The Tower of Ravens (47 page)

Then the passage opened out into a sizable cavern. Passages and antechambers ran off on different sides, and Rhiannon could hear the roar of running water. She thought she must be coming close to the waterfall. She hesitated, not knowing which way to go, and unable to see very well because of the violent flickering of the candle-flames. A cold draught breathed on her neck, lifting her long tendrils of hair.

Suddenly the candles were snuffed out. She scrabbled to light one again. As the flame ignited, illuminating the cavern more fully than before, she saw, crudely etched on the far wall, the shape of a raven. Breathing quickly, she hurried that way and found another passage built by human hands, leading up at a slight angle. Rhiannon followed the passage and soon found herself climbing broad, even steps that rose steeply ahead of her. On and on she climbed, panting a little, the backs of her legs aching.

Fresh air blew coldly against her cheek. She came to another swivel door, standing sideways on its pivot. Shielding her candle with one hand, she crept out into the ruins of the Tower of Ravens. It could be nothing else, this edifice of crumbling stone with grass and brambles growing through cobblestones, and crooked walls rising like broken teeth high into the sky. It was very dark and her candle made only a small circle of light, but she held it high and examined the ancient marks of fire on the walls, the tree growing out of a crevice twenty feet above her head, the untidy ravens’ nests high in the tower.

Rhiannon could hear the sound of chanting and she crept towards it, blowing out her candle and putting it down on the ground so the light would not reveal her. In the numb arc of frozen sky above her, the stars blazed whitely.

She came to a broken archway and looked through, her heart pounding.

Standing in a circle in the central courtyard of the ruined tower were nine people, all dressed in long red hooded robes. Holding hands, they were chanting in a low, monotonous tone. Rhiannon was not close enough to hear the words. A sullen fire burnt in a clay dish in the centre, reeking of strange incense. Nine enormous black candles in iron cages cast a flickering, uncertain light. As Rhiannon leant forward, trying to hear, the nine people stopped their chanting and stood in silence for a moment, all looking up at the sky, and then they broke apart. One man turned and knelt to the north, laying his forehead on the ground, his arms outstretched. Another figure came up behind up him and bent to unfasten his robe, stripping it down so his back was laid bare. The red-robed figure then drew a whip with nine knotted lashes out of its sleeve. After a moment spent in ritual prayer, the figure began to whip the half-naked man, slowly, rhythmically. Nine times the nine-lashed whip rose and fell, and when at last it was laid down, the victim’s back was running with blood.

He lay still for a moment, shoulders heaving, then struggled to his feet, drawing his robe up to cover his abused flesh. Then he turned to face the others. Eager to see who it was, Rhiannon leant right forward, but all she could see under the hood were glittering eyes, a mouth clamped shut with pain, and a cleanshaven chin. The man gestured imperiously and one of the other anonymous figures came forward, carrying a sack. The man who had been whipped took the sack, plunged his hand inside, and withdrew a rooster by its spurred feet. Its raucous protests were loud enough for Rhiannon to hear, and she watched as it struggled to break free, pecking at the hand that held it hanging. The other hand came up, there was a flash of silver, and then blood sprayed from the rooster’s neck. Immediately everyone began to chant again, in high, hysterical voices. Desperate to hear more, Rhiannon lay down on her stomach and wriggled slowly across the cold, muddy ground until she reached a broken colonnade of arches closer to the circle of chanters.

“… By the power o‘ the dark moon, by the power o’ spilled blood, by the power o‘ darkness and the unknown, by the mysteries o’ the deep, I summon and evoke thee, spirit o‘ Falkner MacFerris, long dead brother and laird o’ Fettercairn. Arise, arise from the grave, I charge and command thee…”

Three times they repeated the charm. To Rhiannon’s horror, by the end of the third repetition she saw a frail shape lift out of the ground in the centre of the circle, its head bowed, its arms folded about its chest. It lifted a haunted, cavernous face and said: “Why will ye no‘ let me rest?”

“Falkner!” cried the leader, the man who had been whipped.

“Falkner, we come close to finding the secret. I beg o‘ ye, do no’ despair yet. I ken it has been a long and weary time, but I swear to ye, we come close.”

“A long and weary time, aye, that it has. Why do ye hold me to this world? I want only to rest now. Let me be.”

“Do ye no‘ want vengeance?” the leader cried. Rhiannon was almost certain it was Lord Malvern, but she could not be sure, for this man’s voice was high and shrill and desperate.

