Jadrin took one of her white hands and pressed it against his face. ‘You are more help to me than you know, but how we’ll be able to conceal ourselves I just don’t know. It seems hopeless.’
Amberina was just about to answer, when they were disturbed by the unmistakeable sound of low chuckling coming from the bushes beside them. The branches shook and separated to reveal the slim form of Psydre, the witch’s daughter. She stood up, still laughing and pulling twigs from her hair. Amberina and Jadrin drew closer together in surprise. ‘There are ways and means to everything,’ she announced.
Jadrin bristled. ‘Spying being one of them, I suppose?’
Psydre shook her dark, wild head and smiled with her red, red mouth. ‘I wasn’t spying. I just overheard. Couldn’t help it, although I must confess, I am surprised to learn that it wasn’t you who spun the straw into gold. Does Ashalan know of this?’
Jadrin growled and Amberina laid her hand fearfully on his arm.
‘Hush now,’ Psydre said sweetly. ‘I can help you.’
‘You?’ Amberina sounded sceptical. ‘Why should you want to?’
‘What a suspicious little thing you are!’ Psydre exclaimed. ‘I don’t mean you harm. You can trust me.’
‘As I did the spirit in the turret?’ Jadrin reminded her.
Psydre waved his comment away with a careless hand. ‘Poosht!’ she said. ‘Come on now: listen to what I say. I can help you and I do not lie. Your sister is right, Jadrin. You must find the desecrated shrine, where the spirits congregate to emulate the ways of men. If you walk there in your flesh, you have no chance at all. No, you must leave it behind you.’
Jadrin laughed. ‘Fine. I’ll kill myself then to be able to spy on the spirits. Such action seems a little extreme.’
‘Do you know nothing?’ Psydre asked. ‘I can help your soul leave your flesh and be able to come back to it as many times as you like. It’s a simple art and one that is taught to all where I come from.’
Jadrin was still a little sceptical but Amberina confirmed Psydre’s words by saying that she too had heard of such abilities. ‘We have nothing to lose,’ she said.
‘You don’t,’ Jadrin replied, rather frostily, but he agreed to let Psydre help him.
Well-guarded are the arts of the witch-women of the east. Jadrin hardly knew what was happening to him other than Psydre’s soft, compelling voice seemed to lure him into infinity. She had made him lie down on the damp grass and had stroked his limbs, murmuring in a sing-song voice until he was nearly asleep. Then came a sharp tug upon his spirit. For a second, he seemed to hover between sleep and waking, before leaping up with a yelp as if pulled roughly to his feet.
Psydre was smiling up at him. ‘You see?’ she said.
‘Perfectly!’ Jadrin replied. ‘So what?’
‘So look down at your feet, young magician.’
There, on the grass, lay the body of a pale young man, eyes closed, perfectly motionless. Jadrin recognised it as himself. He was free. His soul was really out of his body.
Amberina was on hands and knees, stunned, squinting at the spectral form of her brother’s soul whom only Psydre could see with any clarity.
‘Go now, Jadrin, quickly, before the moon rises,’ Psydre said. ‘When you want to return, merely think it so, and you will be back within your flesh.’ She patted the ground beside her. ‘Come Amberina and sit with me. Your brother must go alone. We shall have to keep each other company while I weave a protection around his body. After that, perhaps we can gaze into the pool together for some moments...’
Jadrin moved away from them, downstream, where he crossed the water and so ventured into the trees.
It was nearly morning by the time Jadrin came once more to the widest path that led out of the forest. Although he did not truly need to follow it, he was enjoying the freedom this astral movement afforded him. When the trees opened out upon the banks of the river, he thought himself back to flesh, and sat up as if waking from a dream, with stiff limbs and an aching back. Amberina and Psydre had returned to the house hours before, confident that Psydre’s power was strong enough to protect the corporeal part of Jadrin left beside the river. Above the trees, behind him, the sky was flushed with pale dawn. Jadrin walked to the mill-house and let himself inside. On the kitchen table, he found a bottle of wine, which he took with him to the best parlour. Sprawled out in his father’s favourite chair, he drained the bottle. By the time the servants were stirring, he was dozing, half drunk.
