Destiny (21 page)

Helen let the golden brooch fall from her hands, and it plummeted into the pool, making ripples of ever-widening circles on the black surface of the water. The sound of the bell grew louder and more insistent. A pinpoint of light shone far above us, impossibly far away at the top of the deep place that we stood in, and then we saw the moon reflected in the pool. It waxed and waned before our eyes, many times, and the leaves that Sarah had scattered in her circle withered away and turned into dust.

A shape began to emerge from the depths of the pool and from the secret circles of Time. It seemed at first to be made of mists and shadows; then the mists swirled and we saw that a woman was standing on the water, poised under the arch. It was Celia Hartle, but as I had never seen her before. She was young and beautiful, and her dark eyes gleamed with intelligence and curiosity. And there was something else about her—a quick, bright hunger that seemed to fill
her with inner light. She was holding the Seal, and she looked down at it in wonder, turning it in her hands.

“You have shown me many strange things,” she murmured, as though speaking to the Seal. “Is this one more vision to tempt me to give up everything I have ever known for you?”

Helen fell to her knees. “Listen to me,” she pleaded. “I am the daughter you will never have, if you follow the Seal and choose your rightful destiny. If you reject this gift, you will suffer for it, and so will the world. You are called to be great, to be high and pure and noble, to be a Guardian of the Seal. Turn your back on the life you know and follow your destiny.”

The young Celia looked at Helen in wonder. “But I have been told that to do that I would give up all chance of the happiness of this world. Love, marriage…children…the ordinary miracles…And you…you would be my daughter….” Then a shadow passed over her face. “If I accept the Seal, you won’t be born.”

“I know. I am willing to become only a might have been. I would give up everything, even my existence, so that you will bring light and not darkness into the waiting world.”

“Helen!” Sarah gasped. “No—you can’t do this—”

“I can and I will. It’s the only way to stop all the pain
and the danger.” Helen smiled, with only a trace of sadness in her eyes. “I never really fit into life, did I? This way, everything that I might have been, or done, will be forgotten, like a dream. And…and if there had ever been anyone else…if he’s not…well, he won’t remember.” She took a deep breath. “He won’t be hurt by my loss. No one will remember. No one will grieve. All shall be well.” She turned back to her mother and urged her: “Claim the Seal. Embrace its gifts. Do it now.”

Celia Hartle seemed to be strengthened by her daughter’s words. She held the brooch up, and it seemed as though she was bathed in golden light. But before she could speak, a rumbling shook the chamber and the Priestess appeared, wreathed in darkness and flickering fire. This was the Celia Hartle we knew now, and she was unrecognizable as her younger self; her greed and hatred had disfigured her beyond all hope. She began to pace around the edges of our circles, glaring at us in turn.

“Stop this!” she commanded. “I guessed you were trying to slip away to betray me, but my Dark King is all-seeing. He granted me the power to follow you here and stop you. Give the Seal to me!”

“I am trying to give it to you, truly,” Helen said. “If only you would believe me.”

“By digging up my past? How dare you meddle with choices of others, Helen, when you have made such poor choices yourself?”

“You know my choice,” replied Helen steadily. “It is to reject you and your ways utterly, and always has been. But even now, I forgive you.” She stood up. “I forgive you everything. And that makes me free of you. Lynton was right, and so was Miss Scratton. I no longer hate you, or crave your love. I don’t need you anymore. I just want the light to shine and the darkness to be destroyed. That’s what gives me the strength to give everything up—even the person I love most—so that you can be saved.”

“Oh, and I suppose I am to be grateful for that?” the Priestess sneered. “So I have to fall into line and fit in with your ideas of what is right and wrong? I turn into some kind of saintly fool and owe everything to my savior Helen, everlastingly humble and thankful? Well, I don’t want your forgiveness or your second chances. All I want is what is mine!” She leaned forward, her arms outstretched.

“Don’t cross the circles of Time!” Helen shouted warningly.

