Читать книгу The Witch’s Kiss Trilogy - Katharine Corr, Katharine Corr - Страница 22

Sometimes, the dreams were different.

They all started off OK, with her and Jack kissing. Kissing so intensely it made her dizzy. But the good bit never lasted long.

Mostly, the dreams ended with Jack killing her in various inventively gruesome ways. On the worst nights – the nights she woke up gasping for breath, heart pounding, bed-sheets twisted and damp with sweat – he drowned her, holding her down as her lungs filled with water.

Those nights were bad.

But just occasionally, the dreams ended with her killing Jack. Like tonight. She was sitting astride him, her knees either side of his hips, her hair curtaining his face as they kissed. But behind her back she held a sword. With a curious sense of serenity, she pulled away from Jack, brought the sword round and thrust the blade underneath his rib cage. Jack’s eyes widened as the blood began to flow.

Nights like this were pretty bad too.

There was a strange, high-pitched ringing sound, and Merry wondered whether Jack was screaming. But the light had gone out of his eyes: he was already dead. Maybe she was screaming?

The sound kept getting louder, more insistent. Merry pushed herself away from Jack, got her legs tangled in something –

– and fell off the bed.

‘Ow!’ She rubbed her eyes and kicked the duvet away from her feet. The sound was alarm clocks: three of them, all ringing at once. It had been six days since Leo had dragged her out of the water. Six days that had included two visits to the lake (each time ignoring the continued insistence of the manuscript that she should ‘follow him’); a trip to the local swimming pool (an unsuccessful attempt at aversion therapy); more nightmares than she cared to remember. Multiple alarm clocks were now the only way she could get herself out of bed.

Merry picked up a nearby shoe and hurled it at one of the clocks, but the damn thing just kept on ringing. It was clearly going to be one of those days.

She started getting ready for school, trying to figure out exactly what story she could spin her athletics teacher about why she’d missed javelin practice again. Ruby was going to be angry with her too: it was Ruby’s birthday, and instead of going out for coffee and cake at lunchtime, Merry was going to be in the library trying to do a week’s history homework in forty-five minutes. She was about to text Ruby to suggest coffee after school when she remembered the worst thing about today. Gran had finally forced her to commit to a meeting with the coven. As soon as school finished, provided the manuscript didn’t summon her to the lake, Merry had to go and be tested.

Merry left it to the last minute, but Jack wasn’t obliging enough to come out of the lake and give her an excuse. The meeting took place in Mrs Knox’s house: the full coven was too big to fit into Gran’s sitting room. When Merry arrived, Mrs Knox lead her through to a cavernous room at the back of the house.

‘Used to be a ballroom, back in my grandfather’s day. No call for such things now, but it serves our purposes.’ She glanced at Merry over her shoulder and smiled. ‘No need to be nervous. We’re not going to eat you.’

It took a few minutes for Merry’s eyes to adjust to the dimness: the curtains were closed and the only light came from a variety of candlesticks positioned round the edges of the room. There seemed to be about twenty women waiting for her; she hadn’t been expecting so many.

Gran emerged from the throng. ‘Hello, darling. You look tired.’ She hugged Merry tightly. ‘Well, you can relax now. We won’t be doing anything too demanding.’

Merry nodded, but she wondered what Gran’s definition of demanding included.

Gran quickly ran through the names of the coven members Merry hadn’t met before – Merry was glad to see Flo there, despite the unfortunate episode with the manuscript – and then pointed Merry to a chair on its own, facing the semicircle of fully trained witches.

‘So, let’s get down to it. I know you’ve been having problems with the spells I asked you to try. But what magic can you do?’

Merry looked around the ring of expectant faces. ‘Er …’

‘It’s alright, Merry, I know you must have experimented. No one will blame you in the circumstances.’

‘Quite a good thing, actually.’ Mrs Knox’s loud interruption – she didn’t seem to know about indoor voices – made Merry jump. ‘Magic with no outlet is liable to go wild. That’s where stories of poltergeists come from. Usually just some poor, untrained girl who doesn’t know her own power, and then—’

‘Yes, thank you, Sophia.’ Gran, in contrast to Mrs Knox, spoke quietly, but her voice commanded instant attention from the other witches. ‘Merry, it’s been over four years since we tested you. Tell us what’s been happening, magically speaking.’

Merry’s insides squirmed.

‘Well, I did try some stuff out on my own. I … I borrowed a book from your house and, you know, just had a go.’

‘And?’