By mid-day, Amberina could contain her curiosity no more. She went to shake him awake. ‘What happened in the forest?’ she asked.
‘I know the answer,’ Jadrin said wearily, but it looked as if knowing it hadn’t lightened his burden at all.
On the morning of the third day, Jadrin and the six liveried guards took their leave of the mill-house to return to the city. Jadrin said to his sister. ‘Give me the other half of the quartz’ and she did so. He kissed her goodbye, inclined his head to the silent Psydre and embraced his father fondly. They spoke vaguely of reciprocal visits in the near future.
In the afternoon, some miles from Ashbrilim, Jadrin bid his companions wait for him whilst he visited a cottage set some yards back from the road amongst a snuggle of gnarled trees. The guards raised eyebrows at each other and sniffed, although none of them spoke. It was well known that the cottage was the home of a witch of less than savoury reputation. Jadrin stayed within for maybe ten minutes. When he emerged, he offered no explanation to the others, but urged that they should hurry towards the city.
On reaching the palace, without even pausing to refresh himself or brush the dust of travel from his clothes, Jadrin went straight to the king’s apartments. He threw open the doors and five of the king’s servants looked up in alarm. Ashalan was playing a game with counters and a chequered board with one of his courtiers.
Jadrin said, ‘Send them all away!’ and from the darkness in the boy’s face and voice, Ashalan did so.
‘What has happened?’ he asked, once they were alone.
‘You must tell me the truth,’ Jadrin said, quietly.
‘What truth? What are you speaking of?’
‘Of Angeline...’
At the mention of that name, Ashalan’s face fell dramatically. He was silent. He turned away.
‘I shall be truthful with you,’ Jadrin said, ‘and my truth is that I cannot spin straw into gold. Now I shall tell you who can...’
Calmly, omitting no detail, Jadrin told the king how he had gone into the forest on the previous evening. He had followed the winding, hidden paths until he had come to the white, stone shrine, all covered in creepers and moss. There, he had lurked among the ruins, waiting for the spirits to gather. Eventually, two wavery beings had come to sit upon the tumbled stones at the front of the shrine. They were wearing forms that approximated human appearances, though their faces were terrible and their hands merely sticks of bone. Presently, others drifted through the misty ferns, coming to pluck at their companions and chitter together as children do. Jadrin had moved from cover a little. He noticed some of the shades were inclined to hover apart from the rest. He wasn’t that conspicuous. Eventually one of them had said, ‘One of our company is seeking justice this moon!’ and another had replied,
‘Seek it? She shall have it dearest, have it, have it!’
Then another had murmured, ‘Hush now, she is here.’
Jadrin could barely differentiate between one spirit and another, but there was something balefully familiar about the blade of light that had come dancing into the centre of the glade. It danced and sang and preened, cavorting with smug merriment.
‘Are you happy, dear one?’ cried the spirits.
‘Indeed I am!’
‘And why is that, beloved?’
‘Because Ashalan is to die in the arms of his whore!’
‘But why, lovely sister?’
‘He has my blood on his hands, my sisters, my brothers, and I desire to live once more with h
is on mine!’
The spirits swayed towards her like a fog. ‘And how shall you do that?’ they asked together.
Here the spirit grew into a great and pulsing flame. ‘Quite simply,’ it replied. ‘Tomorrow night, I shall possess the boy, Jadrin. I shall possess his body and, through that, experience all that was denied me; the passion of the man I once loved. After that, my dears, Ashalan will experience the true, keen blade of my revenge. As he still penetrates the body that I possess, I shall take a knife and kill him! It will be very easy. Naturally, after such a terrible crime, Jadrin will have to flee the city, but then Jadrin, as he lives and breathes on this earth, shall be no more. He is too weak and no match for me. In Mewt, I think, I will discover a new and rewarding life...’
‘But are you quite sure, my dear, that the boy Jadrin shall have no defence?’ one of the other spirits asked.
The spirit glowed red. ‘Quite sure!’ it said. ‘There is only one way he can defeat me but, as he will never know by whose shade he is to be possessed, there is no chance of his victory. Tomorrow night, Ashalan shall die and I shall live again. I who was once Angeline Hope DeVanceron. I who am the murdered, slaughtered, butchered, dead queen of Ashbrilim!’
