A Witch Alone (The Winter Witch Trilogy #3) (2 page)

‘What makes you think you’ll do any better than your dad and your grandmother and all the other people who tried to track her down? If she’s out there, she doesn’t want to be found, that’s pretty clear.’

‘I’ve got more information than either of them. They each had only half the picture. I know much more – for example, I know that she returned to the Ealdwitan headquarters, after she was supposed to have gone missing.’

‘Are you sure?’ Abe’s voice showed his scepticism. ‘She was running from them like her life depended on it, from all you’ve told me. Why the hell would she go back to their HQ?’

‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘But a passer-by saw her jump from St Saviour’s Dock a few days after she disappeared. They thought suicide, of course, and dredged the river, but no body was found. But I looked at a map and I realized—’

‘That St Saviour’s is where the Neckinger enters the Thames,’ Abe finished. ‘One of the entrances to their headquarters.’ His fingers tapped the steering wheel with restless energy. ‘But that still doesn’t answer why.’

‘I know. That’s why I have to go there again. They must have some kind of records – some kind of witch equivalent of CCTV. I’ve got to get access to their files. Find out what she did.’

‘You’re nuts,’ Abe said shortly. ‘Anna, for God’s sake don’t do anything stupid. Nearly getting yourself killed by them once was enough. If you get caught going through their papers …’

‘I won’t,’ I said. ‘But I’ve got Elizabeth on my side now, don’t forget. If it comes to the crunch, I’m pretty sure she’ll protect me.’

‘You reckon blood’s thicker than water?’ He turned to look at me, his eyes dark and unreadable. Then he turned back to the road, the dim light illuminating his grim, uncompromising profile, the hard set of his mouth. ‘I wouldn’t rely on it, Anna. Not as far as the Ealdwitan are concerned, anyway.’

‘Did I hear a car?’ Dad came out of the kitchen as I slammed the front door behind me.

‘Yes, Abe dropped me,’ I said.

‘Hmm.’ Dad withdrew without further remark. I knew what he was thinking. Abe wasn’t exactly the boy next door. He smoked, drank, and swore, and tried only half-heartedly to hide those facts when he was around my dad. He was also – well, I wasn’t quite sure how old. It wasn’t really surprising that Dad wasn’t keen. But at the same time, Abe had played a big part in keeping me sane after … after Seth left.

Even thinking his name still caused a tearing sensation inside me, as if small unhealed stitches were ripping open. It was hard to believe it was – what? Eight, ten weeks since he’d left? Two months. It felt like forever, and yesterday, both at the same time.

Dad had made my favourite food and refrained from telling me to woman up and get over myself because he’d been through the same thing, only twice as bad, when my mum left. Instead he’d just comforted, and cooked, and let me take my own time getting over it. And Em had jollied, and joked, and propelled me round school with sufficient force to stop my grades completely collapsing. Between them, they’d got me through. But Abe – Abe had made me angry. He’d made me laugh. He’d made me
feel
again. And Dad knew that.

A delicious smell was coming from the kitchen and, when I pushed open the door, the air was heavy with the scent of something rich and mouthwatering. Dad was bent over the stove, stirring, and the smell of butter and spices rose up to greet me.

‘Wow, what’s in there?’

‘Moong daal. Thought you’d be pleased.’

I was. It was one of the few things that I still really, really missed about London. Winter had a Chinese takeaway but no Indian, and there were times when I yearned for our old curry house in Notting Hill.

‘That’s nice. What are we celebrating?’

‘Oh, nothing much. Friday, the weekend, end of school. What are you up to tomorrow? Would you like to come into Brighthaven with me? I’m driving over to pick up some things for El—’ He stumbled and finished, ‘A friend. Would you like to come?’

I sighed.

‘It’s all right, Dad. You can say her name, you know.’ There was enough in Winter to remind me of Seth, and it wasn’t like Dad tiptoeing around Elaine’s name made it any less obvious. Besides, I liked Elaine. I knew she worried about Seth as much as I did. I liked to hear Dad talk about her.

‘OK. Sorry. Anyway, do you want to come? You were saying you needed some new jeans.’

‘I do. But I can’t. I’ve arranged to see Elizabeth this weekend – I’m staying the night, remember?’

