Three maids came rushing into her bedchamber and each cried out in horror as the bedsheets turned red with blood.
*
‘Sir! Sir! Come quick! Lady Iris…It’s Lady Iris!’ exclaimed the servant boy as he burst into the physician’s bedchamber. The physician jumped out of bed at once. The time had come. His hands shook as he hurriedly dressed himself. He shouted for the boy to bring water and rags to Iris’s chamber. Then he snatched up his case and ran.
He could hear the screaming from the staircase as he raced up to the second floor and along the corridor towards Iris’s bedchamber. As he came to the door, it swung open and a panic-stricken chambermaid ran out and grasped his arms.
‘There’s blood everywhere!’ she cried hysterically. ‘The delivery maid said you’re not to come in, but there’s so much blood!’
Delivery maid? He pushed her out of the way and barged into the room.
Iris was sprawled on the bed, her hair drenched with sweat, her nightgown dark with blood. He went straight to the gaunt woman sitting at the foot of the bed. She wore a black dress and her black hair was pulled tight into a bun. Her lips were thin and pressed together in a hard line as she piled fresh rags between Iris’s legs.
‘What is the meaning of this?’ he said.
The delivery maid looked at him sharply. ‘Leave,’ she said. ‘I have stopped the bleeding. You are not needed.’
‘I am delivering this child!’ he shouted.
‘No. I am,’ she said, mopping the blood from Iris’s inner thighs with a wet cloth.
The physician’s face flushed pink. ‘This is an outrage! I will not—’
‘Stand in the corner. And be quiet,’ she said, without a second glance.
He raised a shaky finger and pointed it at her furiously, when Iris shrieked with pain and began to claw at the bedsheets. Scowling, he backed down and stomped over to the corner of the room as the women fussed and ran back and forth with wet cloths and smelling salts. He should have been the one to deliver the child. Had he not earned the right? Had he not spent every day with Iris, examining her and the child? He folded his arms. But, as he continued to watch, a cold feeling trickled down his spine. The thunder rumbled outside. The rain pelted the window. And, suddenly, he was glad that he would not be the first to touch the cursed thing that would soon be pulled from Iris Mortenstone.
The door flew open. Matthew was halfway over the threshold when the delivery maid shouted, ‘No!’
Another maid hurried to the door and shoved him back out. ‘My Lord, this is no place for a father. Beg your pardon. The delivery maid insists,’ the young maid said breathlessly, and she closed the door again in his face.
*
‘Push it out, Iris!’ urged the delivery maid. The other maids stood around the bed, holding her legs, looking at her, their mouths moving rapidly. But Iris hardly heard anything they said. Their voices seemed far away, as though they were speaking to her through a stone wall. She was so tired. She wanted to sleep. She whimpered and let her head fall back onto the pillows.
‘…almost there!’
‘…Push… Lady Iris, push!’
‘Don’t give up now…very close!’
As if a battering ram had come crashing through the stone wall that separated them, there was a sudden burst of sound. Iris heard them shouting her name, encouraging her, their voices loud and shrill. Push. Push. Push. She felt their hot hands grasping, shaking her. She brought her head forward and bore down with all her might, squeezing their hands, feeling their bones shift as she gripped tighter and tighter.
The moment the child slipped out, the agony subsided and she collapsed onto the pillows.
Solemn looks were exchanged around the room in the silence that followed. The maids abandoned their posts and gathered around the delivery maid at the end of the bed. They all looked down at the blanket in her hands. The delivery maid stared at Iris gravely and then turned to the doctor.
‘The child lives,’ she said.
11. ENOLA
‘Her name is Enola,’ Iris said, offering up the bundle to Matthew, who leant across the bed to take her.
The girl had blue eyes – Mortenstone blue – and the same delicate nose as Iris, but her hair was black as night. She stared at him fixedly as he rocked her, never blinking. It was not the curious gaze of a newborn baby, but one of cold awareness. She looked deep into his eyes, almost as if she knew him and everything he was thinking, as if she was penetrating his mind. He looked away, feeling uneasy, and stared at the delivery maid, who was sitting over by the fireplace folding a pile of old blankets. She gave him a regretful look and then returned to her work, eyes lowered to the floor. When he turned back, Enola was still watching him. A prickling feeling ran up his neck, making the hairs stand on end. He handed her back to Iris, who stared at her daughter adoringly, and gave her a kiss on the forehead. She was pale, dark shadows encircling her eyes.
