The Witch's Trinity by Erika Mailman

Author:Erika Mailman [Mailman, Erika]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
ISBN: 9780753181423
Publisher: ISIS Large Print Books
Published: 2007-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

13

The next step of the Judge should be that, if after being fittingly tortured she refuses to confess the truth, he should have other engines of torture brought before her, and tell her that she will have to endure these if she does not confess.

—MALLEUS MALEFICARUM

He finally came, as I knew he would. His notary came behind him, with a carved chair and a small table. I recognized the chair, which had a heart and grouse carved into it, as the handiwork of Künne’s husband when he had yet lived. The notary placed both in the center of the room and then withdrew.

“There is a grave claim against you,” the friar told me as he sat.

I knew not whether to kneel before him or stand. “How shall I…?” I asked helplessly.

“Kneel,” he said. I did so.

“You are accused of witchcraft,” he said. “Do you deny the charge?”

To be asked this so soon! How will you answer? the woman had taunted me. I could not lie before a man of God, but I didn’t know what the truth was. I opened my mouth to speak, as I know he expected, but no words came.

“Your spirit is afflicted,” he observed. “You wish to give the lie of denial, but God is holding your tongue to keep you from blaspheming.”

I placed my hand on his knee, to beg a moment to gather myself, but he slapped it away. “You are a filthy trap in which sin has been caught,” he said. “There is more dirt on your face than in this floor. You smell worse than Frau Himmelmann did.”

I put the slapped hand back on the ground, to support my weight. Blood had dripped from the quill but I had not signed. If the devil tricked me into thinking I had done so, I would need to pull my mind together so that I could resist. My mind…I had once met Jost in the forest and not known him. My own son! My mind had wearied from all the thoughts of my long life; it didn’t work properly. Like my hair going gray, my mind had weakened and gone stray. I pressed my hands hard into the dirt as I considered for the first time that perhaps my mind had made all. Perhaps there had been no rutting in the forest, no cat kneading, no flying through the air supported by a woman’s black hair. No devil’s book to sign.

“You are still mute,” the Friar said. “The Malleus Maleficarum instructs on how to open the mouths of the cursed.” He nestled his hand into the folds of his robes and came out with a small, roundish object that he set on the table to his side. I stared at it. I had never seen such a thing. Made of iron, it resembled a pear. It was rounded in two ways, with one swell and a larger swell at the bottom. There were spikes at its tip.

“This is a pear,” he said. “After I show you its use, perhaps you will learn to speak.

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