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The Saint and the Sorcerer

Page 16

by J. C. Hanna


  Amy stepped back, and she held up her hands.

  “You want me to go back to New York to kill myself? With a glass bullet. Presumably using a glass gun of some kind?”

  “You wouldn’t be dead. You would be complete.”

  “Well that’s okay, then,” she said, sardonically. “I’ll just pop through your magic puddle, kill myself, and be home in time for tea.”

  “You will save millions of lives.”

  Amy paused. She had already been through a version of the same argument with Branna. This time was different, but her conclusion was the same.

  “How?” Amy asked, impatiently.

  Rufus stretched out his hand and touched her in the centre of the forehead with a single finger. Amy let out a loud sigh, and she staggered backward. Fragments of information swirled around inside her head like a flock of frightened birds. The knowledge began to calm, and settle, and take on meaning. She stared directly at Rufus for a moment. She moved towards him at speed. She plucked the glass bullet from the air as she paced past him. She suddenly stopped. She turned around to face him.

  “Vade,” Amy said, in a loud, confident voice.

  Amy slipped through the surface of the water. She was sucked downwards by a powerful, unseen vortex. She was gone. The water around where she had vanished rippled gently for a moment, before falling as still and as flat as glass.

  As Rufus turned to leave the chamber, Tarish appeared. The fairy looked down at the scene in the water, and then at Rufus. Alarm spread across the old man’s face.

  “No!” he yelled, at the fairy.

  The tiny creature moved at high speed towards, and then into the water. Rufus rushed to where the fairy had disappeared.

  “What have you done?” Rufus hissed.

  Chapter Forty-four: The Golden Age

  Tilbury, Essex, 9th August 1588

  Elizabeth sat primly atop a grey gelding. She wore a close-fitting dress of white silk, on top of a light suit of armour. She made her way slowly through the ranks of her army. The men had gathered to gaze upon their Queen. She was poised triumphantly, but uncertainty over the position of the Spanish fleet still caused her commanders great concern. The queen herself had not felt concern or fear for such a long time that she barely recognised it in others.

  While preparing herself for the procession, she decided to wear less of Dee’s white concealment on her face than was usual. It gave her a more youthful appearance than her closest associates generally witnessed—none made mention of that obvious fact. To her fighting men, many of whom had never seen her in the flesh before that day, she looked magnificent. She was their champion, their saviour, and their goddess. A true warrior Queen of England.

  Eleven days earlier, in the Straits of Dover, the main body of the Spanish fleet had been defeated. In disguise, and heavily veiled, the queen had, against the urging of Dee and Kelley, boarded a Spanish man-of-war. With two slender blades, she massacred the entire crew before they could raise the alarm. She waited in the captain’s quarters for her accomplices. Dee and Kelley walked into the middle of the room from thin air. Dee was clutching a small barrel tightly to his chest. The queen unveiled, and she smiled widely.

  “I love how you do that, John,” she said. “You must teach me the way of it.”

  Dee shot her a curious glance.

  “That is just what the world has been waiting for,” Dee said, dismissively. “A vampire that can appear at will wherever takes her fancy.”

  Elizabeth frowned.

  “You used to be more fun, John,” she replied.

  Dee carefully set the barrel on the floor. The queen approached the little wooden container. She reached down and stroked it.

  “This, is it?” she quizzed. “And you believe it will be enough? It looks too small and insignificant.”

  “I have tested it extensively,” protested Dee. “It will work. I have taken the most reliable methods for making Greek Fire and refined them into a more than satisfactory process. This mixture is more potent than anything that the world has ever seen.”

  Elizabeth smiled again. She enjoyed teasing Dee even more than she enjoyed teasing Robert Dudley, and she had turned Dudley into a lapdog of utter ridicule in recent years.

