw all our men transformed as wolves,” said Irmeltrud. “But
she
is the one who tells witches’ lies! I am only the one to repeat the lie here for you.”

“I did no such thing,” I said. “I lay on the flea-ridden straw last night as I have every night. My son’s wife tells lies as twisted as her hair in its braids.”

Commotion again! I watched the fingers pointing, and took pleasure at where they pointed. She was the first to bring the wretched idea to their minds, and therefore she was mistress of its ugliness.

“So you deny the charge that you told her of a night flight where you saw the hunters’ party as beasts of the wood,” said the friar.

“I do most heartily deny it,” I said.

“You are a snake in a woman,” said Irmeltrud. “I wonder at myself, that I kept a serpent penned in with me and my children for so long without the realizing of it.”

“I am no snake,” I said. “A snake brought an apple to Eve and coaxed her to eat. I had no apple to offer, no grain, no meat. I had empty hands with which to trick you.”

“And my hands too were empty,” she said.

“Enough,” said the friar. “A woman can beguile whether she has anything of value to trade. Do you freely confess, Güde, to the other accusation, that you have brought famine onto this village by your malevolence?”

“No, sir, for you see I am like a bone myself.”

“And what of the other accusations? Do you freely confess to souring the milk and consorting with the devil? Of accepting his bite upon your brow?”

I took in a deep breath. A denial would mean nothing, would trouble the friar as much as a flea upon a dog five leagues hence. I stared at his face, bland and yet intense at the same time. He came to a village, barely knew its people, and decided who would die. Such power.