The Faintest Ink (Watty Winner 2015)

Chapter Thirty-Nine

The journey via vegetable cart hadn't been very eventful. The girl remained silent for most of the way, no doubt sulking about her current situation in life, so John had turned his attention to the farmer. They'd had a nice chat about farming, and the shocking price of that turnips were going for at market. Admittedly, the farmer had done most of the talking, but John felt that his small contributions had been both pithy and useful.

"You mind if we keep going?" said the farmer as a small town emerged in front of them. "I'll get a better price at further on down at Whitfair. This lot will spend a bag of gold on a bolt of silk, but won't trouble themselves to pay a copper for a punnet of cabbages."

In truth John could have done with a break from this jostle of an old cart, but his travelling companion had been hiding her face in her shawl ever since they first caught a glimpse of the chapel tower on the horizon and he figured it was best to keep on the road.

Whatever that witch had done to her, must have been truly awful. The girl was as withdrawn as his bank balance back home. That lie she'd been spinning about being a servant was getting more rickety with every mile they travelled. Most of the witches he'd had dealings with limited themselves to what passed as medicine north of the moor, and the odd love potion, but perhaps there really were evil sorceresses who kept young maidens locked up in towers. Still, at least her silence meant he didn't have to listen to that god-awful fake accent any more.

Once the imperious expression had been washed away along with the mud he could see she was little more than fifteen or sixteen. Though she held herself like a knight. Even on the back of this bouncing cart, sharing her seat with a box of turnips, she was so straight-backed she'd make a statue look slouched.

"Sure thing, mate," he said. "We'll go as far as you do."

The town, though small, must have been prosperous, as the main street was paved with cobblestones instead of the usual compressed dirt and horse muck. John looked around with interest and was caught utterly off guard when the wheel bounced off a stone and sent him hurtling towards the girl.

She let out a small yelp and shot a gaze full of knife points in his direction.

"Sorry," he said, regaining his seat, but she wasn't paying attention. The rest of the townspeople were, and had turned to look in their direction.

She visibly shrank before his eyes, pulling up the shawl, which had been dislodged by his attack, back over her face. She didn't seem to breathe again until the houses thinned and they were once again surrounded by fields and hedgerow.

Evening was drawing in long before they reached Whitfair and the temperature had plummeted. The long summer was coming to a close. John reached for his cloak, but drew his hand away just in time.

He didn't know what that woman had done by the fireside, but it had weirded the hell out of him. The woollen cloak which had enveloped him for hundreds of miles worth of traipsing around this magic-laden country now made his skin shudder.

Something was very wrong. And he needed his new travelling companion, to tell him what the hell it was and how to get rid of it before he froze to death.

He had to settle for wrapping his arms around his legs until the town of Whitfair emerged around them. The cart trundled through the streets until it came to a stop outside a cheerful looking tavern.

"The Wisp and Lantern," said the farmer. "Clean rooms, nice grub and a fair landlord. You can't ask for better. Not round these parts," he said.

John stretched out his legs, rubbing his thighs until the feeling crept back into them.