What Will Burn by James Oswald (ebook reader web .txt) 📕

here. Have a seat.’ Sheila’s voice is never friendly, but now it’s colder than the wind coming in off the Forth. Gary sees the chair, set up in front of the desk, and knows exactly what’s coming. He’s still too craven to refuse her command though, even if he hates himself for it.

‘As you know, Mr Tomlinson, the main structural work on this site is all completed now. Barring a few corrections, and the addition to the basement levels that team four are working on, there’s no more concrete pouring work to do.’

Get on with it, you bitch, Gary wants to say. He can’t though. He’s struck dumb by the dawning realisation of what’s happening.

‘We’ve moved a few workers to other sites, but there’s not as much building work going on at the moment, so we’re having to restructure our workforce. To that end, I’ve been tasked with carrying out performance appraisals of all staff.’ She’s had her hands folded on the desk in front of her, and now he sees they’ve been partially covering a thin folder. His name is printed across the top. Fuck.

‘I’m afraid your score is at the bottom of the list, considerably below the average. We can’t afford to carry any baggage in these straitened times, Mr Tomlinson, so I am afraid we can no longer offer you employment here.’

Her words are all strange. Gobbledegook. He can’t see properly. ‘The fuck?’

‘There’s no need for that kind of language, Mr Tomlinson. You will receive a generous severance package and a reference that’s frankly better than you deserve, judging by your appraisal score.’ Now Sheila opens the folder, takes out a sheet of paper from the top, swivels it around and pushes it across the desk towards him.

‘You . . . You’re firing me?’ Gary’s mind, never the fastest, is struggling as if it were wading through recently poured concrete.

‘We’re ceasing your employment, yes. Effective immediately. Don’t worry though, you’ll get a month’s pay regardless.’

‘I . . . whut?’ Gary’s still wading through concrete, but now his anger’s beginning to burn. Before he’s even managed to stand though, the office door has opened and two of the site security guards are directly behind him. He knows them, Ted Sillars and Mac Henderson. He’s drunk with them on a Friday evening, swapped dirty jokes. Fuck, he’s even seen Mac a few times in the stands at Tynecastle. But now they’re all business. Don’t even look embarrassed about it, the fuckers.

‘Thank you for being so understanding, Mr Tomlinson.’ Sheila stands up, the thin folder clasped in her hands like a shield. ‘You can collect your personal belongings from your locker, and then these two gentlemen will escort you to the gates.’ She sticks out her hand, and for a mad moment he thinks she wants him to shake it. Then she nods at his chest and the lanyard hanging around his neck. ‘Your security pass, please.’

And just like that, he’s fired.

Interlude

A cold wind blows in across the Tay, bringing with it the smell of burning wood from the salmon smokers and the silty tang of the mudflats. High clouds hide a weak sun, and out across the water the port of Dundee can be seen as a smudge of dirty air blurring the Sidlaw hills. There will be rain later on, she knows. A storm from the North Sea to make life yet more miserable for these people. She won’t be around to see it, although there is scant comfort in that knowledge.

‘Agnes Carter. You have been found guilty this day of the foul practice of witchcraft. Your sentence as decreed by King James himself is that you be burned at the stake. Do you renounce your evil, reject the worship of the devil and take the Lord into your heart?’

The man’s a fool, but he’s a dangerous fool. Head addled with power and a little learning. He understands nothing, and yet she’s the one tied to a pole, surrounded by wood dowsed in oil. The smell of it makes her senses spin. Easy enough to just do as he says, but then if she’d been that kind of person she’d never be in this situation in the first place.

‘Will it do me any good?’ she asks. ‘If I sing praise to the Lord, will you cut me down and send me on my way, sir?’

He startles at her voice, perhaps not expecting anything from her, perhaps thinking she will rant and rail, curse him in strange tongues. How many women has he executed now? Him and his like, travelling the land, sowing discord and mistrust, finding small grievances and building them into stories of horror these superstitious folk accept without question. Gullible people, so easily swayed and controlled. They blame her for their misfortune even though they’ve brought it on themselves. Will they stop and wonder, once she’s gone and nothing has changed, that they might not have been wrong about her? She doubts that very much.

‘The Lord is forgiveness.’ The witchfinder steps towards her pyre, one hand clutching his leather bound bible. With the other he draws his sword from its scabbard, and she can see well enough how sharp he has honed its edge. ‘Recant your sins and I will send you to him swiftly.’

‘Not much of a choice then, is it.’

She is trying her best to keep the fear and panic from her voice, but even she can hear the tremble. They will kill her here, and it will be painful. There is nothing she can do about that though. No one is going to ride to her rescue, and even if she were to escape the ropes that bind her to this stake, the mob would rip her apart before she could take more than a dozen paces. They have gathered with the morning, their numbers growing until it is clear nobody tends the livestock or tills the fields for miles around. The forge will go cold, the loaves in the bakery fail to prove, and the blacksmith and baker both will