Sorry for the wait! It took me some time to work it out and end this short the way I wanted. I think it ends hopeful, but not quite happy, which in my humble opinion, are some of the best types of endings. If you haven’t already read Part 1, follow the link here to find it! As always, if you enjoyed this, please like or comment below and share with a friend! Thank you for reading.
– Allie
“Farryn,” my mother says over the howl of the wind. Her cold hands hold my cheeks. I can barely see her face, then I see all of it at once as a flash of lightening cracks across the sky. Her eyes are wide and earnest. “Farryn, listen to me. You cannot tell anyone who you are. Don’t tell a soul. If anyone finds out you are a Graves -” Another crack of thunder drowns out her words. She looks behind her as the rain pours over us in a wave. When she turns back to me, she has a small, sad smile playing on her lips, white from the cold.
“Farryn, I love you. You are more special than you know.” With a kiss on my cheek and a tight hug, she whispers in my ear, “Now run.”
I take off through the heavy sheets of rain, but make the mistake of turning back. Three women with their arms wide emerge from the trees, their eyes white in the dark. Electricity crackles around them making their hair stand on end. In unison, they point to my mother and the world goes white as the ground shudders from the shock that rocks the ground.
I wake up drenched in sweat, panting as I stumble out of my bed.
“My name is Abigail Byrd. My name is Abigail Byrd. My name is Abigail Byrd,” I whisper to myself, trying to forget Farryn Graves. Trying to forget that awful night.
I hear a scratch at my window and turn, only to jump when I see a woman’s face. Her hair is silver though she can’t be much older than me, maybe twenty at most. Her startling violet eyes penetrate my fear and I turn to face her, refusing to drop my gaze. She smiles.
A knock at the door makes me jump.
“Abby, dear, Mrs. Horn is having some complications. She sent over Blake just now. Will you come with me? I could use your eyes,” comes Miss Thatcher’s voice. I turn back to my window, but the woman is gone. I rub my eyes. You’re imagining things again, Abby, I tell myself. After those types of dreams, it’s hard not to start seeing waking nightmares.
“Yes, I’ll be right there,” I call through the door.
It’s been almost two weeks since I had helped Nathan with his arm. He visited me a few days ago to give me an update.
“Abby, you truly have a gift,” he’d said with a smile. I was doing some laundry, hanging it out to dry in the bright, noonday sun. Nathan had looked around to be sure there were no prying eyes before he removed his arm from the sling. He’d reached to the top of the drying post with the now healed dislocated arm. “I’ve promised to remain injured for you, but look at this.” He proceeded to do a one armed pull-up, slow and steady, as if it took no effort for him to preform the action.
“Nathan,” I’d hissed, swatting at him. He had grinned widely, his dimple making another dashing appearance. “Put your arm back in that sling. What if someone saw you?”
“Then they’d be impressed by my strength,” he winked and despite all the risk, I’d laughed, rolling my eyes.
Nothing yet had come from my healing him, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that someone had seen it. They had seen him arriving with a dislocated arm and leave walking away without any stiffness. Sure, he’d been wearing a sling, but the idiot had practically skipped from the yard.
I thought again about his dimple as we rushed into town. It was the dead of night, but that never seemed to bother Miss Thatcher. She was ready to attend to Mrs. Mary Horn. Mrs. Horn’s eldest son, Blake, only fourteen, said that his mother’s water had broken.
“She was making the most terrible noises,” he said as he rode beside us on horseback. “But my father was the one who looked terrified. He yelled, ‘Git the midwife now!’”
Miss Thatcher chuckled. She was considered an old maid, around thirty-five years old and never married, but that never seemed to bother her. She always told me, ‘Marriage is only ever worth it if you find love. Or for having children, I suppose.’
I allowed myself to ponder on that for a moment as we make our way into town. What might married life be like? My mind slips again to Nathan and my stomach lurches. Surely I couldn’t be thinking of Nathan as a future husband… could I?
We reach the Horn home and hear a wail.
“Oh dear,” Miss Thatcher says, dropping to the ground. “Abby, please bring the supplies. I’ll meet you inside.” Then she follows Blake through the front door.
