A Discovery of Witches

by Deborah Harkness

  The light was dimming when he finally rose and nodded to Hamish. It was enough for the first day, and though he didn’t need the light to see the deer, he knew that Hamish needed it to get back down the mountain.

  By the time they reached the lodge, it was pitch black, and Jordan had turned on every lamp, which made the building look even more ridiculous, sitting on a rise in the middle of nowhere.

  “This lodge never did make any sense,” Matthew said in a conversational tone that was nevertheless intended to sting. “Robert Adam was insane to take the commission.”

  “You’ve shared your thoughts on my little extravagance many times, Matthew,” Hamish said serenely, “and I don’t care if you understand the principles of architectural design better than I do or whether you believe that Adam was a madman to construct—what do you always call it?—an ‘ill-conceived folly’ in the Lanarkshire wilderness. I love it, and nothing you say is going to change that.” They’d had versions of this conversation regularly since Hamish’s announcement he’d purchased the lodge—complete with all its furnishings, the gillie, and Jordan—from an aristocrat who had no use for the building and no money to repair it. Matthew had been horrified. To Hamish, however, Cadzow Lodge was a sign he had risen so far above his Glasgow roots that he could spend money on something impractical that he could love for its own sake.

  “Hmph,” Matthew said with a scowl.

  Grumpiness was preferable to agitation, Hamish thought. He moved on to the next step of his plan.

  “Dinner’s at eight,” he said, “in the dining room.”

  Matthew hated the dining room, which was grand, high-ceilinged, and drafty. More important, it upset the vampire because it was gaudy and feminine. It was Hamish’s favorite room.

  Matthew groaned. “I’m not hungry.”

  “You’re famished,” Hamish said sharply, taking in the color and texture of Matthew’s skin. “When was your last real meal?”

  “Weeks ago.” Matthew shrugged with his usual disregard for the passage of time. “I can’t remember.”

  “Tonight you’re having wine and soup. Tomorrow—it’s up to you what you eat. Do you want some time alone before dinner, or will you risk playing billiards with me?” Hamish was extremely good at billiards and even better at snooker, which he had learned to play as a teenager. He’d made his first money in Glasgow’s billiards halls and could beat almost anyone. Matthew refused to play snooker with him anymore on the grounds that it was no fun to lose every time, even to a friend. The vampire had tried to teach him carambole instead, the old French game involving balls and cues, but Matthew always won those games. Billiards was the sensible compromise.

  Unable to resist a battle of any sort, Matthew agreed. “I’ll change and join you.”

  Hamish’s felt-covered billiards table was in a room opposite the library. He was there in a sweater and trousers when Matthew arrived in a white shirt and jeans. The vampire avoided wearing white, which made him look startling and ghostly, but it was the only decent shirt he had with him. He’d packed for a hunting trip, not a dinner party.

  He picked up his cue and stood at the end of the table. “Ready?”

  Hamish nodded. “Let’s say an hour of play, shall we? Then we’ll go down for a drink.”

  The two men bent over their cues. “Be gentle with me, Matthew,” Hamish murmured just before they struck the balls. The vampire snorted as they shot to the far end, hit the cushion, and rebounded.

  “I’ll take the white,” said Matthew when the balls stopped rolling and his was closest. He palmed the other and tossed it to Hamish. The daemon put a red ball on its mark and stood back.

  As in hunting, Matthew was in no rush to score points. He shot fifteen hazards in a row, putting the red ball in a different pocket each time. “If you don’t mind,” he drawled, pointing to the table. The daemon put his yellow ball on it without comment.

  Matthew mixed up simple shots that took the red ball into the pockets with trickier shots known as cannons that were not his forte. Cannons involved hitting both Hamish’s yellow ball and the red ball with one strike of the cue, and they required not only strength but finesse.

  “Where did you find the witch?” Hamish asked casually after Matthew cannoned the yellow and red balls.

  Matthew retrieved the white ball and prepared for his next shot. “The Bodleian.”

  The daemon’s eyebrows rose in surprise. “The Bodleian? Since when have you been a regular at the library?”

