Thistle Witch, page 13
part #1 of Anaïs Blue Series
Anaïs consulted her promptuary. She opened it and spoke into it. ‘Map.’
The pages flickered and a map of the city materialised on them.
‘Zoom out,’ said Anaïs.
The promptuary obliged and the city of Amsterdam shrank. The book displayed a complete map of north-western Europe. The British Isles caught her eye. It pulsed with a faint red glow. Anaïs took it as a sign; it was indicating where they should go.
Great! she thought.
The last time she had been in England, she’d had a problem with the small matter of an Empire State Building in the wrong place. The Rolling Stones concert was another thing she could never live down. Even though those events were mishaps and not entirely successful, they were only illusions. She was reminded that tricks of the eye are powerful but not true magic. To stay one step ahead of their pursuers, she would need more than an illusion. Prince had been correct in his appraisal of their situation. They would need to get as far away as possible.
A movement further down on the opposite side of the canal caught her attention. A man was cleaning a boat. The vessel was a reasonably sized motorised sloop. A horizontal, purple stripe ran the full length of its grey hull. Anaïs’s eyes lit up. The remnants of a string of exploded fireworks decorated the bow and empty cans rolled around on the deck. The man was collecting all the rubbish and stuffing it in a plastic garbage bag.
‘Let’s go,’ said Anaïs. She set off and Prince followed. They crossed the bridge they had sprinted across earlier and picked their way along the water’s edge, all the while vigilant for other signs of life. They reached the moored sloop and stood on the embankment above it. The man noticed them standing there and looked up.
‘Careful you don’t fall in.’
Anaïs smiled down at him. ‘Thanks, I’ll look out.’
He eyed the little girl suspiciously. ‘You’re up and about early,’ he said.
The man, in his early thirties and decked out in a white captain’s shirt with stiff lapels, turned his attention to Prince. The shade stared apathetically out across the canal, seemingly oblivious to the presence of the man on the boat.
‘Is he ok?’ The boatman pointed at Prince. ‘Your grandfather looks a bit worse for wear.’
Anaïs raised an eyebrow. ‘Grandfather?’
She looked up at Prince. ‘He sees what he wants to see, remember. You are a child. He fills in the rest. A small child would only be out with her grandfather on a day like this. Everyone else would be nursing a hangover.’
Anaïs nodded slowly and then more vigorously at the boatman. ‘Yes, my grandfather.’ She screwed up her lip. ‘He’s ok. We didn’t get much sleep last night.’
‘Doesn’t surprise me. I don’t think anyone could sleep through the racket.’ He cursed under his breath. ‘They should ban the whole thing. What is there to celebrate anyway?’
Anaïs shrugged and studied the boat. It looked sturdy enough. She had no nautical knowledge but surmised that it should get them across the channel. She only had to convince the boatman to take them.
Anaïs beamed her most angelic smile. ‘Do you mind if we come aboard?’
The boatman looked sceptically up at Anaïs and Prince.
‘Please?’ she pleaded and flashed her teeth at him.
The boatman’s face softened. ‘I suppose it will be ok for a moment.’
‘Cool,’ said Anaïs with enthusiasm. ‘I’ve never been on a boat like this before.’
The boatman moved to the edge of the vessel and close to the embankment. He extended his hand up to her. Anaïs grabbed it and jumped down into his arms. He grunted and nearly lost his footing. He cursed under his breath again.
She had her arms around his neck. He pulled his face away from hers, narrowed his eyes and scowled at her. ‘You better warn me if you’re going to do that again.’ He bent over and deposited her on the deck. He turned to assist Prince and choked with surprise. The shade was standing right next to him. The boatman’s eyes widened and he cleared his throat uncomfortably. Prince looked straight through him. The boatman cautiously backed away from the shade without taking his eyes off him.
Anaïs took off her beret and turned her back to them. She rummaged around in the hat. She found what she was looking for: the little silver box from the apothecary. She pulled it out.
