Darkwitch Rising (56 page)

The Lord of the Faerie opened his mouth to answer, but in fact it was Elizabeth who spoke, her voice full of wonder. “You are the Green Man,” she said. “The Lord of the Forests.”

The Lord of the Faerie smiled, pleased. For centuries the simple folk had worshipped the Lord of the Faerie as the Green Man, honouring him every May Day with dancing and song and branches gathered from the woods. “Aye,” he said. “That is one of my names, although my realm stretches far further than just the forests.”

Elizabeth smiled, the expression making her beautiful. She sank once more into a deep curtsey. “My great lord, I am your servant!”

“And I!” cried Frances, aping Elizabeth’s curtsey.

“What may I do to please you?” asked Elizabeth, looking up at the Lord of the Faerie with shining eyes.

“Only that you do as I ask,” the Lord of the Faerie said. “Now, tell me, do you know who Eaving’s Sisters are?”

The girls glanced at each other, then shook their heads.

The Lord of the Faerie smiled. “Then I have some introductions to make. Come. You are about to be inducted into a sisterhood far greater than the one you have known hitherto.”

I
was numbed by all that had happened. The terrible agony when Weyland had set the imp to tearing his way free. Weyland’s subsequent healing of me. The story of his daughter.

Our shared vision atop the hill, where we both said too much.

Weyland’s two terrifying references to shelter.

Set against the uncertainty and terror of Weyland was the wonder of the Faerie Court, and the moment when Louis,
knowing
, finally had held me in his arms—and I had somehow, for some reason, held back from him.

In my current state I didn’t feel like exploring why I might have done that.

Then, so quickly following on that, Ariadne, telling me I was of her and Asterion’s blood. That I was a Darkwitch. That I was something that Louis and Charles both would naturally revile.

Then, Catling. My daughter, the lie. The Troy Game, making sure I did what it wanted. Nothing counted but what
it
wanted.

Yet more—Weyland, talking to me of a terrible price. I had told him that Jane was to teach me the ways of the labyrinth (I could hardly tell him about Ariadne, could I?) merely to distract him from questioning me too closely about Catling. Then he had wanted the bands. I had hedged (
for all the gods’ sakes, I had wanted some space to think! Some time—was that too much to ask
?), and then he had sprung, trapping me.

My entire world was utterly devastated. There was not a single element left that I could understand, or which existed to save me.

Amid all this chaos, where I drifted so vulnerable and fragile, stepped a saviour. Someone who offered
me
shelter, and time, and all the space I could ever need.

At a terrible price.

“
S
ee,” said the Lord of the Faerie softly. He had his hand on Louis’ shoulder, and could feel the man trembling.

They stood atop Parliament Hill near Highgate. Once called the Llandin, it was the senior among the sacred hills of the ancient land.

It was late at night. London stretched in the distance, a sparkling of tiny lights by the moonlit gleam of the River Thames. To the east and west tiny hamlets likewise twinkled as people lit candles and lamps for the night.

None of this did the Lord of the Faerie and Louis de Silva see. Instead, there stretched before them the ancient faerie landscape. Forests crept down from the north and the east. Tiny laneways and roads winding, barely visible in the moonlight. The sweep of the river, far vaster in its ancient form than it was in seventeenth-century England.

The river also twinkled. Deep within its depths water sprites cast their eyes upwards, catching the moonlight and refracting it back to the two men atop the Llandin. As the sprites’ eyes caught the moonlight, so also did the tens of thousands of bronzed axes lying on the riverbed. They had been cast there over hundreds of years in order to honour the great goddess of the waters so that both land and women would burgeon with new life.

The river was
alive
with light.

Strange primeval beasts nosed among the river meadows, occasionally raising their snouts and sniffing the air, knowing that magic was afoot this night and nervous with anticipation.

Shadows were everywhere, haunting not only field and forest but also the few tiny human encampments dotting the meadows.

“When is this?” Louis asked softly. He remembered the time Genvissa brought him to this hill and showed him the land, and what he saw now was different even to that. Far, far older.

“Many millennia ago,” the Lord of the Faerie said.

“Is this when you first walked?”

The Lord of the Faerie turned his strange-lit eyes to de Silva. “There has never been a first time in my walking,” he said. “I have always been. If there has been land, then there was also me. I have taken many forms, not just this man shape. I have imitated the shape of the great toothed birds that once nested in the cliffs of a far more primordial time. I have taken the form of the tiniest of moles and vetches. Now this man form appeals to me, for it mirrors the shape of those who play the Troy Game.”

Louis shivered. “You do not play the Game, do you?”

“No. I am one of the very few who has not been caught within its twists and turns.”

“And thus you can see what others cannot?”

