Chantress

by Amy Butler Greenfield

  “It doesn’t shine anymore,” he said.

  “Please don’t speak of it,” I begged as I slipped it out of sight. “Not to anyone.”

  “But why—?” I saw the truth dawn on him. “It’s broken?”

  “Shhhhh!!! No one must know.”

  My enemies were not so numerous as Lady Helaine had feared, or as powerful, but over the past few days, I had learned they did indeed exist. Some noblemen were unhappy with the King’s plan to restore Parliament and other longstanding freedoms, and they blamed his liberality on me. Other courtiers simply disliked magic workers on principle. Believing me to be powerful, they did not attack me openly. But that would change if they learned how weak I really was.

  I’d been so sure that the grimoire had lied about destroying my ruby. One small crack—that’s all I’d noticed at first. But later that night, as exultation ebbed into exhaustion, I’d realized the weight felt wrong; somehow the stone had become as light as a shell. Taking it out for closer inspection, I’d seen to my horror that the grimoire had told me the truth: The crack, though small, went straight to the ruby’s heart. The stone’s magic had leaked away, and its light was gone. Now it was as clouded and opaque as Lady Helaine’s stone had been.

  To forestall awkward questions, perhaps I should have accepted the jewels the King had offered me, and worn one of his rubies on my chain instead; there had been one of about the right size. But no doubt Nat would have seen through the subterfuge anyway. And cracked or not, my own stone was still all I had left from my mother. Though it no longer had any power, I could not bear to set it aside. The best I could do was try to keep it hidden—a strategy that had worked until now.

  Nat lowered his voice but did not drop the subject. “Are you saying you can’t do Proven Magic anymore?”

  “It’s worse than that.” I hadn’t meant to say anything, but something in me needed to tell him the truth. “I can’t even do Wild Magic.”

  “What?”

  “Ever since I destroyed the grimoire, I can’t hear a single note.”

  Whether I had the stone off or on, it was the same: utter silence. After four days without music, I was terrified that it was gone forever.

  And the worst of it was that I didn’t even understand why. Both Lady Helaine and the grimoire had warned me about losing my stone, and with it my ability to work Proven Magic. But no one had ever said that I might lose my ear for Wild Magic, too. And yet that’s what had happened.

  Wild Magic will betray you when you least expect it. Wasn’t that what Lady Helaine had told me?

  “You can’t hear anything?” Nat asked.

  “Not even from the moonbriar.”

  I saw consternation cross Nat’s face, and then relief. “You mean, you’re just like the rest of us now?”

  Was he glad I had lost my magic?

  I stared at him in dismay. “Nat, I’ve lost everything. My birthright, my craft, everything I’ve worked toward, every way of protecting myself—”

  “I’ll protect you,” he interrupted.

  “I want to protect myself.”

  In the silence that followed, I stared at him, suddenly and shatteringly aware of the gulf that lay between us. I had thought myself closer to him than to any other human being. Yet he could not understand me, nor could he accept who I truly was. I felt broken, but to him I was better with my magic gone.

  The blow left me almost breathless. “I need to go,” I said thickly. I will not cry in front of him. I rose and backed toward the door. “Swear to me you will tell no one about this.”

  “I swear. Lucy—”

  “No.” I could barely get the words out. “We will say nothing more. No good can come of it.”

  Before he could stop me, I slipped from the room, too upset to say good-bye.

  CHAPTER FORTY

  NEW SONGS

  Three months later, I sat by the sea, cross-legged and single-minded, watching the tide come in.

  It was a lonely stretch of coast, this place that the King had granted me. He had wanted to give me something much grander: a London palace, or a magnificent country estate. But what I had wanted was a refuge. Aside from the King, very few people knew that we were still in England, let alone exactly where we had settled. Norrie and I lived here in seclusion; we had not seen another soul for weeks.

  “Lucy! Where are you?” Norrie called out.

  I turned and saw her scuffling across the sand. I waved, and she headed toward me.

