The Scarlet Dragon (The Witching World Book 5)

by Lucia Ashta

  I sighed, less noticeably this time, and tried another approach. “And why is this magician meeting us in Dillbasin?”

  “Well, if he can make it, it’s to help our little darling Gertrude.”

  I petted Gertrude, running my hand along the fine ginger fur. It had been a long time since I’d seen her in the body with which she was born. “This magician can transform Gertrude back to her real body?”

  Mordecai joined Grand-mère and Sir Lancelot at the window, glancing down. “He may be able to. But he might not. Still, he might have a better chance at it than any of us, my child.”

  Grand-mère nodded her agreement, but I startled. “You cannot change Mina back into Gertrude?” I asked Mordecai. “But you are a great and skilled magician!”

  Humility formed into a careful expression on the aged face. It smoothed the wrinkles around his eyes and stilled the jangling of the beads in his beard. But humble or not, the truth was the truth. “You are right, child. I’m skilled and have worked hard throughout my long life to learn great magic. However, transfiguration is a very complicated process, and it’s most helpful to have a natural inclination toward it. It’s somewhat similar to the binding of another magician’s magic in that it’s easiest for the magician who cast the spell to undo it.

  “Since in this case the magician responsible for Gertrude’s transfiguration is Washur, who is highly unlikely to want to transform her back, and whose magic is bound besides, we need to try something else. Thankfully, transfiguration isn’t precisely like binding magic since another magician can reverse the spell. The magician must be very skilled at transfiguration to undo a spell that someone else has cast, especially when the magician casting it is someone as powerful as Washur.”

  “I see,” I said. “And this magician that we are hoping is coming to meet us is very skilled in transfigurations?”

  “Oh, yes. He’s the best. Even better than I am,” Grand-mère said. “If anyone can undo Count Washur’s spell, it’s him.”

  I ran my hand along Gertrude’s back again, dreamily wondering at what it would be like to reunite with my beloved little sister in the flesh again.

  “Until we know whether he can make it or not, we wait,” Mordecai said.

  “All right,” I said. It was a good reason to wait, and now that I knew it, I wouldn’t mind waiting. But I flashed my own mischievous smile then. If I was going to have to wait, I would do my best to get some of the answers I sought in the meantime. “Since we have the time to spare then, Grand-mère, will you please tell me what happened? Why did we think you dead? Where have you been all this time?”

  Grand-mère shared a look with Mordecai before looking toward me. She held my gaze for a long, drawn out breath, considering. “I suppose you are right, ma chérie. It’s time for you and Gertrude to know the truth.”

  Grand-mère came over to where I was and slid to the floor on the other side of the unconscious patients. “There’s no way to make this brief,” she said on a heavy sigh, then put a hand on Sylvia’s underbelly, uncommonly exposed in a symbolic statement of her vulnerability.

  Mordecai and Sir Lancelot continued to keep watch from the window while Grand-mère sat tall and poised, just as Mother would have admired. She was clearly a lady, even if she leaned against a faded wall with chipped plaster in a neglected house in an overlooked town.

  Then, she began.

  Chapter 8

  Everyone in that sunlit room devoid of furniture listened to every one of Grand-mère’s words. Even if her story hadn’t been interesting, her elegant demeanor drew every set of eyes toward her, not wanting to miss a single utterance of those curving lips. I wondered if perhaps even Marcelo and Sylvia were listening, rapt within, despite the apparent sleeping state of their bodies, and how this woman was mother to my mother. It seemed as if the two women couldn’t be any more different. I never wanted to hear anything Mother said. It was always nonsense, rules of a life in which I had no interest.

  “To begin, I feel that I owe you and your sister an apology, Clara. Your other sisters too, although I doubt I’ll see them anytime soon. Perhaps I’ll never see them again at all.” Grand-mère stared off into the openness of the room, looking at nothing in particular, the scenes of her mind part of a past that no longer existed. “I imagine it’s all right as it is, at least this bit of it. Your other sisters didn’t connect with me the way you and little Gertrude did. I see now it’s because you, Gertrude, and I are alike, beyond the red hair and amber eyes that your other sisters don’t share. I had to fake my death, you see, ma chérie, because of your mother. I imagine your father had quite a large say in the matter as well.”

