The Witches' Covenant (Twin Magic Book 2)

by Michael Dalton

  “I want my mama.”

  “Where is she?”

  The girl’s face creased in worry.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Is this your house? Do you live here?”

  “No.”

  “Where is your house?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Ariel stood and looked around.

  “Do you know this street at all?”

  “No.”

  The wave of memories washed over her, even as Ariel’s instincts—a girl who had lost her mother, though permanently—came to the fore.

  ‘What is your name?”

  “Nadja.”

  “I’m Ariel. Can I help you find your mother?”

  Some sparks of hope flared in the girl’s eyes. “Do you know where she is?”

  “No. But perhaps together we can find her.”

  It was then that Shadow approached. The girl smiled.

  “Is this your doggy?”

  “Yes. Her name is Shadow.”

  “She’s pretty.”

  “Thank you. Let’s find your mama.”

  The girl took her hand, and they walked around for a few minutes. When they approached the church, the girl spoke up.

  “This is the church. We go to Mass here.”

  “Do you know the way home from here?”

  The girl looked around. Then she pointed toward a street on the other side.

  “I think that way.”

  They walked past the church, across the open square. When the shadows of the spires fell behind them, Ariel suddenly heard someone screaming behind them.

  “Nadja! Nadja!”

  They spun around. There was a woman running toward them from the other side of the church.

  “Mama!”

  The girl dropped Ariel’s hand and ran toward her mother. Ariel followed, more slowly.

  The woman swept up her daughter. At first she seemed consumed with relief, but then she looked at Ariel.

  “Where were you taking her? Who are you?”

  “She was lost, I—” Then the woman noticed Shadow, and her eyes swelled.

  “What is that? Why do you have a wolf with you?”

  Too agitated to think clearly and consider what she was saying under the circumstances, Ariel answered her truthfully.

  “She is my familiar.”

  The woman gasped. “You’re a witch! A witch stealing my child!”

  “No! I was helping her, I swear.”

  But the woman would not be deterred.

  “A witch! Help me! She is witch! She was stealing my daughter!”

  Ariel staggered backwards, the shrill accusation suddenly awakening another memory, another memory that was not hers. She saw other townspeople taking notice now, and the panic rose anew.

  She turned and ran back up the road, away from this horror.

  ARIEL SPENT the rest of the day in a fog, struggling to separate the memories that were hers from the ones she had absorbed from the spring. She wandered through the town continually remembering things that were no longer there, seeing places she had never seen before, yet remembering them all the same. Shadow hung close to her, occasionally nipping at her feet to get her attention, but Ariel ignored her.

  The river seemed the same, so she spent several hours sitting on one of the town bridges watching as the water flowed past, hoping the web of sameness—between her memories and what she saw—would calm her head.

  It did not.

  Finally she rose and climbed up toward the castle. It was not the same. The large wing along the east side of the hill had not been there before. It was new, even if it looked decades old.

  The sight of it disturbed her. She knew the things that were inside. If the guards were to let her in, she knew she could find her way around easily. Some part of her had lived here for months. She knew the people who lived here, though the Ariel in her head knew these people were surely all dead.

  She turned back down the road toward the town square. On the way, something in a window she passed caught her eye.

  Purple.

  There was a bolt of purple cloth. Ariel stopped, staring at it. The sight of it calmed her. For a long while, she contented herself with standing in the street looking at it, even as the townspeople walked around her, some staring at her curiously. But after a while, she needed to be closer.

  She entered the shop, walking right up to the bolt of fabric.

  It took a few moments before it occurred to her that someone was speaking. She came out of her daze and looked across the shop. A woman was standing there.

  “I said, do you like it?”

  Ariel tried to clear her head, shaking it.

  “Yes.”

  The intense purple of the cloth drew her gaze back.

  But again the woman was trying to get her attention.

  “What?”

  Traces of concern crept into the woman’s eyes.

  “I said, were you thinking of a dress made from that? It is such a pretty color.”

  “Oh. Yes, it is.”

  This time the woman had to lay her hand on Ariel’s shoulder before she could get her attention.

  “Dear, is something wrong? You seem ill.”

  “Oh. No. I am fine.” She looked back at the cloth. “The purple.”

  The fog returned until Ariel realized the woman was shaking her.

  “Do you wish to buy it? What is it that you want?”

  Ariel looked back. “No.”

  This time the woman pushed her, toward the door.

  “I want you to leave. Go. Get out.”

  Knocked out of her reverie, Ariel stumbled out the door. She looked toward the window, but the woman, eyeing her suspiciously, took the bolt of cloth away.

  With the purple gone from her sight, Ariel’s wits returned, at least partially. The sun had fallen noticeably in the sky. She had been staring at the cloth for at least an hour, if not more.

  She looked back up at the castle. The answer was there, perhaps, whatever it might be. Back up the hill she went. Yet halfway up, she caught the sight of a window on the top floor, just past the tower that anchored the southern corner of the castle.

