The cauldron effect, p.43
The Cauldron Effect, page 43
A wave of her hand and the carriage doors whipped open.
HOOFS THUNDERED IN rhythm to his pulse as Hugh galloped after his carriage. Magic propelled both pursuer and prey; he enhanced his horse’s speed while the demon he followed was behind the carriage’s headlong rush. They passed town after town as if whizzing past wide-spaced trees. At this pace they would be in the heart of Scotland by morning. Darkness had already overtaken twilight.
Lucky for Miss Bryght, Hugh was gaining. Lucky for him, too, for he wasn’t certain how long he could keep up this magically draining exertion. Time to end this. He pulled out his pistol loaded with more than bullet and powder. His shot would not miss and the weapon was capable of self-reloading.
Hang on, Mary! I’m coming.
She cannot hear you. Atalie said, ever practical, while she clung to the pommel of his saddle. Has she given you leave to call her by her given name?
You said yourself she cannot hear me. Atalie’s reminder piqued, but he didn’t care. He wanted to save Miss Bryght. He wanted to see her bare right forearm. He wanted to call her Mary. Yet again, his wishes and choices were on a collision course.
He shook off such maudlin thoughts. Wishes were for children. He was now a full-grown adult and his duty was clear. He must have her back safe and sound. He urged his horse a little faster.
Chapter 13
Warncliff Crags, North Yorkshire
“Look out for that hole!” Fennel, the Flint carriage’s undercarriage, shouted to the lead horse.
“They aren’t listening to us,” Garadh, the carriage’s upper body, said. “I know I mentioned that I longed to travel and see the world, Fennel, but I didn’t mean at high speed along a dark highway in the middle of nowhere.”
Fennel’s left front wheel struck the hole. He bounced up before settling back with a jar on the badly paved roadway, only to have his hind end perform the same rattling maneuver. “At this rate, my springs won’t last. I’m surprised my wheels haven’t broken off.”
“Magic has its uses,” Garadh said. “However, I doubt Master Flint built us to withstand this much abuse. If you think what this driver is putting our wheels through is terrible, you should see what the water demon has done to my inside. Weeds have penetrated my cushions.”
Fennel gave a shudder. “Trust me, I know what goes on inside. You’re dripping into my underbelly. The stench is disgusting. The stuff is slimy and reeks of mold and mildew. Look out on the right!”
Thunk. Thunk.
“Why do I even bother?”
“It’s only going to get worse,” Garadh said. “The driver has taken us off the Great North Road. We’re heading for the crags. “I heard a dragon lives near these parts.”
“Dragon, smagon. We’ll be lucky if we don’t lurch off the edge and into the Don River.” And then Fennel caught sight of something at the rear that cheered him. “Woohoo!”
“What? You’ve suddenly become suicidal?”
“Our troubles are over. The master’s come to the rescue.”
“Where?”
“Behind. He’s gaining speed.”
The carriage door swung open and the water demon looked out.
“I wouldn’t say our troubles are behind us,” Garadh whispered. “‘Be careful what you wish for’ is taking on a whole new meaning.”
MARY WAS OF TWO MINDS whether to jump out of the open doorway or not. A pistol shot splintered the side of the door sending shards flying. She protected her face with her arm and heard the carriage driver shout out behind her. Had he been hit? She craned her neck out the window to see who chased after them when the horses lurched and the carriage tilted, flinging her across the seat.
Jinny rushed toward the open door and looked at who followed them. She then turned back with an excited grin. “Your errant knight has come after all. Oh, this is fun!”
Mary’s heart leapt in gladness, but simmering anger immediately swamped that profound relief. Jinny’s damming words reverberated inside her lonely prison. He guards you only long enough to locate the lore witch and her records. Then his Warlock Council orders are to destroy those tomes.
Worse than that heinous act he planned was the betrayal behind it. He had lied to her. She glanced at her arm as a sense of deep unhappiness blossomed in her chest. How useless Llyr’s mark truly was at helping her discern the true character of a man. Not once had it hinted that Flint planned to betray her. If she didn’t ask the right question, she might as well be walking around with blinders on and her ears plugged.
