Winterbringers (7 page)

In her room, she went at once to her window and moved the curtains just enough to be able to look outside. She could see no one in the dark garden below her, just the
frost-rimmed
shapes of shrubs and trees, but when she looked out over the potato field where she’d first seen Josh, she thought that near the far side she could see two figures, glimmering yet indistinct against the darkness.

She curled up tight in bed and left the light on.

Josh didn’t know exactly what woke him, nor, at first, where he was. He poked his head out from under the covers for some air and to get his bearings and remembered everything at once, just as the noise came from outside his window.

He went rigid, trying not to breathe.
Don’t be stupid
, he told himself.
Either you just imagined it, or it’s the wind or a fox or something
.

He had just begun to relax when it came again; a scraping sound just outside his window, as though
something heavy was being moved across the gravel.

He found that he could hardly breathe. Although he listened, there were no more sounds, but he couldn’t shake the idea that something was outside.

Shamefaced, he crept from his bed through to his mother’s room and shook her awake.

She couldn’t remember how long it had been since he came to her frightened in the night. Looking at his face, she put aside the jocular things she’d been going to say, wondering at the same time why she wasn’t frightened when he so clearly was.

They stood in his room, listening to nothing.

“It was probably a fox,” she said, “but let’s put on the outside light and look from the sitting room.

The sitting room had french doors and a switch for the outside spotlight. Josh hung back while his mother switched on the light and pulled back the curtains.

There was nothing to see.

The spotlight illuminated everything for a fair distance from the cottage, but all it showed was the stiff white outline of frosty plants.

They looked for a few seconds longer.

“Sorry,” said Josh.

“That’s all right. You must just have woken up from a dream and carried some of it over with you, or something like that.”

He turned to go back to bed, but she spoke again. “Look!”

He followed her pointing finger. A few flakes of snow were beginning to fall.

Towards the end of October, Patrick Morton fell ill. I’d paid no
attention
to him the day before when he kept complaining of a headache as he worked at the forge, but that morning when I went past his house his mother called me in and told me he had taken to his bed and wanted to see me.

I went reluctantly, for I’d no wish to see him at all, and found him in his bed all right, tossing in a fever. I was about to creep away when he opened his eyes and caught at my arm.

“Agnes,” he groaned. “Don’t let them do this to me. You can stop them. I know you can.

“What are you talking about?” I said roughly, pulling my arm free. “You’re ill. Go to sleep.”

“They must have cursed me, those other two.”

I felt my blood turn to ice.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said, my voice thin in my own ears.

“Beatrix Lang and Janet Corphat – of course you know what I mean.”

He caught my wrist again and pulled me down close to him, his eyes glittering with the fever. “I know about the three of you. I know YOU would never hurt me, so it must be the other two. They’ve cursed me to stop me speaking out about them.”

“No, Patrick! How can you say such things? It’s the fever speaking. Beatrix and Janet curse you? What nonsense! I don’t know what you’ve imagined about us, but it only exists in your own head.”

It was a marvel to me to hear my own voice so steady now, when my legs were shaking and I could feel the blood skittering through my veins.

His grip was strong in spite of the fever. I twisted my wrist this way and that, but I couldn’t break free.

“Stop your lying Agnes. Have you forgotten I was there at mid-summer? I saw the three of you working a spell. I know you are a good woman: I won’t ever give you away; but the others …
they should be tried.”

I stared at him open-mouthed in horror, then with one last pull I managed to wrench my wrist free. “You’re a sick man, Patrick. You don’t know what you’re saying.”

I ran from the room to find Beatrix and Janet, to warn them. Everything conspired against me that day, but now I wonder what good it would have done anyway if I had managed to warn them. How were they to have escaped?

Between my chores that day I ran here and there around the village looking for Beatrix and Janet, but I never laid eyes on either of them, for they weren’t in their homes and no one seemed to know where they were. I hoped that meant that they had fled before Patrick had a chance to denounce them, but I had a sick feeling in my stomach about them.

That evening, I called in at Patrick’s house, hoping he’d have forgotten what he’d been raving about in the morning, but the fever still raged in him and when I went into the room his mother was there, listening to his rantings.

She gave me a look that was hard with suspicion. “I’m away to fetch the Minister,” she said.

“He’s not that ill, surely?” I was truly shocked.

“No. The Minister should hear what he’s saying about these women.”

I’d to grip the back of a nearby chair to stop my legs giving way under me. If Patrick denounced them to Minister Cowper they were as good as condemned, for he was fierce against witchcraft.

“I should go home,” I muttered.

“Aye, I think you should.”

