Darkwitch Rising by Sara Douglass

And, surprisingly, suddenly shy in that aloneness.

“It has been so long,” Catharine murmured. She sat on the other side of the bed, demure in a white linen nightgown that was feathered all about its square neckline with fine Dutch lacework. She did not look at Charles, but at her hands demurely folded in her lap.

“And so much to say,” said Charles. He wondered why, when he had so gleefully shared his bed with Marguerite and Kate, he now found this moment so awkward.

“Do you worry,” he said, after some considerable pause, “that Noah might not like to think that…you…and I…that she might feel some…”

“Resentment,” Catharine said, her voice very low.

“Catharine,” he said, and shifted across the bed to her side. He lifted a hand to her hair, and undid the ribbon that held it in a thick braid. “Catharine, I sent to Noah both Marguerite and Kate, together with their children that I fathered on them. She did not mind that, not from the reports I have heard, and she will not mind this, not you and I. Circumstances are such that it will be a long time before she and I shall be together again.”

If ever, he thought, remembering so much of what had passed between them.

“Noah is not one,” he continued, his fingers now combing out her hair, “to seethe with misplaced resentment.”

Catharine had at last raised her face from the regard of her hands. “I have dreamed that she had a child.”

He grinned, and Catharine saw in his eyes the deep love he had for Noah. “Aye.”

“And it was fathered by…”

His grin broadened. “Aye, and within the most magical of Circles. And now that I have told you the truth, are you jealous? Resentful?”

She laughed. “No. I am glad for her.”

“Then know that she shall be glad for us.” He leaned the distance between them, and kissed her brow. “Ah, Matilda-Catharine…how I desired you six hundred years past…how I desire you now…Speak to me no more of Noah, I pray you, but only of what you and I can make, here and now, in this bed.”

And Catharine lifted her mouth to his, and let him ease her worries.

Three

Idol Lane, London, and Woburn Village, Bedfordshire

Spring of 1660 was a merry time in London. The grim years of the Commonwealth, when grey austerity ruled and the youthful king languished in exile, were well over, and the Londoners prepared to welcome home their king. Royal crests on the chimney breasts of fireplaces were uncovered from the layers of concealing ash and plaster which had hidden them during Cromwell’s years, and seamstresses and tailors set to sewing colourful pennants and banners to hang from every window on that glorious day when the king would set elegant foot once more within London’s ancient walls. Youths set up maypoles—long banned under Cromwell—in Smithfield so that maidens might dance around them. Church bells rang out wildly upon the least excuse, bonfires were lit in most public greens in and around the city, and many a citizen was observed to fall upon his knees in the street and drink the king’s health. That Charles’ restoration coincided with the regeneration of spring was remarked on by all: England was moving towards a glorious new age and everyone would put well behind them that small regrettable matter of Charles’ father’s execution. This was the happiest period of May celebrations in living memory.

Charles excelled himself at diplomacy. In the first week of May he sent a letter to Parliament submitting himself as their servant. Parliament, in gratitude, sent Charles an extra £5,000 for his costs. Furthermore, in a gesture of goodwill, both Commons and Lords voted to ensure the burning of any books or pamphlets that were “against the king”.

Everyone—king, parliament and commoner—strove to ensure that every bitterness be laid aside, and that only happiness reign.

Weyland was greatly amused. At night he sat with Jane in the kitchen of their house in Idol Lane, smiling cynically at the duplicity of the English. “One day they strike the head from their king, claiming he is a traitor to his country, the next they dance drunkenly about beribboned poles, thinking themselves lucky to submit themselves once more to royal despotism.”

Jane, her head bowed over the skirt she was trying to patch, said nothing at all. It had been a poor day. Her legs and lower back had ached particularly badly through the afternoon, her disease now grinding its inexorable way through to the very marrow of her bones. The sores on her face, as similar ones on her hands and the soles of her feet, wept continuously with an evil, foul-smelling effluent. She no longer walked, she hobbled. Almost everyone Jane knew, save for Elizabeth and Frances, regarded her with a mix of contempt, pity and bleak hatred.

“Do you not find this mass hysteria at the coming of the king most amusing?” Weyland said. He sat across the table from Jane, the light from the single lamp casting shadows about his face.

“I have forgot what amusement is,” Jane said. She wished he would let her be, and retire to his upstairs lair.

Weyland’s eyes narrowed. “Your life is truly pitiful, isn’t it?”

Jane suddenly bundled up the skirt and slammed it down on the table. “Why keep me alive?” she said. “Why keep me in this pain and humiliation? Why—”

“Why not?” he replied softly, and Jane put a shaking hand to her face as tears sprang into her eyes. This was the worst of all, that he could so humiliate her with a few soft words.

“Have you not had your satisfaction yet?” she said.

“No,” he said. “Besides, you know I still need you. You need to teach Noah…and once you have done that then I will set you free, broken and hollow, stripped of everything you hold dear. Perhaps I might even give you a few pennies so you can buy a bowl of broth to warm you on your journey.”

“You will never set me free. You will kill me as soon as I have done my task.”

Weyland said nothing, merely kept his unblinking eyes on her, a small smile playing about his mouth.

“I won’t teach Noah!”

He gave a slight shrug of his shoulders.

“I—”

She never managed to reach the second word. Suddenly agony swept through her, and Jane doubled up, half sinking, half falling, from her chair to the floor.

“If I want,” she heard Weyland say in a soft, hateful voice, “I can keep you in this limbo of torment for years. Eventually you will have had enough, and you will do as I say.”

Jane, doubled over on the floor, could do nothing but try to stifle her cries, and beat her fist uselessly over and over on the flagstones.

Weyland watched her for a few minutes, then he looked up, and his eyes lost their focus, as if he were seeing something other than the kitchen of Idol Lane.

“Noah,” he whispered. “Wake up, Noah. Idol Lane awaits.”

Why wait for the king’s elegant slippered foot to touch England’s shores? Why not act now, and forestall any plan Charles might have to save Noah?

Noah still slept in the large bed, sandwiched between Marguerite and Kate. They had the room to themselves now, as Catling had for several months since slept with the other children.

Noah had slept well, for she and Kate had spent much of the day ferrying bread and cheese and ale to the men scything the meadows. They’d had hardly a chance to rest for almost the entire day, and so, once they’d come home and eaten the supper Marguerite had provided, they’d been glad enough to fall into bed and to sleep.

In the early hours of the morning, Noah began to toss in her sleep.

She’d fallen from rest into dream.

She dreamed she walked down the strangely empty high street of Woburn village. She stopped, uneasy.

There came a sound from behind her, and to her left.

Noah turned about, then started, for there in the half-shadow of a doorway stood Weyland Orr.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered, “but I do need to impress upon you my authority.”

Marguerite woke the instant Noah screamed. She half jerked, half rolled to the edge of the bed, at first disorientated by the terrible sound that issued forth from Noah’s mouth. Kate likewise had woken instantaneously, and now was twisted into a half-crouched position at the very head of the bed, staring at Noah.

Noah was tossing violently from side to side, her back arched, her head dug deep into the pillow, her hands clenched into white-knuckled fists at her sides.

Marguerite, fighting down her terror, inched her way across the bed towards Noah, laying a hesitant hand on her shoulder.

Noah screamed again, lurched upright, then bent forwards, her arms crossed about her belly.