I rushed to his side. Around me, the fire disappeared.
“Faol?” I shook his limp body. “Faol! Is he dead?”
Moranda strode across the room and picked him up as if he weighed nothing. She placed him on the bed. “No,” she said. “But he deserves to be.”
“So, you are wicked.”
She clucked her tongue. “I thought you were clever enough to see past his boyish complaints. Are you as bad?”
I wanted to see how she’d react, so I said, “You killed his mother, and possibly his father! What else am I supposed to think?”
She paused. And in that pause, Faol woke up. He opened his eyes and said, “Get out.”
“I saved your life,” snapped Moranda. “Doesn’t that earn me a slip of gratitude? And what’s this absurd tale you’ve been spinning to the girl?”
“It’s Aideen—”
Faol pulled himself to sitting. “You were in love with my father. And he rejected you. So you killed him.”
“You foolish boy,” said Moranda, sounding tired, like she’d been the one fighting the Mage for seven years. “I never killed your father, Faol. He died. I would have saved him if I could, but I couldn’t. You’re not the only person in this world to deal in pain and failure.”
“You hate me because of who my parents are.”
She put a hand over her eyes. “Faol. Why won’t you see?” She shook her head. “I know it’s much easier for you to paint me as the villain, but I am your master, Faol. I am here to help you. I cannot believe you thought me capable of murder – all because of a broken heart?”
Faol hid behind his hair, staring at his boots.
I cleared my throat. “We’ve tried all we can to defeat the Mage. Please, can’t you help us?”
“No. A student must be qualified.” She collected the three shrunken heads from the corner of the room. “I’ll take these away.”
Faol didn’t react, but kept glaring at the floor.
Moranda took one last look at him. “I want you to succeed, Faol. I wish you’d believe me.” And then to me, she added, “It falls to you now. To help him. You can help him. I believe that.” She swept her cloak around her body, and disappeared.
The silence left in her wake was deafening. The fire had gone out, and even the Mage was quiet.
I sat on the bed beside Faol, saying nothing. I recalled the gentle memories I had from my own childhood, free from death and pressured whispers.
Let her go.
I knew the ache of longing when I saw it, and the pain of loss. I knew them very well, for I had faced both in the last day.
“I believed she truly loved your father,” I said. “She said she’d lived with pain. I don’t think her love drove her to hate; that’s not how she reacted to loss. I think she took you under her wing because she felt guilty about your mother. And because she wanted to help you soar, for your father’s sake. Faol, I really do think she wants you to succeed. I think she loves you too.”
He leaned his head forward, covering his face with his hands. His shoulders began to shake. I rubbed his back and let him cry in peace.
In the morning, I brought him breakfast and coffee in bed.
“Eat,” I encouraged him. “You must.”
He swirled his spoon through his porridge. I’d made it too runny. I really was useless.
“I can make you a fresh bowl?” I offered.
He shook his head and lifted a spoonful to his mouth. I put my hand on his shins, over the covers. “I’m going to go to the study and have a good think. Fresh eyes, remember?”
He nodded. But his eyes were glazed.
I left him alone. He’d come round when he was ready. I took a cup of coffee for myself and settled at his desk. I could almost pretend I was a mage myself, conducting important affairs – or whatever it was that mages did once they were trained.
I grabbed his quill and a loose sheet of paper, and made a list of all the things we’d tried so far, and everything Moranda had told us.
According to her, we had all we needed. She knew the library was a ruin, so the answer couldn’t lie in books. Possession was definitely not the answer. Faol had summoned the elements and while that had hurt the Mage, it had not been enough to destroy the monster.
We’d traveled to the Otherworld to find his mother. Perhaps we could find the Mage too? Perhaps we could destroy it in the Otherworld.
“But,” I said aloud, “Faol’s powers are no greater in the Otherworld. If anything, any advantage will go to the Mage, who’ll be in its natural surroundings.”
I cast around the study for inspiration. But only Faol’s private journals filled the shelves, and I’d bite my own hand off before reading one of those.
My hand.
I lifted it up to the light. There was no sign of anything moving beneath the skin. No sign of any blackness. I touched my face, my scars. What would people say if I ever returned to the village? The marks were clearly the work of magic. Would my parents be frightened, or simply disappointed? Would I scare away customers in the shop?
And if we did defeat the Mage, how would I spend time with Faol? He’d go off to some fancy court and find another mage to settle down with. And I’d be left behind. Yes, I’d have my family, the hills, the familiar faces and safety of my village. But I wouldn’t have Faol. Our lives were never meant to intertwine. Perhaps, if I asked nicely, Moranda could find a job for someone like me, something that would keep me close to Faol.
She believed I could help him. How? I looked down at my hands, my talentless fingers. All I could do was brew coffee and make sure he was comfortable.
I rolled my neck and got up. I could write all day and never come any closer to solving our problem. It had to be Faol.
I climbed the stairs, and paused on the next landing.
He was in the bath, his back to me. His hands ran along the edge of the tub; his head leaned back, eyes closed. Water dripped off the ends of his hair and onto the floor. I needed to move before he saw me, but I couldn’t pull myself away.