I couldn’t think what to do, terrified as I was for Beatrix and Janet, and for myself. I could leave the village, run away, but where could I go? There was no one in another place to take me in. I’d probably die of cold at the side of some road during the winter.

When I got home I told my mother that I didn’t feel well – maybe I’d caught what Patrick had – got into bed and pulled the covers over my head. All night I lay awake, listening for the sound of folk coming to take me away, but there was nothing and just before dawn I must have finally fallen into an uneasy sleep.

In the morning I kept to my bed, trying to shut out the world. There was nothing I could do to help Beatrix and Janet now. All I could hope was that Patrick Morton hadn’t repeated his accusations to Minister Cowper.

I ignored my mother’s shouts to get up and pretended to be asleep when she came in, and to my surprise, she let me be.

About the middle of the day, there was a knock at the front door, and my heart seemed to turn to stone in my chest. For nearly half an hour I strained to catch scraps of conversation, but I could make nothing out. Then I heard the door close and my mother’s footsteps coming towards the bedroom.

I jumped back into bed and pretended to be asleep again, but this time she did not leave. “Agnes, wake up. I must talk to you.”

I yawned and stretched and opened my eyes; and then she told me that the Minister had had Beatrix and Janet arrested on suspicion of witchcraft and that they were to be interrogated later.

I don’t remember much more of what she said, except for how ill I looked.

A little later she brought me up some broth. “Agnes,” she said, “you used to spend a lot of time with those two. Did you ever think there was anything …?” She let the question die away.

“Of course not. They’re ordinary folk. Just like you and me.”

I will seal these papers and the things I brought from the Kingdom of Summer in my little strongbox and put them in my father’s hidey-hole so that my family will know the truth one
day; for if they do come for me, they’ll surely let me speak to my mother or father before the end.

My name is Agnes Blair and every word that I have written is true, so help me God.

The twenty-ninth day of October, 1704.

Morning came.

Callie woke in her narrow bed. Something was different. The air sounded odd, hushed. She climbed out from under the downie and pulled a curtain aside to see a white world, everything dusted with a thin powdering of snow that seemed to muffle all the usual noises. The sky was
pearl-white
, clouded from horizon to horizon.

She thought of the Winter King in the cold cave on the sea shore and her heart sank.

The radiator creaked and gurgled as the central heating came on and she heard someone moving about in the kitchen. She pulled on some clothes and went downstairs, pushing her hair out of her eyes, Chutney Mary following her as though she was a dog, not a cat at all.

In the kitchen, Rose moved around automatically making breakfast, her mind blank with despair. They had brought their combined strength to bear on the cold last night, and it had no difference whatsoever. Their failure had been total. There was nothing else left for them to try.

It had been bad enough last night – already the ice creatures were abroad – but now it would get worse. And worse. And there would be no end to it.

She tried to rouse herself to be more normal as Callie came into the kitchen, yawning.

“Have you seen the snow?”

“Yes,” said Rose, “and the sky looks as if there’s more to
come.”

“What’s going on with the weather?” said Callie, as though she didn’t know.

Rose hesitated, tempted for a moment to tell her the truth; but what good would it do? It wouldn’t help anyone. So she just shrugged her shoulders. “They say it’s the Gulf Stream moving.”

“Do you think that’s it?” Callie pressed her.

“How would I know? I’m not a scientist. I suppose they know what they’re talking about.”

Callie sat down and started to butter toast. “You promised you’d explain about last night.”

Rose turned briefly from frying bacon to give Callie what was meant to be a reassuring smile.

“I didn’t want to worry you in the middle of the night.”

Now we’re getting somewhere
, Callie thought.

“You know there have been sightings of Big Cats between here and Cupar over the last few months?”

Callie’s baffled expression was unfeigned. Of course she knew about that – there had even been a sighting outside the secondary school in Cupar last spring – but why was Rose bringing it up now?

“I didn’t tell you, but George saw it just up the road last week. Luath went after it into the trees then came running out with his tail between his legs.” The bacon sizzled in the pan as Rose turned it. “From Luath’s reaction last night, I think that must have been what was outside. That’s why I didn’t want to open the door.

Do you want some bacon?”

Callie shook her head and ate a mouthful of toast to give herself time to think.

Big Cats? What was all that about? Whatever she’d seen from her bedroom window certainly wasn’t a Big Cat.

“You don’t think last night was something to do with all this weird weather then?” she asked.

Rose turned round, frying pan in her hand, face expressionless. “I suppose it might be making the cat a bit … bolder. You know, if it’s having trouble finding food or something.”

“That’s not what I meant. There was … I saw … oh, never mind.” Defeated, Callie returned to her toast.

