Darkwitch Rising

by Sara Douglass

  Weyland had no financial need to run a brothel, but Jane suspected that it amused him. Most certainly he enjoyed humiliating and tormenting Jane, and grew fat on her despair.

  At least Jane now lived in some manner of comfort. Weyland had moved her here from that terrible, stinking tiny room they had shared for so many years. It was a strange house, growing almost organically as it did out of the bone house of St Dunstan’s-in-the-East, and in a state of disrepair when first they’d moved in. Weyland had hired men to fix the roof and to replace the floors and to glass the hitherto unglazed windows, and now the house was not only more than comfortable, but a comfort in itself. Here there were many rooms, places where Jane could exist for hours at a time in some solitude and in some manner of peace.

  Her favourite room was the kitchen. How Genvissa and Swanne would have laughed! That they had come to this, a whore who took pride in her kitchen. Kitchen it might be, but the room was one of the largest in the house, and it was comfortable, and warm, and it did not stink of sex for sale. The girls (three at the moment) that Weyland had working for him lived in a tavern cellar on Tower Street (he would not keep them at the house), and fulfilled their duties to Weyland and to every lustful carter and sailor and ironmonger in two rooms on the first floor of this house. They came to the kitchen to eat, and to rest, and to sit in silence, partaking of the same comfort in the room as did Jane.

  Weyland sometimes joined them. He ate in the kitchen, and he usually tormented either Jane or one of the girls while he was there, but generally Weyland was either out in the city, or he was upstairs on the top floor of the house, where he had constructed something…strange.

  Weyland had felt it as soon as he had climbed the stairs on that first day he’d wandered into the house from Idol Lane. The first floor was nothing, merely a collection of small rooms that would serve well as bedchambers, the next floor no different, but the top floor of the house…well, that was something special. It was one large open space, and it stank of magic and power. Weyland had spent hours up here that day; firstly, searching the space with his eyes and his darkcraft, making sure it could truly be what he needed and, secondly, trying to scry out the source of the attic’s power. In the end, after hours of seeking, he could not manage to discover the source, but that did not trouble him. Indeed, he felt that the power was not antagonistic to him, but rather in some strange way was actually sympathetic.

  This was the place he’d been searching out for so many years.

  This would be his home, his sanctuary.

  His Idyll.

  The instant that damned wool merchant had spoken the word “idyll” Weyland now realised the house had been calling out to him.

  Here I am! Here I am!

  And here it was indeed. Once the house had been repaired and Weyland moved in, he had made it abundantly clear to Jane and the other girls that the attic space was out of bounds.

  “It is my den,” Weyland said to them as they stood in a line before him, faces solemn, hands clasped behind their backs. “My lair, my nest, my shadowy corner of hell. Keep away from it.”

  They had. Weyland had infused enough threat into his voice to impress even Jane. He kept the top floor of the house in Idol Lane to himself, and out of this space Weyland fashioned his Idyll.

  It took him over a year, and he needed almost every particle of his darkcraft to accomplish it. Weyland knew that so much expenditure of power would bring him to the Troy Game’s attention, and he had been worried for many months. But nothing had happened.

  And the Idyll had grown.

  It was far better than Weyland ever expected. It was his hidey-hole and his sanctuary, but it was also something far deeper. It was Weyland’s expression of self, of what perhaps he might be, given the chance…and the kingship bands.

  It was his kingdom.

  Yet, even so, Weyland was somehow dissatisfied with his Idyll. Oh, it was pleasant enough and beautiful enough to keep him happy and contented for many a long night, but there was still something missing—some tiny element that Weyland could not quite put his finger on—and that irritated him. He wanted his Idyll to be perfect and to have perfection evade him by a fraction, and to not know what it was that he needed to fill that small, missing space…well, that was frustration incarnate, and those days that Weyland spent hours in his Idyll, studying it, and fretting over what might be needed to complete it, those days were the ones when his temper too often frayed, and either Jane or one other of his whores was likely to feel the full force of his temper in her face.