‘Um, some of the spells seemed to work.’ Merry thought back to the first couple of years of her ‘experimenting’. She was definitely going to have to be selective. ‘I learnt a spell to get rid of spots. A memory charm, to help me study for tests. Um, and a deflection spell, which seemed to stop teachers asking me questions in class …’ A couple of the witches were frowning and peering at her searchingly. She could feel her face flushing and looked away. ‘A few other small things.’

‘OK.’ Gran, at least, didn’t seem to be judging her. ‘Have you progressed at all since then?’

‘Well … no. I stopped, last summer.’ Gran’s eyebrow lifted, so Merry ploughed on. ‘I got scared that something would go wrong, with nobody to correct me.’

‘That’s the whole reason?’

Merry nodded, grateful for the dim lighting.

‘And how has your magic behaved?’

‘Nothing happened for a while. I thought—’

Hoped? Or feared?

‘—I thought maybe I was losing my powers. Like you said, I’ve been struggling with casting spells. But I’ve also had these kind of … random episodes. Magic exploding out of me.’ She looked down at her finger nails. ‘I’ve broken a couple of things.’

‘Like what, dear?’

‘I broke a mirror at school, a big one. It shattered.’

‘Perfectly normal.’ Gran smiled. ‘What else?’

‘Well, this thorny bush thing shot out of the ground and basically murdered another plant. Dragged it back under the soil.’

And nearly killed my brother. But I don’t think I’m going to mention that.

‘Oh. Well, that is a bit more unusual. But, as we start training you, those sort of magical outbursts—’

‘And I’m seeing things.’

There was some subdued muttering from the coven. Gran shushed them.

‘What did you say, Merry?’

‘Er …’ Merry paused.

Damn. They really didn’t need to know that. Flo probably thinks I’m nuts. Maybe I could pretend I meant dreaming …

But the way Gran was looking at her, she couldn’t lie.

‘I’ve been seeing Meredith. Our ancestor. At least, I’m pretty certain it’s her. Last time, she told me I had to get on with it. More or less.’

‘Well.’ Gran drummed her fingers on the arms of her chair and stared at Merry. Lots of the witches were staring. Merry started trying to pick a bit of old varnish off her thumbnail. ‘Well. I suppose we are all dealing with something completely new here. Just … keep us informed, Merry. If anything else abnormal happens.’

Yeah, right, Merry thought. My entire life is abnormal at the moment. How long have you got?

But she just nodded.

Gran looked round at the other witches.

‘Any more questions, ladies?’

Most shook their heads, but one woman raised her hand.

‘Yes, Roshni?

‘I would like to ask, Merry, what you think the aim of your training is? What do you think you should become?’ The woman was smiling, but her appearance – dark hair pulled up into a bun, a dark skirt-suit – made Merry think of her headmistress from junior school. She could feel her palms getting damp.

‘Um …’

What are my aims?

Not to die.

Not to hurt anyone. I mean, apart from the bad guys, I guess.

Not to mess up.

The silence around her was solidifying.

‘Um … I suppose … to be a good witch?’

Roshni glanced at Gran, who pursed her lips.

‘You sound uncertain, Merry.’ Roshni’s smile had faded. ‘Also, you’re wrong.’

‘But, I—’

‘Your aim, at this stage, in this state of emergency, is to be a powerful witch. There is no room for doubt.’

Gran was nodding.

‘Roshni is right. Confidence is key. Shall we begin?’

Two hours later, Merry was on the verge of tears.

Gran sighed.

‘Let’s just try one more time. This is a basic shielding spell, Merry. I thought you’d done something like this before.’

‘I have, and it used to work.’ Merry coughed and took a sip of water, wincing as she swallowed. ‘I didn’t know I was supposed to sing it.’

‘Music enhances the power of the words. It should make it easier. Try again.’

Merry cleared her throat and began to sing the spell once more. Her voice sounded croaky.

‘Hard as bronze, hard as iron, strong as a shield-wall round the stone tower …’

Flo, who was her opponent in this exercise – and who looked as miserable as Merry felt – raised her hands and began to sing another spell: a stinging hex. Flo was so good at the spell that she actually only had to sing one line to set it going.

Merry – envious – tried to sing louder. Her shielding spell seemed to be holding: the hex (like a nettle sting crossed with an electric shock) wasn’t getting through.

Is it working? Please, let it work this time –

Her left cheek burned. She gasped – clapped her hand to her face – stopped singing – and her arms and neck began to throb with pain too.

‘Stop!’ Gran was next to her, singing softly, and the pain faded.