  Our time by the sea had done Norrie good. After many weeks in the fresh air and clear light, she was almost back to her old self. Which was mostly good news, except that she had taken to watching over me like a hen with a single woebegone chick. Her one distraction was her garden, where she had been digging when I slipped away.

  “Lucy, dear, have you been here the whole morning?” She stood before me, her face ruddy with sun. “You’re driving yourself too hard, really you are.”

  “I have to keep trying,” I said. “And this is where I hear it best.”

  “But—”

  I put my finger to my lips. “Shh! There it is again.”

  Norrie went quiet as I leaned into the wind. I almost had it, almost . . .

  No.

  “Did you get it?” Norrie asked.

  “Not quite.” I did my best to keep my voice even and bright. Norrie worried about me enough as it was; it wasn’t fair to make her worry even more.

  “Well, there’s always tomorrow,” Norrie said. “You don’t want to go too far, too fast, do you?”

  I winced. She meant well, but it was like salt water in a wound. “No danger of that.”

  Two songs. That was all I had. Two songs in three months. And both of them quite paltry, one for making tidal pools ripple and another for draining them away.

  You should be thankful even for that, I told myself. We had been here a full six weeks before I’d heard the first delicate notes on the air. My initial reaction had been disbelief. After that, fear. Would Wild Magic lead me to my death, as Lady Helaine had predicted?

  But then I remembered my mother. Wild Magic had kept her safe for many years. Wild Magic had helped her protect me. Yes, there were dangers in it, as I knew only too well. But it had unquestionable power, and it had saved me from the grimoire. And with my stone destroyed, it was the only way open to me.

  So I let myself listen, and then, once I was sure of myself, to sing. A fortnight ago, I had unraveled my first song-spell. The second had come to me yesterday. I was here today hoping for a third.

  But my progress was achingly slow.

  I wished that I had my mother to advise me. Instead, I only had Norrie, who tolerated my magic but did not understand it. For all intents and purposes, I was on my own.

  “Lucy, did you hear me?”

  “Sorry, Norrie. What did you say?”

  Norrie looked down at me, concern in her eyes. “I said you should come back to the cottage with me—”

  “Not yet, Norrie.” I turned back to the sea. If I concentrated with my whole might, I could hear the faintest of melodies coming from the whitecaps, a melody quite distinct from the occasional murky notes coming from the depths.

  “But we have a visitor,” Norrie said with suppressed excitement.

  I swerved around in dismay. “No one’s supposed to know where we are.”

  “This one knows,” Norrie said, unruffled. “He had it from the King himself. Young Nat.” She smiled. Ever since Nat had guided her through the tunnel, he could do no wrong in her eyes. The fact that he had helped save me had only confirmed his worthiness. A lad in a thousand, she called him. A treasure. And she had worried when we hadn’t heard from him.

  “Nat?” I scrambled up from the rock. “He’s here?”

  “I thought that you’d be pleased,” Norrie said, taking my arm as we took the path to the cottage.

  I nodded, but what I felt was far more complicated than pleasure. I had not seen Nat since that last night in the Tower. Penebrygg ha
d soon recovered enough to return home, and I had visited him there during my last days in London. But Nat was always out when I called. I guessed he was deliberately keeping away.

  We would never be able to bridge the differences between us. That was the problem. If I hadn’t cared so much about my magic—and if he hadn’t hated magic so much—then perhaps we would still be close. But we were who we were, and that was the end of it. His very avoidance of me confirmed it.

  I told myself it was his loss. But it felt like mine. Not a day went by that I didn’t think of him, of the rapport we’d once shared, of the revelation of seeing myself through his eyes.

  And now he was here. Why? What did it mean?

  Apprehensive, I approached the cottage. As we came close, I saw Nat standing in the garden, by the stone bench built into the wall. He looked older than I remembered, and taller, and he greeted us with a courtly courtesy that took me aback.

  “I know you said you weren’t hungry, Nat,” Norrie said. “But you must be famished after that journey. I’ll fetch you something from the kitchen.”