‘You must rest,’ Matthew said. When she looked at him suspiciously, he sighed. ‘No one will take her from you while you sleep, I promise you.’
Iris looked down at Enola, still frowning. And Matthew noticed, as the child turned her face towards Iris, that there was a patch at the back of her head through which a streak of white hair grew.
‘Well?’ said Josephine as Matthew entered their bedchamber later that morning.
‘A girl,’ he said, taking off his boots.
‘Not that!’ she spat. ‘Is it gone?’
‘No.’
‘Well get rid of it! Soon!’
‘Josephine,’ he said, a warning in his tone. She closed her mouth and returned to her sewing, violently thrusting the needle through the cloth. ‘I don’t think it would be so terrible to let Iris bond with the child for a day or two,’ he said. The words tasted bitter on his tongue. Josephine stared at him, her eyes wide with horror. Then she got up, tossed her needlework into the fire and stormed out of the chamber, slamming the door behind her.
Lucian barged in moments later, his face white. ‘You cannot mean it! Father!’ he said, striding over to him, his hands balled into fists. ‘Let it stay? Here?’
‘Knock next time, Lucian.’
‘Father! Get rid of it! I won’t let Iris manipulate you anymore. It has to go! You’re risking our relationship with the Vandemeres. You will insult them if you let it stay. If we offend them again, we’ll lose them and their men. Then how will you ever build your army? Father, take control!’
‘Lucian, I will strike you if you don’t leave!’
Lucian snorted with exasperation and left. As soon as the door closed, Matthew sank onto the bed and shut his eyes, pulling the fur throw up to his shoulders. The storm raged on outside, battering the castle walls. The sky was growing ever darker. And he felt as weary as if he had been awake for a thousand years.
There was a quiet knock at the door. Saskian entered.
‘My Lord, the physician is asking whether he should… proceed with the arrangement, regarding the Reverof girl.’
‘No,’ Matthew said, sitting up quickly. ‘No, tell him no. Not yet. I don’t…I don’t think I can do it.’
Saskian did not seem surprised. He nodded thoughtfully and approached the bed, perching on the edge beside him.
‘And you know what this means?’ he said.
‘Yes,’ said Matthew. He knew what was at stake. ‘But even so, I can’t.’
Saskian sat in silence for a long time. Then, the smallest hint of a smile appeared on his lips. ‘Perhaps She is coming,’ he said, looking at him knowingly. ‘Perhaps it was all meant to be this way, my Lord.’
‘What do you mean?’ said Matthew.
‘War will come, that is certain. And, when it does, we won’t win. Darkness will befall us, cast its shadow over our land, as your great ancestor foresaw. We will suffer, my Lord. We must suffer. For then She will hear us. And She will come to save us. It is the prophecy.’
Matthew stared at him. Could his wise old friend be right? He wove his f
ingers together and sat in quiet thought, wondering whether any of the choices he had made thus far had ever been his own.
*
Lucian walked soundlessly along the corridor to Iris’s bedchamber and paused outside the door. His heartbeat quickened as he took hold of the handle and carefully pushed the door open.
Iris was asleep, her hand draped over the side of a cot next to the bed. Lucian moved cautiously across the room and stood over it. The child was awake; it stared up at him and kicked out its legs. It was sickening. He clenched his fists and gritted his teeth.
‘Lucian, what are you doing?’ came a panicked voice. He looked up. Iris had woken. She sat upright in bed, wide-eyed with fear. He stared into her eyes as he lowered his hand into the cot and stroked the child’s head. ‘Don’t hurt her,’ she said, her voice shaking. He pinched the child’s cheek lightly. Then he took a step back from the cot, turned around and left the room in silence.
He would like to have thrown it from the window before his sister’s very eyes, listen to her scream as the child plummeted to its death. And he would do, one day, when their father was no longer there to protect it.
