More Than Anything

Short Story

        It was Wednesday, possibly the best day of the week. Wednesday, a day of freedom. My feet itched with the desire to skip but I held them planted. At eighteen I was a child no longer. Wednesday, Wednesday, Wednesday, my mind sang. My skirts played with my ankles as I rounded another corner. Wednesday. It even sounded nice. I could smell the market now, the tangy citrus fruits making their debut, the spicy scent of herbs freshly picked, the hearty bread few could afford. 

            Ahead of me walked a family of four. The little girl clung to her mother's arm, the little boy striding ahead in his new-found freedom. My eyes skimmed down to where the man's hand engulfed his wife's, and a tiny cloud appeared above my Wednesday. I wanted that, wanted it more than anything. Yearning bloomed in my breast for everything their clasped hands represented. I craved for there to be a man waiting for me when I arrived home from the market, ached for there to be trousers as well as dresses to wash in a fortnight. More than anything caught in my mind, and I thought of the repercussions. Anything would include disobeying my master, giving up thirteen years of training. No man was worth that, I reminded myself, and slammed a door in my mind, closing in all those traitorous thoughts.

            Across the street sat the market, and I scurried across, eager to reach the hobbled-together stands cringing under the weight of their goods. Little puddles sat between the cobblestones on the street, waiting anxiously to be displaced by the carriage wheels carrying the wealthy home after a day of leisure. I was in the market now, people jostling me from every side, muddy skirts rubbing against my own until I was brown from the knees down with the sticky April dirt. I paused for one moment to tilt my head back and breathe in the sunshine before striding off. Today was not supposed to be a day of pleasure. I was supposed to be buying supplies, nothing more, so I walked on, practicing walking as my master had taught.

            "Walk with purpose," my master had told me, "and people will move out of the way." Striding through the market with rehearsed confidence, I wove myself between bundles of purposeless strangers. I started with the apothecary, knowing they sold the frog stomachs that my master needed for the duplication potion she was making Friday.

            "Greetings Corrine," he said with a great smile as I stepped up to the stand, impatiently brushing back a great black curl that had fallen to obstruct my vision. I had known William since my first visit to the market almost five years ago, and he never seemed to age.

            "I have your things right here," he continued, handing me a tightly packaged parcel, while glancing around, making sure no one was watching. He knew as well as I did the great consequences of being discovered a witch. I handed him a farthing and stored the parcel inside of the small basket I used specifically for market day. As I departed for the herbalist, I glanced over my shoulder and saw, just for a second, the glint of sun off a fang.

            "Good morning," I said to the herbalist, a touch of sweetness in my words. The herbalist was an attractive man. He simply nodded. He was not a man of words. And what a shame that was, I thought. I pulled out the gold gilded pocket watch that had been a present from my parents for yet another birthday they had been unable to attend, and noted that it was already a quarter past one. My master was going to be enraged by my lateness.                                     Abandoning my carefully confident walk, I turned in a swirl of skirts, set on running home. Instead I was met with a hard wall that hadn't existed a moment before. The man I had run into reached for my elbow, attempting to straighten me, but he was too late, and I fell to the ground with a great pouf. Mud soaked into my petticoats. Flooded with annoyance, I sat there on the ground, an incredulous expression showing on my face as I stared up, way up, into the eyes of the stranger. His shoulders strained against his blackened leather jerkin, and I wondered where he had obtained the soot stains. Though the man was well put together, it was impossible not to notice that he was a commoner. It was also impossible to miss the blush that painted his cheeks a dusty rose.