  “I believe you, John,” she said, in a salving tone. “It is when you use terms such as, satisfactory process, that I pause to ponder. I was hoping for something more along the lines of, perfect process. I am immortal, if all things remain equal. The sudden, premature combustion of your little barrel is by no means equal.”

  “I believe I said, more than satisfactory,” Dee protested.

  Before she had the chance to provoke him further, Dee took hold of her and Kelley. In an instant, they were standing in an isolated spot on top of the cliffs of Dover. Even with the naked eye, the mass of Spanish ships in the far distance was visible. Without warning, the late evening sky lit-up with a clear, blue flame that originated in the heart of the Spanish fleet. A muted crack from the explosion followed the light of the flame. Fire quickly spread from ship to ship, and those ships on the edge of the inferno scattered this way and that.

  The Queen clapped her hands, and she yelped with joy.

  “Do you hear that?” she asked.

  Dee and Kelley listened intently. Save the sounds of the breaking waves on the rocky shoreline below, and the gentle howl of the stiff sea breeze, they could hear nothing.

  “Is there anything sweeter than the sound of a Spaniard dying in agony?” she beamed.

  The men exchanged looks of concern.

  “And for your next trick?” Elizabeth asked Dee.

  “For my next trick, you need to be back in London,” Dee said, sharply. “You have already been gone for too long.”

  Dee took her firmly by the arm. Elizabeth grew enraged as she tried to shake his grip.

  “I command you, Dee,” she growled. “Your magic may overpower my strength, but your magic only works while you are awake. Withdraw now, or I will visit you one of...”

  Before she could finish issuing her threat, they were back in her chambers at Hampton Court Palace.

  “You take me back this instant!” she snapped.

  Dee vanished. When he reappeared next to Kelley on the clifftop, he was content. Even with her great speed, Elizabeth could not get to Dover before the two men had completed their dark deed.

  Without speaking, Dee and Kelley walked towards the edge of the cliff. They raised their hands and recited the incantation inwardly, just as they had been instructed by their angelic tutor. The mighty body of water in the channel began to rise and fall gently, like the belly of a sleeping giant. The motion began to intensify. The swell grew. The proud Spanish ships began to lose control to the mighty power of the water beneath them. Some collided with one another, splintered, and then sank. The water pushed other ships at great haste towards the French coastline. Obliteration followed as they met the rocks at full sailing speed.

  Suddenly, a mighty wind blew through the channel. Dee and Kelley struggled against the force of nature that they were invoking. The remnants of the Spanish fleet was carried northward by the sustained blast of air. The gale that swept them along did not ease for many hours. It blew long enough to take the enemy past England. If the Spaniards were still in a troublesome mood when the wind eased, then Scotland would have to deal with them. That outcome suited Dee and his Queen.

  That main battle with Spain lasted but a few hours. The huge English army that had amassed on the southern coast to meet with the enemy was troubled by nothing more serious than the odd blistered foot, and alcohol-linked blackeye.

  The rumours of the Spanish returning to England were nonsense. Elizabeth knew that the Spanish were completely defeated as she rode through her men. She also knew that the optics of her perceived bravery would play well, and carry far. She turned to her army to speak.

  “I know I have the body of a weak, feeble woman; but I have the heart and stomach of a king, and of a king of England too, and think
foul scorn that Parma or Spain, or any prince of Europe, should dare to invade the borders of my realm. I myself will be your general, judge, and rewarder of every one of your virtues in the field.”

  John Dee stood close by his Queen as she spoke. As he listened to her words he did not hear the relief and thankfulness of one that had almost been conquered; he heard the words of one intent on conquest. In that moment, he knew that it was time to begin the preparations for her death. She could simply vanish into history, following a staged deathbed scene; or he would bring about her end in a more direct fashion.

  He clapped and cheered as she finished speaking. He exchanged a wide smile with her when her gaze locked with his. A deep sorrow settled into his heart. The seeds of a mighty empire were planted in her mind by Dee. It had been a more innocent time and his empire was intended to be carved out of the vast empty wildernesses in the New World. Dee feared the kind of empire that might emerge with a demon queen at its head. In that moment, as he looked upon her, and clapped, and smiled widely, he knew that his Bess was no more.

