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

parish that doubled as the town hall. Up until the incident with the Collins boy, Blackfriar had been lacking not only a hanging square, but a gaol in which to place the criminal. As rumor had it, they were keeping the man in a cage behind the church like some kind of wild animal.

“I would not dally here,” Sloop said. “Go about your business, Lady Ashford. Give my regards to your father.” He nodded once and made off toward the center of town.

Though Henry Morton’s stall was not far, a strange curiosity seized her, and when she was certain Sloop had moved on, she opened the church gate and stepped into the side yard. There was no cage. In the center of the field was a hole with iron bars across the top. She stepped toward it, peering over its edge. There was nothing but darkness beneath the line of the earth.

Then a voice from somewhere below, full of a deep and subtle menace. “Have you come to see the monster, little one?”

The bravery which she had so clearly felt upon the road drained from her body in a sudden, sticky rush. “I…”

“Afraid, are you? I expected more from the way you so boldly cast aside the gate.”

Isabella trembled but found her voice. “How did you know I came in through the gate?”

“I have ears, do I not?”

“I don’t know. I can’t see them.”

“Then you must be afraid. That I can sense, even from your voice.”

Isabella was dismayed when she realized this was true. She leaned forward boldly, anyway, and peered down the hole. “’Tis rude to have the advantage of someone during a conversation. Come forward.”

“We are not having a conversation. I am a monster, as they say.”

Isabella bristled. “I saw a monster once, just last night. He had four legs and sharp fangs. I doubt very much you are more fearsome than he.”

There was a long pause, then a face appeared at the bars. It was a much younger face than Isabella expected. A much more handsome face as well, or might have been were it not for the long days beneath the earth. There were no scars upon it, no deformities, nor devil’s horns. His only ornamentation was a metal ring which hung through the cavity of his nose, and even this seemed oddly noble.

“What’s your name?” Isabella said.

“If you wish to have a conversation, perhaps you should introduce yourself first.”

Isabella might have given up here, but the Lady of the Hill had made her bold. “Isabella Ashford.”

“Hunter of Shadows.”

“That’s your name?” Then, taking his silence for ascent, “Why do they call you that?”

“When I was little, I would follow my father into the forest to hunt. I had not learned to walk as a man walks, and each deer I stalked would be frightened before my arrow loosed. The iron would strike their shadows instead of their flesh.”

“So you killed their shadows?”

“In a manner of speaking.”

Isabella frowned. “Can you hunt now?”

The man chose to ignore this. “Why have you come here, little one?”

“I only wished to see if you were as terrible as people say.”

“And am I?”

“I don’t know,” Isabella said truthfully. “I should like to ask you something.”

“You’re a curious one.” He reached up and grabbed the iron bars with both hands, pulling himself into the light. Isabella took a step back. “Bring me water. I have not drunk for a day. Do this and I shall answer whatever questions you like.”

Isabella considered the request. He was a big man, but up close, he looked drained to the very soul. Perhaps the men of the watch wanted him weak when they took him to the noose. Perhaps with good reason.

“I shouldn’t,” she said.

He disappeared back into the dark. “Be gone with you, then.”

Isabella again considered his request, and for the second time that morning, her curiosity got the better of her. She retreated to Saint Joseph’s. There was a public well not far from the church, and it took but a moment to fill a small cup.

When she returned to the yard, the man with orange hair had left his post and was standing over the hole. He was urinating through the bars. For a moment, Isabella could do nothing but stare. She had caught sight of her father at the chamber pot once, and it was an experience she never wished to repeat, with him or any other man.

The interloper caught wind of her. “Ay, what are you looking at?” His accent was so thick that at first, Isabella didn’t understand him. It might have been Welsh, or from deep in the Scottish Highlands. “I said, what are you doing here?”

The Isabella from the day before might have turned and ran, but she had grown a coat of scales since then. “Stop that.”

He refastened his trousers and walked over to her. “What’s that?”

“Stop that,” she said, firmer this time.

“What business is it of yours?”

“I came to bring him water,” she said, trying to stay calm. She calculated what would happen if she began yelling for help and couldn’t figure the outcome. The town circle seemed impossibly far. “I’m going to bring him water, and you can’t stop me.”

“The hell you say.”

“Step aside, or my father shall hear of this. John Ashford. Perhaps you know him.”

The man laughed. Then he seemed to realize she wasn’t joking, and scoffed. “Blue-blooded prig. Rue the day you crossed me, you will.” The man spat on the ground and began walking toward the square.

Isabella ignored him and walked to the hole. By the time she got there, half the water had splashed from the cup. “I’m sorry.”

The man stared at her through the piss-covered bars. “You are terrible at fetching water.”

Isabella set the cup down next to the hole, thinking he might grab it later. “I still wish to ask you something.” There was nothing but silence below. “They say you were coming into town when the watch caught you.”

There was a grunt. “Is that your question?”

“I was just