  I waited through the pregnant pause. This was a story I had no desire to interrupt.

  “Your mother threatened that she would tell everyone that I was a witch if I didn’t leave her life—and your lives—forever.”

  I gasped. I should have realized that Mother must have known about her mother’s abilities, yet somehow it had seemed an impossible conclusion. My mother knew nothing of magic. In fact, she had gone to great lengths to make sure I never came in contact with any ideas of magic. My childhood exposure to magic consisted of dire warnings of the dangers and evils of magic. “Mother… knew?”

  Grand-mère threw her head back in sumptuous yet sardonic laughter. “Of course your mother knew, darling. She’s my daughter.”

  I stared at Grand-mère, wide-eyed.

  “Yes, yes, I know. We are not alike.”

  “You are as different as any two people I know,” I said.

  “Perhaps we are, chérie. Yet perhaps we are not. She always knew I was a witch. I raised her in the ways of magic as best I could, as it was given to me, as my mother raised me in it.”

  Something was beginning to dawn on me, slowly, the realization that my world would change—again. “But Mother hates magic,” I protested.

  “Yes, yes she does.” I watched Grand-mère closely, seeing an old sadness cross her eyes before it left again, like an old shadow dispelled by the brilliant light of the sun. “But she didn’t always hate it. When she was a girl, she loved it. She and her brother couldn’t get enough of my demonstrations of magic.”

  “Her brother?” I whispered.

  “Yes. Your mother had a brother.” Grand-mère’s words slowed. “He was a year younger than her, my Auguste. He was precious. He looked just like me, you know. Not like your mother, who looks like my former husband’s family. Auguste looked just like me, and he had magic like me. Actually, greater than me. My magic is limited to certain things, you see. I’m particularly good at magic with animals, and I’m especially good at magic with magical creatures, like dragons and firedrakes,” Grand-mère said with a pointed look at the opalescent firedrake beneath her palm.

  “Auguste and Gianne were great friends, always together. After all, a year between them wasn’t much, and they liked all the same things at all the same ages, even if they were a girl and a boy. Auguste began showing signs of his ability very early on. He might have been only two when I first realized that he was doing magic of his own. I came into the nursery to discover his dragon doll floating above his crib while he slept.

  “But Gianne, your mother, was different. Her magic didn’t develop early on like Auguste’s. In fact, at the time of Auguste’s death, it still hadn’t shown itself. Once Auguste died, I think your mother’s heart broke. Her magic would never develop then. She began hating everything related to magic. I think her young mind might have blamed magic for Auguste’s death. Gianne was still quite young when Auguste died. She was only nine.

  “We never discovered what killed him. It was so sudden and there were no signs that he was ill. One day, Gianne found him out in the gardens where they liked to play, and he was dead. After that, Gianne changed. She hated everything and everyone for a long while. And she hated me most of all.”

  “But why? It wasn’t your fault that her brother died.”

  “No, it wasn’t. But she blamed magic for
Auguste’s death, and I was whom she associated with magic. My husband wasn’t magical. Only I was. And Auguste.

  “Life was tumultuous for Gianne from that moment on, and she never trusted me again. She lived out her life at the house as if it were a prison sentence. When my husband decided it was time to marry her away, she left gladly for Norland. There, she embraced everything non-magical, everything she considered stable and predictable.

  “I attended her wedding at Norland Manor, but she made it clear to me on that day that she didn’t want to see me often. I let her be until you were born, and then I began to visit when she’d allow it, always under the severe warning that I wasn’t to discuss magic or allow any of you to witness magic. I watched her grow ever more intent on the life of nobility. She gave all her time to the rituals of our class. It wasn’t long before she grew more intolerant of my presence there, even if I made sure it wasn’t too frequent and that I didn’t reveal my magic.