  Weyland understood that he had years to wait until the time was right to make a play for the kingship bands, and he was furious that he might have to spend those years fretting over what, probably, was no more than a small detail of decoration.

  He was greater than that, surely.

  Part Two

  THE POWER OF THE CIRCLE

  London, 1939

  Jack Skelton threw his bag into the boot of the car, then jumped in the passenger seat, silently cursing the British preoccupation with tiny vehicles. He slouched down in the seat, reaching for his cigarettes just as Frank put the car into gear.

  “It’ll take us at least half an hour,” Frank said. “The Old Man’ll be furious. We were supposed to report in at—”

  “I’ll take responsibility,” Skelton said, drawing deeply on his cigarette, relishing the smoke in his lungs. There were very few things he liked about this twentieth-century world, but this was one of them.

  “But you are my responsibility,” Frank said. “The Old Man told me to—”

  “Oh, for gods’ sakes, Frank! Calm down. The ‘Old Man’ will cope if we’re twenty minutes late. Now, get this damned conveyance moving, why don’t you, before we’re twenty hours late.”

  Frank’s mouth thinned. He crouched over the steering wheel in that peculiar manner he had and pushed his foot down on the accelerator.

  The car moved forwards, and Skelton slouched down even further. He was getting very tired of Frank, and hoped he didn’t have to work too closely with him at—

  A huge black four-door sedan hurtled around the corner ahead and screeched to a halt before them. Frank slammed his foot on the brakes, and Skelton muttered an obscenity as he was thrown forward against the dashboard.

  “Jesus, Frank! Where did the English learn to drive?”

  A slight, fair-haired woman in the uniform of a WREN leapt out of the sedan.

  Frank groaned. “Christ. It’s Piper.”

  Piper hurried to Frank’s window, leaning down to peer first at Frank and then, more curiously, at Skelton. “Hello, Frank!” Piper said, her eyes again slipping to Skelton, who studiously ignored her. “There’s been a change of plans. I’m so glad to have caught you!”

  “Yes?” snapped Frank. Patently he didn’t like Piper much, which perversely made Skelton like her immensely.

  “The Old Man’s left London,” said Piper, her voice breathless. “Gone up to his weekend place. Wants to see you and,” yet again she looked curiously at Skelton, “the major there. You’re to report to him for lunch.”

  “The weekend house, eh?” murmured Skelton, throwing Piper a grin. “If I’d known I’d have brought my tweeds.”

  “Very well, Piper,” said Frank. “Are you coming as well?”

  “Oh, yes,” said Piper, and her mouth twisted. “I’ve the Spiv in the back.”

  “The Spiv”, Skelton thought. The “Old Man”. Do the British not once use a cursed name? He looked ahead, trying to see into the back seat of the black sedan, but cigarette smoke obscured his vision, and all he could make out was the vague form of a man, partly hidden behind the newspaper he was reading.

  Piper was walking back to her sedan, and Frank once more put his own car into gear, waiting for Piper to drive off.

  “So where is it we’re going?” said Skelton. “Where is this weekend house?”

  “Epping Forest,” said Frank, unaware that Skelton had stiffened at the information. “The Old Man’
s got a house there, inherited from some boffin in his family. It’s called Faerie Hill Manor.”

  One

  The heart of the Troy Game, and Antwerp, the Netherlands

  Long Tom, oldest and wisest of the Sidlesaghes, sat by the prostrate white form of the Stag God, Og, as he lay in the glade in the heart of the forest. The flanks of the stag rose and fell with discernible breath, and his heartbeat, not once in millennia, but now at least once an hour, close enough that the watching eye might catch it.

  Og was waking, moving towards rebirth. Long Tom kept watch this night, as he did many nights, but this night, that of the first of May, became something unexpected.

  As he sat, something moved in the forest which surrounded the glade.

  Long Tom raised his head and looked about as he heard a noise coming from behind the trees.

