by Kevin Sands
She saw Tom gripping his sword. “If you returned to use that, I’m afraid you’re too late.”
She lifted her hands. They were painted dark in the glow of the embers, the same dark stain swelling on the front of her dress.
My heart sank. “Let me see.”
She waved me off. Red drops flicked from her fingers, spotting the wool of my coat. “No point.”
“A surgeon—” I stopped myself. Where would I find a surgeon? Was there even one in Seaton?
“It wouldn’t help,” Sybil said. “My guests did too good a job.”
“Who were they? Who did this to you?”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“If we’re going to stop the kidnappers,” I said, “I need any evidence I can get.”
“It wasn’t the kidnappers. Quite the opposite.”
The opposite? She must have meant . . . “One of the parents? Of the missing children?”
I remembered what John Morrow had said when we’d visited his village. Allan Cavill says she’s a witch. He says she’s responsible.
“Was it Allan Cavill?” I said. “His friends?”
She coughed and grimaced. Blood stained her teeth. “I will give you no testimony, Baron. It was not the kidnappers who did this, and that is all you need to know. When you have your own children, you will understand.” She sighed. “Why are you here?”
“I . . . I need your help.”
It felt shameful, asking for help while she bled to death in her own home. Still, for the first time since we’d entered, I saw life in her eyes. “You’ve discovered something.”
“The White Lady has nothing to do with the children,” I said. “The kidnapper’s just using her legend as a cover.”
She closed her eyes. “So I suspected. How is he taking them?”
“The river. That’s why there are no tracks. He walks through the water, leaving the snow undisturbed. Once he has the child, he walks back through the river until it’s safe to return to land.”
“Clever,” she said. “Do you know who he is?”
“I think so. He has to be someone the children know and trust.”
She looked at me sharply. “Why do you say that?”
“Because there aren’t any tracks,” I said. “It’s fine for the kidnapper to disguise his path by only walking in the river. But what about the children? They haven’t been leaving tracks, either. That means he hasn’t had to chase them down. They just walk into the river when he calls them. They wouldn’t do that for a stranger. It has to be someone they know.”
I drew a breath. “I think it’s Julian Darcy.”
Sybil looked startled. She hadn’t been expecting that. “Why do you say it’s him?”
I told her of the trap that had been set for us this morning. “We couldn’t see the archer’s face, but he looked to be around Julian’s size. And he’s a hunter; he knows how to use a bow.”
“Many people do. None of that is proof.”
“No, but this is: Julian was the only one who knew we were going to Hook Reddale.”
Sybil listened while I told her what had happened at the Darcy estate. “Sir Edmund wouldn’t tell me where the village was, and his friend Álvaro refused to go there. When Julian tried to warn me off, too, I thought it was because he was scared of the White Lady. Now I realize: He was actually scared I’d discover that there was no White Lady.
“He tried to get me to stop investigating the children’s disappearance. When he saw I wouldn’t, he told me where Hook Reddale was—not to help, but so he could set a trap.
“And there’s more. That blood word I found: Sir Edmund and Álvaro knew what it said. That made sense: They were witch-hunters; they’d studied evil. The thing is, Julian also knew what it said. Because before his father explained what it was, Julian turned his head away. He wouldn’t look at any of us. I thought it was because he was afraid. But now I see: He was ashamed.”
Sybil shook her head. “Julian might not have been the only one who knew you were going to Hook Reddale. He could have told someone else, after you left his room. He could have gone and told his father.”
“Maybe,” I said. “But it wasn’t Sir Edmund who attacked us; his gout won’t let him leave the estate. And it wasn’t Álvaro, either. He’s too tall to be the archer we saw.”
She frowned. “Who is this ‘Álvaro’?”
“Álvaro Arias. He’s an old friend of Sir Edmund’s. An assistant, from his witchfinding days.”
Her expression darkened. She spat, and what came out was mostly blood.
“You didn’t know,” I said.
“I never met the man.”
