the legend of witches craig by mary easson legend of witches... · “the legend of witches...

CREATE A LEGEND COMPETITION – THE WINNERS! “The Legend Of Witches Craig” by Mary Easson

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“The Legend of Witches Craig”

By Mary Easson

There is a place in the Bathgate Hills called Witches Craig. It is a lonely place where the wind

blows stronger and the ice freezes harder than anywhere else for miles around. Few people

know it. Though it stands dark and proud against the sky, it is set back from a road that is

not well travelled except by those with a brave heart and a swift horse. In times gone by it

has been a place for those who don’t want to be seen, who have business of their own that

they want to keep to themselves: like the Covenanters who secretly preached nearby from

the old Bible, like outlaws seeking sanctuary with the Hospitallers and, of course, the

witches... who leave behind their mark wherever they go.

This was the place where the boys used to meet. They had been friends since childhood

and, though they were now half-grown into men and working in the fields, the woods and

the blacksmith’s forge, they were still drawn back to this place and into each others’

company. One moonless night the leader of the gang arrived to find that the others were

already deep in conversation inside the meeting place: a deep cleft in the rock- almost a

cave- at the base of Witches Craig. Their voices were hushed and low as he tarried outside

in the inky darkness, hoping to catch some fragment of gossip that he might use against

them, for that was the kind of leader he was. He soon realised he could hear a voice in their

midst that he hadn’t heard before. And something about that voice made him swallow

hard. The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end.

All talking ceased as he dipped his head low beneath the hawthorn that concealed the

entrance to the den. A small candle flickered in the middle of the assembly, casting shadows

across every face and up into the crag where tree roots had rent the rock apart and hung

loosely in contorted fashion like the ropes on a hangman’s gibbet. He eased himself into a

space between two of his gang so that he could take a good long look at the stranger. The

newcomer met his gaze with black eyes that looked deep into his heart, a stare cold enough

to freeze his very soul. He saw the boy’s ragged clothing and his pale skin pulled taught over

a gaunt face, bony hands and skinny feet - for he wore no shoes. The stranger’s hair looked

grey at first till the leader realised it was streaked, like everything else about him, with a

white dust.

Everyone watched, waiting for his reaction, and the seconds ticked by. Eventually he said

that it was customary for a newcomer to tell a story before he was allowed to join the


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group. And the story, he explained, had to be a true account of that time in his life when the

storyteller had been most frightened, scared out of his wits by what had befallen him.

All eyes turned to the stranger as he started to speak. When he said that he worked as a

miner the company was taken aback. The only mine in the vicinity had closed many years

before and it was a long walk to the coalmines beyond the hills where they sat just then,

listening intently to the stranger’s tale. He described his working life underground, how he

had to crawl along narrow tunnels and climb rickety ladders up and down shafts following

the veins of minerals into the heart of the hill. It was always wet, he explained, and the

darkness hurt his eyes for there was never enough light.

The owner of the mine was a miserly man and, through his overseer, spent as little as

possible on measures to operate the mine safely. One day, the inevitable happened. The

roof, unsupported by wooden props, fell into a cavern where several men were working.

The stranger was there at the time, loading a small bogey with metal ore for the women to

pull to the bottom of the main shaft where load bearers would carry it to the surface.

Several men, two women, one boy and a small child died that day. The stranger said that

when the rock fall enveloped him in darkness, he had been more frightened than he had

ever been before. The sounds of women screaming and a young girl weeping had echoed

around his head to this very day. Dust had filled his nose and mouth and his lungs had been

fit to burst. He could not move or call for help as he had lain trapped in his black, stony

grave praying that someone would care enough to find him.

A long silence followed until the gang realised that the story was at an end and the stranger

had nothing more to say. One or two heads nodded. How frightening that must have been,

they agreed. They worked in the open air and could not imagine such a fate. But their

leader decried their fear, calling them cowards and worse names than that, as he always

did. What was so terrifying about a rock fall? It would be easy enough to dig yourself out.

He’d said a similar thing after one boy had described how he’d nearly drowned in a flooded

quarry leaving him terrified of going near water forever more; he’d dismissed the tale of the

horse that had rolled over in the blacksmith’s yard pinning a lad to the ground making every

day at work a trial for him; and he had laughed without pity when another told how he’d

watched his father being taken away in the night for a crime he did not commit, leaving him

the sole breadwinner for a family of six.

It irked the leader when the stranger interrupted his taunting. Didn’t he know who was in

charge? That his father was a rich and powerful man and owned all of the land thereabouts,

as his family had done for generations? But the stranger persisted. He said that now it was


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the leader’s turn to tell a story. Wasn’t it true that he had never told his own tale but had

listened to everyone else’s fears only to make fun of them? He opened his mouth to put the

stranger right, he’d a mind to tell him to leave, but one by one the boys nodded their heads

in agreement. The time had come for their leader to tell his tale, they said.

He thought hard but his head was a blank. Soon he had to admit that he didn’t have a story

to tell since he’d never been frightened of anything in his life. Then he heard the stranger’s

hollow haunting voice say that he’d have to leave the group and would not be allowed to

return until he had a story of his own. The boy knew that he’d have to go, it was no use

arguing. His power over the others had evaporated thanks to the stranger and his meddling.

He stepped out into the dark night and wandered along a narrow path to the north road. It

wasn’t his usual way home but it was the quickest. Suddenly, lightning flashed across the

sky and thunder rumbled in the heavens, reverberating around in the hills. Rain lashed

down and he was soon soaked to the skin. He hurried on his way but the rain stung his eyes,

and soon he realised that he wasn’t, after all, on the road home to his nice warm bed with

its fine linen sheets and a warm fire crackling in the grate. The wind howled through the

hedgerows and tall trees creaked as they took the strain of the gale in their branches. On

and on he trudged and no matter how often he turned this way and that on the twisting

road, the wind blew mercilessly straight into his face.