  “The last time I visited, I knew it would be my last. Gianne was terribly upset about something that had happened with you. She didn’t tell me what it was, but I suspected you may have shown signs of magic. Gianne was furious with me. She went on and on about how terrible an influence I was on all of you. She said I could never see any of you again.”

  Grand-mère paused and trained her eyes on the vague space in the middle of the room again, where painful memories came to life. “I protested saying it wasn’t only my right to see my grandchildren, but that it was also important that I be in your lives. I told her that it would be wrong to deny any of you your magical heritage. That you should all be allowed the chance to choose the path that was destined for you.

  “That’s when she lost her temper with me all the way. She told me I was never to come to Norland Manor again and that if I were ever to attempt to contact you girls, that she’d tell the townspeople and anyone else that would listen that I was a witch. She shouted this last part so loudly that your father came into the room. But all he did was stand at her side. It became clear this was something they’d discussed and agreed upon.

  “Well, I know as well as any witch that telling the townspeople means death at the pyre, and I would certainly not do my grandchildren any good dead. Besides, the idea of dying that way wasn’t particularly appealing. I asked Gianne what she’d tell you girls. And she said not to worry myself about it. That I should make sure never to show myself to any of you again, and she’d make sure you believed me dead.

  “I read of my death and funeral in the newspaper, and I attended the funeral in disguise. No one noticed me there, not even you, my darling Clara, though you looked at me. I remember it. My heart froze as your eyes looked into mine, and I thought then that you recognized me. But you were crying so hard, my darling, that you just turned away, and I knew you were lost to me after all. I cried as hard as anyone there that day, but it was for different reasons. Gianne didn’t cry a single tear. I was dead to her already.”

  Grand-mère turned to me then, with fresh tears in those brilliant yellow eyes. She placed her hand atop mine, clasping my hand and Marcelo’s beneath it. “You aren’t lost to me anymore. I won’t leave you again.” Her hand felt warm against mine. She was very much alive.

  “And what if Mother finds out?”

  Grand-mère shrugged with her eyebrows. “Then she does.”

  “And if she tells on you, and they try to kill you?” Now that I’d found Grand-mère again, the thought of losing her was unbearable. I’d already lost too much.

  “My darling, it’s pointless to worry about those things which may never come to pass. It’s a waste of time.” She took her hand back and placed it over her heart. “Besides, don’t worry, my love. I have no intention of throwing my life away. As it is now, your mother thinks you are dead.”

  “What does she think of Gertrude?”

  “She believes that Gertrude is married to Count Washur and living at Washur Castle.”

  So that was what happened! Father and Mother married Gertrude away to a monster in exchange for prestige and wealth. My stomach rolled against Gertrude’s body, but she didn’t move. Was her heart that heavy that she didn’t even react to the horrible life sentence to which our parents had condemned her?

  There were so many things I still wanted to ask Grand-mère, but I couldn’t bring myself to form the questions. My heart was heavy, knowing where Mother and Father’s choices had led, and sadder yet that there was no reason for it to begin with, other than the broken heart of a girl named Gianne, who gave herself over to the ambitions of the Lady of Norland long ago.

  Several minutes passed while the room grew as onerous as the memories of the past. Finally, Grand-mère broke the silence. “Are you all right, my darling?” She reached for my hand again and squeezed.

  I meant to say yes, but I didn’t. Instead, I nodded while tears brimmed.

  Grand-mère left Sylvia’s side and circled to mine. She lowered back down to the floor and pulled me into her chest. Whatever resolve I’d summoned melted and went somewhere far, far away. Once the tears began in earnest, I thought I might never find the way to stop them.

  Grand-mère hugged me closer, running a hand along the length of my hair. “Ma chérie. My darling girl.” She placed her chin atop my head, and I cried harder. I wasn’t exactly certain why I was crying, but if I’d stopped to wonder why, I could have come up with a hundred reasons.

  “It’s all right, ma chérie. Let it all out. It’s been hard for you, I know. I’m so sorry.”

