The next day I found myself alone with Elisabeth. The Archbishop had stocked the witch house with several instruments of torture so I was not limited in my possibilities to the thumbscrew.
I still feared to torture her. I had no reason to believe that she was anything but innocent, as Angelika had been, and I wished that I’d let Angelika die so that I might have been able to persuade Godke to let Elisabeth live in her stead. Looking back, it was clear that my moral rationalisations had baulked in the face of loneliness and youthful desire.
‘Good morning,’ she said as I entered the witch house. Her voice was silky smooth despite the fact that she’d had to sleep on the stone floor without a blanket. If she’d slept at all.
‘Good morning, witch,’ I said.
I was trying to convince myself that what I was about to do was okay. I didn’t want her to die, and I definitely didn’t want to torture her first. But that was the way things were, so I chose not to use her name.
‘Are you going to torture me?’ she asked, her voice completely free of fear.
‘I am,’ I responded.
Perhaps she heard a tremor in my voice, or perhaps she sensed my discomfort, for she then offered me a way out. ‘Maybe you should just try talking to me. Convince me to confess,’ she said.
I immediately knew that I trod a dangerous path. I knew that talking to her would only steel my belief in her innocence and make it harder for me to perform my duty, and that was probably her plan.
On the other hand, I had always preferred to extract a confession without torture. I was acutely aware of my successes in Leer and Reims, which had both occurred without the need for torture. I let the memories of those cities justify my delinquency, and finally accepted Elisabeth’s proposition on the mental basis that I wanted to test my skills of persuasion.
‘If you are a witch, you should confess. It is the right thing to do,’ I said, taking a seat beside her on the ground.
‘I am not a witch,’ she said.
‘Then why does the farmer say that you poisoned his dog and his cattle?’
‘I am an outsider, Karl. I am from Berlin. My parents beat me so I came here to be away from them.’
‘Usually the witch is an outsider,’ I agreed. Then I hesitated for a moment, realising what I’d just said. It was true that the morality of witch hunting was something that I had begun to doubt, but I realised that I was playing right into Elisabeth’s hands. ‘Is this your plan? To elicit my sympathy? To trick me into agreeing with you?’
‘I have no plan,’ Elisabeth replied. I loved and hated the way that she would lock eyes with me when I spoke to her, or when she was talking. I loved it because her eyes were a beautiful shade of blue; not grey-blue like Fleurs but vivacious and electric. Women usually could not hold my gaze for more than a few seconds, but Elisabeth would stare at me even after she had caused me to turn away. I hated it because it gave her power over me, and I was enduring sufficient difficulty without becoming the captive of a captive. She continued speaking, ‘if you were an evil man, then I would need a plan. I do not believe you to be an evil man.’
‘Why do you believe that I am not evil?’
‘You sat down with me, didn’t you?’ Elisabeth smiled. ‘You did not take my clothes, or shave me. An evil man would have done that without thinking.’
‘I have done that many times before,’ I said.
‘What happened?’
I frowned. This question seemed to come out of the blue. How could she know that I had changed? Even I was still coming to terms with it, maintaining to myself and Godke the pretense that it was only a temporary state of mind.
‘A lot happened,’ I said.
‘Tell me.’
‘No,’ I finally replied. ‘Be silent.’
Elisabeth obeyed my command, but I soon regretted it as the conversation was replaced by uncomfortable silence. Eventually I left the witch house and returned some time later with a pack of playing cards.
‘Karnöffel?’ I asked her. Karnöffel was a popular card game that I’d picked up as a boy. I had taught it to Fleur but played it only sparingly in Metz, and to my delight Elisabeth’s eyes lit up with recognition at the word. She nodded and I shuffled the cards and dealt them.
