1 Born wicked

All my life I felt alone. I was raised by a woman who called herself my aunt but who did not love me. We lived out in a remote cottage on the outskirts of a poor village. My aunt was not a cruel woman but was forever occupied in her office.

Every year, when winter would descend, a dark stillness would fall over the village. People would whisper in the dark, howling nights of wicked creatures that dragged children from their beds. They would speak of men who would disappear into snow storms and never return. Or worse, they would be caught by a witch.

Although magic was commonplace in the imperial capital, in our village it was rare to see. Occasionally a passing mage would illuminate the skies with bright swirling magic. A mage was a celebrated guest. A witch was an entirely different thing. Witches were those cursed with the darkest of magics. A magic so vile and wicked it could corrupt the human soul. Turning a virtuous man into a beast.

But what is the difference between a virtuous man and a beast? My aunt was a practical woman by all accounts and she instilled in me the cardinal virtuous that all good men and women must possess.

"If you are good, you will be loved by the gods", she once told me.

"And if I am bad?"

"The world is a place that punishes the wicked and rewards the good". And so I was good.

I lived a quiet and pristine life. I never raised my voice. Whenever I felt alone, I would think, "This is your punishment for discontentment, try harder".

But It seemed no matter how hard I tried, that the people of the village could not love me. And then it appeared one day. Painted in bright red letters across my door.

I came out one morning to fetch water from our well and there it was. This strange word I barely knew the meaning of and yet instinctively felt was an ugly word the moment I saw it :

WITCH.

The next morning I heard it again. Jane Laune spat the word out in a fit of laughter. I had entered the downtrodden bakery to collect our order. Her father, a bulbous and sweaty man who never looked me in the eye pushed over our bread in his usual aggressive manner. I had never realised his repulsion until that moment. His daughter behind the counter lit up, almost delirious with satisfaction as she spat out the words.

"Witch!"

And it sat in the air like a pool of smoke. I looked up at him, hoping to catch the flicker of recognition. And in that moment of cold indifference I felt that the words must have been true.

That night when I returned home, I asked my Aunt what the words meant. She looked at me unflinchingly and told me its meaning.

"A witch is a perversion of the natural order. Your mother was a witch. She seduced a duke and had you. Whether you will follow in her wickedness I cannot say ", My aunt told me flatly.

"And is it such a terrible thing ,to be a witch?" I asked.

"Your mother always wanted more. No doubt that is why she became interested in your father. Now you cannot be like her nor him. You are in the inbetween. A thing that does not know it's place is wicked. And a thing that has no place is.." She paused and drew her breath. I waited anxiously for her final words. She stirred from her perch in the arm chair by the fire. Heaving, her hand disappear into her pocket and she pulled out her long, thin pipe. Filling it slowly, she lit it up. She took a long pull and drew out a breath. Her eyes bore into the flames of the fire. They danced around in merriment, burning and blackening.

"What is a thing that has no place", I encouraged softly.

Turning her focus back to me as if out of a spell. She answered in a low voice, "Only the demon lord knows the answer to that".

"The demon lord?"

"When the seven divines, the cardinal gods of virtue finished creating the world, they looked down upon their creation. They looked into the face of men and a feeling unknown before washed over them. From the deepest depths of the world a being came into existence. The demon lord. He who unleashed demons, witches and darkness over the land", Her face grew dark and contemplative. I sensed the conversation was over. I went to bed that night and wondered what the gods had felt when they first looked at their creations.

From that day on, it seemed all the village children came to learn what the word 'witch' meant. Day after day the pranks and derision escalated.

Two years had passed since the word was branded on the door. The blacksmith's five children and Jane Laune, the baker's daughter, threw a pale of mud over my head.

The following month, I found a toad in my basket. It continued on in this way like a dull, numbing pain. Each time, this feeling would rise up into my throat and I'd choke it down. And eventually, I became numb to it all.

My aunt always told me that the duty of a good person was to serve others. Put others before yourself and you won't have time to dwell on your own pain. Consequently, we would toil away for hours preparing food for the harvest festival. The meals were an offering to the god of temperance but really it served as a convenient pacifier for the workers of the Marsh Mines, The men would descend at night and not emerge til the sun had set. The mine and land owners would put together the event as a way to smooth over the awful working conditions. I often pitied their life utterly devoid of sunlight.

It became a ritual of the women to bring baked goods and an assortment of sweets. Although my aunt never married, she made it a point to join all the major events of the village. The week of the festival I was sent with our offering into the village. I arrived in the midst of hurried preparations. The women were put up decorations. The younger children ran about the stalls, while the older children huddled around playing games.

I approach the wife of the mining overseer with my basket. She was a loud and obnoxious woman. Still, amongst the poor women of the village she was matron. She set her beady eyes upon me and waved me over to where the other baskets had been placed. As I stepped inside the open store room. I could hear the women chatter from the distance.

"I don't know why they bother every year", Came the shrill voice of the Matron.

"Quite a spectacle!" Another voice chimed.

"Indeed. Then again, the family has always enjoyed the spot light" A third rejoined.

"They don't know their place. No doubt they are still under the impression they have any sway in this village", the Matron grumbled, "A fallen family, living off the scraps of some rich patron. And we all know who that is!"

I set the basket down and stood in awe. Here were these people I barely knew, who seemingly knew more about my family than I did. My aunt and I had lived alone my whole life. I had never met my parents. I wanted to shout. I wanted to tell them that they were wrong. But I didn't. I stood there quietly. Eventually their topic changed and I stepped back out. The matron feigned a smile and patted me on the shoulder. As I walked away I heard her uttered under her breath:

"Such a gloomy and homely child! T'is no wonder they call her a witch".

I arrived home to the silent cottage. My aunt was gone. Every now and then she would disappear for a day or two. She would never offer an explanation as to where she would go. I had become used to it. That night I looked up at the sky and reflected on my aunt's words. I have always found the dark abyss more comforting than the light.

Do wicked things always happen to people who are wicked? Can a person be wicked from the day they are born? I clasped my hands together and prayed to the god of courage. I asked for the courage to bear the curse of being born wicked.

On the night before the harvest festival, my aunt asked me to prepare ribbons for the parade. I took them out to the line to dry after washing and lay down beside them. It was a warm and peaceful dusk. Crimson flames scored the skies. I sat watching, breathing the dry air and the smell of the forest. I was so entrenched by the skies, I didn't notice them sneak from behind. Suddenly the ribbons tore from the line and flashed across my eyes.

By the time I got to my feet, I could only see a great white sails fluttering down the hill, deeper into the wood. I began to run down. Tumbling over the great tree roots and skidding down through dead leaves, I finally came by the river. It was a thin streak of a river in the late summer months. The great ribbon materials were entined between rocks and twigs just below the surface of the water. I took a step into the stream. The cold and fresh water hit my ankles.

As I began to arch down towards the white wisp, a sharp pain suddenly hit me from behind. I fell forward with a splash. My knees fell against the sharp rocks and I drew in a breath quickly looking behind. A rock came hurtling my way and it was all I could do to put up my hands to cover my face. I heard childish laughter and giggling, it seemed to come from all around. And then another hit. I curled up, cold and wet, immersed in the softly thrashing water.

The voices began to fade. My flesh ached and it pained me to drag myself to the dry banks. The dull pain inside came up again. This time I cried out. I sat and cried till I was all alone in the dark.

Sometimes when I close my eyes at night, I feel the sharp cold waters at my feet. I am out wandering through the woods, crawling up the slopes like a beast. I feel I am still out there, that I left myself behind there.