Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.”
“Witches,” whispered Kent, paying tribute to the god of all things bloody fucking obvious.
“Aye,” said I, in lieu of clouting him. (Jones stayed behind to guard my hat.)
“Eye of newt and toe of frog,
Wool of bat and tongue of dog,
Adder’s fork and blind-worm’s sting,
Lizard’s leg and owlet’s wing,
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.”
They double-bubbled the chorus and we were readying ourselves for another verse of the recipe when I felt something brush against my leg. It was all I could do not to cry out. I felt Kent’s hand on my shoulder.
“Steady, lad, it’s just a cat.”
Another brush, and a meow. Two of them now, licking my bells, and purring. (It sounds more pleasant than it was.) “It’s the bloody pork fat,” I whispered.
A third feline joined the gang. I stood on one foot, trying to hold the other above their heads, but while I am an accomplished acrobat, the art of levitation still eludes me; thus my ground-bound foot became my Achilles’ heel, as it were. One of the fiends sank its fangs into my ankle.
“Fuckstockings!” said I, somewhat emphatically. I hopped, I whirled, I made disparaging remarks toward all creatures of the feline aspect. Hissing and yowling ensued. When at last the cats retreated, I was sitting splayed-legged by the fire, Kent stood next to me with his sword drawn and ready, and the three hags stood in ranks across the cauldron from us.
“Back, witches!” said Kent. “You may curse me into a toad, but they’ll be the last words out of your mouths while your heads are attached.”
“Witches?” said the first witch, who was greenest of the three. “What witches? We are but humble washerwomen, making our way in the wood.”
“Rendering laundry service, humble and good,” said witch two, the tallest.
“All it be, is as it should,” said witch three, who had a wicked wart over her right eye.
“By Hecate’s[27] night-tarred nipples, stop rhyming!” said I. “If you’re not witches, what was that curse you were bubbling about?”
“Stew,” said Warty.
“Stew, stew most true,” said Tall.
“Stew most blue,” said Green.
“It’s not blue,” said Kent, looking in the cauldron. “More of a brown.”
“I know,” said Green, “but brown doesn’t rhyme, does it, love?”
“I’m looking for witches,” said I.
“Really?” said Tall.
“I was sent by a ghost.”
The hags looked at one another, then back at me. “Ghost told you to bring your laundry here, did it?” said Warty.
“You’re not washerwomen! You’re bloody witches! And that’s not stew, and the bloody ghost of the bloody White Tower said to seek you here for answers, so can we get about it, ye gnarled knots of erect vomitus?”
“Ah, we’re toads for sure now,” sighed Kent.
“Always a bloody ghost, innit?” said Tall.
“What did she look like?” asked Green.
“Who? The ghost? I didn’t say it was a she—”
“What did she look like, fool?” snarled Warty.
“I suppose I shall pass my days eating bugs and hiding under leaves until some crone drops me in a cauldron,” mused Kent, leaning on his sword now, watching moths dart into the fire.
“She was ghostly pale,” said I, “all in white—vaporous, with fair hair and—”
“She was fit,[28] though?” asked Tall. “Lovely, you might even say?”
“Bit more transparent than I care for in my wenches, but aye, she was fit.”
“Aye,” said Warty, looking to the others, who huddled with her.
When they came up, Green said, “State your business, then, fool. Why did the ghost send you here?”
“She said you could help me. I am fool to the court of King Lear of Britain. He has sent away his youngest daughter, Cordelia, of whom I am somewhat fond; he’s given my apprentice fool, Drool, to that blackguard bastard Edmund of Gloucester, and my friend Taster has been poisoned and is quite dead.”
“And don’t forget that they’re going to hang you at dawn,” added Kent.
“Don’t concern yourselves with that, ladies,” said I. “About to be hanged is my status quo, not a condition that requires your repair.”