Chapter Thirty-Six

“I demand her release. She has done naught wrong, and stands innocent.”

“Innocent?” The clerk who faced Malcolm over the polished wooden desk repeated the word as if he’d never heard it before, though he must have, a thousand times—in cries, shrieks, entreaties.

This place raised the hairs on the back of Malcolm’s neck. From the moment he’d walked in, it seemed he could hear those cries and entreaties even though, in truth, he could not. Misery permeated the very air.

He glared at the clerk. The man wore a wig and a sour, supercilious expression. He looked both annoyed and confident in his position. Malcolm, not certain how to deal with such a dangerous authority, nevertheless knew one mistake on his part could harm Tansy’s chances most terribly.

No diplomat, him. Used to battling with a sword in his hands, he usually only negotiated with men of the same mind. This exchange felt like a trap, and fraught with peril.

“Aye, sir, innocent,” he repeated firmly. “She is my betrothed and has been accused falsely.”

The clerk lifted his eyebrows. It had taken hours for Malcolm to achieve an audience with him; now it appeared he might be dismissed summarily. But the man pulled a thick sheaf of foolscap toward him. “Betrothed, eh? What was the name again?”

“Tansy Bellrose Gant.”

The man began rifling through the sheets. Outside, a wagon pulled up, to the accompaniment of screaming. From where he stood, Malcolm could see through two doorways and just glimpse what happened there; burly men wrestled with an aged woman and dragged her from the bed of the wagon.

Not Tansy then. But nay, she’d already been hauled away into the bowels of this dreadful place. From one dungeon, at Dun Ballan, to another here.

He stood while the woman, her bloodshot eyes rolling like those of a panicked horse, was towed in between two men. They paused beside Malcolm, and he made full eye contact with the woman.

“Help me! I am no’—”

“Nellie Robertson,” one of the men said to the clerk. “Witchcraft.”

The clerk nodded and wrote the name and charge down carefully on the top sheet. The men hauled the screaming woman away.

Malcolm, turning cold inside, followed her with his gaze.

The clerk recalled him with a grunt. “Tansy Bellrose Gant, you say? Curious. I show two Bellroses. Not a common name.”

“Two?”

“Your betrothed is charged with witchcraft. And murder.”

“Murder!” Malcolm’s thoughts flew. Latham must have died of his injuries. How to free Tansy now? “’Tis no’ true, any of it.”

The clerk leveled a hard stare on him. “If you would like to speak at her trial, you can wait.”

“Aye. When?”

“I canna’ say. The accused first must undergo questioning. A confession is always preferable, you understand. It saves time and also favorably impacts the accused’s immortal soul.”

Rage and terror suffused Malcolm in equal measures; the rage rose to his head and fed words to his mouth. “You think God listens? You suppose he can be found anywhere near this place?”

“Those who repent fare better in the afterlife: judgment above as well as below. Shall I make a note on the charge saying you wish to speak? Will you wait?”

“Aye.” And how was he to discipline himself meanwhile? How wait without tearing the walls down? At any given moment, Tansy might be enduring the irons, making a false confession under the impetus of pain. Condemning herself.

She could expect no mercy. Neither, in the depths of his tormented soul, could he.

****

Time passed without measure while a host of thoughts crowded Tansy’s mind. She thought about her mother and what might be happening to her, what agonies she endured. She lived again the wonder of gazing into the eyes of Bellrose Gant if, indeed, she still went by that surname, which Tansy doubted. She remembered how swiftly a connection had formed between them—or had it formed long ago? Mother to daughter, woman to woman, witch to witch. Whatever the case, she’d been able to feel Bellrose’s spirit. Curiously, she could yet, as if her mother lingered still in the corner of the cell. The energy felt the same as that which had occupied the shadows of the pit back at Latham’s keep.

Was that possible? Did Tansy but imagine it all, a product of her terror and dread?

