A Passionate Magic (27 page)

She expected the men-at-arms who guarded the
castle gate to be more alert than the men and women in the hall, so
she placed three of them under spells similar to the one she had
used on Todd. All of them would waken unharmed after just a few
minutes, and none of them would recall her exit. Once she was over
the drawbridge it wouldn’t matter who saw her.

She ran to the path leading down the face of
the cliffs to the beach and made her way to the sand below as
quickly as she could without falling off the narrow trail.

The tide was in and seawater washed around
the rocks dividing Penruan beach from the beach where Hermit’s cave
was. Emma pulled off her shoes and stockings and bundled them into
her skirt, tying her belt tighter to secure the bundle. Holding her
skirt up high, she began to wade through the water. She thought she
heard a shout from behind her, but she was too busy trying to avoid
being knocked off her feet by the surging waves to pay
attention.

She almost didn’t make it. A huge wave broke
over her head, soaking her and threatening to pull her out to sea
as it ebbed. She gasped and struggled shoreward.

“Dear girl, what are you trying to do?”
Hermit caught her around the waist with his good left arm and
dragged her out of the surf onto dry sand. “Emma, in the name of
heaven, how could you be so reckless? What’s in your skirt?’’

“My shoes,” she answered, sputtering from the
saltwater she’d swallowed.

“They’ll be as sodden as the rest of you.”
Hermit took the dripping shoes she pulled from her bedraggled skirt
and, still with a supporting arm around her, led her toward the
cave entrance. “Come along, child. There’s a fire burning inside. I
was searching for shellfish on the rocks and caught you,
instead.”

“You are using your right hand,” she
exclaimed.

“It’s much improved.” He held up her shoes so
she could see how easily he carried them. “What are you doing out
of the castle on a chill and misty day?”

“I need to see Agatha and thought she might
be with you,” Emma said. “If she’s not here, I’ll walk to Trevanan
village along the beach.”

“You’ll go nowhere with the sea as wild as it
is,” Hermit told her. “There must be a dreadful storm beyond the
horizon and we’re feeling the edges of it. Squeeze through the
opening now, and I’ll see you warm and dry before I send you
home.”

“I can’t go home until I’ve talked with
Agatha.” But she did as he ordered and slid through the narrow
entrance and followed him to the inner chamber of the cave.

“Take off your clothes and wrap up in my
cloak,” Hermit said, picking up the garment from his pile of
belongings and offering it to her.

“It will take hours for this woolen gown to
dry at a peat fire,’ she objected.

“Perhaps you won’t have to remove the dress
after all,” Hermit said. He shook his head at her as if she were a
heedless child. “My dear, you ought to have complained about my
suggestion that you undress.”

“The thought didn’t occur to me. I trust you.
I know you’d never hurt me.”

“Oh, Emma.” Hermit’s eyes were suddenly
bright, as if they were filled with unshed tears. “Do you find me
trustworthy? There’s an honor I never dreamed of earning, and I
thank you for it. All the same, I am going to provide you with a
chaperone.

“Vivienne!” Hermit called, raising his voice.
“Come out. Emma has come to visit and she needs your help
again.”

”Vivienne is here?” Emma turned in the
direction Hermit was looking. At first she saw only the solid stone
of the cave wall. Then Vivienne walked through the stone as if she
was entering a room through an open doorway.

“How wonderful!” Emma exclaimed. “Vivienne,
have you a special affinity for rocks? The one you hid behind up on
the moor was created by magic, wasn’t it?”

“Stones, and certain other objects,” Vivienne
said. “Why are you wet?”

“She tried to walk through the sea.” Hermit
responded to the question with exasperated impatience. ”Vivienne, I
beseech you, dry the foolish girl before she catches a bad
chill.”

“Of course.” Vivienne moved her hands in a
gesture that was familiar to Emma. In an instant Emma was dry and
her hands and feet, which had been chilled by the cold sea, were
warm again.

“I should have thought of doing that myself,”
Emma said ruefully.

“So you would have done, if Hermit hadn’t
been fluttering over you like a mother hen,” Vivienne said. “Now
that you are more comfortable, I shall scold you for risking your
life on the moor the other day, and then again, just now, in the
sea. You must take better care of yourself. You are needed,
Emma.”

