“Hey, don’t get all worked up, okay?” Devon took a breath. “She didn’t see us.” He looked down at Wiglaf. “Did you do that deliberately to get me in trouble?” he asked under his breath.
“There are consequences for every foolhardy action,” Wiglaf whispered, a mischievous little wiggle to his ears.
“Be that as it may, Devon March,” Clydog intoned from his lectern, “you put our mission at risk. As did you, Gisele of Zeeland.”
Devon felt badly that Gisele had been dragged into it. “It was totally my idea,” he insisted to Clydog. “Please don’t blame her.”
He glanced down at Gisele. She gave him a small smile.
“But the other thing is,” Devon adds, looking around at the group, feeling suddenly more confident, more a part of them, “I know from studying Nightwing history in the future that you will win against her. Isobel will be burned at the stake. I know that from reading history—”
“Then history must be changed!”
The entire congregation was stunned by the sudden voice—a shrill, high-pitched utterance that seemed to emanate from every corner of the room. Devon tried looking around to see who this newcomer was, but all at once he felt claws gripping his shoulders—invisible claws—and he was lifted from his place into the air. The crowd gasped.
The claws holding Devon by his shoulders materialized. Above him grinned one of those hideous flying monkeys, its reptilian wings flapping furiously in the air.
But far more terrifying was the image that suddenly appeared at the front of the hall, hovering over Clydog. Its laughter told Devon who it was even before he saw her face.
Isobel the Apostate.
And she was descending on Clydog, who simply fell to his knees.
“Shall I reduce him to nothing, right here before you all?” Isobel shrilled. “Turn him into a quivering, drooling creature—your great leader, the mighty Clydog?”
“Please,” Clydog begged, covering his face.
“Tell them how much you desire me, Clydog. How you dream of me, night after night—”
The great warrior cowered before her.
“Your little gnome messenger was so easy to bend to my will,” Isobel told the crowd. “I learned all of your schemes from him. I knew last night not to trust him when I sensed the presence of these two children. Think not that you can defeat me!”
Devon struggled to break free of the demon’s grip, but he found he could not—not while he heard Isobel’s voice. Or rather, Morgana’s voice—
I think I’ve fallen in love with you, Devon.
Try as he might, he couldn’t deny the feeling he had for her, even now, even as she threatened to destroy them all…
But maybe he wouldn’t have to. Several of the female Nightwing had leapt from their seats in an attempt to subdue her, including Sybilla and Gisele. Devon watched Isobel’s flashing black eyes. She had something up her sleeve—literally. Just as the Nightwing approached her, Isobel hurled something out into the air—something shiny—something gold—
It was a golden chain, and it magically wrapped itself around Gisele, the smallest of the army that surged forward.
“Gaze upon her!” Isobel commanded, as Gisele struggled in the air, bound by the chain. “She is under my power now. Your gnome proved very useful, revealing many secrets. Including the special goldmines in the Arctic whose enchantment is so great they can even contain Nightwing!” She laughed hysterically.
The women stopped in their charge, concerned about what might happen to Gisele if they continued.
“Such will be the fate of all who oppose me,” Isobel said, her shrieking voice echoing throughout the room. “And now, my Nightwing brothers and sisters, I bid you a fond farewell. I’m sorry that I shall not be able to join you at Witenagemot. May you enjoy your last gathering—for when I have achieved my victory, you will all be banished into my Hell Holes!”
“Seize her!” Clydog shouted from the floor.
“Oh, and I must not forget,” Isobel said, laughing once more, “a couple of young hostages for safekeeping.”
Her eyes locked onto Devon’s. The beast gripping him by the shoulders began to flap its wings. It flew over the crowd and headed straight for an enormous stained-glass window. Saint George slaying the dragon, Devon realized, just like the one at Ravenscliff, as he protected his face with his hands. The last sound he heard was the smashing of glass. Then all was dark and quiet.
He awoke in a dungeon.
