The door opened at the hour when the sun doth sink behind the neighbor's roof. I sat upon my cushion by the window while observing all.
My mistress entered. She did not speak her usual spell of lights. She did not set down her satchel with her usual flourish. She stood in the dark a long while, breathing as one who hath carried a great burden up a hill.
Then she sank upon the settle and covered her face with both hands.
I judged it time to intervene, as is the duty of a familiar.
I leapt to the cushion beside her and presented my head for her blessing. She stroked me, and her hand did tremble.
"Oh, Perkins," quoth she, and her voice was thick. "It's over. It's finally over."
Speak, mistress; I am bound by oath to listen.
"They told us not to discuss the case with a single soul until he's convicted." She laughed, though it was a poor and watery laugh. "But I can always talk to you."
Here I must confess a thing most curious. Methought she spake of a sworn silence, a binding upon her tongue, and I marveled. Even a great witch may be bound by the edicts of her court. And yet she hath found the cunning loophole: she may confide in her familiar, who cannot betray her. In this I am both honored and well suited, for I have kept the secrets of many a household, and not one have I ever repeated.
"Six counts," she whispered. "Six. And we said guilty on every one."
I blinked slowly, which is the sign of trust among my kind.
"I keep seeing his face when they read it. He didn't say anything. He just looked at the table." She drew a ragged breath. "He sold poison, Perkins. To people who were already drowning. And some of them didn't come back from it."
Poison, thought I. In mine own age, 'twas the apothecary and the cunning woman who dealt in draughts, and many a one was hanged for a bad tincture. Methinks the world hath not changed so greatly. Only the wizards have grown more numerous, and their potions more fell.
"There were days I wasn't sure I could do it," said she, her fingers moving along my spine. "Twelve strangers in a room, arguing over what was true, going over every piece of evidence until my eyes ached. Nobody tells you how heavy it is. Deciding what happens to another human being. Even when he deserves it. Even when you know."
I pressed my brow into her palm. In my former life I witnessed a trial or two, though none so careful as hers. Where I came from, a man might be judged in an afternoon by a crowd that had already decided. My mistress and her coven sat for days, weighed all the proofs, and bound themselves to reason. 'Tis a stranger magic than any she conjureth from her glowing slate, and a nobler one.
She sat in silence a while, and I purred, for the purr of a cat is an ancient and potent charm, older than any court.
"I did the right thing," she said at last.
I know not the particulars of the case, for the proceedings were hidden from me. But I know my mistress. I have watched her carry spiders out of doors rather than crush them. I have seen her weep over a bird that struck the glass. A woman of such heart doth not condemn lightly, and she weighed each charge as though it were her own soul on the scale.
So I did what a familiar must. I climbed into her lap, turned thrice, and settled my full weight upon her, that she might feel she was not alone in the world.
She laughed again, truer this time.
Presently she rose, with me tucked beneath her arm as a lady carrieth a muff, and went to her kitchen. She spoke the word, and the cold cabinet opened. She drew forth a vessel of wine and poured a measure into a glass. Then, mark you, she opened the sacred pouch wherein she keepeth my feast and shook forth a tribute of fishy morsels into my dish.
"Here," said she. "You've been very patient with me this week."
I ate with great dignity, as befits one who hath served three centuries and counting.
When the dish was clean, she sat once more upon the settle, wine in hand, and the light of the glowing slate lit her face. She did not look at it. She only gazed at the window, where the last of the day was draining from the sky.
"Tomorrow I get to just be a person again," she murmured. "Go to work. Make dinner. Forget about all of it."
Forget, thought I. A fine hope, but I have lived long enough to know the mind keepeth what it must. Yet I did not say so. Cats are not made for dispensing hard truths on a night like this. We are made for warm laps and steady purring and a presence that asketh nothing.
I curled once more upon her knee and closed my green eyes.