Free The Wise Woman by Philippa Gregory

it as a supernatural force. The stone was Morach’s. By blessing it Alys hoped to stay inside the misty border which separated God’s work from that of the devil. But with the old lord glaring at her, and the dwarf’s slight malicious smile, she felt in equal danger of burning for heresy as being taken as a witch and strangled.
    She put her hand, which shook only slightly, on the old lord’s forehead.
    “His sickness is here,” she said, as she had seen Morach do.
    The dwarf hissed as the crystal broke its pattern of circular swing and moved instead back and forth.
    “What does it mean?” he asked.
    “The sickness is not in his head,” she replied softly.
    “I didn’t see your fingers move the crystal?”
    “Have done with your chatter,” the old lord flared at the dwarf. “Let the wench do her work.”
    Alys drew back the rich rugs covering the old man. She saw at once how his skin shivered at the touch of the air, yet the room was warm. Tentatively she put the back of her hand against his withered cheek. He was burning up.
    She moved her hand cautiously to rest on his flat belly. She whispered: “His sickness is here,” and at once she felt a change in the movement of the stone. It circled strongly, round and round, and Alys nodded at the lord with renewed confidence.
    “You have taken a fever in your belly,” she said. “Have you eaten or fasted?”
    “Eaten,” the old man said. “They force food on me and then they cup me of the goodness.”
    Alys nodded. “You are to eat what you please,” she said. “Little things that tempt you. But you
must
drink spring water. As much as you can bear. Half a pint every half hour today and tomorrow. And it must be spring water, not from the well in the courtyard. And not from the well in town. Send someone to fetch you spring water from the moor.”
    The old man nodded. “When you are cold, cover yourself up and order more rugs,” Alys said. “And when you are hot have them taken off you. You need to be as you please, and then your fever will break.”
    She turned away from the bedside to her shawl spread before the fire. She hesitated a moment at the twists of burned fennel and then she shrugged. She did not think they would do any good, but equally they did no harm.
    “Take one of these, before you sleep every night,” she said. “Have you vomited much?”
    He nodded.
    “When you feel about to vomit then you must order your window opened.” There was a muted gasp of horror from the little man at the head of the bed. “And read the writing aloud.”
    “The night air is dangerous,” the dwarf said firmly. “And what is the writing? Is it a spell?”
    “The air will stop him being sick,” Alys said calmly, as if she were certain of what she was doing. “And it is not a spell, it is a prayer.”
    The man in the bed chuckled weakly. “You are a philosopher, wench!” he said. “Not a spell but a prayer! You can be hanged for one thing as well as the other in these days.”
    “It’s the Lord’s Prayer,” Alys said quickly. The joke was too dangerous in this dark room where they watched for witchcraft and yet wanted a miracle to cure an old man.
    “And for your fever I shall grind you some powder to take in your drink,” she said. She reached for the little dried berries of deadly nightshade that Morach had put in the bundle. She took just one and ground it in the mortar.
    “Here,” she said, taking a pinch of the powder. “Take this now. And you will need more later. I will leave some for you this night, and I will come again in the morning.”
    “You stay,” the old man said softly.
    Alys hesitated.
    “You stay. David, get a pallet for her. She’s to sleep here, eat here. She’s to see no one. I won’t have gossip.”
    The dwarf nodded and slid from the room; the curtain over the door barely swayed at his passing.
    “I have to go home, my lord,” Alys said breathlessly. “My kinswoman will be looking for me. I could come back