Ashalan’s expression of disbelief as he listened to this tale gradually changed to one of pale horror. At the end, he said, ‘I did not kill her,’ which Jadrin had expected and also dearly wanted to believe.
‘Then tell me the truth,’ he said. ‘Who was this woman and why is she so bitterly seeking revenge from beyond the grave?’
Ashalan looked at the floor. It was clear he was considering memories best left forgotten. ‘She was my wife,’ he said.
Jadrin sat down beside him. ‘Then how...?’
‘I did try to dissuade her,’ Ashalan butted in, slamming a clenched fist into his cupped palm. ‘I told her marriage to me would be a barren, joyless venture, but she would not listen. She was obsessed. What could I do? She was a strong-willed creature and clearly intended to try and change my nature, even make me love her. A fruitless task!’
Ashalan told of how he and Angeline were married to the delight of Ashalan’s father and those who had previously considered Ashalan to be a weak and sickly creature. Surely the strong and tempestuous Angeline with her fiery beauty would fill him with life and strength? Unfortunately, their relationship, which had started off badly, never came to anything. Ashalan found Angeline terrifying: a succubus of a creature, hungry and grasping. He knew his nature and refused to go anywhere near her bedchamber at night, never mind share it. This behaviour only served to stoke Angeline’s pain and grief into a vicious rage. She tried to win Ashalan over, but eventually, exhausted by her efforts, resorted to extreme and desperate measures. A boy of whom Ashalan was particularly fond was found poisoned, his flesh black and burned. Ashalan knew who was responsible, but had no way of proving it. Angeline stalked the battlements crying out her marriage vows, shrieking of fidelity and the painful fate awaiting those who discredited those vows. In numerous ways, Angeline sought to cause trouble for Ashalan, especially with his father, the king. She knew Ashalan had no desire to rule, so in some undiscovered way, persuaded the old king to abdicate in favour of his son. Then she was queen and for a while the power of that position put a binding over her wounds, but it did not last. Ashalan’s original indifference towards Angeline had developed over the years into an abiding aversion. He wished her dead a thousand times a day, longing only to be free of her obsessive vigilance, her troublemaking, her carping demands. What she saw in him, he could not fathom. He was powerless to end her pain. She would not listen to reasoned argument. She would tolerate no compromise.
One night, as she had done many times before, the queen followed Ashalan to the high tower on the north wall of Ashbrilim. She knew that Ashalan was friendly with a captain of the guard there, and through her spy network had discovered the two men had arranged to meet that night. Ironically, it was not a lovers’ meeting. Ashalan and the captain were good friends, yes, and with similar tastes but had never been physically close. In fact, since the episode of the poisoning, Ashalan had not been close to anyone. Angeline did not believe this for an instant. She followed Ashalan up the winding, yellowstone steps to the battlements and concealed herself among the shadows of the buttressed wall. She must have watched them for a long time, perhaps becoming disappointed, for all they did was share a bottle of wine and talk together. However, as Ashalan got up to leave, he bent and kissed his friend on the cheek. That was enough evidence for Angeline. She waited until Ashalan had gone back to the palace before leaping out of hiding. All that the captain saw was a frenzied, shrieking shape, hidden by robes, rushing towards him, brandishing a long, curved knife. He rightly presumed it meant to murder him.
Angeline did not have much time to regret her reckless behaviour. She did not think about how the captain was one of Ashbrilim’s best warriors, well trained in self-defence. She had no chance. He did not know who she was. Perhaps he thought she was a mad woman from the town. After a brief scuffle, he disarmed her, but still she would not give in, frenziedly tearing at his face with clawed hands, her face unrecognisable with the insanity of her rage. Afterwards, the captain said he could not recall exactly what happened, but during the struggle, Angeline fell or was pushed over the city wall.
