Cauldron of Fear Read online

  The Black Drum, the clerk had assured Sarah, was a very reputable inn, with good food, comfortable rooms and even - a rarity, even in London - hot water available at any hour of the day or night. For a total of ninepence ha'penny - a special concessionary rate for passengers of the coach company - she would be assured of everything she could possibly want and then the following day, once she was properly rested and replenished, it was but two miles from there to Barten Meade and the sanctuary of her uncle, Oliver Merridew's house.

  She sighed again and turned back to look out into the night. At least, she thought, she had left behind no loose ends. She had little money, true enough, but her uncle made it very clear in his letters that she should be more than welcome. It would be quiet after the city, she knew, but at least it would be safe there with the last dangers now many miles behind her.

  The countryside, she thought dreamily as she closed her eyes and tried to ignore the bruising jolts, the countryside would be so peaceful after life in the big city...

  Chapter 3

  The overseer, Adam, was deliberately tormenting her, Kitty realised, making her beg for what they both knew she now craved so desperately, but refusing to sate her desires fully. Several times he used his devilish whip to bring her to a writhing frenzy, but then, just as she thought she was approaching the orgasm for which her every nerve ending was screaming out, he stopped, standing back to watch her frustrations with a disdainful leer on his handsome face.

  With her hands still cuffed to what these people referred to as her slave training harness belt and her elbows pulled tightly behind her until they all but touched, Kitty was helpless to help herself, protect herself, or do anything save dance to the tune played by the whirling thongs, and the sheen on her inner thighs bore witness to how his ministrations had succeeded in keeping her on the very precipice.

  'Enough,' Adam said at last and folded the whip away. 'I think you've learned what you needed to learn; that you're just a slave and therefore fit to be done to and with as your masters decide. You earn everything now for nothing is free, especially not you, Titty Kitty.'

  Kitty hung her head and said nothing, while her breasts rose and fell in time with her laboured breathing. She dared not look at him again and did not raise her eyes, even when she heard the sound of something heavy being scraped across the floor.

  Matilda groaned and rolled over onto her back, her eyes screwed tightly shut against the pain across her shoulders, and then immediately twisted back onto her opposite side, regretting the movement that had placed such rough pressure on her stinging flesh.

  Crawley's whip had not cut her skin - he took great delight in explaining that he had no wish to mark her permanently - but the flat hide strip sent searing fire throughout her entire body and she could still feel the heat, even two hours after the beating had stopped.

  With a great effort, for her wrists were still manacled to the broad leather belt, she managed to roll over and rise onto her knees, at last opening her eyes and peering around the darkened chamber. From somewhere high above a strip of lamplight filtered through a narrow crack, not enough to see anything clearly, but sufficient to confirm that her latest cell was empty.

  Her mouth felt dry and her throat sore and, when Matilda's eyes picked out the vague outline of a bowl set in one corner, it was all the incentive she needed to move further. Slowly, her knees scraping against the cold stone floor, she inched her way towards it, fearing all the while that it would prove to be empty and heaving a sigh of relief when she saw the liquid shimmering darkly in it.

  Tentatively she lowered her head, sniffing, and then carefully dipped her mouth and chin. Water - clear fresh water. She lapped greedily, ignoring it when the liquid splashed up her nose, stopping only when there was barely enough left for her to submerge her lips again.

  She straightened up, sitting back on her haunches, water dripping from her chin and splashing down onto her naked breasts which gleamed ghostly pale in the near darkness, contrasting starkly with the distended nipples. Matilda peered down at herself, between the valley formed by her bosom and down to the now hairless crease between her thighs, and shuddered at the memory of the wickedly glinting blade as it took away her little pubic bush to leave her most intimate treasure as exposed as her shaven head.

  So far, neither Crawley nor his cronies had touched her there apart from with the razor, but she knew it was only a matter of time and she cringed at the images that crowded into her mind. It would almost certainly be Crawley who violated her first, but his two henchmen had made it only too clear that they, too, would take their turns with her.

  Matilda felt herself beginning to tremble, for the thought of being used thus, as a common whore or even worse, was more than she could bear, and the way the men, Silas and Jed, treated her was little different from the way stockmen would treat cattle or sheep. To them it seemed, she was less than human, just an object or animal, with no mind nor will of her own.

  If only James would come for her, she prayed. He would soon put a stop to this barbaric nonsense. To accuse her of witchcraft and heresy was ridiculous, the sort of superstitious hokum that was supposed to have died out with Matthew Hopkins, the dreadful and dreaded so-called Witchfinder General, who had thankfully disappeared into obscurity at least a decade ago, before Matilda had been old enough to understand the tales that she heard in the big city, tales of torture and hangings, cruelty and petty spiteful revenge turned to madness in the hands of a man who people had since come to understand had been at least partially mad.

  People in London, at least, Matilda reflected as she eased her position and tried to sit against the rough wall without rubbing against her sore shoulders too badly.

  But people in London were more educated and informed and not like the people here. Apart from the likes of James Calthorpe and his father and a handful of others, the villagers and farm folk were largely ignorant and still wrapped in traditions and superstitions that dated back centuries.

