“You must promise me that one of you will stay with her at all times.”
“Of course,” said Chris.
Rachel said, “What about the school – we don’t want them thinking she’s gone missing again.”
Will thought back to his wanderings around the school in the hours he’d spent waiting for Eloise to appear. Several times he’d stared in at the headmaster working in his study, long after his secretary had left, usually while the rest of the school was at dinner. It would be easy, Will thought, to speak to the headmaster without being seen by anyone else, to plant in his thoughts some memory of Eloise visiting family.
“I’ll deal with the school. And I will come to you tomorrow evening.”
“We can pick you up.”
“No, you stay with Eloise.” As an afterthought, he said, “But how will you do that? You have your establishment to run.”
Chris looked about to speak, but Rachel said, with no room for argument, “No, the café stays closed tomorrow.”
It was decided. Will carried Eloise to their car and watched as they drove away towards the city with her. She had to get better, there was no other possibility. She had to get better because without her he was defeated, in every way.
18
Will spent the rest of the night and all of the daylight hours in the tunnels. There was peace and calm down there now, no sense of the tectonic shifts that had taken place earlier, no sense of brooding disquiet. He wondered if the change in atmosphere had come about because these tunnels no longer led to the gateway he’d sought.
That seemed likely. On his own he was able to rebuild an image in his mind of how the labyrinth had been rearranged, and within the first hour, he could tell that there was no longer any way of even getting close to the site of the circular chamber.
It didn’t stop him looking, or calculating how many walls he might have to knock through to reach a gateway that could have been demolished anyway. He didn’t see how it could be done, particularly when Wyndham probably had it within his power to set the walls moving all over again.
Just before darkness fell the following afternoon, he spent a little time in the one tunnel he’d otherwise avoided, where Eloise had been trapped. It puzzled him and made him angry again, wondering what had happened to her in there. He’d come close to admiring Wyndham, this unseen adversary, but he was determined now of one thing – he would destroy the sorcerer, or be destroyed in the process.
He didn’t linger once he’d left the tunnels, but headed directly to the school. Instead of approaching in the normal way, for his prime spot in front of the Dangrave common room, he walked round the back of the building and cut along in its own shadows until he was able to look from a small shrubbery into the headmaster’s study.
He was sitting there now, a slim, sporty man in his forties. On a shelf on the far wall there were some trophies, which Will imagined were his, some for running, others for tennis. His hair was receding, but it was cut short enough so as not to make too much difference. He had a clipped military bearing somehow, a look that seemed out of place with what Eloise had told Will about the school.
A secretary came into the office, but even without Will being able to hear the brief conversation, it was clear she was saying goodnight, that her working day was over. The headmaster smiled and went back to his paperwork.
Over the next ten minutes the headmaster didn’t stir and nor did Will. He heard a few cars driving away from the other side of the property, could smell food and hear the general good-humoured clatter of the school having dinner.
Will made his way inside then, through a door nearby which allowed the headmaster access to his own private shrubbery garden. He walked past the two darkened administrative offices, into the small hallway where visitors and students were kept waiting.
He looked at the nameplate on the door: Dr Paul Higson.
Will knocked on the door and opened it without waiting for a response. The headmaster looked up as if annoyed that someone should come in without being summoned first, but he saw Will and smiled awkwardly.
“Just a moment, please – I’ll just finish reading this paragraph.”
“Of course,” said Will. He closed the door behind him and walked across to stand in front of the desk.
The headmaster pored intently over the document in front of him, a pen poised in his hand. It would be quick, Will imagined – hypnotise him as soon as he looked up from his paperwork, fill his head with thoughts of Eloise going to visit a sick relative, remind him that he’d forgotten to inform the other staff members. If it didn’t work perfectly, it would work well enough to make Eloise’s new absence less problematic.
The headmaster put his pen down and said, “Just a second and I’m with you.” He was still looking closely at the document, and for the first time, Will became suspicious. It seemed odd that anyone in the headmaster’s position would so resolutely fail to make eye contact with a visitor, a stranger at that, someone who was not a student of the school, but appeared to be of that age.
Higson reached into the drawer at the side of his desk, saying, “Just staple these together and I’m done.”
Will glanced at the stapler sitting on the desk next to Higson’s telephone, but it was too late. Higson pulled a small but powerful torch from the drawer. He pushed himself backwards at the same time as he turned on the torch and directed its beam straight at Will’s eyes.
He said, “Stay back, get away from me!”
The pain was immediate and dazzling, ripping through Will’s eyes with a power that felt as if it might tear his skull apart. He was as stunned by his own stupidity as much as by the torch beam – obviously Wyndham had a connection with the school, obviously he’d had more than one person there working for him, so why hadn’t it occurred to Will that the headmaster himself might be in league with the sorcerer?
He was furious too, because this man was supposed to be concerned with Eloise’s welfare, but was actually part of a vicious plan to harm her. Higson was as guilty as Wyndham for the state Eloise was in now, perhaps more so given his duty of care.
