Witchstruck (26 page)

Again, I hissed.

The unpleasant sound reverberated about the trees, sibilant, seeming to come from everywhere at once. A ridge of cloud shifted across the burning face of the sun, and suddenly the lane was strangely dark. The horse’s ears pricked forward, and its liquid eyes rolled uneasily.

Tom caught his mount’s mood and swore again, angry and impatient. He slid down from the animal’s back and stood there, staring first at Juan, then at the stranded cart blocking the road, and finally about himself in the shady lane. His hand wavered on the sword hilt, but he brought the weapon up and pointed it at Juan.

‘Move the cart,’ he instructed him clearly. ‘Or die.’

There was sweat on my forehead. I stepped out slightly from between the trees. I heard Malcolm’s exclamation as he
saw
me, but ignored him. It was too late now to worry about that. We had come here to get the stolen letter back, and that was all I could think about.

I lowered my head and raised my eyes, as I had seen my aunt do a hundred times before, standing within the protection of the circle to call on the spirits.

I spread my hands out, palms open, and fixed my gaze on Tom’s astonished face. ‘Throw away the sword,’ I told him in a clear voice. ‘You do not need it.’

‘I do not . . . need it?’

‘Throw the sword away, Tom. The weapon is burning your hand. Can you not feel the heat?’

Tom frowned, then stared down at the sword hilt in his hand. With a sudden gasp, he threw the weapon away from him. ‘It burns!’

The sound of approaching hoofbeats was a maddening distraction I could have done without. Tom heard them too and stiffened. He blinked and glanced back at Malcolm in confusion, then down at his sword glistening in the water as if unsure how it had got there.

Malcolm shook himself with an effort. He too had been caught by my spell. Awkwardly, he urged his horse into the flowing water.

‘Tom, it’s an ambush!’ he cried. ‘That’s Meg. She must be working with the Spanish now. We still have the letter, let’s get out of here!’

Tom’s face cleared as he realized what had happened. He turned and scrabbled for his horse, but it was too late. With a crash of undergrowth, the sun suddenly burning hot overhead again, Alejandro burst into the narrow lane opposite my hiding place, a stone’s throw from the cart on the side of the ford.

EIGHTEEN

Liberty

ALEJANDRO WHEELED HIS
sweating horse violently about to face the two other men. He would have looked like a devil in his black jacket if it had not been for the ornate silver cross swinging about his neck. Without taking his eyes from them, Alejandro drew his sword of Spanish steel.

‘So you are happy to die for England, thief?’ His voice was grim as he addressed Malcolm across the sunlit ford. ‘Draw your sword, and meet me. Your wish is about to come true.’

‘It will be a pleasure to spit you on my steel, Spaniard,’ Malcolm growled in return and drew his own weapon.

Tom had pulled himself up onto his horse again. The animal was still nervous, floundering in the shallow water as he tried to wrench its head round and head back the way they had come.

I hissed again, using all my power, and saw the horse roll its eyes wildly, then rear up, unseating Tom and casting him with a loud splash into the water.

Alejandro’s horse had whinnied uneasily at my hiss but he controlled it with a word and a squeeze of his knees. ‘
Dios!
’ he muttered, and shot me a look which made my cheeks flush with heat.

Was he angry that I had used my power? I shook that fear away. The consequences of using it no longer mattered. The letter was all that mattered, and while Malcolm held it, Elizabeth and the future of the whole country lay under threat.

‘Tom?’ Furious, his face red, Malcolm drove his horse deeper into the ford. He leaned down to help a sodden, gasping Tom back to his feet, then raised his head to glare across at Alejandro. ‘Bid your little pet be silent and keep her witch’s spells to herself. Unless you cannot fight without a woman’s help, Spaniard?’

Alejandro glanced at me on the leafy bank and I nodded my agreement, though reluctantly. I had done what I could. Now it was up to Alejandro to retrieve the letter from Malcolm. My cousin knew too much about my power; he had made himself proof against my influence. But he would not be proof against Alejandro’s swordplay.

The two horsemen met in the middle of the flowing water, each as keen as the other to prove himself. I had never seen Alejandro look so fierce, his dark eyes shining, his cloak thrown back to leave his fighting arm free.

The loud clash of their swords sent birds flying up from the hedgerows. Malcolm swayed under that first blow, perhaps not having expected to meet such strength in Alejandro’s arm. He parried the stroke well enough, but fell back slightly, swearing an oath under his breath as he was forced to give ground.

