Darkwitch Rising by Sara Douglass

The forest vanished about them.

“Tell me,” said Ariadne as they stood in the centre of Tower Green, just to the west of the White Tower. “Where do you think the labyrinth lives when it does not loom dark and malevolent before us?”

Noah frowned. She looked away, as if staring at the distant chapel, but Ariadne knew she did not see stone and mortar, but the spaces deep within her own psyche.

“It lives all around us,” Noah eventually said.

“How do you know that?” Come on, girl. Tell me the ultimate secret!

“The labyrinth is life,” Noah said. “The labyrinth is creation.”

Ariadne’s eyes filled with tears. It had taken her weeks to fathom that secret, weeks of training and meditation and damned, terrifying ordeals.

And here Noah had won it from the thin air, without even stepping inside the Great Founding Labyrinth.

She had been born to this.

Ariadne again hooked her arm through Noah’s, turning her to walk once more across the green towards the chapel.

“The labyrinth is creation, yes,” she said. The women’s hips rubbed now and again as they walked, and Ariadne revelled in it, the touching and the closeness. Oh, to have bred such a daughter-heir! “The labyrinth is the result of the marriage of the stars and the globe, this earth, and of life itself. The labyrinth is reflected in the twistings of our brains and bowels, in the secret passages of our veins, the flow of our blood through our bodies. It mirrors the dance of the stars through the heavens, and the twistings of our own earth through the strange night skies.”

“And the Mistress of the Labyrinth?” Noah said. “How does she manipulate this? How does she gain ascendency over this power? How does she use it?”

“Dancing the labyrinth recreates the harmonies of life, Noah. The harmonies of the movement of the stars, the earth on which we live, the recurring patterns of the seasons and the tides, the twistings of rivers and streams and of the breath through all living things—all of these harmonies thrum through every living being. The ultimate Mistress of the Labyrinth dances the labyrinth, and in so doing, controls all these separate yet entwined harmonies. In controlling them, she manipulates them.”

Ariadne stopped in the shadow of the chapel and eyed Noah carefully. “The greatest Mistress of all, my dear, controls the power of the earth and the stars, of the sun and the moon, of the seasons and tides and the breath and purpose of every living thing. Do you think yourself capable of that?”

Noah responded with her own question. “And you, Ariadne? How much of this did you control?”

“A fraction, Noah, but enough to effect the Catastrophe.”

“And Genvissa?”

“A fraction of what I managed.”

Noah took a deep breath, and Ariadne knew that she was thinking through the possibilities…and the responsibilities.

“Am I capable, Ariadne?” she said.

“You are born of both myself, the greatest Mistress of the Labyrinth hitherto, and of the creature who lived at the dark heart of the labyrinth. You are, separately, also the goddess of the waters whose very beating heart dictates the cycles of the seasons. I do not think that coincidence. Of all women who have aspired to be the highest among the Mistresses of the Labyrinth, you have the greatest potential. Whether or not you attain that potential is up to your own courage and determination.”

“What does my training consist of, Ariadne?”

“Of learning the dance. Of learning to manipulate the power of the labyrinth, of creation, without allowing it to rope out of control, or to manipulate or control you.”

“And the Game? What part does this play in the power of the labyrinth?”

“The Game is the single way the ancients found to use the power. The original Mistresses and Kingmen learned to use the power of the labyrinth to create the protective enchantment you know as the Game. In your case, the Troy Game.”

“Is the Game only capable of protection and safeguarding?” Noah said.

“No. The Game is as capable of great evil as it is of great good. The Troy Game, which Genvissa and Brutus left unfinished, has roped out of control. It is all of that power I have spoken of, and it is out of control.”

“Gods,” Noah whispered.

“Yes,” Ariadne said, “gods, indeed. There is very little else now that can stop it.”

“We’re back at The Naked!” Jane said.

Indeed they were. Jane looked about as she stood at the Lord of the Faerie’s side, astounded at the stunning view of rolling, wooded hills. When she’d been here previously, when Louis had been told of his destiny, she’d not thought to look about at the landscape.

A movement caught her eye, and she looked down.

All the creatures which had surrounded her within the forest were walking slowly up the sides of the hill. A host of faerie creatures that Jane had only ever glimpsed as Genvissa, and then only at the height of some of the most powerful rites that she and Gormagog had conducted.

This was stunning—and terrifying—for every one of the faerie creatures had flat, hateful eyes, and every one of them was trained on Jane.

She took an automatic step backwards.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” the Lord of the Faerie said, his hands catching at her shoulders and holding her still. “Are you so very, very sure that you want to face their judgement in return for your freedom?”

Jane was not sure at all, but she couldn’t back down now. Not in front of Coel and what he had become.

“I am sure,” she said, sure only that her “freedom” actually meant “death”.

“Then stand on your own,” he snapped, letting go her shoulders, and taking a step back from her.

Summoning all of her courage, Jane stood as upright as she could, straightening her back and shoulders in a flash of her old arrogance.

The next ten minutes, as the bleak-eyed creatures slowly ascended the hill, were the slowest in her life. The faerie folk drew close, their first rank standing only two paces away from Jane, almost completely encircling her save for a passage they left clear through to where the Lord of the Faerie had sat on his throne on the eastern edge of the summit.

“My faerie folk,” the Lord of the Faerie said once they had all come to a halt, “here stands before you a woman you know well. She has been a MagaLlan, a Darkwitch, a wife, a whore, and through all her lives she has sought to do the Faerie as much damage and death as possible. Yet here she stands, willing to pay recompense to you so that she might live in freedom. What say you? Will you accept her recompense?”

“Aye!” shouted the great throng, and Jane winced, not so much at the sound, but at the hatred she felt washing over her. Gods, why had she agreed to this?

“And your price?” said the Lord of the Faerie, his low voice carrying clearly across the entire summit. “The price you demand of this Darkwitch whore?”

A water sprite stepped forth. “I speak for all,” he said, staring at Jane.

“Yes?” said the Lord of the Faerie. “Name the price.”

The water sprite held his flat, hateful stare at Jane for a long moment, then suddenly, he grinned, and held out one of his spindly arms.

A magpie fluttered down from the sky, coming to roost on the water sprite’s arm.

“We want you to learn to carol,” the magpie said. “We yearn to hear once more the Ancient Carol of the dawn and the dusk.”

“That shall be enough for the day,” said Ariadne. “You have done far better than I’d dreamed.”

Noah blinked, looking about. Somehow most of the day had passed, and now late afternoon shadows stretched across Tower Green.

“You need to go back to your house in Idol Lane,” said Ariadne, “and think about what you’re doing.”

“What do you mean, ‘What I am doing’?”

Ariadne lifted her hand once more to Noah’s chest. “I can feel it within you,” she said, her voice soft, her eyes hard. “Asterion’s seed. You lay with him, Noah. Why did you do that?”

“The same reason you did,” Noah replied, flatly enough that Ariadne knew she was lying. “Because he felt good to me.”

“He is a good lover, is he not?”

“Aye, he is a good lover.”

“He was desperate when first I had him,” said Ariadne. “I was his first. I imagine, however, that he’s gained some experience since then.”

“In coupling, yes,” said Noah, “but not in love. Of that he has never had experience.”

Ariadne hissed. “Be wary where you tread, girl! Couple with him if you must, for whatever reason you wish. But, gods, girl, do not speak of love in connection with the Minotaur!”