by Mark Hayden
‘Do you want to stay here – in Clerkswell – for a few days, or do you want to go?’
‘Can I stay?’
‘Of course. You are as much of a Clarke as I am, and this is Clerkswell.’
‘I have so much to learn. I remembered how you smoked at Casa Convente, and how you liked the manzanilla sherry. I have brought both. As a gift.’ She shook her head. ‘When I bought them, I didn’t know I was buying a gift for my brother. Drink and cigarettes. Not a good first gift, no? But please take them.’
‘I will. Everyone likes the sherry, so I’ll open a bottle later, when everyone’s gone and you’ve been grilled.’
‘Grilled?’
‘Questioned. When the place has been cleared up, Mina and I are going to take Scout for a walk. Vicky and the girls are going to find out what sort of Mage you are.’ I paused. ‘That’s why you’ve come to England, isn’t it? To study?’
‘Yes. Mamá said you would help. She lied and lied, you know. She said that you knew I was coming when you did not, and on the phone just now she said that she did not know that Alfredo and Maria would be here. I think she lied about that as well.’
‘Perhaps.’
Our eyes flicked to the lawn. Mother was on her way, bypassing the party and heading for the well.
Sofía’s hand flew to her mouth. ‘What should I call her?’
‘Señora Clarke. Until she says otherwise.’
Mother looked tired. Very tired. Strangely, she had Scout with her. I’d been wondering where the mad mutt had got to. She opened her arms and gave Sofía an embrace. I wouldn’t call it a hug. She stepped back and said, ‘I want you to know that the door is always open to you at Villa Verde. I don’t blame you.’
Sofía balked. The idea of being blamed for being born had never crossed her mind. She stammered out a gracias and bobbed her head.
‘Could you give us a minute, Sofía?’
‘Of course.’
Scout detached himself and followed Sofía to the main group, no doubt in search of food.
‘That was truly awful,’ said Mother.
‘Rachael?’
She nodded. ‘Much worse than when Alfred told her that we – he – had sold Elvenham to you.’
I sighed and squeezed her hand, quickly letting go before she could flinch. ‘I wish Rachael would grow up.’
Mother did what she does best when faced with a challenging conversational gambit: she ignored it. ‘We won’t stay long, dear. We’re seeing the Thewlises later, and I need a lie down, but you and Mina must drag Sofía along to the Inkwell tomorrow morning for a farewell breakfast.’
‘Will do.’
She stood up and bent down to kiss me. ‘Do you remember your eighteenth birthday? Grandma Enderby baked you a cake with RAF wings on it. You’d just passed your board. When you picked up the knife to cut the cake, Rachael said, “I can’t wait until he flies away and leaves us alone.” Do you remember what you said back to her?’
‘I honestly don’t remember. I made my first legal trip to the Inkwell later, so most of the family party is a bit of a blur.’
‘Hmm. You said, “If you’re not careful, I’ll wish for a better sister.” I think you must have made that wish, because Sofía was conceived less than a year later.’
It was a beautiful late evening. Bees were buzzing lazily round people’s gardens as we left the village on the little lane that leads to Clerkswell Station. We passed the last house and I slipped Scout off the lead. We only use it for the sake of propriety.
‘When are you going to take me on the train?’ said Mina as I took her hand.
‘We’ve been on loads of trains. Birmingham, London, Valencia, Madrid…’
‘In my whole life, I have never been on a steam train, and you have the Gloucester-Worcester Steam Railway running by the village.’
The station was shut up but the yard gate was still open. I steered Mina towards the buildings and Scout ran happily round the compound sniffing out new smells. ‘There,’ I said, pointing to the noticeboard. ‘How about a dinner special on your birthday in September?’
She pushed back her hair and stared up at the poster. Her eyes lit up when she read the small print. ‘Can we? It’s a Downton Abbey Special! I get to dress up!’ Her face fell. ‘Will there still be tickets?’
‘Ben’s cousin is a volunteer. We’ll get Myfanwy on it in the morning.’
She looked at the date again. ‘The next night is when Carole should have got married.’
‘We should throw a costume party. Take everyone’s minds off it.’
‘Really?’
‘Ask the Coven. Get Myfanwy to ask Carole. If they’re up for it, why not?’
‘That would be the best present I’ve had since I was fourteen. I will be twenty-eight in September, so that makes it half a lifetime ago.’