Alejandro followed him hard, pressing his advantage with a second blow, then a third. This time I saw Malcolm flinch under the violent clash of blades.

I felt sick with apprehension, not wishing to see either of them hurt. Yet if my cousin would not willingly hand over the letter we had come for . . .

The ground under the horses’ hooves was treacherous and shifted constantly, slippery from the water. Alejandro controlled his horse with a relentless hand, and the stallion responded, knowing its master well. Malcolm had more trouble on his borrowed horse, and cursed as his mount faltered and slipped. Dragging its head up, he only just turned away in time as Alejandro’s sword flashed down across his unprotected shoulder.

‘Yield!’ Alejandro insisted. ‘Yield, and return the stolen letter you keep there.’

‘Never!’ Malcolm gasped, and twisted to avoid the lunge of Alejandro’s sword. He was holding his ground, and bravely too, but I could see that my cousin was tiring more quickly than his more skilled opponent. Alejandro had been trained as a soldier in Spain, after all, and had been in the thick of a fight more than once. Malcolm had no such experience to draw on.

My skin prickled and my head swam, leaving me momentarily dizzy.

It was a warning. I looked down and saw Tom scrambling up the bank towards my hiding place, his clothes still
dripping
from the river, an unsheathed dagger in his hand. I could have called for Juan, who was watching the fight intently from atop the cart, but I did not wish to distract Alejandro. If he were to make a mistake now, look away even for a second . . .

Narrowing my eyes, I stared down at Tom and spoke softly. ‘There is nothing you can do to hurt me. You feel too weak. Too weak to go any further.’

Tom hesitated, his face uncertain. Then he shook his head. His mouth twisted in a snarl. ‘Keep quiet, witch! I know what you are trying to do. You think you can unman me with your foul spells.’ He continued climbing. ‘But I shall catch you, Meg Lytton, and make you wish you had never dabbled in the dark arts.’

I spread my hands wide, my fingers held long and strong, and asked the spirits of the trees about me for strength. I called on the damp earth, and on the power of the making. The fresh greenery and the birdsong, the blue sky and the babbling stream: all these filled me. My body began to vibrate, blocking out the clash of swords below us, the smell of human fear.

Tom straightened up, coming towards me. He licked his lips, and his eyes moved up and down my body. ‘I cannot pretend not to have wondered what it would be like to see you unclothed.’ His smile was cold, and I knew he was enjoying himself. ‘By the time I’m finished, you’ll be ready for the fire . . . just like your devil-worshipping aunt.’

He had looked at me in the same way that night in the Bull Inn, yet I had not then recognized Tom for what he was – a traitor to Elizabeth, and to his unhappy country. I had thought him quiet, when in truth he was scheming and two-faced.

Carefully, I pictured Tom in my mind’s eye, just as my aunt had taught me. I sketched his face against the inner darkness, his cruel eyes, his sneer, the grasping hands. Then I made this inner Tom suddenly grimace and step back, as though encountering some dreadful creature. I widened his cruel eyes and pulled his sneer wide until it was a gaping ‘O’, then imagined a buzzing that grew in intensity until I could feel it rumble through every bone in my body. Only then did I whisper the words beneath my breath, finishing with his name, ‘Tom Dorville.’

The spell was almost too late.

I smelled his reeking breath on my face, felt his hands on my shoulders, then abruptly Tom was staggering back, his face contorted, his hands flailing wildly about his head as though batting away a swarm of angry wasps.

Tom turned with a cry and ran, only to catch his foot in a briar and tumble down the bank. He landed headfirst in the shallow waters of the ford.

I heard Juan’s startled exclamation. Then he was halfway up the bank, grinning and holding out a friendly hand. ‘Come,
señorita
,’ he urged me in his thick Spanish accent. ‘Back to the cart.’

The other two were still hard at it. Both had dismounted and were fighting on foot, hand-to-hand, up to their knees in water. The horses stood together on the bank, wet-flanked and shivering. As Juan helped me up onto the cart seat, I saw Malcolm slip as he lunged. Alejandro’s answering lunge passed through my cousin’s feeble defence – a flash of silver in the shady lane – and suddenly Malcolm was standing still as stone, with the fierce point of Alejandro’s sword at his throat.