She did not die at once. The captain, remorseful for using violence against a woman, no matter how crazed, ordered his men to look for her body. They found her still alive, crawling brokenly among the filth and offal of the city that was thrown regularly over the walls at that point. It was the rubbish that had arrested her fall somewhat, although both her legs were ruined. Because her face had been cut, they found her with rats clinging to her head, devouring even as she crawled along, head wagging to dislodge them. She was clearly a mad woman, some poor wild soul, tormented by demons. It was also clear that she was dying, beyond the help of any physician. The soldiers carried her back within the walls. They never expected anyone to claim her, but made her as comfortable as they could and sat with her, waiting for her to die. No one recognised the ruined figure as Angeline Hope DeVanceron. No one, until a priest passed the lodge and the soldiers called him in to bless the dying woman. The priest lifted her hand and there, on a ring, he recognised the symbol of the house of her parents, which the soldiers had not known. A frantic search was organised and it was discovered that the queen was missing from her rooms.
She died before they could carry her home, in discomfort and filth, halfway down the main road to the palace.
‘The whole business was tragic and sordid,’ Ashalan said, which Jadrin thought was rather an understatement. ‘None of us had realised the depths of her feelings, nor how they had dragged her into insanity.’
Jadrin thought this was rather stupid. Angeline must have had these tendencies from the beginning and in Ashalan’s position, he was sure he would have identified them.
Ashalan rubbed his face. ‘My father tried to persuade me to have the captain executed, because, no matter what the reason, he had killed the Queen of Ashbrilim. Perhaps I should have ordered this execution. Perhaps it was my duty, but I couldn’t. You see, in the depths of my heart, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t feel grief for her death. Secretly, I felt I owed that captain a favour, not the death sentence. Do you see, Jadrin? Do you see how terrible a creature I am?’
‘You were caught in a difficult situation,’ Jadrin said carefully. He was unsure how he felt about these disclosures.
‘Ultimately,’ Ashalan said, ‘I had the captain posted to the border of Cos, where he was out of harm’s way. My father never understood me, or sympathised with me at all. He made sure I was punished for what had happened in small, subtle ways until the day he died.’
‘Angeline’s spirit must have been waiting for the chance to wreak its revenge,’ Jadrin said, unwilling to comment on Ashalan’s story. ‘Unwittingly, I gave it that chance. I gave it power: my breath and my warmth. Oh, to live those few days again!?
??
‘You sound bitter,’ Ashalan said. ‘I have disappointed you and it has killed our love. She has won.’ He put his head in his hands.
Jadrin stared upon the king, caught in a maelstrom of conflicting feelings. In his view, the main tragedy of the story was that Angeline had obviously been very ill: no sane woman would have behaved and felt as she had done. No one had helped her. She had suffered alone, and for that Jadrin felt very sad. Still, despite the wretchedness of the story, he thought there was no excuse for the queen’s spirit to continue her obsessive vendetta beyond the grave. He knew now at least that he was dealing with a mad ghost, and in some way, that gave him courage. ‘Do not crumble, my lord,’ he said in a cold voice. ‘Angeline has not won yet. Perhaps you are to blame to some degree, but who among us acts always in complete wisdom? The fault is not entirely yours.’
Ashalan made an anguished sound. ‘It is certainly my fault that she has this advantage over you. If I had been content after the first night of your spinning, this would never have happened. All she wanted of you then was a kiss. Oh, I was blind to the true gold that was in you all the time!’ He put his head in his hands once more.
‘Do not punish yourself with guilt any further,’ Jadrin said. ‘What is done, is done. Now leave me to resolve this matter, once and for all. I shall go to the bedroom. Wait here for an hour and then come after me, but no sooner, mind.’
Jadrin went alone to the king’s bedchamber and drew all the drapes against the balmy evening. He lit pungent incense on a brass saucer and robed himself in white and let down his hair. From the velvet bag, he withdrew the two halves of the lilac quartz and laid them on a table next to the smoking incense. It lay like two halves of a broken egg, glowing inside, reflecting the light of the smouldering charcoal upon which burned the perfume. Jadrin stared at it for some time. Then, he sat down on the bed, calmed his mind and called to the aethers. Within seconds, the baleful spirit appeared at the window. It appeared to be a little confused. ‘Let me in Jadrin,’ it said.