It looked like every dungeon he’d ever seen in movies or books. On the far wall, two men hung from chains on their wrists. Rats crawled over filthy, stinking, moldy straw. The only light came from slivers of windows far up the stone walls.
Devon groaned. His shoulder killed—the monkey demon had ripped open the same spot where he’d been wounded before. Or will be wounded, Devon thought. Whatever.
“Here, my young Nightwing,” came a voice near him in the dark. “Let me assist you.”
It was Bjorn Forkbeard.
“Here, in the pocket of my breeches, I have a powder,” the gnome told him, extracting a vial. “It will aid in your healing.”
“Thanks,” Devon said, remembering how the powder worked the last time. He pulled down his bloodied doublet to reveal his shoulder. Bjorn shook the powder onto the wound. Instantly the pain was relieved.
“It is all my fault,” Bjorn said, tears dropping down his cheeks. “She forced it out of me—the place where the Nightwing were meeting—and she made me forge that golden chain.”
“I want to trust you,” Devon said. “I want to believe you didn’t squeal of your own choice.”
“On King Henry’s name, I vow I did not! She has ways—she gets into a man’s heart, his thoughts, his very soul!”
Devon sighed. That much he knew to be true. Who could resist Isobel when she turned on the charm? Even Devon himself hadn’t been able to do it.
“But there is something I can do,” Devon said, standing. “I can free these men.”
With a wave of his hand the men chained to the wall suddenly found themselves free, sliding down the stones to stand on the floor of the dungeon, weak in their knees but standing nonetheless.
“You are a great sorcerer,” one of them said in awe, looking at Devon. “You must defeat the Witch!”
“Yes,” the other man adds. “The Witch imprisoned us after taking our homes and all of our land. She must be stopped!”
“Yeah, I’m with you on that,” Devon said. “But just how to go about doing it I’m not so sure.”
He tried willing open the door to the dungeon but it didn’t budge. He felt Isobel’s power behind it: it was as if she was on the other side, holding it shut. Nightwing power, head-to-head, and Isobel was stronger.
“I’ve got to help Gisele,” Devon said. “What was that golden chain you made, Bjorn?”
“It is forged out of gold from the Nightwing’s own mines in the north of Finland. It has the power to contain a sorcerer, to prevent him from using his power.”
“Or hers,” Devon grumbled. “Gisele is powerless against Isobel then.”
“I am afraid so.”
The men Devon had freed were stretching their legs and exercising their stiff arms. “When the guard comes,” one man whispered, “we will retreat to the shadows and overpower him.”
“And then what?” Devon asked. “I’ll run smack up against Isobel and who knows what will happen then. I need a better plan. Let me think.”
He tried to reassure himself that he knew how this all would end—Isobel burning at the stake, her hands bound by the same golden chain that now kept Gisele a prisoner. But could history be changed? Had Devon’s very presence in this time altered the flow of history enough so that Isobel might win? If so, what consequences would that have on his own time? Might Cecily and his friends truly die at the Apostate’s hands?
Or—the thought nearly knocked Devon over—might they never even be born?
He realized that it wasn’t just his current dilemma over which he needed to triumph. It was also something far greater: in his hands he held Cecily’s very existence—and maybe even his own! If Isobel was able to win here in the fifteenth century, then the very course of Nightwing history would be changed. Horatio Muir might never even come to be born. So Cecily—and Mrs. Crandall and Edward and Alexander—would never exist!
And Devon’s parents, whoever they were, might also fade from the pages of history.
What happens then? Devon shuddered. I’ll just disappear, he thought in terror. I’ll cease to exist. Maybe that was Isobel’s plan all along. Send me back in time—and thus change the course of history—allowing her to win in both 1490 and in the future!
“The guard comes,” one of the men said. “I hear his footfall. Be ready!”
Devon had no choice but to act. The guard was a misshapen creature, with a hunchback and one empty eye socket. He unlocked the door to the dungeon and lumbered in awkwardly. The two prisoners easily overpowered him, allowing Devon and Bjorn to escape.
