#witch burning

[weirdlookindog]

[alpaca-clouds]

People get the Witch Hunts all wrong

It is history-rant time. And today let me rant about one topic that just really gets me frothing at the mouth, because people will just mix up so many fucking things in this. And yeah, this is gonna be a long one. So strap in.

When it comes to the witch hunts, people are gonna have all sorts of ideas, that are just wrong. And today I wanna go and debunk some of them.

The myths for today:

The witch hunts were a medieval phenomenon.

The Spanish Inquisition was about witch hunts.

The witch hunts were about pegan religions.

Witches were all burned on the stake.

Witch hunts were all about women.

Actually, witch hunts established modern rights for defending yourself against accusations and were therefore good. (Yes. I heard that one.)

Myth 1: The Witch Hunts were a medieval thing.

I honestly do not know how often I have seen this one before. Like so many books and other media just keep harping on about this one. About the witch hunts happening in the middle ages. Which is just not true.

The middle ages are usually said to be 500 till 1500, though the most precide way to define them would be to say they lasted from 476 (the fall of the Roman Empire) till about the midth of the 15th century.

Meanwhile we also can argue exactly when the first witch was persecuted as such. Because there were people kinda persecuted for witchcraft, but actually executed for something else. But all in all the witch hunts started in the midth of the 15th century, aka, when the middle ages ended.

From there on there were witch hunts happening again and again all over Europe and later the US. It was not a constant thing that would happen every other week, but rather it would usually just hit an area like almost a collective mania. Then within a short time several people would be accused of witchcraft (often accusing each other) of which some would be executed. Then there would not be such a thing for several decades.

The reason, why witch hunts were not a thing of the middle ages, was that the church basically was not allowed to persecute crimes. And as the general society kinda saw magic as an in general more neutral thing, there were laws against black magic, but usually the punishment against those was not death.

And this changed in the 15th century, with the church getting more legal power.

Myth 2: The Spanish Inquisition was a witch hunt.

One thing that I do not quite get how it happened... A lot of people just claim that the Spanish Inquisition was a witch hunt... Which it was not.

There really is not much to say here. The Spanish Inquisition happened after the Reconquista war, aka after the Christians reclaimed the Iberian peninsula from the Muslims, who were ruling Iberia for a long while. And because the Christians at the time were a lot worse when it came to living peacefully with other religions than the Muslims of the time, they went out and wanted to force the Muslims (and the Jews who had fled to Iberia because of persecution in the Christian areas of Europe) to either convert to Christianity - or be killed.

Yes, that kinda turned into another craze that ended with a ton more people dead in the end, as after a while people were hunted down for all sorts of things... It really was mostly about hunting down Muslims and Jews.

Myth 3: The witch hunts were all about pegan religions

With this myth I do know where it comes from. It comes from the neopagans, who usually have found their home with pegan religion within the last two generations, but love to claim that their family (especially their matrilinear line) totally always has been pegan, but they had to hide this because of the witch hunts. To be perfectly frank: This is mostly something that comes from white cis abled women, who desperately want to feel persecuted in some way.

But, yeah... I am not saying that there were no pegans killed during the witch hunts. Though of course the idea of keeping "pegans" as a different thing from Christians is kinda... complicated. Because for the most part in Europe it was not that Christianity totally extinguished the indigenous religions of whatever culture it took over, but rather supplemented it. This is super clear in Scotland and Ireland, but also in parts of Scandinavia.

A lot of those original religions have been lost, yeah. But... It was not quite how people imagine it to have gone when it comes to the conversion of people.

But in fact, the time this happened - the conversion of people towards Christianity and the pegan hunts that came with it - happened mostly between the 4th and the 8th century, so in the late Roman and early medieval period. And it was not what had happened in the witch trials.

The witch trials mostly went back to a very misogynist book of the "Malleus Maleficarum" - and to the church needing a good reason to get more power. It started out as: "Women are very corruptable. Satan has in fact corrupted so many women. Here is what you can do to find out whether a woman is a witch!" And from there it went to like: "Satan does want to corrupt us all! Everyone is corrupted by Satan!"

And a lot of it ended up being also directed against women, who held knowledge. Which was mostly connected to the entire push for more stricter patriarchal powers to come in. So, for example herbalists, who often taught their daughters, were often targeted, because they held knowledge and through that knowledge power. But also women in other positions of power.