“Vengeance?” the ghost asked in mild curiosity. “It is all dust and ashes to me now. What do I care?”

“But do ye no‘ wish to live again? Do ye no’ wish to embrace your loving wife, do ye no‘ wish to hold your son in your arms? What would ye no’ give to feel the sun hot on your skin and fill your lungs with sweet air, to drink cool water and eat your fill o‘ the fruits o’ the earth? Falkner, once ye raved for these things, ye begged me…”

“They are all good things,” the ghost said slowly. “Indeed, I had almost forgotten.”

“Falkner, Falkner, how could ye forget!” one of the others cried, stretching out trembling, age-spotted hands. The ghost turned his face towards her.

“Evaline,” he whispered.

“Falkner, my love!”

“It has been so long. I had begun to let go, to drift away, to forget.”

“It has only been five months, Falkner,” Malvern said impatiently. “We last raised ye on All Hallows’ Eve, as we have done every year since ye died. Tonight is the spring equinox, the night when the hours of darkness equal the hours o‘ light, and tonight the moon is dark. It seemed too good a chance to waste. We carina raise ye too often, ye ken that. It is too dangerous…”

As if his words were a key to unlock a door, the candle-flames suddenly wavered and were snuffed out as a bitter-cold wind swept round the courtyard. The fire whirled away in a blast of sparks and ashes, plunging the courtyard into darkness. There were a few terrified screams.

“Hold fast!” Lord Malvern shouted. “Hold the circle o‘ protection!”

All Rhiannon could hear were the shrieks of panic and fear, and then every hair on her body stood erect and quivering. She could sense something new in the courtyard, something huge and cold and malevolent. She shrank down, hiding herself, as afraid as she had been when lost in the castle.

Suddenly nine tall pillars of pale greenish fire shot up from the candles. Mist was roiling everywhere, dank and foul-smelling. The ghost of a woman stood in the centre of the circle, regarding the cowering figures with amusement. In the one glance Rhiannon took before she pressed her face back down again, she saw only that the woman seemed richly dressed, and that her skin was white and her hair dark.

“Ye seek to raise the dead, ye fools?” the ghost said. “With a slaughtered cock-a-doodle-doo and a handful o‘ powdered nightshade? Amateurs!”

Lord Malvern struggled to his feet. “Begone, foul spirit!” he cried. “Ye were no‘ invited here. By the power o’ the sacred circle, I command ye to return to the world o‘ the dead.”

She laughed, and raised her hand. The bitter-cold, uncanny wind blew up again, strewing the salt and charcoal of the circle they had drawn across the stone.

“If ye open a portal to the spirit world, ye must expect some uninvited guests,” she said. “Look out into the darkness. Can ye no‘ see the ghosts that swarm about your pitiful circle o’ protection like a hive o‘ angry hornets? Ye stand here upon a Heart o’ Stars and call upon the dead, and think ye can open and close the door at will?”

The nine hooded figures looked fearfully out into the darkness, cringing in their fear. Rhiannon looked also and had to bite her knuckle to stop from crying out, for a host of dead were indeed crowding close round the circle of candles with their strange, green flames. The ghosts seemed made of starlight and shadow and bone, only barely visible in the darkness, yet as they pressed forward eagerly, Rhiannon could see their faces, some grave and terrible, others cruel and greedy, others distorted with grief or rage. The longer she looked, the more she saw, hundreds of phantasms melting into each other like pallid marsh-flames.

“They are angry,” the woman said. “I wonder why? So many spirits o‘ the dead, eager to kick open this door ye have opened and swarm upon ye like maddened bees. Do no tell me. I can guess. Ye have been experimenting, haven’t ye? Ye’ve been trying to discover the secret o’ resurrecting the dead. Ye have dug up corpses and tried to reanimate them, ye have killed others in order to study the moment o‘ death, to understand how and when the spirit is severed, to find out how long it lingers, to study the psychic memory o’ bones, to use them as objects o‘ power for your rituals, to seek to know death. Were ye never taught that it is no’ for us to decide the time o‘ a man’s death, but for she who cuts the thread?”

“Who are ye?” Malvern said in a high, desperate voice. “What do ye want o‘ us?”

“For ye to bring me back to life, o‘ course,” she answered. “That is what all these ghosts want, crowding round your door. I am the only one who kens the secret though. I am the only one who can help ye.”

