The Healer (The Witch Hunter 0.5)(4)
We don’t take the main roads to get out of Harrow. Even in a town full of Reformists, Father doesn’t like anyone knowing our whereabouts—those pirate habits again. Instead, we take the side roads, the forest paths, the desolate trails that lead south from our home in the tiny village of Whetstone, skirting the edges of the towns and hamlets that make up the rest of Harrow, until we reach the border: the magical protective barrier that separates us from them, safety from harm, Harrow from the rest of Anglia.
The walk from Harrow to Crouch Hill is a two-day journey, comfortably. But we aren’t comfortable, not out in the open like this. The Inquisitor’s witch hunters, they normally keep to the areas around Upminster. But if they’ve got a lead on someone, they go after them, no matter where they are. Which means they could be anywhere.
Father and I move quickly, and we don’t stop to sleep. Before we left home, I prepared a wineskin full of tonic to fight fatigue, to give us energy, to keep us alert. We pass it back and forth throughout the night, Father stifling a gag every time he takes a drink. I can’t blame him. It’s a mixture of licorice, ginger, dandelion root, and chicory, and it tastes like hell.
As dawn comes and the gray light with it, I finally spot a signpost pointing to Crouch Hill: ten kilometers. Out here, it’s mostly open stretches of land mixed with gently rolling hills, for the most part unpopulated. But the closer you get to Upminster, the villages grow larger and begin to run together until you reach the city. Then it’s nothing but paved roads, pubs, markets, and crowds.
And prison and scaffolds and flames and death.
“You’ve been quiet tonight,” Father remarks through a yawn. “Are you nervous about seeing Nicholas?”
“No,” I say, his yawn making me yawn, too. “Just wondering what’s wrong with him. Why all the secrecy? Why haven’t I heard he’s sick? That sort of news would travel fast in Harrow.”
“Which is exactly the reason for all the secrecy.”
“You said he’s seen other healers,” I say. “Seems like word would get out—”
“John.” Father stops, turns to me, and takes my shoulder. His eyes are bloodshot with fatigue, somehow making them darker. “It’s imperative you keep this information about Nicholas to yourself. You mustn’t tell anyone. Not that Nicholas is ill, not that you’re here. George knows about Nicholas, of course, and you and Fifer. But that’s it.”
I feel a tug of anxiety at the urgency in his tone. “I don’t discuss my patients with other people,” I say. “Besides, there isn’t anyone to tell.”
Father pulls me to him then, holding me tight and patting my back. Another gesture he hasn’t made in years. I start to push him away but then I don’t, and for a moment I think I’ve been wrong to shut him out, wrong to shut everyone out. But my misery, despite what they say, does not love company.
Another hour and we reach Nicholas’s house, hidden behind a copse of trees. While I’ve been to his house in Harrow before, many times, I’ve never been to this one. It’s huge, brick, and beautiful: three stories tall, walls covered with greenery now beginning a slow winter death on the vine. From the outside, it looks abandoned. So many homes nowadays look abandoned—are abandoned—that it doesn’t draw notice. We cross the graveled path toward the entrance. Two large wooden double doors, stained glass windows on either side, each bear the symbol of the Reformists: a sun surrounded by a square, then a triangle, encircled by an ouroboros, a snake with its tail in its mouth.
It’s meant to symbolize renewal, a balance of creation out of destruction, life out of death. But there’s no balance, not now; not anymore. Now we’re trapped in an endless cycle of fear and terror, devoured by flames and death, until eventually there will be nothing left.
3
I’m not two steps inside the house before there’s a shriek and then a laugh as Fifer hurls herself at me.
“John!” She throws her arms around my neck and squeezes tight. Then, just as abruptly, she releases me and steps back, a scowl replacing her smile. Fifer is as mercurial as a spring day: sunny one moment, then the next thing you know you’re caught in a downpour, running for cover. I’ve known her since she was six and, ten years later, not much has changed.
“It’s been weeks since I heard from you,” she starts. “Didn’t you get my letters? You look good. Did you forget to shave? You need a haircut. And are you eating? You’re too thin.”
I shake my head, a small smile working its way across my face.
“Yes, yes, and thank you,” I say. “I’m not sure but probably, and you’re right, I do. What was the other?”
“I asked if you’re eating. You’re too pale and too thin.” Her scowl softens, and she glances at Father across the hall, deep in conversation with Nicholas. “Is everything all right? Are you still having, you know, episodes?” She practically whispers the word.
I nod. There’s no point in hiding anything from Fifer anyway. She’s known me too long, and she’s the closest thing I’ve got to a sister, now. Fifer is the complete opposite from Jane in looks: rust-red hair, matching red freckles, pale-green eyes. But aside from that, they’re exactly the same. Jane never passed up an opportunity to take the piss out of me, and Fifer doesn’t, either.