“Not Álvaro. Sir Edmund. You didn’t know he had gout.”
She said nothing. And the final piece fell into place.
“You thought it was him all along,” I said. “That’s what you meant when you told me only I could solve this puzzle. It wasn’t because I was good at puzzles. It was because the only one who could investigate Baronet Darcy was someone of higher rank than him.”
Sybil smiled, proud, defiant. “I knew you were the one. You weren’t from here, so you hadn’t grown up with the fear of the White Lady. You could face her down—and Edmund Darcy, too. When I saw you’d already begun to crack the mystery, found the blood mark, spotted it was a word . . . I knew it would be you. Because it is Edmund Darcy behind this. It has to be.”
She coughed, even more violently than before. Spasms wracked her body. We leaned in to help her, but there was nothing we could do. She stayed like that, heaving ragged, bubbling gasps until she found her breath.
“You are wrong about Julian,” she said.
“There can’t be anyone else who—”
She held up a hand. “I’m not saying he’s not involved—though if he is, it’s not in the way you think.”
She had to clear her throat. “I know the boy,” she said. “He’s foolish, and his brain is addled in many ways. But he’s not evil. If anything, he’s obsessed with being ‘good.’ I don’t mean ‘a good person.’ I mean a hero of old, like one of King Arthur’s Knights of the Round Table. If Julian really is involved with the children’s disappearance, then I guarantee you: He’s only doing his father’s bidding. The man has convinced his son it’s the noble thing.”
Tom frowned. “How could kidnapping children possibly be noble?”
“I don’t know,” Sybil said. “You’d have to ask the baronet.”
“Why are you so sure it’s Sir Edmund?” I said.
“I know the man. He’s a fraud. And a murderer.”
I stood there, still. “Why would you say that?”
“Because he killed my daughter.”
And although the room was already cold, a new chill filled it, sinking deep into my bones.
“Edmund Darcy is not from Devonshire,” she said. “He used to live in Essex, which is where I lived after I got married. My husband, God rest his soul, died when the plague of thirty-six spread through the land. But, before his passing, he and I had a daughter.
“Her name was Alyson. Oh, Baron . . . she was beautiful. As beautiful and sweet as the summer sun.”
Her voice trailed off. She stayed like that, quiet, her mind lost in gentle memories, until another fit of coughing brought her back.
Sybil wiped her mouth. Her fingers trailed blood across her cheek. “Yes. She was beautiful. But she was cursed. She had the great misfortune to fall in love with the son of a marquess—and the even greater misfortune for him to love her back. For this was a match that could never be.
“The daughter of a local baron, you see, had already set her sights on the marquess’s son. When he told the girl that he loved my Alyson—that he’d rather renounce his title than marry anyone else—she went to Edmund Darcy, witchfinder. She accused Alyson of witchcraft, said she’d cast a spell on the boy. His love for a peasant girl could only have been black magic.”
Sybil grabbed my arm, her grip strengthened by rage. “She was guilty of nothi
ng, Baron. Nothing. I swear on all that is holy, she was no witch. When the bailiffs took her away, I went to Edmund Darcy. I fell to my knees and begged him to see that Alyson was innocent.
“Darcy listened to me. He listened, and he nodded, and he promised me a fair trial. He showed me the needle he would use to prove her innocence. ‘Do not fret, good lady,’ he said. ‘The truth will out. My methods of testing are infallible.’
“So came the trial. I watched as that foul girl spilled her lies, and I waited for Darcy to step forward. When it came time, he grilled Alyson mercilessly. She professed nothing but innocent love.
“Then came the testing. Darcy explained that Alyson had a blemish on her hip which might be a witch’s mark. He could test it, and prove guilt or innocence once and for all. I was not afraid, Baron. It was a birthmark, nothing more!
“Darcy showed us all the sharpness of his pricking needle by plunging it through a strip of thick leather. Then he plunged the same needle into Alyson’s side. But there was no pain. And when he drew the needle out, there was no blood.”