That was how we passed the first day. Elisabeth knew a few card games of her own that were played in Berlin and these she taught to me. I was fearful that Godke would return and see our wastefulness; I sat beside Elisabeth in friendship for hours and failed to utilise any instrument of torture. But there was no rush that I was aware of, and I think that he wanted to give me the best opportunity possible to redeem myself as a witch hunter. Sadly, by that stage I was already irredeemable, and I had only to decide on what career I would pursue instead of witch hunting. I glibly recalled Wallenstein’s suggestion to me as a boy that I should become a soldier, and I was now beginning to understand why he had looked down upon witch hunters.
Dusk approached and the witch house’s lack of artificial lighting meant that the faces of the 48 cards were increasingly obfuscated with the veil of night. Elisabeth’s pale skin was as milk in the growing moonlight when I bid her goodnight and departed. I left her my cloak for warmth as the witch house was not insulated, and made my way back to the tavern.
Godke said little to me once more. I was not worried that we were speaking less and less, there was simply not much to say and I was no longer filled with the childish need to fill a comfortable silence with idle conversation. He did ask how it went, and I simply told him that I hadn’t tortured her. I didn’t mention the Karnöffel, nor did I lie to him.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
That would come later.
----------------------------------------
The night passed as it always did and I awoke fresh in the morning. I breathed in the invigorating dawn air and hungrily devoured a meal of pastry and baked bread before making my way back to the witch house. This time I brought a book of folk tales that I purchased from the already busy marketplace.
I spent the morning reading the tales to Elisabeth. We talked sometimes in between tales or when the characters acted without logic, but she did not want to remind me of my duty and I did not want to be reminded of it. At lunchtime we ate together and I took a break from reading the book.
‘Does Godke not expect you to torture me today?’ she finally asked.
‘Only if you don’t confess,’ I said, evading the issue.
‘Karl…’
I sighed. In the end I didn’t say anything in response. We finished our meals in silence and then I asked her if she wanted me to keep reading to her.
‘It’s my turn,’ she said and I allowed her to take the book from me. She flipped through the printed pages and picked out a tale to read to me. I had not heard it before, and I allowed her to soothe me with her strong yet dulcet tones. She started to sing at one point but I stopped her as that could have attracted attention.
The day once more came to an end and this time I left her with food. I was running out of money so I decided to forego dinner to cover this expense. Instead of purchasing a new book or other form of entertainment I took the one non-military item that a witch hunter always carries with him: a Bible.
Godke saw me taking it and asked how the torture was going. The implication was that I should most definitely have begun to torture Elisabeth by now, as she hadn’t cracked after a full day of verbal interrogation.
‘It’s going fine,’ I said. Then, to allay suspicion, I blurted out without thinking, ‘I expect a confession today.’
Godke raised an eyebrow. ‘Good,’ he replied with no obvious misgivings.
With that I left and made my way to Elisabeth’s cell for the third consecutive day. This time we read our favourite tales from the Old Testament. My copy was a reprinting of the Luther Bible and Elisabeth professed to be Lutheran so this pleased her. I considered myself Catholic, but I did not care for the stories that Luther omitted and it was not always easy to get hold of translated copies of the Catholic Bible so I had never bothered to replace it.
Godke’s words did not weigh on my mind for I did not permit them to. Whenever I came close to pondering them, Elisabeth would say something or I’d distract myself by starting a new passage. But I was in denial. Sooner or later things were going to come to a head with Godke.
The sun was past its highest point in the night sky and we finished Moses’ tale of Exodus when something changed and our minds were forcefully dragged back to the present. Elisabeth sighed and that was the first time I saw her appear less than utterly confident.
‘Why am I still here, Karl?’ she asked me.
I flipped back a few pages in the Bible and pointed at it, ‘Exodus 22:18: “though shalt not permit a sorceress to live.”’
‘Do you believe me to be a sorceress?’
‘No,’ I said before I could stop myself. I found myself continuing. ‘But I feel as if under a spell.’
She smiled, ‘what’s going to happen?’
‘I don’t know.’
We sat in silence for some minutes, though if Elisabeth’s mind were absent mine was not. I was finally beginning to think about how I could avoid having to kill Elisabeth. There were not many options to choose from, and no amount of procrastination would provide fresh solutions to the dilemma.
