The Witch Hunter (The Witch Hunter #1)(2)
“I’ll kick it open, but you go in first,” Caleb tells me. “Take charge of it. It’s your capture. Sword up and out. Don’t lower it, not for a second. And read the arrest warrant straightaway.”
“I know.” I don’t know why he’s telling me this. “Not my first time, remember?”
“I do. But this won’t be like the others. They won’t be like the others. Get in and get out. Nothing fancy. And no more mistakes, okay? I can’t keep covering for you.”
I think of all the things I’ve done wrong in the past month. The witch I chased down the alley who nearly got away. The chimney I got stuck in trying to find a hidden cache of spellbooks. The cottage I stormed that didn’t house wizards brewing potions but a pair of aged friars brewing ale. They’re just a few mistakes, true. But I don’t make mistakes.
At least, I didn’t used to.
“Okay.” I raise my sword, my sweaty hands slipping off the hilt. I quickly wipe them on my cloak. Caleb draws his leg back and slams his foot against the door. It smashes open, and I burst into the house.
Inside are the five necromancers I’m looking for, huddled around a fire in the center of the room. There’s a large cauldron perched above the flames, a foul-smelling pink smoke billowing from the top. Each of them wears a long, tattered brown robe, and oversized hoods conceal their faces. They stand there, moaning and chanting and holding bones—either arm bones or a very small person’s leg bones—and shaking them like a bunch of damned Mongol shamans. I might laugh if I weren’t so disgusted.
I circle around them, my sword pointed in their direction. “Hermes Trismegistus. Ostanes the Persian. Olympiodorous of Thebes—”
I stop, feeling like an idiot. These necromancers and the ridiculous names they give themselves. They’re always trying to outdo one another.
“You five,” I say instead. “By the authority of King Malcolm of Anglia, I am commanded to arrest you for the crime of witchcraft.”
They continue chanting; they don’t even look up. I glance at Caleb. He stands by the door, still flipping his dagger. He almost looks amused.
“You are hereby ordered to return with us to Fleet prison for detention and to await your trial, presided over by the Inquisitor, Lord Blackwell, Duke of Norwich. If you are found guilty, you will be executed by hanging or by burning, as is the king’s pleasure, your land and goods forfeit to the crown.” I pause to catch my breath. “So help you God.”
This is usually the part where they protest, where they say they’re innocent, where they ask for proof. They always say this. I have yet to arrest a witch or wizard and have her or him say to me, “Why, yes, I have done illegal spellwork and read illegal books and purchased illegal herbs and thank goodness you’ve come to stop me!” Instead, it’s always, “Why are you here?” and “You’ve got the wrong person” and “There must be some mistake!” But it’s never a mistake. If I show up on your doorstep, it’s because you’ve done something to draw me there.
Just as these necromancers have.
I keep going. “Tuesday, 25th October, 1558: Ostanes the Persian purchases wolfsbane, a known poison, at the black market in Hatch End. Sunday, 13th November, 1558: Hermes Trismegistus etches the Seal of Solomon, a talisman used for summoning spirits, on Hadrian’s Wall outside the city. Friday, 18th November, 1558: All five subjects seen at the All Saints Cemetery in Fortune Green, exhuming the corpse of Pseudo-Democritus, né Daniel Smith, another known necromancer.”
Still nothing. They just drone on and on, like a hive of old bees. I clear my throat and go on, louder this time.
“Subjects possess the following texts, each on the list of Librorum Prohibitorum, the king’s official list of banned books: Albertus Magnus’s Magister Sententiarum. Thomas Cranmer’s New Book of Common Spells. Desiderius’s Handbook of a Reformist Knight.”
Surely they’ll react to this. Wizards hate nothing more than finding out I’ve been inside their home, finding things in places they thought no one would ever look. Small hollowed-out niches under the floorboards. Beneath the chicken coop. Stuffed inside a straw mattress. There’s nothing a wizard can hide that I can’t find.
It occurs to me that it’s rather pointless to recite their crimes, considering I’ve caught them in the middle of an even bigger one. I’m not sure what to do. I don’t have all day to stand around listening to these old fools chant, and I can’t let them finish their spell. But I can’t exactly jump in and lay them out with my sword, either. We’re supposed to capture, never kill. Blackwell’s rule. And none of us would dare break it. Even still, my fingers tighten around the hilt and I’m itching to start swinging, until I see it: a shape beginning to form in the pink mist in the cauldron.
It rises into the air, swaying and undulating in a nonexistent breeze. Whatever this thing is that they’re in the middle of conjuring—my guess is that it’s Pseudo-Democritus, né Daniel Smith, who I watched them dig up—it’s hideous. Something between a corpse and a ghost, translucent yet rotting, mossy skin, disjointed limbs, and exposed organs. There’s a strange humming noise coming from it, and I realize it’s covered in flies.
“Elizabeth.”
Caleb’s voice startles me. He’s standing beside me now, his dagger held in front of him, staring at the thing in front of us.