Bag of Weasels. Chapter 20

For the right now though I was stuck, wedged in tight all shoved up shoulder to shoulder, and it was livening up a treat.
" 'This was the land! The site! The chosen! Beyond our power and time, beyond our understanding¦'  I knew that voice, and those thick borrowed glasses; that was Badjock, from over the border, generally known for his taciturn nature but that was definitely him, up above us on some poor sod's shoulders, swaying dangerously but holding the floor with his rant recital.
" 'But not beyond our touch' it says, 'not beyond our thoughts, us who have dwelt in darkness, and been opened up to more than this.' 
"It'll end in tears, laughed a baggy-arsed prophet and fair enough, for although Badjock's lines were well met with more encouraging whoops and shouts, there were a good few here that got easily broke, too fragile to hold a charge. Overexcited and spinning out, they were giving it away with hoots and howlings, twitchings and funny walks.
I earwigged in to get the gist, to see how far gone we were, but was surprised to discover another thread looping round to tie us in together: a name this time, bandied around and used as currency, a password into deeper ground.
"Dr Madwich, he was the man. He saved my neck.
"Saved your neck? He saved my soul. The only one who could.
"The only one who really tried, that Madwich man. He reached right in and did his work.
"True. He took my ghosts away, you know. Took them upon himself he did, and set me free.
"Madwich.
The name weaved through us dog-like, and recitals and reminiscences meshed together into one sweeping ritual. The walls ran wet with sweat and rain.

" 'The Romans came and burned us,' 

"Whatever happened to old Madwich?

" 'They lined us up across hilltops, human beacons spreading their message of merciless stifling structure.' 

"A lot of these coming in are Madwich's.

" 'They burned our sites, our homes, and built upon them.' 

"They're the who now?

" 'But always there, beyond the borders, the fools and witches, the mad and possessed, they kept in touch with the power of place.' 

"Madwich's. Madwich's clientele. You know Madwich?

" 'The temples were returned to us, freed from that cold hand, but once again we were squeezed and pushed down, when the churches came with their deadening powers. We held on for the return of the jester, one more time.' "

" 'But London burned in a rage of revenge, and new buildings came to smother the old, to carve out new paths to smother the old.' 

"They took him away, took him away. Never seen again he weren't.

That was enough; I ducked under the crossfire, slipped my hand into my layers and fingered my papers, rubbing the one that I had slipped in between, the thin one, disintegrating. Stolen. I moved as far out as the crowd would let me, slid down the brickwork and sat in the dirt, and although I was kicked and trampled on, I was out of the line of fire. Now I did something rare for me, an unnatural act even. I scraped up the makings of a plan, for if and when it all got too haywire ' and it was well on the cards. It was a half-arsed concocted safeguard and I daren't think it through, let alone speak it: to give it life would be to hex it. But the name had started me off.
I knew that name.
It was a name from before this turning; from the time of ward rounds and visits and how are we today. From before Ralph even.
The name of a rare one. A listener.
But before my plan could even settle, a rough-raw rusty barking voice hacked across and cut my thoughts to the quick. I pushed myself back up and peeked across to find its source. Lo and behold it was our witch Banksy with the volume turned up, perched on an oil drum, one leg up like a highland piper, and giving them verse in a kick-arse style.
"This is what I found here, luvvies, before you even knew your own names. This is what I came upon before you was even twinkles. Long before you lost it. Before you even had it!
Before my time, then. Silly witch.

" 'I am all laid out, spread thin and weak. Built upon and trodden on.
But my design cuts deep beneath the city plan, too deep to be rubbed out so easy.
So, I am yours and you are still mine, free to wander through my veins and humours. To be lit up again in the age or grey.' 

"And then there's this, me darlings! She changed feet, to great applause.
"Here we go then,
'I'm all lit up like Christmas! I'm not so lost and it's not so dark. It's shining all over, and at last I can cry again. I'll walk my tears into the ground for¦'  She cut off mid rant. Froze. And we all fell silent like we'd been slapped.
Still on one leg, she put a hand up to her shell-like and cocked it towards a once-was window; she'd so bewitched us that we all turned our heads.
"Told you so! shouted the prophet and bang to rights now we all could hear it: beyond the window, out in the scruff, it was kicking off in the circle.