Chapter 20
The sort of thing that will make an awfully good story one day
Earthen steps led down into a passage of stone, soil and tree roots.
And, concerningly, occasional patches of faint moonlight.
Gwen went slowly, as slowly as she dared with Isobelle tense on her heels, testing the ceiling here, choosing different footing there.
If this had once been a full tunnel, fifteen years of the harsh seaside winds had partially unearthed it.
Or else it had once been a path that the ground had nearly finished swallowing.
Isobelle, behind her, carried the lantern they’d found inside the passage. Its juddering, leaping flame scattered Gwen’s shadow before her, creating monsters behind every root and stone. Gwen had drawn her sword before stepping into the earth.
She wished it were her sword.
Gwen swallowed hard and whispered, ‘No sudden moves, okay? We don’t know what we’ll find at the end of this tunnel.’
Gradually the patches of moonlight vanished. The tunnel sloped downward and came to a sudden stop at a wooden door.
Isobelle held up a finger, and Gwen waited while she silently stripped off that gorgeous silk cloak and laid it in a neat bundle on the dirt floor. She tied her hair into a knot. The slit skirts, she bound round her ankles.
At the edges of the lantern’s light, the indigo fabric of her dress blended perfectly with the tunnel.
Gwen watched, forgetting her concerns about the door, forgetting the pit of mingled fear and hurt in her belly, utterly bewitched by Isobelle’s transformation. Ethereal goddess of moonlight one moment, and becoming one with the shadows the next. Gwen bit her lip.
Isobelle glanced at her and frowned. ‘What?’ she asked suspiciously, chin lifting in preparation to raise defences.
‘I wasn’t laughing at you,’ Gwen said quickly, heart doing a painful manoeuvre in her chest. ‘I just … you … I …’ Her throat closed, leaving her floundering and only slightly capable of breathing. She could hear in her mind the words she wanted to say, but couldn’t make her lips form them.
Isobelle’s face grew grave and intent, unable to hide the swell of concern as she watched Gwen scrambling for words. ‘We need to learn who’s behind this door. I’m ready if you are.’
Gwen tried to get herself under control. ‘Yes. Right. Eyes on me …’ She began to mime a countdown, her hand curling around the handle. Isobelle met her eyes, and when they nodded in unison, Gwen opened the door.
Beyond the doorway was a shadowy, narrow staircase that spiralled down into darkness. Each step was formed by a thick slab of rock hammered into the vertical shaft.
Together, Gwen and Isobelle knelt by the hole. Isobelle stretched her arm down as far as she could with the lantern, then drew the light back.
Her eyes slid towards Gwen’s, and they looked at each other for a long moment, for once wearing twin expressions of absolute nope.
Then Isobelle gave herself a little shake. ‘Well, it’s the sort of thing that will make an awfully good story one day. I don’t think I could stand not knowing what’s at the bottom.’
Gwen groaned. ‘Are you sure? I could very happily live out the rest of my days never finding out.’
Isobelle turned to muffle her soft laugh against Gwen’s chainmail. ‘You don’t fool me.’
Gwen reached down and tested a stone rung of the spiral stair with her hand. It seemed firmly wedged, but her attempt dislodged a very tiny, very quiet waterfall of dust that pattered down into the shaft. It went on pattering for an excessively long time.
Gwen glanced at Isobelle again. ‘Let’s go find Tabitha.’
The stair proved to be far less treacherous than it seemed.
The shaft was missing a few stones, but those that remained were all firm and steady, and they reached the bottom without mishap.
They came to a door, its metal latch rusted but twisted as if from an old blow – the warping meant it was possible to simply lean against the door to pull the latch from the frame.
Isobelle, her eyes round in the lantern’s light, whispered, ‘It’s a dungeon.’
And it was. A long corridor opened in front of them, with cells lining either side. The single source of light from the lantern did horrible things to the shadows clustered around each metal-grilled opening.
They moved slowly down the length of the hallway.
Gwen had the strangest feeling she shouldn’t peer into the shadowy cells, as though she might catch a glimpse of some ancient, nameless ghost huddled in a recess.
The corridor opened out ahead into an intersection of hallways, one of which curved into a stair leading upward.
The stonework smoothed out – they had to be under the tower.
Gwen halted, lifting a hand. Isobelle responded instantly, drawing back against the wall.
Ears straining, she waited until the sound came again – a soft, distant scraping, coming closer.
Without a word, Isobelle pushed the lantern’s guard in front of its flame, shuttering it and plunging them into darkness.