We left the station and continued up the lane, over the bridge and into open country. Just ahead was a field I knew to be empty. ‘What happened on your fourteenth birthday?’
‘Papaji got tickets to a red carpet screening of Parineeta. In London. He got Sunil to stand there for two hours to keep our places. I got Vidya Balan’s autograph. It was before selfies became a thing.’
I could see tears forming. Sunil was her eldest brother. He looked out for Mina at school and she idolised both him and her father. When she was twenty-two, Sunil had been murdered in front of her and Papaji had died shortly after.
We arrived at the field in silence. Scout had already slipped between the bars and was racing around like a lunatic. By the way, I do not recommend this for dogs who aren’t magickal.
Mina dried her eyes and smiled. ‘Thank you, Conrad. A costume party would be brilliant.’
‘I can’t think of a better setting for a Downton dress-up than Elvenham.’
‘Oh no.’ Her eyes glinted in the setting sun. ‘I’m looking forward to trying on a corset for the train, don’t get me wrong, but for my birthday party, we’re going Bollywood. My cousin, Anika Ben, the one who helped me in India. Do you remember me telling you?’
‘I look forward to meeting her one day and thanking her for what she did.’
‘And you will, one day. You know she’s standing for election, on a women’s rights platform?’
‘I do.’
‘She supports a charity, and the charity has a fundraising section in the UK. We could dedicate the evening to them. We could sell outfits made by their clients. We could have fittings in the afternoon. Show films. And dancing, of course.’
‘Of course. I can’t wait.’
She pulled me down for a kiss. ‘And neither can your Familiar.’
Inside the field, Scout was parked in front of the gate, tongue hanging out and eyes full of mischief. I pushed the gate open and took the tennis ball out of my pocket. ‘Ready, boy?’
‘Arff!’
‘If my grandma could see me now, she’d go mental,’ said Vicky. She raised her glass of Manzanilla and admired the delicate, pale golden colour before sticking her nose in and sniffing. ‘I’d swear I can smell the sea.’
‘You can,’ said Sofía. ‘Why would your grandmother be a mental case?’
‘It means getting angry. Loco. If she could see me sitting with me feet up in a house like this, sipping sherry on a Sunday night, she’d say I was a class traitor.’
Sofía’s English is excellent. Mercedes chose a school that specialised in my mother tongue, because she knew this day would come. Having said that, the rather academic course in Barcelona focused more on BBC English and Shakespeare than Geordie accents and Marxist ideology.
Wisely, Vicky let the concept of class traitor slide and focused on magick.
Mina and I had found the coven slouched around the drawing room, with Vicky in the chair. Literally. Because of her lung, she has to sit up most of the time. Sofía jumped up, eager to please and eager to get out of the spotlight. While Sofía put the sherry bottle back, Vicky gave us the verdict.
‘Sofía can get i
n to Salomon’s House, nay bother, but none of us has a clue where her real talents are.’
‘I want to work with Myvvy in the garden,’ said Sofía.
I nearly choked on my sherry, and not because Sofía struggles with Welsh. ‘No hemp plants, please,’ I said. ‘Not here.’
‘Hemp?’ said Saffron, my current partner in the King’s Watch.
‘Sí. I grow amazing cannabis. Everyone says it is very good. I have brought seeds.’
Myfanwy is a clever woman. She can also be very naive. That’s why she’s Confined to the village: she trusted the wrong people. If she hadn’t helped me save Vicky’s life, she’d be locked up in Blackfriars Undercroft. Myfanwy waved her glass. ‘Miss Parkes’ arthritis is terrible. It could really help.’
Erin looked at me over Myfanwy’s head and mouthed I’ll sort it. To change the subject, Erin said, ‘I still can’t believe you can’t read tarot, Sofía. Surely with an enchanted deck…?’
The shrug is an under-documented area of body language, in my opinion, and I’m something of a connoisseur. In Spain, the shrug is more a hand gesture, an open palm, than a shoulder movement. Sofía shrugged. ‘It is easier if I show you. Mina, you play bridge, no?’
‘I am only learning.’
‘You have new decks of cards?’
‘Yes. I’ll get one. Let’s go to the kitchen.’
We installed ourselves in the kitchen. I could see from Sofía’s face that she much preferred it to the sitting room. It is lovely, with an antique farmhouse table in the middle and an Aga to keep us warm in the winter. I topped up the Manzanilla, and when Mina got back, Sofía took the deck from her and broke the seal.