In the cave by the sea, a huddled figure lay on the floor, features glazed with ice, scarcely breathing, trying to will his strength across the miles, across the worlds, to Her.

“This heating’s hopeless,” said Josh’s mum, putting her hand against a lukewarm radiator. “Feel that – it’s hardly warm at all.” She turned the oven on and opened the door. “Let’s see if that helps.”

Josh buttered toast, saying nothing. As soon as he got up, he had looked out of his window for any sign of whatever had been there last night, for he was still sure there had been something – but the snow was a blank white sheet.

“Put the TV on, will you?” Anna said as she made coffee.

He took his toast over to the sofa, curled up and switched it on to a breakfast news programme. It was full of reports about the freak weather and far from being an isolated local event, it seemed that the area around St Andrews had so far been spared the worst. There was footage of snowploughs in Edinburgh and London, and pictures of the sea frozen off Newcastle.

His mother sat down beside him. “Maybe we should go
home,” she said.

“No! I mean … it looks worse there, not better. Anyway, it can’t last, can it? Not at this time of year, surely?”

She sighed and shook her head. “I don’t know, Josh. It shouldn’t be happening at all. I don’t know what’s going on. I don’t think anyone does, whatever they say.”

There was a knock at the door and the owner of the cottages came in.

“Morning. Just to let you know we’ve closed the swimming pool for the moment. We can’t get it to heat up at all in this weather and the last thing we want is to blow the wiring so that the heating in the houses goes off. Sorry, but I’ve never known anything like this. We’ll let you know as soon as things get back to normal.”

He crunched off to the next cottage.

“Well, that’s swimming out, unless you fancy breaking the ice. If you don’t want to go home, what are you going to do?”

“I thought I’d go and see Callie for a bit.”

His mother gave him an arch look. “You two seem to get on very well.”

He sighed, trying not to show how annoyed he was. “It’s not like that. We do get on – as friends, that’s all.”

“Okay, okay. Sorry I spoke.”

He went into the bedroom to get dressed and when he came out she was already at work at the dining table, deep in a litter of papers.

“I’ll be back for lunch. Do you want me to get anything from the village shop?”

“Some cheese – and eggs if they’ve got any. Thanks. Are you going to be warm enough?”

“Yeah. It’s not far after all. See you.”

“Bye.”

The cold caught at him as soon as he stepped outside.
Now he understood why the heating didn’t seem to be doing much. He trudged off down the track, hands deep in his pockets, chin tucked down into his jacket as far as possible. It was like being underwater somehow, this fierce cold.

He’d intended to go to the shop first, but he was shivering so much by the time he reached the Ferguson house that he decided to go in there first for some respite.

As he walked up the path he noticed that the paint on the front door was scratched and gouged from top to bottom. He rang the bell and waited impatiently, stamping his feet, for someone to answer.

After a moment, Rose opened the door. She looked so surprised to see him that he wondered, belatedly, if he should have phoned first.

“What happened to your door?”

Her expression told him she didn’t know what he meant until she looked around at the outside of the door he was holding open. Her eyes widened and her face turned pale.

“Did Luath do that?”

She shook her head. “No, not Luath … it must have been the cat,” she said, collecting herself.

“The cat? She couldn’t have done that,” Josh said, baffled, as he followed Rose inside.

In the kitchen he found Callie yawning over a cup of coffee, her hair even more of a mess than usual.

“It looks as though you slept even worse than me,” he said.

“Huh. I bet you’re right. The dog woke us all up at three in the morning barking at something outside.”

“Was that when your front door got trashed?”

“Trashed? What are you talking about?”

“Haven’t you seen it?”

He followed her back to the hall and watched her stare at the gouged door.

“Rose thinks it was the cat, but the cat couldn’t have done all that.”

Callie shivered. “I wanted to open the door and see what Luath was barking at, but Rose stopped me. I looked out of my bedroom window and I saw two … figures … going off over the fields. I was sure that Rose knew something about what was going on, but when I asked her this morning she started talking about Big Cat sightings. I don’t understand at all.”

“Ah …
Big
Cats. I thought she meant the kitten.” Callie rolled her eyes. “All this happened at about three o’clock, you say?”

“What?”

“The dog woke you at three o’clock?”

“That’s right. Why?”

“Something woke me at about half past three.” He cleared his throat. “I thought there was someone moving about outside my window. Or something. But when I looked, there was nothing there.” He didn’t mention having woken his mother. “Do you think that’s just coincidence?”

She shook her head slowly. “But what do you think it was? Or who? You don’t think it was the Winter King?”

“No. I’m sure it wasn’t – he said he had to stay at the cave.”

