The Witchfather

by Allister Nelson

A campfire burns like sin, crackling spitting embers onto the cold grave soil. I am huddled in wind-worn rags of brown, rough cloth, pale and starved, making pottage soup over this treacherous flame. I live in a shanty in the midst of the harrowing woods, in a little hollow by a small boulder which I use to reflect heat, sitting between stone and fire. I am a witch — of course I am a witch — but one who was never accepted by her village and so lives in her castaway dreams.

The night is bitter winter, November bordering on December, and suddenly the shadows on the cliff face dance like bodies burning. I see witches at stakes, I see witches at Sabbats, I see witches carousing with demons. I watch the nighttime play with trepidation, knowing the calling card of the Witchfather if ever I saw him: Black Sam.

The sparks begin to form wisps of women that tango together in Traveler skirts. Red eyes form out of the fire and, suddenly, standing burning in the roaring campfire is the Witchfather. His deer-skulled face protrudes in smoky shadow, antlers rising up like swords piercing the sky, an old wood staff at hand with a ruby at the helm. Sam wears a cowl, robe, and hood pulled over him to obscure the blazes in his eye, and his fine olive hands offer me a leather grimoire.

“It’s been a while, witchdaughter,” Sam rasps, a bone voice like sin and honey, and I shudder at the eldritch horror of it as tentacles of darkness writhe over the flame. His Lovecraftian appendage reaching out to caress my cheek and wipe away a small tear. “Why are you in these woods alone?”

“Ma and Pa died in the plague, and my village cast me out thinking me a Plague Mary,” I whisper, beginning to cry. “They said I had brought a curse to their village, a witch and fey enchantress that breathes misfortune wherever she goes.”

“Tell me, witchdaughter,” Sam murmurs like a snake rattle, “would you come with me and be my bride? This world is full of sorrow but, in my realm, in my kingdom of darkness, we drink fine red wine, eat red meat, and live bloody and true. I would make you my bride, witchdaughter, if only you shall give me some pottage soup.”

I smile at the thought. He has always been tender with me. “What use have you for a bride, oh Black Sam?” I say through muffled weeping, clutching my tattered white skirts and gathering my courage. “You may have all the soup you like, but I cannot promise it will be very good. I have not had the heart to cook well in ages, and sleeping out here in the woods is draining the very lifeblood from me. I will not last the night.”

His ruby eyes dazzle. “True, you are more bones than flesh, your skin anemic like lead powder, and your heart is full of remorse.” He shapeshifts into a man with ebon hair, olive flesh, brown cat’s eyes and still the same terrifying robe, but his voice is low and base: a man’s, not bone, not wind, not a rood.

It makes me feel less alone, this display of companionship he gives me. I offer Sam a dull wooden bowl with cracks full of the wild herb stew I have brewed. I sigh as he takes it, his talons black.

“You will last the night, and many starry abodes turning in the stratosphere more, my dear. You are ever, eternally beautiful, witchdaughter. All you need is love, a home, a kingdom to call your own, a broom to ride, and a sorcerer king to wipe your sorrows away. Let me make you my bride, if the pottage is true.”

“I would like that Sam, I would like that very much.”

He winks. His lashes are so much like black lace and poetry. His cheekbones and jaw could cut glass. But there is softness about him, and age in his endless eyes, a worn, loving look only the God of Death could offer.

Sam pulls a hollowed bone spoon from his pockets and samples the pottage, his fangs agleam in the fire and moonlight. “Ah, divine, made with witchcraft true!” He whispers the fine silk words like a siphon, then smiles. “Simple yet as powerful as a rich man’s steak. The pottage is worth a birthright, after all.”

“Like Jacob and Esau...” I murmur, bravely collecting my skirts and going across to the other side of the fire to lean against Black Sam’s arms. He puts a veiled hand around me and squeezes tight. This small display of affection sets off a dam in my chest, and tears waterfall out.

“When I found you in the woods at seventeen, and you claimed me, Witchfather, I did not know this path would be so heartless, cruel, and hard. I should have been a cook. I should have been a wife. I should have been a wetnurse. Anything, anything but witch!”

“You will cook my food. You will be my wife. You will nurse our children, cambions though they may be, but sure to grow like Agrat bat Mahalath and Merlin alike. You are strong, you are kind, and you love like nature does, mistress mine the Goddess is. You are as much a goddess as I am a god, and your village may deny you, but I will only love you fiercely, Magdalena Bittern, with all my black magic indeed.”

He kisses me then, with black pepper lips, and his roving tongue stakes out a claim in my mouth. It is full of passion, and I return it with vigor, I am so hungry, so starved and ill, but the edge of death awakens a deep need in me, and so I kiss Black Sam, and soon we are undressed, and making love like two ghosts in the night. I cry out to the hills and hollows as I come like rain, and afterwards, spent in his pale arms, against his muscled chest, I cry more, but he licks my tears away like white wine on a wolfen tongue, then wraps me up in his cloak and carries me off to the mountains.

And we fade into the night, into the Underworld, we become one with the hills and harrows. And I am made his Queen.