And then... just everyone who was an inconvenience...

And disabled people...

Myth 4: All the witches were burned on the stake.

Another thing that keeps getting iterated in media a lot is the idea of witches burning on the stake. Because... I guess it is a pretty big image as an influence.

But... actually a lot of witches were simply hanged or beheaded. It kinda depended on the area and whoever was responsible for the witch hunts there. France in general was big on the burnings. But large parts of England were bigger on the hanging. Here in Germany some were burned and beheaded. And some were hanged first with their bodies then burned.

In some areas it shifted over time.

Nothing much more to say about this one. If you wanna write about some witch hunts, you should look up how people were killed in the version of witch hunts were you are from.

Myth 5: Witch Hunts only targeted women

As I said: Yes, the witch hunts definitely started with misogyny and was partly aimed at removing women from positions of influence and power. But they did not only target women. In fact in the end it was about equal with whom they targeted. In the end it was also highly dependend on the area. But... yeah. It is more complicated.

A just little fun fact: In Lichtenstein most of the "witches" killed were in fact men, because someone figured out that the entire "yeah, actually, we own the stuff the witch had owned" was way more profitable if you went for the men, who usually owned more things than women. Because patriarchy.

Another group that definitely was also targeted where people who were disabled or neurodiverse. Because they were often seens as being posessed by demons and such, due to people not understanding what was happening. This was especially true for people with turettes.

So, yeah. It started with misogyny and targeting women. But over the about 300 years during which most witch hunts happened, it shifted and spread from there.

Myth 6: The witch hunts gave us proper legal protocol

Okay, another one... This one I heard first from the father of my ex boyfriend, as he defended the bad things that had happened in the name of the church. But I have heard it several times since, so I think it is worth adressing.

The idea goes like this: "Well, actually during the witch hunts they introduced those neat legal concepts. Like, you could not be tortured more than three times, you were allowed to have a defendend and you could not be charged with the same crime twice! So it totally brought us modern legal practice!" Which... like...

*deep sigh* Honestly, that this has to be said. But... No.

First of all: Actually those things predate the witch hunts. And in fact torture was a thing that was not permitted as a form of interrogation in many areas where it became permitted during the witch hunts. Not saying it was not used as such still, just that it technically was not permitted. Just as the people just didn't give a flying fuck during the witch hunts on the legal limitations they had on the torture. People would often be tortured a) more than three times, b) for longer than allowed and c) with the kind of permanent injury that the law did not in fact allow. Because people did not care in the end. Same with the other things. And if you got a defendend, that defendend was not always on your side.

And, again, all those concepts predate the witch hunts. They were not universal, no. But they were not invented during the witch hunts.

So... Christ. If you really want to defend the senseless killing of people based on a made-up crime... Then at least think of some actual facts to defend it, rather than making shit up.

(Also I think this myth comes from history channel.)

So, yeah... That are some myths about the witch hunts that I have encountered several times. Are there some I missed?

[booloocrew-blog]

A thing I theorized about Homulily

[starryvomit]

voted most likely to be burned at the stake during the salem witch trials

[haggishlyhagging]

The pity reserved for single women may well conceal a bid to ward off the threat they represent. Witness the cliché of the "cat lady," where the pet is considered to fulfill unmet emotional needs. Journalist Nadia Daam develops this idea further in her book Comment ne pas devenir une fille à chat: l'art d'être célibataire sans sentir la croquette ("How not to become a cat lady: the art of being single without a whiff of Sheba"). In her show Je parle toute seule ("Talking to myself"), comedian Blanche Gardin describes how her friends advised her to get a cat—a sign, as she read it, that her situation was really desperate: "No one says, 'Get a hamster, they live two or three years, by then you'll have found someone.' No, what they propose is a twenty-year-long solution. I ask you!" Cats are, in fact, witches' favorite choice of "familiar spirit" —usually simply called their "familiar" —a supernatural creature who assists in their magical practice and allows them sometimes to change their appearance. In the original animated opening credits for the series Bewitched, Samantha turns into a cat and rubs against her husband's legs, before jumping into his arms and becoming her human self again. In Richard Quine's film Bell, Book and Candle (1958), the witch played by Kim Novak, who keeps a shop selling African art in New York, asks her Siamese cat Pyewacket—a classic name for a familiar—to bring her a man for Christmas. In 1233, a bull issued by Pope Gregory IX declared cats to be "the Devil's servants." Then, in 1484, Pope Innocent VIII ordered that all cats seen in the company of women be considered their familiars; these witches were to be burned along with their animals. The cats' extermination contributed to the growth of the rat population, so aggravating subsequent outbreaks of disease—which were blamed on witches . . . In 1893, Matilda Joslyn Gage remarked on the persistence of mistrust toward black cats, inherited from these earlier times, which translated into a substantially lower market value for their fur.

