Darkwitch Rising

  “Jane!” The voice was far closer.

  Curse it! jane put her hands to her ears.

  “Jane.”

  Now the voice was but a few paces behind her, and infinitely gentle.

  Jane…

  She turned around, weeping.

  The Lord of the Faerie stood there, one of his hands outstretched.

  “Come back, Jane.”

  “No!” Jane pressed her hands more firmly against her ears.

  “Jane, come home.”

  “Home is waiting for me ahead.”

  “No, Jane. Home is with me.”

  “How is it that you can tread this path then, Coel? Are you dead as well?” She finally lowered her hands from her ears.

  “I learned these paths in my last life. That is how I returned, and—”

  “Murdered me.”

  He laughed. “And murdered you, yes. But now I offer you life, Jane. Will you take it?”

  Her mouth turned down. “My body is all ripped and broken.”

  “Your body is whole and beautiful, Jane. Look.”

  Jane looked down upon herself.

  Her tears became sobs. Her body was indeed whole, and far more beautiful than she had ever known it in her life as Jane.

  “Comb out your hair, Jane, and see that also,” the Lord of the Faerie said.

  She put her hands to her hair, and discovered it long and thick. She drew her hands out, slowly, looking at the strands as they ran silken through her fingers.

  They were golden, silvered and rosy, all in one.

  She wore the hair of…of…

  “You wear the hair of a Caroller, Jane—the colour of the dawn and dusk light. Dear gods, Jane, I need you to carol in the dawn and the dusk. How can you stand before me, and weep, and say you want only to walk away? How can you abandon the Faerie for the oblivion of the Otherworld?”

  “I lied to you,” she said. “You know that now. I can feel it. You know how I deceived you, and—”

  “I love you,” the Lord of the Faerie said very gently. “I know you lied to protect Noah.”

  “You love me because I protected Noah?”

  “I love you because I discovered a beautiful woman. I knew it for certain that day you stood before the Faerie on the summit of The Naked, and offered your throat for their revenge.”

  “But you love Noah.”

  “I will always love Noah. But that is a soft and gentle thing now, not the raging want that once it was. I am her overlord, and her companion on the road. I am not her lover. Not any more. Nevermore.”

  She relaxed, as if for the first time in thousands of years. He did not want Noah as he had once wanted her.

  He still loved her, but it was a quiet and quiescent thing now. Jane could understand that.

  “I have a message for you from Noah,” she said.

  “Yes?”

  “She said to tell you that above all she is Noah and that she is for the land.”

  He smiled, and Jane saw he was vastly relieved. “I am more than glad to hear that. Catling has been telling some nasty tales.”

  “Catling murdered me,” said Jane. “She set her imps to me.”

  The Lord of the Faerie went very still. “I know. But why?”

  “In revenge, because I was the one who opened Noah’s eyes to Catling’s true nature.”

  The Lord of the Faerie hissed, and Jane lowered her eyes, not wanting to see the anger there.

  “It was a foul day,” he said, “when the Game concluded its alliance with the land.”

  “Can it be stopped?”

  “Do you want the Troy Game stopped, Jane?”

  “I want nothing more to do with it!”

  “Then take your place behind my throne, and take the place in my heart which I offer to you. Then you may deal only with the Faerie, and with my heart. A bargain…yes?”

  Still she stood, too scared to take the step.

  The Lord of the Faerie sighed, stepped forward, and took one of her hands. “Come with me,” he said, “and carol in the day and the night, and be my Faerie Queen.”

  He pulled her close, and she was unresisting.

  “Come with me,” he said.

  “Yes,” she whispered.

  And then she lifted her face to the light, and she began to carol.

  Nine

  Whitehall Palace, London

  Ringwalker, Marguerite, Kate and Catharine, together with Long Tom, retired to Charles and Catharine’s bedchamber.

  They sat in a tight circle of chairs before the fire, trying desperately to make some sense of what Catling had said.