He now raced to save her? She crossed her arms and sat back, wishing Hugh to Hades.
Unlike Mary, Jinny seemed enchanted by Flint’s rescue attempt. At a wave of her hand, the doors vanished giving the demon an uninterrupted view. She used her freakishly bony toes to grip the floor’s edge and raised her hand. To throw a spell at Flint?
The possibility of Flint being vaporized like those doors tempered Mary’s anger. She wanted a chance to throttle the bounder and wasn’t prepared to let Jinny deny her that pleasure by killing him. Without pausing for thought, she braced herself against the seat and kicked at the demon’s skinny butt.
Jinny cried out as she was flung outward across the moonlit darkness. She twirled midair, arms flailing in a vain attempt to regain balance, all the while skewing her head around to keep her astonished gaze fixed on Mary.
Mary’s gaze settled with relish on the tree looming ever closer directly behind the wildly twirling Jinny. Before impact, however, the carriage roared along the darkened roadway taking Jinny out Mary’s line of sight.
AHEAD, A WOMAN LEANED out of the carriage in a dangerously bizarre posture to look at Hugh. It was too dark to see who it was and he had a momentary fear that Mary was being held out by the demon to torment him. Then the woman hurtled outward.
He drew back on Ilar, flares blinding him as their magical momentum came to a grinding halt. Hand raised, he automatically formed a spell to stop that body crashing into the surrounding trees.
Once his sight cleared, the woman’s unnaturally glowing green arms and legs and diaphanous gown registered her as the demon. Not Mary, but her tormentor. His chant choked in his throat.
The demon struck a tree. Branches splintered. She screeched, sounding more enraged than in pain until, with a resounding thunk, she crashed against the wide, old wood trunk. Her screams cut off. The crack of bones echoed inside Hugh’s eardrums and he cringed in sympathy.
The demon tumbled downward, her fall splintering more branches. During that inevitable gravitational plunge, each snap and crack of a branch was punctuated with cries and curses until a final thud brought an eerie silence to the night.
It all happened in seconds. Hugh was too shocked to do anything but watch. He leaned over the edge and cast a spell for light. Near the bottom of the ravine, his magic painted a glow that outlined a crumpled heap of broken bones covered in a ripped and bloody diaphanous gown.
The sharp-edged mound slowly shifted and then began to roll toward a nearby riverbed. In the state the demon was in, she would no doubt drown, and good riddance was his first thought. Then he reconsidered.
In her broken, vulnerable state, she might be willing to share some insights the Council would be interested in. Like what type of deal had she made with Peregrine? Why did the warlock dare to physically attack a human when all Wyhcans, witches and warlocks, had worked so hard to safeguard that race? Since the Bedfordshire incident three hundred years ago, when so many innocent earthlings died because of ill-cast Wyhcan mind spells, humans were under an unspoken Wyhcan protection.
Hugh built a shield to hold her in place until he returned from rescuing Mary. Instead of being grateful for his rescue from a watery demise, the foolish demon struggled against his hold, pounding at his magical barrier so ferociously that he wavered, fighting to hold his spell in place. It was as if the demon fought to reach the river.
A water demon? Atalie suggested.
He strengthened his binding, using the last of his reserves. Her magic was still strong but unfocused, blindly thrashing in all directions. Long sinewy weeds struck at trees and swirled and curled like writhing snakes as they blindly sought the fiend that kept her from reaching the precious water.
The carriage escapes, Atalie said.
With Peregrine still driving it.
Choose your battles, Spencer always advised.
With a frustrated curse, he rode on. Without his constant attention, he felt its energy disperse until the spell weakened against the demon’s relentless assault. In less time than he’d hoped, his spell gave way and the drain on his magic was gone. At least she should be too busy recovering from her ailments to come after him just yet.
