Books by Maggie Shayne (264 page)

Nathanial Dearborne, a dark High Witch. It made sense now. My mother’s note had told me that I’d know another only when I touched them—and that tingling sensation, the one I’d become so used to since Arianna had come into my life—was the same one I’d felt when that beast touched my hand as I hung in the stocks. I simply hadn’t made the connection before now.

“Duncan wouldn’t want you risking your life to bury his empty shell, love,” Arianna whispered. “Leave him to the sea, and come. He’d want you to stay alive, to await his return. You know he would.”

I looked down at Duncan, lowering my head as tears rained from my face to his. “Yes. I suppose he would.” Bending low, I kissed his cheek. “I love you, Duncan Wallace. In this lifetime and the next, I will always love you. I vow it on my heart.”

And gently I eased his broken body from the rocks. Even as I did, an unusually large wave broke over us and swept him from my hands as it washed back out to sea. As if the sea were claiming him.

“Goodbye, my love,” I whispered, but my words were only whispers, my pain so great I could speak no louder. And yet, I thought he might hear me.

Arianna touched my shoulders, and together we turned and made our way back to shore.

Nathanial Dearborne ran all the way to the base of the cliffs where she was supposed to have been thrown, but there was no sign of the dark-haired wench.

Nor of his beloved Duncan.

He clenched his hand into a fist and shook it at the heavens. Again! She’d eluded him
again.

And this time she’d taken young Duncan Wallace into death with her! A death from which she could return… and he could not.

“Damn her,” Nathanial whispered. And fury rose up to engulf him. Oh, Duncan would be back. Yes, he’d return. But when he did, he, too, would be a High Witch. One of the Light Ones, and as such, Nathanial’s sworn enemy.

And if he knew Raven St. James, she’d manage to find the lad again, even then.

Then he paused, narrowing his eyes. What if she did? And what if,
when
she did, she found
him
as well?

Yes. Oh, he’d likely take the selfish bitch’s heart long before then. He’d never stop trying to exact his vengeance. But if all else failed, he could use what he knew…

He could use Duncan…

If
he could find the lad before she did.

But he would. He had to. He’d find a way. And he wouldn’t rest until he’d exacted vengeance upon Raven St. James, until he’d cut out her heart and held it beating and bloody in the palm of his hand.

Weak. Heavy. Languid. My body did not want to move, and I had no will to argue with it. Arianna gripped my forearm, tugging me along in her wake as we trekked into the woods. The village lay to the north, and the forest was but a thin strip of shelter between Sanctuary and the sea. And that might have been enough to protect us, if everyone in town truly believed me dead. They’d have no reason to suspect Arianna would have lingered in the vicinity for so long.

But there
was
someone who knew better. Nathanial Dearborne. And my gut told me he hadn’t traveled all the way from England only to accept defeat so easily. No, he would be searching for us. I felt it in my bones.

And still, I felt no desire to move. I only managed to continue sloughing along, dropping one foot ahead of the other, for Arianna’s sake. If I sank to the ground as I wished right to my soul to do, if I surrendered, she’d stay with me. I knew she would. And there would be yet another life lost because of me. More blood on my hands. Yet another one dead because of having loved me.

I would not let that happen. So I moved. But I felt numb, and dead inside. Truly, had it not been for Arianna, I’d have simply remained in the icy cold sea until Dearborne came for me. Not because of a desire to die, but because I had no desire not to. No reason to cling to my life. No will to fight for it.

I loved Duncan, and he’d been murdered, and my heart bled so profusely it seemed I could feel my life force draining away, bit by bit. Every breath drawn without him seemed to come a little harder. Every heartbeat cost more effort. Even lifting my head became too much work, so that I slogged through the forest without looking up. Head hanging, hair in my face, wet dress dragging through the brush. My only link to life, that small, strong hand gripping my arm. A lifeline. An undeniable force dragging me slowly forward, and maybe, inch by inch, out of the black swamp of deadly grief into which I had fallen. It sucked at me like quicksand, that grief. Pulled me under, choked me. But Arianna never let go. She refused to let it win.

And eventually, I surfaced enough to blink in the darkness and ask in a voice without life, “Where are we?”

She turned her head sharply, her steps ceasing all at once. But she did not remark on my finally having spoken. “Deep in the forest, heading south,“ she explained. ”We got past the settlement, and we’re well into the mainland by now.“

It seemed it took my brain a long moment to process her words. They fell on my ears like meaningless noise and gradually worked through the machinery of my mind and made sense. “Already?” I asked her, not really caring, but vaguely aware of how disoriented I was.

“We’ve been walking for hours,” she said, her eyes intense, probing mine. “It’s nearly dawn, Raven.”

Nearly dawn? How strange… how very…
wrong
that the sun would rise again now that Duncan was gone. It made no sense, somehow.

“Dearborne’s following. We must keep moving.” And she started forward again, tugging me into motion.

