The Watching Wood (12 page)

‘
What?
Eder, help us!’

‘Don’t take it with you,’ he said in all earnestness.

‘Take what?’

‘The dungeons are forever, you’ll never leave them.’ He grasped her wrist. ‘Don’t take your story with you.’

Fury boiled inside Grace and she smacked the notebook out of his hand. Tightening her grip on Delilah, she forced her way through the crowd, shoulder-first, violently when necessary, until the mob thinned and she emerged at the other side.

‘Going somewhere?’

Gaukroger stood in front of her. His tall frame, that had at first seemed awkward and ungainly, now loomed over her with square-shouldered confidence. Behind him the Raven girl grinned, her small eyes wicked in her long, oval face.

‘Ow!’

Grace looked back. Jenny sprang out of the crowd, and Adie and Una lost their grip on her as she went sprawling onto the floor. Behind them Victoria Meister’s hands crackled with blue energy.

‘Nice guarding,’ she sneered as Aura’s team-mate snuck past her and joined Gaukroger and the Raven girl.

‘We had it in hand,’ Gaukroger replied coolly.

‘Didn’t you save their lives in Origination?’ She smirked when Gaukroger scowled. ‘Funny that. And three of them get away from you now? I think maybe you need to take a tougher approach.’ She pointed a crackling finger at Jenny’s back. ‘A little encouragement will get this lot moving much quicker.’

‘No!’

Una smacked her arm out of the way, and Jenny was able to scramble to her feet.

Rebounding off the mob that was moving steadily forward, Victoria snarled and snatched Una around the throat, pushing her against the wall.

‘Behave,
dog!
’

Una whimpered as the blueness snaked up her neck and
reddened the skin along her jaw.

‘Get off her!’

Victoria looked momentarily stunned as Jenny grabbed her collar and spun her away towards the opposite wall. They grappled and crashed into an ancient suit of armour. The two girls lay dazed in the scattered, dented pieces. It wasn’t until Jenny sat up and shook her head that Grace noticed a gleaming sword was standing upright, its hilt leaning into the wall, its point lodged in Victoria’s forearm.

‘Oh no!’ shouted Grace

The Hawk Falls girl slowly came to, screamed, and fainted again.

12

A Wicked History

‘I thought I could just talk to them,’ Rachel said as she strolled along the gallery mezzanine.

‘We don’t like to communicate directly with Tithon Castle too often,’ Alinda replied. ‘We don’t … we like to keep some separation between ourselves and the Lyceum of Wicca. They school upcoming wiccans, and we are Wicca in action. We’re two different worlds really. Are you not happy with your friends’ letters?’

Rachel glanced at the pages in her hand. She wasn’t happy with them. They were in her friends’ handwriting, they used her friends’ phrases but … something wasn’t right.

‘They’re all so upbeat, so happy.’

‘Shouldn’t they be?’

No
, Rachel thought.
They shouldn’t be. They’re homesick, and
nervous about the Trials
. But out loud she said, ‘It’s just funny. Jenny didn’t make a single spelling mistake either, and she always makes one or two.’

Out of the corner of her eye Rachel saw Alinda tap a ruby ring on her finger. The red stone flashed for a split second, and when she glanced back at her letters she suddenly noticed an error in Jenny’s writing.

‘Oh,’ she said, ‘I didn’t see that. Guess she did make one after all.’

She eyed the ring on Alinda’s delicate hand and quenched the suspicion growing in her gut. When she looked up, the woman was smiling at her encouragingly. Rachel shrugged.

‘I just hoped that I could talk to them, you know, ask them more about the Trials. I miss them, I guess.’

‘Maybe I should explain a little of the history behind the Trials. You see, they’re
nothing
.’ Rachel looked up at her, perplexed. ‘They’re a distraction. What no-one outside this mansion knows, is that the Trials were created by the Hunters to weed out those that display enough skill to join our cause. The Glamour Trial is the only one that matters. Everything else is just distraction.’

‘I don’t understand. Then why not just have a Glamour Trial, and tell people what it’s for?’

‘Hundreds of years ago,’ Alinda draped an arm around Rachel’s shoulders, ‘the Supremes were a force to be reckoned with. Did you know they’ve been alive that long? Well,
they have. They were powerful witches with dreams of building a bigger, brighter future for all of us. They helped take control of this island. Before the Supremes and the Hunters arrived, faeries swarmed Hy-Breasal like locusts. Those three witches carved out a home for us here, and established the first formal school in the Lyceum of Wicca. Lord Machlau’s gift for building and architecture made Tithon Castle the most glorious of its kind.’