  Even the local priest, Father Wickstanner, preached of demons and imps, who waited in shadows to catch the souls of the unwary and of a God who exacted terrible retribution from unrepentant sinners. As a result, the offerings plates were kept well topped by a congregation that might otherwise not have enough coins to feed their families, and it was not Simon Wickstanner who walked through Fetworth village with patched and darned clothing.

  Matilda closed her eyes and thought back to her girlhood and to Father Mucklewhite, the Vicar at St Giles on the Heath Church, where her parents had taken her every Sunday from the time she was old enough to walk. A scholar and a true Christian, the kindly old cleric had preached of love and forgiveness and of a God of Salvation and Hope, not spouting the venom and hatred that seemed to be Wickstanner's only message.

  Wickstanner! Matilda's top lip curled even at the thought of his name, picturing the greasy-haired little priest, with his close-set, pig-like eyes and thin, sneering lips, the little gob of spittle that always seemed to be present at one corner of his mouth. And the way he always looked at her and at the other young women as he passed them by, frequently summoning them to speak with him under some pretext or other.

  Several times, since Matilda had moved in with her grandmother, Wickstanner had approached her, giving broad hints that he would not be averse to something other than just a liaison, talking cautiously around a possible marriage, though without ever directly mentioning the word. Matilda rebuffed these overtures, politely at first and then less delicately when he continued to pursue her and now, she reflected, this was probably partly his way of taking his revenge upon her.

  Only Wickstanner could have summoned Jacob Crawley to Fetworth and, even had he not approached the self-proclaimed witchfinder, Crawley would not have dared try to exercise any authority in the village without the direct acquiescence of the local priest. Crawley would have to hold warrants signed and sealed by a bishop, appointing him to his office, but he could not operate within the jurisdiction of a church witho
ut the consent of the incumbent, that much even Matilda knew.

  She knew, too, of the stories of how Matthew Hopkins had managed to abuse such warrants, taking his supposed authority far beyond the diocese in which they were originally drawn up and terrorising whole areas of rural England, his name synonymous with fear and death wherever he went during a reign that had seemed far longer than the two years or so that it in fact occupied.

  So dreadful had been the atrocities inflicted by Hopkins in the name of the Church, that the bishops in London had decreed that witch hunting should be curtailed, but although Hopkins himself disappeared from view, apparently the appearance of Crawley suggested that there were still those who disagreed with this view.

  'Oh, James,' Matilda whispered, tears forming in her eyes. 'James, where are you? Please God that you come for me soon.' Her plaintive voice echoed back from the featureless walls, seeming to mock her in her pain and desolation, and now the tears began to flow freely.

  The three shadowy riders waited between the trees, sitting astride their mounts well back from the road, so that only someone expecting them to be there would be able to see them. Someone, that is, like Jane Handiwell, who turned her mount off the track and trotted steadily towards the trio.

  Her waiting companions were dressed in similar fashion to her, but the voices were unmistakably feminine, for there was no need to make any attempt at disguising their true genders as yet. When that necessity arose, Jane and Mary Watling would do such talking as was required, both of them able to pitch their voices down, so that with the muffling effect of the kerchiefs they would draw over their mouths, their frightened quarry would not think twice that they were being robbed by anything other than a marauding gang of men.

  'It's getting late,' said the nearest of the three, Kate Dawson. She, like Jane, was tall and angular, but without even a pretence towards any feminine beauty. 'We were beginning to think you might not come tonight.' There was accusation in her tone, but Jane was used to her irritability and well aware that Kate also resented Jane's position as leader of the little band.

  'There is still plenty of time,' she replied coolly. 'The coach will not reach the crossroads before three at the earliest, and it is rare enough for it to be even that close to time.'

  'There are new rumours that the coach companies are adding extra guards to the night runs,' Mary Watling growled. Even her normal voice was deep and rough and her heavy body muscled like a man's. Fifteen years labouring in her father's fields had honed what nature had given her, until she was a match for most men in strength and the mistress of many.

  'There are always new rumours,' Jane replied easily. 'But rumours are rumours because they are seldom true. Only this evening I spoke with two officials in the Drum and they became quite garrulous in their cups.'

  'Aided, no doubt, by you?' Ellen Grayling, the fourth member of the group laughed. Jane smiled back in the darkness.

  'A little,' she agreed. 'Their ale was, shall we say, just a little more potent than they would have expected.'

  'You and your potions,' Mary said gruffly, but with good humour. 'So what did these fine gentlemen confide in you?'

  'Only that there are few enough passengers willing to take the night coaches without them having to pay good coin for extra guards, the same reason the patrols are now less frequent, for the army does nothing for nothing and the offer of rewards is no guarantee of filling soldiers' bellies.

  'There is a patrol out this night but twenty miles north of here, close to where we stopped the coach last week. Not only that, but there are only four troopers and a corporal up there, even so. The pending trouble with the Dutch has meant that many troops are being called to muster down along the coast, so that all that are left for such duties up this far are young boys and old men.'

  'Your father's inn is a good source of intelligence, and no mistaking,' Ellen Grayling said. 'My brother was saying much the same thing at breakfast this morning.'