My legs hurt, and I glanced down to see that my dress was ripped to ribbons now. I could see bloodstains here and there. Obviously I’d walked like a blind person, through brush and brambles, never moving them aside, scratching my flesh and never feeling the sting. I felt it now. It began slowly, as my brain registered what my eyes were seeing, and told me that my legs should hurt. Then grew sharper, hotter. I lifted my hand to my cheek when that, too, began to pulse, and I discovered a long scratch there.

’Twould heal soon enough. That was part of the powers we both possessed, the rapid regeneration of any wounds we might suffer. Already, even the faintest bruise caused by my fall from the cliffs would have vanished. These new injuries would, as well. ”Twas one of the things we all had in common.

Our other powers were not so easily identified. For they were different from Witch to Witch, even in ordinary mortal ones. Some were gifted at divination, some at reading the stars. Some were psychic, some in touch with the spirit realm. Some could manipulate the weather, while others could communicate with animals. In immortal High Witches the area of power became magnified, and, Arianna had explained, other magickal gifts began to appear, and to grow. She’d told me that some of the very old ones had even mastered shape-shifting, though I doubted the validity of that tall tale.

My own powers were those of healing, always had been. But the longer I remained in this new form, this stronger, more sensitive, immortal form, the more I realized that my healing magick was only one very small part of my abilities.

There were more. Many more. Some, I’d discovered aboard the
Sea Witch
during my crossing. The acute hearing, the enhanced eyesight, and night vision. The ability to scent things, and people. And every spell I had cast since coming here had been incredibly potent, bringing immediate, incredible results. The fertility ritual I’d done for Aunt Eleanor’s old cow had produce a successful mating the very next day, and twin calves, big and healthy. When I’d worked a charm to increase our flock of laying hens, the results had required a larger shed be built for them all! When I wanted a sunny day for Aunt Eleanor, or rain for our vegetable patch, it happened almost as soon as the thought appeared in my mind. And a prickling sense in the back of my neck usually warned me when danger was near.

’Twas there now.

“He’s close,” I said.

Arianna stopped walking, turned to scan the woods. “I know. I feel him, too. But I don’t think he’ll make a move when I’m with you, Raven. He knows I—”

An explosion ripped through the forest, and Arianna stopped speaking and jerked. Her jaw gaped, worked soundlessly, and I cried out as I saw the gaping wound in my beloved sister’s chest. The blackened edges of the hole in the shirt she wore.

I reached for her, but Arianna’s eyes rolled and she slumped to the ground. Whirling, I scanned the trees, and then I saw him. Nathanial Dearborne, there among the pines. In his hands he clutched a musket, which stank of sulphur and spewed black smoke from its dark, deadly eye.

“You bastard,” I whispered. “I’ll not let you take her heart. I will not!” In a heartbeat my dagger was in my fist, and the numbness was fleeing from my body. I may have had no reason to live a moment ago. Now, though, I had found one. Vengeance. “You killed my mother in the name of God, when you’re nothing but purest evil. And I lost my love to the same vile lie. I’ll not let you kill my sister as well!”

“Sister, is it?” He stepped forward, dropping the now useless weapon to the ground, knowing, perhaps, that should he try to load it again, I’d attack before he could finish the job. He pulled his own dagger from his hip, saluted me with it mockingly. “For now, Raven St. James, ”tis your heart I want, not hers.“

“Then try to take it!” I shouted.

“Oh, I will. And long before your..
.sister
revives to come to your rescue. It’s almost too good. Not only do I get my vengeance on you… but on her, as well. Can you imagine her grief when she wakes to find your lifeless body lying at her feet?”

“The only corpse to litter this ground will be yours!” I cried, and crept closer, my blade before me, though my hand trembled.

He came a step closer to me as well, then another. “I’ve killed hundreds, over the centuries,” he told me, his voice strong, sure. “How many have you taken, Raven?“‘

I blinked. He was trying to frighten me, to shake me. And he succeeded. I’d never killed. And despite all of Arianna’s training, I doubted my skills now.

“I could kill you so very easily, so quickly,” he said, coming still closer, then standing near enough so I could feel the heat rising from his body and see the fog of his breath appear and vanish again on the deadly blade he held. “So very quickly, you’d never know what happened.” Then he smiled. “But I’m not going to.”

I lunged forward, swinging my blade, and nicking his belly before he could jump back. He hooked a leg behind mine as I drew back from him in anticipation of his return thrust. Then he shoved me with his hand, so that I toppled backward to the ground.

He was upon me in an instant, straddling my chest and pressing me down into the earth so forcefully that I could scarcely draw a breath. Clutching both my wrists in one of his large hands, he pinned them to the ground above my head. He smiled down at me, a frightening grimace of a smile. “It’s going to be slow, Raven,” he said. “We have time.”

“Why?” I whispered. “Why do you hate me so much?”