I gather the basket that has blankets, rags and some herbs that will assist in the delivery and head for the door.
Once I enter, Miss Thatcher gives me the look. It says, Tell me what you see.
Miss Thatcher did not know the extent of my abilities nor had she ever asked for an explanation. I would be forever grateful to her for that.
She had found out on accident during one extremely complicated delivery. Miss Thatcher and I had spent nearly two days with Melissa Davis as she labored through delivering twins. We got the first baby out, but as soon as we saw the head of the second, Miss Thatcher looked at me, her face absolutely stricken.
“I don’t know what more I can do. She’s bleeding too much,” she’d whispered. And that’s when I saw it. The thick cord of dark red was tangled around the ball of light. I stood and began rolling up my sleeves and scrubbing them clean with the hot water that Melissa’s husband was replenishing every other hour. I remember the scald of the water, but I paid it no mind. I remember watching as Mrs. Davis’ second ball of light began to dim with a panic. “What are you doing?” Miss Thatcher had asked, with concern and hope.
I didn’t say anything as I reached past her and worked my way towards the child’s head and unwrapped the umbilical cord from the child’s neck. The baby was delivered shortly after that and Miss Thatcher had eyed me keenly whenever she was free. As soon as we were out of ear shot on our horses, she’d turned and gave me a stern look.
“Tell me,” was all she’d had to say.
“You know how most people say that pregnant women have a glow about them?” I’d asked her. She’d nodded slowly as though uncertain as to what that had to do with anything, but I continued. “When I see a pregnant woman, their abdomen is literally aglow. I can see the mesh of pink and red and the ruddy brown strings and the white, hazy ball like a bubble.” After a pause, Miss Thatcher nodded.
“You could see the cord,” she’d said. I shook my head in affirmation and she became quiet. Once we got to the house, she’d stopped me with a raised hand and wouldn’t look me in the eye as she said, “I will only say this once, so make sure you listen. I will tell no one of this nor should you. This stays between us, but,” she’d paused there and then finally met my eyes. “If you ever see anyone in pain or hurting, during a delivery or otherwise, see that you try to help. Always. Understood?”
“Yes ma’am,” I’d said.
And I had kept up my end of the bargain.
Now she watched me carefully, waiting for my keen eye, to determine what she should do first. I scanned Mrs. Horn and gave her one nod. No complications.
Miss Thatcher turned to spring into action when a loud, demanding pound beat on the other side of the door we had just entered.
“Who could that be?” Mr. Horn grumbled, clearly unhappy with how noisy everything was in his home at such a late hour. He crossed the room and yanked it open with a hard set of his mouth looking like he was ready to give someone a harsh verbal lashing. But his face fell and he took a step back, allowing a sheriff to enter the room with Smithy hot on his heels.
“There’s the witch,” Smithy said as he pointed right at me. The man was tall and skinny with white hair and a nasty mole sitting on the tear-duct of his left eye. The sheriff sneered down at me and I felt my pulse immediately quicken.
“What?” Exclaimed Mr. Horn, his eyes dancing from me, to Miss Thatcher, who had frozen, to his wife, then back to Smithy and the Sheriff we didn’t recognize. “You can’t be serious. Miss Abby is no witchling.”
“She’s a witch, alright. I’ve seen it with my own two eyes, Mr. Horn. The girl is unnatural. I’d get her away from your wife as soon as possible if I were you,” Smithy said, his left eye twitching.
“Hold on,” Miss Thatcher said, finally standing. “She’s my apprentice. She’s a midwife apprentice, Smithy. Nothing more.”
“Not unless you’re teaching more than just delivering babies, Miss Thatcher,” Smithy hissed, heavy with accusation. “I’ve seen you with your herbs. You just might be a -”
“What is it you want?” I yelled, louder than I should’ve. It was one thing for them to accuse me of being a witch. It was something wholly different to accuse Miss Thatcher too.
Smithy took the bait and his face stretched into a wide, toothless grin.
