The Hounding

by Xenobe Purvis

Yes: she had shamed him.

Good

He had not done anything wrong, and yet here he was, ashamed. That was the cunning power of girls, he thought. They turned a strong man weak. They made a good man penitent.

DIEEEEE

“Unnatural,” someone shouted. “Demon. Fetch the priest!”

When a fish ? Is a demon

The village’s oppressive atmosphere—the way it watched,

Happiness was frail and flimsy: a petal, a whisper. Hardship was constant. It was muscular and loud.

“There’s something else here. Something…” She cleared her throat. “You’re going to be hunted. You’re going to be afraid.”

He hated anything weaker than himself—women, children, sometimes even animals.

The Mansfield sisters had meant to scare him. They were mocking him, testing him. In return, they would feel the full, scalding weight of his anger.

“Dangerous nonsense. Girls have been called witches for less—and killed for it, even in my lifetime.”

She was aware of the stickiness of the ale on her fingers. “Because I believe those girls are being bullied,” she said. “And if you call yourselves good Christian people, you’d be kind to them instead of spreading vicious stories.”