Catherine Fisher - Darkhenge

Between two ash trees Vetch stopped. “Here. This is it.”

They stepped through.

Inside, the castle was cold. The walls were thick and bubbled seams of glass, twisted and fused with palest color, aquamarine and emerald; columns of twisted glass held up shards of the shattered roof.

Vetch scratched the corner of his mouth. “We’re too late. They’re not here.”

The trees had long broken through. They grew in the empty halls, in the vast chambers. Great blocks of glass lay in smashed heaps on the floor; already bramble and bracken were smothering everything. In each room, window shutters had been forced; ragged curtains of foliage hung there now, and a stand of tiny oak saplings had cracked the iridescent paving into tilted slabs and grown a foot high, each with tiny green leaves newly unfurled.

“This damage would have taken years.”

“Not necessarily.” Vetch scrambled toward a staircase at the back. “Let’s go up.”

But the staircase was ruined. A vast elm branch had thrust through the wall; its weight had brought the steps down into a confusion of sharp slivers and jagged edges that Vetch kept back from. “Too dangerous. Chloe isn’t here.”

A breath of warm air.

The faintest chink of sound.

Vetch turned. This time Rob had heard it too. “Someone’s there.” His heart leaped. “It’s Chloe!” He went to run, but the poet’s hand grabbed his sleeve and held it tight.

“No. We’re being followed. I think we have been since we entered the wood.”

“By who?”

Vetch’s eyes were dark and troubled; they glanced at him once. Instead of answering he said, “I’m going to make my way back to the great hall. After a few minutes you come too, but loudly, and talking, as if I’m with you. Understand?”

“Yes, but—”

Vetch’s fingers loosed from his sleeve. “Just do it. And be ready.”

He stepped back. He stepped into the glassy shadows, and at once dissolved into reflections of himself, each shivered and fractured, so that Rob couldn’t see for a moment which one he was, and then they were all gone, and something sinuous and lean slipped past him, a dark fox with wet fur that gleamed.

The fox slunk up the corridor.

Rob let out a slow breath. He closed his eyes and saw darkness, licked his lips and tasted the saltiness of sweat and the icy drips from the roof.

He was cold with fear and disbelief.

Far off, something crashed, as if another shutter had fallen. The sound jerked him out of one terror into another; he strode forward quickly, mumbling, saying anything. “Yes, well, all right, we can’t go back. Did I ever say I wanted to go back? All I want to do is find her. And you have no right to say I don’t!” His voice was rising to anger; he let it. He argued with Vetch, though Vetch wasn’t there, because he could never have said these things if he was. “I love Chloe. She’s a pain and she always wants attention and she should never have written what she did about me but I still love her....”

He stopped. His hand went to his pocket; felt the small stiff outline of her diary. He hadn’t opened it. Was he too afraid to read the rest?

Something crashed ahead.

A gasp, a cry rang out. He turned the corner and raced into the forested hall, tripping over the smashed floor. “Vetch! Vetch? ”

A figure was inside the door, behind one of the trees. In the glass walls he saw it loom, break, reform. The figure of a woman, green-stained and worn, her hair coming loose, a stout branch grasped in her hand, and as he watched, she swung it and the fox yelped and gave a great twisting, sideways leap. Wood cracked against glass. The woman screamed in pure fury, whirled to strike again.

“No!” Rob yelled.

She turned, saw him. In seconds, Vetch stood behind her, breathless. He looked shaken, the whiteness back in his face.

Rob stared in disbelief.

“Clare?” he breathed.

STR. STRAIF: BLACKTHORN

Brain activity has altered. That’s what they’re saying. Her body temperature has dropped and there’s eye movement.

John’s on his way and Katie’s studio is driving her down the motorway, but it’s Rob I’m worried about.

Danny’s out looking. He’s a good lad.

I should have been around more. I should have been more wary of Vetch. A charmer, full of enticing ideas, and Rob’s vulnerable. Always was.

Where in God’s name is he?

Chloe’s hand is in mine. So small and white.

Into what terrors have I let them fall?

I have been in many shapes

before I reached a handsome form.

“THE BATTLE OF THE TREES”

Vetch had lit a fire, using a tinderbox from the small bag.

The trees seemed to hang over the glow, curious, as if flames and heat had rarely been seen here. Sparks drifted up in the smoke; following them with his eyes, Rob saw the dark interlacings of bole and bough above him, and an owl’s white round face peering down. Moths irritated the twilight, landing on his shirt, never still.

The woman who looked like Clare sat with her knees drawn up. She had cleaned her face with her sleeve; now she tied up her hair. But how could it even be her? Because she was wearing a green dress that looked like velvet, and a necklace of berries and seeds.

He said, “How did you get here? Did you follow us down?”

She laughed shortly. “I told you I’d wait at the foot of the tree.”

Rob looked at Vetch. The poet was watching the woman warily; his face side-lit with flames and shadows. Now he said, “She is and is not Clare. Here her name is Ceridwen. The vengeful muse, the queen who haunts me. Centuries ago, when I was barely more than a boy, I stole wisdom from her, and inspiration. A crime that made me a poet. A crime all poets commit.”

“You stole more than that!” Her voice was fierce. “You stole belief. You stole trust.”

He nodded, looking down. “And you won’t forgive me. But that’s no reason to hurt the boy. The boy is looking for his sister.” Sadly, he held a long hand out over the flames. “Can’t we forget the past, Goddess? Here, where there is no time? You could help us. With us, you needn’t be alone.”

She gave him a bold blue glare. “Poets think they know how to persuade. But here, as you say, I have power too. ‘I have fled in the shape of a raven,’ you boast in your poems, ‘a roebuck, a bristling boar, a grain of wheat. I have been in the dark bag for nine months, rocking on the waters.’ All these abilities you have, Vetch, because you drank them from my Cauldron.”

The owl above them flew away, almost silent.

She turned to Rob quickly. “But he’s right, none of this is your fault, so I’ll tell you what I know. Your sister is in the forest. They passed this way hours ago; by now they will have reached Caer Pedryfan, the Turning Castle.”

“They?” he said, his chest tight.

“The King of Annwn has her prisoner. He’s always masked; no one sees his face, but he’s young and strong.”

Rob looked at her through the flames. “Who is he?”

She shrugged. “Only Chloe could tell you.”

“Can you take us to this castle?”

“Yes.” She spat on her fingers, wiped green lichen from a tree trunk and rubbed it in coils and circles down her face. “I can. I will. But things aren’t that simple. You’ll need more than me. The trees are involved.”

Vetch looked up sharply. “Already?”

“Oak and hazel, birch and thorn. The forest is Annwn, and in it lies death, and hidden meaning. It doesn’t stir easily, but it’s stirring now, and that must be because of Chloe.” She stood lightly. “If you want to find the third caer we should hurry.”