Devon couldn’t answer. Maybe she was right. Dad never did tell him much … and he could have. He could have told him so much. But he didn’t.
He looked over at her. “When he left here, Mrs. Crandall, did he give any indication why? Or of any Nightwing who might have had a child? Namely, me? Rolfe told me that my father said he’d heard that the one-hundredth generation had been born …”
“No, Devon. Thaddeus did not give any indication why he was leaving or where he was going.” The matriarch of the house walked over to the fire and warmed her hands. “In fact, I believe your father sent you here because he knew of our repudiation of sorcery. He knew we’d understand your abilities, but he also knew that we would forbid you to use them.”
“My father never forbade me to use them. In fact, he—”
“None of that matters,” Mrs. Crandall said severely, interrupting him, “because I do. I forbid you to use any magic, any sorcery, from here on in!”
Cecily just looked at Devon anxiously.
Again Devon was not sure what to say. He couldn’t openly defy Mrs. Crandall. It was her house, and she was his guardian. Lowercase.
“Mrs. Crandall,” he said, after a moment’s consideration, “I promise I won’t use my powers except to protect myself or anyone else from demons or Jackson Muir. Is that fair?”
She looked at him warily. “I suppose so. For now.” She brightened. “But I truly believe that such protection will no longer be necessary. Once more, we do not have to fear anything in this house.”
“I hope you’re right, Mrs. Crandall.”
“I am.” She gave Devon a tight smile. “And one other rule still stands, Devon. I do not want any further contact with Rolfe Montaigne.”
“But, Mrs. Crandall—he’s the only one who can tell me more about my Nightwing heritage—”
She scowled. “If you are not practicing sorcery, you don’t need to know.” She seemed exasperated. “Devon. For God’s sake. You’re a high school sophomore. Next semester you’ve said you want to join the track team. You have studies to think about. Algebra, trigonometry. And then college. A career. That’s plenty for a young man.”
“I have a right to know who I am,” he told her. “I believe my father wanted that much for me anyway.”
“Then why did he never tell you?” She crossed the room, placing her hands on the knobs of the double doors of the parlor. “You’ve learned enough. There’s no need to know anything more.” She opened the doors to leave. “And be careful of how much you share with your friends. There are already too many legends of Ravenscliff out there. Let’s not stir the pot any more than we already have.”
She swept grandly out of the room.
When he caught up with the gang at Gio’s later that day, Devon was unsure how much he should say, but he did manage to give them a bare-bones account of the episode with Simon, promising that as he learned more, he’d fill them in. They all took a vow to keep it among themselves.
“But, dude,” D.J. said, “if we’re going to be doing anymore fighting off demons, you got to promise to make us honorary Nightwing again.”
Devon promised. He was glad to hear they’d done a good job convincing the terrified seniors that the fight with the demons had been staged for their benefit. Devon knew he could trust these guys. After just a month, they’d become the best friends he’d ever had.
It was Alexander he wasn’t so sure about. He hadn’t been allowed to see him yet, and he half-expected that when he did, the child would glare up at him with the same malevolence in his round button eyes as ever.
That night, he peered into the boy’s bedroom.
“Alexander?” Devon whispered.
“Devon!” Alexander called happily.
Devon stepped inside the room. “Hey, buddy. Feelin’ better?”
“Yeah. I feel fine.” Alexander was in his bed, reading comic books. Superman. Batman. Justice League. “But Aunt Amanda said I had to stay in bed all day, just to be sure I wasn’t coming down with anything.”
Devon sat down on the edge of his bed. “You remember anything about last night?”
“No. The doctor said I fainted or something.” Alexander tried to recall what happened. “I was waiting for you to go trick-or-treating, but you never showed up.”
“And I’m real sorry for that, Alexander,” he told him.
“I know. I think I remember you telling me that at some point.”
Devon smiled. “I did. But to make up for it, how about if we go into town this weekend and play some video games at the arcade?”
“Cool,” Alexander said.
“We’ll get you out of the house more often. Away from the old boob tube.”
Alexander frowned. “I hate television,” he said.
“Me, too, buddy.” Devon tousled his hair. “I’m glad we’re friends now.”
“Me, too.” Alexander looked over at Devon. “You still promise you’re not going to go away?”
“Still promise, Alexander,” Devon told him. “You can count on that.”
EPILOGUE
The Ravens
“Well, the most bizarre thing of all this is the change in that little monster,” Cecily said as they stood on the terrace, looking out along the cliffs. Several days had passed since Simon’s death, and at last, they were enjoying a peaceful night over Misery Point. “Alexander actually seems human now. You really are a master sorcerer, Devon.”
He laughed. But his eyes were drawn upward toward the roof of the old house. There was motion up there, a sudden flurry of wings in the moonlight.
“Cecily,” Devon whispered, pointing. “Look.”
Ravens.
They had returned.
They settled down, one by one, dozens of them, taking up their posts once more. Enormous, proud black birds with piercing, shining eyes.
