Darkwitch Rising by Sara Douglass

Kate now moved about the bed so that she sat on my other side, on the edge of the mattress.

“None of us can do anything,” I said, and then felt my body take a huge breath. Ah! How I loathed this lack of control! I had been entirely taken over, and it terrified me for what it implied about my daughter.

My sweet, innocent daughter. That’s all I wanted…please gods, let it be what I received.

I took another breath, very slow and deep, and arched my back slightly.

“Is the pain—” Kate began.

“There is no pain,” I said, and then arched my back again as that strange hateful discomfort swept over me. I could feel the child moving through my birth canal, could feel her head crowning, and yet there was no pain.

Just that total lack of control.

I cried out in frustration, and Marguerite, who had now shifted very close to me, reached down her hands, and drew forth my child from my body.

“Look!” she said, holding the child up before me. “Look!”

The baby stared at me with deep blue eyes, perfectly aware. A calm, cool stare, tinged with what I thought might be triumph. This was no sweet child, no dependent being on whom I could lavish love and care. I tried to smile, but found it difficult. I rested one hand on my now flaccid belly. Where my daughter had rested I felt now only hollowness and loss rather than the ecstasy of a successful birth, and where my heart should have been I felt only sadness and despair rather than the unconditional love every mother should feel instinctively for her child.

My daughter, still held in Marguerite’s hands, stared at me, and her tiny brow seemed to wrinkle, as if in irritation. Maybe I was not the mother she had wanted; as I wondered that, maybe…no. I could not think that at all. Not wanting this child went against my every instinct, both as Eaving, and as Cornelia-Caela-Noah. She was my daughter. I ought to love her.

None of this Marguerite or Kate noticed. Marguerite was now holding the baby in her arms, the umbilical cord severed, one fingertip tracing out the lines of the baby’s face.

“She looks like a kitten!” Marguerite declared.

Once more I tried to smile, and this time somehow I managed it. “Then we shall call her Catling,” I said, “not merely for her looks, but for the game she plays.”

My heart felt like a great, still, cold rock in my chest.

Thirteen

Idol Lane, London

One year later

Weyland grew more impatient and more nervy with each passing day. He spent most of his days, and half his nights as well, out in the city, listening to both gossip and hard news, trying (along with every other person in London) to hear if Charles was on his way yet, if the king was to return. No one now doubted that he would return, but no one could know the how and the when.

Most of the citizens of London were torn between two emotions: joy that the king would return—surely he would usher in a glorious golden age for the city and country both—and a deep anxiety that the king may exact revenge for the unfortunate murder of his father so many years ago.

Both anticipation and nervousness beset Weyland as well. There was, after all, a long history of debt and hatred between Brutus and Asterion, and Brutus-reborn in this life had considerably more reason to exact revenge than just Charles I’s murder.

Weyland knew he could best Charles, but the weapon he could wield—Noah Banks—was one fraught with difficulties. Yes, Weyland knew he could control and contain Noah; she was his, after all, but he was also wary of her power that emanated from the land, and Weyland had no way of understanding it.

He didn’t think she could break free from him, or manage to exercise her free will, but he wasn’t completely sure.

Thus it was, in the last cold days of the winter of 1660, that Weyland decided to pay Noah a visit.

Just to be neighbourly.

Just to be sure.

He went in person, not in spirit or glamour. Weyland needed to feel and see and taste Noah, and he could only do that if he went in the flesh. Woburn was not too long a ride away; he could manage it in two days if he changed horses regularly and rode through part of the night. He was young and strong enough to cope, and he was, Weyland was somewhat surprised to discover, jaded enough to relish the thought of an excursion into the English countryside, as cold and as brittle as currently it was.

He arrived in Woburn village in the early afternoon on a weekday in late February. The air was icy and sharp, the road slick with frozen slush. The sloping high street of the village was deserted: who would go out in this weather? The scent of Noah lay all about. Weyland could feel her, almost as strongly as if they shared a bed, and lay skin to skin. Her presence dominated the village, although Weyland doubted all but the most gifted or sensitive could feel it.

He pulled his horse to a halt some ten or twelve paces from the church. At this spot her presence was very, very powerful, and Weyland glanced at the house a little further up the street.

She was in there. By the gods, he could feel her very breathing. She was sitting at some needlework —for an instant Weyland’s mind was flooded with the memory of Caela with her ever-present embroideries and silks—and she was at peace.

She had no idea he was close.

Weyland shivered, and put it down to the cold.

He dismounted, pulling the horse into the lee of the house. He drew in a deep breath, and then whispered, infusing his voice with great power of command.

“Noah. Come to me, I demand it.”

Instantly Weyland felt a flash of fear from her, and it relieved him. He sent another demand, this one not composed of words, but of pure emotion: anger, aggression, insistence.

He felt the needlework fall to the floor, and heard, as if he stood next to her, Noah’s voice as she mumbled some excuse or other to whoever it was sat with her.

Then there were footsteps, straight to the front door, not even pausing so she could gather to her a cloak or coat against the bitter chill.

Weyland smiled, and then shuddered again as chills ran down his spine.

The door opened, and a figure slipped through.

She hesitated as she closed the door, looking about, and Weyland had his first sight of her.

It stunned him. He hadn’t expected her to be so lovely. Her thick hair was tied in a simple loose knot which fell over one shoulder. Her face, pale even before she had come through the door, was now almost completely white with the cold.

Her blue eyes shone brilliantly in the winter light, and they were staring wildly at him.

Yet again Weyland trembled, and yet again he attributed it to the cold. Ignoring the knot in his stomach, he raised a gloved hand, and gestured slowly to her.

She swallowed, and then moved forward, stumbling a little before coming to a halt some two paces away from him.

Her arms were now wrapped about her body, and she trembled violently in spasmodic shudders. She was not dressed for the outdoors, and Weyland knew she would be suffering badly.

“Noah,” he said.

Her mouth moved, but no sound came out.

Dropping his horse’s reins, Weyland stepped close to Noah, and cupped her chin in his gloved hand.

“Well met, my lovely,” he murmured.

“What do you want?” she said.

“You, of course,” he said, and felt her flinch. Then her eyes hardened, and he saw defiance in them. For some reason it pleased him, although he knew he should punish her for it. Perhaps he should punish her for it.

Very slowly, Weyland leaned forward, and kissed her.

She stiffened, but he knew she would not pull away, for that would be to admit defeat. So Weyland took his time, drawing her against his body, very slowly exploring her mouth with his, tormenting her with softness.

“I remember,” he murmured, pulling his mouth away from hers just enough that he could speak, “taking your virginity when you were Caela. I shall enjoy our bedding even more in this life, I think.”

“I am no virgin,” she said. “I chose not to wait for your gruesome summons.”

“You think I did not know that?” he said. “It is of no matter. I can but hope that your experience in this life has taught you some amusing tricks.”

“Indeed,” she said, “I shall be quite the skilled whore for you, Asterion.”

Eyes narrowed, Weyland stepped back a little from her, although he kept a grip on one of her upper arms.