Shakespeare's Witch Read online

  By the second scene, Tom had forgotten his fears, the words weaving their magic and binding him into the fate of the characters. And though he knew this first depiction of the witches to be false, the malevolent hags of popular superstition, their words were real enough to compel belief in their power. Then the boy John Upton spoke as Macbeth’s Lady, and Tom was spellbound.

  He had seen him act before – a few nights since, he had played Goneril in King Lear – but this time the transformation was astonishing. The gawky boy was now a woman: the ungainly limbs were elegant and lithe, and the callow green eyes were knowing, cat-like. Even seated on the low stool beside his master as they read through the lines, his posture had changed. He sat up straight-backed, making quick, graceful movements with his hands or a tilt of his head, and the wide lips were sensuous beneath the sculpted cheekbones. He was beautiful, Tom realised, this boy-woman on the cusp of his manhood, and he couldn’t tear his eyes away. His cock began to stir in response, warmth rising in his groin, and he shifted the pages of the play to cover his lap. Self-consciously, he flicked a glance to his sister, still watching from the side of the stage, but she too was transfixed by John’s performance. The speeches were long but he barely faltered – beside such skill, even Burbage’s great light seemed dimmed.

  The messenger missed his cue and the illusion shattered as Will abused him with uncharacteristic temper. John dropped the mask and watched as the players shifted in their seats, waiting until they could resume the reading, but something of the beauty remained. Tom could hardly bear to shift his gaze away, lust billowing through him, his breathing ragged.

  In the pause he cast his mind back over recent months, trying to recall if he’d ever seen John with a woman. Nights at the bawdy house with the other actors flickered through his memory, but he could find no remembrance of it. Still, the boy was sixteen; surely he must have known a woman by now. By that age, Tom had been a veteran already. And if he had tasted the pleasures of a woman, Tom thought, mayhap he would be easier to persuade. Most men, he had learned, preferred to try a woman’s touch first, although for himself he had not been so picky: he had always taken his pleasure wherever he could find it.

  The messenger read his line and John became the Lady once more.

  ‘… Come, you spirits

  That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,

  And fill me from the crown to the toe top-full

  Of direst cruelty …’

  Once more, Tom glanced towards his sister. She caught the movement and met the look with eyes that were full of misgiving. He gave her a smile that he hoped was reassuring, then slid his attention once more to the play.

  At dusk Tom walked with Sarah through the darkening streets. A bitter wind had risen during the day, blowing off the river with a promise of rain, so they cut quickly inland, following Deadman’s Place south towards the High Street. Despite the cold and growing dark, the day was still lively: the change of shift between the workers of the day and those who haunted the pleasures of the oncoming night. Torches flared beside the doorways, billowing and restless. Sarah huddled inside her cloak and picked her way carefully across the rutted mud, shoulders hunched, and the cold air hurt her lungs to breathe.

  ‘What are your thoughts?’ she asked.

  Tom tilted his head, considering. ‘It’s a good play, no doubt. One of his best.’

  She nodded. She too had been drawn in, spellbound by the magic of the words despite their call to dark forces, the awakening of evil. For it was not only the witches who appealed to the night; the Lady had summoned the spirits too. Was it her words of conjuration, she wondered, that would bring about the ill-fortune she foresaw in the shewstone? Her death, her brother’s death?

  ‘And it is only a play …’ he offered.

  She nodded, wanting to believe it, desperate to forget the dreadful certainty of the shewstone. ‘If I had not seen …’ she began. ‘If he hadn’t asked me to foretell …’

  ‘We cannot unsee the things we have seen. But the play is out of our hands now. Will is set on it and it will go its own way. We can only watch and hope and try to keep ourselves safe.’

  They reached the High Street, the main thoroughfare that led to London Bridge, and it was packed with the rush of the last people who had crossed from the city, heading out of town. Carts and horses vied for space with travellers on foot, and tavern workers stood in the doorways, shouting out to entice them in from the cold for ale and meat and a bed for the night. They walked among them in silence and it seemed to take a long time to get home.

