Twilight of a Queen

by Susan Carroll

  As she made her way through the silent house, she could not resist peeking into one room. Moonlight spilled across the bed where Seraphine lay cuddled next to her two younger sisters. The older girl’s arm was flung across them in a protective gesture, even in her sleep.

  Meg’s throat worked and she had to swallow hard. One of the most difficult parts of this was not being able to say good-bye to Seraphine. But her friend would never understand what Meg had to do and would have tried to prevent her.

  “Forgive me, ’Phine,” she whispered.

  She studied the three golden heads nestled against the pillows, all looking so innocent and lost deep in their dreams. Had she ever looked that way? Meg wondered sadly.

  If she had, it was so long ago, she couldn’t remember. She felt as though from the moment of her birth, her mother had leaned over her cradle like some malignant fairy, marking Meg for darkness.

  Meg closed the door and went quietly on her way, slipping out of the house. It was a full moon and the golden orb served as a lantern as she wended down the road leading away from Belle Haven.

  At times she was obliged to abandon the road and crouch down in the underbrush to avoid the vigilance of Justice Deauville’s patrol.

  But she made it to Port Corsair undetected. The moon had risen higher in the sky by the time she stole past the conifer trees and hastened down the path to the cove that had been her private refuge.

  She thought that she saw something glitter against the rocks, a shard of glass perhaps, all that remained of the crystal she had smashed.

  She still resented Xavier for tricking her into destroying it, but she no longer needed the scrying glass. Its prophecies were etched into her mind.

  Meg paused, groping through her pack for the other forbidden object she kept hidden away all these months. She drew it carefully out into the moonlight. The witch blade looked like a stiletto with a needle-sharp tip. The hilt was hollow and it could be pushed, sending a lethal poison through the thin blade. A silver flower was engraved upon the hilt.

  Another legacy from the Book of Shadows, one that Meg’s mother had put to fearsome use. Meg shuddered at the feel of the weapon in her hand. She tucked it gingerly in the hidden pocket she had fashioned for her cloak.

  Then she set herself to wait. She did not have to do so long before she heard the splash of an oar. She saw the small boat approaching, bobbing on the waves as it neared the cove. The dinghy was occupied by a single youth, the young fisher lad Meg was bribing to take her off the island.

  The boy looked nervous as he waded ashore to help her into the boat. No doubt he feared the displeasure of the Lady of Faire Isle, should Ariane ever discover his part in Meg’s flight.

  But his fear was not enough to overcome his greed, Meg thought cynically. If you offered enough coin, you could motivate a man to do anything. Only consider Xavier.

  Or perhaps like almost everyone else on Faire Isle, this boy merely wanted Meg gone. He said nothing as he settled Meg into the dinghy. The trip across the narrow channel of water between Faire Isle and the mainland was accomplished in silence. That suited Meg just fine. She drew her cloak tighter around her, withdrawing beneath the hood.

  One of the questions that her mother had constantly posed snaked through Meg’s mind.

  “What is the greatest mistake any woman can make, Megaera?” Cassandra Lascelles was wont to demand of her daughter.

  “Trusting a man,” Meg would solemnly reply, knowing that was the answer her mother expected from her. Any other would earn her a sharp rebuke or a cuff to the ears.

  Meg had not believed it then as she did now, since she had been betrayed. First by Sander Naismith and now Xavier. She saw clearly that she had never been able to trust or rely upon any man save her father. And even Martin le Loup was far away, fighting for someone else’s cause when Meg needed him most.

  But it didn’t matter, Meg assured herself fiercely, winking back tears. Papa could not have helped her. No one could. Her fate had been revealed to her by her crystal ages ago and there was no longer any point in resisting.

  When they reached the opposite shore, Meg rummaged through her pack and produced a handful of coin. The boy muttered something that sounded like merci. He clambered back into his boat and manned the oars as though he could not get away from her fast enough.

  Meg shivered, feeling a little lost, abandoned in the unfamiliar terrain. Then she squared her shoulders and trudged toward the only light she saw in the distance, far up the beach.