The swift shattering of his spell, however, emphasized the incredulity of Miss Bryght’s recent achievement. A female human had bested a demon that Hugh had a hard time quelling, even after it was injured. How?
It didn’t take long to catch up to the carriage because it no longer traveled at a magical speed. Had Peregrine relied too much on the demon for his spells?
His mistake, my gain.
Once he drew closer, Hugh lifted Atalie. Keep the lady calm until I deal with the rogue warlock.
He sent her skimming ahead until she landed on the carriage’s open doorway. After a moment to find her balance, she sauntered inside.
AS THE CARRIAGE TOOK a sharp curve in the roadway, Mary slid sideways, tumbling hard onto the floor, her right shoulder blade striking the seat edge. Pain shot up her back and into her scalp. Suddenly, something dropped onto the carriage floor.
Startled, heart in throat, Mary looked around. Had Jinny returned?
Atalie calmly jumped onto the seat and sat to gaze at her with an inscrutable expression. That meant Flint was here.
Not wanting to look weak in front of him, Mary hurriedly straightened to sit on the opposite seat. She nursed her sore shoulder but nothing felt broken, though she was sure to be black and blue by morning. She was shivering again, from her soaking gown and stockings.
Since finding out about Flint’s treachery, however, she determined to freeze to death before she would let him lay one finger on her. She wiped at her stinging eyes and realized she was crying, though she was hard-pressed to understand why she succumbed to silly tears now after her demon tormentor was gone. Inexplicably, the ache in her chest spread outward, enveloping her in a shroud of sorrow.
Atalie’s placid, unblinking stare hinted at a possible cause for Mary’s vapors – her disenchantment with the double-crossing, deceitful warlock who owned the feline.
“I hate him.” Mary fervently hoped Atalie would pass that message on to her lying master.
AS HUGH PASSED THE carriage, he nodded to Miss Bryght, expecting a cheerful greeting. She stared at him tight-lipped and displayed a surprisingly fierce glare before they broke eye contact.
He shook off his unease as he drew level with the driver. It wasn’t Peregrine! Would this day of surprises never end?
The man was pulling on the reigns with great effort but little effect. He gave Hugh a frightened glance. “Help me, sir! I can’t get them to stop.”
Although the demon’s influence on the vehicle’s speed was gone, the mind spell on the horses must have lingered to keep them blindly racing ahead. They were heading up a wide pathway that was bordered by a forested hill that climbed toward crags on the left and a steep drop to the right that led to the river below. If not for the minimal control the driver exerted, the horses could easily careen off the ledge and never realize it.
He had to break the spell on these animals and quickly, before disaster struck. Hugh leapt off his mount and onto the left lead carriage horse. It neighed in alarm and Hugh gently petted the neck and withers to calm him. The carriage careened down the road at a breakneck speed but he refused to let that looming danger distract him. He had to trust the terrified groom’s skill to keep them all safe a few moments longer.
Leaning forward, Hugh laid a hand over the horse’s forehead, seeking the mind spell that kept it running at this breakneck speed. There it was. A thirty-foot, hairy, fanged beast roared behind the horse, nipping on his heels, leaving his hind fetlocks bloody and sore. The pain in the horse’s mind felt so real, Hugh was hard pressed not to believe it even though his eyes told him the horse was unharmed.
Mind spells based on fear could be extraordinarily effective and the most difficult to break. A quick check on the other horses showed only the front two were affected. If he could free them, he could easily bring the carriage to a halt. The question was how.
When it came to fear spells, Robert Spencer had taught that the best defense was to twist the source of the fear, play with it, and then bring it to heel. He had been a fine teacher, able to show how to break a complicated problem into its simple components in order to take it apart.
Magically balancing himself between the two front horses, Hugh laid a hand on each of their foreheads. Slowly, he overlaid his spell around the crevices of Peregrine’s magic.
Under his persistent influence, the giant creature the horses ran from began to evolve. First, its left top fang fell out. Then the opposite fang dropped, followed by the rest of its teeth until it looked as if all that the creature could manage once it caught any of the horses, was to try to gum them to death.