But the Priestess wasn’t listening. A red light of famished hunger glared in her eyes. “Even in the battle I heard
the Seal calling to me, from my past. And now it will be mine again, but I will also have everything I’ve learned since those days of foolish, groping innocence.
Give it to me!
”

She leaped forward and stepped onto the wall surrounding the deep pool. With a cry of triumph, the warped husk of Celia Hartle snatched the Seal from the hands of her former self. A great crack of lightning tore though the chamber, striking the bell and making it toll. The younger Celia staggered back and vanished. The Priestess stood balanced for a moment on the wall, holding the Seal with a gloating expression on her face. Then the light from it intensified and burned white hot, too dazzling to look at. It seemed to run across her body like licking flames. The Priestess began to shudder, and the waters of the pool began to swirl. She was alight with a great and radiant power, a power so overwhelming that it was tearing her to pieces. She screamed…. I turned away, not wanting to see the end, but in that instant the wretched being was sucked into the whirlpool of Time. The Seal spun from her grasp as Celia Hartle sank out of sight into those deep mystical waters, and out of our lives forever.

We waited, hardly daring to breathe, and when I looked at Helen I saw that she was crying, and that the Seal was
clasped in her hands. Sarah went over and put her arms around Helen, as though she was soothing a child.

“It’s over,” Sarah said. “It’s over. She can’t harm you anymore.”

“I know—I just can’t take it all in,” Helen replied shakily.

“But what happened to her?” I asked, still not fully understanding.

“You cannot meet yourself in the circles of Time and hope to survive,” Helen replied. “Besides, the power of the unveiled Seal was far too much for her. Celia Hartle had diminished over the years, and not grown. She couldn’t touch it without being destroyed.” The tears welled up in her eyes again. “I wish it didn’t have to be like that.”

“You did everything you could to try to help her, Helen,” Sarah said earnestly. “You even offered yourself—your whole life—so that she could have a second chance, but she brought her destruction on herself in the end.”

“I know.” Helen let out a long breath as though a great burden was falling from her. “But—oh Sarah—Evie—has she truly passed into death now? Is she free of the shadows? Is there any hope for her in the next world?”

I shrugged and took Helen’s hand. “I don’t really know. But there’s always hope, isn’t there?”

“Yes.” She sighed. “We have to believe that.”

We moved away from the pool. There was nothing more we could do there, and we got ready to leave.

“There’s just one more question,” Sarah said. “You said you were prepared to give up the person you love best, Helen. So who would that be—me or Evie?” She gave a faint smile. “Or a certain musician?”

Helen blushed and looked away. “Not all stories have a happy ending,” she murmured.

“But there’s always hope?”

Helen smiled self-consciously in return. “Yes, Miss Fitzalan, there’s always hope.” Then she was suddenly serious again. “But we have to get back to Cal and Josh and Velvet. I hope that now the Priestess is…gone, her followers will lose the will to carry on. Let’s hope this madness is over at last.”

We climbed the spiral staircase up to the crypt until our legs ached, and replaced the stone over the entrance to it. I wondered if anyone would ever use it again, and in what desperate circumstances they might seek out the crack of Time under Wyldcliffe’s ruins. But for us, it was nearly over. We just had to get back to our friends and hope that now we could look to the future, not the past.

One of the passages from the underground crypt led
to the grotto. Sarah led the way, commanding any fallen rocks and stones that blocked the way to move aside and let us pass. It felt as though there was nothing we couldn’t do now. We quickly reached the grotto’s familiar cavern and ran out into the grounds. The night was far advanced, and the sky was as black as a raven’s wing, but there was a glow of light in the school ahead. I thought for one moment that the ballroom had been brilliantly lit for a party, and then I realized the awful truth. That wasn’t the welcoming glow of candles and party lights. There was a dull flare of flame and smoke. Drifting on the night air was the distant sound of screaming. This was the Priestess’s final act of revenge.

Wyldcliffe was burning.

T
HE
W
ITNESS OF
S
ARAH
F
ITZALAN

W
yldcliffe was burning. We stared in horror, spellbound, at the dull red light that glared and flickered from the ballroom, then began to run toward the school. We had only one thought, to get there in time, to stop whatever was happening and get everyone out before it was too late.

We tore open a side door, then raced through the deserted building, heading for the red corridor and the locked ballroom. There was the sound of fists beating on the inside, girls desperate to open the doors and escape. I laid my hand on the carved wood and spoke to the tree it had once been, asking it to open for us, but I was thrown back. Some greater spell held sway. “Helen, you’ll have to
help us,” I said, and she quickly took our hands in hers. In a brief swirl of light and energy we passed through the air and into the ballroom.

