The river was ahead, a dark rolling mass at the end of the street, just visible between buildings under the light of the moon. I could hear faint shouts from the riverfront.
I straightened and staggered on at a walk, still breathless but thinking hard. To my right rose the high towers of Whitehall, guards on the side gates, the empty courtyard beyond illuminated by flaming torches. The palace guardsmen stared as I passed, one shouting an insult that I ignored. No doubt they thought me a woman of the streets, selling her body for a few meagre shillings, struggling to survive in this city.
Gritting my teeth, I began to run.
I tracked Marcus down on the dark waterfront, just where Cecilie had told John Dee he would be. A small river craft bobbed at anchor behind him, its sail already hoisted, torches in brackets lighting the deck, no one on board. I guessed that Marcus planned to sail it himself, using the powerful outgoing tide to sweep him swiftly away from London.
I was surprised that he would leave his prize so readily, the seer he had tortured for so many months. But the witchfinder’s mind was a maze with many vile, convoluted twists and turns. I did not understand him, nor did I seek to.
I just had to stop him.
But what I found at the dockside was Robert Dudley also on foot, threatening Marcus with a sword, and my terrified brother, suspended in mid-air above the dark water by a magickal spell.
‘Marcus!’ I yelled, stumbling along the wooden dock towards them. ‘Let him go!’
Marcus whipped round at the sound of my voice. Fury chased hatred across the falsely handsome face.
‘A fine trick you played on us up there at the house, Meg,’ he sneered. ‘Queen Mary, indeed! But I do not begrudge you the seeress. I had already taken everything she had to give. The slattern is nothing to me now, you may keep her.’
‘Thank you,’ I said drily.
‘And this ring is a curious object. Many hundreds of years old, by the look of it.’ His gaze flicked cautiously to Robert Dudley. Then the witchfinder held up the ring to show me, glinting between thumb and forefinger. ‘Invictus. As deadly to the wearer as it is protective, according to the seer.’
In the torchlight his magickal visage looked almost young again: intelligent blue eyes, fair hair shining sleekly. I wondered what he might have been without the hatred, without the dark centre that had destroyed him as a man and made him into this monster.
‘An interesting dilemma, is it not?’ Marcus mused, smiling at me. ‘For every prize there must be a price.’
I had been wearing the ring outside his house, I realized, when he had pushed me down with his foul boot. The ring had brought that upon me. For if he had tried to use a spell, it would have failed. With clenched fists, I watched my enemy admire my mother’s legacy, and wondered if the ring itself had betrayed me.
‘When I have killed your brother, and this gallant fool here, there will only be the Lady Elizabeth left to destroy. Oh, and your little friend, the Spaniard.’ Marcus lowered the ring, and looked at me gloatingly. ‘Though Señor de Castillo has returned to Spain for his wedding, I believe. Such a shame. I thought you two would make a match of it.’
He was laughing at me. Mocking my agony, my loss, my failure.
‘But you need not die,’ he said, his voice sharpening. ‘Leave these fools and come with me. I will teach you more than your mother’s spell book will ever do.’
My mother’s grimoire. So he knew about that too?
He read my thought. ‘Yes, Cecilie saw everything at Hatfield, which means I know everything too. She is – or rather, was – a very talented seer. But sadly broken now. Past her prime. I would not want you to share her fate, Meg.’ His voice dropped to a whisper, barely audible over the lapping of water against the jetty. ‘Come with me and share my power instead. You will find me a generous and attentive master.’ He was almost hissing now, his eyes flickering with venom. ‘I shall not abandon you as he did.’
I understood at once what he was offering me, and the bile rose in my throat. My hand tightened on my wand and I saw his sharp blue gaze drawn to it, suddenly greedy, intent.
‘If you will not come with me, then you must give me your mother’s wand. I have the ring; now I want the wand. Come, Meg, don’t tempt me to drown your brother. The Thames runs deep and fast here. He would not stand a chance.’
He was still holding the ring; the ring that had belonged to my mother, and ought by rights to belong to me.
‘Last time of asking, Meg. You will not join me in power?’
I shook my head, contempt in my face.