  Matthew fouled, his white ball hopping over the cushion and onto the floor. “Since I was at a concert and overheard two witches talking about an American who’d got her hands on a long-lost manuscript,” he said. “I couldn’t figure out why the witches would give a damn.” He stepped back from the table, annoyed at his error.

  Hamish quickly played his fifteen hazards. Matthew placed his ball on the table and picked up the chalk to mark down Hamish’s score.

  “So you just strolled in there and struck up a conversation with her to find out?” The daemon pocketed all three balls with a single shot.

  “I went looking for her, yes.” Matthew watched while Hamish moved around the table. “I was curious.”

  “Was she happy to see you?” Hamish asked mildly, making another tricky shot. He knew that vampires, witches, and daemons seldom mixed. They preferred to spend time within close-knit circles of similar creatures. His friendship with Matthew was a relative rarity, and Hamish’s daemonic friends thought it was madness to let a vampire get so close. On a night like this one, he thought they might have a point.

  “Not exactly. Diana was frightened at first, even though she met my eyes without flinching. Her eyes are extraordinary—blue and gold and green and gray,” Matthew mused. “Later she wanted to hit me. She smelled so angry.”

  Hamish bit back a laugh. “Sounds like a reasonable response to being ambushed by a vampire in the Bodleian.” He decided to be kind to Matthew and save him from a reply. The daemon shot his yellow ball over the red, deliberately nicking it just enough that the red ball drifted forward and collided with it. “Damn,” he groaned. “A foul.”

  Matthew returned to the table, shot a few hazards, and tried a cannon or two.

  “Have you seen each other outside the library?” Hamish asked when the vampire had regained some of his composure.

  “I don’t see her much, actually, even in the library. I sit in one part and she sits in another. I’ve taken her to breakfast, though. And to the Old Lodge, to meet Amira.”

  Hamish kept his jaw closed with difficulty. Matthew had known women for years without taking them to the Old Lodge. And what was this about sitting at opposite ends of the library?

  “Wouldn’t it be easier to sit next to her in the library, if you’re interested in her?”

  “I’m not interested in her!” Matthew’s cue exploded into the white ball. “I want the manuscript. I’ve been trying to get my hands on it for more than a hundred years. She just put in the slip and up it came from the stacks.” His voice was envious.

  “What manuscript, Matt?” Hamish was doing his best to be patient, but the exchange was rapidly becoming unendurable. Matthew was giving out information like a miser parting with pennies. It was intensely aggravating for quick-minded daemons to deal with creatures who didn’t consider any division of time smaller than a decade particularly important.

  “An alchemical book that belonged to Elias Ashmole. Diana Bishop is a highly respected historian of alchemy.”

  Matthew fouled again by striking the balls too hard. Hamish respotted the balls and continued to rack up points while his friend simmered down. Finally Jordan came to tell them that drinks were available downstairs.

  “What’s the score?” Hamish peered at the chalk marks. He knew he’d won, but the gentlemanly thing was to ask—or so Matthew had told him.

  “You won, of course.”

  Matthew stalked out of the room and pounded down the stairs at considerably more than a human pa
ce. Jordan eyed the polished treads with concern.

  “Professor Clairmont is having a difficult day, Jordan.”

  “So it would seem,” the butler murmured.

  “Better bring up another bottle of red. It’s going to be a long night.”

  They had their drinks in what had once been the lodge’s reception area. Its windows looked out on the gardens, which were still kept in orderly, classical parterres despite the fact that their proportions were all wrong for a hunting lodge. They were too grand—they belonged to a palace, not a folly.

  In front of the fireplace, drinks in hand, Hamish could at last press his way into the heart of the mystery. “Tell me about this manuscript of Diana’s, Matthew. It contains what, exactly? The recipe for the philosopher’s stone that turns lead into gold?” Hamish’s voice was lightly mocking. “Instructions on how to concoct the elixir of life so you can transform mortal into immortal flesh?”

  The daemon stopped his teasing the instant Matthew’s eyes rose to meet his.

  “You aren’t serious,” Hamish whispered, his voice shocked. The philosopher’s stone was just a legend, like the Holy Grail or Atlantis. It couldn’t possibly be real. Belatedly, he realized that vampires, daemons, and witches weren’t supposed to be real either.