-Mona Chollet, In Defense of Witches: The Legacy of the Witch Hunts and Why Women are Still on Trial

[fieryfemale]

Penelope's mother was very religious, and extremely strict........... HAHAHA

[profeminist]

Photo ID: cartoon of a man about to burn a woman at the stake, saying, "Let me start by saying no one is a bigger feminist than me."

Cartoon by JOHN MCNAMEE

[autumnmobile12]

For the sake of curiosity, I’m going to talk about witch trials and how they relate to the events in Castlevania.

The time period is accurate.  The earliest documented case of witch trials in Europe is believed to be the Valais Witch Trials, taking place between 1428 and 1447.  What makes Lisa’s situation worse (and the Bishop more evil and insane) was amount of time that passed from when she was first arrested to her burning in Târgoviște.

We see in the premiere of Season 2 that the Bishop’s cronies burned her house to the ground, but in the very first episode, Dracula finds the fire extinguished but still smoldering.  So Lisa can’t have been gone more than a day.  And also note that it was raining that night.

Witchcraft was a serious accusation, and in most cases, the accused were assumed guilty and no one dared to prove them innocent for fear of being accused of witchcraft themselves.  However, in most cases, the authorities needed a confession from the alleged witch and would resort to any methods to obtain one.  Given a proper time frame and ‘investigation,’ Lisa likely would have been tortured within an inch of her life, given time to recover, and then the process would have repeated until she admitted ‘guilt’ if only to make the pain end.  However, since she was apparently burned less than twenty-four hours after her arrest, none of this could have taken place.  Besides, given her character’s personality, she definitely would have held out as long as she could until her husband or son rescued her.

Conclusion:  The Bishop in his ecclesiastical fanaticism had reached a point of political power and religious corruption that he was able to bypass ‘the process’ and commit an act of vigilantism with impunity.  This bastard had friends in high places, which is all the more terrifying and impressive in the most twisted way when you take into account the religious context of Catholicism not being the dominant religion in Wallachia.  In fact, Catholicism and the Pope were largely treated with suspicion.

Note for clarity:  Wallachia was greatly influenced by the dying Byzantine Empire (Eastern Orthodox Christians,) and when Constantinople was on the verge of being invaded by the Ottomans, a man by the name of Lukas Notaras famously declared, “I would rather see a Turkish turban in the midst of the City than the Latin mitre.”  So yeah, the Wallachians were not fans.

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Richard Dawkins

Published: Aug 4, 2023

A colleague sent two challenges to me, posted by Jordan Peterson, suggesting I should respond. I’m happy to do so because I greatly respect Dr Peterson’s courageous stance against a bossy, intolerant thought-police whose Orwellian newspeak threatens enlightened rationalism. The hero of 1984, Winston Smith, was eventually persuaded by O’Brien that, if the Party wills it, 2+2 = 5. Winston had earlier found it necessary to stake out his credo. “Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows”.

My answer to the question is no if you include supernaturalism in your definition of a religion, and a dear colleague takes her stand on this distinction.  But the following three similarities are enough for me to justify a yes answer to Jordan’s question. The first of the three is characteristic of religions in general. The other two are kin to Christianity in particular.

1. Heresy hunting. Ruthlessly uncompromising, relentlessly unforgiving persecution of heretics: “Kill a TERF today”. “'If you see a TERF, punch them in the fucking face” etc. There is an orthodoxy, not written down in one particular scripture but understood by all votaries. And woe betide you if you transgress. As a minimum you’ll find yourself in the Twitterstocks, pelted with abusive epithets as a bigot. And you may well find yourself out of a job as universities, governments and businesses queue up to signal their virtue. Such latter-day Torquemadism rams home the fact that what we have here is a cult with its own religiously enforced dogma: dogma that makes no sense to anyone outside, but which resonates perfectly with cult insiders – the evangelical leaders and their sheep-like followers.