The fury seethed up inside Will until he could no longer feel the pain, and though he couldn’t see, his other senses told him exactly where Higson was. Will threw the desk to one side and lunged forward. He grabbed Higson by the shirt and tie and threw him up against the wall with so much force that a painting fell to the floor nearby.
Higson let out a cry of alarm and tried to redirect the torch beam into Will’s eyes. Will grabbed his hand and crushed it instantly around the torch. The torch dropped to the floor and Will stood on it, smashing it.
Will’s vision was coming back to him now and he looked up into Higson’s face. Higson was kicking and flailing at Will, becoming more fearful with the growing realisation that his strength was inadequate. All Higson could do was avoid Will’s gaze and he did this by turning his head frantically to the side, exposing his neck.
Will looked at the vein throbbing above Higson’s collar, but he was too angry even to think about blood for the moment. Instead he lowered Higson to the floor while keeping him pinned to the wall, and now that they were on the same level, he grabbed Higson’s face with his free hand and turned it forcibly to face him.
Higson closed his eyes and was whimpering now, all his military bearing gone, to the extent that Will no longer believed he had ever been a soldier.
“Open your eyes and look at me.”
“Never.”
“Then I’ll rip off your eyelids.”
“Please, don’t, I …”
“I have no intention of hypnotising you. But I tell you again, I will rip off your eyelids unless you open them. Wyndham has surely told you that I come from an age when such a torture would have been considered rather mundane.”
“I …”
“Open them!”
Higson opened his eyes, blinked them shut again, twice, and finally opened them properly, revealing them to be full of tears and terror.
“I was going to hypnotise you, but not now. Not now that I know you work for Wyndham.”
“I haven’t done anything.”
“Eloise is in your care, yet you have allowed Wyndham to conspire to do her harm – you consider that nothing? You allow him to fill the school with his spies – you consider that nothing?”
“But I haven’t, please believe me. Marcus Jenkins, he’s the only … what I mean is, he’s the only connection with Wyndham. I haven’t conspired, I swear it.”
“Then your oath is worthless. You avoided eye contact, you used light to attack me, things you would not know if you were not in Wyndham’s trust. Reverend Fairburn was the same before you and he, let me remind you, is dead. So ask yourself where your fear should lie, with Wyndham, or with me?”
Higson winced with pain, and looked panicked and distraught as he said, “I think my hand’s broken.”
“Three fingers and the knuckle of your middle finger, not even a hint of the pain and injury I could inflict upon you.” The pain behind Will’s own eyes had almost subsided now, and he said, “Eloise has gone away for a day or two. You’ll tell staff that you knew about it, that she’s gone to visit a sick relative. You won’t question her when she returns, nor will you speak to her.”
Higson nodded, eager to comply.
“I had planned to make you follow these instructions by hypnotising you, but I want you to be conscious of what I’ve told you because I want you to understand something else. If any harm comes to Eloise, whether you are directly responsible or not, neither Wyndham nor anyone else will be able to protect you – mark this, I will look upon it as a point of honour that her suffering is returned to you tenfold.”
“I understand.”
Will let him go and stepped away from him. Higson immediately clutched his injured hand, tentatively daring to look at the extent of the injuries. Will looked at the desk, solid and imposing, and casually pulled it upright again, leaving the debris lying on the floor.
He crossed the room to the door, but stopped and looked around briefly, then said, “My family built this house.”
Despite his wounded hand and his earlier terror, Higson produced an unconvincing expression of defiance as he said, “You’re a vampire – you don’t have a family.”
Will smiled. “I stand corrected. My brother’s family built this house.”
Higson looked bewildered, but said, “Yes, yes, I know that.”
“Good.”
Will left by the same door and headed back across the park to the new house. He would call a taxi from there. He had no family, not any more, but he had described Eloise as his family earlier, and it was true in one sense at least, because she was the first person in over seven centuries for whom he would be prepared to die, and the first for whom he would be prepared to kill in anger. His words to Higson had been a promise, and not intended for Higson alone.
19
As Rachel had promised, The Whole Earth was closed for the day and Will couldn’t make himself heard at the front of the property. He made his way to the back and as he walked past the kitchen window, Chris saw him and waved, then came to the door to let him in.
As he opened the door, he met Will’s concerned expression with a smile and said, “She’s fine. Rachel’s with her. She slept all night and most of today, then woke a couple of hours ago and she’s been talking.”
“The trauma has left her?”
Chris looked hesitant, but said, “It’s early days. I think she’ll recover, but she still looks … I don’t know, like someone recovering from a fever or something, you know, like she’s had the stuffing knocked out of her.”
“May I go up?”
“Of course. She’s in the guest room – you’ll probably hear Rachel.”
Will walked through and climbed the stairs, picking up Rachel’s voice immediately, then perhaps a single word from Eloise. As he got closer he could hear Rachel more clearly, saying, “Oh, this was a favourite of mine …”
She started to read, poetry – Byron, he thought. He stood outside the door and listened as she finished, lulled by Rachel’s beautiful, slightly musical reading voice.