“You figure it out,” he told me, and with his free hand, he sliced open the front of my dress, from my waist to my neck. Using the blade again, he parted it, baring my chest, my breasts. Then, the knife still in his hand, he touched me, the backs of his knuckles pressing to the center of my chest. “Right there,” he said. “Beating so fast… so hard. It’s strong, your heart. You’ll stay conscious as I begin to cut it from you, you know. I know how to do it.”

“Please,” I whispered, a tremor working through me from head to toe. Suddenly I didn’t want to die at all. Not at all, and most certainly not like this. “Please, I’m so young. What good can my heart possibly be to you?”

“You’re so clueless, my dear,” he whispered. “So very young, and naive.” He traced a path on my breastbone with the cold tip of his dagger. “You have immense power in you. Wasted on one with no idea what to do with it.”

“I… I…”

“And then there’s vengeance,” he went on. “Always a strong motivator.” He traced the same path again, this time cutting me, but not deeply. Just breaking the skin and leaving a bloody outline of the pattern he drew.

I whimpered. He smiled wider.

“What have I ever done to you?” I cried.

“You took my’s… you took Duncan. You turned him against me, and now you’ve cost him his life.“

“B-but he’ll return—”

“As my sworn enemy! All because of you! Damn you, Raven St. James!” Eyes blazing, he lifted the dagger high above me, blade pointing down.

I opened my mouth to scream, but the sound never emerged. There was, instead, a soft hissing sound, and then the thud of an arrow driving into Nathanial’s chest. He looked surprised for just an instant, then fell over backward.

I scrambled to my feet, pulling my torn dress around me and searching the forest.

The silver-haired red man… the one who’d given me the fish for breakfast a full two years ago… he stood in the distance, his bow in one hand, his black eyes holding mine. My hands went to my face as relief swamped me and tears sprang to my eyes. And my dress fell open again. The man’s eyes lowered, affixed upon my bared breasts, I thought at first. And then I realized that wasn’t it at all. He looked at the place where Nathanial had cut me, and his eyes widened as the skin there drew itself together, and mended. I quickly covered myself, but too late. He’d seen.

And even if he hadn’t, our secret would have been out. For when I turned, ’twas to see two other shirtless, dark-skinned men in buckskins, leaning over Arianna, then backing away as she sucked in her first new breath with a loud, desperate gasp. Her back arched off the ground, even as the hole in her chest closed in on itself and the younger men’s eyes widened.

I lunged forward, uncertain what they would do to her. But the silver-haired man touched my arm, and when I turned, implored me with his eyes. Narrowing my gaze, I searched his face. And finally, seeing no ill intent there, I nodded once.

He in turn raised a hand to the other two, and they picked Arianna up even as she was blinking her eyes open and looking around her. Silver-Hair took my arm, his grip gentle, and the five of us marched away, through the forest. I tugged free once, turning back, realizing Dearborne would revive, that there was only one way I could ensure that he stay dead.

But the old red man met my eyes, shook his head once, and took my arm again.

“Another time, then,” I whispered. “Another time.”

His name, in English, was Trees Speaking. In his own tongue, ’twas impossible for me to pronounce, and my constant attempts only made the other members of his tribe laugh at me as we all sat around a central fire that night, in their village. Long, narrow buildings all covered in pale bark served as their homes, and it seemed many generations of a given family resided in each one. But the gathering place, which seemed to serve as many purposes as the meeting hall in Sanctuary, was the area around this central fire.

’Twas there we were taken, and urged to sit. The old one spoke in a tongue that was like something ancient and sacred to my ears, and people spilled from their homes and stopped whatever they were doing, to stare at us, with wide, shining dark eyes. In a moment they broke away, running in a dozen directions. A dark, beautiful woman brought cloaks of whisper-soft doe hide to drape gently over our shoulders, while another, a plump young woman with an infant strapped to her back in some ingenious contraption, brought bowls filled with something like stew. Another draped a dress across my lap, and another dropped beads atop it. And one by one every member of this clan gathered round the fire, all seeming to vie for the spots nearest Arianna and me. We kept exchanging glances and shrugging. Neither of us knowing what to expect, much less what to say as they spoke to us in words we could not understand.

Finally a young girl, perhaps twelve or even younger, began to speak to me in halting English.

“I know some… white man tongue,” she said slowly. “My name Laughing River.”

I was surprised at her knowledge of English. And yet should not have been. The settlers were all around these people. They’d be wise to learn their language, and obviously they were that.

“My name is Raven,” I told the beautiful, sloe-eyed child.

“Raven?” And when I nodded, she turned to repeat the word to the rest in their tongue. Then turned to Arianna.

“I am Arianna.”

Laughing River tilted her head. “Ahhhrrrr…”

“Arianna,“‘ my sister repeated.

“Ahhrranna.” Laughing River nodded hard and said it again, with authority this time. Many in the circle tried to pronounce the name, but it only resulted in more laughter.