“I have a warrant for your arrest and a sheriff to carry it out. Now will you go quietly? Or will you show everyone what you truly are, child? A witch?”
Everything slowed down in that instant and I felt the blood pounding through my veins like a stampede.
“But I’m not a witch,” I said to myself. I’m not a witch. I can’t be a witch. Can I?
________
Every year on what we call my Homecoming Day, Mrs. Thatcher recounts the story of how I came to be her apprentice.
“You were found alone in the woods just on the outskirts of town and immediately brought to Smithy.” I always make a face and she nods, knowingly. “He may be insufferable, but he is a doctor, and you had a terrible cold and high fever. Smithy pronounced that you were as good as dead.”
“But you knew better,” I’d say with a smile.
“I did,” she’d grin. “But being a man who needs to be told he’s always right, I said to him, ‘Let me look after the poor thing. You are SO busy with patients that the dear can spend her last moments with me.’
“And sure as rain, you recovered. You were brilliant. And you became my young apprentice.”
I loved her for her kindness and paid close attention to all the things she taught me about being a midwife, but I should’ve known that the security of being Miss Thatcher’s apprentice wouldn’t last forever.
Then again, I never imagined sitting in the dark, muggy cell of the small sheriff’s place being accused of being a witch.
I’m not a witch. I’m not a witch. I’m not a witch.
I had repeated the words verbally and to myself now too many times to count. It helped me stay sane. After all, I wasn’t a witch.
I heard the loud pound of hooves and shouting sound outside. My heart started to race when I thought I had recognized the voice.
No. I thought numbly. No, no, no, no…
“You can’t just lock her up!” His voice was furious, bigger than himself, and angrier than I had ever heard it before. I scrambled to my feet and held onto the bars, trying to catch a glimpse of what was happening outside.
“He can, an’ he will, son,” came Smithy’s demeaning tone. He had stayed behind with the sheriff and kept up a non-stop chatter since they’d first shoved me in here, happily recounting the unexplainable things he’d seen me do. Most of them were made up. Others…
“What did he tell you? They’re lies! He’s just jealous because Abby is more skilled a physician than he will ever be.” Nathan’s words flew and landed like acid. I couldn’t see Smithy’s response, but the silence that followed was as thick as molasses.
“You see what I mean, sheriff?” Smithy’s voice was soft. Sweet. It was his bedside manners voice that delivered the bad news of death or incurable illness. “She’s already sunk her talons into this one. Bewitched. He came running when she was incarcerated. I don’t think that’s a coincidence. Do you?”
“You can go straight to hell,” Nathan was growling, but ten minutes later, Nathan was being roughly deposited into the only other cell beside mine, a thick wooden wall separating us.
“Have you bewitched anyone else, harpy?” The sheriff asked, his face red with exertion. Smithy laughed and the two of them went out to the porch again, taking in the coolness of the summer night.
“Nate, what are you doing here?” I hissed, trying to position myself so that I could see him through the bars at the front of my cell.
He growled, then it turned into a groan.
“I think that bastard knocked out a tooth,” he said, half astounded, half annoyed.
“Nathan,” I scolded. I heard him shuffle and then his hand came through the front of his cell, reaching for mine. I took it and for the first time since they accused me, felt like crying.
“Call me Nate again. I like it when you call me Nate,” he said softly. The tears fell silently on my cheeks and I was happy for the thick wall that divided us.
“Why did you come? You shouldn’t have come,” I cried.
“Miss Thatcher sent Blake Horn to my house. Said you’d been accused of being a witch. What else was I supposed to do, Abby?” He asked, his voice sounding strained.
We stood like that for a while, me crying and just holding hands through the cell bars.
“What if I am?” The question was out before I could think better of it.
“What if you’re what?” Nathan asked, sounding sad and tired.
“What if I am a witch?” I clarified, wiping the tears from my face and sniffing, determined to stop crying.
Nathan took his time responding, but his hand stayed firmly around mine. He squeezed me tightly in one quick pulse before he answered.
“If you’re a witch, Abby, then we need more witches like you around.”
Allie Marin 