  “Do I look like I’m joking?” Matthew asked.

  “No.” The daemon shuddered. Matthew had always been convinced that he could use his scientific skills to figure out what made vampires resistant to death and decay. The philosopher’s stone fit neatly into those dreams.

  “It’s the lost book,” Matthew said grimly. “I know it.”

  Like most creatures, Hamish had heard the stories. One version suggested the witches had stolen a precious book from the vampires, a book that held the secret of immortality. Another claimed the vampires had snatched an ancient spell book from the witches and then lost it. Some whispered that it was not a spell book at all, but a primer covering the basic traits of all four humanoid species on earth.

  Matthew had his own theories about what the book might contain. An explanation of why vampires were so difficult to kill and accounts of early human and creature history were only a small part of it.

  “You really think this alchemical manuscript is your book?” he asked. When Matthew nodded, Hamish let out his breath with a sigh. “No wonder the witches were gossiping. How did they discover Diana had found it?”

  Matthew turned, ferocious. “Who knows or cares? The problems began when they couldn’t keep their mouths shut.”

  Hamish was reminded once again that Matthew and his family really didn’t like witches.

  “I wasn’t the only one to overhear them on Sunday. Other vampires did, too. And then the daemons sensed that something interesting was happening, and—”

  “Now Oxford is crawling with creatures,” the daemon finished. “What a mess. Isn’t term about to start? The humans will be next. They’re about to return in droves.”

  “It gets worse.” Matthew’s expression was grim. “The manuscript wasn’t simply lost. It was under a spell, and Diana broke it. Then she sent it back to the stacks and shows no interest in recalling it. And I’m not the only one waiting for her to do so.”

  “Matthew,” Hamish said, voice tense, “are you protecting her from other witches?”

  “She doesn’t seem to recognize her own power. It puts her at risk. I couldn’t let them get to her first.” Matthew seemed suddenly, disconcertingly, vulnerable.

  “Oh, Matt,” Hamish said, shaking his head. “You shouldn’t interfere between Diana and her own people. You’ll only cause more trouble. Besides,” he continued, “no witch will be openly hostile to a Bishop. Her family’s too old and distinguished.”

  Nowadays creatures no longer killed one another except in self-defense. Aggression was frowned on in their world. Matthew had told Hamish what it was like in the old days, when blood feuds and vendettas had raged and creatures were constantly catching human attention.

  “The daemons are disorganized, and the vampires won’t dare to cross me. But the witches can’t be trusted.” Matthew rose, taking his wine to the fireplace.

  “Let Diana Bishop be,” Hamish advised. “Besides, if this manuscript is bewitched, you’re not going to be able to examine it.”

  “I will if she helps me,” Matthew said in a deceptively easy tone, staring into the fire.

  “Matthew,” the daemon said in the same voice he used to let his junior partners know when they were on thin ice, “leave the witch and the manuscript alone.”

  The vampire placed his wineglass carefully on the mantel and turned away. “I don’t think I can, Hamish. I’m . . . craving her.” Even saying the word made the hunger spread. When his hunger focused, grew insistent like this, not just any blood would do. His body demanded something more specific. If only he could taste it—taste Diana—he would be satisfied and the painful longing would subside.

  Hamish studied Matthew’s tense shoulders. He wasn’t surprised that his friend craved Diana Bishop. A vampire had to desire another creature more than anyone or anything else in order to mate, and cravings were rooted in desire. Hamish strongly suspected that Matthew—despite his previous fervent declarations that he was incapable of finding anyone who would stir that kind of feeling—was mating.

  “Then the real problem you’re facing at the moment is not the witches, nor Diana. And it’s certainly not some ancient manuscript that may or may not hold the answers to your questions.” Hamish let his words sink in before continuing. “You do realize you’re hunting her?”

  The vampire exhaled, relieved that it had been said aloud. “I know. I climbed into her window when she was sleeping. I follow her when she’s running. She resists my attempts to help her, and the more she does, the hungrier I feel.” He looked so perplexed that Hamish had to bite the inside of his lip to keep from smiling. Matthew’s women didn’t usually resist him. They did what he told them to do, dazzled by his good looks and charm. No wonder he was fascinated.