  As she neared the small fishing village, she found it increasingly hard to breathe as her surroundings took on an aura of familiarity—the dark slated roofs of the cottages, the narrow lane, the light emanating from a modest tavern on the green. She had seen it all before in her vision.

  She heard whickers and the occasional stamp of a hoof from the horses tied up in the yard. Meg drew close enough to peer into the inn window. The tables of the taproom were thronged with a contingent of the queen’s soldiers just as she expected.

  She shrank away, trembling, feeling her resolve waver. It was always at this point in her vision that her faceless betrayer stole up behind her, prodding her inside. She glanced fearfully about her, but there was no one. All she saw was her own pale reflection in the window.

  Steeling herself, Meg approached the inn door and crept inside. No one noticed her amidst the clamor of masculine voices and rough laughter.

  One complaining voice rose higher than the rest. It belonged to a plump young man with bewhiskered cheeks. “Well, I say we had best wait for the rest of the troop to catch up with us before assaulting the island.”

  “What, are you afraid of a pack of women, Alphonse?” one of his drinking companions taunted.

  “Not women, witches.”

  “Aw, are you scared some Circe will turn you into more of a pig than you are already?”

  The young man flushed and appealed to an older gray-haired man lounging in his chair. “Bear me out, Captain. Are there not too few of us to comb that entire island? How are we supposed to find one girl?”

  The captain shrugged. “By torturing the first woman we get our hands on. I doubt it will take much. All wenches have loose tongues.”

  His comment produced a spate of ribald retorts and more laughter.

  Meg gulped, but the ugly threat was the spur she needed.

  “There is no need to torture anyone,” she spoke up in a quavering voice.

  All conversation abruptly ceased, a myriad of hard and curious eyes turning in her direction.

  Her heart thudded and her hand shook as she pulled back her hood.

  “I am the girl you were sent to find. I am the Silver Rose.”

  BLOIS CASTLE PERCHED ON THE HEADLAND DOMINATING THE small town of the same name and a stretch of the river Loire. The royal castle was a jumble of architecture of the centuries, the medieval towers giving way to the more elegant designs of the new wing.

  The main gallery had played host to a brilliant gathering, the ladies of France dazzling in their gowns, the gentlemen almost as resplendent. Everyone had looked on while the king of France had received his enemy, the duc de Guise. Although pale and sullen, Henry had tried to give the semblance of still being king as he had pardoned de Guise for his part in the Day of the Barricades. But everyone present had known that the duke required no pardon.

  He was in every sense now the master of France.

  As Meg was escorted through the palace by a tall sentry, the gallery where the king had suffered his final humiliation stood empty the throne vacant.

  Meg regarded it through indifferent eyes. The wearying journey that had finally brought her to this point was as much of a blur as her surroundings.

  Considering that within moments she was about to encounter the figure of her nightmares, she was astonished by her own calm. Something strange had happened to her after she had plucked up the courage to surrender herself to the queen’s soldiers. She was numbed by a curious sense of resignation.
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  She wondered if this was how prisoners felt when they reached that final moment, mounting the steps to their own execution. There was no longer anything to fear when all resistance was futile, all one’s choices stripped away.

  After traversing a succession of halls, Meg was led into an antechamber. She blinked at the sunlight pouring through the windows, brilliant against the multicolored tiles of the fireplace.

  Set against all the array of color, the queen was a shadow in her black gown. She lay stretched out on a day bed, her face almost as gray as the hair swept back from her face. She looked ill and she applied her handkerchief to her mouth, her shoulders shaking with a ragged cough.

  The sentry turned Meg over to one of the queen’s ladies. The young woman leaned down to whisper in Meg’s ear to stand up straight and not stir or make a sound until the queen had finished her visit with the king.

  That man positioned near the queen’s daybed was the king? Meg thought in astonishment. Despite being sumptuously clad, he did not look very regal with his stooped shoulders, gaunt face, and sunken eyes.

