They Burn Witches, Don't They?

They Burn Witches, Don't They?

She was the one who protected them all, the most resourceful, the most talented. Of all the people to be helpless, no one would ever have thought it could be she.

But wandlessness, isolation and torture can break even the strongest of men. A young witch not excepted.

Wisps of her hair float lifelessly on the breeze, obscuring her face as she stands. In fact, she hardly stands, though she is in a standing position: practically unconscious, she lolls limply at the stake, hands tied behind her back with twine, her body secured and bound to the stake with coils upon coils of hempen rope. Her tunic is ripped open; the milling crowd stares bawdily at her exposed breasts, welted and wealed as they are. Her back is scored with similar stripes, her arms seep clear fluid from the burns the Inquisitors have inflicted, but it is not this that has broken her - she is strong enough to withstand much more. Onto the timber and kindling upon which she stands seeps a trickle of blood, from the leg which they crushed in the Iron Shoe - a device so fearful it pulps the bones within the flesh. It is this fearful torment which has broken her. Her leg will never be whole again - nothing short of magic could heal it. There is nothing in the knowledge of this age that could make her walk again. Yet what need has she of walking, jeers the crowd - were she not so tightly bound, could she not fly away?

"Fly away, witch!" jeers a portly matron, the butcher's wife. She wears a wine-coloured burlap gown; her apron is stained with layer upon layer of dried blood. "Go on then, why don't you?"

"Fie on thee, witch!" shouts a well-dressed young man, in velvet hose and silver-buckled shoes. He flings a ripe tomato at her. It hits her full in the face.

She stirs. The head slowly, painfully inches upward, and the big brown eyes, bleary now with the torture and the weakness and the helplessness, gaze unseeingly upon the multitude, and for a moment the mob holds its breath - will she curse him? Will she fly?

But the weary head droops down to her breast once more. A renewed chorus of jeers and catcalls erupts from the crowd when they realize that no superhuman feats are forthcoming.

A tall figure, hooded in black, strides effortlessly through the milling throng, parting it like water. He shoulders aside two clumsy-seeming young bards who, burdened by a lute and a zither, cannot get out of his way fast enough. The rest of the populace move out of his way in fear; there is something about this man that carries the stench of death. The horde erupts into whispers.

"He is come!"

"It is he!"

"The hour is come!"

The executioner steps up to the pile of firewood, holding aloft a flaming torch. The scarlet flickers throw deep shadows onto his face and the crowd's, leaping up eerily in the gathering twilight. "Hear ye, hear ye!" he cries. "For being a witch, this woman has been sentenced to death by burning at the stake." He plunges the torch into the kindling and it catches ablaze.

Some of the more excitable women shriek; the ladies faint dramatically into the arms of their beaux. The rabble swarms around more anxiously now, scenting the nearness of death.

But the executioner looks upon the girl bound to the stake, and his eyes, under the hood, are sad. He stalks off, forbidding as ever, but as he strides away, no-one hears him whisper:

"May the Lord have mercy upon your soul."

The people ooh and ah in morbid fascination as the flames begin to rise. Still far from the young witch. But soon they will reach her.

As the circle of flame rises higher, all but obscuring her from the view, the clumsy young bard raises his lute; his friend raises his zither.

No one hears their murmured incantations.

Protected by the Flame-Freezing Charm, they walk through the fire. The Invisibility Cloak protects them from the crowd's murderous gaze. Inside the circle of the flames, enclosed by a fence of flickering yellow light, they can see up close how bad her hurts are, how far gone she is. Now that they are finally alone together, there is no need to hide their feelings. "Oh, Love..." her husband whispers as he sees her, and his tears threaten to fall. But there is no time for that now. No time for anything but slicing through her bonds and catching her as she falls. No time for anything but raising the lute and the zither. The one tiny thing her friend allows himself is an infinitesimal delay to pull her tunic modestly closed over her welted chest. Her husband gives him a grateful glance, a mere flicker of his eyes, as they pick her up. Cradled in both their arms, she is supported gently, her face anointed with kisses and tears.