  “Who goes there?” he called, wondering if Asterion had gained enough power to dare the heart of the Game.

  Then the stag moaned, and something most unexpected walked free of the forest.

  Long Tom stared.

  The being that had stepped forth smiled, and then it spoke.

  Long Tom listened, his large mouth dropping ever so slightly open. When the being had stopped speaking, he frowned, but then nodded.

  “I will see that it is done,” he said.

  The chamber, like the house which contained it, was large, yet sparsely furnished. The floorboards were well swept and bare save for a single rug sprawled before the fire. There were two plain elmwood chests pushed against a far wall, and a table of similar material to one side of the room with the remains of a meal scattered over it. Candles sat on both the table and the chest. A fire burned brightly in the grate, and before it, and slightly away from the direct heat, stood five large copper urns, steam rising gently from their openings.

  A huge tester bed, again of plain unadorned wood, dominated the room. The bed curtains which hung down from the tester, threadbare and dulled with years of use, had been pushed back towards the head of the bed. The creamy linens and the single blanket—both linens and blanket expertly patched here and there—were piled towards the foot of the bed.

  Three people lay on the bed, two women and a man. The younger of the women, perhaps of some twenty-five or twenty-six years, and of a fair beauty, lay stretched out naked on her side, watching the other woman and man make love, occasionally reaching out to stroke the man down the length of his back, or the woman over her breasts. This younger woman watched with gleaming eyes, seeming to receive as much pleasure from watching the lovemaking as she would had she been the recipient of the man’s attentions herself. That she had been the recipient of some man’s attentions, if perhaps not this one’s, was evident in the gentle rounding of her stomach, showing a five- or six-month pregnancy.

  The lovemaking between the other two intensified, and the younger woman stretched sensuously, her hand now running softly over her distended belly. When the man cried out, and then his partner, so also did this younger woman, her breath rising and falling as rapidly as did that of her companions.

  A long moment passed, then the man, Charles, now King Charles II in exile, raised himself from Marguerite’s body, leaned over, kissed Kate’s mouth lingeringly, then pulled himself free of both women, rolled over to the side of the bed, and sat there, laughing softly.

  “You will tire me out,” he said, “before we have accomplished what we must this night.”

  Marguerite, slowly rousing from her state of post-coital languor, ignored her lover for the moment, and instead rolled onto her side so she could kiss and fondle Kate. Catherine Pegge, called Kate by all who knew her well, had joined Charles’ court in exile some eighteen months earlier.

  She was Erith-reborn, the second of Eaving’s Sisters to join Charles, and the second of the triumvirate which would eventually give Charles so much of his power. These three—Ecub-reborn, Erith-reborn and Matilda-reborn, who was yet to join them—were the core group among the larger community of Eaving’s Sisters. The three most important, the three most powerful, the three greatest in the Circle about Charles.

  And the most unknown. Charles had now been almost thirteen years in exile, much of it spent travelling western Europe seeking financial, moral and military support for his always-in-the-planning invasion of England, to snatch it back from the archtraitor, Oliver Cromwell. He’d gathered little in the way of any such support, save muttered sympathies, and the occasional embarrassed handout from this prince or that, mortified to have the ragtag king begging at his court.

  What Charles did have extreme success in collecting was women. Tall, darkly handsome, charming, and exuding an aura of undefinable power, Charles was well known for his score of mistresses, most of them highborn, all of them willing to part with whatever virtue they had to share a night, a month, or a season in Charles’ bed.

  But this night, Charles was secluded with his tiny, inner circle of “mistresses”, that unknown coterie of Eaving’s Sisters. These women shared not only Charles’ bed, but his heart and soul and ambition as well. They knew his innermost secrets, and gloried in them.

  Marguerite rolled onto her back, smiling in contentment, her eyes staring at but not seeing the shabby bed curtains about her. The twelve years since she had joined Charles had treated her well. Her beauty had mellowed from that of the young girl to that of the mature woman: her hair was darker, but just as thick and luxurious; her form was a little thicker, but the more sensual because of it; her softly rounded belly showed the marks of the three children she had borne Charles. Without looking, she raised a hand and rested it on Kate’s pregnant belly. This was Kate’s first child, a daughter, and growing well.