Tentatively, the boatman turned his eyes away from Prince and looked down at Anaïs. ‘What’s that?’
‘Lollies, candy. Do you want one?’
He thought for a moment. She gave him her best smile. Reluctantly, he agreed. ‘I suppose so.’
‘I’ve got some different ones. What’s your favourite?’
‘Zoute drop.’
‘I prefer the sweet, soft liquorice myself, but I know many people like the sour ones. I think you might be lucky. Let me have a look.’
She opened the box and selected one of the various coloured balls rattling around inside. She held out her hand. There was a single black piece of salmiak liquorice, in the form of a cat, cupped in the centre of her palm. The boatman hesitated.
She sensed his trepidation. ‘It’s really yummy. Personally I prefer the purple ones, so you can’t have one of those.’
He relented, took the sweet and examined it carefully. He eyed Anaïs, decided she was on the level, and popped it in his mouth.
‘Mmm, you're right, it’s really good.’ He bit into the sweet and his eyes glazed over. A vapid grin spread across his face.
She waved her hand in front of his face. There was no reaction. He didn’t even blink. He was as catatonic as Prince’s camouflage.
‘We are going to England,’ announced Anaïs.
A serious look replaced the stupid grin. He pulled himself up to his full height and puffed out his chest. He nodded slowly.
‘We are going to England,’ repeated the boatman.
ON THE HIGH SEAS
The boat was bigger than she had expected. A cabin arose amidships. Inside was a kitchen, and, deeper under the deck, an open door led to a bedroom. The boat was solid and appeared seaworthy. Still, Anaïs knew, even before they had left the confines of the North Sea Channel, they would be in for a rough ride. She watched the city of Amsterdam recede into the distance. It looked grey and lifeless. The festivities of the previous night had left their mark. The city was drained. She had thought she would regret leaving, but as the last church spire disappeared behind the smokestacks of the industrial area in the western suburbs, she felt nothing.
She put it down to the loss of Nan. There was no reason for her to stay in the city. She had no real connection to it; only to one very special occupant. With Nan gone, Amsterdam meant nothing to her. She reassured herself that she had a new companion, but Prince wasn’t the same. He was no Nan and, unfortunately, he was dead.
She pulled the silver tin out of her beret again and counted the number of balls. If her calculations were correct she would have just enough to get them across the Channel. She had others—yellow, green, purple—but they had other purposes.
‘What are you doing?’
Anaïs was lost in thought and the voice in her head made her jump. She would never get used to it. It was one thing to listen to your own thoughts but, even though Prince couldn’t read them, having his voice in there as well felt like an invasion of privacy.
Prince sat next her on the seat at the stern of the boat and looked over her shoulder.
‘Just checking whether I have enough supplies.’
‘And do you?’
Anaïs pursed her lips. ‘No, not really, but I know a place. This will have to do for now. We have enough to make it to the other side.’ She thought for a minute. ‘Can you lay your hands out on your lap?’
‘Why?’ He eyed her with suspicion.
She smiled at him. ‘Just humour me. It won’t hurt. I want to try something.’
He shrugged and did as requested.
Anaïs pulled her legs up and knelt on the seat. She turned to face him. ‘Palms up, please.’
He obeyed. She put the tin next to her on the seat and pulled out her promptuary. She opened it and laid it flat on his hands. Immediately the open page transformed into a screen and, once again, a map appeared on the page. A flashing dot now showed their current position. The map zoomed out to show an overview of Western Europe and the British Isles. It then zoomed in on the south coast of England. A second spot appeared and started to blink. It was somewhere in Cornwall. She looked up at his face. ‘Do you know this place?’
He shook his head. ‘No.’
She studied the map closely. ‘I think the promptuary is showing us where you need to be.’ She looked up at him. ‘I think if we can get you there, we can solve what needs to be solved.’
He nodded with uncertainty and twisted the corners of his mouth. ‘You may be right.’
Anaïs tried to reassure him. ‘It’s definitely trying to tell me something. It has been doing strange things since I met you.’ She put her hand on his shoulder. ‘I think it knows what we have to do.’