‘Yield,’ Alejandro repeated, and now his voice shook with exhaustion.

Malcolm’s eyes were desperate. ‘Better kill me,’ he said, ‘for I have failed England.’

‘That letter would have brought nothing but a traitor’s death for the Lady Elizabeth and more sorrow to a country already at war with itself.’ Alejandro gestured to Malcolm’s sword. ‘Throw it down.’

Malcolm obeyed and stood trembling in the water, his gaze narrowed on the one who had bested him.

‘Now give me the letter, and you may go free.’

My cousin hesitated, looking from Alejandro’s face to mine. ‘What will you do with it?’

‘I will take the letter back to the Lady Elizabeth so that she may satisfy herself it is no longer a threat to her life. Then I will personally ensure that it is destroyed.’ His eyes flashed angrily. The point of his sword pressed more deeply into Malcolm’s throat, so that a trickle of crimson blood ran
down
to stain his shirt. ‘Now hand over what you stole, Malcolm Lytton, or I will run you through and take it from your dying body.’

Malcolm flinched. ‘Here,’ he said hoarsely, and reached inside his cloak, producing a folded and bound document. ‘Take it, Spaniard.’

Alejandro took it, watching Malcolm’s face. ‘My thanks,’ he said drily.

‘What now?’ Malcolm demanded, a barely suppressed anger in his voice. He glanced at Tom, who had emerged from his second dunking in the stream and was nursing what appeared to be a broken arm. ‘Are we to die here like dogs, or will you be true to your word and let us go? Tom is hurt; I need to get him back to his house.’

Stepping backwards through the flowing current, his gaze held steadily on Malcolm’s face, Alejandro nodded. ‘You may go. But if I ever meet you again—’

‘Yes, yes, you will chop me up and feed me to swine. I get the idea.’ Malcolm shook his head in disgust, though I noticed he was quick enough to make a grab for their horses before Alejandro could change his mind. ‘You think you are invincible together, you and your little witch. But you will meet your match soon enough.’

I stiffened, and jumped down from the cart. ‘What do you mean?’ I called out to my cousin across the noise of the water.

Malcolm was leading Tom’s horse back towards him,
so
he could help Tom mount up. He smiled coldly but seemed reluctant to say more. ‘You will find out,’ was all he would say.

Only once they had ridden slowly away down the lane, Tom nursing his injured arm as he rode, did Alejandro finally sheathe his sword. He mounted his horse and rode gently through the ford again, the bright surface of the water buzzing with flies.

On the other side he reined in and sat looking at me, his serious gaze searching my face as though he feared what he might see there. ‘Are you hurt?’

‘Not a scratch,’ I insisted.

With a frown, Alejandro looked at Juan. His servant was beginning to turn the cart round, but slowly, taking care not to startle the already nervous horse. ‘It will be quicker if I ride back to Woodstock alone. You can follow with Juan on the cart.’

‘No!’ I exclaimed, instantly furious.

‘Meg, it is not safe. They could be lying in wait for us up the road here. I do not trust your cousin.’

‘I don’t trust him either,’ I agreed. ‘So let us go cross-country.’

It was Alejandro’s turn to be furious. ‘Cross-country? With a cart?’

‘Then take me up before you on the horse and let Juan follow on the road.’

He shook his head. ‘This is madness.’

‘It was my fault the letter was stolen in the first place. I was the one who foolishly listened to my father and persuaded Elizabeth to write it. Then my own father stole it, my treacherous cousin nearly died for it.’ I shook my head despairingly. Why did he not understand? ‘I must be the one to give the letter back to her, to assure her that it can never be used against her. Can you not see that?’

He looked at me for another minute, then reluctantly nodded. ‘Very well, you may come with me and Juan will follow with the cart. But first . . .’ He held out the letter in his hand, still folded and bound. ‘Make sure this is the letter you sought. In case I need to go riding after your cousin again and kill him this time.’

I unwrapped the letter and scanned it briefly. ‘Yes,’ I agreed, with a deep relief, ‘this is the letter I saw the Lady Elizabeth write to Marcus Dent. Though something has been added.’

My voice had risen in outrage. Alejandro nudged his horse forward to read the letter over my shoulder.

‘See?’ I pointed to the space beneath the Lady Elizabeth’s signature where a few bold lines had been added in a curiously similar hand. ‘That was blank before.’