They both drew back around the corner, Isobelle just behind Gwen, Gwen’s sword raised.
The footsteps came nearer, slow and halting, and light began to dance along the walls once more – whoever was coming had a light of their own.
Gwen waited until she thought she might scream from impatience, until she caught a glimpse of movement … she raised her sword …
And nearly fell over.
‘Tabitha!’ she cried, as the young witch actually did fall back, her eyes round with astonishment.
Isobelle moved past Gwen to take Tabitha’s arm, offering her support until she found her feet again. ‘Are you okay?’ she asked anxiously, eyes scanning the other girl for signs of injury.
‘What … how …’ Tabitha had never been so discomposed in the whole time they’d known her. She gulped and got hold of herself. ‘How are you here?’
‘Through the tunnel in the cottage,’ Isobelle replied, unshielding the lantern and restoring its golden glow once more. ‘We followed the trail your abductor took. Who grabbed you?’
Tabitha swallowed. ‘I didn’t see his face. But … it’s him. The necromancer, the lover, whoever he is. He stuck me down here.’
‘Oh, Tabitha, we found …’ Isobelle’s gaze slid towards Gwen, the blue eyes anxious and hesitant.
Gwen sheathed her sword and leaned back against the wall. ‘She needs to know,’ she murmured, though her heart ached in sympathy. It was one thing to believe your mother was the victim of an evil sorceress. It was quite another to discover that your mother was the evil sorceress.
Isobelle braced herself and began explaining what they’d read in the book in Tabitha’s mother’s cottage. The toy forming her name. The books. The passage on necromancy.
‘And …’ she finished, ‘Tabitha, I think he wants to use you for some terrible ritual, something … something really bad. I—’
But she trailed off, because rather than slacken in increasing astonishment, Tabitha’s face had been growing more and more impassive.
Into the quiet, Tabitha said quietly, ‘I know.’ She drew a shaking breath. ‘He told me. I have until midwinter’s eve. Then he’ll kill me to bring my mother back from the dead.’
Silence pervaded the underground prison. Somewhere, a bit of moisture dripped, providing a steady, interminable staccato background. Gwen focused on the sound, telling her heart to slow until it matched that rhythm.
She cleared her throat. ‘Right. Come on, Tabitha. We’ll go out the way we came in. If he doesn’t have you here, he can’t perform his ritual.’
If anything, Tabitha only looked gloomier. She shook her head. ‘I … I can’t. It’s hard to explain. Come with me, I’ll show you.’
Gwen exchanged a glance at Isobelle, whose face mirrored her own thoughts.
As Tabitha led them towards the staircase that led up into the tower proper, Isobelle said softly, ‘How do you know your way around? You can’t have got here that long before we did, we were on your trail at once.’
Tabitha stopped mid-step, foot half raised, and looked back at her. ‘What? But … surely it’s been days, hasn’t it?’
Gwen’s heart lurched, her eyes pricking with sheer alarm and dread. ‘You mean to say that for you it’s been longer than a few minutes?’ A spell to boost insight or a bunch of superstitious townsfolk, sure … but what explanation could there be for Tabitha’s experience other than magic?
No. No, it can’t be, can it?
Tabitha shivered, turned, and kept walking. ‘At this point I’m no longer surprised by what this man can do.’
They had to be content with that cryptic comment, and save their breath for climbing.
The stairs let out into a foyer, beyond which lay a vast hall.
They stepped out into the space, gazing around intently.
The stonework was impressive, though half finished in places, the buttresses of the vaulted ceilings carved with decoration.
Long tables stretched in rows along the floor, suggesting this room had once been a place for people to gather for meals and conversation.
Dust-covered pennants and tapestries hung from the walls.
Isobelle grabbed Gwen’s arm, her breath catching.
Gwen looked at her, and then followed her gaze up, all the way up to the exact apex of the vaulted ceiling.
There, in the exact pose and style she remembered from Isobelle’s smashed necklace, was an owl. Olivia’s symbol, the symbol of whatever strange life she had led before becoming Isobelle’s maid.
Gwen’s breath came out in a gasp.
Tabitha was watching them intently, her eyes widening, her fingers gripping her own arms. ‘The symbol of the Order of the Evening Star,’ she said, her voice tense. ‘It’s everywhere here. You recognise it?’
Isobelle nodded, her face expressive, showing every turn of her thoughts as she and Gwen both tried to understand what they were seeing.