  “No need,” he said, but she was already gone, leaving the two of us alone in the garden.

  “Did the King send you here?” I asked. Henry had said he would send a messenger if he thought I was in danger, or if he had need of me.

  “The King? No. I came on my own, as soon as I could.”

  As soon as he could? It had been three months. “You’ve been very busy, then?”

  “That’s one way of putting it,” Nat said. “I’ve spent the past fourteen weeks shut up in Ravendon House.”

  So he hadn’t been trying to avoid me, after all. “Why on earth—?”

  “Scargrave’s papers,” he said. “Room upon room of them. The King thought they might involve the defense of the realm, so he wanted them investigated speedily and in secret—and he put me on the committee to help.”

  “Why you?” I asked, before thinking how it would sound. Flustered, I added, “I mean, I’m sure there’s none better—”

  “Oh, hundreds better, I’m sure.” He grinned. “But it was Sir Barnaby who recommended me. You know he’s the Lord Chancellor now?”

  I nodded. The appointment had been made while I was still a guest in the Tower.

  “He suggested to the King that I could help, and I agreed before I quite understood the conditions. It turned out we had to live there under guard, and we couldn’t communicate with a soul while we were there. I couldn’t even tell Penebrygg where I was going.”

  “How awful.”

  “Well, it’s good to be free again, I can tell you. And I could live without seeing another file.”

  “What did you find in them?” I asked.

  “Confessions, mostly,” Nat said somberly. “Drawn from his victims. Thousands and thousands of them down in the crypt.”

  “You read them all?” I asked.

  “Enough to know what they were.”

  “And where are they now?”

  Nat looked up at the clouds. “Funny you should ask that. Some of the King’s advisers wanted to keep them on file, in case of future unrest. But someone broke into the crypt and set fire to the place. Nothing else burned—the crypt is stone, and quite separate from the rest of the house—but every single one of those confessions is gone.”

  I gave Nat the ghost of a smile. “And they have no idea who did it?”

  “None,” Nat said with an answering smile. “Luckily, the King didn’t seem overly dismayed to have lost the papers, and he wasn’t inclined to make further investigations, so we were allowed to leave last week. I’ve been on the road ever since.”

  “You mean, you came straight here?” I said, amazed.

  “Well, I went back to check on Penebrygg first. He’s doing well; his head hardly ever pains him now. And after that, I was off. I thought it would take five days, but I made it in four.”

  “If you’ve been on the road for four days, you must be famished.” I glanced back at the cottage. Norrie was taking a very long time about the food.

  “I’m fine. But I’m tired of talking about me,” Nat said. “What I want to know about is you.”

  “What exactly do you want to know?”

  “Everything.”

  “I’m well enough, thank you,” I said warily. “It’s good to be by the sea again.”

  “And your magic?”

  “Why do you ask?” The question was too sharp, my voice too defensive.

  “Is that what’s wrong?”

  I looked away. “What makes you think something is wrong?”

  “The look on your face,” he said. “The way you stand. Everything about you.”

  It seemed Nat didn’t need magic to read me. I couldn’t speak.

  “Lucy, what is it? Can you still not hear any music?” His voice was tense, as if too much hung on my answer. Was he hoping, then, that my magic was gone for good?

  If he was, then I would have to disappoint him. “I can hear enough to do a bit of magic. In time I hope to do more. But it’s a start.”

  “I’m glad,” he said.

  His polite rejoinder was the last straw. Surely, after all we’d been through, we owed each other a little more honesty.

  I turned away from him. “Don’t say that. Not when you don’t mean it. You never liked my magic; you’ve been clear enough about that. You’d probably be glad if every scrap of it went.”

  “No,” he said. “No more than you’d celebrate if I could no longer do science.”

  I looked back at him, not sure I’d heard right. “But you hate magic—”

  “I can change my mind, can’t I?” he said. “I used to hate magic, yes. I thought no one with magic could be trusted. But when you destroyed that grimoire, you proved yourself as steadfast as anyone alive. I’d trust you anywhere, with or without magic. Though I hope for your sake it’s with.”

