WRITERS ABROAD MAGAZINE: THE THIRD SPACE
OUTCAST
BY Vanessa Couchman
She bared her fangs whenever I passed by the cage. Her yellow eyes blazed and my guts turned to water. What would happen if she got loose?
They didn’ t normally have that effect on me, but this one was different. It had taken four strong men to capture her and hold her down. It was a long chase, they said, out of the village, through the forest, over the hills.
They got her at last by the river, out of breath and spent. She still managed to bite Tom Wetherby on the hand. He says it’ s festering. Old Alice gave him some kind of ointment, but it hasn’ t done any good. Tom looked terrible this morning, shaking with fever and blotchy in the face. I don’ t give much for his chances.
When they brought her in, she was tied up firm but still struggling and snarling and spitting. We managed to get the chain on her and then she lay quiet. But those yellow eyes followed me all the time; they bored like gimlets into my back. She never uttered a sound but I knew she wanted nothing better than to sink her teeth into me, too.
I’ m glad it’ s all over. These last few months have been a nightmare. Ever since she started roaming around the village, things have been happening, evil things.
First there was the miller’ s baby, snatched from his cradle and never seen again. Then there was old farmer Morton, found in his cow byre with his throat ripped out. People were afraid to walk abroad at night. It was if a demon had come amongst us.
Everyone blamed her. We stood guard every night in turns. But she always managed to avoid capture until the day she was seen rummaging in the midden for scraps. Then they hunted her down.
When I put the torch to the fire, those eyes blazed even yellower and more savage. The flames licked around her and she started to howl. There was a smell like singeing fur. The crowd pointed at her and cried aloud,‘ Witch! Witch! Witch!’
4 | NOVEMBER 2017