“Who are ye?” he asked again.

“Never mind who. All ye need to ken is that I can help ye raise your beloved ones from the dead.”

“Ye can help us?” Lady Evaline asked in a quavery voice.

“Aye, I can. I have waited long for this chance, I have clung to life with tenacious hands, I have refused to go on to the final dissolution o‘ self, in the hope that somewhere, somehow, I would find someone with the will, the wit, to evoke the spell o’ resurrection. I will tell ye where to find this spell, if ye promise that ye will raise me first.”

The hooded figures were irresolute. Some looked out at the darkness with terrified eyes, others huddled together, muttering.

Lord Malvern was not hesitant. He stood up straight, looking the ghost in the eye. “I have waited twenty-five years for this chance!” he cried, exultant. “Twenty-five years I have sought to find the secret o‘ bringing the dead back to life, and always I have failed. We have done such terrible things—we have dug up corpses in all stages o’ putrefaction and cast all manner o‘ spells upon them. We have tortured men to watch how many times they can be killed and revived afore the spirit flees forever. We have tried every way imaginable, and always we have failed. O’ course we will help ye, my lady, whoever ye are. We will be glad to help ye!”

“Excellent,” the ghost said in her low, rich, purring voice. “First let us drive away some o‘ these listeners, and then I shall tell ye where ye may find the spell.”

Rhiannon was suddenly convinced that the ghost knew there was a quick soul listening as well as a host of dead ones. She felt an overwhelming need to escape before she was discovered. She began to slowly creep away, keeping as low and quiet as she could, until at last she reached the shelter of the wall. She was trembling in every limb, but at last she managed to light her candle and find her way back through the secret passage and into the library.

She dared not warm herself before the fire, but hurried back up the stairs and through the maze of corridors and galleries till she at last reached her own room. By now Rhiannon was so cold and weary she could hardly put one foot before the other. Her legs threatened to buckle beneath her, every limb trembled, and black specks danced before her eyes. She came into the bedroom at last, and stripped off her cloak and boots so she could creep under the warmth of the eiderdown, shaking and prodding the sleeping Felice until at last the other girl yawned and half-woke.

“Felice! We must get away from here. Felice! Wake up! Felice!”

“What is it? What’s wrong?” Felice said sleepily.

“We must get away from here. They mean us evil, I ken it. We must wake up Nina and Iven, and the others, and get out, somehow, I dinna ken how, we must get away as fast and as quiet as we can…”

“Rhiannon, ye’re gabbling! What’s the matter with ye?”

As Rhiannon tried to explain, Felice sat up and laid a hand on her forehead and then on her cheek. “Rhiannon, your hands and feet are like ice! And your head is boiling hot. Look at ye, ye’re shivering.”

“Cold, so cold,” Rhiannon muttered, and shuddered as she realised she had echoed the refrain of the ghostly boy.

“Let me put some more wood on the fire, get ye warm.”

“Never mind about that,” Rhiannon said impatiently, though she gratefully huddled under the counterpane Felice pulled close around her. “We have to get away. There are ghosts, Felice, hundreds o‘ them…”

“Ye and your ghosts,” Felice said, suppressing a yawn. She dragged her dressing-gown around her and got out of bed. “This is the second time tonight ye’ve woken me gabbling about ghosts. I wish I’d slept with Edithe, ye’re a most unrestful bed partner.” She threw some wood on the ashes of the fire, stirred it once or twice with the poker, and then caused the logs to burst into flame with a wave of her hand. She yawned again, so widely that Rhiannon could not help yawning also, and climbed back into bed.

“Nay, nay, we have to get up, we have to go,” Rhiannon said feverishly.

“It’s the middle o‘ the bloody night, for Eà’s sake! We canna go anywhere. Now go back to sleep and in the morning I’ll get ye some o‘ that wine Cameron kept raving about. I think ye must’ve caught the boys’ cold.”

“I do no‘ want wine,” Rhiannon said, sitting up in bed, clutching the bedclothes to her chin. “Are ye no’ listening? They’re murderers, the lot o‘ them.”

“Who? Who are murderers?”

“Everyone! Everyone in the castle.”

“Oh, Rhiannon! Go back to sleep, please.”

“Sleep? How can I sleep? Did ye no‘ hear me? I saw ghosts, the ghosts o’ murdered boys, and then I saw them, the laird and lady, working some kind o‘ evil to bring back the dead…”