“Defeat her!” one of the men cried after them. “Save us from the Witch!”
Devon didn’t respond. He was growing more frightened by the moment, convinced he was merely playing the patsy in Isobel’s grand plan. He wished he could talk to Rolfe—or Wiglaf.
Your fear is your downfall, the Voice reminded him. You must believe you can win.
“Believe I can win,” Devon mumbled to himself as he hurried up the damp cold steps into the Witch’s castle.
“Of course you will win, good sir,” Bjorn said beside him. “I believe in you.”
Devon looked down at the little man. Was he friend or foe? He wished the Voice would tell him for sure…
Trust your gut, the Voice said. You need no assurance other than that.
They’d emerged into the great hall of the castle. Devon gasped at what he saw ahead of them. At the far end of the hall a throne was set upon a pedestal. A throne fit for a King—or a Queen. Banners with the royal arms hung over the throne, and beside it were hunched two demons, beasts with faces like apes that were nodding in and out of sleep.
“Stay back,” Devon whispered to Bjorn as they crouched in the shadows. Devon surveyed the room. It was empty except for the throne at one end and a banquet table in the middle of the room. But then he heard a sound. The clanking of a chain. He looked up.
There, in what looked like a silver birdcage attached to the rafters, was Gisele.
She had spotted them. Their eyes held without saying a word. Devon felt confident he could free her from the cage, but he’d still be powerless to remove the chain from her wrists. Only a non-Nightwing could do that…
He looked down at Bjorn.
It was if the gnome had read his mind. “Bring her down,” Bjorn said, “and I will break the chain. I am strong enough!”
Turn around, the Voice suddenly commanded him. Quickly!
Devon spun back toward the demons guarding the throne. One sleepy eye had opened wide, and it was trained right on him.
“We’ve been spotted,” Devon whispered. “Now!”
He concentrated. The door to Gisele’s cage swung open. With his mind, Devon brought her down safely to the ground. But the demons had now launched themselves across the hall as if on springboards, shrieking out hideous monkey calls that summoned more of their filthy kin flapping in as backup.
“Free Gisele!” Devon barked to Bjorn as he fought off the first demon to reach him, landing a punch to its jaw and sending it sprawling back across the hall. But another was on him then, and then another—
“Let him go!”
The voice was Isobel’s. The foul-smelling beasts had knocked Devon to the floor but rolled off him obediently when their mistress commanded it. Isobel’s shadow suddenly fell over Devon as she approached. She stood over him to stare down at him with her bewitching black eyes.
“Who are you, my little time traveler?”
Their eyes locked. It was Morgana—how well Devon knew those eyes. His heart leapt.
I think I’ve fallen in love with you, Devon.
“Who are your parents, boy?” the Witch demanded.
Devon said nothing. Isobel didn’t know him. She had no idea that they would meet five hundred years from now—or did she?
She was studying him. “I could suck your lifeblood into nothingness,” she told him. “But you intrigue me. I want to know who you are.”
Still Devon said nothing. In his peripheral vision he could see Bjorn being restrained by the demons. Gisele remained shackled, unable to help him.
Isobel smiled. “You have great spirit,” she told him. “I could enjoy having you at my court. For only those Nightwing who join me will be spared.”
“I’ll never join you,” Devon told her. “I’ve come back in time to stop you!”
She threw her head back and laughed. Devon recoiled from the sound. It was the same cruel, manic sound he heard that day in the tower.
“You cannot defy me, boy. You saw what I did to the great Clydog. I will soon have the King’s throne—and I will rule all of Europe by year’s end! In another year, I’ll have the world!”
She laughed again, a hideous cackle pealing throughout the hall. Her merriment offered Devon just enough time to act. With her eyes turned away from him, he found the strength to pull his legs up and back, landing a powerhouse kick right on her shins. It sent her flying back across the room.