  “Surely you believe none of this,” Catharine said to Ringwalker. “That child was full of hate, not truth.”

  Ringwalker did not answer her. All he could think of was that what he’d felt from Noah married entirely with what Catling had said.

  “Ringwalker,” Marguerite said, “trust Noah, please. We know nothing of what has occurred within that house on Idol Lane, nothing of what Noah has endured, or even of what she has learned. We should trust her…please.”

  “This tale cannot be proved or disproved until we have Noah among us,” Long Tom said. “I am sure there is an explanation.”

  “I for one do not like Catling,” Marguerite said. “The Lord of the Faerie has told us how distressed Noah was when she learned the truth about Catling.”

  “I am also wondering if I should have believed so implicitly in what the Game—” Long Tom began, but Ringwalker interrupted him.

  “Still all these words! They are useless. I am going to take Noah. Seize her from Weyland’s house. Catling was right enough about that. We cannot allow Noah to linger with Weyland any longer.”

  Take her, Marguerite thought, her heart sinking. Seize her. Not “rescue her”.

  “That is too dangerous!” Long Tom said. “You are not yet ready to—”

  “What?” said Ringwalker. “Should I sit here and allow Noah to succumb completely to her foolishness?”

  “Can’t you give Noah the benefit of the doubt?” said Catharine.

  But Ringwalker was not listening to Catharine, nor to what he had felt for Noah, nor was he even recalling what Catling had said to him. All he could see, all he could remember, was that day in Mesopotama, so many thousands of years ago when he had been Brutus, and Noah had been his hated wife, Cornelia.

  Brutus and his two companions Membricus and Assaracus stood on the beach of the bay just west of Mesopotama. Almost one hundred black-hulled ships bobbed at anchor in the waters before them, crowded so closely together there was scarcely an arm’s breadth between their sides. Soon, Brutus would be able to embark for Troia Nova with the Trojans.

  He turned a little and caught sight of a figure standing atop the walls of Mesopotama.

  Even at this distance he knew who it was.

  Cornelia.

  Beside Brutus, Membricus hissed as he, too, recognised the figure.

  Cornelia moved a little, and as she did so a shadow suddenly poured from her and slithered down the city walls and across the ground to where the three men stood.

  It touched Brutus, enveloped him in its gloom, and travelled no further.

  “Sorcery!” Membricus said, grabbing Brutus, and pulling him to one side.

  But as Brutus moved, so the shadow moved, and Brutus could not escape its touch.

  Membricus hissed again. “She is a witch, Brutus! Beware!”

  “Witch?” said Brutus. “Surely not, unless hatred and scheming can brew sorcery of its own accord.”

  “Kill her,” said Assaracus flatly.

  “She carries my son.”

  “Brutus, listen to me!” said Membricus. “See this shadow? Do you remember, when we stood atop that hill overlooking Mesopotama, I said I could see a darkness crawling down the river towards the city? It came from Hades’ Underworld. Look at this shadowy darkness crawling towards you now. Brutus, can you not understand what I am saying?”

  Brutus glanced at his wife?
??she still stood, watching them, and it seemed that in that moment the shadow deepened about them—then looked back to Membricus. “No. I can’t. What do you mean?”

  “Cornelia was born and raised and fed by the evil that crawled out of Hades’ Underworld down the river to Mesopotama,” Membricus said. “She is Hades’ daughter, not Pandrasus’, even though he might have given her flesh. If she continues to draw breath then I think—I know—that she has the power to destroy your entire world.”

  Ringwalker sat in the king’s bedchamber within the palace of Whitehall, staring into the flames of the fire, and remembered.

  She is a witch, Brutus! Beware!

  His mind formed the word “No”, and his lips shaped it, but no sound came forth.

  She is a witch, Brutus!

  All these years, and now Ringwalker wondered if Membricus had been speaking the truth.

  She was a witch. But she was Asterion’s daughter, not Hades’.

  Asterion’s daughter, and now his lover.

