The Tower of Ravens

by Kate Forsyth

  Looking white and unhappy, Nina was sitting with Lady Evaline under the apple tree, while Fèlice and Landon wandered along the lawn. Miss Prunella sat a short distance away, working on some embroidery. Nina rose at the sight of Lewen and her mud-splattered and highly indignant son.

  ‘Roden!’ she cried. ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘Dai willna let me stay and watch the tree crash down,’ Roden said with a quivering lip and flung himself in his mother’s arms.

  ‘Iven thinks it’s too dangerous,’ Lewen explained, ‘and he was worried about Roden catching a chill. He was jumping in puddles.’

  Nina looked rather puzzled. ‘Och, Iven doesna normally even notice things like that.’

  ‘He doesna want Roden to catch a fever,’ Lewen answered. ‘It does seem as if Laird Malvern is right when he says the air here is unhealthy.’

  Nina glanced up at him, her brows twitching together. ‘Well, let’s go get ye dry and changed,’ she said to her son, then cast a rueful glance down at her own gown. ‘And me too, now. Look at my skirt! I’ve got mud all over it.’

  Lady Evaline had been gazing at Roden with a look of longing and now she reached out a frail, blue-veined hand to ruffle his curls. ‘Och, he’s such a bonny lad.’

  Roden gave her a look of disgust. ‘I’m no’ bonny, that’s for girls!’ he retorted. ‘I’m doughty!’

  ‘Indeed ye are,’ Nina said with an apologetic smile at Lady Evaline. The old woman smiled back wistfully, her gaze returning to Roden’s face.

  ‘A big doughty lad like ye must be hungry,’ she said. ‘Would ye like to come and have tea with me when ye’re changed? My cook makes some very nice honey cakes.’

  ‘Lewen said I could have hot chocolate,’ Roden said winningly.

  ‘O’ course, the very thing to drive out the chill. Miss Prunella, could ye ask the kitchen to heat up some chocolate milk for Rory?’

  ‘My name’s Roden,’ he said crossly, the scowl returning.

  ‘O’ course. I’m sorry. I get muddled sometimes. For Roden.’

  ‘O’ course, my lady,’ Miss Prunella said, folding up her embroidery and rising. She looked as if she had been sucking on a lemon, her face was so sour.

  ‘I’ll come up with ye,’ Lewen said to Nina. ‘As ye can see, I got rather wet too.’ He cast a rueful hand down his mud-splattered clothes.

  Fèlice and Landon had both drawn near and waylaid Lewen a few moments with questions about the fallen tree and what the others were doing. He escaped them as quickly as he could and hurried after Nina, who was climbing up the stairs hand-in-hand with her son, who was still very cross at being made to come back inside the castle. Thankfully there was no sign of the ubiquitous Irving, who was normally so careful to make sure they were escorted anywhere in the castle. He was able to tell Nina about the deliberately felled tree, and what conclusions he and Iven had drawn. She agreed that he must try to escape the castle and find the Scrying Pool at the Tower of Ravens.

  ‘I tried to send my sunbird with a message but one o’ the ravens killed her,’ she told him unhappily. Lewen exclaimed, and she pressed her hands to her eyes.

  ‘Aye, I ken. I loved my wee bird, I canna believe it happened. I should no’ have tried to send her.’ She let out her breath in a great sigh and blotted away another tear. ‘Anyway, what canna be changed must be endured. We must focus now on getting all o’ us out o’ this blaygird castle alive. Lewen, I think Iven is right. We must get a message to the Rìgh and the Scrying Pool is the only way. Though how we are to do so without arousing any more suspicion, I do no’ ken,’ she said. ‘They must no’ guess what ye are about.’

  ‘I’ll think o’ something,’ Lewen said. ‘How is Rhiannon doing?’

  ‘She’s sleeping still. The fever does seem to have eased. Landon says Dedrie came to look in on her but went away again once she saw him sitting there. Edithe is there now. I thought poor Landon needed a break.’

  But when Lewen opened the door into Rhiannon’s dim, fire-lit room, it was not Edithe he found leaning over her bed, but Irving. The seneschal swung round abruptly at the sound of the door and Lewen saw with horror that he held a pillow in his hands.

  ‘What are ye doing?’ he cried sharply.

  ‘Just adjusting the young lady’s pillows,’ Irving answered suavely, turning back to the bed.