He was quickly on his feet. “My father always told me to never hit a lady, but in your case, he’d make an exception.”
The demons were enraged, dive-bombing at Devon, but he was so pumped by his success in taking Isobel by surprise that he confidently swatted them away like so many flies. Isobel, meanwhile, had regained her feet, her eyes blazing in fury.
“You will pay for that!” she howled. “You will burn!”
“No, I think that dance card is reserved for you,” Devon said, leaping through the air toward her.
She parried him with a simple wave of her arm. Without even touching him, she sent him crashing into the far wall. Devon was dazed for a moment, but regained his senses just in time to find Isobel in his face, bearing down at him.
“You don’t want to fight me, Devon March,” she purred, her voice dripping with honey. He tried to avoid her eyes but he could not. They overtook him, filled up his vision. “You’d rather kiss me, wouldn’t you, my love?”
“No,” he groaned.
But his strength was ebbing. He smelled her—Morgana—lilacs. She touched his hair.
“You will fight me no longer, will you, Devon March?”
He looked up into her eyes. She was so beautiful—the most beautiful woman who had ever lived—
She smiled. “I think I’ve fallen in love with you, Devon.”
The room went black. Devon felt horribly lightheaded as everything began to spin. Then he felt himself falling, falling, falling …
She’s won, he told himself, his last thought before losing consciousness. And I no longer exist …
Witenagemot
Free the gnome.
It was the Voice.
You’re still here, Devon.
Free the gnome!
Wherever he was, Devon realized that his spirit still existed. There was blackness all around him, thick and warm, but he still had some link to the world. He could still think. He willed himself to visualize Bjorn being held down by the demons. He saw the little man kicking and twisting.
Get off him, Devon commanded. You have no power over him!
In his mind’s eye he watched as the demons suddenly fell backward off their prisoner. The gnome sprung to his little feet.
And suddenly there was light again. Devon opened his eyes and realized he was back in the great hall. In the rafters, to be exact—looking down as Bjorn rushed over to Gisele as Isobel approached her ominously.
“Hey, Izzy,
” Devon shouted. “Up here!”
Isobel the Apostate looked up in shock.
“You’ve lost your charm, I’m afraid,” he told her, dropping down to land both feet on her back, sending her crashing into the floor.
It gave Bjorn just enough time to rush to Gisele’s side and snap off her chain. The demons were now attacking from all sides, and Gisele knocked the first few easily aside. But there were dozens of them—and more kept arriving, their talons scratching at the stone floors, their wings flapping up windstorms.
“There’s too many of them!” Gisele shouted.
She’s right, Devon realized. It was the scene at Ravenscliff all over again. Devon did his best to fight the creatures off, but they kept coming, one after another. Bjorn cowered under the banquet table. The demons were not concerned with him; they cared only about defeating the two young Nightwing who have so humiliated their mistress.
Isobel was back on her feet. “They can’t best you all!” she shrieked to her minions. “They cannot defeat the power of Isobel!”
A green-eyed feathered thing with an enormous beak had landed on Devon, trying to peck out his eyes. He thrust it off him, but his strength was fading.
Don’t give in to your fear, he reminded himself. Do not be afraid!
“You can still live, Devon March!” Isobel called to him. “You can still join me!”
The beast with the feathers was back on him, squawking in his ear. He fought it, but fell to his knees.
“Don’t surrender, Devon!” he heard Gisele call from somewhere in the mayhem. “You are a great sorcerer!”
“Yes,” he told himself, wearily but convincingly. “I am the one-hundredth generation from Sargon the Great!”
With that, he easily tossed the demon off of him, sending it shrieking through the air, disappearing into its Hell Hole.
He was on his feet facing Isobel again.
“One-hundredth generation,” she was saying, looking at him in wonder.
“Yeah,” he said. “Thought that might impress you.”
Demon Witch (Book Two - The Ravenscliff Series) Page 22