Alinda’s nostalgic smile faded and her voice grew serious.

‘But the Supremes had their weakness. And that was greed. Not for money, not for power, but for
life
. They dreaded their own mortality, they didn’t want to pass on. So they put their skill and knowledge into creating a potion, an elixir of youth. And they drank. Every day they drank, and every day they still do.’

‘I can’t believe they did all that,’ Rachel said. ‘They seem so, so–’

‘Mad?’

‘Well, yes.’

‘That’s because magic can stretch the lifetime of the body, but not the mind. We’re not meant to live for centuries and the price for doing so has been their sanity. Lord Machlau can still remember every detail of the castle’s construction, but he will never build another. Lady Hecate has held on best – she can curb the others’ odd behaviour when she needs to – but she once had an astounding gift for potions
that is long gone. And Madame Three, well …’

Alinda trailed off before continuing.

‘Her dementia set in early, they say. You know she can’t even remember her own name? And when she forgot it, so did everyone else. She’s the third of their group, so they just call her Madame Three.’

‘That’s awful.’

‘It is,’ Alinda said. ‘But it’s a lesson to us all. When the Supremes tried to keep their hand in maintaining control of the island, it was disastrous. The faeries multiplied, and we’re still trying to decrease those numbers. So the Hunters devised the Witch Trials. The preparations keep the Supremes occupied throughout the year, and over the decades they became a fixture at Tithon Castle.’

‘So they get schools to send students to compete every year?’

‘We absolved them of that responsibility – goodness knows what a disaster of organisation that would be – a perpetual spell was cast to pull in competitors from any wiccan school that qualified in any given year. Students can be pulled in at random, but generally a school selects those to compete and stands them ready to be summoned.’

‘And to qualify a school would need …?’

Alinda shrugged.

‘It would simply need enough students to form a team.’

‘Six?’

‘That’s correct.’

Delilah!
Rachel thought,
Delilah was our sixth. She joined our classes, we qualified, and the spell sucked us in
.

‘We have little contact with the Supremes now,’ Alinda said, ‘and we like to keep it that way.’

‘But you still use the Trials to find new Hunters.’

‘Our one indulgence, and it has served us well. We’ve found many talented new Hunters through the Trials. We found you.’

They moved down the spiral staircase to the marble floor below, and Rachel tried not to look at the paintings she already knew were there. Even in daylight the ground floor of the gallery was in shadow. Those eerie eyes – the blond boy with the wooden puzzle, the girl simpering from the cottage window with her fearful twin at the door – bored into Rachel while she gazed firmly at her feet.

‘I come here once a day,’ Alinda said softly, ‘so I never forget.’

‘Forget what?’

‘Look around you.’

Rachel glanced quickly at the framed portraits lining the walls, then focussed on smoothing a hangnail on her finger. Alinda lifted her chin.

‘You don’t want to, but look carefully. Do you know who they are?’

Rachel shook her head.

‘The Lost Ones. These witch-oags were the last victims of faery malice.’ She pointed to the blond boy. ‘Lark Walden, lured into the woods by nymphs, barely old enough to walk. He was never seen again. You see the girl at the cottage door? Vela Romwood; her story always gave me nightmares. She was snatched from the cradle and a sly, twisted creature was left in her place. It was not until the faery intruder revealed her wickedness as a teenager that the truth was realised. The real Vela was never recovered.’

They continued to the end of the gallery where an even larger portrait hung above an altar. Rachel hadn’t seen it that night, because all her attention had been on the boy curled on the floor.

The painting had the same grim colouring as the others – all greys and blacks and dark greens – and depicted a cliff edge on a stormy night. A glowing lamp hovered in the air just above the ragged edge and a small boy, no more than two steps from his doom, reached for the lamp. His wore a white woollen nightgown, and his black hair was slicked to his forehead above huge green eyes.

‘Tormey Vause,’ Alinda said. She stared at the painting as if lost, and her voice dropped so low it was like she was talking to herself. ‘Lured to his death by faery fire, held by the Phooka. Tormey saw the light in the forest from his bedroom window. He snuck out into the night and followed it through the trees, with the light always just out of reach.
He walked so far his feet were blistered, but faery fire has a strong hold. The Phooka, unseen, led him out of the woods to the very edge of the island and …’

Her voice drifted off. Rachel stared at the mournful scene, imagining the long fall into the raging sea.

‘How do you know?’ The words were out of her mouth before she had even thought them.

‘I’m sorry?’

‘How do you know the story?’

‘These tales were handed down through generations so we would never forget.’

‘Yes, but how does
anyone
know what happened? If the children were never seen again, how do you know the Phooka led Tormey to the cliff, or that nymphs lured Lark Walden into the woods? I mean, the Vela story maybe, but the others …’

She trailed off when she saw Alinda’s expression. It was a mixture of disbelief and hurt. Rachel stammered an apology until the woman gently cupped her face in her hands.

‘We know the truth,’ she said earnestly, ‘because the children will never let us forget. And we will
never
forgive.’

Again Rachel could feel the painted eyes glaring. The Lost Ones did not appreciate her lack of faith. She could feel it.

Grace wasn’t sure how she was climbing the long staircase
of the turret. Her whole body was numb. She could barely see in front of her, despite the light from the candelabra in the Raven girl’s hand. She could feel Delilah’s tiny hands in her back, guiding her up the steps. The small girl had prevented her from falling twice already. She tried to get her head together, but the scene outside the courtroom played over and over in her mind. The blood that spilled from Victoria’s arm, the shock on Jenny’s face and then, the sound of Madame Three’s voice triumphant. The trial would continue as promised tomorrow, but with four defendants only.

Jenny was gone.

The turret door was unlocked and the girls pushed inside.

‘Homey, isn’t it,’ said the Raven girl, ‘but don’t get too comfortable.’

‘Because,’ Gaukroger grabbed Adie’s arm roughly and leered, ‘you’ll be joining your friend in the dungeons very soon.’

As the door slammed shut Grace slumped against a pile of rusted junk and began to cry.

‘She’s gone.
We’re
gone. We’re never going home.’

She looked up through a blur of tears and watched Adie turn towards her, shakily holding out the folded piece of paper that Gaukroger had pressed into her palm.

The sheet of paper sat spread on the floor of the turret, a
sprinkling of what looked like pink salt over hasty, bubbled handwriting.

Rose myrrh, as much as we could find.

I hope it’s enough.

Love,

Aura

And under the scribbled note was a shakily drawn diagram, marked with an X.

‘I don’t know what
rose
myrrh is,’ Delilah said, ‘but regular myrrh is sometimes used to break binding spells.’

‘Then that,’ Grace pointed to the diagram, ‘is a map to the dungeons. Aura, you little angel.’

‘Then he doesn’t hate me,’ Adie was whispering to herself, but the others heard her.

‘Nah-ah,’ Una said, squeezing her arm. ‘That boy’s head over heels.’

‘He must be,’ Grace agreed. ‘They’re risking an awful lot to help us.’

‘Then let’s not look a gift horse in the mouth. Let’s look him right in the eye and … you know … accept the gift.’

‘Let’s do it!’

A few moments passed.

‘Anyone know how to do it?’ asked Una.

‘Delilah,’ said Grace, ‘you know how to break a binding with the myrrh, right?’

‘I know how to make a potion,’ the small girl replied,
‘with tools and other ingredients. I don’t know how this stuff works on its own.’

‘Careful, Una!’ Grace said as her friend grabbed a pinch of the pink salt. ‘There’s hardly any of it.’

‘We gotta try,’ Una said, sprinkling the rose myrrh over the ring on her ankle.

Nothing happened.

‘Abracadabra.’ Una wriggled her fingers over her leg like a magician.

Still nothing.

‘Fudge.’

Aruj stood on the deck, broad-shouldered and handsome, his face turned to the high sun and the wind ruffling his loose-fitting shirt as the ship sped towards the forest. Rachel stared and tried not to drool.

‘Are you nervous?’

She jumped, embarrassed that he was aware of her watching.

‘I guess there
are
lots of faeries in the woods,’ she said.

‘There are. But you have no need to worry.’

‘There was only one in the cell, and I didn’t handle that well.’

It was the first time she had mentioned the tree-like goblin since it happened. She had been ashamed at how it
had ended, but much more than that, the experience had been one that gave her nightmares. Sometimes, sitting at the dining table or alone in her room, she would get the sudden sensation of sticky sap spilling over her hand and the deep smell of rotten wood. She shook her head to push away the dying hiss that hurt her ears.

‘In my first training session,’ Aruj said, still basking in the sunshine, ‘I didn’t even glamour. I sank into a corner before the Leanan-sidhe facing me, and I cried. But you, you fooled a black annis.’ Rachel shook her head. ‘You
did
fool a black annis, and took its life before it took yours. You achieved that in your first session. Just imagine what you will do in your tenth.’

Rachel sighed. Long before her tenth session Grace and the others would have found the sapphire rose they needed, and she would be back home, living her boring old life in boring old Dunbridge.