And then he looked at me, and my heart stopped.
“I was—” My words failed. I couldn’t think of a plausible excuse for staring at him. I hurried up the stairs, almost tripping over my own feet. I didn’t stop until I reached his room. I closed the door behind me.
I’d liked men before – two, to be precise. I’d harboured a soft spot for both; my mother had approved neither. She knew me well.
One had fancied himself rather swish, with big dreams and a corresponding mouth with which to proclaim those dreams. Perhaps if I’d stayed with him, he would have whisked me off to the city like Winnie. But now, after meeting Faol, I knew I’d have been unhappy.
Because when I thought about Faol, my stomach filled with butterflies. When I looked at him, I wanted to grab his face and kiss his lips.
I’d never felt this way about anyone before. And doubted I would replicate such feelings towards another. Because despite his numerous, undeniable flaws, despite the monstrous Night Mage that was a living, breathing part of him, I cared for Faol. Perhaps I loved him. And yes, we’d known each other less than a month, but our relationship was not normal, nor were the circumstances in which we’d been thrust.
I ran a finger along the frame of the window. The sun was setting. Each day seemed to vanish quicker than the last. My adventure in this castle had not been anything like I’d predicted. Not better or worse – just different.
I caught my faint reflection in the glass. I was actually growing fond of my strange scars. They marked me as someone interesting, with a story to tell. And I could use them to scare away small children, which would always come in handy.
The door opened and closed.
His hair was still wet, dripping on the floor. He wore a dark shirt and trousers – no waistcoat. The top three buttons of his shirt were undone.
“Hello,” I said.
“Hello.” He crouched by the hearth and lit a fire. The light was bright in my eyes.
<
br /> “Do you feel any better?” I asked.
“A little. Did you uncover a vital clue we’ve been missing?”
“I’m afraid not.” The floorboards creaked as I joined him by the fire. “I went through everything.” The firelight danced in his eyes. And in them I saw resignation.
I felt it too. And it showed.
He kissed me, and held my face in his palms, blocking the heat from the fire, creating a world within a world where only we were present. I slid my hands down his neck and to the fourth of his buttons. His kiss didn’t waver, so I slipped the button free and worked my way down until his chest was bare. I wanted to look, but he still held me in his kiss. I explored with my hands instead, feeling the softness of his skin, the beat of his heart.
He unbuttoned me too, and we sank to the floor, to the heat of the fire, and it burned one side of me: my face and arms, and then the length of my legs, and later my back, with his hands in my hair and our legs folded around one another. By nightfall, every inch of me had been kissed by the fire, and by him.
We pulled the top sheet from the bed to wrap ourselves in a cocoon, and rested against one of the armchairs. I leaned back into his chest; he kissed the top of my head.
“It won’t be so bad,” I whispered.
“No…not at all.”
We had time left to destroy the Mage, but why would seven years of failure transform to success in the next few days? I’d made my own decision to stay with Faol, knowing the risks. If this was how my life would unfold, then so be it. No one’s life was perfect. No one had it all.
But I had more than most.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Faol made more jam in the morning, and we ate together at the kitchen table with a pot of coffee between us. I swung my legs and admired the mountain view. The kitchen was probably my favourite room in the entire castle. If only it were safe at night.
We took our second pot of coffee downstairs to the study with the full intention of reading, however it wasn’t until mid-morning when we stopped kissing long enough to get down to work.
“We need to go through these,” he said, pulling a book out from the shelf.
“Your old journals?”
“Yes. Perhaps there’s something in there I missed before. Something I can’t remember.”
“But these are private…”
He tossed a book at my chest. “You don’t want to see my ugly side?”
“I don’t want to invade your privacy.”
He lifted an eyebrow, and I blushed like a schoolgirl.
“I’m letting you in.”
“As long as you’re sure…”
“You’ve seen the Mage,” he said. “What could I have to hide that’s more hideous than that?”
I didn’t have an answer for him. I took my coffee and sat on the floor with my legs crossed.
“You won’t have the chair?” he said.
“I prefer it down here.” I’d spent all day in that chair yesterday, and my back was still hurting.
He’d given me his very first journal. His handwriting was almost as ineligible as Moranda’s.
‘I’ll be out of here in a week.’
As I read, I heard his voice, and the arrogance of inexperience. His bold attitude continued for almost a month. And then—
‘This is impossible; she’s set me an impossible task!’
The despair crept in slowly, poking in around the edges. And then he said,
‘Cal and Orla have come to rescue me! They believe I need rescued…
And now we are all trapped inside this castle. I hate her. I hate her!’
“Faol? What happened to Cal and Orla?” He was silent at first, but he must have known I’d have come across this information.
He put down his journal. “They were my friends.”
“Is Scaly—?”
“Yes. After Moranda banished me to this castle, they came to free me. But you know yourself that anyone who enters cannot escape. This was years ago. After they came to rescue me, Moranda cast a spell on the castle to let no one else in.”