  ‘Get away from me!’ Rhiannon cried, her voice rough and breathless. ‘Lewen, Lewen, he try … he put pillow on me … I couldna breathe … Lewen!’

  Lewen came swiftly to the bed. Rhiannon gazed up at him, her eyes so dilated with terror they seemed black. Her cheeks were red and had faint creases pressed into them. Her breath came harshly.

  ‘Get away from her,’ Lewen hissed.

  Irving looked surprised and stepped away from the bed. ‘I assure ye, the young lady is mistaken. She has been most feverish and I merely sought to make her more comfortable.’

  ‘He try kill me,’ Rhiannon gasped.

  ‘Where’s Lady Edithe?’ Lewen demanded, sitting beside Rhiannon and pulling her into his arms, stroking the damp tangled hair away from her face.

  ‘The young lady was rather bored when I came to bring her some morning tea and I suggested she go down to the library to find herself a book to read. My laird has a very extensive library.’

  Lewen was so furious he could not speak for a moment. Irving moved away, fluffing up the pillow and placing it on a chair nearby, looking as suave as ever.

  Just then, Nina came in. ‘What on earth is the matter?’

  ‘He try kill me,’ Rhiannon said, her breath still coming short. ‘He put pillow on me, held me down so I couldna breathe.’

  ‘That’s ridiculous,’ Irving said, his colour altering just a little. ‘The young lady is delirious.’

  ‘Oh no, has her fever got worse?’ Nina asked in concern, coming across the room quickly. ‘She was quite incoherent this morning, but I had hoped … och, ye poor man! Ye must no’ mind her.’

  ‘No, he try kill me!’ Rhiannon protested.

  ‘Oh, dear, she really is quite crazy with this fever! What are we to do? She hit poor Dedrie, did ye hear? And Lewen too.’

  Rhiannon shrank away from Lewen. ‘That’s right,’ she said in a horrified voice. ‘I had forgotten … I thought it but a dream. Ye poison me too.’

  ‘No, no,’ Lewen said in distress, trying to draw her back into his arms. ‘We were trying to help.’

  ‘Ye all try kill me!’ Rhiannon stared from one face to another with huge, terrified eyes.

  Nina shook her head sorrowfully. ‘Dedrie said the fever can take one like this sometimes, but it’s very distressing, isn’t it? Look at her, the poor deluded lass!’

  Rhiannon clutched the sheet to her. ‘Why ye want kill me? Why?’

  ‘Nay, nay, leannan. Ye’re safe, I promise ye,’ Lewen soothed her, torn between his desire to comfort her and his dismay at having forgotten they were meant to be damping down the suspicions of any of the lord’s minions.

  Rhiannon did not believe him. She sat very still, her breath coming fast, her eyes darting from one face to another. Lewen could see a pulse leaping in her throat.

  ‘I am so very sorry,’ Nina was saying to Irving, drawing him away from the bed. ‘I do feel dreadful. First Dedrie hit in the face, and accused so wildly, and now ye. I hate to think what the laird must think o’ us. I do hope ye will forgive us. Rhiannon is … well, she’s difficult, there’s no gainsaying that. The best thing for her now is peace and quiet.’

  Nina’s voice faded as she escorted Irving from the room. Lewen tried to draw Rhiannon back into his arms. She resisted violently.

  ‘Leannan, no, do no’ be afraid,’ he said in distress. ‘Indeed, I ken what ye must think but it’s no’ like that. Ye must ken I would never hurt ye.’

  ‘Ye made me sick,’ she accused. ‘Ye poison me!’

  ‘’Twas no’ poison,’ he protested. ‘We … we were trying to make ye better.’

  She made a disgusted noise. �
��Go away,’ she said, pushing him with her hot, damp palms.

  ‘Rhiannon, indeed ye are sick. Please, lie back, let me sponge your face. I ken … he’s a bad man, that Irving, I ken that. It’s just we need to pretend for now … until we can get away from here …’

  She listened to him, and after a while let him lay her back down, and smooth back her hair, and dab her face with the cool cloth. After a while her eyes closed and she fell asleep again. He sat watching her, feeling such a hot painful feeling round his heart it was as if the organ was actually bruised.

  Nina came quietly back into the room. ‘Is she sleeping? Poor lass! I could strangle Edithe. What was she thinking, leaving Rhiannon alone like that?’

  ‘Nina, he had a pillow over her face, I’d swear it!’