Why is a (white) woman in America vilified and damned if she identifies as black but lauded if she identifies as a man? That’s topsy-turvy, because race really is a continuum whereas sex is one of the few genuine binaries of biology. Why do journalists, police, and prison authorities respectfully kowtow to a convicted rapist by referring to “her” as “she”, even as “she” uses “her erect penis” to assault yet more women? Why do so many of us go along with a distortion of language so perverse that it comes perilously close to 2 + 2 = 5. We know the answer. Cowardice. Too many of us are afraid of the baying mob. 

2. Hereditary Guilt. One of Christianity’s nastier doctrines is the notion that we are all, even tiny babies, born in sin. Every baby inherits, via a long lineage of semen according to St Augustine, the sin of Adam. Augustine could not be expected to know that Adam never existed and therefore could own neither sin nor semen. But post-Darwinian “sophisticated theologians” should know better, and their learned treatises are harder to respect

(https://www.anthonysmith.me.uk/2021/01/29/the-origins-of-original-sin-for-augustine/).

Today’s Original Sins are slavery and colonial oppression. All white people are born in sin, the sin of their ancestors.  From the moment they are born, all white people partake in the “institutional racism” handed down, like Adam’s semen, from their great great great grandfathers, “visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon their children unto the third and fourth generation . . .” (Deuteronomy 5:9).

3. Transubstantiation. Roman Catholics are required to believe that bread and wine, when a priest says certain magic words over them, become the body and blood of Christ. In a stronger sense than Protestants, who see the bread and wine as mere symbols. Catholics invoke Aristotle’s silly distinction between “accidentals” and true “substance”. The accidentals of wafer and wine remain wafer and wine, but in their substance they become body and blood. Hence the word “transubstantiation”. Similarly, in the cult of woke, a man speaks the magic incantation, “I am a woman”, and thereby becomes a woman in true substance, while “her” intact penis and hairy chest are mere Aristotelian accidentals.  Transsexuals have transubstantiated genitals. One thing to be said in favour of (today’s) Catholics: at least they don’t (nowadays) insist that everybody else must go along with their beliefs.

Peterson is right to imply, in the rhetorical tone of his question, that there is a religion of woke. I have mentioned two specific similarities to Christianity. But more important is their extreme, intolerant zeal, shared with typical new cults, just beginning their journey towards eventual settled status as religions with a long and dignified tradition.

--

And so to Peterson’s second challenge:

I see this accusation again and again in graffiti scribbled on the lavatory wall that is Twitter. Peterson’s tone is more civilised, of course, but the message is the same. We who have spoken out against the irrationality of religion are to blame for the rise of the irrationality of woke. 

There is a certain logic that might be said to underlie the indictment. Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a personal hero of mine, has suggested that in some parts of the world we need Christianity as a bulwark against Islam. Both religions are equally nonsensical, but Islam is the more evil. In the words of Hilaire Belloc,

Always keep a hold of nurse For fear of finding something worse.

Belloc’s great hero GK Chesterton is supposed (perhaps wrongly) to be the author of the following quip: “When men choose not to believe in God, they do not thereafter believe in nothing. They then become capable of believing in anything.”

I get the point, but I love truth too much to go along with it. I, along with Sam Harris, Dan Dennett, Christopher Hitchens, Victor Stenger, Lawrence Krauss, Michael Shermer, and others, are against all religions without exception. And that includes the cult of woke. To oppose one irrational dogma by promoting another irrational dogma would be a betrayal of everything I love and stand for.

Richard Dawkins

[sowhatnotcreative]

What other mass murder and persecution actually gets treated like *that* by the movie industry?

Let's add a little funny scene where the woman is a real witch that got burned! Won't that be fun? Recent examples Good Omens and that spinoff remake or what ever of the Halloween movie with the three witches? It's in horror movies and shows too but again obviously those are almost always supposed to be witches in the show or media. Like Mayfair Witches.

Yea just a fun little segment about how it was actually probably justified cause ya know they were women-I mean- WITCHES.

[weirdlookindog]

Salem Mass - Witch Burning

[roselynvictoria]

Witch Burning

In the marketplace they are piling the dry sticks.