His mouth tightened, and I caught a flicker of frustration in his eyes. Not as confident as he wished to appear, perhaps. ‘Then it is time for me to kill your brother, just as I killed your aunt. I expect he will die screaming too.’
Bitter fury exploded in me at this mockery, laughing at my aunt’s cruel death. How dared he?
‘Desiste!’ I shouted, putting all my anger and hatred and despair behind the spell.
To my astonishment, a crack of lightning seemed to leap from my wand, striking Marcus Dent full in the chest. Abruptly the spell was broken and William plunged with a hoarse cry into the river.
‘No!’ I spun, wand in hand, and used magick to drag him out of the rolling current, then flew him – dripping wet and gasping – onto the wooden jetty, where he collapsed, Robert Dudley kneeling swiftly beside him.
‘I will tend your brother,’ Robert said grimly, shaking his head when I ran forward, frantic to help. ‘You take care of the witchfinder. Look!’
I turned, following his gaze. On the very edge of the jetty Marcus was swaying, a dark figure against a dark river. For a moment he just stared at me, blue eyes stretched wide with pain.
‘Meg,’ he mouthed, his expression almost plaintive. Then his face shifted, rapidly changing, his skin pale and coarse, and suddenly it was as though a cover had been pulled away to reveal a cage of freakish horrors within. As his control slipped, the blind eye grew white and dead again, and the scars once more gleamed cruelly in the moonlight.
His lips drew back in a grimace of surprise and Marcus fell backwards into the river, the Invictus ring tumbling from his relaxed fingers. His body hit the water with a loud splash, then there was no sound but the river rolling by.
He was gone. And so was my mother’s ring.
Robert Dudley ran forward at once, staring down into the black current.
William was still lying face-down on the jetty. Throwing myself to my knees beside him, I shook him. None too gently either, for I was terrified of losing him too.
‘Speak to me, Will!’
My brother started to choke as I shook him, then suddenly rolled over, still spluttering, a trail of green weed on his face, his eyes bloodshot. Foul river water drained out of the corner of his mouth. He coughed, trying to spit out the last of it. ‘M . . . Meg?’ He struggled to sit up, still coughing, but I restrained him. ‘Where is Dent?’
‘Half a mile or so downstream by now, I would say.’ Robert Dudley had come up behind us. He sheathed his sword, his voice calm. ‘The current is flowing quickly tonight, and when a man is dead, he travels fast.’
‘Dead?’ I stared up at Robert Dudley, feeling numb.
‘I saw his face as he fell. Whatever you did to him, his heart had stopped beating before he went into the river, I would swear it.’ Robert raised his brows at my expression. ‘That was your intention, was it not?’
I took William’s hand and squeezed it, so thankful that he was still alive I could not get everything clear in my head. Had I intended to kill Marcus Dent tonight? I had yelled ‘Desiste!’ which meant ‘Stop!’ in Latin, and hit my enemy in the chest.
And his heart had stopped.
‘But he had the ring,’ I whispered.
‘Holding it, not wearing it.’ Dudley crouched beside us. ‘Perhaps the witchfinder did not understand that it would only protect him when it was on his finger.’
‘Perhaps.’ I stared dully at the
river. ‘And now my mother’s ring lies at the bottom of the Thames.’
William spat out a thin strand of green weed, a look of disgust on his face, and struggled to sit up. His wet hair was plastered across his forehead, almost in his eyes. He thrust it back impatiently. ‘Who cares?’ my brother demanded hoarsely. ‘He’s dead, it’s over. Did we save the girl?’
‘I . . . I think so.’
‘Good, then let’s go home.’ William looked about himself at the darkness, the river, the wet jetty. His lip curled up. ‘I do not like London.’
CHAPTER TWENTY
Bladderwrack
‘Take the juice of two dead toads—’ I made a face. ‘Disgusting. Why does it always have to be toads?’
‘Read on and stop complaining,’ Richard muttered from under the brim of his floppy straw hat.
I sighed, finding the place again in my mother’s grimoire. ‘Take the juice of two dead toads that have been dried three days on a hot brick . . . Wait, that’s wrong. Powdered toad. Yes, sorry, wrong spell. That was for stopping a wound from bleeding.’