  ‘I do no’ doubt it,’ Nina said. ‘We canna leave her alone. Maisie says she will come and sit with her a while now, she’s feeling much better after a sleep, well enough to sit up for a while anyway. I’m going to go and find Edithe and rip shreds off her!’

  ‘I’ll sit with Rhiannon,’ Lewen said.

  ‘Ye canna,’ Nina replied. ‘Ye must find some way to slip out and get to the Tower o’ Ravens. Noon and midnight is the best time to use the Scrying Pool, or dawn and sunset, and I do no’ want ye there at night. I’m beginning to believe all those tales about malevolent ghosts that haunt the tower! So it’d be best if ye went now, and got there afore noon.’

  Lewen nodded and got reluctantly to his feet, casting one last look at Rhiannon’s flushed and sleeping face. She looked soft and vulnerable. He marvelled how this had the power to hurt him. He would have liked to have lain down with her, and curved his body to hers, pressing his mouth to the arch of her neck. He did not want to wake her, though. He did not want to watch her flinch away.

  The door opened and Edithe came in, absorbed in a thin, vellum-bound book she held in her hand.

  ‘Where have ye been?’ Nina at once exclaimed furiously.

  Edithe looked up in surprise and chagrin. ‘I was only gone a minute!’

  ‘A minute is more than enough,’ Nina snapped. ‘And it was much longer than that. We’ve been here for close on ten.’

  ‘Well, I’m sorry, but I got chatting with Laird Malvern. He really is a very interesting man, so cultivated and so learned. His library is absolutely fascinating. I would have liked to have stayed and let him show me his collection, but I came hurrying back here because I kent ye wanted someone to sit with the satyricorn girl.’ Her voice was filled with self-righteous indignation. ‘Really, I canna think why, ye all seem to have got infected with her hysterical nonsense …’

  ‘Edithe, until we arrive at the Tower o’ Two Moons, I am your teacher and mentor. If I tell ye to stand on your head in a graveyard all night ye do as I tell ye, without question and without hesitation.’ Though she spoke softly, Nina’s voice had an edge to it like a whip. ‘I have never kent an apprentice with less o’ the qualities the Coven thinks necessary in a witch. Ye do no’ listen, ye do no’ watch, and ye do no’ learn. Sit down in that chair and do no’ move until I say ye may. And be glad your stupidity has no’ had more dire consequences.’

  Edithe’s colour was high and her eyes glittered with angry tears, but she swept to the chair and sat down as ordered, disposing her skirts about her feet with exaggerated care. She then opened her book and began to read with an air of great interest.

  ‘I’ll just tell Maisie she can bide a wee longer in bed, I want her as strong and well as possible for the journey ahead,’ Nina said as she led the way out of the room.

  Lewen nodded, his mind already busy with plans for getting away from the castle without arousing suspicion. He took one last look at Rhiannon, sleeping restlessly in her bed, then followed Nina across the hall and into Maisie’s room. She was out of bed and limping about, but it was obvious her deep festering wounds still troubled her. She was glad to get back into bed and have Nina give her another draught of pain-killing poppy syrup and tuck her up in her eiderdown. Lewen stoked up the fire for her, and moved the cup of water closer to her hand.

  ‘Call out to Edithe if ye need anything,’ Nina said gently, ‘and try to get some sleep.’

  Maisie nodded gratefully and shifted onto her side, trying to find a comfortable position to lie in.

  ‘I wonder where Lulu is,’ Nina said anxiously, as they went out into the hall again. ‘I would’ve thought she would have been quite happy playing with the doll I made her and no’ gone wandering off. She doesna like Edithe, though. Happen I left her too long and she went looking for Roden. We’d better go find her, Eà kens the trouble she could be causing!’

  She put her head in the door of the big suite. ‘Roden? Roden?’

  There was no answer.

  Nina went in, and hurriedly searched the room, her face growing whiter by the second. ‘He’s gone!’ she cried. ‘I left him only a moment, just while I looked in on Rhiannon. Och, the wicked boy! Where has he gone?’

  Lewen came in too and searched in the cupboards and under the bed. There was no sign of Roden.

  Nina was so white he thought she might faint. He supported her with one hand and went to pour her some water but she refused it impatiently. ‘We must find him!’ she cried. ‘Och, this is no’ the place for a wee laddie to be wandering round by himself. Oh, Lewen! Do ye think someone took him? That sly-faced Irving!’