  “But I don’t need Diana’s blood—not physically. I won’t give in to this craving. Being around her needn’t be a problem.” Matthew’s face crumpled unexpectedly. “What am I saying? We can’t be near each other. We’ll attract attention.”

  “Not necessarily. We’ve spent a fair bit of time together, and no one has been bothered,” Hamish pointed out. In the early years of their friendship, the two had struggled to mask their differences from curious eyes. They were brilliant enough separately to attract human interest. When they were together—their dark heads bent to share a joke at dinner or sitting in the quadrangle in the early hours of the morning with empty champagne bottles at their feet—they were impossible to ignore.

  “It’s not the same thing, and you know it,” Matthew said impatiently.

  “Oh, yes, I forgot.” Hamish’s temper snapped. “Nobody cares what daemons do. But a vampire and a witch? That’s important. You’re the creatures who really matter in this world.”

  “Hamish!” Matthew protested. “You know that’s not how I feel.”

  “You have the characteristic vampire contempt for daemons, Matthew. Witches, too, I might add. Think long and hard how you feel about other creatures before you take this witch to bed.”

  “I have no intention of taking Diana to bed,” Matthew said, his voice acid.

  “Dinner is served, sir.” Jordan had been standing in the doorway, unobserved, for some time.

  “Thank God,” Hamish said with relief, getting up from his chair. The vampire was easier to manage if he was dividing his attention between the conversation and something—anything—else.

  Seated in the dining room at one end of a vast table designed to feed a house party’s worth of guests, Hamish tucked into the first of several courses while Matthew toyed with a soup spoon until his meal cooled. The vampire leaned over the bowl and sniffed.

  “Mushrooms and sherry?” he asked.

  “Yes. Jordan wanted to try something new, and since i
t didn’t contain anything you find objectionable, I let him.”

  Matthew didn’t ordinarily require much in the way of supplemental sustenance at Cadzow Lodge, but Jordan was a wizard with soup, and Hamish didn’t like to eat alone any more than he liked drinking alone.

  “I’m sorry, Hamish,” Matthew said, watching his friend eat.

  “I accept your apology, Matt,” Hamish said, the soup spoon hovering near his mouth. “But you cannot imagine how difficult it is to accept being a daemon or a witch. With vampires it’s definite and incontrovertible. You’re not a vampire, and then you are. No question, no room for doubt. The rest of us have to wait, watch, and wonder. It makes your vampire superiority doubly hard to take.”

  Matthew was twirling the spoon’s handle in his fingers like a baton. “Witches know they’re witches. They’re not like daemons at all,” he said with a frown.

  Hamish put his spoon down with a clatter and topped off his wineglass. “You know full well that having a witch for a parent is no guarantee. You can turn out perfectly ordinary. Or you can set your crib on fire. There’s no telling if, when, or how your powers are going to manifest.” Unlike Matthew, Hamish had a friend who was a witch. Janine did his hair, which had never looked better, and made her own skin lotion, which was nothing short of miraculous. He suspected that witchcraft was involved.

  “It’s not a total surprise, though,” Matthew persisted, scooping some soup into his spoon and waving it slightly to cool it further. “Diana has centuries of family history to rely upon. It’s nothing like what you went through as a teenager.”

  “I had a breeze of a time,” Hamish said, recalling some of the daemonic coming-of-age stories he’d been privy to over the years.

  When Hamish was twelve, his life had gone topsy-turvy in the space of one afternoon. He had come to realize, over the long Scottish autumn, that he was far smarter than his teachers. Most children who reach twelve suspect this, but Hamish knew it with deeply upsetting certainty. He responded by feigning sickness so he could skip school and, when that no longer worked, by doing his schoolwork as rapidly as he could and abandoning all pretense of normalcy. In desperation his schoolmaster sent for someone from the university mathematics department to evaluate Hamish’s troublesome ability to solve in minutes problems that occupied his school-mates for a week or more.