‘Huh, that could have proved useful when Alejandro was wounded.’ He sounded impatient. ‘Have you not studied all the spells in that book? I told you, there’s little point finding a remedy after you needed it.’
I said nothing, holding my breath for a count of ten, then letting it go slowly. I had frozen at the name Alejandro.
Very carefully, no one had mentioned Alejandro since we returned from London a bare month ago, though now and then Elizabeth spoke warmly of the ‘sacrifices’ that made us better people. But it was ludicrous to shrivel up inside every time I thought of a certain Spaniard. Alejandro was gone from my life, and so was Marcus Dent. I was free of all past ties, good and bad.
I had to admit, it was odd to think that Marcus Dent would never trouble me again. Of course, Richard had his doubts about that, and despite being confined to his bed for many days after Dent’s attack had quizzed me at length over the circumstances of the witchfinder’s death.
But I was the one who had struck him, and knew my spell had connected. Marcus Dent was dead. And it was time I began to live again. Even if that meant learning to smile even after hearing Alejandro’s name.
So I forced my lips into a mimicry of a curve. It felt hard. But worth the effort if it concealed my broken heart.
‘I’ve been too busy,’ I explained huskily, pretending to leaf through the pages, ‘for I still wish to learn more natural magick from Cecilie while she is still with us. She must return home soon, of course, now she is feeling stronger.’
I glanced at him curiously, for Richard and Cecile had grown close over the past weeks. Though that was not surprising, for both had power and had spent long hours together as their hurts healed.
‘Will you miss her when she goes?’ I asked softly.
Richard pushed back the brim of his straw hat to stare at me. His eyes were hard but ironic. ‘Hoping to push my affections onto some other woman, Meg?’
‘I thought perhaps it had happened already.’
He shrugged, closing his eyes again, his arms folded loosely across his chest. ‘I like Cecilie, I will not deny it. But I have promised Master Dee that I will return to his service as soon as Bishop Bonner releases him from his duties. I cannot be in two places at once, so to tie myself to another person would be foolish. Besides,’ he added calmly, ‘you forget I am not a free man. I am still Dee’s apprentice and bound to him under law.’
‘John Dee would let you go if you asked,’ I murmured, but did not pursue the matter. I knew his affection for Dee to be as strong as mine for the Lady Elizabeth, and that was a bond I too would find hard to break.
‘Spells to repel evil spirits,’ he reminded me.
Turning back to the grimoire, I searched through the pages. ‘Oh, here’s one. Burn two small coals in a copper dish when the moon has been new three days. When the coals have cooled, take nine pinches of ash and scatter them across the threshold at noon. This will attract friendship and good luck to your house, and repel ill will.’
‘That’s a love-spell,’ he said contemptuously, and sat up, holding out his hand. ‘Give me the book. I will find the spell.’
‘No, it’s mine,’ I insisted childishly, and jumped to my feet, clutching the grimoire to my chest. ‘Anyway, why do we need to repel evil spirits? Marcus is dead. The Queen has lost interest in persecuting her sister now that King Philip may be coming back to England, and we have added to Mistress Goodwife’s protective ring around the house. We are safe from all threats here.’
Glaring up at me, Richard made the sign to avert bad luck. ‘You never learn, do you? Have you forgotten that small thing called tempting fate? It is never possible to defend a place completely. There is always a counterspell for those determined enough to find it.’
I heard laughter, and looked up in relief to see Cecilie and Alice slowly crossing the lawns towards us, my brother in tow. I did not like arguing with Richard, so seized on this excuse not to answer him. William was looking sheepish, I noticed, perhaps because he had an armful of cushions.
‘Here,’ Alice instructed him, pointing. ‘And you can sit there. By your sister.’
‘Thanks,’ I said drily, and made a rude face at William, who stuck out his tongue in turn.
William had returned from London a changed man, more ready to laugh at himself, and less quick to take offence. Perhaps his encounter with Marcus Dent had proved the making of him.