  ‘We’ll find him,’ Lewen reassured him. ‘Nina, can ye sense where he is? Close your eyes, concentrate. Ye ken him better than anyone. Canna ye sense him?’

  Nina tried to calm herself. She sank down on one of the cushioned chairs, sipped at the glass of water Lewen passed her, and closed her eyes, resting her face in her hands. The only sound was the cry of ravens outside. Lewen saw one had come down to perch on the windowsill. He went to the casement, threw open the window and violently shooed the bird away. It cawed mockingly and flew off with slow flaps of its enormous black wings.

  ‘I think … he’s over that way somewhere,’ Nina said, waving her hand to the north. ‘Oh, Lewen!’

  ‘We’ll go and find him now,’ he said, leaning down to help her up. ‘Do no’ fear, Nina. He’s bored and restless, and angry he wasna allowed to watch them move the tree. He’s gone off exploring, that’s all.’

  ‘Happen he’s gone to find that room with all the toys,’ Nina said. ‘I’ll skin him alive!’

  Together they went quickly along the hall and down the stairs, keeping a wary look-out for any servants. They heard voices from one room and passed it silently, then hid for a moment in an antechamber as some footmen went past, carrying some silver down to the kitchens to be cleaned. Otherwise all was quiet.

  ‘I wonder where the laird is?’ Lewen whispered.

  ‘Still in his library, I’d say.’

  ‘I hope Edithe kept her mouth shut!’

  ‘Unlikely, but I do no’ think it’ll matter. She dislikes Rhiannon so intensely she would’ve done a better job than any o’ us in discrediting her. I’m sure she told the laird that Rhiannon is half-satyricorn and quite wild and a constant trouble to us all. By the time she would have finished, the laird would be sure we suspected no ill o’ him!’

  ‘I hope so,’ Lewen said grimly.

  They came to a thick oak door that stood ajar. They could hear nothing beyond so eased it open a little further and slipped through. They tiptoed down a stone-floored corridor that led to a spiral staircase, winding upwards into gloom.

  ‘He’s here somewhere,’ Nina whispered. ‘Upstairs, I think. It’s so hard to be sure. These thick stone walls confuse my witch-sense.’

  Then they heard the low murmur of voices from a room to their right. Moving very carefully they pressed themselves close to the door to listen.

  ‘Someone has been sneaking about and spying,’ Lord Malvern said angrily. ‘Irving found a smashed lantern on the steps near Rory’s room, and I swear someone has been in my library! Ye ken I canna bear to have things out o’ place, and things have definitely bee
n moved. None o’ the circle would’ve done it, they all ken better!’

  Lady Evaline murmured something about sleepwalking.

  ‘Sleepwalkers do no’ take lanterns with them,’ Lord Malvern cried. ‘Nay, that girl knew what she was doing. The question is, how much did she see?’

  Another low murmur from Lady Evaline.

  ‘Dedrie says her boots and cloak were all muddy. She must have gone outside at some point, and I canna help thinking she may have found the secret way to the tower. If so, who kens what she may have seen and heard! We canna risk her telling a soul. Thank the Truth the witch suspects naught.’

  Lady Evaline made some kind of protest.

  ‘It’s a little late to get cold feet now, Evaline. We’re so close! Do ye no’ want Falkner and Rory back? After all these years, all this trouble, ye canna get squeamish now!’

  ‘There’ve been too many deaths,’ Lady Evaline said unhappily.

  ‘But the things we have learnt! And now we are so close, ye canna say it has no’ been worth it. The secrets o’ resurrecting the dead! That is a prize worth sacrificing for.’

  Lord Malvern’s voice came closer, as if he were striding around the room. Nina and Lewen flattened themselves on either side of the door, but were too eager to hear more to retreat. ‘If we can just stop her from telling them all she saw! I’m sure they do no’ suspect anything. Lady Edithe says she’s some half-breed faery girl that is quite wild and hysterical, so happen they will no’ believe her, no matter what she says. We canna take that risk though. We must stop her mouth somehow.’

  Lewen gritted his teeth together in rage and Nina cast him a warning glance.

  ‘What about the lad?’ Lady Evaline said pitifully.

  ‘Och, he’s just too perfect,’ Lord Malvern said with a strange note of longing in his voice. ‘It canna be coincidence that a boy just the same age and height and colouring as Rory comes riding through our gate the very day we finally get the secret o’ resurrecting the dead into our hands!’

  ‘But they’ll take him away! Once they ride out o’ here we may never see him again.’