The following morning, Lucian awoke to the sound of clanking metal. He sprang from the bed and rushed to the window. Below, at least fifty guards were marching along Stone Lane towards the Dark Forest, suited head-to-toe in silver armour, holding longswords in front of them, blades pointing to the heavens. They walked in uniformed rows. Crunch, crunch, crunch. Their steel boots rattling. Behind them walked three horses, dragging carts filled with firewood, rolls of canvas, barrels of wine and ale, and servants.
Lucian dashed to the trunk at the end of his bed and threw it open, seizing breeches and a tunic and pulling them on hastily. He slipped his feet into his boots and ran from the bedchamber.
He raced down to the entrance hall, out into the courtyard and through the square, crossing it in four strides, running down Stone Lane towards his father, who was standing at the bottom, looking out across the Grassland.
‘What’s happening?’ he asked breathlessly. His father turned his head towards him but his eyes remained fixed on the guards and the carts as they shrank into the distance.
‘I’m posting men along the border. The Dark Forest is off limits to all. Entry is punishable by banishment. This arrangement is to be permanent.’
‘Why?’ Lucian said, bewildered.
‘I must protect my people,’ said Matthew. ‘There are dangerous people in the forest.’
Lucian watched him closely. There was something his father wasn’t telling him. He was avoiding his eye, combing his fingers through his beard anxiously. Why did they need protection? Why did he care now if anyone died in the Dark Forest, when he never had before? No. This wasn’t about them. This was about Iris. He had always favoured her, always paid her special attention. But this? All this to prevent her from returning to the forest? It was madness.
Across the Grassland, servants were jumping down from the carts and pulling out the rolls of canvas and long wooden poles. Lucian watched as they thrust the poles into the earth and backed away, raising their arms, palms facing upwards. One roll of canvas unravelled and flew high into the air above them before falling gently down over the wooden poles. And, just like that, the first tent was erected. Lucian gritted his teeth.
‘When is the wedding?’ he said as the servants began on the second tent.
‘Soon,’ said Matthew distractedly.
‘Good,’ Lucian said. But it wasn’t good. It wasn’t enough. Edward Vandemere was not heir to the Vandemere army. He looked at his father with contempt. His weakness had cost them dearly. Iris had cost them dearly. He hoped she did go back to the Dark Forest. Then his father would be forced to banish her - and the snake spawn she had birthed.
*
Iris woke again to silence from the cot. She leaned over and looked in. Enola was wide awake, staring up at the ceiling. Then, suddenly, her head rolled to the side and she looked at her with eyes of ice. Iris recoiled slightly, a nervous flutter in her stomach, but quickly moved back to the cot again, pushing the feeling away. No. She wasn’t afraid. She loved her daughter. She brushed her fingers over her soft cheek and smiled at her, but Enola remained expressionless.
It had been months now. Months and no smile, no laughter, no tears. Months of silence. Months of listening to the maids whispering in the corner of the chamber. “Peculiar”, they called her. “Strange.” None of them looked directly at the girl; it was as if they were afraid the curse was catching.
Iris stuck out her tongue and pulled a face. Enola looked away, disinterested, as three sharp knocks sounded upon the door. Iris’s head snapped up.
‘Who is it?’ she said, pulling the bedcovers up to conceal her nightdress. The door opened. Her father came into the room, followed by the delivery maid. Iris stared at the woman in surprise. She hadn’t seen her since the day Enola was born and presumed she had returned to wherever it was she came from. Draxvar, perhaps, judging by her paleness.
Her father looked at her gravely and her heart began to race.
‘Iris—’
‘No!’ she shouted, snatching Enola from the cot. ‘No, don’t hurt her. Go away!’
‘I’m not going to hurt her, Iris. Listen to me. It’s time. She can’t share your chamber when you’re married. Maid Morgan here will look after her down in the lower rooms. She will be her Companion while she grows up,’ he said, nodding towards the delivery maid, who bowed her head.
‘She’ll hurt her,’ Iris said, staring at Maid Morgan coldly.
‘She won’t.’
