Chapter 1
MORGAINE
Along, harsh winter had turned into a crisp spring, the earth still hard and barren.
It had been much the same for several years now, the wet summers ruining what few crops managed to survive the brutal cold.
The animals had grown lean, and the villagers even leaner, their faces hollow and gaunt, while the prince demanded more and more in taxes and the nobles feasted on the spoils.
I picked up the wicker basket holding the cabbage and few potatoes I had managed to find in our small vegetable garden, before coming to forage in the woods.
“Morgaine!” Rosemary called, and I turned to see her galloping towards me with her cupped hands full of shrivelled berries. “Look what I found!”
I gave her a nod and a thin smile, allowing her to drop the fruit into the basket with the rest of our meagre haul. “Good find, Rose. Lavender will turn these into a fine crumble for after supper.”
The child beamed at me, her long, straw-coloured hair catching the weak sunshine that broke through the canopy.
Her innocence made the ice around my heart crack.
She had been left on the stoop of the coven’s cottage as a babe, according to Lavender, who had taken on the role of surrogate mother.
Rose's birth mother had never returned for her—likely a village woman with too many children of her own to feed and clothe.
Or a young, unmarried girl who wanted to avoid a scandal, and hoped the two spinsters living in a cottage in the woods might take the child in.
I prayed Rose would never learn the cruel and selfish ways of men, the way I had at her age.
Sadly, I knew that she one day would. The world had not changed so much in the past five centuries since the collapse of Camelot.
Men were still fighting their misguided wars, clinging to their small amounts of power or status as though nothing else mattered.
Sending younger, poorer men to die for it.
Claiming girls like Rosemary in order to reinforce it.
Killing or discarding them when they were no longer considered valuable.
“Come,” I said, pushing my dark thoughts away. “Let’s check the traps and see if we’ve caught anything for dinner.”
Rosemary bobbed up and down on the balls of her feet beside me. “Oh, yes. I can’t eat any more of Lavender’s potato peel pie.”
I watched as she raced off ahead of me, hair streaming out behind her like a ribbon. She didn’t know how lucky we were to have Lavender and her ability to turn any scraps into something resembling a meal.
We. I would need to stop thinking of Rosemary, Lavender, Sal and myself as a ‘we’. It would only make it all the more difficult when I had to leave the coven. And I would need to leave sooner rather than later.
When I caught up to her, Rose had indeed found one of our snares; a rabbit’s leg caught in the wire.
The creature attempted to thrash, eyeing us with fear, but it appeared too injured to do more than kick feebly.
The smear of red around its muzzle told me it had attempted to chew its way out of the trap.
Whether it had been chewing the wire or its own leg was unclear.
“Oh, no!” Rosemary’s lip wobbled as the rabbit fought its entrapment. “Morgaine, can we set him free? Please?”
I frowned. “It wouldn’t survive the night, Rose. Not with the injuries it’s sustained in the trap. It would be kinder to put it out of its misery.”
The girl pouted, looking younger than her eleven years. “You could heal him and we could keep him as a pet.”
I shook my head and said, “There’s barely enough to eat as it is. We can hardly take on another mouth to feed, especially when it would make such a delicious supper.”
The look on Rosemary’s face tugged at my heartstrings, but I knew what she did not. My powers were not the solution to our problem. The rabbit might not live long with its leg so badly broken. And Rosemary would not live long if she let every animal we caught go free.
“I’m sorry, Rose. The rabbit’s destiny is to feed and sustain us. It deserves a clean death. Give it to me.”
She snatched the rabbit away, keeping it at arm’s length from me. Her eyes flashed. “What if I used the life bond enchantment? Then would it survive?”
My breath caught and I narrowed my eyes. “How do you know about that spell?” My tone may have been a little sharper than necessary, but the life bond enchantment was far beyond the knowledge and ability of a witchling her age.
She had the good sense to look sheepish, as she said, “I read about it in the Book of Enchantments, when you were all sleeping.”
I would have to tell Sal and Lavender to find a new hiding place for the spellbook. “That’s very advanced, dangerous magic, Rose. It isn’t something to be taken lightly or used willy nilly. And it certainly isn’t to be used to save a wild animal from a trap.”
She nodded, cowed by my tone, and reluctantly handed me the twitching creature. A rumbling farther along the forest road reached my ears and I pushed her roughly towards a broad oak tree. “Hide.”
We crouched there behind the tree, among the ferns and hawthorns, for several minutes as the thundering of horses’ hooves grew louder.
The vibrations filled my chest as the convoy approached—a visiting noble with a large number of guards, coming to enjoy the company of Prince John, I presumed.
When I caught sight of the rider at the front of the pack, galloping ahead of the rest of the caravan, I couldn’t help but follow him with my eyes.
The stallion’s pitch-black coat glistened with sweat as it tore through the forest at a speed I hadn’t imagined possible of any living creature.
The rider’s dark curls rippled behind him as he leaned forward, pressing the horse on, an expression of pure elation on his chiselled face.
His face turned towards us, eyes roving the undergrowth right where we were hidden. I reached out and put a hand over Rosemary’s mouth, holding my breath as the keen, dark eyes of the guard narrowed, and then he faced forwards once more, spurring his horse on.
A second rider galloped a little behind the first, between the black stallion and the first elegantly carved carriage.
As they passed our hiding place, I thought I saw frustration in the tight lines of the second guard’s face, as though he were attempting to catch up to the first and failing miserably.
I frowned, perhaps the dark-haired man was a new recruit, or a soldier recently returned from the war on the continent, just blowing off steam.
He would be in for a stern talking to from the noble in the carriage when they reached their destination, I felt sure.
The remaining guards and carriages trundled past and I held my hand over Rose’s mouth for a minute more, keeping her from speaking or dashing out onto the forest road too soon.
When I was confident there were no more riders pulling up the rear, we climbed out of the bushes and stood looking down the road towards Sherwood village and Kings Clipstone, the residence of Prince John here in the Royal Forests.
With any luck, they’d run into a band of rebels who’d relieve them of the riches loaded into those carriages and redistribute them among the needy, and more deserving. A cold smile played about my lips at the thought.
Tearing my eyes away from the path the caravan had disappeared down, I felt the rabbit twitch feebly in my hand—I’d almost forgotten it was there in all the commotion. I took its neck in both hands and twisted until I felt a snap and the creature ceased its kicking.
“Come, Rose. We’d better get back to the cottage and help prepare dinner.”