The Silver Well by Kate Forsyth

Author:Kate Forsyth
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: magic, contemporary fantasy, historical fantasy, english civil war, warsaw uprising, cerne abbas, australian speculative fiction
Publisher: Ticonderoga Publications

As soon as he was gone, I changed into my boots. “What are you going to do?” my mother asked.

“I have to find the true murderer,” I said. “I am going to find that crazy monk that denounced the abbey, and I am going to ask him to tell me the truth.”

My mother sighed. “I suppose you want me to cast a spell of truthfulness on him?”

“Can you do it?”

“It’d be easier if I had a lock of his hair or some fingernail clippings, or even dirt from his footsteps. But I will do my best.”

My mother went to the pantry and carefully cut a small square of parchment from her precious hoard. She knelt by the fire and carefully drew out a burning furze twig, blowing on it till the flame was snuffed out. Then, with the blackened stick, she swiftly drew a man’s face on the parchment. A thin austere face within a dark hood. Eyes that seemed to burn with fervour. We had all seen William Christchurch many times in the years when he had lived at the abbey, and then during his long battle to denounce the abbot. Still I marvelled at my mother’s skill in capturing his likeness with just a few strokes. She held the parchment above the flames. It caught fire.

“Flames so red, let the truth be said,” she chanted. “Flames so bright, let what’s hidden come to light.”

The parchment flared up, then crumbled to dust. My mother threw a handful of salt into the flames, crying, “Let it be so!”

She sank back on to her heels. “He will speak truth to you,” she said wearily. “If he is the murderer, he will confess to you.”

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