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When Black Joan learned she was with child, she applied to the apothecary to request a tincture to rid her of her troubles, but - being but a poor lass with little to her name - she could not afford the asking price. Since he was unlikely to cause her any more harm than she was in already, he took his payment another way and in exchange Black Joan received a tea made from Blue Cohosh that she took for three days.
But whether she was already too far along or the tea too weak, the herbs did not work, and after seven months she found herself hidden away in a stable in the depths of winter with a few steady friends gathered round to help her.
Af first, they thought the babe was stillborn, for he was blue from lack of breath and did not show sign of life.
So, Black Joan took the babe in her arms and sucked the blockage from his mouth and lungs. After that, he cried out a howling wail that could be heard for a Welsh mile.
Weak and tired and fierce as a she-wolf, Black Joan named her son after the Raven King. She named him John.
But the old beggar man who'd been looking after Black Joan nearly all her life took to calling the boy John Blue, for the Blue Cohosh had not worked, and he'd been born blue as anything, and he cried a blue streak when he could get breath.
Later, when John Blue's light steps and lighter touch made him the best pickpocket in Black Joan's gang, they called him John the Cat. He did not mind, for John had a certain affinity for cats. Like enough they were: prone to come and go as they pleased and unimpressed with the world for the most part.
In fact, John the Cat kept his curiosity about all things to himself, until the day a dusty young man crossed his path and when John the Cat picked his pocket, he found as his reward a slim, leather-bound book. John the Cat had never touched a book in his life, but he marveled at the texture, at the look of it, at the mystery of its printed pages. It was with this book that he learned to read, and discovered the world of magic, for the book was about the Raven King that his mother so often talked of and about the magics he used to perform throughout England, but especially in the North.
When John the Cat was too old and too tall for going about unnoticed amongst Yorkshire crowds, he set his feet to wandering, and when he reached the ports of London, he set sail upon the first ship that would hire a pollywog like himself. So well did the voyages go when he was aboard that the Captain called him Luck John, and this was he called for many years.
But somewhere along the way - in Whitby to be exact - Luck John came across the marvel that was known as the Cards of Marseilles. The old sea dog that read the cards did so for a small fee, and because Luck John was careful with his money he returned again and again to have his cards read - for the past, the present, and the future - until he was correcting the old sailor upon his own decipherings. The sailor was rather put out, but he let Luck John borrow his cards so that he could make his own copies, carefully drawn on bits of whatever came to hand. Not long after, men were calling him John o' the Cards, and he would read out fortunes to any who paid, and sometimes in exchange for small services.
When he had his fill of the sea and felt the call of home, John o' the Cards turned his feet toward England and God's Own Country, and got there in his own time.
John o' the Cards found that home was precisely how he remembered it, and also vastly different when seen through the long lens of a man much travelled. He could find no sign of Black Joan, though it seemed the same gang of youths ran their racket in the streets of York as when he had been among their number. There was a rumor that Black Joan had died, and so John o' the Cards left a bouquet of daisies and heather at a crossroads, said a brief prayer, and mourned very little. Black Joan had not been much of a mother. But then, he reflected, he likely had not been much of a son.
He took odd jobs where he could find them and supplemented this day-to-day income with his card readings. But none of this satisfied the curiosity that had once been awakened by a small book of John Uskglass's magic that he had with him still, weathered though it was with the salt of the sea and a hard life lived.
So, when he heard tell of a reclusive magician living in his own old home of Yorkshire, he made his way to the place known as Hurtfew Abbey, and inquired if there was any position needing filling or work to be done about the place.
Folk all about the Riding had heard of Odd John, for so they called him-- tall creature that he was, and quiet, and willing to take on any odd job so long as the pay was fair. Even the servants at Hurtfew had heard of him, and intrigued as they were, they hired him on as the under-gardener, for the grounds needed a good deal of tending and he was a strong fellow who handled all manner of work well.
When they lost yet another footman at the master's whim, Odd John was asked to accompany the carriage into York, and he accepted, and so was brought before the master: a Mr. Norrell, who was small and scholarly and not quite as old as Odd John had imagined.
But when Mr. Norrell inquired as to his name, John realized he must give a proper one. So he thought quickly, knowing that none of the names he'd ever been called would suit. He briefly considered John Black, for his old mother's sake, but then recalled the story of his own birth in the barn on the night when Christians remembered the Slaughter of the Innocents, and so in reply to his new master, he said, "John Childermass, sir."
From that moment on, he was never called anything else, except upon his occasional travels when an old friend would hail him as Odd John, John o' the Cards, Luck John, John the Cat, or - once - an ancient beggar man who called him John Blue.