Emma Campion - A Triple Knot by Emma Campion

in rhythm with the humming. A few more steps and she saw that it was a swarm of flies. The hart sensed her, turning to look at her. The flies rose up as the antler moved, allowing Joan to see what it was on which they fed. Her stomach turned. It was her father’s head, horribly eaten. Joan screamed
. What is it, sweet Joan?
He was so close she felt his breath on the back of her neck. She screamed again—
    “My lady, Lady Joan, you are dreaming,” one of the wet nurses whispered as she gently shook Joan.
    She sat up, hugging herself to stop the shaking. “God be thanked.”
    Bella had a pillow atop her head, already back to sleep.
    Felice had raised up on one elbow. “You were thrashing about and gasping as if you would scream, my lady. Should I send Mary for some wine to soothe you?”
    Joan had already seen that her maid was not asleep at thefoot of the bed, as she should be. It did not matter. She could see a hint of dawn out the window. “There is no need. Go back to sleep.”
    When Felice’s breath steadied, Joan rose and dressed, telling the wet nurses that she would be in the chapel. Her soft shoes whispered down the steps and across the tiles of the great hall. She slowed down as she walked through the kitchen, savoring the warmth and the ordinariness of the servants beginning their day, then wrapped her short cloak round her and stepped out into the garden. She meant to gather dew from the lady’s mantle growing there, her nurse Efa’s herbal spell to free one’s soul from a frightening dream—a thimble’s worth of dew, then thrice round a willow. There was a great old willow out beyond the fruit trees, so old that it had been there when the river wall was built and it curved around it, leaving just enough space for a slender person to pass between the wall and the trunk. She and Bella sometimes hid there to trade gossip. She picked a leaf from the bed of lady’s mantle, tipping back her head to drink the sweet dew. Now for the willow. Removing her shoes so the dew damp grass would not ruin them, she tucked her front hem into her girdle and ran across the lawn to the dry ground beneath the ancient willow.
    It was dark beneath its thick, hanging branches, and the bole so broad that someone might hide on the far side. Three grown men might just span the trunk with arms outstretched. She would not have dared make the circuit had this not been such a protected place, an abbey garden surrounded by high walls patrolled by the king’s guard. Even so, she shivered as she moved into the absolute dark inside the hanging foliage between the trunk and the wall, feeling her way over the twisted roots, one hand on the rough trunk for balance, barely breathing. Coming round to the orchard side she found the rosy dawn replaced by a soft river mist, settling down over the fruit trees, chilling the air.
    Taking a deep breath, Joan wrapped her cloak more tightlyabout her and forced herself to begin the second circuit, telling herself that, now that she knew what to expect, it would not be so frightening. But the gloom had deepened and her heart pounded as she fought the memory of the dream, the hot breath on her neck.
Who had it been? No, do not think of it. This is a cure. It will take away all memory of the horror
. Her hand on the trunk, she focused on placing one foot in front of the other, whispering Hail Marys. The prayer was not part of Efa’s cure, but it felt right.
    Her teeth chattered as the cold spread upward from her chilled feet.
Holy Mary, Mother of God, I do not feel the cold, I do not feel the cold. My feet are warm. I am walking on sun-warmed sand
. Coming out again within view of the orchard, she was torn between pushing on for the third circuit, because to pause was to cool down even more, or to sit down on the grass and cover her feet until they warmed a little. She remembered Efa telling her that a counterspell, once begun, must not be abandoned or else the power of the original spell tripled.
    She