A thicket of shadows is a poor coat. I inhabit

The wax image of myself, a doll's body.

Sickness begins here: I am the dartboard for witches.

Only the devil can eat the devil out.

In the month of red leaves I climb to a bed of fire.

It is easy to blame the dark: the mouth of a door,

The cellar's belly. They've blown my sparkler out.

A black-sharded lady keeps me in parrot cage.

What large eyes the dead have!

I am intimate with a hairy spirit.

Smoke wheels from the beak of this empty jar.

If I am a little one, I can do no harm.

If I don't move about, I'll knock nothing over. So I said,

Sitting under a potlid, tiny and inert as a rice grain.

They are turning the burners up, ring after ring.

We are full of starch, my small white fellows. We grow.

It hurts at first. The red tongues will teach the truth.

Mother of beetles, only unclench your hand:

I'll fly through the candle's mouth like a singeless moth.

Give me back my shape. I am ready to construe the days

I coupled with dust in the shadow of a stone.

My ankles brighten. Brightness ascends my thighs.

I am lost, I am lost, in the robes of all this light

Witch Burning by Sylvia Plath

[randominternetartist]

Of the Fae - We're getting to the good bit

Thank you Mystical and Angel for beta-reading this fic

Tommy runs

Warnings: Minor Character Death, Depictions of Violence

Read on AO3

∘₊✧ : – ⭒ 𓆩✦𓆪 ⭒ – : ✧₊∘

“Burn the witch!”

A man steps closer to the wood that surrounds the stake; the witch; his mother.

A lit torch sits in his hand

Tommy screams. It’s shrill and loud and pierces the air.

A part of the crowd turns to face him as the chanting quiets. They freeze. A woman takes a step back as her eyes widen in surprise and horror. She points at him with trembling fingers.

“Witch’s child!” Her scream gets the attention of the other townsfolk as the chanting stops completely.

“No!” Another scream rings out. It’s his mother. “Tommy. Tommy run!” She thrashes against the bindings holding her. “Across the river, there’s someone–” She screams as someone digs a silver dagger into her ankle.

“Quiet, witch!” He yells at her, then turns to face Tommy.

It’s said that silver hurts witches.

Tommy turns and runs. The words witch’s child ring in his mind.

“Get him!” It’s the same man that screams the command, and Tommy hears the cascade of footsteps sound behind him as part of the crowd follows.

He can barely make out the sound of his mother screaming and sobbing his name, telling him to go the other way.

He runs back through the streets, reversing the twists and turns he made moments ago. He doesn’t know where he’s going. He just runs and runs, between wood and stone buildings, through fields of grass and flowers, under the shade of a blanket of leaves, he runs until his legs give out, and he falls on the forest floor.

A snapdragon stands in between his fingers, untouched by his hand. Its bright yellow coloration seems to shine with the way the sunlight hits it. But it’s not glowing, not really.

“There!” The scream startles Tommy.

He gets up and runs again. They still followed him. His heart pounds in his ears and his blood burns through his veins as it carries adrenaline and exhaustion to every part of his body. Tears fall from his eyes, but he doesn’t notice.

Neither does he notice a woman scream out, “Fae ring!” Or how the forest grows quiet after it. Neither he notices yells becoming fainter.

He does hear when someone yells, “Let’s kill it too!”

He closes his eyes. Weren’t they already planning to do that? The panicked thought arises, but Tommy does not give it any note. It doesn’t matter ; not now. They just confirmed he’s running for his life.

So he keeps running. And he doesn’t slow until he hits something solid.

He tries to step back but something grabs his forearm. It’s large and wraps itself around the limb as a similar thing snakes around his back from the opposite side and presses him up against the solid shape.

Tommy screams. They’ve caught him, he’s going to die. He fights, kicking and thrashing but it’s no use, the grip is relentless, though not bruising, and holds him firm.

The hand on his arm slowly snakes up to Tommy’s shoulder, making its way to his neck.

Tommy freezes.

Were they going to choke him until he passed out? Crush his neck and let him die? Torture him by cutting off the airflow until he almost blacks out but let him have a gulp of air to recover before repeating it again and again? He panics again at the thought and fights more. He tries, over and over, to pull himself away as he cries and begs for mercy, to be let go of, saying he didn’t know his mother was a witch.