She clenched her fists. “It was impossible. Impossible. Yet it was all the proof the assizes needed. My daughter was dragged away and hanged. I watched her die, Baron. She was only fourteen years old. And I watched her die.”
Sybil lay her head against the hearth and closed her eyes. “They burned her body, afterward, as a witch. Didn’t even leave a grave I could visit. I went to see Edmund Darcy. All he could say was ‘Madam, the test cannot lie.’ But, suddenly, he seemed to have all this money. When he’d first arrived at Colchester, he’d stayed in a meager inn. Now he moved to the most expensive rooms in the city. It was fraud, Baron. He murdered my girl with a fraud. And he did it all to make himself rich.
“I knew, now, what he was. So I began to watch him. And I saw. More and more, he brought accused witches to trial. And always, always, always it was the same: The rich were proven innocent; the poor were always guilty. And when the assizes finally refused to hear any more witch trials, Edmund Darcy left town, his wealth grown without bound.
“I lost track of him—until our king’s return. I saw in the news-letters that one Edmund Darcy of Essex had bought himself a baronetcy and moved far from his crimes, where no one would remember him.
“But I remembered, Baron. I remembered. Now you must remember. For Alyson. For all the girls who died at his hands, and for all the children gone missing. Remember what he is.”
She fell silent. I knelt there, beside her, mind churning.
“I don’t doubt your story,” I said. “But even if Edmund Darcy was a fraud, why would he steal children now? What possible purpose would it serve? And why would he force his own son to do it?”
When she answered, her voice was weak. “I don’t know. All I can tell you is that it must be for money. All Edmund Darcy is loyal to, all he believes in, is money. Find the money, and you will find his guilt.”
She slumped. “Now go. You have my story, Baron. Go and put things right.”
“Wait,” I said. “Please . . . I’ll do as you ask, I swear it. But you have to ask the Spirits to release me from the geas.”
“I can’t,” she said.
“I promise I’ll—”
“I can’t release you, Baron, because the Spirits cast no geas.”
I sat back, stunned. “But . . . you said . . . the storm. The shipwreck. My memories. The Spirits told you—”
“I spoke to no spirits.” She sighed. “I am a sinner, Baron. There are so many sins of which I am guilty. But I know nothing of spirits. I’m just an old healer woman, with a passing knowledge of herbs.”
“But . . . the witches’ marks on Robert’s door. The charm at my feet. You made those. Didn’t you?”
“I made them because the people believe. And if they believe I’m a cunning woman, then maybe it will spare me from being called a witch.”
“No. You knew. You knew things about me. The storm. The shipwreck. The demon. The . . . the Raven.”
“I knew you were in a shipwreck because Robert Dryden told me you were. I knew you were tormented by a demon raven, because when I came at Robert’s call, you screamed about it in Latin, in your dream.”
“But . . . why would you do this to me? Why would you lie?”
“So you’d search for the children. No matter where the hunt took you, no matter how much danger you were in. If you could only save yourself by finding the children, then you would never stop, never rest, until you’d exposed the culprit, and condemned Edmund Darcy.”
She sighed. “Add that to my sins, Baron. I manipulated you with a lie of my own. Perhaps your memories have gone because you are cursed. Or perhaps your memories were taken by your illness, when you lay abed those two weeks. Either way, I had nothing to do with it, and I cannot heal you. I am sorry, Baron. I wish that I could.”
I slumped next to her, crushed by despair. But I asked her no more questions, and she offered no more comfort. We just sat there together, quietly, until the end.
CHAPTER
37
FOREVER, I THOUGHT. THIS IS forever.
I cast those words into my mind as we trudged through the snow. Are you there, Master? Are you listening? Why didn’t you save me? Why didn’t you help?
He wouldn’t answer.
“Are you all right?” Tom said.
I stared into the distance. Nothing but endless snow. “No.”
He shifted Moppet on his shoulders as he walked beside me. “Are you worried about your memories?”
“What memories?” I said bitterly.
“Some of them have returned.”