The Lord of the Faerie’s teeth gleamed. “Do not ask me what I can see,” said the Lord of the Faerie, “for it shall do you no good.”

Louis studied the face of the Lord of the Faerie. He could see Coel in there, but only just, and he wondered if Coel would ever survive in—

“What if Coel was always me?” said the Lord of the Faerie. “I rarely walk, only when needed. But I
always
live
. Somewhere. In someone. Besides, would you begrudge Coel a death in me?”

The Lord of the Faerie paused, then laughed softly at the expression on Louis’ face.

“You would,” the Lord of the Faerie said. “That surprises me…and comforts me. Fear not, Louis-William-Brutus. Coel shall always laugh during the day. But on some nights…or on some desperate faerie concern…then I step forth in my true form. What better for a King of England, eh?”

“None better,” said Louis. “Lord of the Faerie, what happens tonight? What do I do?”

“You step forth on the Ringwalk, my friend.”

“What
is
this Ringwalk?”

“It is the path the Stag God takes over the land and through the souls of its inhabitants.” Once more the faerie lord extended his hand over the landscape. “See.”

The previously random scattering of lights over the landscape had resolved themselves into a pathway of twinkling lights. It stretched from the foot of the Llandin, from the Holy Oak, east and then northwards, leading deep into the forests.

“What happens when I set foot on the Ringwalk?” Louis said.

“That, my friend, is up to you,” and the Lord of the Faerie’s hand gave Louis a very gentle push towards the hill as it sloped down towards the Holy Oak.

Louis hesitated, then he turned his back and set off down the hill.

The Lord of the Faerie smiled, cold and feral. “Die well, my friend,” he whispered. “Die well…or die not at all.”

L
ater that night Weyland asked Jane once again to leave Noah and himself alone in the kitchen. Weyland had been fiddling about by the hearth, and as Jane left the room he moved back to the table where Noah sat, sitting opposite her.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“For what?” Noah said.

“For whatever happened with Catling. She has done something to hurt you,” he said.

“What care you if I hurt or not?” she said.

“I find I care very much, Noah.”

She stared at him. Slowly, his eyes not leaving hers, Weyland gently took one of her hands in his.

Noah tensed, but did not withdraw her hand.

“I am glad Jane will teach you the craft of the Mistress of the Labyrinth,” he said.

“You shall be able to use me splendidly, then.”

He gave a short laugh. “Learning the ways of the Mistress will make you more beautiful, more desirable. Any woman would be enhanced by learning the craft of the Mistress of the Labyrinth.
You
will be graced. I find I look forward to that very much.”

“I will never love you, Minotaur. Do not think to trick
me
into love!”

“Then I shall harbour no expectation of your love.” His mouth quirked again. “Although I still find myself confused by what you said atop the hill.”

“Then forget it, I pray you!”

Weyland let go her hand and looked about the kitchen, as if seeing it for the first time.

“This is a poor room,” he said finally. “A poor place to sleep.” He glanced at Noah, and saw panic light her eyes.

“I find it warm enough, and pleasant,” she said.

He grinned. “Nevertheless, I would prefer that you spend your nights with me from now on.”

“No.”

“I said I would ask a terrible price of you, Noah, for leaving the bands to lie undisturbed until you learn the art and craft of the labyrinth. This is it. Your choice. Spend your nights with me, or I will force you to fetch the kingship bands.”

She stared at him, clearly appalled.

“This price is not so terrible as you may fear, Noah. Let me deal plainly with you. Spend your nights with me—I am demanding no sexual favours or comforts from you—and I will agree that the bands can stay where they are until you have completed your training,
and
I will give you and Jane the complete freedom you need so you can learn from her teaching. See what a good humour I am in. I have even given you a bonus.”

“You think I should believe you?”

“I do not play with words. I will not force you to any sexual play that you do not want—that you do not
ask
for—but we will lie together side by side, and talk, and share sleep. For this you receive your freedom to do what you must, and you receive my word that I will not force you to take the bands until you have finished your training. It is a bargain, Noah.”

“
Why
?”

Because I want you
. “Because I want to know you better, and I want you to know me.”

Noah frowned, and Weyland could see her trying to fathom the trap.

“No trap,” he whispered.

“With you there is always a trap.”

“No trap.”
Not for her, maybe
.

She was silent, still thinking, then, with some obvious reluctance, she nodded. “Very well.”

“We must seal the bargain with a kiss.”

“You said no sexual play I did not ask for!”

“It is but the conclusion of a pact, Noah, and common enough. Come now, a kiss.”

He leaned across the table, and laid his mouth very gently against hers. He let it go at that, waiting, and was rewarded when she sighed, and moved her mouth more firmly under his.

He increased the depth of his kiss, but still kept it undemanding, and, very, very slowly, he felt her relax under his mouth.