‘But I thought you two were hanging that new tapestry this afternoon. Is it done?’ I asked them.
Alice smiled, settling herself demurely on the cushion and pulling Cecilie down beside her. ‘Not quite. We came out because . . .’ She glanced shyly at William. ‘Your brother has some news he wishes to share with you, Meg.’
I stared. ‘William?’
My brother grinned. ‘Wish me happy, Meg. I have asked Alice to marry me, and she has said she will speak to her father. If he gives his consent—’
‘Which he will,’ Alice interrupted quickly, ‘or there will be trouble about it!’
Everyone laughed, even Richard from under the brim of his hat.
‘Then we will marry next summer. I wrote to Father last week and received his reply today. He has agreed to let us rent the small cottage from him, up near Home Farm. The farm will be mine when he dies, of course, but until then the cottage will make a cosy home for the two of us.’
I hurried to embrace him, tears in my eyes. ‘I do wish you happy, William. With all my heart.’
‘And I wish you happy too.’ Richard pushed back his hat and held out a hand for William to shake, for although he had recovered from his injuries, he was still meant to be convalescing. The two shook hands, Richard’s smile lopsided. ‘One day you must show me how to do that.’
‘Do what?’
‘Persuade a woman to take you on. And such a man. I fear Alice will have a hard task ahead, smoothing off your rough corners.’
William pretended to curse, but was laughing all the same. ‘Well,’ he said awkwardly, ‘there is always Meg. She would make you a good wife, though perhaps not a biddable one.’
Richard stilled, as did I.
No, I thought, and winced inwardly.
Alice looked aghast at her new betrothed, then covered her face with her hands, shaking her head.
‘I thank you for that kind recommendation, sir, and will take it into consideration when I am ready to lose my liberty,’ Richard said lightly, a smile on his face, but his gaze had moved past me to where Cecilie sat listening to our lively conversation, her fair head bent.
Since being brought back from London with us, Cecilie had settled into Hatfield with gratitude after her imprisonment, but it was obvious to me why she had remained here so long after her hurts had healed. She was hoping for some sign from Richard that he was interested in more than just friendship.
She would have a long wait, I thought sadly. Richard was not easy. Not easy at all.
&nb
sp; William was frowning. ‘Forgive me if I spoke out of turn,’ he said, looking at me.
‘You are forgiven.’ I closed the grimoire. ‘Enough reading for one day. Does the Lady Elizabeth need me?’
Alice shook her head. ‘No, she is reading with Kat and Blanche. Some great dusty tome on the government of nations.’
Richard crooked a brow. ‘Sounds delightful.’
‘Well, it’s better than love poetry, the way she suffers. Poor Lady Elizabeth, I caught her crying this morning. She was very cold with me afterwards.’ Alice sighed, shaking her head. ‘She is taking it hard.’
‘Master Dudley, you mean?’ I asked quietly, for it was plain now that her ladyship had dissolved the knot between them in London. It was a pain I could perfectly understand, though I had only noticed how the princess had drawn away from us all since returning from her brief visit to court. It was almost as though the Lady Elizabeth had finally seen the crown within her reach, and was now determined to think of nothing else – not even the man she loved but could never have. ‘At least she will see him again one day. He has not left the country.’
I had intended to go inside and sit in my bedchamber for a while. It was something I did most afternoons if I was not needed for my duties. Sitting alone in my room, not thinking about . . . Well, just sitting alone.
But to my surprise, Cecilie was looking up at me. ‘Shall we take a walk? I was hoping to talk to you, Meg.’
My mother’s grimoire still clutched to my chest, I followed her slowly across the lawns and into the well-kept herb garden. The fragrance was intense there in the afternoon sun, almost dizzying. I stopped to break off some delicately scented thyme, handing it to her.
‘Good for speaking with spirits,’ I said, as she bent her head to sniff at the dark green spikes. ‘Dried, ground into powder, then burned in small pinches in a censer.’
‘Not bad in rabbit stew either.’
I grinned.
‘What did you want to talk about, Cecilie?’ I asked, pausing beside the sweet marjoram to drag out a thin straggling weed from near its base.
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