  Later, at the Castle on the Hoop, Tom drank steadily, waiting for the others to arrive. A young girl with her breasts pushed up and a painted face came and sat close to him, a hand on the inside of his thigh.

  ‘Good even, Tom.’ She smiled, inviting. She was still young and still pretty; the rough life of her trade had not yet taken its toll. He lifted a hand and tucked a stray strand of hair back behind her ear.

  ‘Jane.’ Gently, he nudged her hand away from his leg. Tonight he was in no mood for women, despite the looseness of the ale in his limbs.

  She tilted her head and pouted. ‘You don’t want to play tonight?’

  ‘I’m waiting for friends.’

  ‘Girlfriends?’

  He shook his head.

  ‘Then perhaps I can play with you all?’

  ‘Later perhaps,’ he offered. ‘Or perhaps not.’ He shrugged. He had given her good business in the past and though he liked her, he felt no obligation.

  She considered him for a moment, then let her fingers caress his thigh once more. ‘You know you’re my favourite customer …?’ She arched an eyebrow. A new mannerism, he thought. She was getting harder. Soon all the softness would go out of her and she would be just one more painted harlot, riddled with disease and the disappointment of a life of hard use. For a moment he pitied her – in a different life he might have thought her sweet enough to court.

  ‘And you, Jane, are my favourite whore.’ He pushed her hand away, less gently this time. ‘Next time I want one, I’ll come find you.’

  Rejected, she swung away from him and left without another word. He watched her go and move on to the next man with a slight shadow of regret. The man was fat and ageing, with a mop of greasy hair across a scabby pate, and he grabbed at Jane’s arse with a hand that expected obedience. He watched her squeal in mock offence and play the game she hoped the man would pay for. No wonder the girl had hoped to entice him, Tom, to her bed: young and attractive, he had never deliberately hurt a woman in his life. He took another mouthful of ale and turned his eyes away from her, his mind still turning on the play, the witches’ words running through his mind.

  His thoughts were broken when the others arrived, their cloaks damp with the first fall of drizzle and eager for the fire. He picked up his ale as they moved to a table closer to the hearth, and he took his seat close to John with their backs to the fireplace. He could feel the skin across his back reddening in the heat. Nick sat across from him, and Tom took a moment to examine him: the regular features, a square jaw and strong shoulders, the stubble of his beard, good teeth. But it was his eyes that made the whole attractive – intense and searching, and something sad behind them. He understood what Sarah saw in him, though he was unsure if she realised it herself as yet. He had seen her watching him today and recognised the hunger in her look, but she was still an innocent with men, still just a girl. Well, she could do worse than Nick, he thought. He would be a passionate and tender lover.

  William Sly brought a jug and mugs from the bar and sat his bulk down next to Nick. Ale slopped from the jug across the table and Sly cursed as it dripped off onto his leg. John Heminges laughed and said something that Tom couldn’t hear, raising a retaliatory obscenity from Sly. Burbage and Will took their places and continued a private conversation until Nick raised his mug and called a toast.

  ‘To Macbeth,’ he said.

  ‘Macbeth,’ the others echoed, and drank.
r />   Tom turned to John, the desire he had not felt for Jane finding its mark at last. He could feel it in the quickened heartbeat, the heightened sense of touch. He placed a hand on John’s shoulder and it was narrow and bony under his palm. Heat shifted inside him. ‘You read well today. You are a most convincing lady.’

  John smiled with pleasure and lowered his face away, made shy by the praise.

  ‘Truly, you have quite a gift.’

  Nick leaned in to join the conversation. ‘He speaks for all of us. When you become a man, Master Burbage had better watch out.’

  Burbage turned at the mention of his name. ‘Eh? What was that?’

  ‘We were just saying, Master Burbage,’ Tom explained, ‘that John’s skill as an actor may one day rival yours.’ He winked at John, who was looking uncomfortable.

  Nick smiled and took another drink. It was good sport baiting Burbage, who, to his credit, always took it well.