A scene of madness was waiting for us. The battle was still raging. There were the wild riders fighting on one side and the coven fighting back, and burning torches and broken glass everywhere. One of the long drapes at the far end of the room had caught fire. The terrified girls were trying to escape through the shattered windows, but they were beaten back by the haggard figures of the Dead. Cal was fighting desperately with three hooded women, and Josh was trying to hold off an attack from Miss Dalrymple and Miss Schofield.

Above all the noise and confusion Dr. Franzen was screaming, “Celia, no, my darling, no…come back…where are you?” But his screams died away into silence, and there was no one to answer him.

He must have loved her, in his own sick way, because his face had changed, as if he had grown old since we had last seen him. “She’s gone…she’s gone…,” he wept. Then he gave a deep, inhuman groan and snatched up his stick. Ignoring us, he strode through the crowd, shoving people aside until he came to Velvet. He pointed his cane, and a tongue of blue lightning shot out and hit her in the
chest. Her eyes rolled and she gasped, then staggered back unconscious. And as Velvet fell, the Wild Hunt vanished like mist now that she was no longer awake to summon them. The windows they had shattered sealed up again, trapping everyone inside. The Dark Sisters cheered and whooped as the Wild Hunt disappeared from sight, but they didn’t celebrate for long.

“It’s over, you fools,” Dr. Franzen groaned. “Your great mistress has passed.” He grabbed a flaming torch from one of the women and thrust it into another of the heavy drapes at the long windows. “Let them all burn,” he cried, as the cloth quickly caught fire. “Let everything burn. First the Abbey and then the village. Let the whole valley burn, and everyone in it!” Some of the coven women ran up to stamp out the flames, but he laughed and the light of madness was bright in his eyes. He wielded the torch again, thrusting it into the face of the nearest woman—Miss Dalrymple—and whatever crimes she had committed for the Priestess, she didn’t deserve that. She howled with pain, but he lashed at her again, and her robes caught fire. I wanted to be sick as she blundered away in agony, spreading fire around the room like a contagious disease. The students began to scream again at this new terror. Everything seemed to be happening at once, yet I had the
oddest feeling that it was all slowing down in front of my eyes, like in a surreal nightmare.

Helen reached Velvet and tried to cradle her in her arms, but Dr. Franzen swooped down and grabbed Helen by the throat. “You!” he snarled. “All this is because of you! Nothing will stop me from killing you now, as blood price for my beloved!” He stepped back and pointed his black cane at her, but Helen commanded the Seal and she fell from his grasp. “You will never hurt me again,” she said quietly. “Your time is over. It’s you who will die.”

Then Dr. Franzen really seemed to go berserk. He snatched up his stick, howling, “It is the end!” He pointed it into the air, and a shower of green flames erupted, touching the ceiling and shooting everywhere. The whole room was catching fire now. Flames licked at the roof and windows, the air filled with bitter, choking smoke, and people were crying for help. I stood clutching Evie’s hand and looking around desperately for Cal. So it was going to end like this. It was the end.

Dr. Franzen’s voice boomed out again. “You will all die, as payment!” He staggered away, laughing insanely and lunging out wildly at anyone who was near him. “Burn!” he shouted. “Let it all burn! This is the hour of your death—and mine!”

His voice seemed to echo loudly above the pandemonium. “The hour of my death…the hour of my death…”

Velvet stirred weakly in Helen’s arms and opened her eyes. “The hour of my death,” she murmured. “Agnes…remember Agnes…”

At that moment I was almost too frightened to think or act, but Helen looked up, and her eyes were clear and unafraid. “Agnes!” she called. “This is the final reckoning! At the hour of Velvet’s death we remember you! Come to our aid. By Crown and Seal and Talisman we call to you, our secret sister!”

The next moment Agnes stood in front us—not a vision or a shadow or a memory, but a real living girl, with long, dark red curls and gray eyes like the far-off sea, just as she had been when Wyldcliffe was her home and she had reached out to grasp the mysteries of life for the first time.

“I have answered your summons. Lend me the Talisman, Evie, and let us make this night into a lasting memorial to Lady Agnes Templeton and her sisters!” Evie tore the necklace from her throat and gave it to Agnes, who kissed the sparkling crystal. In the middle of all the chaos and agony, a white light seemed to spill out from Agnes and her Talisman that shielded us from the heat and smoke.