  A Darkwitch. The Stag God’s only true enemy. The one with the power—born, bred and taught—to destroy his entire world.

  “I am going to take her,” he said.

  Outside, crouched within a shadowy corner of the Great Courtyard, Catling conferred with the two imps.

  “There is nastiness afoot,” said Catling. “Evil.”

  “Besides you?” said one of the imps.

  Catling grinned. “Besides me. But listen to me, my best boys. We have a problem. You were right to say that Noah was not to be trusted. Even now she plots to destroy me, with Weyland her axeman.”

  The imps hissed, their eyes widening and glinting in the dim light.

  “You need to do something!” one of the imps said.

  “Of course,” said Catling. “I’m really going to pinch her where it hurts. But I need you to do something for me, and I need you not to fail.”

  The imps raised their eyebrows.

  “I need you to sneak back into the Idyll,” said Catling. “There’s a sweet baby there. She’s going to be all that we need to bend both Noah and Weyland to our will.”

  Ten

  The Idyll

  NOAH SPEAKS

  I don’t know what I’d expected from Louis—Ringwalker, I should now call him—but what else could I have expected from him? I could not blame him. He’d known, even if I had not said as much, that I was Weyland’s creature.

  He had thought I was to be his partner, and I had turned my back on him and on the Troy Game for Weyland.

  Treacherous Cornelia, come to full flower in Noah.

  I did not know what to do to make it right with him. Yet I would have to, for, as I had said to Weyland, it would probably take all three of us to destroy the Troy Game.

  All three of us, working in concert.

  In truth, the moon would turn to cheese before that ever happened, and for that I had only myself to blame.

  I didn’t know what to do, but I decided that one thing that would make a fine start was to begin speaking the truth to Weyland. I could not bear to have him turn against me as well.

  When I came back to the Idyll, I took Weyland, and I led him to the bed and there, lying with Grace wriggling between us, I spoke. “I need to talk.”

  Weyland tensed.

  “I have been to Brutus-reborn,” I began. “You know this.”

  “Yes.”

  “You felt his power.”

  “Yes.”

  Oh those single, curt words. They fell like stones on my heart.

  “Weyland, I am telling you this because of two things, and I want you to know what those two things are before I—”

  “What two things?”

  “I am your shelter, and I must point out to you what shoals lie in your path.”

  “Very well. What is the second?”

  Gods, but he was tense! Grace was starting to fret, sensing her father’s deep anxiety.

  I reached out a hand and allowed my fingers to drift gently over his face. “The second reason I want to tell you about Brutus, is because of what lies between us, Weyland.”

  “Yes?”

  “A love, Weyland, that I had never expected. And, oh, it is so fragile. I fear greatly for it, and for me.”

  “Just spit it out, Noah! Don’t put me through this hell of indecision!”

  “Brutus-reborn has transformed into the Stag God.”

  He went rigid, his eyes widening, and I could see that he had to use every particle of self-control not to leap out of the bed away from me.

  Stupidly, at this critical moment, all I could think of was that if Weyland had been Brutus, he would have leapt out of the bed.

  “How?” The word hissed between us.

  I closed my eyes briefly. “Brutus-reborn is not Charles. That was a deception. Instead, Brutus lived as a minor French nobleman within Charles’ court. You were meant to focus entirely on Charles, which—”

  “Gave Brutus the time and space to transform. Oh, dear gods, Noah! How long have you known this?”

  “Always.” I whispered the word.

  “Why tell me now?”

  I flinched at the coldness in his voice. “I brought the bands here so that Brutus could not take them, Weyland. When I went to him, he demanded them of me. I refused.”

  Weyland stared at me, then he uttered an obscenity and rolled away, sitting on the side of the bed.

  His back was towards me, stiff and angry. “You will betray me. You have betrayed me.”

  “No. No!”

  And then another voice, one which ripped all that fragile love between Weyland and myself apart.

