Moondance of Stonewylde (31 page)

‘Oh I suppose so,’ sighed Clip. ‘But six eggs at the very most, and if she gets distressed then I’m taking her straight home.’

Yul was sickened by the way Magus spoke as if she were nothing, just a commodity to be used. How could the man be so heartless? While they were distracted arguing, Sylvie had slowly turned towards the sea, gazing out at the pinkness that heralded the first glimmer of moonrise. Her arms began to lift but it was her singing that roused them both.

‘Quick! It’s rising!’ shouted Magus, grabbing her round the waist and almost throwing her up onto the disc. Again she stumbled and he jumped up next to her, pulling her into the centre. Her arms had dropped and she stared at the horizon, making a strange, horrible mewing noise. It was nothing like her ethereal singing at Hare Stone.

‘Are you coming up too?’ Magus asked Clip.

‘No, it was too strong last time,’ he replied. ‘I’ll wait till the moon’s risen a bit and she calms down.’

‘Well I’m going to try and stay on this time. Here we go!’

The pink rim of the moon was just visible and Sylvie had begun to shake and vibrate, her body jerking uncontrollably, her face contorted. Yul had to close his eyes. He thought of her tiptoe dancing, leaping with the hares, skipping around in the grass, and then this – standing on the hard stone, being pounded and shaken by a force of immense magnitude pouring through her body. He understood what was happening straight away; the great stone was wrenching the moon energy from the night sky, dragging it down hard through her frame and into the rock at her feet. She took the full force of it and couldn’t move; she simply had to endure. Yul felt the tears hot on his cheeks and
fought down the sob threatening to fly from his throat. This was far worse than he’d imagined. He’d have done anything to stand there instead and take the pain for her.

Magus stood next to her, blasted with the force that came back up through the stone and into his body. He shouted in exhilaration as if on a roller-coaster ride, his arms outstretched and head thrown back. But a few moments later he jumped off the stone.

‘Sacred Mother, that’s too much! I thought my heart would give out. That is
so
powerful!’

Clip lay on the grass with his toes touching the stone, an expression of ecstasy on his face. Magus unlocked the chest and brought out six stone eggs, which he placed next to the disc of rock.

‘I’ll load her up in a minute, when it’s less intense,’ he said, joining Clip on the grass. Yul could feel Sylvie’s suffering; the sharp, shooting needles that darted through her and down into the rock below her feet. He saw her glowing, the silvery threads chasing over her skin. She’d closed herself away, retreated into some tiny, hidden place where the pain couldn’t touch her so badly. Yul tried to embrace her in his mind, tried to comfort her. He too almost drifted away from consciousness in his fierce attempts to reach Sylvie in her hiding place.

He was brought back to reality by Magus’ voice.

‘I think she’s ready to charge the eggs now.’

‘Alright, if you’re sure she’s okay. How long have we been here?’

‘I’ve no idea. My watch always stops up here at moonrise. But it’s fine – she’s doing well so don’t worry.’

He climbed up onto the stone and put two of the heavy eggs in her hands. Yul could see how they started to glow almost immediately as the force shot down through her arms into the greedy stone. Her severe jerking had stopped now the moon had risen above the horizon and lost its pink-gold colour; instead she merely trembled and shuddered. Yul closed his eyes, wishing desperately to relieve her of such pain.

Magus changed the eggs over after a while and both men climbed up onto the stone, spreading themselves out on it. Sylvie remained standing, staring up at the moon with unseeing eyes. Yul was sure that an hour had passed and he felt his anger, clamped down tightly inside, begin to bubble up. When Magus changed the eggs again, Yul realised he’d never had any intention of keeping to the agreement. Clip, for all his earlier solicitousness, appeared to have forgotten about Sylvie and her suffering. He was having too good a time soaking up the moon magic. As Magus put the new eggs in Sylvie’s hands, she turned her eyes to him. She’d left her hidden place and felt the pain shooting through her body. Her arms and fingers ached terribly and Yul willed her to drop the eggs, but her fingers were frozen into position.

