The Midnight Moon [ONC 2024]

Chapter 1: Hereward Slaine, Puzzlesolver

That day started in a way I never expected. Did it change my life? No. But it did give me a headache.

Mornings were always the same in Morteton. Yes I know what the name means: Town of Death. But to be fair to the place, its name was given to it over a thousand years ago, when the world was much darker, and, if you can believe it, even crueller than it is now. Perhaps I'll tell you the story sometime...

Anyway, I left my home on South Gate Street when the dark was just beginning to lessen, and headed up towards the Market Square. Even at this early hour, it was busy as traders, some who'd had to travel from farms beyond the town walls, had started to get set up for a day of selling.

I passed through the square, trying my best not to get mowed down by carthorses or bumped into by young men carrying piles of goods higher than their heads, and turned towards the river. At the Crossroads of the Temple, I took a left, where the streets took on a different milieu. Up until now, I had been walking, well, not the best roads of Morteton, but the fairly well-to-do ones. Now I was entering those border streets where the middling blended with the less well-to-do, and its reputation reflected that.

A little way along Draper's Row, brick buildings with slate or tile roofs became stone and thatch. If you continued on towards the North Gate, stone and thatch became wood and turf...if you were lucky.

At this point of architectural mingling was a turning to a little alley, known as Green Way, which if you followed it, as I did every morning, and did that morning, you found yourself facing a large open triangular space, with buildings on all three sides, yet the density wasn't as heavy as it was closer to the centre of town.

There was some commotion or other taking place on the far side of The Green, but I didn't care to head over and find out what was going on. Instead, I followed the road down to where a building with the sign of a jigsaw puzzle piece, swaying from a bracket above the door, was located. I stopped outside and retrieved a heavy iron key from my pocket and unlocked the door.

The puzzle piece was the sign of my profession: I was a puzzlesolver, or an interfering busybody, depending on who you asked. And my name was written across the heavy wooden door, in fancy white letters: Hereward Slaine.

I closed the door behind me, and started the tasks which would show I was ready for business. Usually these were carried out by Annie, my clerk, but since she had dumped me for a very rich silversmith in the next town over, I was on my own, both professionally and personally.

I lit the fires throughout the building to take the chill out of the air, and then set about lighting the lamps in my office and in the hallway. In the little kitchen out back, I set the kettle on the range to boil, and then made myself a cup of tea.

Only then did the disturbance I had witnessed earlier resurface in my mind, and with my teacup warming my hands, I stepped outside to see if I could learn what was behind it.

I didn't have to wait long, as Mother Flora May, The Green Gossip as she was affectionately (or not) known, was bustling up the road towards me.

I called out the customary greeting, 'Good Morn,' before asking her, 'What's occurring yonder?'

'You haven't heard, Slaine?' she questioned, as she tried to recapture the skill of even breathing. 'And you, a puzzlesolver!' she scoffed.

'Even a puzzlesolver could not claim to know more than you about the goings on around The Green, Mother,' I replied. I was laying it on thick, I know, but it was either that or telling the old bat to go away. I could be a little oversensitive when my profession was mocked.

Mother May eyed me suspiciously, no doubt wondering if I was mocking her in turn. But the power of the gossip could not be denied, and she eventually said, "It's Mistaria Heath."

'What about her?'

'The witch won't open her door. Her cottage is all shut up too.'

'So she's gone away,' I shrugged dismissively.

'And not told a soul? You don't know Mistaria, do you?'

I did not. I had no use for witches in my line of work, but I could understand their appeal to others.

'Anyway, someone's got to go in and sort it out.'

'Why?'

'Who knows what will befall the people of The Green with a decaying witch in our midst!' Mother May exclaimed. 'Bad times ahead, Slaine. Very bad times. I don't know if we'll all come through it.'

'You're not even certain she is dead!' I countered with a pointed look.

But Mother May's attention was now somewhere behind me. I turned to look, and saw a couple of elderly matrons walking down the street. As quick as a flash, the gossip was off to meet them, with a hastily cried, 'Good Morn, Slaine,' shouted over her shoulder.

I went back into my office and decided to look at my workload for the day. There were a handful of ongoing cases sitting on my desk, which, to be frank, were dull, dull, dull. A man had thought his neighbour had abducted his pet goose. A woman thought her husband was the father of the three unborn children her three maids were carrying. And an elderly matriarch believed her grandson was bringing in serving wenches from the local tavern to sleep in her attic.

I wasn't enthusiastic about any of them, but I told myself it was better than nothing. Did I believe it? No. But later that day, I would have counted myself lucky those three cases were all I had to deal with. My day was about to go downhill. Swiftly.

The door opened, and I heard someone step inside the hall. With a mental note to myself that I was going to have to hire a clerk soon, or accept that I was going to have to move my desk into the corridor, I left my office to see who was there.

A young lady, maybe eighteen years old, was standing in the hallway, wringing her hands in apparent distress.

'Can I help you, young lady?' I enquired. She was obviously lost.

'Are you Hereward Slaine? Him whose name is on the door?' She was speaking in the local way of Mortetonians.

'I am.'

'Then I needs your help, sir. It's of the gravest import.'

She looked like she was about to cry, and I, who had little experience with young folk (being ten years and more older), wasn't sure what I should do.

'I...er...yes, I'm...well,' I blustered for a moment, before simply asking, 'Are you all right?'

'No, Sir, I am not. I'm being hounded, sir. Hounded. And you must make it stop.' And with that she burst into tears.

I guided her through to the office, and sat her on the chair before the desk.

'I'm ever-so embarrassed for crying like that,' she said, once the sobbing had calmed down. 'But you see, they've been bothering me all night long.'

I stared at her face. She looked tired and careworn. 'They?'

She nodded. 'Said they wouldn't stop until I came here to speak with you.'

'About what?'

'About the missing witch, sir. And to convince you to speak with them.'

'And just who are these folk who've been bothering you all night?'

'It's best that I show you, sir. Otherwise you won't believe me.'

I looked on as the young woman stood up and listened as she retraced her steps out of the building. She returned a few minutes later. As she sat back down, I watched the doorway with interest, but heard no other footsteps. Then...a whoosh and a light padding on the wooden floor of the hallway...and in walked a crow and a cat.

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Word count: 1319