“Indeed, you are,” said Hermit.

Emma was watching Vivienne, noting changes in
the mysterious lady. Vivienne was wearing her usual flowing white
garments, with the turquoise and silver pendant hanging upon her
bosom and her auburn hair waving loose around her shoulders, yet to
Emma’s eyes she did not seem as distant and unearthly as in her
previous appearances, and her voice, though low and soft, was no
longer a whisper.

“You are drawing nearer,” Emma said to her.
“You are more substantial now.”

“The time approaches,” Vivienne
responded.

“The time for what?”

“For an end to disguise,” Vivienne said.

“For justice,” Hermit interjected abruptly,
his deep masculine voice severing the delicate linking thread that
Emma and Vivienne were beginning to spin between them.

Emma felt a spurt of irritation when the
thread broke; Vivienne only smiled.

“Tell me why you are here,” Vivienne said to
her.

“I came to the beach looking for Agatha,
hoping she’d know where to find you,” Emma said. There was a pocket
sewn into the fabric belt that encircled her waist. Emma dug into
the pocket and drew forth the blue bead she had tucked there for
safekeeping. “This is the latest in a series of objects I have
found on Dain’s pillow. The guard outside my door insists no one
entered the room all night, and I accept his word, for I think it’s
likely he was entranced. Did you leave this on the pillow?” She
held out the blue bead for Vivienne to see.

“The gifts are meant for Dain,” Vivienne
said.

Before Emma could ask why Vivienne should be
giving presents to Dain they heard voices in the outer chamber of
the cave.

“That’s Dain now,” Emma said, clearing her
thoughts and preparing herself to perform magic. “Agatha is with
him.”

Emma was poised to act, so the instant
Vivienne made a movement to flee Emma caught her, holding her by
magic, forcing her to remain where she was.

“Please don’t,” Vivienne cried, fighting
magic with magic. “It means his death.”

“Whose death?” Emma demanded. “What are you
saying?”

“Dain may not look upon my face. It is
forbidden. If you love him, and I’m certain you do, release me at
once.”

“Dain will die if he sees you?”

For the duration of a single heartbeat Emma’s
power faltered at the thought of Dain’s death, and Vivienne broke
away from her. In the next moment Vivienne rushed into the rock and
vanished, just as Dain and Agatha arrived.

“Who was that?” Dain exclaimed, staring at
the rock. “What did I just see?”

“It was Vivienne,” Emma told him. “I wanted
her to stay and meet you, but she claimed seeing her would mean
your death.”

“What are you doing here?” Dain glared at
her, his face and eyes cold with fury. “Two days ago you promised
never to run away from me again, yet you vanished from the castle.
I can guess how you got past Todd. You used magic to circumvent my
wishes and to break a promise I trusted. I will have an explanation
from you.”

“Aren’t you afraid she’ll use magic on you?”
asked Hermit. “Emma could turn you into a crab and eat you for
supper if she wanted.”

“I will soon learn what you have to do with
the mysteries that bedevil me,” Dain said to him. “In the meantime,
since I have suffered you to live on my land, I’ll thank you to
avoid making useless threats. There is no reason for me to fear
Emma. She will not harm me.”

“But I may, if you break her heart,” Hermit
said, very quietly.

“Who the devil are you, to threaten me?” Dain
shouted at him.

“I have made no threat, my lord. I have
merely offered a promise, which I will keep.”

“Please, stop arguing,” Emma cried, stepping
between them. She held out her hand to show Dain the blue bead.
“This is the latest gift, found on your pillow this morning, though
Todd insists, and honestly so, that he saw no one enter or leave
the lord’s chamber. If you are looking for magic, my lord, here it
is.

“I have not broken my promise to you, for I
haven’t run away. I came to the beach in search of a solution to
this mystery, and believing either Agatha or Vivienne could provide
the answers I want. Vivienne admits to being the one leaving the
gifts. She says they were intended for you, and she was about to
tell me why she would give you presents when she heard your voice
and left.” Emma wasn’t sure Dain had heard all of her speech, for
he was staring at the bead that lay on her palm as if he was
transfixed by the sight of it.