Eventually, he came to the top of a steep hill and he caught his bearings when the rain

stopped, the wind dropped to an eerie calm and the clouds parted a little, enough for a few

bright stars to shine through. He heard low voices chanting in unison through the scant

woodland uphill of where he stood, petrified. He peered through the branches of a stunted

hazel bush and there, high up, arranged around a circle of standing stones, was a group of

men in long robes holding torches. Suddenly their singing stopped and they turned in his

direction. His heart was thumping in his chest and his eyes were wide at this strange sight.

Surely, this hadn’t been seen on Cairnpapple Hill for two thousand years? Though his feet

seemed rooted to the spot the boy managed to flee, throwing his quaking body through a

hedgerow and onto the grassy slope beyond. He rolled and rolled downhill, unable to stop

for what seemed like a long time. When he managed to stand up and look around, he saw

great heaps of rock all around him and a steady stream of people coming and going from

gaping holes in the sides of a small valley. The workers were moving heavy loads, depositing

them in wagons where horses stood waiting to haul them away. A man with a thin face and

sunken eyes stood at the entrance to one of the shafts holding a large fiery torch. He

beckoned towards him with a long gnarled finger. The boy sensed danger all around but he


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followed the man who led him underground. Welcome to the great silver mine of King

James, was all he said before he turned and left him in the darkness.

Though he tried to explain to everyone he met that he had no place in a mine, the boy was

met with the same response. He was ordered to work in the tunnels. When he said that his

family owned the land, they sullenly laughed in his face. Better get used to it, lad, they

would say. You’re a serf now and there’s no escape, even if you do think you’re high born!

Bewilderment soon turned to fear as the words sank in. He might never leave this place.

Was this his fate, to work in semi-darkness for the rest of his life?

In the days that followed he often thought about his comfortable home and his bed with its

soft linen sheets. Since he seemed to have no home of his own, he lived in the stable with

the ponies that hauled the ore to the smelting mill at the bottom of the hill - and was

grateful for their company. He had no friends here. A diet of thin porridge and watery ale

never vanquished the ravaging hunger or the raging thirst that haunted him. He tried not to

recall the sights and sounds of the kitchen at home where the table often groaned with

produce brought in from the tenant farms. His body grew thin and calloused from slithering

over the hard ground where the tunnels were narrow. But as the years passed, he never

appeared to grow any older.

The boy never got used to working underground but he tholed it. He couldn’t understand

what had brought him to this strange place, a silver mine still working centuries after it was

said to have closed. And he soon learned to stop hoping that his father would send men out

looking for him and take him home, for nobody came.

Then seven years later, on a day that started like any other, everything changed. He was

working in one of the low tunnels that connected to a large cavern where the ore had

formed in a wide vein. Precariously balanced on roughly-made ladders, men hacked away at

the lead and silver glinting in the roof. Halfway through his shift the boy heard screaming

and the sounds of a rock fall. A cloud of dust blew towards him. He pushed through some

debris into the space where the accident had happened. A child was crying and a woman

screamed as a further rock fall engulfed them. When the dust settled there was no one left

but him, it seemed, and as he stood with his back to the wall he realised that he was more

terrified than he had ever been before. He looked back and forward trying to find an exit

that was safe. He noticed a foot sticking out of the debris a few yards away and wanted to

close his eyes, to forget that he’d seen it and think only of saving himself. But as he moved

some of the smaller stones, the foot moved so he dug into the debris till his hands were


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bleeding. He uncovered a boy of his own age and brought him out of his dusty tomb then

they helped each other out of the mine to safety.

In the cold night air the rescued boy led him up the slope, pointing to the road below

Cairnpapple Hill. Relief and joy washed over him as he realised his imprisonment in the

mine had come to an end. He was no longer a serf, condemned to live out his young life in

the bowels of the earth where the sun never shone. He could go home. When he turned to

say goodbye, his friend had already gone. The lines of workers, the horses and the great

beacons that had lit the entrance to the mine had all gone too though the heaps of spoil

remained. The boy hurriedly shoved through the hedgerow and ran the familiar road back

to Witches Craig as fast as his legs would carry him.

As he dipped his head under the hawthorn and pushed his way into the meeting place in

the base of the crag, a feeling of unsurpassable joy washed over him. His friends were all

there and he smiled broadly at the sight of them. The stranger was still there too and he

met his stare with a knowing smile.

Now you have a story to tell, the stranger said. But I cannot stay to hear it.

After he had left, the leader told his story to a bemused audience. The seven years he

described were hard to believe they told him, since he had hardly been gone more than a

few minutes. They gasped in disbelief when he held up his hands and showed them his

callouses and bloodstained fingernails. The leader knew that the stranger and the boy he

had rescued from the mine were one and the same person and that he would never see him

again. It was also the last time the gang would meet to tell each other stories.

The boy grew into a much kinder, more caring person and, in time, he became a benevolent

laird who built a fine school for the children who lived on his lands. He never again went

near Witches Craig on dark nights and, keeping his eyes firmly on the road, galloped swiftly

across Cairnpapple Hill on his best horse whenever he had to travel that way.

Mary was a school teacher for a number of years and now spend much of her time writing. She loves walking in the varied landscapes of Scotland and discovering the stories of the people who live there - past and present. Her first novel, Black Rigg, has been published by Ringwood Publishing. It is set in the year 1910 and tells the story of Scotland's coal mining communities.

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