They had left when the Nightwing were gone from Ravenscliff. Devon smiled. Now they’d returned—because the Nightwing had come back as well.
“Well, since you’re such a sorcerer,” Cecily said, “maybe you’ve cast a spell on me.”
“Cecily,” Devon said. “I like you a lot. But sometimes I still worry …”
She frowned. “That I’m your sister? Oh, Devon, that’s crazy. Wouldn’t the Voice tell you if that was so?”
“I would think so,” he said. The Voice always warned him of danger, and surely that would count as danger. Still, Devon wished he could banish all those lingering little nagging doubts from his mind. It would make kissing Cecily a lot more fun.
But surely putting his arm wouldn’t be a problem. They stood that way for a while, looking up at the ravens. And then Devon spotted something else in the upper reaches of the great house.
A light in the tower.
“Cecily,” he said, pointing again. “Look.”
She saw it.
“Still that light,” Devon said, shaking his head. “What does it mean?”
Then they heard something, too, from behind them.
The sobbing.
Stepping back into the parlor, they listened as the long wailful cries echoed across the marble of the great house.
“Some things don’t change,” Cecily said, sighing.
That was for sure.
After Cecily had gone up to bed, Devon sat in the darkened parlor, lit only by the light of the fire, pondering all the things he still didn’t know. What was the light in the tower? What did the sobbing mean? Who was the old woman who had saved him from Jackson on the tower?
And while Jackson was gone, could they be sure he’d never find a way back? What did the story of Jackson’s life—and the lives of all those who had lived here in this house—have to do with the mystery of Devon’s own past? Who was Clarissa Jones? Who was the boy in the portrait who looked so much like him? Who was buried under the gravestone marked DEVON?
Simon had hinted at knowing some of those answers—and Jackson, too. But their secrets had gone back with them to their graves. Would Devon ever l
earn what they were?
And what of his Nightwing heritage? Forbidden access to Rolfe, how could Devon find out the history of his people? Dad’s ring might tell him some things, but he’d need help in understanding them. Would he forever be made to go behind Mrs. Crandall’s back to find out the truth?
Behind him, he heard a footstep.
Devon stood, peering into the darkness.
“Who’s there?” he asked.
There was no one. Perhaps he was wrong. Perhaps this was one time that a creak in the old house really was just the wind.
Devon took a step forward to head up to bed.
Just as a hand burst from the shadows and grabbed him by the throat.
CONTINUED IN BOOK TWO, DEMON WITCH
More from The Ravenscliff Series...
Demon Witch
Book Two - The Ravenscliff Series
PROLOGUE
The Burning of a Witch
A.D. 1490
It took sixteen loads of peat and fifty bundles of fresh green wood to burn a witch.
“When it’s green,” the Guardian explained to the boy, “it burns longer.”
Men with shirtsleeves rolled up their hairy arms were laying the wood around the stake. The square was thronged with people cheering them on in their task. The execution of traitors, after all, was always a great public occasion, and a burning at the stake was the most festive of all. All around the bedazzled boy, vendors in silly jester’s hats hawked roasted chestnuts and steaming fried apples. Spider monkeys turned somersaults while their owners played merry little tunes upon their lutes.
“There!” someone from the crowd called out. “There she comes!”
A shout rose up as the cart carrying the witch trundled into view over the cobblestone road. “Burn the she-devil! Burn the witch! Burn! Burn! Burn!”
The boy turned, his eyes wide.
But Isobel the Apostate looked back at all of them with only a cold, quiet disdain. Her black eyes flashed as the crowd parted to make way for her cart. Strong men fell to the ground at the sight of her, overcome by her terrible beauty. If not for her wrists being bound by that strange golden chain, the boy knew they would all be in great danger. Yet bound as she was, the witch could no longer harm them, no longer summon the demons from the Hell Hole to do her bidding, the demons which would terrorize the villages of northeastern England no more.
Her green velvet dress was torn and soiled. Her black hair was loose, tumbling down to her waist in great disarray. Once, Isobel the Apostate was a noble lady with a vast estate who claimed descent from the blood royal, who dared to quarter her arms with those of King Henry the Fourth. For such audacity alone, the judges decreed she should die.
But there were sins far worse than treason.
“Look, over there,” the boy’s Guardian pointed out to him. “Do you see that man? The one with no legs, propped in the chair? ’Twas under his home that the witch discovered the Hell Hole. Without any regard to him who lived there, she opened the portal between this world and the one below.” The Guardian paused. “You see the result. The man is fortunate. His wife and sons did not survive the cataclysm.”
“But the golden chain…?”
“It has the power to keep her from escaping, from turning all of us here into toads and rats and skunks.” The Guardian lifted his eyes to the gray, cloudy sky. “At least, I pray that it does. I pray that the noble Sorcerers of the Nightwing, God be praised, have at last found the means to contain her.”