  Chapter Forty-five: The Successor

  Richmond Palace, 24th March 1603

  John Dee recognized that it would be no easy task to convince Elizabeth that her time as Queen was coming to an end; but never in his darkest dreams did he imagine that it would take him another two decades to reach that necessary point. Despite the promise that he had made to himself, he never once seriously contemplated forcefully ending her life.

  William Cecil, the son of Robert Cecil, who had passed away five years earlier, stood by the bedside of his dying queen. William spoke softly, but in earnest.

  “Majesty, we must address your great matter.”

  Elizabeth had been lying with her eyes closed. She slowly opened them. The gesture was only a partial lie—she may not have been dying, but she was bored senseless with the genuine concern from those around her. Being constantly asked if there was anything that she needed? Could she be made more comfortable? Was she thirsty? It was endless and she was at her wit’s limit with it all. And then there was the succession. It vexed her greatly to have to hand over power to anyone. She simply no longer cared who that someone was.

  “Soon to be your great matter, William,” she croaked, with cruel delight.

  William sighed. Her obstinacy was legendary. She merely had to utter one name and all the uncertainty would be at an end, and the realm could prepare for the next ruler with clarity. Keep them guessing; string them along—it had been her mantra all her life, and she was too set in her ways for any last-minute change.

  “You worry so, William. You remind me of your father. Another great friend, now gone. So many good friends lost to old age and sickness.”

  “I will press you for an answer, one last time, Majesty. Name your heir. Save the kingdom from unrest and war. A name. One name. For me. For my father’s memory. For England.”

  She closed her eyes and defiantly turned her head away. She enjoyed toying with the young Cecil.

  Her eyes flashed open as William moved to leave.

  “James,” she said. “He may be an odious little turd, but it is his God-given right to rule.”

  William nodded. He was giddy with relief, but it did not show.

  “I will inform the Council, Majesty,” William said.

  As William left the room, Dee and Branna stepped out of the air, by the foot of the bed.

  “What now, in this great deception?” Elizabeth quizzed.

  “I have made all of the necessary preparations,” began Dee. “A suitable corpse has been modified to resemble your Majesty. You will leave with Branna and I will bring in your eternal double. I will then join you. It will take but a moment.”

  “But Ireland,” complained the queen. “Why must it be Ireland? Such a troublesome race. As for the weather… They say that it rains on every day of the year. Twice on Christmas Day.”

  She turned to Branna, and added, “No offence.”

  Branna did not respond. The queen got up from the bed. She moved with the speed and grace of her restored self—a far cry from the ailing character that she had been playing.

  “Aren’t the people there a little dim?” she asked, in the hope of provoking a reaction in the witch.

  Branna glared at her, before grabbing her arm firmly. They vanished.

  A moment later they appeared in the ancient Kingdom of Mourne. They were standing in front of the concealed entrance in the mountainside. Elizabeth shook her arms. She took in her surroundings.

  “It is true what they say about the weather in this land,” she began. “So grey and miserable. It is beyond reason why so many kings of England have spent so much time and treasure trying to tame such a dire territory. It is no prize at all.”

  “You would get no argument from the people of this land, on that score,” Branna said, caustically. “If the kings of England were to spend more time and money in their own land, the people of Ireland will be content to run a little wild for a time. Queens of England too.”

  Branna took her by the arm again. She led the queen through the rock. Where they had been standing, Dee appeared. He looked at the rock. Branna had explained everything to him; though he still felt disinclined to believe all of it. According to the young witch, this moment was important. Dee, or a version of him, had been inside the mountain for hundreds of years. He had to enter that place at some point in time. The moment had arrived. He did not fully understand the complexities of it, but he was certain in some regards. The man that now looked back at him in the mirror each morning was the same old man that he had witnessed in the glass at Hatfield, all those years before.

