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Merry squeezed her eyes shut against the pictures in her head. Even though the image of Jack standing over her with the broken blade was fresh in her mind – still made her breath short with terror – she couldn’t hate him. After talking to him this evening, she pitied him. More than that: she almost (kind of) trusted him. It didn’t make any sense. But somehow, he felt … familiar.
Poor Jack. She tried to imagine him dressed in modern clothes and with a different haircut, and the thought made her smile a little. Jack would make a pretty cute twenty-first century teenager. If things had been different, maybe they could have been friends.
In the dream, Merry wasn’t wearing pyjamas. She was wearing a gown of thick, red-brown wool that fell in heavy folds from below the belt around her waist. Glancing down, she saw objects hanging from the belt: a leather pouch, a knife, a stone with a hole through its centre. Nearby stood a pair of enormous wooden doors, dark-coloured, scarred with runes and symbols.
There was a touch on her shoulder. Jack was standing behind her. He cupped her face in his hands, gazing down at her as though he was trying to memorise every detail of her skin, her eyes, her lips.
‘Jack …’ Merry’s eyes closed. Jack’s lips were firm and cool as they moved against hers; he put his arms around her and pulled her close. For one infinitesimal, infinite moment, Merry was burning, and liquid gold was running through her veins.
Jack drew away, and Merry realised the wooden doors had swung open to reveal –
Trees. Crowded up against the doorway, blocking out the light. Huge holly trees with thick black branches, dark green leaves the size of her hand, long spines, like talons tipped with silver, curving out from their edges. Jack was whispering in her ear.
‘You left me. You poisoned me with the black holly and you left me there, buried alive, as the centuries passed.’ Slowly, his hands tightened around her wrists; he began pushing her forwards, towards the trees. ‘You shouldn’t have left me.’
‘Jack, what are you doing? You’re hurting me.’ Merry struggled to break his grip, to force him back from the doorway, but his hands were like iron manacles on her arms. ‘Jack, stop!’
They passed the door posts and Jack did stop, holding Merry a few centimetres in front of the wall of holly.
‘It’s time for you to sleep, Meredith.’ Jack shoved her forwards.
Merry closed her eyes as the spines pierced her skin …
Jack woke up in the darkness of his room under the lake.
He remembered things, now. He remembered sitting with Merry and Leo next to the lake, confessing the terrible things he had done or been made to do. And all the time his memories of the past were getting clearer. It was hard to believe that Merry was right, that such a weight of years had passed since the witch sisters had left him and Gwydion sleeping under the lake. And yet, the world was so very different. He could recall his childhood: playing among the wood shavings while his father worked, or listening to the clatter of the loom as his mother wove cloth.
His foster-mother, not his actual mother. Because he had only seen his birth mother once.
Once, in – Helmswick. That was the place. Jack closed his eyes, trying to inch his way into the past, to that particular evening. To the night he had been sent out to kill his own brother, to cut out his heart –
The memory flooded back. That was what he had been trying to describe to Merry: the only other time he – the King of Hearts – had failed …
In his mind’s eye Jack could see the room clearly, the bunches of mistletoe and scarlet hangings: it was near Yuletide. His brother was lying on the bed with his eyes closed, a smile on his lips. Dreaming about the girl he loved, no doubt: the very thing that made him vulnerable to the King of Hearts’ malice.
The smile faded when he opened his eyes, and saw Jack.
The boy stared at him, and somehow – was it the wolf’s-head brooch Gwydion made him wear, or some family resemblance? – recognised him.
‘Jack.’
‘Yes,’ the King of Hearts replied. ‘And you must be Edmund. There’s no need to be afraid. I am here to help you. To save you.’
The boy talked to him. Imagined he could, somehow, save himself ‘Please, Jack – you are still my brother. Let me help you. Surely there is some part of you that is still – human?’
And Jack fought for control of his body, felt the shadow within him waver, weaken – but only for a minute. ‘No, Edmund. I do not desire your help. I desire only to serve my master. And his desire is to set you free.’