‘I’m so sorry!’ Flo was hovering nearby. ‘I didn’t mean to come on that strong, but you seemed to be doing better—’

‘Merry dear, it’s not about singing louder, it’s about – about getting inside the real meaning of the spell, focusing on what you want to achieve—’ Gran sighed. ‘I think we should stop for today. But I had hoped you would be more … advanced. You’re going to need regular lessons from now on.’

‘I thought you said the stuff in the trinket box would be enough? That it didn’t matter about me being untrained?’ Merry could hear the pitch of her voice rising as the panic and shame bubbled up inside her.

Gran didn’t answer immediately.

‘I think it will be enough,’ she said eventually. ‘I have confidence in all the witches – your ancestors – who have planned for this moment, even if you don’t. But, it’s only sensible to be as fully prepared as possible, especially since you haven’t yet been able to find a way under the lake. Have a rest now. I’m going to talk to the others, see if we can organise some kind of schedule.’

Carefully avoiding eye contact with any of the other witches, Merry went to sit in one of the armchairs in front of the huge, empty fireplace. There was a table next to it, and on that were glasses and a few jugs of iced water – Mrs Knox’s idea of refreshments.

What did you expect? This isn’t the Women’s Institute.

Shutting her eyes, Merry leant back in the chair.

A cup of tea, that’s what I could do with right now. Or a really strong coffee.

Ruby’s dad had one of those posh Italian coffee-making things, the type you put on the stove to boil. The last time she’d been there at the weekend he’d made coffee for her in it; she remembered the sound of the bubbling water, and the scent of coffee filling the kitchen …

‘Merry, what on earth are you doing?’ Merry opened her eyes. Mrs Knox was standing over her, pointing at the jugs of water. The iced water was … boiling. Steam was rising up to the ceiling.

‘But – I didn’t do anything!’ Merry sat up straighter. ‘I mean, I was thinking about coffee, and boiling water, but I don’t know any spells for that. How could it be me?’

Silence. Followed by a buzz of conversation around the room. Gran appeared.

‘Merry, I need you to be totally honest with me. Did you try another spell? Sing or say anything in particular?’

‘No, Gran, I was just thinking about having a hot drink. Really.’

Gran held her gaze for a moment.

‘OK.’ She raised her voice. ‘Ladies, if you please …’ Gran swept off to the far end of the room again, followed by the other witches. Merry couldn’t really hear what they were saying, but she caught the word ‘dangerous’ a couple of times. And then Flo looked over her shoulder, back at where Merry was sitting, and Merry recognised the expression on her face.

She’s frightened.

She’s frightened of me.

The fear Merry had felt when she realised what she’d done to Alex – that terrifying sense of her own potential for evil – rose up inside her again as strong as ever. What if she was really dangerous? What if they decided she was just as bad as Gwydion? Would they turn on her?

‘Merry,’ Gran was beckoning to her, ‘come here.’

Merry hesitated.

This is ridiculous. That’s your grandmother over there. She’s not about to transform you into a frog.

She walked over to the coven, head held high.

‘Well?’

‘We’ve decided,’ Gran stared around the ring of women, as though daring anyone to challenge her, ‘that your training may need a – a different approach. Usually the whole coven would be involved in training a witch, but for the time being you’ll work mostly with me, and occasionally with Roshni and Sophia. Your abilities are clearly very unusual: virtually non-existent in some areas, highly developed in others. To be honest, it’s not something any of us have come across before.’

‘If anyone was to ask me,’ began Flo’s mum, ‘I’d say what she’s done is – well, it’s not natural. Not at all how any true witch would go about things.’ She backed away a little as Gran turned to glare at her.

‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, Denise, do stop being ridiculous! Merry’s abilities are most likely to do with who she is. What she is.’ Gran paused, but Denise didn’t seem inclined to argue. ‘Well, we’re done for today, ladies.’ The witches separated. Some stayed and chatted, but Merry noticed Denise hustling Flo straight out of the room.

Merry pressed her fingers to her forehead, trying to push away the headache building behind her eyes. Gran hugged her.

‘You can go too, Merry; I’ll call you later. Unless there’s anything you want to ask me now?’

Merry shook her and turned away. She’d remembered what Leo said, the night they found the trinket box. That she would be the kind of witch who eats children.

So I’m not going to ask Gran who I am, or what I am. Somehow, I don’t think I’d like the answer.

It was the next day, and Merry was sitting in the garden shed. The shed was full of spiders, but that meant Mum wouldn’t expect her to be in there. Merry was pretty certain her mother had put some kind of eavesdropping spell on the main house.

She settled herself on an old bag of potting compost and thought about practising her witch fire spell, before deciding she was too tired and pulling out the manuscript instead.