Tomorrow, the populace will search in vain through the ashes for the bones of the witch. Some will say she was completely consumed by the flames; others will say she did manage to fly away after all. But for now, the crack of Disapparation is drowned out by the fierce crackling of the blaze.

* * *

His sister and the Wise Woman have already prepared the house. The Wise Woman stands, anxiously waiting to heal her wounds. The men lay her down in sheets of linen, and his sister bathes her with cotton batting and a basin of warm water. The Wise Woman weeps over her leg, and heals the flesh and bone with spells and herbs. Her friends help to smooth salves onto her poor burnt arms, and pack her weals with poultices.

They keep vigil by her side, her husband and friend, lying on either side of her. They fear to touch her body, as her grievous wounds cause them pain to see, and they would die rather than cause her pain, yet they cannot refrain from showing her that she is loved. Both of them kiss her softly, stroke her hair and croon to her, begging her to return to them. There is nothing strange about this, for there has long ceased to be jealousy between the three of them.

The night wears on, and the candles burn low, and still they speak to her of their love for her, and hers for them. They speak to her of adventure, and trivialities, and again and again of the great love they bear for her, made stronger because born of comradeship and friendship. They kiss her wounds, and weep over them again. They tell her she is brave, and wise, and loved. They tell her she is their comrade, their friend, their life, and how they will allow nothing, not even death, to part them.

The candles gutter out as the first streaks of the dawn paint the morning sky, and she wakes as the sun's first sliver of gold slips over the horizon.

She sighs and moans as she wakes, and gasps as she realizes she is safe. Then she turns to them with her insatiable curiosity and asks what happened. The men look at each other, and finally her friend begins, and her husband takes up the tale.

When they tell her, she explodes, weakly. "Why didst thou take such a risk? Was that sensible? Thou couldst have been captured as well!" she scolds them, though she is barely able to breathe. They laugh through their tears then, and one of them supports her head in his hands as the other raises a goblet to her lips, then another, and she drinks the potions the Wise Woman has made.

She sighs with relief as the healing draughts do their magic, and sinks back into the pillows, her hands seeking those of her two friends - friends first and foremost, friends to death, and perhaps beyond. One of them murmurs promises of a new wand once she is recovered enough to go to the Forest to visit Master Ollivander's hut. The other promises a new broom. Trivial concerns, she thinks, voiced for comfort, more for their sake than for hers; yet she knows that the time will come when life will go on, when a new wand will be a necessity, that she will need to replace the broom they burned. But for now...

She buries her face in her husband's chest and reaches behind her to pull her best friend closer, so that she is tightly sandwiched between them. The searing agony of her torments has faded into the merest twinge; touching does not hurt, but loneliness does. More than anything she needs them to feel safe and complete.

Sighing with relief, she burrows into their warmth. They oblige by moving closer still. Her friend puts his arm around her, gingerly, as though she might break. Her husband does the same, and his arms are long enough to encircle both her and his friend. "It's all right," he whispers. "It'll be all right, love." She knows, from experience, that he is speaking to the two of them.

"You will be well and whole again," her friend says, in the tone of a promise. She knows he will move heaven and earth to make it so. She smiles, against all odds. She feels maternal towards these two men, yet it is a wonderful change to be taken care of, buoyed up by their love. She shifts and sighs contentedly in the cocoon of warmth and affection.

"I know," she says. She knows, too, that her torment will not be easily forgotten, and that none of them will be safe as long as the Inquisition lasts, but in this moment, she is content.

The sister and the Wise Woman gaze fondly upon them from the door. The girl smiles. "What shall we make for them when they wake, Matron?" she asks.

"Roast goose with parsley, I think," Matron says briskly. "And potato broth."

The women roll up their sleeves as they leave the room. There is work to be done.

In bed, asleep, wrapped in each other's arms, the trio smile.