  “But of course she will betray you, Weyland. Betrayal is in her very blood. Didn’t you know that?”

  I gave a low cry and sat up.

  Ringwalker stood framed in one of the beautiful arched doorways, naked, tense, and with a great spread of blood-red antlers rising from his curly black hair.

  Weyland gave a strange, incoherent cry, and flung himself at Ringwalker, the force of the impact sending them rolling into the chamber beyond.

  The imps moved the instant Weyland attacked Ringwalker. As Noah moved to the doorway, watching aghast as the two battled, the imps scuttled unseen and silent from a shadowed corner to the bed, where the baby lay on her back.

  One tried—mostly unsuccessfully—to make happy faces at Grace. The last thing they needed was for the baby to start to squall, and attract her mother’s attention.

  The other imp reached forward.

  Between his hands he held an intricate web of red wool.

  He slipped the twisted strands of wool over the baby’s wrists, binding them tightly.

  Then the imps stood back, desperate to be gone, but needing to know that Catling’s hex had worked successfully.

  The baby waved her bound wrists, mildly puzzled.

  Suddenly the wool glowed in red hot lines of power, flashed, then sank into the baby’s flesh.

  Within an instant they were gone, and the imps breathed in sheer relief, and vanished also.

  Grace stared at her wrists, still waving back and forth in front of her face.

  Her face creased, and her mouth wavered.

  And then she began to scream.

  I made a sound, but whether shout, cry or roar, I am not sure. All I knew was that my entire world was about to be destroyed.

  And I did not know what I should do. I stood in the doorway, watching Ringwalker and Weyland battle, and hesitated.

  As I hesitated, Grace screamed, a cry of pure fear.

  I whipped about. She was lying on the bed where I’d left her, waving her arms about, obviously terrified at the sounds coming from the other chamber.

  I ran back and grabbed her, holding her against me so tightly she was in danger of suffocation. Then I turned back to the battle, screaming at Ringwalker and Weyland, trying to tear their attention away from each other to me.

  It was impossible.

  I can hardly describe what I saw as I sto
od in the doorway.

  Both Ringwalker and Weyland maintained their human forms, although both forms blurred now and again as each warped power through his flesh and into the flesh of the other. Not merely their forms, but almost their every movement was blurred.

  They were intent on tearing each other to pieces. There was no finesse about this, no elegance, no dignity, no majesty. Two men, yet beings far more powerful than any mortal man, punching and grappling and shoving and roaring and twisting and pummelling and biting and raking. It was a bitter, hateful, vicious, brutal exchange fed by raw emotion and long-nurtured hatred.

  Ringwalker drew on his powers as both Kingman and Stag God, although he was as yet so new to the realm of the forest that his powers as Stag God-reborn were muted and uncertain, and nowhere near as natural to him as those of Kingman.

  Weyland fought with everything he could draw on as Minotaur. He fought with darkcraft, and with enough murderous resentment that it could have darkened the moon all by itself.

  He also fought with the power of four of the golden bands of Troy.

  I have no idea how Weyland did this, or even if he was aware of it. Somehow, merely having the bands so close to him within the Idyll imbued Weyland with extra power, and it was enough that he was in danger of murdering Ringwalker. He’d driven Ringwalker to the floor, pinned him against a far wall, and was standing over him pounding him with his fists about his head and neck and shoulders.

  Ringwalker resisted as well as he could, but Weyland had driven him so far down that it would be all but impossible for him to rise against the rain of blows.

  Blood dripped down Ringwalker’s nose and chin, and spattered across his chest.

  One of Weyland’s fists drove into Ringwalker’s neck, and I heard something crack, and Ringwalker cried out.

  “Weyland!” I screamed. “Stop! I beg you! Stop!”

  Hugging Grace—still screaming in terror—against my breast, I ran as close as I dared. It was not just the physical violence which frightened me, but the power which roped between the two men. A fist fight would not have done much damage to either one of them, but each strike had other power behind it, and it was that which was proving so deadly.