‘Hello, manuscript.’

Eala, Merry.

‘So … can we get into Gwydion’s fortress through a tunnel system that runs under the lake?’

No.

Merry sighed and crossed ‘tunnel’ off the list in her notebook. Other suggestions the manuscript had rejected included a secret entrance, a magic portal and a rip in the space-time continuum (Leo’s idea). Gran had tried putting charms on Merry to remove her fear of the water, but so far none of them had stuck. Merry wasn’t surprised, given she couldn’t even force herself to get into the local swimming pool.

Maybe there’s something I can do to the water, instead of something being done to me?

She thought back to the incident at Mrs Knox’s house.

Maybe I can make the lake boil away? If I can figure out what the hell I did to the water in those jugs. Although, people might notice an entire lake disappearing …

The whole magic thing was so confusing. She was frightened of being a witch, but she needed to be a witch. She had to try to be good at spells, but she felt sure she shouldn’t want to be good at spells. Why could she work some magic easily and some not at all? And were there going to be any more killer plants or other dangerous outbursts?

Just a lot of questions. No answers.

Shaking her head, she made a note to consider the boiling lake idea further, then went back to the list she’d already made.

‘OK. Is there a spell we can use to destroy the puppet hearts from a distance?’

No.

Another line through another list; they’d already run through variations on the idea of getting Jack to bring the hearts out of the lake (without, of course, revealing to him – and potentially the King of Hearts – exactly what they were attempting). Nothing doing there either, apparently.

‘Is Jack going to leave the lake tonight?’

Yes. Follow him into the water.

‘But – I can’t swim down through the damn lake! I can’t—’ Merry threw the manuscript to the floor. Every other night now, the answer to that last question was ‘yes’. There was no point in crying about it. But she was just so very tired.

Merry barely noticed when they arrived at the little car park in the woods that evening. Leo turned off the engine and twisted round in his seat to look at her.

‘You were very quiet during dinner. Try to talk a bit more. Mum’s going to get suspicious, given it’s normally impossible to get you to shut up.’

‘She’s already suspicious. You saw the way she was watching me.’

‘I guess it’s not surprising; you look terrible.’

‘Gee, thanks.’

Leo drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. ‘School OK?’

Merry shrugged. Not really. Currently I have no social life, no time to study and I’m probably about to get dumped from all my sports teams.

But she just said: ‘Same as usual.’

‘Right … Well, is there anything you do want to talk about, while we’re on our own?’

‘What, other than the fact I’m turning out to be the most rubbish witch in history, and Gwydion is probably going to catch me and – and turn me into a pumpkin, or something?’

‘Wrong fairy tale. But yeah – anything other than that?’

Merry considered. There was something else on her mind: Jack. Even when she wasn’t having nightmares about him, she couldn’t seem to stop thinking about him. It was disturbing. And wrong, surely: to start looking forwards to spending time with somebody you were supposed to kill. Definitely wrong to be dreaming about kissing him.

‘Well?’ Leo nudged her.

Better to say nothing, maybe. But there was so much she was keeping hidden at the moment. And this was Leo she was talking to …

‘Do you think Jack’s hot?’

Leo’s eyebrows shot up, but he pursed his lips, musing. ‘Course. If you like that whole tall, blond, ripped, murderous thing. I definitely fancy him. I mean, who wouldn’t?’

Merry laughed. ‘I suppose. You’re obviously going to think he looks good, because you’re tall, blond and ripped yourself. Not quite as tall or blond, and definitely not—’

‘Yeah, yeah, I get the picture. But Merry—’ the smile faded from Leo’s eyes, ‘—you what know Jack is, what he is capable of. Or at least, what that thing that takes over his body is capable of. You’re not falling for him, are you?’ He looked so serious.

Merry shook her head as she opened the car door. ‘Don’t be an idiot, Leo. Let’s get this over with, shall we?’

A little while later they were sitting with Jack near the edge of the lake, huddled close to the small portable heater Leo had started bringing with him. Gradually, some of the missing fragments of Jack’s memory seemed to be returning. He told them about the impenetrable hedge of black holly that had grown around the tower, and how the witch sisters had used it in the spell to cause enchanted sleep.

‘I remember them now. They were all beautiful. Carys, the eldest, was tall, with hair the colour of primroses. Nia, the middle sister, was pale and dark. There was something … unusual about her.’ He described them exactly as Merry had last seen them, standing with Meredith in their fire-lit cottage, asking – commanding? – her to deal with Gwydion. She took a deep breath, trying to control the sudden swirl of anxiety in the pit of her stomach. How was it possible for her to have been talked to by people who’d been dead for almost fifteen hundred years?