  ‘I think I’m safe for the moment,’ Burbage answered. ‘It’ll be a while before he’s old enough to play a hero. But yes, I’ll grant you, he has great talent.’ He lifted his mug towards John. ‘I salute you, my Lady,’ he said. Then he took a swig of his ale and turned back to talk once more to Will.

  ‘Whereas you, Nick,’ Tom murmured, ‘are a more immediate threat.’

  ‘Hush, Tom,’ Nick replied. ‘I am young yet. My time will come.’

  Tom nodded and returned the smile, but he guessed Nick’s easy acceptance was a mask for his true ambitions. It had to be. For what actor did not desire to play the lead? He was not so young after all, middle-twenties, mature enough for a prince or king. And Nick had a true skill – a quieter, tenser passion than Burbage, something always in reserve, a quality that was hard to look away from.

  ‘Have another drink, John,’ Tom said, filling the boy’s mug from the jug. John smiled his acceptance awkwardly. Even after two years in the Company as Nick’s apprentice, he was still ill at ease in the midst of his fellows. Despite his talent and his growing repertoire of leading female roles, he seemed to be unwilling to accept the easy camaraderie of the others. Tom could not recall that a single conversation had ever passed between the two of them.

  ‘So, John,’ Tom began, turning to face the boy, giving him the privilege of his full attention. ‘Like you the life of an actor?’

  ‘I like acting,’ John answered.

  ‘Ah, but that is not an answer to the question I asked.’

  John looked down into his ale and licked his bottom lip and said nothing.

  ‘You can tell me,’ Tom coaxed, laying a reassuring hand on John’s arm. The warmth of the touch travelled through him and he swallowed, forcing his breathing to evenness. ‘Are you unhappy?’

  John’s glance snapped briefly towards Nick, now in conversation with Sly, the older man’s laugh ebullient and hearty. He let his gaze drift back to Tom and their eyes met briefly. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I’m not unhappy.’

  ‘For such a fine actor,’ Tom said, ‘you’re a terrible liar.’ For himself, he found an inability to lie bewildering – his own facility with deception had always been endless. Perhaps it came from the instinct for self-preservation that was natural to a wayward child: his skill had saved him from more than a few boyhood beatings. What was John’s background, he wondered, that he’d had no need of such a skill? He tried to remember how John came to them – an orphaned nephew of someone, perhaps? He couldn’t recall.

  ‘It’s easy to be someone else,’ John said. ‘Harder to be myself.’

  ‘Then be someone different,’ Tom replied with a shrug. ‘You can change. You of all people should know that. You don’t have to remain the same person all your life. You can be whoever you want. Become someone else.’

  ‘Who? Who should I become?’

  ‘Who would you like to be?’

  John’s gaze wandered instinctively towards Nick. Tom smiled and squeezed John’s arm again. ‘You cannot become Nick Tooley. You can only become a different version of John Upton. But you can become more like Nick if that is what you wish. You can learn from him …’

  John nodded, clearly uncomfortable with the conversation. But when he looked up, his gaze held Tom’s with a steady, cool insistence that was surprising. ‘And have you always been as you are now?’ he asked.

  Tom tilted his head, considering. It was a good question. ‘I change my face to suit my company,’ he replied, after a moment. ‘I’ve always done so.’

  ‘And when you are alone?’ John said. ‘Who are you then?’

  He shifted back a little, breaking the web of tension between them. He could not answer.

  ‘Tom?’ John prompted.

  ‘That I cannot answer,’ he murmured, with a small shake of his head. ‘I don’t rightly know.’

  John regarded him for a moment, thoughtful, and in the pause, Tom recovered himself and laughed. ‘What serious things we speak of,’ he said, taking up his mug once more. The others were getting to their feet, readying themselves to leave. The table juddered as they bumped against it. ‘But I am glad to talk with you so. We will talk again.’

  ‘I’d like that,’ John said.

  Then they stood up themselves, and made their way to the door.

