I did not blame them. I was not certain if I believed myself. The deaths of those women haunted me, haunted me every night, and every winter after that, I saw the wolf, but I ignored him. He had led me astray. I believed the wolf was sent by Satan to beguile me. Maybe the wolf was Satan himself.
It was because of this that, yesterday, I went to church and read my confession. I apologized to the families of those who died, but I could not make it right. I could not make it right. I could not bring back the women who died because of me. And I could not bring back the goodness that was within me before I spoke to the wolf, before I lied.
May God have mercy upon my soul.
PART 2
Kendra Speaks
After I left Salem, I journeyed back to England, the place of my birth. I had made some enemies in England, based upon a certain incident with a gingerbread house, but presumably, many of those people were dead. One of the grand things about being a witch is the ability to outlive one’s enemies. Many decades—nay, centuries—hence, I would search the online Find a Grave site for members of the Nurse and Corey family, to pay my respects. But in the seventeenth century, I stayed in England a year, then moved next to France, taking a scenic, circuitous route and looking, always, for James.
I did not find him.
I later found out that, after I left, he was arrested in Salem. He was tried, and he was hanged. I know he did not die, though. I did not know where or how he went.
I tried not to wonder if he looked for me.
But, in Paris, I found Charles Perrault, a writer. I told him the story of Ann and the wolf, and he adapted it into a story of his own about Le Petit Chaperon Rouge, a young woman with a red cape. In his version, however, the saucy maid gets eaten alive!
In 1744, I was banished from France (an incident involving a princess and a pea—don’t ask!) and moved again, to Germany. The Germans had finished hunting for witches by then, so it was a nice place to live at that point. I chose Bavaria, where I opened a bookstall at the Viktualienmarkt. I developed quite a following as a storyteller in my own right, so much so that by the nineteenth century, some brother professors came all the way from G?ttingen to fanboy in my presence and hear my stories. Many of my exploits (including the one you are about to hear of, involving my assistant, a strange, short young man with rather specialized abilities) would serve as the inspiration for later works of the Brothers Grimm.
But I never did find James, though I searched for his face in every customer, every new fishmonger, every delivery boy. I never saw eyes as blue as his.
One day, late in the eighteenth century, I had walked into a stall in a far corner of the market. It was an odd stall, one I had not noticed before. While most of the sellers there sold something in particular, something people would want, this stall was called Krimskrams, or “Bits and Pieces,” and was more likely to contain a broken doll’s head, a stake said to have belonged to Vlad the Impaler, or a petrified mouse than ordinary household items like thimbles or bed warmers.
So, of course, it fascinated me. What need had I for the ordinary?
It was there, tucked beneath a bone saw, behind a working flea circus, that I found my mirror.
It was a grand mirror, sterling silver and larger than my head, with ornamental curlicues and sculpted flowers—roses and chrysanthemums. In its tarnished state, you could not detect it, but I knew that polished, it would be fit for a queen.
I found the shopkeeper, an old man with a sort of hump, and asked how much it was.
He quoted a price many times what I felt its value should be.
“Oh, that is too much,” I said, nestling it back into place, thinking that, now that I had seen it, I could conjure one of my own.
“What you do not understand, Fr?ulein, is that it is a magic mirror.”
“Oh, a magic mirror! Well, that’s different.” I laughed, recalling the lad I knew who had sold his cow in exchange for some “magic” beans in a similar flea-market situation.
“It is true. With it, you can see whomever you wish, wherever he may be.”
Oh, wait. The beans in Jack’s story had been magic. I found myself bouncing, inadvertently, on the tips of my new shoes, which were made of black satin with Italian heels. If it was truly a magic mirror, perhaps I could use it to find James at last.
I pushed from my mind the idea that he might not be alive. He must be alive. I could see him, finally!
I drew in my breath, seeing my face in the glass. The girl there was smiling, appearing more excited than I had ever seen her before. “May I try it?” I asked.
The old man grinned, revealing a tooth of gold. “Certainly. Just ask for who you want.”
I stared into it, hesitating before saying, “I want to see James Brandon.”