‘How do you know? You don’t know her! She might!’
Matthew looked at the maid apologetically.
‘Maid Morgan is the daughter of Francis le Fay,’ he said. Iris fell quiet, forgetting whatever it was she had been about to say. ‘This is a great honour for their family, as it is our honour to have her here,’ he continued. ‘I doubt very much that she would do anything to harm Enola. Wouldn’t you agree?’
Iris glanced at the woman quickly. The le Fays of Latheera were an old family, an important family. But how was she to know? She couldn’t help thinking, even now, that this Morgan le Fay looked too stern and battle-worn to be one of them.
Matthew came closer to the bed and lowered his voice.
‘I have shown you great leniency in these last months,’ he said. ‘I have allowed you to keep your daughter here in the castle, against the advice of my council, your mother and my own better judgement. Do not challenge me now, after all I have done for you.’
Iris felt a stinging pain behind her eyes and her father became a blur as they filled with tears. Her throat tightened. Her heart ached. But she didn’t resist when Maid Morgan plucked Enola from her arms and carried her out of the room. When her father bent down to kiss her, she turned her face away.
The wedding day crept up on Iris like a snake in the grass. Before she knew it, she was standing in her bedchamber, staring vacantly out of the window as four maids fastened her purple gown.
Eve danced around with excitement. ‘Do we get to keep these dresses?’ she said, flitting past the other bridesmaids, who were sitting on the bed, their feet dangling over the edge. Iris didn’t answer her. But for the maids’ skirts swishing, the fire spitting and Eve’s shoes tapping against the floor, no one made a sound.
As she left her chamber and began the long walk along the corridor towards the staircase, she noticed movement in the corner of her eye and turned her head. There, standing at the top of a darkened stairway that led down to the lower rooms, was Maid Morgan. She held Enola to her chest and offered a small smile. Iris nodded and returned an even fainter smile, feeling a stab of jealousy as she walked on.
A single bell began to ring. The sound drifted down from the bell tower, fading as it reached her ears. Dong. The dying echo replaced by another. Dong. Summoning her, not in celebration, but in duty.
Her father met her at the foot of the stairs and offer
ed his arm. She took it, her hands trembling. The servants lined the corridor and bowed as they passed them, each beaming with excitement, eyes roving over her gown, over the jewels glinting in the fabric of the hem. Iris could hear the din of voices rising in the Great Hall as they approached. And then the bell stopped ringing. They halted outside the doors and waited while maids and dressmakers hurriedly straightened out the folds in her dress and veil, pulled up the bridesmaids’ stockings and flattened their hair with spit, before arranging them into rows of two in order of height. In that moment, briefly, as the frenzy unfolded around her, Iris thought of Alexander, standing there in the clearing, as vivid as if he were in front of her. But the Dark Forest was another world away now.
With heart-stopping suddenness, the music began. Iris’s stomach lurched. Her father glanced sideways at her and squeezed her hand as the choir began to sing the Song of Merlin the Good.
‘For the realm,’ he said.
Iris’s mouth was so dry she couldn’t speak. She looked ahead and swallowed hard as the doors opened. A sea of heads turned. Her father began to walk. And she was walking, too, the music blasting in her ears, the choir singing over it, projecting their voices from the end of the hall. Walking, walking, slowly, tentatively, under the Mortenstone and Vandemere banners, which rippled above their heads in the cold draft. She smiled tightly at the faces leaning out into the aisle to get a proper look at her. She didn’t recognise any of them.
As they neared the end of the aisle, the music began to build, the singing grew louder, and Iris looked dead into Edward Vandemere’s eyes. He was standing in front of the choir, staring at her in awe. His older brother, Gregory, was at his side, looking as if it was the last place he wanted to be. He glared at her as she approached and then turned around to face the minister, encouraging Edward to do the same with a nudge.
When she reached the end of the hall and came to stand alongside Edward, the music swelled. The entire orchestra held its final notes and let them ring out across the room. Her father lifted her veil and squeezed her hand one last time before handing it to Edward.
The White Witch (The Serpent and The Sorcerer Trilogy Book 1) Page 11