Edmund leapt towards the door then, but the King of Hearts shouted out the words that rendered his victims powerless and the younger boy fell as though someone had swept his legs out from under him.
Jack went to stand over him, drew his sword, raised the blade point-down above his head –
‘Jack!’
A woman, standing on the threshold, eyes wide, burning against her pale skin. His mother. The next moment she threw herself across Edmund’s body, shielding him. But the curse inside Jack did not hesitate. Jack watched, horror-struck, as his own arms plunged the blade downwards towards Edith’s back, as Edmund screamed –
The blade shattered.
Jack gasped and opened his eyes. And there was Gwydion, standing before him, unchanged by the centuries that had passed: the same dark hair, touched with grey; the same scarred, narrow face; the same contemptuous expression. Jack felt for his knife.
‘It is not there. Neither is the sword. My King of Hearts put them somewhere safe on his return from the world above.’
Jack did not reply. Gwydion watched him for a while.
‘How many years has it been, Jack, since we last stood together under the open sky?’
Still Jack remained silent. How much had the dark shadow that inhabited his body already revealed to Gwydion, that was the question.
‘Oh, I know what has been happening at the lake: when the King of Hearts loses control of you he is deaf, but he is not blind. But who is she, this girl who has thwarted my servant, turned him aside from his purpose?’
‘I do not know,’ Jack burst out. ‘I only understand a little of what she says, and I do not know how she is able to – to prevent me from …’ He stopped. Gwydion would surely realise that he was lying, at least in part.
And then what? Torture. Or Gwydion would use some spell to break open Jack’s mind like an oyster shell – Somehow, he would have to resist.
Gwydion was speaking again. ‘… that is the question. What is it about this girl that defeats us?’ Gwydion paused, his eyes narrowed, studying Jack’s face. ‘Soon I must rest, but first I think … I think it is time to renew the curse.’
‘No!’ Jack backed away.
Gwydion raised his eyebrows. ‘No? But the magic has to be fed, until I can make the effect of the curse permanent. Come now.’ Gwydion beckoned to Jack. ‘You know you cannot resist me.’
Jack stared into Gwydion’ dark eyes, but found no mercy there. ‘I know it.’
He followed Gwydion along corridors, up and down stairs, until they reached a cavernous room lit only by a fire burning in a trench in the floor. There was a chair set facing the fire; a huge chair, made out of some dark wood, carved all over with swirling patterns that seemed to form leering faces when Jack looked too closely. Narrow leather cords were attached to the frame of the chair.
Jack murmured a prayer, took a deep breath, and sat down on it. The cords came to life like so many snakes, wrapping themselves around Jack’s body, his head, his face, holding him fast.
‘Good, good.’ Gwydion bared his teeth, the closest he came to a smile. ‘I enjoy hurting you, but it does save time when you do as you are bid. Now, let me select the sacrifice.’ He went to a wall at the far end of the room, entirely covered with long shelves. Three of the shelves were filled with glass jars.
Jars of hearts.
The hearts that Jack – the King of Hearts – had cut out of the bodies of his victims. Jack tried to remember: how many months had passed between Gwydion capturing him, and the three witches putting him into an enchanted sleep? How many people had he killed?
Gwydion picked up one of the jars and brought it over to the fire. ‘The body is dead, so now I sacrifice the soul.’ Gwydion raised his hands and started to draw the fire runes in the air, chanting in a language Jack did not understand. The runes were a dull red-brown, the colour of old blood. They burned themselves directly into Jack’s brain until he gasped and sweated with the pain of it, but the cords on his face still held his eyelids open. Gwydion pulled the stopper out of the jar and tipped the contents into the fire.
The heart screamed.
As the sound faded, Jack felt himself fading too, until he was sealed somewhere inside his own head, a spectator without any free will. Someone else, or something else, took control of his body.
The leather cords fell away, lifeless. Jack found himself kneeling before the wizard.
Gwydion put one hand on Jack’s head, as if he were blessing him, then raised him to his feet.
‘Welcome again, my King of Hearts.’
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.