‘Oh.’ Dad’s expression turned closed, reserved. He looked down at the bubbling pan. I knew it had been hard for him to forget past wrongs and accept my grandmother in my life. There was a lot to forget; she’d cut her daughter off when Isla fell in love with my outwith father. ‘Now you mention it you did say, but I forgot to write it on the calendar.’

‘I’m sorry, only …’ I trailed off and Dad gave a slightly forced smile.

‘Don’t apologize! It’s nice that you’re spending time with Elizabeth. I still feel guilty that you lost out on eighteen years of each other because of—’

‘Dad …’ I put my hand on his. ‘Please, don’t. It wasn’t your fault. I understand, truly.’ Dad had been bound, barely able to speak my mother’s name, until the charm wore off when I turned eighteen. I knew that now. What I still didn’t know was why.

After supper I helped Dad clear and wash up, while he chatted about his plans for the weekend. I couldn’t concentrate though; the lowing moan of the foghorn kept breaking in on my thoughts.

Abe was right. There was something unnatural about this fog, the way it groped its way through the trees and huddled up against the house. I glanced at the thick white blanket pressed up against the kitchen window and shivered, thinking of the sailors out in it, thinking of …

No. I pushed that away, dried my hands, then filled a glass of water.

‘Dad, do you mind if I go up? I’m shattered and I need to pack.’

It was true. My practice with Abe had taken it out of me, and my grandmother would probably want me to do more tomorrow, although her approach was almost the polar opposite of Abe’s – all rote learning and books and memorizing. She’d taught me how to scry, how to divine, the difference between a charm and an incantation. She’d made me learn every one of the Given Runes. She’d rehearsed me in the Bright Invocations and the Dark Invocations, the spells to protect and safeguard, and the spells to blast and break and maim.

She believed that the best magic came from books and learning. That you could swot your way out of trouble. Whereas Abe felt that magic came from inside, that instinct was better than memory, that if you couldn’t come up with the spell yourself, you shouldn’t rely on it in a tight place.

They both agreed on one thing, though: I had eighteen years of neglect to make up for. I had power, but power alone couldn’t make you powerful. For that you needed control and confidence, and I lacked both, a problem which had almost proved fatal a few months ago. Both Abe and my grandmother were determined that if another crisis evolved, this time at least, I’d be able to look after myself.

Dad was looking at me with concern.

‘You do look tired, sweetie. Have an early night. Want a lift to the train station tomorrow?’

‘Sure? I’m going early,’ I warned him. ‘I told Elizabeth I’d be up in London mid-morning, so I’ll have to be at the station by eight-ish at the latest.’

‘That’s fine. I’d rather get to Brighthaven before the parking fills up anyway. I’ll drop you off and then carry on to …’ He faltered, but then carried on bravely, ‘To the Anchor to pick up Elaine.’

‘Oh, you’re going with her?’ I was surprised.

‘Well I thought I might, since you can’t come. It’ll be more companionable with someone else and if I go early she can be back before the pub opens for lunch.’

‘Good.’ I tried to smile. ‘Great idea. Give my love to Elaine. Ask her …’ I stopped. But Dad knew what I’d been going to say.

‘Yes, I’ll ask her for any news.’ He kissed my forehead. ‘Goodnight, sweetie. Sleep well.’

The concern in his face stayed with me as I climbed the creaking stairs and pushed open the heavy oak door to my bedroom.

He worried about me. Worried about what I did all night, holed up in my room. He would’ve worried even more if he’d known the truth.

The bedsprings squeaked as I sat, but I didn’t get undressed, not yet. Instead I spread my hands on my knees and looked at my seaglass ring, smoky amethyst in the light from my lamp. The foghorn boomed again and, suddenly, pulled by a temptation too strong to resist, I wrenched off the ring and picked up the polished wooden bowl that sat on my bedside table.

For a long minute I just sat on the bed, holding the bowl in my lap and the ring in the palm of my left hand, my breath coming fast. Then, with a quick movement, I emptied my glass of water into the bowl, dropped in the ring, and put my face down inside, so close to the surface of the water that my reflection became broken and meaningless, a collection of choppy refracted lights, too close to focus into a single image.

As I gazed the waters seemed to shimmer and move, rippling with the grain of the wood, with the trembling of my hands, with each breath I exhaled. Small waves sprang up, lapping at each other, chasing a fleck of light across the bowl. Then, gradually, clouds began to gather, the waters darkened, and the fleck of light dwindled and resolved into a tiny boat racing across the sea, trying desperately to keep ahead of the huge waves that threatened to overwhelm it. Nearly all the sails had been stripped away, until the boat was scudding under almost bare poles. I could see a figure at the tiller, lashed by rain and wind, struggling to keep the prow pointing into the oncoming waves.