  Ellen was the youngest of the women, still in her teens and the daughter of Lord Grayling. As such, she had no need of the money that the foursome gained from their misadventures, but the danger and excitement appealed to her such that it had been she who originally mooted the idea that the night coaches were an easy source of money - and more.

  'Your brother still has to pay us for the Irish wench we sent him two weeks since,' Jane retorted. 'I trust you reminded him of that?'

  'I did, indeed.' There was a faint chink-chinking of metal coins in the darkness. 'I have our bounty here now. I shall divide it when we are done, unless you would prefer to share it out now?'

  'No, later will do,' Jane confirmed. 'For now, I think we should be on the move. And,' she added, wheeling her horse back to face the road, 'if my information is correct, we may well have another little filly for your brother's stables this night.'

  Harriet Merridew could not sleep at all, though the hour was now well past midnight and she had been hard at work since first light that morning. The stories she heard in Fetworth were more than just disconcerting; if true, they meant there was big trouble afoot.

  She had not ventured right into the village itself, neither had she seen the man, Jacob Crawley, with her own eyes, but John Slane, at the smithy, told her what he had heard, and his daughter, Mags, confirmed it was true, a man had arrived at the village, proclaiming he was a hunter of witches and heretics, appointed by some bishop in the west country and now authorised by the Reverend Wickstanner to conduct an investigation into allegations of witchcraft concerning Matilda Pennywise, the granddaughter of old Hannah, who had lived in Fetworth since birth.

  'That's ridiculous,' Harriet had retorted. 'Matilda Pennywise is no witch, though London has definitely given her a broader outlook on life than many around here. Who has made these allegations against her?'

  'The fellow, Crawley, has not said,' John Slane replied, 'only that he has testimony, signed and witnessed. Someone said one of his witnesses was old Paul Horrocks.'

  'But Paul Horrocks died nearly two weeks since,' Harriet protested. 'His horse kicked him in the head and he was dead before they got him to the physician in Leddingham.'

  'Rumour has it that he signed his testimony beforehand and that the accident was no accident and that his horse was bewitched by Matilda in revenge at his making his complaint about her.'

  'Rubbish!' Harriet snorted. 'I doubt Horrocks ever set eyes on Matilda a handful of times, for he seldom came in from his farm and Hannah's cottage is set away from the main village. Besides, old Paul could not read nor write.'

  'Wickstanner recorded his testimony, I've heard,' Mags said, 'and Paul made his mark to the document.'

  'And then conveniently died,' Harriet mused, but then decided it wisest not to pursue her train of thought. Simon Wickstanner was no friend of hers, nor she of his, for she had not that long since been forced to tell him, in no uncertain terms, that his continued pestering and advances were loathsome to her, although she had not quite gone so far as to use that word directly to his face.

  Now, as she sat alone in her bedroom, high up under the eaves of Barten Meade, Harriet sensed that Matilda Pennywise might only be the first to stand accused of crimes against the Church. Jacob Crawley had surely not happened upon the village by chance, which meant that Simon Wickstanner was the instigator in this affair and that the choice of Matilda as the target of these allegations was also no coincidence.

  The greasy little priest's eyes roved over every presentable female he came across and it was therefore quite possible - probable even - that she had succeeded Harriet as his main prey. Matilda's London upbringing gave her, so rumour had it, more than just a wider knowledge than the other local girls, but also a quick wit and a ready tongue and Harriet could imagine what sort of rebuff she would have given the piggy-eyed cleric.

  'You little swine,' she breathed, barely out loud. 'This is your way of getting back at her, isn't it?' Harriet swung her legs off the bed, stood up and paced across to the window, drawing asid
e the curtain to peer out into the blackness beyond. 'And then will it be me you turn your dog on?' she mused.

  Her breasts rose and fell beneath the thin shift she wore and she remained rooted for several long seconds, her mind filling with so many thoughts that it became too crowded for any semblance of order.

  'I think, Master Wickstanner,' she said, opening the window and leaning out into the cool night air, 'that you are quite possibly evil enough to do anything, for all your clerical garb and air of piousness.' She furrowed her brow, thinking furiously and trying to banish the images that swirled around inside her mind.

  'No,' she whispered, 'it shall not be, for I know one man who will stand against you and your foul lies. Let us see how you fare when confronted with education, shall we?'

  Kitty sat astride the curious rocking horse, groaning and trembling as the device lurched back and forth, the long phallus from the saddle embedded deep within her, the cunningly contoured edge rubbing up and down her swollen clitoris with every movement.

  Adam had lifted her onto the devilish seat, strapping her ankles to the rigid iron stirrup extensions and adjusting their length so that her legs were held stretched, thus preventing any chance of the hapless girl lifting herself clear. With her arms still strapped behind her to the training harness, all she could do was remain upright, unable even to prevent her weight shifting, nor to defend herself against the periodic slashing of his whip, which guaranteed that her convulsive movement would set the beastly contraption into another cycle of to and fro rhythm and renewing the stimulation that was even now threatening to launch her into an oblivion of abandonment.