‘Please let me stop now,’ she whispered to Magus. He smiled at her in the moonlight, his hair shimmering almost as brightly as hers. He shook his head and put his finger to his lips, glancing down at Clip.

‘
You bastard!
’ thought Yul, longing to leap out and hit him over the head with his stone eggs. But Clip heard something, for he opened his eyes and sat up.

‘Goddess, I must’ve been in a trance,’ he mumbled, staring around him in the bright moonlight. ‘I meant to keep a close eye on Sylvie this time but that moon magic just sends me off to another realm. I’m sure we’ve been here longer than an hour, Sol. Why didn’t you wake me?’

‘Don’t be a fool,’ laughed Magus. ‘See, she’s fine – much better than last month. Your hypnosis really helps her, so no need to worry yourself.’

‘That’s good. Come on then, let’s get her down and take her home.’

‘Just five more minutes,’ said Magus. ‘Remember, she does love to dance at Mooncliffe.’

He laughed again and Yul found it almost impossible to control his pure, white-hot hatred.

Later, Yul followed them back to the Hall at a distance. Sylvie was delivered to her bedroom via the private staircase and both men left. Yul saw her mother moving around in the dimly lit room upstairs. He knew there was no point going home and trying to sleep as he was boiling over with anger. He seethed with it; a molten rage that ran through his veins like poison. He knew that if he were to bump into Magus now, he’d try to kill him. He wasn’t rational in any way. He’d had to endure watching Sylvie being abused by Magus, used for the man’s own gratification and then laughed at in her weakness. It was more than he could take.

Yul ran from the Hall and headed for the Stone Circle. In the light of the brilliant silver-gold moon, now riding high across the night sky, he could see perfectly. He pushed himself to his limit, trying to blot out the images of Sylvie’s suffering. His legs pumped like pistons as he raced up the hill. The great stone dance was silhouetted against the silvery night sky, the dark shapes blotting out the stars. He slowed down just before he reached the circle and tried to calm his emotions, knowing he should enter the sacred space with reverence. But he couldn’t. His hatred for Magus was too intense and all-consuming to be pushed aside so soon. He stepped into the arena with his heart pounding from the punishing run, his veins pulsing with fury and the desire to kill. He stood in the centre of the circle not wanting any energy tonight from the Altar Stone. He already seethed with an excess of energy that chased around his body searching for an outlet. As the moon poured quicksilver into the circle Yul raised his face to the bright disc and howled.

The rage and frustration, hatred and blood-lust came cascading from him in a torrent. It hung in the hot night air, eddying about with nowhere to go. Then, slowly, Yul started to move, pacing around the edge of the circle. He prowled silently and purposefully, circling inside the circumference of the great stones still adorned with corn dollies and images of the Corn Mother. Gradually he picked up speed, loping round and touching each stone as he passed. Moonlight and shadow flickered on him as he ran faster, light and dark, silver and black, like a strobe on his
face flashing into his soul. Round and round he raced, his pain and rage spiralling into the centre of the Circle. A great vortex of emotion started to build, a flickering carousel of anger and passion.

He didn’t see the inky clouds piling in from the west. They rolled in fast, building and climbing on each other, great towers of swollen blackness growing in the sultry August night. Still Yul ran, his body slick with sweat, curls stuck to his head. He wrenched off his restrictive damp clothes as he ran. The night air clung to him, oppressively hot and heavy against his bare skin. The hair on his body tingled. He felt a strange lifting in his heart as if his breath itself was charged with particles of rage.

He raced one final, mad circuit of the Stone Circle, stirring the power and energy into a maelstrom of wild and uncontrollable passion. He felt it building inside him, climbing, towering, piling up. With a shout he broke away from his track and lunged full pelt for the Altar Stone. He sprang onto the great stone with a mighty leap and turned to face the moon, his body thrumming and throbbing with a dark, negative charge. He roared and roared, the sound pouring from him in a blind flood of wrath. At that moment the heavy black clouds billowed across, blotting out the moon and plunging the arena into utter darkness.

