Downfall Read online

  ***

  Hopkins himself came to question me in the cell which was now my home. His clothes spoke for his status as an official; his mannerisms told me just how new he was to the wealth which accompanied it. Hopkins was too confident, too sure nothing could harm him.

  I was hoping to find a way to do so.

  No matter how impossible it seemed to me.

  The jailer unhooked my shackles and led me to the small table set up for the questioning. I rubbed my fingers against the raw skin the metal had left behind as I examined the gentleman who waited for me on the other side. His lean form was the tallest I’d ever seen. The confidence radiating from him allowed Hopkins the luxury of lounging back in the chair, as if he owned it instead of the King he called master. I shrank down in my seat to meet his eyes in silence.

  “Mistress Sinclair. I am Matthew Hopkins, appointed by authorities as England’s Witchfinder General. You may answer my questions here, in the comfort of your cell. Or on the rack or other, less pleasant options. It is your choice.”

  My eyes flickered around the small space in search of the comfort he spoke of. The stones were slick from the fall rains seeping through the open window. The cot was nothing more than moldy straw; it itched worse than the bugs skittering across the chill floor. I could not help it. My eyebrow rose in mocking response before I nodded.

  “Here, then, sir.” My voice sounded strange to me, so long it had been since I had heard it.

  These men—no, this man—knew nothing of my, of all our folk’s great secrets. The voice within me, which had been my guide since I first discovered my gifts, would show me how to protect myself and my abilities. Of this, I made no doubt. My lies would fall as true to his ears as did the gospel the Witchfinder heard at his worship each Sunday.

  Hopkins leaned forward and grabbed hold of my right arm, flipping it over to expose the scar of the moon’s phases on my wrist. This indeed was the very mark labeling me as special, as powerful, and one among the very few. As a Chosen One. I waited for him to speak as my Goddess began to whisper the answers to questions he had yet to ask in my mind.

  She was with me; my Queen of Witches, my Lady of Darkness. She would create the lies I could not make up myself.

  “How did you control the waters on the day we caught you, witch?”

  My shoulders lifted and a small laugh, humble as I could make it, forced itself up through the fear.

  “M’lord, surely you have experienced the weather of our mother country as often as I. Storms blow forth, winds which no mere human can control. It was this stirred the waves. Not I. I am but a helpless maiden, weak and poor and with no one to give me aid or assist me.”

  Those dark eyes returned my laugh as he leaned forward. His fingers dug into the bones of my wrist until I winced against their pressure.

  “You must be seeking the rack indeed, mistress. You are not the first witch I have encountered; nor will you be the last. Your actions are commanded by Satan, as are all of your ilk. Your lies here before me confirm it.”

  “Then what is the point of your questioning me at all, Master Hopkins, if you are so sure of the answers?”

  I hissed against pain as those fingers pressed further into my raw flesh.

  “Tell me this, Mistress Sinclair. This sign, this sigil, this mark of the Devil burned into your very flesh. How did the dark lord give it you? When did you become his companion? When did you give yourself over into his fleshly lusts, his evil commands?”

  Lusts.

  She was always with me; thinking when I could not. The Goddess whispered softly in my ear as I recognized the desire unchecked in his eyes.

  Matthew Hopkins was a very powerful man.

  But he was still a man.

  And I, a maid.

  A maid willing to do anything to set herself free.

  My head dropped forward and I shook the thick curtain of blonde hair to curl around my face. Thoughts of love and adoration from him toward me suffused my cheeks with a blush; my thoughts flowed toward him like the icy water running the length of my veins. The contact he had with my skin made passing those thoughts into him a deed most simple. The grip Hopkins had on my arm was loosened the moment my enchantment hit him, but the touch was still there. Strong enough so he couldn't stop the magic my Goddess was casting on him.

  If he loved me, he couldn’t kill me. No matter what he would lose from the council by preventing my death.

  I raised my emerald eyes, so prized by my multitude of suitors, up to meet his face, and I rejoiced in my secret heart; his skin was flushed, his eyes dazed by my magic.

  “Master Hopkins, the Devil has never been my companion. But perhaps . . .you can be, if you so will it.”

  The Witchfinder General dropped my wrist as if fire had erupted from my hands. The shock on his face exposed the truth I had suspected, and I had the desire to laugh aloud despite the danger surrounding me in this place.

  Matthew Hopkins was a very powerful man, indeed. But he was still a man.

  And I could see, as clear as I could hear my Goddess whisper in the darkness, Hopkins wanted me for his own.

  He stood so fast the chair scraped back against the stone floor and slammed into the door. I stood as well when he threw a stiff nod and a single word in my direction.

  “Madam.”

  He near ran from the room, and the door crashed closed behind him.

  I covered my face with my hands—hands he had forgotten, or not dared, to shackle—not to hide my tears but my smile.

  The hours passed and found me more and more anxious. If my spell had failed, then I would meet my end sooner than expected. Yet if it had been successful, then perchance I had saved myself.

  The doubts plaguing me proved unfounded. Later the same day, creature comforts began to arrive to my tiny cell. The food, no longer cast before me as if to some mongrel, became edible. The water clean. The straw for my bedding was changed.

  During the second week of my confinement, my nights were spent in the arms of the most powerful man in England, saving only the embattled king himself. Words of love were whispered—from him to me, and I replied as he wished to hear, so the spell would continue to be woven. Words of adoration and devotion we exchanged. He offered me abject promises of protection and privilege and a future—together.

  There was to be a false trial, he told me. One where the witnesses would be allowed to come forward and speak their lies.

  Lies which would set me free.

  Hopkins could not protect me from the hatred of Colchester. But he could save me from the stake.

  My life was, indeed, all I was after. As soon as I had my freedom, he would see me no more.