The hand touches the back of his neck and he stops fighting. He cries instead, loud and powerful sobs piercing the air and shaking his whole body. It presses his face against the soft clothing Tommy’s captor’s wearing. A thumb rubs circles on the base of his skull.

“Calm down, runt. You’re safe.”

And against his wishes, Tommy relaxes into the hold. “Breathe, copy with me,” A rumbling voice sounds from above him. “Just breathe, calm down, I’m here, you’re safe.”

Tommy’s shallow, hurried breaths gradually turn deep and slow, matching the rising and falling of the chest pressed against his skull.

“There we go,” Techno says and loosens his grip. “Are you alright?”

Tommy looks up at him. His vision is blurry and his body is shaking, but he sees the man’s worried expression clear as day.

Suddenly, all the feelings of the past few minutes bubbled up once more, stronger now that they were not being suppressed by the urge to just don’t die.

“I– Mom she– The village– I– Hunters, they–” The words clog up Tommy’s throat. His breathing is panicked again. The townsfolk they’re coming after him, he needs to tell Techno! His mouth opens and closes like a fish. The words don’t come out. They block his throat like a dam in a river.

Techno will be in danger because of me. The thought makes warm tears fall down his face. He doesn’t want to hurt Techno.

“Hey,” Techo says, pressing Tommy against his chest with a hug that wraps around his body like a warm blanket. “It’s alright, let's talk about this inside, yeah?” And then Tommy’s being picked up and carried towards the house.

He buries his head in Techno’s shirt and cries quietly. He’s too tired to make a sound or to move a finger. Exhaustion falls over him as the feelings of confusion, danger and hurt overwhelm him.

The townsfolk are coming. They’re gonna hurt Techno for protecting Tommy. Techno wouldn’t turn him in, Tommy knows it.

He cries a little harder at the thought. His body begins to shake again, just a slight tremble, but Techno notices. A large, warm hand strokes Tommy’s head. Techno’s nails are sharper than Tommy thought they’d be, but they are still gentle and comforting.

“It’s alright, runt, they won’t hurt you, not anymore.” Tommy can feel the rumble of Techno’s voice through his body.

A creek sounds through the house before Tommy is gently lowered down on a soft surface. Techno wraps the blankets around the boy tightly. Tommy looks at him. “There we go. Do you want some water?” Tommy nods his head as Techno gets up and walks out of sight.

Tommy’s thoughts go to the town, what he saw, what he heard, what happened after.

Techno returns with a cup of water in his hands. He offers it to Tommy and the boy takes it, not wasting a second before he drinks the water. The liquid is cool and tastes sweet. It soothes his aching muscles and Tommy relaxes with each sip.

Techno tilts his head to the side, making his earring (earrings?) dangle in the air and the metal and jewels shine in the light. He reaches out his hand to pet Tommy’s hair. “Everything’s alright. I’ll take care of them, they won’t hurt you.”

“Promise?” Tommy asks, tone uncertain.

“I promise.” Techno’s hand reaches behind Tommy’s head and he bumps their foreheads together. “Just rest, runt.”

Tommy nods as Techno pets his hair one more time before walking out of the house.

A part of Tommy wonders if the townspeople are going to accuse him of helping a witch. If they’re going to try and kill him. Or maybe if Techno’s going to side with them and hurt Tommy.

No, he wouldn’t do that. He will never hurt us, a part of Tommy whispers. And he won’t get hurt either. And it sounds right, so Tommy accepts it, even if it’s not logical.

What doesn’t make sense is why the townspeople think his mother is a witch. She isn’t! Tommy would have noticed if she was.

He tries to make a mental list of things witches do or have. They’re mean and make curses, and they make friends with faeries and merlings and they eat children. The baker told him that when he was watching her make bread. They also have crystals and knives and cauldrons and they make potions in jars. He remembers that from books his mother had. They were books about magic and spells and… Are books about magic something witches have?

But his mother isn’t mean, and she doesn’t make curses or eat children! But the baker also thought that bats were birds, which they aren’t because they don’t lay eggs. Tommy’s mother told him so when she took him to a cave to see little baby bats!

She had to tell the bats that Tommy was a friend and that he wouldn’t hurt their babies, and the most amazing thing is that they listened!

She told him that animals can understand people, and that we can talk to them if we really try. And that it doesn’t apply to just animals, but plants too! Which is why it was alright that she was taking a branch from a tree, or fur from a rabbit, because she asked them if she could and they said yes.