“I had a bead like it once,” Dain said, and
began rubbing his forehead as he had done when Emma first mentioned
Vivienne’s name to him. “My mother took it away from me. It’s part
of what I can’t remember.” He fell silent, still gazing at the
bead.

“Agatha,” Emma said to the elderly healer,
who had stood quietly at one side of the chamber since entering it,
“what do you know about this?”

“Tell them,” Hermit said. “It’s time, Agatha.
You know it is.”

Agatha said nothing aloud; she merely made a
gesture in Dain’s direction, a gesture that Emma recognized as
magical. Dain began to speak in an oddly slurred voice, as if he
were half asleep.

“She gave it to me so I wouldn’t forget her,”
Dain said. “Before she left Penruan she crept into my room and
kissed me and put it into my hand. I can see her folding my little
fingers around it and telling me she wouldn’t forget me, either. ‘I
will love you always.’ she said. Emma, help me! Am I mad?”

“No.” Emma put the bead into Dain’s hand and
folded his large, adult fingers over it. She wrapped her arms
around him and held him tight. “Not mad, Dain. Not you. But you
have been held in a spell.”

“What else do you remember?” Agatha asked
him.

“My mother snatching the bead away from me,
scolding me for having it, slapping my hand until my fingers were
red and aching, telling me over and over that it was an evil
object,” Dain said, his voice growing steadily clearer as he spoke.
“It wasn’t evil, it was a gift. The last gift – ah! My head!” He
pulled away from Emma’s embrace, both hands at his head. The blue
bead fell onto the sand and Hermit picked it up.

“It’s his memory returning,” Agatha said. “I
have released the spell.”

“Take his pain away now!” Emma shouted at
her. “Then I insist you tell us what you’ve done to him, and tell
us who Vivienne is.”

“Let magic undo what evil has wrought,”
Agatha proclaimed in a deep, sonorous voice. Drawing herself up to
her full height, and then up again until she was at least a foot
taller than the old healer, she reached out to touch Dain’s
forehead.

Dain’s hands dropped to his sides. He took a
deep breath and opened his eyes.

“Emma,” he whispered, “the pain is gone. I
knew you’d help me.”

“Now Agatha is going to help you,” Emma said.
“Agatha is going to explain why she has held you under a spell for
more than twenty years. I intend to see to it that you remember
everything Agatha made you forget.”

“A spell?” Dain said. “Agatha, why would you
do such a thing? I’ve always considered you my friend.”

“So I am,” Agatha said. “The spell was an act
of kindness, intended to protect you and to save Vivienne’s life.
Dain, there is a danger if I allow you to recover all of your lost
memories. Are you willing to take the risk? I warn you, it won’t be
the danger you expect to find. Arms and armor will be of no use to
you. The knowledge you gain will permanently alter your life.”

“For years I have been pretending to myself
that the emptiness inside me didn’t exist,” Dain said. “Most of the
time it was easy enough to ignore, because no one ever spoke the
strange woman’s name. So far as I can tell, no one at Penruan, or
in Trevanan village, even knows what the name is. Not until Emma
learned it and spoke it aloud to me did the torment in my mind
begin in earnest, and it has plagued me ever since. I must have
answers! Agatha, if you are my friend as you claim, then break the
spell and give me back my lost memories. Or teach Emma how to do
it.”

“It’s you who hold the power to end the
spell,” Agatha said.

”I? There’s no magic in me.”

“We shall see.” Agatha gestured, and the
surface of the rock through which Vivienne had disappeared began to
waver.

Dain blinked and shook his head, as if trying
to clear his vision. Emma took his hand and stepped forward,
drawing him with her to the rock. Though he was plainly puzzled, he
didn’t resist.

“Don’t fight us, Vivienne,” Hermit called.
“Let us in. The time has come.”

“Vivienne!” Agatha no longer spoke with the
voice of an elderly woman. Her clear, commanding tones rang through
the cave. “The time for fear has passed! Your exile is about to
end.”

A section of the rock wall suddenly vanished,
revealing an arched opening. Still holding Dain’s hand, Emma walked
through the arch and into the room beyond. Above a smooth rock
floor the walls and the high ceiling shimmered and sparkled with
multicolored embedded crystals. From halfway up one wall a spring
burst forth, its water falling with a soft, trickling sound into a
depression at the base of the rock.