“Yet I got in…” Moranda believed I could help Faol. I still couldn’t see how.
“I was due some good luck,” he said with a smile, which vanished as quick as it had arrived. “I tried to get them out of here. I thought— I don’t know what I was thinking. I thought if I transformed their bodies they would escape Moranda’s enchantment. I’d read about a similar situation where a mage had freed her lover from a demon’s trap, and I thought I could do it myself.” He shook his head. “Well, you’ve seen what they look like now.”
“I’m sorry, Faol.”
“It’s me who should be sorry. My friends came to help me, and look what I did? They are stuck here with me, in foolish bodies. Orla can’t even speak! I called her Orla at first, but then it became too unbearable to associate that tiny lizard with my old friend. So I pushed her out too.”
“Moranda won’t help,” I said, matter-of-factly.
“She said they’ve learned their lessons for being so stupid. And I have learned mine. Three lives… And it’s all my own fault.”
“I followed you, Faol.”
“Because I was trying to escape and you saw me in the woods! If a man appears from nowhere, I’d be intrigued too. I led you all here with my idiocy, and that same ineptitude has tied you down as my prisoners. Do you have any idea how much I hate myself?”
“Please don’t hate yourself. You’ve been trying your best. It’s all anyone can do!”
But he wasn’t listening. “I could perhaps cope with my failure if it didn’t involve others. If Moranda loves me, she loves me at the expense of others. Cal and Sca— Orla should have been freed as soon as they set foot in this castle.”
“Perhaps Moranda wanted you to have company?”
“Why do you always defend her! My friends are not there to be used. If Moranda wanted me to have company she should never have sent me here in the first place! She should have trained me like any other student!”
“Please don’t be angry, Faol. I’m only trying to help. I’m trying to see the positives.”
“There are none,” he said flatly. “We should keep reading.”
I sighed and picked up my book again. I read the events that Faol had just described; I read his fury and his hatred, and his terrible, terrible guilt.
‘I cannot sleep. I cannot eat. I could have killed them both!’
As the pages turned, the months passed, and Orla became Scaly, and Faol became depressed.
‘I am so alone. I cannot bear to look at Cal. Or the lizard. I cannot bear any of it. I must be free of this castle before I lose my mind.’
What would he have done if he’d known how many years of solitude lay ahead of him? It was a miracle he’d kept his sanity. I would have certainly lost my mind within the first year.
Faol wrote about the Mage, but he only mentioned physical descriptions, and the sounds it made at night. He spoke broadly about the magic he used against the Mage – too broad for me to know what he was actually describing. Most of the journal was filled with his anger and misery and hate. He hurled daily complaints at the castle, at Moranda, at his books, his wand and cup, his parents, and himself.
I put down the journal and went to him. I lifted the book from his hands and placed it flat on the desk. I slipped onto his lap and kissed him.
“You won’t be alone again. I promise.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I won’t let it happen.”
“I want to believe you,” he said. “But nothing ever goes right for me.”
“That’s not true. You had parents who loved you, and a teacher who’s doing all she can to make you the best you can possibly be. And you have friends who cared enough for you to storm a castle.”
He laid his cheek on my chest, and after a while he said, “I have you too.”
“You have me. And if we escape, you’ll have me outside the castle too. If you want me…”
He leaned back and took both of my hands, and pressed them against his lips. “I will want you no matter where we are. Wherever I go, I want you with me. And wherever you go, I will follow.”
I smoothed his hair back from his face. His natural colour was already growing back in at the roots. I wondered what shade he’d go for next. Perhaps I could convince him to let the blue grow out, just so I could see his hair as it was meant to be. And then he could go back to dyeing it all the colours of the rainbow.
“You hate my hair,” he said.
I laughed. “Of course not. It’s special. Like you.”
“I only do it to copy others.”
“Then maybe you should let it be natural. And then one day, others will copy you.”
“Do you really believe that?”
“Of course I do.”
But I didn’t. In my heart, I believed I would never set foot outside this castle ever again, or see my family, or the village where I grew up. And if I thought too hard about it, my heart broke in two. But there was nothing I could do now. And I had Faol. He was more than enough. I had no reason to be miserable anymore. Once our month was up, I would bring him round to my way of thinking.
Tiredness hit me like a rock. I swayed forward; Faol braced me with his palms.
“Aideen?”
“Sleepy, that’s all.” I hadn’t slept much the previous night, and even coffee couldn’t repair all the damage.
“I’m taking you upstairs.”
“No— Don’t. There’s no need, I’m—”
I caught sight of my fingers, and held up my right hand.
The skin was black as night.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Faol would not let go of my hand. His grip was painful, but I didn’t tell him. I was actually glad to still have feeling in my hand; it was so black I feared it might drop off.
“I’ve never seen anything like it,” he said.
“It’s the Mage. So strictly speaking, it’s you.”
“If I could undo it, I would.”
He left me in the study while he whirled around the castle, collecting various items. He forced a revolting potion down my throat; poured green liquid from his cup all over my hand; he prodded at the skin with his wand.
The Night Mage Page 12