  Chapter Three

  The Innocent Flower

  Sarah was in her chamber when Tom came home, preparing to scry her own future in the shewstone. Beyond the window the first squalls of rain whipped at the glass, and she was glad to be indoors. She had lit a fire in the hearth and sat now before its warmth in the flickering half-light. Her father disapproved of fires in the bedchamber, regarding such luxury as sinful, but its liveliness was welcome against the darkness in her mind and she hoped he would not know. On the table the shewstone sat ready as she closed her eyes and breathed slowly, trying to find the peace within she needed to continue, but her thoughts tumbled one over the other in vivid jumbled words and images: she was too weary to tease them into order.

  The door swung open and a drift of cold air from the passage outside fanned the flames in the hearth. Tom stood in the doorway, his head tilted in question. She nodded – there was no point in consulting the stone tonight. She had not the clarity of mind, the concentration, it required. He closed the door and settled himself on the rug before the fire next to her, peering into her face.

  ‘Sarah?’

  She got up in one movement. ‘I’m tired merely.’ She did not feel like explaining herself, even to Tom: she wasn’t sure if she could describe the turmoil of emotions within her.

  ‘No.’ He shook his head, looking up at her from his place on the floor. ‘It’s more than that.’

  She shrugged. ‘I don’t know what it is … I’m out of sorts, is all.’

  He observed her for a moment and she wondered what was in his mind – she had never been able to read him as he could her. It had been a game they played as children that often ended in tears of frustration, but she was more accepting of it now. Besides, she had come to understand that there was much in Tom’s life she was sure she would prefer not to know.

  ‘What were you going to ask?’ he said. ‘Of the spirits.’

  ‘Nothing. It’s not important.’

  ‘Tell me. If it was important enough to scry for …’

  She sighed. It was pointless to argue with him; he would persist all night if need be. But still she was reluctant. The play had unsettled her, the message in the stone still resonating. Will’s witches should have no power to frighten her – they were stage hags from a fireside tale to scare puritans and children, a mishmash of traditions that bore scant relation to any witchcraft she had ever learned. But they had yet possessed a power she didn’t understand, something evil, something secret. And Tom had been one of them, words of dark sorcery on his lips. She no longer felt so safe in his presence. And in the midst of her fears there was Nick. The familiar sense of hopeless desire hardened in her belly: if he noticed her at all, he thought of her as nothing more than a child.

  Tom was stil
l watching her and she turned away, irritated by his scrutiny and the knowledge that she would end up telling him all.

  ‘Sarah, sit with me,’ he said. ‘Come.’ He reached up his hand to coax her, lips lifted in a smile, eyes warm and friendly. There was no sign of the witch in him now, and in spite of it all she returned the smile. Did he do this with all the women in his life, she wondered, win them over with a charm that was impossible to resist? She suspected he might – a light touch of his hand, a well-timed smile, the deceptive innocence in his eyes. She shook her head, exasperated, and lowered herself once more to the rug beside him. They sat a moment in silence and gazed into the flames in the hearth, the fire burning low, beginning to die. The embers gleamed and glittered and she watched the images shift and change. There were some who read signs in the embers but she had never been gifted to do so. It was a pity, she thought. The fire was hypnotic in its beauty.

  Tom touched her arm and she turned towards him. ‘So?’ he said. ‘What were you going to ask?’

  She took a deep breath. It seemed trivial beside the dangers of the play, the foolish desires of a lovesick girl. But the pain of it was real and she had fought to suppress it long enough.

  ‘About Nick,’ she whispered, sliding her eyes once more towards the hearth. ‘I wanted to know if he would ever see me as a woman that he might …’ She trailed off with a shrug. Such things were hard for her to speak of: it was a world she had only recently entered.

  ‘That he might love?’ Tom finished the sentence for her.

  She nodded, pulling a face of embarrassment. ‘It’s foolish, I know.’

  ‘Not foolish at all.’ Tom was quick to reply. ‘How is it foolish to want such a man? He would be a good match for you.’

  ‘A match?’ Anger lit inside her and she shifted away from him, sliding back across the rug. ‘You sound like Father.’

  For once Tom was speechless. ‘Then …?’ he managed to say, one hand turning in the air to complete the question.