And I could do nothing. Nothing but watch the silent struggle, the figure alone in the dark, in the middle of this vast hostile waste of ocean.

I watched, until I could bear it no longer. Then I sat upright, ripping myself bodily out of that storm-racked, lonely world.

My neck was so stiff I could hardly straighten it. I rubbed slowly at the cramped muscles while my eyes got used to the light of the lamp, so warm and soft after the harsh blackness of the storm.

I fished the ring out of the bottom of the bowl and poured the water on to my African violet, feeling a mixture of fear and disgust. Fear for Seth, and disgust with myself, for spying on him like this.

I’d watched him obsessively at first. It was part of what had worried Dad so much after Seth left; my habit of keeping to my room, with a charm-locked door. But I wasn’t moping or crying or tearing Seth’s pictures out of my photo album. I was scrying. Fruitlessly at first and then, after I used the seaglass ring to focus my attention, with better and better accuracy. I never knew
where
Seth was exactly – what coast he was sailing past, what quay he was moored at – but I could always find his face. And it became an obsession: watching him sail, and eat, and sleep, and cry. And, one horrible night, bring a woman back to his boat. She was beautiful, with hair like polished mahogany, and as she walked down the steps to the cabin I saw the tail of her sarong as it fell to the ground. And then I saw Seth, as he turned to follow.

I threw the bowl out of the window that night and vowed never to spy again. I felt degraded by what I’d done, and by what Seth had done, even though he owed me nothing. Not now. Not any more.

Tonight, though, with the fog so low – I wasn’t spying, only wanting to make sure he was OK. Wasn’t that different?

Maybe. But I still wished I hadn’t. What would Seth think of me using my power like a peeping Tom? And what good did it do? I couldn’t help him. I couldn’t change a thing. I could only watch as he battled his demons alone – and I battled mine.

K
iller Fog Claims Three!
screeched the billboard, as I came up the steps from the tube, my nostrils still filled with the warm, sooty air.
South Gripped by Death Mist
the banner headline read and, underneath,
Three dead in freak fog
. Their faces stared up at me from a discarded newspaper; an elderly Essex man who’d tumbled down some steps in the mist and a young couple whose car had ploughed into the central reservation of a lonely motorway. No news about ships. But a year of living in Winter had taught me that sailors’ deaths weren’t usually reported, unless they were well-to-do day-trippers. Real sailors – professional fishermen and skippers – no one was interested in the risks they took.

The last of the mist still curled thick and strange about the streets as I walked quickly through Pimlico. Perhaps it was the fog, but London looked somehow unfamiliar. It was hard to believe that I’d walked these busy streets every day, that the stink of car exhaust and the warm gush of air from the tube vents had been more familiar than the smell of the sea and of oyster pots drying on the quay.

I felt a fierce stab of longing to be back in Winter – but I pushed the thought down and turned on to Vauxhall Bridge Road, trying to ignore the growing sense of foreboding about what was to come.

I hadn’t been back since my first disastrous visit – first and last. My grandmother had come to Winter and I’d visited her house, but every time she’d asked me to come to the Ealdwitan headquarters, I’d refused. I’d made my peace with my grandmother, but I’d never be able to forget the Ealdwitan’s actions last year, not with Bill’s memorial stone still clean and white in the Winter churchyard.

But the fact was, if I wanted to find out the truth about my mother and myself, I had to go back there. When I’d first suggested it to my grandmother, it hadn’t seemed like such a big deal. But now …

I stood on the parapet of Vauxhall Bridge looking at the silky swirl of the grey waters beneath and my stomach did a little flip.

‘Come on you bloody coward,’ I whispered to myself, steeling myself for the leap. Buses thundered up and down the road and there was a ferry passing beneath, so I murmured a few words and then looked down at my feet to check the invisibility charm had worked.

‘Houston, we are go,’ I muttered. And then I jumped.

The smell hit me first, like the memory of a nightmare. As I opened the door, the rich air flooded into the small anteroom, laden with the scent and feel and taste of magic, like a thousand spices crushed underfoot. I flinched.