Will knocked and opened the door. He couldn’t help notice, and was stung by it, that Eloise recoiled in fear for just a moment before realising it was him and smiling.
She was sitting up in bed in borrowed nightclothes. Rachel was sitting on the bed next to her. There was a chair beside the bed and Will walked over and sat on it as he said, “You’re feeling better?”
Eloise smiled again, but looked groggy as she said, “I don’t know that I’ve been ill. I just feel like I’ve woken up after a really long sleep, like I’m still only half awake.”
“You had a terrible shock,” said Rachel. “But your mind’s probably blocking it – that’s why you feel confused.” She stood up, leaving the anthology of poetry behind as she said, “I’ll go and make that tea.”
She left the room and Eloise said, “Chris said you saved me.”
“Not really, and I shouldn’t have endangered you in the first place. You were trapped, that was all, and I broke down the wall to get you out.”
He suddenly realised she was making as little eye contact with him as one of Wyndham’s disciples. But she turned and looked at him directly now as she said, “I remember what I saw, Will. I haven’t told Rachel and Chris because it’ll just confuse them and make them suspicious. But I do remember.”
“Make them suspicious? But why, what did you see?”
“I saw you, Will, I saw you.” Her eyes were pleading now, wanting him to reassure her in some way, but he couldn’t imagine how seeing him might have traumatised her like that.
“I was on the other side of the wall, you know that. Anything you saw inside that chamber wasn’t real, it was created by Wyndham. If he showed me dead or injured, that’s just his attempt to weaken you.”
“No, it wasn’t that. You weren’t hurt. I mean …” It looked for a moment as if the vision had flashed back into her memory and she had to steel herself before continuing. “I know it was probably Wyndham’s work, and I know I should ignore it because it’s lies, but it looked so real, felt real. It was you as you’ll become, when you achieve your destiny. And it was frightening, really frightening.”
“It was a lie,” said Will. “He knows nothing of me or my destiny, and you will never have reason to be afraid of me.”
“I know that.”
How could she know that? She had known him weeks and had seen only the better part of him. She wanted to believe in him, he understood that much, but something of what she’d seen in those tunnels had shaken her belief.
Will shook his head, and said, “No, you don’t know that, neither of us do – how can I know what my destiny will mean for me? What will become of me? If you saw me a devil, then perhaps a devil is what I will become.”
“That’s impossible,” she said, suddenly full of conviction.
“It is possible – if it was not, you wouldn’t have been so disturbed by the vision he put before you. It serves neither of us to pretend it couldn’t happen – vigilance is the only way of ensuring that it doesn’t.” Eloise looked downcast, but then he said, “Wyndham has already tried to harm you, and now he has tried to poison your thoughts, as he will no doubt do again. The only thing I ask is that you think on the witches. Have they not always put your interests first? They didn’t want you to go to Puckhurst, remember? They alerted me to the attempt on your life just the other night. They have questioned my loyalty too, but have they ever warned you to stay away from me?”
Eloise smiled and looked up, reaching at the same time for her pendant, panicking when she realised it was gone. She looked on the bedside cabinet, on the bedclothes around her.
“Where’s my pendant? Did I lose it in the tunnels?”
“Not that I remember.” He heard Chris and Rachel coming up the stairs and along the landing, and as they came into the room, Eloise looked ready to jump out o
f bed in a frenzy.
“What happened to my pendant, do you know?”
Rachel was carrying a tea tray. She smiled and said, “Don’t worry, I’ve got it. You were having some sort of nightmare while you were sleeping and you tore it off. I put a new leather strap on it.”
She put the tea tray down on the bed and crossed the room to a tall, narrow chest of drawers. She opened the top one, took the pendant out and brought it back to Eloise.
Eloise looked at it, checking nothing was wrong, then slipped it back over her head. She looked immediately relieved to be wearing it again, the significance of having torn it from her neck apparently passing her by.
Will understood the action perfectly. He’d described Wyndham as having tried to poison her thoughts, and realised now that he’d already succeeded. Yes, Eloise had come back to him, the attack had not been fatal to their relationship, but a small stubborn residue of that poison remained, just enough that it would be harder for her to be certain of him in future. She didn’t know it, but she would be always watchful, looking for signs of the evil that might be within him.
Chris was standing at the bottom of the bed and now he said, “You’re looking much better. How do you feel?”
Eloise smiled, once again a schoolgirl, embarrassed by all the fuss. “I feel fine, honestly. I’ll go back tomorrow, if that’s OK with you. I mean, I don’t want you to close the café or anything.”
“Not at all. When do you want to go back?”
“In the morning?”
“Well, we don’t open until ten, so we could take you back before that without having to close.”
“Great.” She smiled, and glanced awkwardly at Will. He knew what she’d done, choosing to return in daylight, and could hardly blame her for wanting to go back without him. He smiled back, letting her know that it didn’t matter, that he understood. She looked helpless and a little ashamed in response, but he could offer her no other reassurance.
Alchemy, Book Two of the Mercian Trilogy Page 12