Dr. Franzen was stumbling crazily about the room, starting to choke on the thickening smoke. “I curse this place!” he was screaming. “I curse the Abbey and this valley of Wyldcliffe! A thousand years of fear and darkness, anger and hatred, will be born this night!”

“No! I won’t let you harm my home!” Agnes called, holding the Talisman high above her head. She closed her eyes and began to murmur to the unseen powers. “Spirit of the sacred flame, I have served you faithfully. Hear me now! Let this sorcerer’s curses crumble into dust. Let the fire of life burn brightly for good, and not evil. Scour this place with healing flames, so that the dead return to their graves and trouble us no more! Bright tongues of power, do not touch the innocents of Wyldcliffe! Come to me now…and now…and now…”

As Agnes stood there, clothed in purity and strength, a high sweet song echoed above the noise and fever of the fire, like a cooling balm. The darting tongues of flame that had threatened to destroy Wyldcliffe began to shoot like bright arrows toward Agnes, answering her call. Dr. Franzen lunged crazily from side to side like an injured animal and then collapsed. And all the time Agnes remained true and steady, as she held the Talisman above her head and it absorbed the flames, withstanding their heat and anger
and containing them in its pure crystal heart. At last the fire was swallowed up by the glittering jewel. Stillness and silence seemed to descend upon Wyldcliffe like a prayer.

The Dead had departed. The doors of the ballroom stood open. Josh and Cal stumbled over to us, thankful and exhausted. I held on to Cal as though I could never let him go again, as all around us the Wyldcliffe students got to their feet, shaking and bewildered. Their nightmare was almost over. The sound of injured girls crying filled the air as friends huddled together and tried to comfort one another.

I looked around. Dr. Franzen was sprawled under one of the long windows. He was dead. Near him, the Dark Sisters stood in shock, slowly pulling off their robes and staring at one another in dismay as though waking from some dreadful dream. I saw Miss Dalrymple’s body lying twisted in the debris. Part of the roof had collapsed and as it began to rain, plumes of steam rose up from the blackened timbers. I saw Miss Clarke and Miss Hetherington emerge from the trance they had been in, dazed and bruised but determined to shepherd the girls to safety. They seem to have no memory of what had happened.

“The fire is under control. Everyone assemble in the drive for roll call,” Miss Hetherington called out shakily.
“Miss Clarke, can you go to the Master’s office and telephone the emergency services? Caroline dear, don’t panic, it’s just a cut, you’re safe…come on, girls, on your feet, let’s get out of here. The doctor will soon be here. There’s been a dreadful accident, but it’s over now….”

She swept past and didn’t seem to see us. We were hidden by Agnes’s light and power. It was over for the Wyldcliffe students. A fire had broken out in the school, but by some miracle they had all escaped. That was all they would remember. Life would go on. But for us, for Velvet, it was different. She lay in Helen’s arms, her skin white as a lily and her lips red as blood, and there was death in her eyes. No doctor could help her now.

Agnes turned to us. “My time here is finished. I have done as you asked, and the prophecy is fulfilled. Wyldcliffe and its people have been saved from their great danger. The fire is tamed. The coven is broken. There will be no Bondsouls at Wyldcliffe. The curse is broken. And now I shall never walk on this earth again.”

“You can’t leave us now! We love you, Agnes. Stay with us,” Evie begged.

Agnes shook her head and took Evie’s hand. “My sister—my daughter—I can’t. This is the end. Our paths crossed so that you could save Sebastian, and I could save
Wyldcliffe. We have done what we needed to do. I have been torn for so long between this world and the next, but now, if you love me, you will let me go.”

“But—it’s not over yet!” Evie sobbed. “We still need you.”

“You are all mistresses of your own powers and destinies. You don’t need me anymore.”

“And what about Velvet?”

“She is your sister of fire now,” Agnes said. “The three of you must help her, and Josh and Cal too. They are part of our Mystic Way now. So you see, you aren’t alone. You have each other. You have the Crown and the Seal. And the Talisman I bequeath to you, Evie, for all time. Use it well, in memory of me.”

She put her arms around Evie, and they clung to each other for a second. And then Agnes was gone, like the passing of a star, and the light around us was dimmed. But we weren’t alone. We had each other, and one last task was facing us. Velvet was slipping away, and we had to bring her back from the brink of death.