  I stared at him, astonished.

  “What you said about having a gift, a craft, and being allowed to explore it: That struck home,” he said. “That’s what I want for myself. Why shouldn’t I want it for you?”

  I stood very still.

  “I really mean it.” He reached inside his coat and pulled out a parchment packet. “Here’s proof.”

  Mystified, I took the packet. Inside I found sheets of paper with familiar handwriting:

  For my daughter, Lucy . . .

  “My mother’s letter,” I whispered. “Where did you find it?”

  “In the secret passage at Ravendon House. I didn’t say anything about it to the King’s advisers. I was afraid they’d lock it away if I did. And I thought you ought to have it.”

  I sat down on the stone bench and studied the letter. Even in bright sunlight, the water-splotched pages were impossible to read. But when I held them close, I heard a fragile thread of melody spiral out from them, a tune sung in my mother’s own sweet voice, every note soft but clear. As I joined in, the handwriting began to darken, and I could read passages that had eluded me before:

  My daughter, you are very dear to me—and would be even if you had no magic at all. But since I must leave you here, perhaps for a very long time, it is a comfort that you have the gift of Wild Magic. I can hear it in you already, even though you are so small, and I believe it to be even stronger than my own . . . .

  Do not be afraid. There is much said about Wild Magic that is not true, and there are more ways of protecting yourself than anyone guesses . . . .

  I could hear my mother’s voice clearly, almost feel her arms embracing me. The pages trembled in my hand.

  There will be times when your ability to do Wild Magic is compromised; this happens sometimes after illness or turmoil. Indeed, after you have worked a very great feat of magic, your gift may even appear to vanish altogether. I know myself how distressing this can be, but do not fear: The magic is inside you still, dearest daughter, and with time and rest, it will return . . . .

  There was more, but my eyes were too blurred with tears to continu
e. I folded the letter and held it close, yearning for the mother who had reached across time to comfort me.

  “Thank you,” I said, looking up at Nat. “Thank you with all my heart. You don’t know what this means to me.”

  “I can guess.”

  I rose from the bench. The bond between us was so strong I could almost hear it humming in the air.

  “Nat?”

  He looked at me then, his gaze quiet and clear. He looked at me with liking and respect and kindness, and perhaps something more . . . .

  Oh! What wouldn’t I give to be able to read his mind again, just long enough to know what he truly thought of me now?

  But that was beyond me, at least for the time being. And perhaps that was just as well. Some secrets shouldn’t be forced. I needed to be patient, letting the future unfold in its own time and its own way.

  I began to pull back, but Nat leaned forward. With the fiercest look I’d seen from him yet, he curved his hand against my cheek and gently kissed me.

  The humming in my head burst into full song.

  As I stepped back from him, Norrie called to us from the cottage door. “Nat? Lucy? Are you still out there? I’ve set us a table in here. You need a proper meal, Nat. And you could do with one too, Lucy.”

  Nat offered me his hand. I took it.

  “We’re coming,” I called. We walked up to the house together, and my heart sang all the way.

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  How much history is in this historical fantasy?

  A fair amount, as it happens.

  Chantress, for example, is a real word, and you really can find it in the Oxford English Dictionary. Penebrygg’s statements about its derivation are correct.

  Although the story takes place in 1667–1668, London’s geography is more or less as it would have been before the Great Fire of 1666 (which hasn’t happened in Chantress’s world). Furnishings, clothing, and food are in keeping with what was available in the period, depending on the various characters’ positions and circumstances.

  The Great Devastation owes something to Guy Fawkes’s failed Gunpowder Plot (1605).

  In real life, King Charles I was much like the “tyrant” Nat describes. In our world, he lost both his crown and his head in the English Civil War and its aftermath. In Chantress, he manages to subdue his enemies before war breaks out, only to be killed along with his court in the Great Devastation. His successor is King Henry IX, Henry Seymour. In the real world, an older Henry Seymour was, in fact, a distant claimant to the throne, a descendant of the Tudor line.