The boy watched as the witch was led from her cart to the center of the square. The crowd surged forward. Insults and curses rained down upon the woman, whose neck now began to snap back and forth, finally reacting to the taunts of the crowd. Her teeth gnashed wildly. She growled, hissing like a cat cornered by a pack of angry dogs.
“Get up there, boy,” the Guardian told him. “You must bear witness.”
Two platforms stood to the right of the square. They were filled with men from the King’s Court. Statesmen and clerics. The Archbishops of York and Canterbury. The Duke of Norfolk. They had all come to see the destruction of Isobel the Apostate, the most feared sorceress in all of Europe, a lady whose courtiers were not knights and gentlemen but the very beasts of hell.
Shoved toward the pillory by her guards, Isobel was forced onto her knees to face her judges. A pointed hat was placed on her head, on which is inscribed the words: Heretic, Witch, Apostate. Her death sentence was proclaimed, and a cheer rose from the crowd.
“Will she be allowed to speak?” the boy asked, looking up at his Guardian.
“Oh, no. For all that the last words of the condemned have long been a tradition in this realm, Isobel the Apostate is far too dangerous a prisoner. Even secured by the golden chain, what terrible catastrophe might she bring down upon us with her final words?”
But though she might be denied speech, the witch could still scream.
It was a horrible sound, and many in the crowd covered their ears. The witch’s screams echoed like those of a banshee off the walls of the square. Forcibly she was led to the pyre, snarling and twisting all the way.
“It wasn’t supposed to end like this, you see,” the Guardian explained, leaning down and whispering to the boy. “It was supposed to end with Isobel crowned as Queen of England. From there, with the English navy at her command, it would have been an easy step for her to rule the world, the demons of the Hell Hole at her side.”
The boy watched as the witch was pushed up the steps of the platform to the stake.
“But twas her own kind who turned her over to the King. Her own Nightwing brethren looked upon her evil and trapped her. It was they, far more than any of the King’s men, who consigned her to this fate. And do you know why it was done so, boy?”
The boy’s eyes remained riveted on the witch.
“Because true power can never be found through the pursuit of evil,” the boy replied, never removing his gaze. “True power comes only from good.”
His Guardian smiled.
“Yes, boy. You have learned well. You will make a noble sorcerer. Now watch. And learn from the death of the Apostate.”
Isobel was tied to the stake with the same kind of golden chain that bound her wrists. Her black eyes continued to flash, looking at each and every face in the crowd, as if committing them all to memory.
Her gaze fell upon the boy.
He gasped, pulling back from the power he saw there.
Her eyes danced as she took in the sight of him. She laughed, a cackle the boy would not soon forget. On his shoulder the grip of his Guardian tightened. “Fear her not,” the Guardian whispered. “Her time has come.”
The executioner lit the wood piled up around the base of the stake. Once more, Isobel the Apostate screamed.
“Think not that I perish here!” the witch cried out into the crowd, defying the order against speech. “Think not that you have won!”
The boy felt his Guardian’s hand tremble.
“This is not the end of Isobel!”
The flames sprung into roaring life, caught by the peat. Like malevolent imps, they popped and crackled and jumped upward. A spark ignited the witch’s dress.
“She burns!” someone in the crowd shouted.
The fire below her grew in heat and intensity. It was so strong that even several feet away the boy and his Guardian could feel it on their faces. Thick sheets of pitchy smoke appeared, obscuring their view. Soon the whole square was as black as night, and the crowd began coughing, turning away from the pyre. The foul stench of burning flesh assaulted their senses. From the heart of the darkness the witch screamed again. It was taken by many as her cry of death.
“So must perish all of the King’s enemies!” proclaimed the executioner.
But then the wind shredded the smoke, and there was a glimpse of the witch. The boy could see her, with her arms upstretched, free of her chains, as the flames consumed her body. Her eyes were wide and she was smiling.
“Does she p
erish?” the boy asked his Guardian, tugging at his robe. “Does she really perish?”
The Guardian did not reply.
Later, when the flames had died down, there was nothing left of the body of Isobel the Apostate. The King’s men declared that so great was the fire that the witch was consumed completely, reduced to mere cinder and ash.
But the Nightwing knew better.
For the boy reported to them that as he watched, the witch transformed herself into a great bird, a creature of gold with a tremendous wingspan that rose majestically above the flames with a resounding call of triumph. Then the bird diffused with the smoke, disappearing into the gray skies over the square.
“Like a phoenix,” the boy’s Guardian said, a great and shattering awe in his voice, “Isobel the Apostate has risen from the flames to live again.”
DEMON WITCH is available from all major ebook retailers.
Acknowledgments
Thanks to everyone at Diversion Books for bringing the stories of Devon March and the Nightwing back to life. Thanks also to Malaga Baldi and Tara Hart. And thanks to all the readers who have waited so long for this series to continue. I want to hear from you. Write to me at [email protected].
—G.H.
@HuntingtonGeoff
www.Facebook.com/Geoffrey.Huntington
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Sorcerers of the Nightwing (Book One - The Ravenscliff Series) Page 29