  The young witch had never misled him. If he did not step through the rock, then all the good that had gone before would be undone. He took a deep breath, stepped forward, and disappeared.

  Chapter Forty-six: Amy’s Death—Part Four

  Amy rose from the water in Turtle Pond. The vortex that had sucked her under suddenly reversed, and then spat her out. Complete focus had set in her eyes. Utterly possessed by knowledge and certainty, she was blind to the question of whose certainty was shaping her deeds. She walked across the surface of the water as if it was firm ground. The glass projectile safely concealed within the clenched fist of her right hand. A short distance in front of her she saw her other self as she walked along the path towards the pond. The carefree version of Amy had no sense of what was about to transpire.

  Amy came to a stop. She raised her hand and released the bullet. The projectile hung expectantly in the air above her hand. The hidden knowledge that Rufus had given to her took complete control of her actions. Unfamiliar words whirled around inside her head until they eventually formed an incantation. The bullet shot off at high speed. Her other self came to a sudden stop as the bullet passed through her body.

  Amy watched herself stagger and fall. It was a terrible moment. It was sad. Sad for the slain her, and for her parents, and for her friends. Yet every fibre of the assassin’s being felt that it was the right thing to do. It was the only thing she could do.

  A line of silvery light passed over Amy’s head as she watched her dying double. The light entered the heavy canopy of a tree next to the fast fading girl. The light moved in a blur through the branches of the tree. The leaves turned brown and then fell. Amy blinked. Tarish was hovering above the fallen girl.

  The hidden knowledge inside her head filled her with a sense of dread—it was a warning without explanation. She did not know what the little creature was trying to achieve, but she knew that it wasn’t meant to happen—or at least, it was not in keeping with the instructions that had taken control of her actions. She was certain that the fairy had to be stopped. She ran towards Tarish. The creature rushed to meet her. As it collided with her she was lifted off the ground. Tarish carried her high into the air. The pair eventually came to land in the pond. They vanished beneath the surface of the water—the mighty vortex pulled them away from the scene of the assassination.

&nb
sp; Amy and Tarish tumbled across the solid water in the Seeing Chamber. The fairy quickly withdrew from the room. Rufus traced its flight with a look of deep annoyance. Rufus moved swiftly to help Amy to her feet. As she stood up, the certainty that had come with the touch from the old man, instantly dissolved. A feeling of emptiness settled in her core. She felt sick.

  “What have I done?” she asked, in a sorrowful tone.

  “What had to be done,” Rufus said.

  Rufus looked down. The Amy in the other place lay still on the ground. Three people had rushed to her aid. It was too late. She was already dead. The naked tree beside her and the carpet of crisp brown leaves marked the spot where she fell. The tree would never again burst into leaf. It would forever be a signpost in time to that terrible moment; the fairy had ensured as much. Rufus understood what that meant, and the great danger that the fairy’s actions could yet bring about.

  “Do you feel any different?” Rufus asked, indifferent to the sorrow that Amy was experiencing.

  “Huh? No… I feel the same,” she said, with mild annoyance.

  Branna and Dee appeared in the middle of the room. Branna was angry from the moment that she materialised.

  “Why did you send us away?” she snapped. “What have you done?”

  Rufus did not respond. As Branna looked down to view the scene in New York, she immediately understood. She rushed to Amy’s side.

  “What do you see when you look at me?” Branna asked.

  Amy paused. She looked hard at the witch’s face.

  “I see… I see you. Just you.”

  Branna turned to Rufus.

  “That girl is dead. And she has died for nothing,” Branna accused.

  As the anger began to get the better of her, Branna could feel the demon inside her rise to the surface. If she stayed, then she would lose all control. She turned around and was gone. Amy looked on helplessly into the space that Branna had once occupied.

 

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