  The king bowed over Queen Catherine’s hand, but even though he enquired after her health, his expression was one of complete indifference. He looked distracted, as though his mind was elsewhere.

  “So Maman, how are you faring?”

  “Much better, I believe,” the queen said, suppressing another cough.

  The king’s mouth twisted petulantly. “Would that I could say the same, but I still have de Guise here swaggering about the palace as though he owns the place. I have set the seal on the treaty that gave him everything. What more does the man want of me?”

  “Treaties are worth no more than the ink and parchment they are written upon. Be patient, Henry. Our time is coming.”

  “That is what you keep telling me and I grow weary of hearing it. I have been more than patient, heeding your advice and biding my time.” An angry look darkened his saturnine features, but he forced his lips into a smile.

  “But I know that you were right, Maman. I would have been ill-advised to harm the duke in Paris. As you say, a wise man keeps his enemies close and waits for the opportune moment to strike.”

  His reply clearly pleased his mother. He bent to kiss her cheek and turned to leave. Meg followed the example of the queen’s ladies and sank into a deep curtsy.

  As the king drew closer, Meg risked a glance up at his face. His eyes had that murky look of one whose mind is no longer in a state of balance. It was often difficult to read mad eyes, but the king’s were calm in their cunning as Meg peered into them. Henry might have managed to fool his mother, but to Meg, the king’s murderous intentions were clear. She shivered as he swept past her.

  An elderly man attired in the robes of a physician bent over Catherine, taking her pulse and frowning. The young lady who had admitted Meg into the room crept forward to whisper something in the queen’s ear.

  Catherine’s eyes turned in the direction where Meg hovered just inside the door. A surge of energy seemed to return to Catherine. She sat up higher and Meg felt like a mouse that had attracted the attention of a large, hungry cat.

  “You may leave me now, Dr. Caberini,” the queen commanded, never taking her eyes off Meg.

  “But Majesty,” the doctor protested. “You are quite ill. You are feverish and I fear the pneumonia may be settling into your lungs.”

  “Leave me,” the queen snapped. “I have no further need of your services.”

  As the physician bowed and retreated, the queen lifted her hand in a gesture toward Meg, indicating she should approach.

  Meg felt some of her calm desert her. She remained frozen until the young lady-in-waiting rustled over to urge Meg forward. She whispered more hurried instructions into Meg’s ear.

  Meg had never possessed Seraphine’s grace. She sank into a wooden curtsy. She had been told to stay down until bidden to rise, to keep her eyes lowered. But Meg could not refrain from looking up. She feared to have the Dark Queen’s eyes fix her with all the mesmerizing force of a basilisk.

  But the queen’s eyes seemed a trifle cloudy. They narrowed as though straining to see her better.

  “Come closer, Margaret Wolfe.” The irony of the way the queen pronounced her name was not lost upon Meg.

  She moved forward slowly nervously folding her hands in front of her. The queen coughed into her handkerchief, her eyes watering. She blinked several times and then cocked her head, studying Meg.

  “I admit my eyes are a little tired today, mademoiselle, but I believe you have changed a great deal since I saw you three years ago. You are no longer quite such a frightened little girl.”

  “And you are not nearly as terrifying,” Meg blurted out before she could stop herself.

  She braced for the queen’s anger, but Catherine only smiled. “Am I not? We shall see about that. I admire impertinence to a degree, but it is not becoming in one so young. I advise you to have a care, my dear.”

  Meg tipped up her chin in a show of bravado. “Why? You—you probably intend to have me killed anyway.”

  The queen clucked her tongue. “Is that why you look so grim, child? You fear that I brought you all this way to have your head? I assure you that I mean you no harm.”

  “You did once. You sent an assassin to London to kill me.”

  “A mistake on my part and you have my sincere apology. That was before I understood what an extraordinary girl you are. Now I hold you in the highest esteem.”

  “I cannot imagine why that would be, Your Grace.”

  “Because—” the queen dropped her voice lower. “As far as I know, you are the only one who has ever managed to translate and read the Book of Shadows.”

