The Devil's Mistress by David Barclay (summer reads txt) 📗

Two young women in his life, both close to him, both of whom had fallen within the grasp of the Adversary. Were women as weak as his contemporaries claimed? Or was it perhaps his own failings, his own lusts and desires that turned them from the righteous path?

He glanced once more at the crowd. A pale face with large, hazel eyes and a small, button-like nose was suddenly there at the centermost table. The red cloak about her shoulders was the very same he remembered.

He blinked as if not believing his eyes. “Gwendolyn?”

The face ducked beneath the table and was gone.

Sloop took a step forward. He had never been so confused.

There was a scream from the other end of the hall. Heidi Sommers, the tailor’s wife, threw her cake down upon the table and swatted it.

Her husband did much the same, dropping his to the floor with a cry. “What is this?”

There was another shout, and another. All round the room, people were jumping to their feet and throwing their cakes. More than a few were holding their bellies. Henry Morton, the best dressed man in all of Blackfriar, lowered his head and vomited all over his Parisian shoes.

Sloop was not a man used to moving quickly, but he strode down the platform and grabbed one of the half-eaten cakes. When he turned it, a nest of brown cockroaches sprung from the center and began crawling over his hand. He threw it down with a curse.

Several townsfolk ran for the doors. The rest climbed on top of the tables and watched as an army of vermin crawled from the cakes and spread onto the floor below.

“Is this some kind of trick?” Gruebe shouted.

Sloop had no words. He looked to Marianne, who was gazing horror-struck at the slithering insects.

Behind her, Rufus had begun lumbering about like a stone drunk on the streets of Sodom. His eyes rolled to the back of his head. A great jet of black liquid sprayed from his mouth, and he toppled to the floor. “It hurts,” he cried. “Oh Lord, help me! It hurts!”

A great wind blew through the center of the mill, snuffing every candle in the room. Rufus stopped thrashing, and for a few dreadful seconds, the only sound was that of the skittering horde.

Then Rufus spoke, and the voice issuing from his mouth was nothing like his own. “You have taken innocent life and felt nothing. You have shamed this town and been allowed to prosper. You would not heed my pleas in life, but you shall heed them now. The deaths of John Ashford and his stable hand will not go unpunished. The fires of Hell are coming to Blackfriar, and they will avenge sevenfold what you have taken. One by one, I shall come for you.”

The voice fell silent. The watchman let forth a gut-wrenching scream. His body bucked one final time, and then an army of black insects burst from his mouth and nose. They crawled over his body, biting his flesh and devouring his eyes.

The townsfolk roared in terror.

Sloop reached beneath his cassock and found the silver cross at his neck, the one he had taken from the Ashford girl. He tore it from its string and brandished it at the room. “Stay back, demon. Get ye gone from this place. I am the holy—” A boiling hot pain shot through his hand. He howled and looked down. The cross had melted within his palm. Liquid metal ran down his fingers. “Damn you! Who are you? Who are you, demon?”

Another wind blew through the room. Upon it, the faint melody of laughter.

The doors to the mill burst open. A tall, bedraggled figure in long boots and a tattered shirt stood in the opening. Blood streamed from a dozen wounds upon his flesh. The remains of his right arm hung down his side, a mangled mass of bone and sinew. He took two steps into the room, a man on the brink of collapse.

“Wolves,” Sands cried. “Cursed…wolves.” Then, with a final, blood-foamed burst, “Run…”

The townsfolk ran for the doors.

Sloop gazed confusedly over the stampeding crowd toward Marianne. She stared back, her eyes asking the same questions which now cut through his own mind.

The deaths of John Ashford and his stable hand will not go unpunished.

Was not the witch herself responsible for the death of her own father? And as for the other, well, that simply made no sense at all.

Chapter 23

In the back room of an old and musty cottage, amidst a pile of dusty shelves and ancient books, a young man came awake in the darkness. At his right knee was the ghost of a leg, a round stump worn raw. Upon his back was a series of whip marks, where his former master of house had been a little too eager to mete out discipline. Round his neck was a much fresher wound, a purple halo that would soon fester and scar.

He sat up with a jerk, finding himself upon a straw mattress in an unfamiliar room. A horse blanket had been draped over his body. His clothes had been stripped, and his wooden leg was missing.

In spite of all this—the pain and disquiet welling inside him—he was aware of one fact, a truth as simple as it was undeniable: he was alive. In need of food, perhaps. In need of a bath, certainly. But all things considered, he could have been much worse for the wear.

Another straw bed lay opposite, almost close enough to touch. Upon it lay the pale form of the magistrate, Mister Beauchamp. He was still unconscious. Someone had placed a damp cloth over his head.

Who that someone was, Jacob didn’t know. He thought about shouting for assistance, then thought better of it. Half the town wanted him dead, and the first thing he needed to do was gain his bearings and find out where he was. The last thing he remembered was hanging from a tree, a watchman hacking