See, nothing to fear, he reassured in a soothing voice.
The barrel chest of the horse on his left sank in as it let out a loud huff, followed by a sigh from the one on the right.
The creature that chased the horses had been running on its hind legs. Now it dropped to all fours and a waft of sweet hay drifted from it.
The horse to Hugh’s right snorted, its nostrils flaring wide as if he took a strong whiff of that enticingly mouth-watering scent.
Hiding his triumphant smile, Hugh continued his work of diminishing the might of the imaginary beast.
The creature stumbled, rolled on the ground and tumbled over the edge of the road. It cried out as it catapulted toward the ravine.
All the horses slowed their mad rush, breaking from gallop to a canter and then into a trot.
Hugh showed them the creature flailing in the river as the water pulled it under, until it disappeared below the surface.
The horse on the left came to a full halt and the rest stopped with him. The lead horse turned to look back as if to verify what his mind’s eye told him.
Indeed, the danger was gone. Only a carriage was behind him.
You’re safe now, you have my word, Hugh said.
The gelding tossed his head in acknowledgment and took deep breaths, his sides heaving in and out.
The groom leaped off the carriage and in a clatter of footsteps and frightened blubbering, ran off back the way they’d come as if that mythical creature now chased him.
Hugh focused on the man, trying to read him. Was he under a similar mind spell? Unable to make a connection, he gave up.
Miss Bryght jumped out and then fell onto her hands and knees on the roadway. Hugh swung his legs over the horse to his left, prepared to sprint to her aid when she straightened and strode purposefully toward him.
Under the carriage lamplight, she looked drawn and her light brown eyes were filled with tears.
At that sparkle in the dark night, his throat tightened with compassion. Torn between wanting to comfort and apologize for failing to adequately protect her, words failed him.
She looked at him sitting on the horse and then, quite extraordinarily, picked up her skirts and carried on ahead on foot.
Hugh glanced back the way they come, to where the groom’s silhouette was already lost to sight. Then, instead of running after her, he swung his left leg back over the horse and facing forward, urged the lead carriage horse to follow the maddening woman. He’d need this vehicle to take her to safety. If he left it behind, there was always the chance the terrified groom might return to steal it.
Atalie leaped to straddle the horse’s withers in front of him. The Wise One is angry.
Understandable, he said, petting her, sensing she was as upset by the lady deserting them as him. She’s probably embarrassed about the demon fooling her with a mind spell. If that demon weren’t half dead and a league behind us, I’d strangle her for what she put our resilient Miss Bryght through.
It is you that draws her ire.
Me? Hugh recoiled from such an unfair criticism. Whatever for? I saved her life. She should be kissing me in gratitude.
The lady’s steps were so steady along the darkened roadway – and going in the wrong direction – that kisses seemed the furthest things from her mind. At her swift pace, she would soon be lost to sight.
The horses needed a walk after their mad dash anyway. He just wished they could all be going toward the Great North Road instead of further up this craggy slope.
The ominously methodical crunch of horseshoes on the stony ground seemed to contradict the river below gushing as if in a great rush into the misty wilderness of North Yorkshire. The sky chose that propitious moment to spit and add its desolate patter to the night’s lonely harmony.
She says you lied to her. Atalie skewered him with a backward analytical glance that was filled with reproach. Would you ever lie to me?
Of course not. Perhaps her frightening experience has unhinged her. It would any other normal human. Not that his Mary was a normal anything. She’d single-handedly defeated a demon. He still reeled at that feat.
She is not frightened, Atalie said.
She must be frightened. She’s a woman. I was frightened by that demon. Did you not feel its power as it fought against my binding? And that was while it was half dead.
Looking more infuriated than fearful, the lady in question stomped ahead in a sopping wet evening gown that hugged her rounded bottom and thighs in a provocative fashion as if to unmistakably confirm that she was indeed, a woman.
