Darkwitch Rising by Sara Douglass

He leaned forward, and kissed me once more—my cheek this time, as I had my face averted.

“Do you remember,” he whispered, his mouth brushing my flesh with every word, “when we met in dream on that strange hill top?”

I wished I had the strength to deny it. “Yes,” I said.

He had moved, and was now sitting on a chair next to mine, and his hands, so gently, had turned my face to his.

“When you said to me, ‘Weyland, Weyland, what are we doing? How can we stop?’ Remember? I do. Those words have not once left my mind since you uttered them.”

He kissed me yet once more. On the mouth again, very gently.

“Noah, what did you mean with those words?”

I began to cry, as I had on the hill top, and Weyland began to kiss away the tears. He moved closer still, and all I could think of was his presence and his nearness, and I was horrified that I did not find them fearful, nor unwelcome.

What did I mean?

“What did you mean, Noah?” he whispered. Another kiss, just behind my left ear this time.

“I—”

There was the sound of the door opening, and then came Elizabeth’s and Frances’ low voices, and Weyland muttered a soft curse, and sat back from me.

Whitehall Palace, London

“You’re not Brutus,” she said. “You’re not Brutus.”

There was a slightly hysterical ring to her voice, and Jane had to forcibly shut her mouth lest she babble those words over and over.

Charles sank down on his haunches before Jane, his eyes watchful. Louis, Marguerite, Catharine and Kate moved close about him, their eyes similarly on Jane; Louis had his sword drawn.

Jane found it difficult to breathe. Any moment she knew she would feel the blade of that sword through her neck.

Wielded by Brutus. Gods, somehow Coel and Brutus had swapped identities! The “why” of it Jane could understand—this way Brutus had free rein to do whatever he needed while Weyland, the fool, watched Coel-reborn like a hawk. But how? How?

“You are Coel-reborn,” she said to Charles, using every ounce of courage she possessed to utter those words. “You are not Brutus.” You are the Lord of the Faerie.

Aye, he responded, but of that we will not speak for the moment.

“Aye,” Charles said aloud. He was studying her face, noting its new abrasions, the broken nose, the closed eye, and he frowned at them.

“Jane,” he said, “is Weyland still ignorant of this deception? Does he think me Brutus-reborn?”

She nodded, the movement jerky and slightly uncoordinated.

Louis moved in closer, so close that Jane could smell the steel of the sword. He made a sudden movement, which made Jane flinch, then squatted down so he could look her in the face.

“I won’t tell him,” she said, garbling the words in her fear. “I won’t!”

“You want us to believe you?” said Catharine. “You? Lady Snake?”

“Don’t trust her,” said Marguerite. “She was always the lying bitch.”

Jane averted her eyes again, and she hugged her arms about herself, crouching a little lower to the floor. “I will not tell him,” she whispered. “Please, believe me.”

“You have spent hundreds of years teaching us not to believe you,” said Louis, his eyes burning into her huddled form. “You would be better dead for all you have done to Coel, and to Cornelia-reborn. Dead, we can surely trust you. Alive? I am not so sure.”

He shifted a little, only to readjust his balance, but Jane cringed at his movement.

Charles stood. “I want to speak with her alone,” he said. “If you could leave us, please.”

“Charles,” Louis said, rising also. “I should be here. I—”

“Leave us, Louis!” Charles said. Then he added, softer, “She is terrified, Louis. I will do better on my own than with this circle of vehemence about her. Sisters, please, leave us. I can accomplish what we need.”

Louis looked at Catharine, Marguerite and Kate, and nodded. He glanced once more at Jane, then shepherded the women towards the door. Charles paced slowly about the chamber until the door closed, then walked back to where Jane knelt, and extended his hand to her.

Very slowly, tremulously, Jane took it, and rose.

Almost immediately she sank into a curtsey again.

“I do not,” she said, looking up to him, “honour you as King of England, for which I care very little, but as—”

“I know,” he said. “Jane, do not speak of the Faerie here. Not now. When next you go to Tower Fields, then we shall speak when you meet me by the scaffold. But not here.”

“Yes, my lord.”

Charles burst into laughter. “’My lord?’ Oh, that I should hear that from your lips! Hark, is that the sound of Genvissa and Swanne turning over in their cold, cold graves?”

Jane smiled apprehensively. He was teasing her again, as he had when they’d met in dream.

“In the realm of the mortal, you may call me Charles when we are alone, and any variety of honorifics of your choosing when we are in public. But when I come to you in the Realm of the Faerie…then…” he paused, his brow creased as he thought. “Well, when we are alone there you may call me Coel.”

Again that apprehensive smile, and a little nod.

“Good.” He still held her hand, and now he raised her to her feet, and he pulled her close. His fingers touched her cheek.

“When did he do this?”

“Last night. He was not well pleased that my face had healed. He wanted me ugly for you.”

“Ah, gods, Jane, I am sorry. I had not thought he would punish you for that.”

“You have not lived with him these thirty and more years.”

Charles reached out a hand, and she flinched.

“I will not hurt you,” he said, and very gently ran his hands over her swollen cheekbone and then her nose.

“Oh, gods…” she said, the breath shuddering in her throat. “Don’t.”

He withdrew his hand and let her go, standing back a pace. “You are sure that Weyland thinks I am Brutus?”

She nodded. “I don’t understand. You feel like him. You have the aura of the kingship bands about you, and only Brutus has that. How can this be? Dear gods, Charles, you had me fooled as much as you have Weyland.”

“It was a simple deception, but a much needed one,” Charles said. “Louis and I were conceived at the same moment, born the same day. Our souls are thus easily confused, especially when we are together.”

“But the aura of the bands.”

“In our last life, when I had died at Hastings—”

Jane winced. She had caused his death.

“—Caela stopped me on my journey into the afterlife. She gave me two of the bands to take with me to the Otherworld. They and I are close, now. I cannot use them, or wield their power, but their aura clings to me. That has made the deception possible.”

Jane wondered again how Charles could allow her to live having told her so much.

“I am not going to kill you, Jane.”

She started to cry. “Why not? Why not? I have killed you twice over, and you have taken my life but once. You are owed a death.”

“I am sick of death,” he said, very gently, “and I think you have suffered enough in this life to settle whatever lies untallied between us. I meant what I said in Tower Fields. There is no score to settle. Jane, I do not hate you.”

“You should.”

He studied her a moment before continuing. “Jane, you may owe me nothing, but you do owe the land.”

Of course, Jane thought. I knew there would be revenge somewhere.

“You tried to murder both Mag and Og, and all but succeeded. For that I’m afraid you shall have to do reparation. Not death, but some degree of penance. The land itself demands it. It is why the Faerie sent me to you in the field. The magpie came and demanded it.”

Her face twisted, and she looked away.

“Bitterness does not become you,” Charles said.

“It comforts me,” she said, very low.

“Well,” Charles said, “of how the Faerie might judge you we will not speak within these man-made walls.”

It will be a windswept moor, Jane thought, or a forest. There I shall be judged. She trembled, thinking of how harsh that judgement was likely to be.

The silence grew longer, and Jane grew more uncomfortable. Then, suddenly, she remembered why she was here.

“Oh gods, Charles, Weyland has sent me here with messages for you, and I have forgot them completely!”

“Then relay your messages, Jane.”

“He has sent you three messages. One, Weyland offers you his hearty congratulations on gaining the throne. He thinks you must be very pleased.”

Charles quirked an eyebrow, but said nothing.