Bid Him Welcome

“We haven’t any creed, any dogma, child. Your will is your own, which is what gives it power and worth when it joins with ours or that of one of our friends.” She spoke these words to me over a bowl of oil, herbs and pig’s blood one afternoon before the others arrived. Twilight was pouring warm copper over the whole scene and I was anxious for night to hide us.

Some of the baron’s men had jostled and questioned me, one adding a groping leer that made me want to bite him, in the kitchen that afternoon. They suspected that some of the women of the village were involved in some mischief, and Bishop Otto had emissaries in the area, one of whom had caused the baron no small discomfort with his questioning. I fended them off and feigned bovine ignorance, which confirmed their natural suspicions, though one was clever, Peter was his name, and he pressed me. We had to be more careful.

“There will always be talk, child.” She smoothed her silver hair with an air of impatience. I have looked into them dozens of times, but I could not swear that Bianca's eyes are blue or violet or grey. They seem to slide hither and thither with her mercurial moods, a visible sign of the constant motion in her wise old head. “If a few of them need quieting, we have tools for that. Some are sharper than others, and we can pour venom on a few if it comes to that.” She chuckled and pinched my cheek like a grandmother jesting with a child. She knows I became a woman two years ago, just before I met her and the others on the hill. What they did to that brigand who was on me frightened me at first, and then I recognized the delicious justice in it and drank my fill. Most of what we did still struck me as clever theater, but that was something cold and real. That fool will be blind and mute for the rest of his days. I walked past him begging alms in the market the other day and spat on his shadow.

“Tell Margot about your worries before we begin tonight. She is more imaginative than most, and has a saw’s edge.” Bianca nodded, gathered some inky candles and a piece of chalk from the makeshift table beside the altar and knelt to sweep dirt and leaves from the stone floor, forming a large patch of clear order in the filthy tumult. “Whom shall we talk with tonight, child? Pan, Hecate, Nyx? You know the latter well. You are always more alive at night. That is why the cats are so fond of you.” She began to mark symbols on the stone in a circular pattern. She could write and draw beautifully. Envy and admiration always quarreled in my heart when I watched her do these things. I had a crude, brief education. She is the daughter of an earl, spurned by her family after she refused to marry a man with more wealth than sense. How wonderful it must have been, to have a learned person help you to overcome yourself.

Margot and the others arrived as night began to usher twilight offstage. She had a black goat on a rope. Have you ever looked into the eye of a goat? Their pupils are shaped like dark squares! I spent more time than I ought to have done on the farm when I was young studying them and imagining what sort of world one would see with such an eye. Margot’s goat was cleaner than most, probably pinched from one of the wealthy farmers who had more beasts than they could count or remember. There were prosperous farms on the southern edge of the baron’s holdings. He talked of their crops with smug pride over dinner in the hall.

“Merry meet and merry part and merry meet again, sisters!” Bianca stood and pitched the chalk onto the table. She and Margot embraced and Margot whispered something that made Bianca’s eyes darken with vexation. She nodded and began giving instructions to each of us. There were six: Bianca, Margot, Cante, who was too fair for her own good and had to keep her hood on in the market to fend off hungry eyes; Divita, who seemed always to be blushing due to some secret shame, Felice, who was being wooed by a penniless poet from the next village and never stopped talking about it, and me. Bianca had tasks for all. It was Litha, and she was determined to make something of this sacred, summer moment.

She glided to the center of the floor and began to hum. We were all doing likewise soon enough, without explicit command. Music should always be born that way, and probably was to begin with, I thought. Throats sometimes sing because they cannot help it, when the heart is bursting and needs pouring out. The sound attracted Uberti, a cat kept by the apothecary who has a small shop about half a league to the east. He is black, so there are those who are eager to do him in, but he is clever and quick and has the favor of enough of the villagers to remain alive. He is generally bored and aloof like all cats, but sometimes peers at me like he has something urgent to tell me.

Just as our song was rising, horses arrived—four or five by my hasty count. I recognized that inquisitive fellow, Peter, among the riders. They were armed and flying the heraldry of Bishop Otto. The lead man was tall and stout with a beard brown as an otter. He shoved his way to Bianca. Color drained even from Divita’s cheeks. We all retreated into the shadows save Bianca, who smiled at the oaf as she would a guest just arrived at a feast.

“Know that we have heard tales of your mischief,” bellowed the bearded oaf, “and that, by order of his holiness bishop Otto, it ends tonight. His holiness tires of heretics and witches vainly seeking to keep the old ways. They are dead and gone, and you are fools to do these things. Leave off or die.” He drew his sword and pointed it at Bianca. His henchmen began punching and shoving and hurling insults and curses at the rest of us. I dropped to the floor and crawled backward into the dark, just managing to avoid Peter’s probing gaze. The floor was redolent of ash and forgotten tidiness. Uberti was beside me at once, his eyes turning from the brutes and back to me as if he was weighing alternatives.

“You do not know where you are.” Bianca said it with pity. The bearded brute took a step back in spite of himself. The others carried on roughing up my sisters, but I could see his conviction waver a bit. Uberti placed his small paw on the back of my hand. I looked into his eyes. It was as if there was something written there that I could not quite make out. My fear squinted and it was there, plain as if he had thought it straight into my head. “Bid him welcome,” I said. Bianca and the brute both heard and turned to me.

And then I did it. I caught the eye of the goat. Margot had dropped the rope and it had wandered into Bianca’s chalk circle. Its hoof and the rope had marred the edge of the circle, and I hadn’t time to sort out if that mattered. I simply said, with all the fear and anger in my heart, with all of the memories of pain and doubt I could conjure tied to each syllable, “Be welcome, Dark One.” I pointed at the goat as I said it, and Uberti yowled his approval.

The goat slowly rose onto its hind legs as if it had been waiting to do so all of its life. It seemed to be growing as it did so, drinking shadows into itself from the dirty ruins about it and the wrath and terror spilling from the souls in its orbit. Its eyes fixed on the otter bearded lout, who shouted some admonition in Latin and turned his blade on it. Bianca fell to her knees at the edge of the circle and began speaking words I could not comprehend.

The goat glanced at the sword and it spun and ran the oaf through. He shouted his surprise in blood. The sword withdrew and danced through the ruins, slicing through the oaf’s henchmen like cured hams. Margot and the others were singing again. It was madly beautiful. I heard Peter scream last. Uberti began to purr.

Bianca rose and approached me. She extended her hand and helped me off the floor. “How are your worries now, child?”

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Thanks to Kenny Penn for inspiring this humble effort. The details of his challenge can be found here: