Darkwitch Rising by Sara Douglass

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.

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.”

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?”