Anaïs felt his shoulder relax. ‘I suppose we have nothing else to go on, do we?’ Prince grinned and leant back in the seat. ‘Let’s just go with it.’
Anaïs beamed. ‘Excellent!’
She took a ball out of the silver tin. She closed its lid before dropping it in her beret and pulling the hat firmly down on her head. She stood up on the seat and stepped across to the boatman. Both his hands firmly gripped the boat’s wheel and his gaze was fixed on the canal as it widened ahead of them. He was oblivious to her presence. Anaïs yanked down on his chin and threw the ball in his mouth. She then clamped his jaw shut. Taking the book from Prince’s lap she held it in front of the boatman’s face.
‘Take us there,’ she commanded, pointing at the flashing dot on the map.
He sucked nonchalantly on the ball and stared at the spot she indicated in the book. He shrugged. ‘Ok.’
She closed the promptuary, dropped it back in her jacket pocket, and jumped down from the seat. She carefully picked her way along the gunwale and sat at the bow. It was colder out on the water than it had been on land and she pulled her jacket tightly around her. She wished she had not dropped the blanket.
Anaïs shut her eyes and let the wind play in her hair. They were leaving the canal and heading out into open water. The wind strengthened and buffeted her. Occasionally sea spray flew over the bow and splattered her face. She didn’t mind. Its bite was invigorating. She opened her eyes, stared at the waves and kept a lookout for other vessels.
Prince wished he could sit next to her but she needed time alone. He visualised the flashing dot in the promptuary and felt a spark of hope ignite inside him. Something told him it wouldn’t be long before he had a new future.
THE CROSSING
The English Channel is a dangerous place, especially in a small boat. There are ferries, hydrofoils and transport ships of all sizes and descriptions. Most of them are a great deal larger than a sloop. It’s not a place for the faint hearted. As with most wide bodies of water, it also attracts less than ideal weather conditions.
Anaïs had been prepared for a rough ride but had not expected it to be so severe. Once they had hit the open seas, she realised it was not wise to remain at the bow. She had taken shelter in the cabin. She stood on the kitchen table, gripped a railing on the bulkhead and peered out through a small porthole towards the prow of the boat. The swell was whipping the little boat from side to side. It struggled over the break of a wave and down the other side. Water washed up over the head and crashed against the porthole, obscuring her view. Anaïs instinctively pulled back from it. The sea water ran down the porthole and harmlessly over the sides of the boat. She turned toward the stern and peered through the open door at the boatman. His stony face was contorted in deep concentration. She was certain that if he hadn’t been under the influence of the potion, his face would have also been clouded with fear.
He struggled at the helm, gunning the engine as the sloop climbed the face of a particularly large wave. He rode the sea’s undulations, flexing his knees as the vessel bucked under his feet. Prince sat behind him on the aft seat. He looked out grimly at the sea, his hands firmly clasping the seat cushion on either side of his legs. If he hadn’t been dead, his hands would have displayed the whites of his knuckles. He turned to face her and she gave him a reassuring smile. It was half-hearted. He didn’t buy her false confidence and she saw the worry in his eyes, even through the camouflage.
She returned to staring out the porthole and riding the table like a surfboard. Keeping one eye on the sea, she pulled out her promptuary. She flipped it open with her free hand and balanced it on her palm.
‘Map,’ she said.
The book obliged, its pages transmogrifying into a screen once more. It zoomed out from their position. They were approximately midway across the Channel. Threat of the ocean and inclement weather or not, there was no point in turning back now.
She spoke into the promptuary, her voice wavering. She hoped the book could not sense fear. ‘Zoom out,’ she commanded.
As earlier, she was presented with an overview of the British Isles. The dot in the southwest corner of the country still blipped. They were a long way away from it. Anaïs scrutinised the coastline and decided it was best if they headed directly for it. She was no expert, but common sense told her the seas should be calmer closer to the shore. She traced her finger along the contours of eastern Britain until she found the town closest to their present position, Lowestoft.