There was an earth-shattering crack as the skies and the boy released their fury in unison, all the elements as one. A great pillar of lightning slashed down to earth accompanied by an explosion of thunder strong enough to rouse the dead. Yul screamed in wild glory and again the lightning forked down, hitting the hills in the distance. Flash followed flash, the blue-white light blindingly intense, searing the eye. Pure volts of vicious energy discharged themselves from the skies and blasted the earth below with their violence.

Completely exposed to the elements, Yul stood astride the stone with his arms outstretched to the heavens. His dark curls corkscrewing with static, he threw back his head and laughed. He shouted, screamed, yelled, bellowed – his tiny sound drowned by the great anger of the elements, the rage of the thunder as it
rolled and rumbled around Stonewylde. And then came the rain. It hit Yul’s hot skin like burning nails, driving hard into every inch of him, bouncing off his skin with such force that he felt punctured. He raised his face, tipping his head right back and letting the needles of water wash away the sweat. It ran in torrents through his curls, down his body, washing and cleansing him with its fierce drumming. He was caught in a waterfall of rain. Gradually the downpour turned cold as the heat and energy of the storm dissipated, its force spent. Yul’s roars turned to cries and then to sobs, and he howled once more into the drenched night. Howls of pain and sorrow, howls of anguish and torment for the girl he loved but couldn’t protect from the man who abused her.

Just before dawn, the cold boy lying crumpled on the Altar Stone was awoken by a pecking on his arm. He opened his eyes blearily, unable to focus properly, and saw the crow perched next to him. It blinked and let out a loud
caw
. He pushed himself upright, his head spinning and his body wracked with tremors. Slowly he levered himself off the stone, stumbling as his bare feet hit the wet earth below. The crow flapped off and he followed it, falling and tripping, as it took the short cut to the sanctuary of Mother Heggy’s cottage.

After the night of the Corn Moon Sylvie rested in her Tudor bedroom for a few days, spending most of her time asleep or sitting by the window in a daydream. She wasn’t as weak as the previous month, having been allowed down from the stone before she collapsed. Miranda took care of her and Magus looked in to check she was alright, pleased that Hazel wasn’t needed this month. Clip too was delighted that she seemed stronger than the month before, but he still irritated Miranda with his frequent visits to sit with Sylvie.

Yul, however, was not safely tucked up in his bed. When he’d arrived in the grey light of the misty August dawn, falling through her front door and shivering without his clothes, Mother Heggy had been waiting for him. She’d wrapped him in a mouldering
blanket and laid him on a narrow truckle bed at the back of the cottage. She made him drink from her stone mug and then left him to battle it out. He had a high fever but she knew he was strong and in good health. He tossed and turned for two days and nights, his black curls plastered to his head, cheeks flushed and eyes glassy. He was delirious and unaware of where he was. Mother Heggy took good care of him. She forced him to drink, sponged him down with tepid water, covered him when he shivered with cold. She sent a message with a passing Villager to Maizie telling her of Yul’s whereabouts. On the fourth night Mother Heggy judged him recovered from the chill and let him leave, wrapped in the blanket and with stern instructions to bring Sylvie to her well before the next full moon.

September began as warm and balmy as August had been. The sun was hot, and in the afternoon Sylvie decided she felt strong enough to go outside. She’d recovered so much quicker from her ordeal this time, although she still felt a little weak. She wandered around the lawns and flower gardens, watching the newts in the great ornamental pond for a while. Then she went to the formal garden with its raked gravel paths and clipped hedges. She’d never been here alone before and strolled around looking at the stone ornaments carved to represent mythological creatures.

Sylvie was deep inside the maze-like garden when she heard the gravel crunching behind her. She turned to see Buzz approaching and her heart sank. She’d managed to avoid him so far as he’d been keeping to himself because of his injuries, which were the talk of the Hall. But it was now a month since the fight with Yul and he was on the mend. His nose was out of the splint, although swollen and unsightly. The bruising around his eyes had faded to a nasty yellow and his split lip was almost healed. The tooth was still missing; soon he’d have to face the dental work necessary to restore his smile.

He quickened his pace and waved for her to stop.