  “Matters are stirring,” said Charles, rising and walking to the curtained window. He twitched one of the curtains back, staring out into the dark. It was May Day (May Night, now), and spring celebrations would be well under way across Europe.

  It was one of the nights of power in the annual cycle of seasons, the night of the land’s rebirth and reawakening. It was one of those four or five nights during the year that Charles always spent closely closeted with this magical, powerful inner coterie, Eaving’s Sisters, as well as…“Louis?” he said.

  Both the women sighed, and Charles repressed a grin, hearing their disappointment in the lack of

  Louis’ presence.

  “He said he would attend as soon as possible,” said Marguerite. “Edward Hyde kept him a while, to go over some detail regarding money, I believe.”

  “Where would we have been without Louis and his money?” asked Charles, his tone indicating he expected no reply. The Marquis de Lonquefort had kept his bastard son well supplied from the Lonquefort coffers, which in turn had kept the wolf from the door of Charles’ court. Well might he bear a pretty title, and even prettier pretensions, but Charles was a king without a kingdom, and without the money with which to support his court. His mother had done her best (the sale of the crown jewels had kept them in bread and wine for a few months), as had Charles’ relatives spread about Europe.

  But there comes a point when relatives grow tired of supporting what appears to be a lost cause, and over the past few years Charles had literally existed from hand to mouth on those handouts his loyal supporters were able to secure. If this chamber was plainly furnished, then it was because Charles had no money to spare.

  That they could actually eat was due almost entirely to de Silva money; Louis offered more, but Charles refused. He had given up many things over the past thirteen years, but his pride was not one of them.

  “There is something happening,” Charles said. “Not just in the land. I can feel darkness closing about, and I can feel the Game moving.” He raised both his hands, resting them on his biceps, as if he could feel the golden kingship bands of Troy there. “Something will happen tonight. Something powerful.”

  Both Marguerite and Kate shivered as they stared at Charles. Their intimacy with him greatly increased their respect, not only for his int
uition, but also for his power. If Charles said something was going to happen tonight, then tonight would be a night of power, indeed.

  And not necessarily benevolent power.

  “Asterion?” said Marguerite.

  Charles shrugged. “I don’t know. It is just a tightness in my belly. An intuition only.”

  “Will we be safe?” Kate said, resting her hand on her belly.

  “I can never guarantee safety,” Charles said. “You have always known that. If you want safety, then leave now. Leave me, leave this house, leave this Circle.”

  Kate had joined the Circle that Charles, Marguerite and Louis had first formed twelve years earlier as a matter of course. She was one of Eaving’s Sisters, she was sworn to Eaving’s protection, and she had the power. The group used the Circle to reach out to Eaving where she lived at Woburn Abbey, to ensure that she was safe, and to send her all the wellbeing they could muster.

  It was not much, but it was enough, and it was all they could do to help her until they were back in England, back with their feet touching the Troy Game.

  It was also potentially dangerous. They all feared that Asterion might sense the power of the Circle, sense the reaching out to Eaving, and, in so sensing, that he might leap. They had all imagined, and then discussed, the nightmarish possibility that one day Asterion himself would rise up from beneath the piece of turf that Marguerite transformed into the circle of emerald silk.

  There had been no indication yet that Asterion was aware of their activities in any way, but they were apprehensive nonetheless.

  Everyone had learned from their previous lives that it was murderously foolish to underestimate the Minotaur.

  Kate dropped her eyes, chastened. “I’m sorry. I was concerned for the child only.”

  Charles’ stern gaze did not turn away from her. “Then you should not have conceived it. Kate, the child is as much a part of this as you or I, or Marguerite, or Louis, or Cornelia-reborn. Fate has us all caught in its whim. If we don’t have the courage to dare it, then we will never succeed.”