‘What about Meredith? Did she seem really powerful? Did you know she was a witch as soon as you met her?’

Jack shrugged and plucked a daisy out of the grass. Its petals were closed up against the night. ‘None of the sisters were as I imagined witches to be.’

In the darkness, she tried to make out Jack’s expression. He obviously didn’t want to talk about Meredith. Maybe he hated her. After all, she hadn’t freed him from Gwydion, and she hadn’t killed him; she’d just left him buried alive under the lake for fifteen hundred years. I can kind of understand it, if he hates her. I’m not exactly a big fan either.

‘I’m sorry. You must’ve been really lonely.’

All at once, Jack covered his face with his hands.

‘Jack—’ Merry started to scramble to her feet, thinking only of what Jack was suffering; of whether he was OK. But Leo grabbed her arm and pulled her back down, frowning and shaking his head. Merry muttered under her breath, but she didn’t disobey.

‘We will find a way to stop Gwydion,’ Leo said gently. ‘Meredith must have believed he could be defeated. And at least while we’re here the King of Hearts isn’t hurting anyone else.’

‘That’s right.’ Merry cast around for reasons to be cheerful. ‘And hopefully, that means Gwydion isn’t getting any stronger, that he’s no closer to escaping from the lake.’ She looked at Jack for confirmation, but he shook his head.

‘I do not know. The wizard still struggles to shake off the effects of the black holly, but he sleeps less than he did.’

‘Oh. Well …’ But Merry couldn’t think of any other comforting suggestions to make; she just didn’t know enough, that was the trouble. She didn’t know how much of Gwydion’s strength was drawn from the King of Hearts. And she didn’t know why the King of Hearts was – so far – sticking his sword into people but not cutting out their hearts.

Maybe he just hadn’t got his mojo back before we got in the way …

Merry shuddered a little and shook the thought away.

‘So, you really were completely alone until the witches showed up?’

‘Not exactly.’ Jack looked at her strangely for a moment. ‘There was a … a kitchen maid. She came in the autumn after I’d been captured. Gwydion made her cook for us, and she would come to sweep the floor and lay fresh rushes. We became friends. I – I liked her. A lot.’

‘Oh. Did she like you too?’

‘I believe she looked upon me with favour.’

Merry felt herself straighten up and pull away from Jack a little. Seriously? I’m jealous of a dead Anglo-Saxon maidservant? She forced herself to smile. ‘I’m glad you had someone to talk to. What was she like?’

‘Both fair and fearless. When the wizard – when he tortured me, whether for sport, or because I tried to resist him, she would come afterwards and take care of me, even though she knew he would hurt her if he caught her. I remember one day …’

And Merry was no longer sitting in the dark by the lake. She was in a small room, faint light coming from a deep-cut window high up in one wall, and next to her was –

– Jack, lying on the floor of his cell, barely breathing, his skin torn and discoloured with bruises. So pale, she’d feared he was dead when she first knelt on the rushes next to him. But he was frowning now, flinching as she washed the blood away from the welts on his back and arms. When she was finished, he opened his eyes a little and murmured her name.

‘Oh, my poor Jack, what has he done to you?’ She lifted his head and pressed a cup to his lips. ‘Drink a little, then I will look to your wounds.’

‘No – don’t …’

‘Please, Jack, try the medicine.’

Jack swallowed a little of the liquid. She dipped one finger into a pot of sweetly-scented cream and gently smoothed it across a graze on his cheekbone. He caught hold of her hand.

‘Don’t help me. I should suffer. I deserve to suffer. I nearly killed – I nearly—’

‘Shh, don’t talk now. Rest, and I will put poultices on the rest of these cuts. Then we will talk …’

Merry blinked and coughed as a gust of cold air blew across the lake. Leo was shining his torch in her face.

‘Leo, what the—’ She squinted, pushing the torch away.

‘Why didn’t you answer me? Are you OK?’

‘I don’t know, I—’ She stopped.

Was she now daydreaming about Jack, too? It had been so vivid: the sensation of his bare skin beneath her fingertips …

She felt her face grow hot.

‘Merry?’ Leo shook her gently by the shoulder. ‘What’s the matter?’

‘Nothing. I’m just tired, that’s all.’ She’d pretend nothing had happened. Act normal. ‘Um, Jack, do you remember—’ But there was no time for more questions. Jack had gone, the King of Hearts had taken his place, and Merry had to say the words that would send him back into the lake …