I didn’t answer.
“Sybil thought maybe you lost them because of your illness.” Tom nodded toward Sally, who followed some twenty feet behind. “Maybe your memories are like her hand. You just have to use them, and they’ll get better.”
“You don’t know that,” I said. “When Sally was injured in Paris, she lost memories, too. Most of them never returned. So what if this is it?” I waved my hands over the hills. “What if this is all that’s left to me? To live the rest of my life as a stranger. No family. No home.”
“You have a home.”
“You mean the shop? Blackthorn? A home isn’t a thing, Tom. It isn’t wood and bricks and mortar. It’s the people in it, and the things that happen there. It’s the place that, even when it’s empty, it’s not really empty, because the memories you have fill it with love. I understand that now. I understand it because I have no memories. And I’m starting to think I never will.”
“I don’t believe that,” Tom said. “You have been remembering things. Little things, yes. But it shows Christopher Rowe is still in there. We’ll help you get the rest of them back, one way or another.”
“And if you can’t?” I said. “What happens then?”
“Then we’ll still be here. Sally. Bridget. Isaac. Even Lord Ashcombe. We’ll help you make new memories, make a new home. And even if all those others fall away, I’ll still be here. We’re friends forever, Christopher. No matter what.”
I looked up at him, at this stranger who’d pushed relentlessly to find me, even when all hope was lost.
And as we walked—for at least a little while—I no longer felt so alone.
• • •
We stood on the banks of the River Axe. As I watched the water flow, I felt like I was watching my own mind: shifting, changing, ever impossible to grasp.
“Which way?” Tom said.
I sighed. “North.”
“North?” Sally said. “You don’t mean . . . back to the Darcy estate?”
Tom looked at me like I’d gone mad. “You do remember Julian tried to kill us, don’t you?”
“Yes,” I said. “And I’m willing to believe what Sybil said about Sir Edmund, too. But if we’re going to stop them, we need proof.”
“You’re a baron,” Sally said. “Any court in the land would take your word over Sir Edmund’s.”
“I’m a pretend
baron. I can’t go to the assizes and tell them I’m an Ashcombe. What happens when we finally go to trial? Besides, for all my suspicions, we don’t really know Julian’s the one who shot at us, or that Sir Edmund’s forcing him to kidnap children. And if they are the ones behind it, we don’t know why, or who else is involved. Álvaro, for example—what’s his role in all this? Is he working with them, or is he in the dark? What about the locals? Do any of them know the truth?” I shook my head. “We need real evidence if we want to put a stop to this.”
They couldn’t argue with that. Still, Sally wondered, “What do you hope to find?”
“I’m not sure. But Sybil claimed Sir Edmund was a fraud. So let’s start there. Let’s see what we can discover at his estate.”
“Hold on,” Tom said. “If they are behind everything, and it really was Julian who shot at us, aren’t they just going to kill us when we return?”
“On the contrary. If they’re the villains, then the estate’s about the safest place we can be.”
“. . . Are you feeling all right?”
“Think about it,” I said. “They could have murdered us in our beds last night. Why didn’t they?”
“You want me to explain the minds of madmen?”
“I don’t think they’re mad. Look, suppose Sir Edmund and Julian are the kidnappers. What if the others in the house—the servants, if not Álvaro—don’t know what’s going on? What would happen, then, if we died in the baronet’s home? How would he explain it? Don’t forget, I told Sir Edmund Lord Ashcombe is coming to get me. What do you think the King’s Warden would do if he arrived only to discover his grandson was murdered at their estate? No, as long as we don’t push them into a corner, our lives there are safe. It’s when we leave the estate we’ll need to worry.”
That did still leave a question, however. I had no idea how to prove Sir Edmund was behind the kidnappings. I wasn’t even sure how to prove his witch-hunting was a fraud.
“I think I need to see that needle again,” I said. “And I need to examine it without Sir Edmund there. We need a distraction.”
“Do you have anything in your sash that would make me sick?” Sally said.