When Tommy told his friends that, they said his mother was weird. They said she was weird a lot.

Like when he told them that she said the only reason why people didn’t like witches was because they didn’t understand them. And when he told them that he wasn’t allowed to go into the woods or open the door in the kitchen that doesn’t lead outside or the tool shack or the living room or any other room in the house Tommy had been to.

They dared him to open the door when he told them that, and he did because he was a Big Man and he wasn’t scared of his mom or what was behind the door.

The room had been filled with books, jars, candles, pots, and other things. Some of the books were glowing.

That was when he heard his mom open the door of her room. Which was weird because it was night and she was always asleep at night. So Tommy pretended to have come down to the kitchen to have a snack. He lied to his friends the next day.

Wait- that… Those weren’t normal things to have. He knew that but he kind of just accepted that it was part of his mom being not-normal which was fine with him. She was still a great mom, a better mom than normal moms because she taught him stuff normal moms didn’t know about.

But looking back now, with everything else. Those were probably witch stuff. Fuck. His mother was a witch! But Tommy still didn’t understand why the townspeople… did what they did to her because she was nice! She didn’t hurt or curse people and she wasn’t friends with fae creatures, she didn’t like them!

Tommy doesn’t understand. He wants to. It doesn’t make sense, couldn’t they see that her being a witch didn’t change the fact that it was still her?  

His eyes start watering.

Tommy shakes his head. No, he doesn’t want to cry. He’ll just think about something else.

But his mind is filled with memories of his mom and feelings of confusion, so Tommy looks around the house instead.

It’s not very exciting. To his left is the front door with a window that shows the porch, a garden and the tree line. In front of Tommy is the kitchen counter, filled with cupboards and drawers and hanging pans, with the fireplace and pot to the right. To the right is a plain wall with a passageway that has two doors facing each other. One leads to Tommy’s room, the other leads to Techno’s room. Behind Tommy is another wall, this one with windows and a door that leads to the outhouse.

Tommy looks back at the fireplace.

The pot of soup is still there, being heated by the fire and Tommy wonders if it’s a hunter’s stew.

He gets up and walks closer. When he is standing in front of the pot, he looks down. It looks like the same soup he ate yesterday.

It smells delicious and Tommy suddenly wants to eat some.

Techno wouldn’t mind, right? Besides, he’s hungry.

Tommy turns to the counter and opens some of the cupboards. He takes out the bread and a knife and places them on the cutting board. He cuts two slices (and knicks his finger while at it), then dips them in the soup before eating them.

He hums in bliss when the taste reaches his tongue. It’s even better than it was yesterday.

When he is finished eating, Tommy looks around again.

He’s never seen Techno’s room, has he?

He wants to know what it looks like.

Tommy puts the bread away, places the knife back in the knife block thingy and makes his way to the hallway.

He walks until he reaches the door to Techno’s room.

He grabs the handle and twists.

The door opens soundlessly.

Tommy steps inside.

It’s a normal-looking room.

There is a bed and some shelves. There is also a desk with papers and a golden bracelet with emerald jewels.

Tommy decides to look at it more carefully later.

Then Tommy spots a mirror.

The reflection is wrong. The layout of the reflected room is similar, but they look nothing alike. The reflection has gold, marble and patterned wood, while the cottage Tommy is in has plain planks and simple furniture.

“Faeries are tricksters,” his mother had said. “ They are powerful and use illusions to trap their victims. But in their illusions, there will always be an object that reflects the truth of the spell.”

Tommy thinks about the previous day. What strange things happened yesterday?

The feeling at sunrise, the way it called him to the woods. How he got lost, and how Techno seemed to have just the right things for Tommy. A bed his size, his favourite stew, knowing the right words to calm him down. 

Wait, wasn’t the hallway to the left of the front door when he was here the first time? And so was the outhouse!

The place changed.

Techno’s a faery and he knows Tommy’s name. Tommy ate his food!

“Fuck.”

He needs to get out of here.

[poisoned-peppermint]

18) Leave you hanging

Don't marry someone who'll get you condemned for witch craft

its not a fun time

[sage-eclectic-witch]

I’ll never shut up about it ✨💜✨

[fieryfemale]

3am.........

I like this one I did....

Penelope