  She knew that room. She had never been there, yet she had. She had been there that night, the night she made her decision, the night everything changed.

  All at once, the memories flooded back in a chaotic jumble. She was nude. She was making love to a man she did not know, someone important. There was a child. And the spring.

  The spring.

  It was all about the spring. She had to return there.

  “Shadow!” she called. “We’re going. Come.”

  Ariel strode rapidly down the hill, out of town, back down the road. The sun set as they reached the forest, but she could see well enough with her wolf-sight. Shadow loped along behind her, though she could sense the wolf’s concern and confusion. They followed the path up the ridge, down past the site of the battle where they met Hans and the mercenary, then back up, down again, then down the path where it straightened and led to the spring.

  It was dark by the time they arrived, yet the spring lit the clearing in a dim blue light. The memories roared through Ariel’s head, more things than she could have experienced in four lifetimes. Whatever this was, whatever she was remembering, it could not possibly have involved only one person.

  But the proximity to the spring did not calm her mind, nor did any solutions present themselves. Ariel finally sat down on one of the stones and stared down into the water. She could see dim swirling tendrils of purple energy. She reached for them almost absentmindedly, but nothing happened. Without Astrid, she was powerless.

  She sat there so long that Shadow curled up and went to sleep. She sat there so long that her back started to ache.

  She sat there so long staring at the unchanging sameness of the spring that she almost didn’t notice when the cloaked figure appeared from the forest, across the clearing.

  25.

  SABINE
CLIMBED the road to the castle with the babe in her arms. Her mind was a maelstrom of competing concerns: Philip’s breach of the covenant. The young mage-yet-strangely-not-a-mage she had found in the clearing, and charmed in order to deal with when she was done with Philip. The strange visions she had been having of a twin sister and a husband with a—no, she still could barely conceive of that.

  The death of half a dozen of her killcrops as a result of some battle she had missed was another matter, if a less important one. She had given birth to so many of them over the years—most she simply turned away into the forest—that she cared little for them, but finding them hacked to pieces like that had been a jolt. Something was clearly going on here, though she could not tell what.

  Yet above it all was a profound weariness, both a sense of having done this too many times in the past and the prospect of having to do it many times again. When would it end? Was she to be trapped in this horror forever?

  Of course she had known Philip had sent a different baby. Did he truly think she would not? Or had Anna not explained the covenant clearly enough to him? Philip was young, not yet twenty, and perhaps he had simply not taken the matter seriously enough. She did not know how the covenant might have become misunderstood within the House of Hessen through the decades since Louis’s death. Perhaps it had become as perverted as the bedtime story that had grown up around it, the things the villagers told their children to make them beware the things in the night.

  But further thought put that matter to rest. Anna knew. Of this Sabine was certain. That meant she had either chosen not to tell Philip everything, or Philip had ignored her warnings. Sabine knew the story of the covenant had caused distrust of mages to fester in Marburg for many years, and that might have colored Philip’s thinking.

  In either case, though, she had no choice. She needed Ulrike, and if Philip would not deliver her, Sabine would come and take the babe herself.

  So many times had Sabine entered the town and the castle over the years that she barely needed to do anything to get past the guards—their minds were permanently warped by her charms.

  She saw that Philip was entertaining tonight. There was clearly some sort of major event underway. More than a dozen carriages waited on the castle grounds inside the wall, and she had seen more coming up the road behind her. Philip’s guests in their finery were filing into the great Prince’s Hall in the north wing.

  In such an environment, she had little trouble passing unmolested. The guards and attendants merely saw her as another guest, though she wore only a simple gray cloak. Simply to amuse herself, she followed the line of elaborately dressed men and women into the castle and up the flights of stairs into the Prince’s Hall on the top floor. They ignored her as the guards did, and she moved slowly through the hall, remembering the days she had cared about such things.

  Then she noticed Anna standing along one wall, talking to another guest. Sabine was still shrouded in her purple web of charms, and Anna did not notice her, nor would she. Sabine moved closer, reaching into Anna’s mind, wanting to see what she had told her son.

  The truth emerged quickly. So Anna had indeed told Philip all she knew. That meant it had been Philip who chose to break the covenant.

  This annoyed Sabine. Philip was young, and she would likely be dealing with him again when the next babe came. Perhaps several times. What happened now would be a precedent. Either he faced some consequences this time, or she would face them the next.

  What to do?

  Then she noticed someone else she recognized. He was not a guest but Philip’s artificer, Constantine. He was struggling with a short automata about the size of a child, but when she looked closer, Sabine could see it was meant to be a dwarf. Suddenly she realized what he was doing, a thing she had known about, but forgotten in her other concerns.

  Constantine was cursing to himself. He had the chest of the thing open and was tinkering rapidly with its innards.

  She walked over until she was standing next to him.

  “Hello, Constantine.”

  He looked up.

  “Who—” He was at first confused, then his eyes cleared. “Ah. Brigitte. You are here at last.”