  I cried for myself and a childhood devoid of affection, for the years of my life I’d lost against my will to the merworld, and for a man I loved that might not survive the attacks of a cruel Count Washur. I cried for Gertrude and the words she couldn’t express within a body that wasn’t hers, and for her condemnation to a marriage that could only bring pain. I cried for Sylvia, who had still not awakened, and for Albacus, wondering if Count Washur had truly taken his soul to fuel his relative immortality by capitalizing on Albacus’ love for his brother.

  I cried for the time lost with this wonderful woman, who could have taught me from the start who I was meant to become and saved me the pain of the violent fever that almost killed me. I even cried for the loss of my lady’s maid and friend, Maggie, whom I might never see again, and for Winston’s brother Samuel and his kind heart. I cried for all of this and more—wherever my thoughts landed, they found heaviness and misfortune—because there was so much to regret.

  Before long, my heaving chest began to settle and the tears to slow. Whereas just moments before I only seemed to be able to think of the difficulties in life, out of nowhere, unbidden, came flashes of my many blessings. Suddenly, the sun, which had hidden behind a cloud, revealed itself, streaming through the window again with that kind of beautiful warmth that heated the bones on the chill of a spring day that leaned more toward winter than summer.

  I thought of my grandmother, miraculously back from the dead; of my sister, on my lap instead of inaccessible at Norland Manor or Washur Castle; and of Marcelo, dangerously ill but still alive, fighting to survive to share a life with me. Mordecai was smiling again, which he’d done little of since his brother’s murder, and Sir Lancelot’s nerves were settling from the ordeal in the courtyard of Washur. Mordecai thought Sylvia would survive. And my magic was as strong as ever, and each moment brought with it the gift of greater understanding of my power.

  I closed my eyes and sensed the five-petal knot at my heart. Things had been challenging. At times, they’d been terrible. But everything was getting better. I was with my new family, determined both by blood and by love, and we were powerful magicians. The light was strong enough within us that we could make a difference in this world, where darkness had tipped the balance toward calamity and suffering.

  Grand-mère continued to run her hand through my hair, from my head all the way down to my waist. “Now that’s much better, isn’t it, ma chérie? There are times when we all need a good cry. It’s a miraculous hea
ling for the soul.”

  I chuckled against her elegant silk bodice. My nose was running and I could feel my eyes already swollen. “I do feel better actually.”

  “Of course you do, darling,” Grand-mère said and kissed the top of my head. “Everything will get much better now. You’ll see.”

  I hoped desperately that Grand-mère was right. I didn’t know if I could take many more experiences like the ones I’d managed to survive.

  “Now. What do you say? Shall we find something to eat and fill our bellies while we wait for our magician to arrive?”

  I nodded. My hair rubbed against silk, making a rasping sound. I couldn’t yet breathe through my nose, but my stomach spoke up at the mention of food. When had I last eaten? I had oats in Bundry before our departure for Washur in the middle of the night. That was more than a full day ago.

  “Good.” Grand-mère looked to the old magician at the window, who observed us respectfully. “What do you think we can manage, Mordecai?”

  “I shall go to the inn and see. It’s better if our party remains out of sight, don’t you think?”

  “Oui. We don’t want to raise suspicions now.”

  I didn’t have to ask why we would raise suspicions. One look at our entourage could answer that for me. We looked like—well, we looked like a bunch of magicians and magical creatures. If anyone had eyes willing to see the truth for what it was, they would know. “Do you think Count Washur will come looking for us here?” I asked.

  “Perhaps. There are others to worry about too. Washur might be the worst of the dark magicians, but he’s not the only one. There are other dark magicians out there who might enjoy encountering weakened magicians with powers such as ours.” Mordecai cast a meaningful glance at his patients. “And we don’t know what happened to Winston. He might come after us in an attempt to please his master, even though I don’t think he’d be much of a threat. Marcelo’s nephew is also still recovering from the spell his father cast over him.”