She quickly discarded the Jokers and fanned the cards out to show that they were in order. ‘Before I could read books, Mamá taught me to shuffle. Watch.’
She riffled the cards with a lightning speed and professionalism that would get her a job in any casino. While she shuffled, she said, ‘To read tarot, you need two things. You have to put magick in your fingers, and you have to have the Sight. I have the fingers, but not the Sight.’ She plonked the deck in front of Mina. ‘Cut. Please.’
Mina lifted a quarter of the cards and put them underneath. Sofía handed the deck to Saffron. ‘You deal, please … Mmm … Deal to Conrad first, then Mina, then Erin, then yourself. Six cards each should do it.’
Saffron held the deck in her open palm and closed her eyes. ‘No residual Lux. I couldn’t perform magick and leave no trace like that. You did perform magick, didn’t you?’
Sofía pinned back her hair again. ‘Deal the cards and we shall see,’ she said with a smile that was pure Mercedes. If she used that smile on Xavi, she’d have a slave for life. Saffron swiftly dealt the cards. I picked up my hand and scanned it.
Sofía said to me, ‘There is no Knight of Swords in this deck. I gave you the Jack of Spades. Same thing.’
And there he was.
When Mercedes had read the tarot for me, I’d drawn the Knight of Swords as a symbol of myself. I turned the Jack of Spades to show the group. Everyone looked impressed, except Mina, who looked alarmed as she scanned her cards.
She slowly laid down the four kings. ‘How in Ganesh’s name did you do that?’
‘And the other one,’ said Sofía. Mina laid down the Queen of Hearts. Sofía tapped it with her finger. ‘Queen of Hearts outranks the Jack of Spades. As it should be.’
‘Wow, Sofía,’ said Myfanwy. ‘That’s amazing. Well done.’
‘Now you know why I cannot read Tarot. Without the Sight, all the cards would come from my fingers.’
Erin gave a dramatic sigh. She’s a Witch, and learnt her magick with the Brotherhood of Arden rather than at Salomon’s House. I met her on a mission, and she turned up here one day, curious to meet Myfanwy. They are now firm friends, and Erin rents one of my empty stables as a studio. Erin is an Enscriber – she can put Lux into words, signs, runes and images. More than that, she is an excellent slip fielder and useful Number Four bat.
Now, I don’t obsess about women’s appearances, but bear with me for a moment. Myfanwy’s hair is a honey-blonde that matches her cornflower blue eyes. Saffron has the biggest mane of white-blonde hair in Clerkswell and keeps it well pinned up most of the time, like a barely restrained polar bear. Myfanwy and Saffron are naturally blonde; Erin is not, but her dyed, curled halo suits her.
She has an open, simple face with a dimple, and when Mother gets back to San Vicente, she will probably describe Erin as a girl-next-door type, which she is, if your neighbours go in for firearms and obsessional violence.
Erin threatened Vicky with a shotgun not so long ago, and despite Erin being one of the Elvenham Coven, I’m not sure that Vicky trusts her any more than I do.
We all stared at Erin, and Erin stared at Sofía. ‘I thought it was me you loved,’ said Erin. She laid down another four kings and two more queens – Hearts and Diamonds. She grinned and sat back with her glass of sherry.
‘Madre de Dio,’ said Sofía. ‘May I see?’
Erin slid the cards over to Sofía, who picked them up and stroked them. She passed them to Vicky and said, ‘I can feel the magick in them. It is not an illusion – they are fixed, but how did you do it? A Transformation?’
‘She’s not that good,’ said Vicky. ‘Clever, though. Very clever.’
Erin grinned. ‘While Mina went for the new deck, I nipped out to my workshop. I’ve got quite a few blank playing cards and I brought them in. When everyone was looking at Mina’s hand, I swapped them, then imprinted something dramatic. If you look closely, you’ll see that the backs aren’t quite right.’
She picked her original six, random cards from her lap and returned them to Sofía. ‘Sorry. I didn’t mean to steal your thunder. No way could I do what you did with the shuffle. That was awesome. How did you fix the cut? Mina could have cut the deck anywhere.’
Neatly done. Erin had stolen Sofía’s thunder, and now she was graciously handing it back.