“We didn’t imagine him, did we?”

“You know we didn’t. Anyway, just look out of the window. This is what he said would happen.”

Callie ran her fingers down the gouges in the front door. “These aren’t even like claw marks,” she said. “They’re much too broad, more like fingers.”

“I wouldn’t like to meet whatever it is that has fingernails that can do that,” said Josh, measuring his own hand against the marks.

Callie shuddered and pushed the door shut on the cold garden.

She looked around. “Puss, puss … where have you gone?”

They looked around the kitchen, under the table, under chairs, in the laundry basket, but there was no sign of Chutney Mary.

“I thought she usually stayed beside you?”

“She does. She follows me like a dog, not a cat at all. Puss … where have you gone?”

“Maybe she’s got into your bed to keep warm.”

They went upstairs and searched Callie’s bedroom, but Chutney Mary wasn’t there either.

George and Rose joined in the search, but the kitten was nowhere to be found.

“She didn’t get out while we were looking at the front door?”

“No, I’d have seen her.”

They went back to the door anyway and looked outside, but there were no paw prints in the snow.

“Oh, she’ll turn up,” said Rose. “Cats do this all the time. They’re nowhere at all, then suddenly they’re sitting right in front of you, licking their paws and trying to look innocent.”

“You don’t suppose Luath …?”

“Of course not,” said George. “If he was going to eat her he’d have done it long before this. It’s not as if we keep him hungry after all. Don’t worry, she’ll turn up as soon as you stop looking for her.”

“Go and light the fire in the smithy, Callie, would you please?” asked Rose. “And I’ll bet you she’s sitting in the kitchen when you go back in.”

Josh had never been in this part of the house before. It was a big, formal sitting room dominated by an enormous chimney. To one side of the hearth sat an anvil. He stared at it; he’d never seen one before.

“George found it buried under the floor when they put the
central heating in,” said Callie by way of explanation. “This used to be the village smithy. That’s why it’s got this huge fireplace.”

She was holding an armful of logs, ready to pile them in the fireplace.

“Sshh!” said Josh.

“What?”

He held up his hand, and they both listened carefully. A thin mewing came from somewhere in the room.

“She’s in here!”

“Sounds like it.”

Callie put the logs down with a thud in the middle of the carpet. “Puss, puss, puss, where are you?”

They listened again. For a moment there was nothing, then the mewing started again, more insistent this time. They moved around the room, trying to find her.

“She’s stuck somewhere,” said Josh.

“The chimney! She’s in the chimney.” Callie stepped up onto the hearth and ducked her head to see under the chimney canopy. “I need a torch.” Her voice emerged muffled. “It’s too dark to see her. There should be one on top of the fridge.”

“I’ll get it.”

He returned a minute later with the torch. The chimney was so big that Callie had been able to stand up in the fireplace, her head and shoulders disappearing under the canopy. He poked her in the back to get her attention and passed her the torch.

Indistinctly, he heard her talking to the cat, then the torch clattered to the floor and she squirmed out covered in soot, clutching Chutney Mary, who was no longer tortoiseshell, but black from nose to tail.

“Take her for a minute, would you?” She thrust the filthy kitten into his arms, picked up the torch and disappeared
into the chimney again. “There’s something …” Her voice died away to a mutter, then a shower of soot came down the chimney and she reappeared holding something black and about the size of a brick.

“What’s that?”

“I don’t know. It was wedged into a recess up the chimney. The cat was sitting on it when I found her. Is she okay?”

“I think so.” He held the kitten up level with his face and she sneezed a little cloud of soot at him. “What do you want me to do with her?”

“We’ll need to give her a bath. We’ll use the kitchen sink.”

They retreated from the smithy, trying not to get any more soot on the carpet.

It was amazing, Josh reflected as he looked around at the kitchen ten minutes later, how much mess bathing one small sooty kitten could create. Rose and George had left them to it and disappeared off to the garden across the road to tuck fleece round various plants that the cold was on the verge of killing. There were puddles of soapy water all over the floor, wet towels and of course, the outraged kitten, now backed into a corner and spitting, while Callie tried to tempt her out with a piece of cooked chicken.

He let the grimy water out of the sink and glanced out of the window. It had begun to snow again, big leisurely flakes drifting down.

“She’s fine now,” said Callie. Chutney Mary sat demurely under a chair, damp fur sticking out in every direction, tail curled neatly round her paws, eating the piece of chicken. “I’m just going to get cleaned up. Why don’t you make some coffee?”

“Okay.”

Filling the kettle, he noticed that the snow was falling faster. He’d take a lift back to the cottage if it was offered.