Would she be able to feel the moment her mother died? Transformed, Bellrose had called it. Turned to spirit. But the waiting dragged on.

She thought on the changeable nature of time—how a moment could fly in bliss or drag in agony. She wondered how it must stretch out when she lay beneath the irons—and then had to vomit into the overflowing slop bucket.

Try to vomit, that was. Nothing came up from her empty stomach, but the effort scalded her aching throat.

Perhaps I will die before ever they take me out of here. That might be for the best. But then she would never see Malcolm again—never gaze into his eyes nor touch his hand.

Ah—fool! That would never happen anyway. Best that the fever she felt raging through her body should take her. Best she should be carried out of here to her grave rather than to questioning.

Upon that thought, she heard voices and footsteps above, and a wailing cry drifted down the corridor toward her. The scuff of shoes preceded the now-familiar groan of the grate as it was drawn open.

A bundle of clothing tumbled down. Nay—it was a woman clad all in gray cloth and with a head of gray hair, like rags. She landed hard on the stone floor and her wailing abruptly ended. The grate slammed shut, and the guards marched away.

Company. But Tansy stood where she was, afraid to move or approach the new arrival, who lay so still.

Injured, no doubt—just as Tansy’s knee had been injured when she fell that distance. None of their minders cared; there existed no one to help this poor creature. Save she.

Even as she acknowledged the fact, she thought she saw the woman move. Nay—something moved near her, a faint eddy that stirred the foul air. An exhalation? A mist?

Tansy approached her slowly and hunkered down as best she could, given her twisted knee. She touched the woman’s shoulder. “Mistress? Are you sore harmed?”

Foolish question; to be sure, she must be.

At Tansy’s touch, the woman flopped over onto her back. Her head sagged to one side at an impossible angle and her bloodshot eyes stared directly into Tansy’s.

Sightless.

Tansy caught her breath. She’d seen enough chickens readied for the pot to recognize a broken neck when she saw one.

She withdrew her hand as if burned and got to her feet with difficulty. Forming the words through her burning throat, she called through the grate, “Here! She is dead! You canna’ leave her. You canna’ leave me wi’ a dead woman!”

No response. Her voice did not so much as echo from the depths of the pit.

She backed off and retreated to the place her mother had once occupied, curled herself into a tight ball, and covered her head with her hands.

****

“Tansy Bellrose Gant.”

The summons came out of near darkness and recalled Tansy from the place to which she’d retreated, one of fever and pain. It roused her and started her heart thumping in a mad rhythm. They had come for her.

At last.

She struggled to her feet and looked at the grate in dread. Here it ended—and here it began. She knew not what she went to face, nor all of what had happened to those who went before her. To her mother.

Only that it must be dire and terrible.

The dead woman still lay sprawled directly beneath the grate. The man who had come to fetch Tansy noticed her and muttered to another. One of them—after a cautious look at Tansy—dropped down into the pit, where he gathered her up precisely like the soiled clothing she mimicked. A rough ladder came down; the man handed his bundle up before gesturing roughly at Tansy.

“Go.”

“I will no’.”

Suddenly the pit seemed a haven of safety. Despite the malodorous air and its distance from freedom, she wanted to stay there. She reached for her magic—to knock this man down—and found only weak remnants that scattered from her reach.

Ah, had the spirit fled her? Did she go to this ordeal with no defense?

I abused my power. She knew bitter regret. I wielded it against the likes of Ranna, and this is the outcome.

Too high, too high a price. I never meant ill—well, not much. Set me free and I will never again use the gift in order to harm.

“Move!” The guard shouted and dragged Tansy to the ladder, by the arm. He placed her on the first rung by force and gave her a shove.

She climbed. At the top, though, her legs failed her. She fell in a heap, a tangle of hair and filthy skirts, heart pounding so deafeningly she could not hear what the guards said.

Inexorable, they drew her to her feet and dragged her, by her arms, down the hallway.

Time, she understood, had all run out.