‘That is my secret,’ said Sofía. Her lips curled and I could see that she was thinking fondly of her mother, perhaps for the first time since she’d arrived here. If a Mage says that something is their secret, you have to change the subject. It’s very rude to probe any further.
Mina picked up the baton. ‘Why do you have blank playing cards, Erin?’
‘There’s always money in vanity. You can have a personalised deck for fifty pounds a card. Here. Watch.’ She took more blanks out of the pouch in her phone case and took some of the original cards from the table. She pressed two blanks to the back of the mundane cards, creating perfect copies of the cross-hatching. Then she looked at the other sides and stared in concentration for a second. ‘There. To celebrate your engagement.’
She laid down yet another Queen of Hearts and a King of Spades. The cards had Myfanwy’s and Ben’s faces, grinning and smiling. They were very good.
‘Aww, Erin, that’s …Thank you.’ Myfanwy leaned over and gave Erin a hug.
‘You are engaged?’ said Sofía. ‘Where is the ring?’
‘Long story,’ said Myfanwy. ‘Conrad tells it best. I’m gonna be a party pooper, I’m afraid. See you all tomorrow. Mina? Can you put Vicky to bed for me?’
‘Howay, I’m not five,’ said Vicky.
‘No, but you do need your dressing changed and your blood pressure taken.’
We all got up. It had been a very long day. ‘Come on, Sofía,’ I said. ‘I’ll tell you that story over a last cigarette in the garden.’
3 — Back in the Field
When we got back to Elvenham after breakfast the next day, the Elvenham Coven was waiting for us in the kitchen: Myfanwy, Vicky, Erin and Saffron. After yesterday, no one had any particular appetite for hard work this morning.
Mina slumped into the nearest seat, and Myfanwy jumped up. ‘What’s wrong, precious? And where’s Sofía?’
‘Dad’s taking Sofía for a walk round the village,’ I said. ‘Showing her the ancestral lands and al
l that.’
Mina looked up. ‘Do you know what Mary said when he suggested it? She said, “Alfred, are you really going to show off that girl like a prize pig?”
‘Ouch,’ said Myfanwy.
‘That’s harsh,’ said Saffron.
‘Harsh, but a bit too close for comfort, I reckon,’ added Vicky. ‘What did Sofía say?’
‘She didn’t understand, thank the gods,’ said Mina. ‘But that is not the worst thing. Oh no.’
‘Coffee?’ said Myfanwy. ‘Cake?’
Mina shook her head. ‘I am awash with coffee and protein. Those breakfasts are designed for people twice my size.’ She gave me an accusing look.
‘Rosie was serving,’ I said.
‘Oh, no,’ said Myfanwy. ‘All three counties will know about Sofía by now.’
‘Still not the worst,’ said Mina. ‘When Alfred and Sofía went for their parade, Mary fixed me with one of her looks. You know, Conrad, I swear that your mother is part serpent. I am rethinking whether I adopt her, you know.’
Saffron was struggling to keep up. ‘How can you adopt Conrad’s mother?’
Mina swept her hand round the table. ‘You all have mothers. Why should I be left out? Sofía even has two mothers if she wants them. Do any of you have aunties with no children that I could borrow?’
Myfanwy grinned. ‘I’ve got Auntie Bethan, but she’s more Welsh than the Archdruid. Might be a bit of a communication problem there. Anyway, what did Mary say to you? Was it about your past? I’ve avoided being alone with Ben’s Mam for exactly that reason.’
‘She asked me if I was ready. Ready to be her bridge partner on a cruise next week.’
‘No!’
‘I’m afraid so,’ I said. ‘Mother asked me if I had any leave owing yesterday, and I foolishly said yes. It’s a twelve night cruise round the Baltic, leaving Liverpool next Monday.’
‘You haven’t agreed, have you?’ said Saffron. ‘You’re only twenty-seven, Mina. Even Conrad’s too young to go on a cruise.’
‘Oy, Hawkins,’ I said. ‘Watch it. As it happens, we did agree, didn’t we love?’
Mina threw her hands in the air. ‘Mary said we shouldn’t go if I wasn’t up to it. The Clarkes have their motto, and so do I: no one pushes a Desai. Of course I had to accept. And they’re paying.’ She planted her elbows on the table and jammed her chin in her fists. ‘I have so much to do. Mary said I only need three ballgowns. Three! I didn’t even wear a ballgown for my school prom.’