  “The book is gone,” Meg insisted.

  “Is it?” Catherine smiled. “I don’t think so. I believe you learned a great deal from it.”

  Meg swallowed. “That was my mother’s doing. She insisted that I learn how to read the book.”

  “And you were such an adroit student, fashioning those nasty witch blades, conjuring up poisons and those deadly white silver roses. What a brilliant girl you are, Megaera.”

  “Th-that is not my name and I no longer do any of those things. I have forgotten everything I culled from the book,” Meg said, even though she realized from the way Catherine was smiling that her denial was futile.

  Catherine produced a small glass vial. “Then wherever did you learn to brew the powerful elixir that you gave to your friend, Xavier?”

  Meg flushed. “That man was no friend of mine.”

  “Truly? He certainly behaved as if he were. Risking his own neck in an effort to convince me that you were nothing, that the potion in this vial was water he had obtained from some magic fountain.” Catherine’s lips twisted.

  “I must confess the man can be very glib and convincing, but not quite convincing enough.”

  Meg listened, her eyes widening. So Xavier had gone back to Paris to see the queen. Not to betray her as she had feared, but to deflect the queen’s interest away from her.

  “He really did that for me?” she said. “I don’t believe it.”

  “You may ask him yourself if you like. I was obliged to punish him for his treachery.”

  “Wh-what did you do to him?” Meg asked, struggling to conceal her dismay.

  “Nothing so terrible yet, merely locked him up in the dungeon. Captain Xavier is not fond of imprisonment, owing to an unfortunate experience aboard a Spanish galley. He may well be on the way to losing his mind.” The queen shrugged. “But since he is no friend of yours, you need not distress yourself over his fate. Or that of the Englishwoman.”

  “What Englishwoman?” Meg asked, her stomach knotting with another layer of dread.

  “Oh, did I fail to mention that when Xavier attempted to escape, Lady Danvers was foolish enough to come to his aid? I was obliged to detain her.”

  “Jane?” Meg cried. “Oh, what have you done to her, you evil witch? Did you hurt her?”

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sp; “There is no need to resort to unkind insults, child. Lady Danvers is quite well. See for yourself.” The queen gestured to a point behind Meg.

  Meg whirled around to see that Jane had been escorted by two guards into the antechamber. Jane looked paler and thinner than Meg remembered, but she appeared unharmed.

  Meg had resolved to present such a brave front to the Dark Queen, icy and controlled. But the sight of Jane was her undoing. She stumbled across the room into Jane’s outstretched arms.

  Jane held her so tight, cradling Meg in her arms, burying her face in Meg’s hair.

  “Oh, Meggie,” was all she could say.

  Meg wished she could remain locked in the safety of Jane’s embrace forever. Her tears wet the front of Jane’s gown.

  “How touching,” the queen drawled.

  Jane raised her head to glare at the queen. “Why did you have to bring Meg here? Why can’t you leave her alone? She is only a young girl.”

  “Oh, Megaera may be many things, but a mere girl is not one of them. Is that not so, my dear?”

  “Yes.” Meg stiffened her spine, drawing away from Jane. She furiously mopped at her eyes before turning back to face the queen.

  “I am sure now you understand how matters stand,” the queen said. “Lady Danvers’s continued well-being is entirely in your hands.”

  “Do not lay that burden upon her,” Jane began, but it was Meg who cut her off.

  “It is all right, Jane,” she said tersely. Any reluctance, any remaining doubts Meg had about carrying out the purpose that had brought her here were at an end. She could feel her heart hardening.

  “What do you want from me?” Meg demanded.

  The queen held up her empty vial. “More of this potion to begin with. After that we will see …”

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  THE DARKNESS OF XAVIER’S CELL WAS UNRELENTING WHEN night fell. The sheer weight of the black chasm that engulfed him seemed to press against his eyes. His body was a mass of aches and bruises, his wrists and ankles raw from his futile efforts to free himself from the manacles that bound his hands and feet.