‘If I do not torture you, then Godke will,’ I said, thinking out loud. ‘And you will confess. And once you confess, you will die.’
‘Then we have to escape,’ she said, putting into words what my mind would not.
Escaping would mean confronting Godke. I was going to have to face him in combat. Our paths were no longer conguent, they were diverging like two rivers emanating from the same source. He wanted to continue his murderous trade until he was no longer able, and I had grown up to realise that I could not continue it at all. Elisabeth may have clouded me with her beauty, but I’d killed the beautiful before. She represented the innocent who deserved protection, and Godke was the oppressor who fought for ulterior motives.
Yet I was not ready to fight him. My mindset was all wrong. I had spent the past year preparing to travel with Godke as my sole companion. I had been looking forward to bonding as brothers and rebuilding the warband, but now I was being called upon to fight against him?
That was why I decided against confronting Godke there. Perhaps it was cowardice, perhaps it was out of sentimentality, but I knew that if I faced Godke as I was that day, full of turmoil, then I would lose. Elisabeth had proposed the solution but it still meant crossing Godke.
‘Yes, we should escape.’
‘Karl, you must think about this,’ Elisabeth said. ‘If we just walk out of here then we will die.’
‘You are right,’ I said. Why was she doing the thinking? Was I that lost?
‘Maybe you shoul–’ she began, but I interrupted.
‘Look,’ I said. ‘I need to do this myself. I know your life is on the line, but things are complicated.’ I paused for a moment before I divulged my plan to her. ‘I’m going to try to cut a deal with the Archbishop to take you off his hands. I’ll leave a note for Godke if he accepts.’
‘If he refuses?’
‘Then we escape at sundown.’
I stood to leave, but Elisabeth stopped me with a hand on my cheek. ‘Be careful,’ she said, and I nodded, blinking. I touched her face in kind and departed. I was careful to check that Godke was not visibly near the witch house before leaving entirely, but there was no one in sight other than the youthful guard. Once I was sure that Godke was not around, I sought the Archbishop, Christian Wilhelm. I was told that he lived in a different city altogether, a place called Halle which was about as far south from Magdeburg as Dessau had been southeast of it.
I cursed my luck, but was immediately forced to recant the curse as I remembered that he had been talking about printing posters advertising the execution. I thought that I might have better luck looking for him at the printing presses and to my surprised joy he was there, looking over the wooden Gutenberg presses and ink cauldrons.
‘Archbishop!’ I called over the sound of a dozen clerks making busywork. I caught his attention. ‘Could I speak to you for a moment?’
Christian Wilhelm nodded and we approached each other so that we could talk.
‘What is it, witch hunter?’ he asked me.
‘Apologies, Archbishop,’ I said. ‘I have a proposition for you.’
‘Go on,’ he said tentatively.
‘If you will agree to release the witch, then we will take her far away from Magdeburg and you will never have to see her again. We will also not require the payment you promised us,’ I said. It was a risky proposition, but I had enjoyed little chance to judge Christian Wilhelm and my options were limited.
Unfortunately, he looked at me as if I were mad. ‘Do you mean to renege on our contract?’
‘Of course not!’ I said, putting on my most professional tone of voice. ‘I am offering you an alternative that would rid you of the witch for no fee whatsoever.’
‘I am not interested,’ Christian Wilhelm said. ‘I do not seek the witch’s removal. I seek her execution in a manner which will satisfy the people under my rule. I am expecting war with the Holy Roman Emperor and I cannot risk the unhappiness of my subjects.’
‘We could execute someone else in her place. A criminal, perhaps,’ I stammered, but it was obvious that I was grasping at straws. He had rejected my proposition. In fact, the Archbishop did not even respond to my latest offer. He simply told me to honour our original deal and left.
I sighed and left the building. I was running out of options. I was also running out of time: dusk had arrived and the city streets were darkening.