She looked out through the porthole and waited for a lull in the sea. When it came she sprang down from the table and made her way to the stern. She climbed onto the seat next to Prince and thrust the promptuary into the boatman’s face. He snapped out of his trance-like demeanour, refocusing his eyes on the book. Anaïs pointed at the town.
‘Take us here,’ she yelled, trying to make herself heard above the roar of the waves churning around them. The boatman nodded and dropped his eyes to a compass embedded in the steering console. He looked from book to compass and back again, adjusting their course. Anaïs dropped the promptuary in her pocket, took the beret off her head and retrieved the silver tin. She pried the boatman’s jaws open, which was quite difficult, considering he was gritting his teeth. She popped a black ball in his mouth and watched him roll it around with his tongue.
Satisfied he wasn’t going to spit it out, she resealed the tin, dropped it back into the beret and pulled it securely down around her ears. She looked down at Prince.
He studied her face. ‘Problem?’ he enquired.
‘No.’ Her voice thick with sarcasm. She waved her arm at the surrounding water. ‘I don’t like this. Do you?’
Prince slowly shook his head. ‘No.’
She pulled the promptuary from her pocket, flipped it open and ordered it to display the map. She shoved the book in his face.
‘Look.’ She pointed to the town of Lowestoft. ‘We’ve set a course to bring us closer to the coast. I think we’ll have calmer water there.’
‘Seems logical to me and I hope you’re right. But once we’re there, then what?’
‘We’ll just skirt the coast until we get to your little dot.’ She indicated the flashing speck on the map.
He looked up at her quizzically and shook his head. ‘It’s not my dot.’
She nodded enthusiastically and grinned down at him. ‘Oh, I think it is.’ She put a hand on his shoulder. ‘Either way, we’re going to make it yours.’
They fell silent and joined the boatman in staring towards the bow. The vessel was broadsided by a wave and Anaïs instinctively grabbed the boatman’s arm to stop herself being launched out of the vessel. He lost his footing and had to re-centre his balance, clutching the wheel tightly for support. Prince slid his arm around her legs and a chill run up them. She decided to put up with the cold. Any contact at all was a welcoming comfort right now.
LAND HO
The boatman held the sloop at a constant distance from land for a long time. Darkness had fallen, but occasionally the full moon peeked out from between the clouds and showed them their surroundings. As they skirted the coast she began to make out wide expanses of beach and the outline of rolling hills in the distance. There didn’t seem to be any comforting lights indicating civilisation.
Anaïs had expected to see more evidence of life on the shoreline. In the semi-darkness it all seemed so barren and uninhabited. A little further down the coast was a reassuring indication of life: a lighthouse swept the sea.
She consulted her promptuary. The current had carried them south from her original objective, the town of Lowestoft. They were also still far from their intended destination. It was slow going, and she estimated it would take days to get there using their present mode of transportation.
She looked over the boatman’s shoulder and inspected the fuel gauge on the console in front of him. It was plunged deep into the red. They were barely running on fumes and needed to put in to shore. The needle swung with the rocking of the boat. Every now and then it passed above the empty mark before sweeping back down through the red and hitting rock-bottom. It wouldn’t be long before they would be helplessly adrift. She could swim, but not far. She wondered if the dead could swim. She supposed it was unnecessary. Prince could probably just walk along the seabed if he wanted to. But even if that were possible it didn’t help her. She couldn’t take a stroll along the sea floor with him. She thought about the straw, but it wouldn’t be of any use. It only purified air, it didn’t supply the stuff.
Anyway, abandoning the boat wasn’t an option. There was a natural involved and she couldn’t risk the life of the boatman. It would go against the most fundamental rule of witchdom, the sheltering of the living from the unknown. He was an innocent pawn. She had borrowed him to achieve a goal and had no right to take his life. This was not something she wanted to consider. It made her squeamish. She didn’t want to be responsible for the death of yet another person.