  “I said I would come. I apologize for my lateness.”

  The charm she had laid over him years ago held. It held in large part because the artificer was a foolish man when it came to pretty women, and he charmed himself halfway before any spells were necessary. He did not appear to notice the babe in her arms.

  “I am still struggling with this thing. I think I can make it sing, but I cannot put words into it.”

  The last time Sabine had come here to see Constantine, whom she had charmed to have reliable eyes amongst Philip’s closest retainers, he had explained about the singing fool. Seeing a way to solve his problem, she had offered to help, but had forgotten about it after Ulrike was born.

  “When must it be ready?”

  “Not for an hour or so, thankfully. It is meant to perform at dinner. But I am at an impasse.”

  Sabine smiled, seeing a way to solve both her problem and Constantine’s at once. Philip would get his performance. But it would not be what he expected.

  “Worry not. I know what to do.”

  Constantine was an artificer, which meant he could make mechanical things move. But he could not fill them with intelligence. That required skills only a mystic could master.

  Sabine closed her eyes. She needed a loyal spirit for this, for spirits normally detested possessing physical objects for more than a few moments. She knew they found them cold and painful, and the ones that did it at all did it only because of the pleasure it gave them to annoy the living.

  But there was a spirit who would do her bidding no matter the pain and trials of it. One who would serve her ably as he always did.

  The father of her children.

  She called to Flame, feeling him answer at once. She allowed him into her flow. So long had she mastered him that he lay still at once, struggling not at all, awaiting her command.

  Sabine explained what she wanted. And Flame promised his obedience.

  Now she pushed him out. Constantine had prepared the vessel, the automaton’s crystal brain, and Flame quickly flowed into it. The crystal took on a purple glow.

  Constantine’s eyes lit up. “What did you do?”

  “Try it now.”

  He closed up the back panel. The automaton stood up, and danced a little jig. Then it leaned back its head and sang:

  “Now I am as old

  As Bohemian gold,

  But this is the first

  I’ve ever heard tell,

  Of beer being brewed

  In an eggshell!”

  Then it did another jig , and was still.

  Several guests had looked over to watch, and Constantine clapped his hands in joy.

  “Wonderful! At last!”

  “It will perform for Philip as you asked.”

  The artificer beamed. “Thank you! Thank you, my dear.”

  Sabine nodded. “I must go.”

  Constantine’s face fell. “Can you not stay for the dance?”

  “I cannot. I have other obligations tonight.”

  A tendril of purple swirled between them, and Constantine instantly forgot about her.

  SABINE KNEW her way to Erika’s rooms and found Ulrike where she expected. The girl’s nursemaid was no hindrance, and Sabine walked into the nursery unopposed.

  Ulrike woke as she entered, green eyes looking up her in recognition.

  “Yes,” Sabine said. “I have come. It is time.”

  She laid the blonde-haired girl down in the crib, and lifted Ulrike into her arms. Sabine looked down at the familiar face. This child would soon be gone, but she had given Erika a more appropriate replacement than she might realize.

  Sabine had examined the blonde child after she found it at the spring, wondering where it came from, and the answer seemed oddly appropriate. The Flow might move in very strange ways at tim
es, but it always balanced itself in the end. Always.

  She slipped back out the castle the way she had come. No one saw her.

  But when she reached the town square, Sabine felt a sudden enervating spear of energy flowing out of her. She fell to her knees. She cradled the child as best she could and caught her fall with her free hand.

  It was some moments before she could get her bearings. What had happened? She felt . . . nothing.

  Sabine got to her feet and sat by the fountain to collect her thoughts. There had been things clouding her mind that were now gone. She could remember nothing but Philip and this baby. There had been more there, but now those concerns had vanished.

  For a long time, she sat there, mind nearly blank. People came and went through the square, but she ignored them.

  Some part of her felt this was critically important, but with nothing to ground themselves in, the worries finally faded. In any case, they were surely less important than the babe.

  Finally—she was unsure how long she had sat there—she stood. She had things to do, tonight. It was time to get to them.

  PHILIP WAS in a fine mood, made finer still by a head full of wine. The guests were enjoying themselves, the musicians were tolerable, and his cooks had done an excellent job with the food—other than a vegetable soup that he had found strangely distasteful.

  His mother was here, true—he could hardly exclude her after she had shown up that week—but she kept her distance. The matter she had brought to him was already fading from his mind. He was still quite proud of himself for how he had resolved it. The stupidity of women amazed him sometimes. Here his mother had thought the dilemma so perilous, and he had found a way to address it and solve a problem of his own. Now the witches were sated for another decade, his inconvenient bastard was no more, and no one would doubt his resolve going forward.

  Philip danced with a few of the wives of his retainers and vassals, at least the pretty ones. More than one of them seemed to hint they might be amenable to more private conversation. Philip laughed to himself. So what if he cuckolded a few of his own men? He was the Landgrave, and if they were not man enough to keep their own wives faithful, that was not his problem.