Chantress Fury (6 page)

“This isn’t going to work, is it?” Nat said.

Dread hit me in the pit of the stomach. He’d spoken my fears aloud.

Slowly I said, “I think we need to talk.”

“Yes.”

“You go first,” I told him.

For a moment, I thought he wouldn’t. But then, looking steadily down into the candle flame, he started to speak.

“The reason I was on that ship—the reason I was coming back to England—was to see you.”

That
was why he was here?

“Since we parted, I’ve thought of you every day, almost every hour,” he went on. “I’ve hated being so distant from you, but I thought that in the end we’d be stronger for it. And I was hoping the time had finally come when we could be together again. But it’s not that simple, is it? I saw that on the ship. The moment you saw that gag, you sided against me.”

“I had questions, yes.” I couldn’t deny it. “But—”

“You gave the mermaid the benefit of the doubt, again and again. But not me.”

I winced. I hadn’t thought of it that way before. “That was a mistake. I’m sorry.”

“It’s not an apology I’m after, Lucy. I’m just saying that the trust between us is gone. I’ve been trying to tell myself it doesn’t matter, that we can rebuild—but I’m not sure we can. The way you look at me, the way you speak to me, it’s all changed. We might as well be strangers.”

I was so upset, I couldn’t speak.

More gently, he said, “You must feel it too.”

And the worst of it was, I did. The Nat who had gone away wasn’t the same as the one who was speaking to me now. And I supposed I wasn’t the same Lucy, either. But that he thought of us as strangers—that was as bitter as galls to me.

I meant to stay calm, meant to choose my words carefully, but I suddenly found I couldn’t. “If we’re strangers, whose fault is that?” I said, my voice unsteady. “You’re the one who left me. You’re the one who asked me to stay away. You’re the one who said I mustn’t even write to you.” I hadn’t realized till this moment quite how angry I was about that. Or maybe I had, and I’d buried it. But there was no burying it now.

“I gave you everything you asked for,” I said. “I let them all think there was nothing between us. Even when the Court gossips said that you’d left me because I was too cold, too inhuman to love, I said nothing—”

“They said
what
?”

I barely registered his words. “I didn’t even tell my friends the truth. I couldn’t; they might have given you away. I was more alone than I’ve ever been. And maybe you’re right; maybe that’s changed me. But in the name of all that’s holy, Nat, how could you walk away from me for a year and a half and then come back and expect me to be the same?”

I turned my back on him and ran up the stairs.

CHAPTER NINE

LOVE SONG

I woke the next morning to a sore ankle and a sodden, weeping sky.

He didn’t come after me
, was my first thought.

And then:
What did you expect?

His voice echoed again and again in my mind:
We might as well be strangers
.

By the cold light of morning, I had to admit the truth. He was right. I was a stranger to him, and he to me. There was no trust between us anymore—and no love.

I shut my eyes again. Whatever loneliness I had felt while on the road paled beside this.

The maidservant bustled in, bearing a cup of chocolate. “Good morning to you, my lady. Though
good
’s not the word for it, really. It’s bucketing, it is. You should see the guards at the gates. They look half-drowned.”

Drowned 
. . .

I sat up sharply. “The ship. The
Dorset
. Is she still out there?”

“No, my lady.”

My heart thudded. I shouldn’t have left her unguarded. “What happened?”

“She left for London on the dawn tide,” the maidservant said. “The King and Lord Walbrook and the other councilors left too, on the royal barge. And a good thing, because the rain wasn’t near as bad when they set out.”

“They left without me?”

“Yes, my lady. I tried to wake you, but you were dead to the world. Must’ve been the tea I gave you last night, for the pain.”

Vaguely I remembered the tea, a black concoction the maidservant had insisted on bringing to me last night after she’d seen me limping. I’d drunk the tea to placate her, and because I’d been desperate for sleep.

“But the King was going to hold a meeting.” I waved away the chocolate that she was trying to press on me now. “I was expected to be there.”

“He was told you were indisposed, my lady,” the maidservant said. “The others urged him to let you rest.”

The others? Did that mean Nat? Had he been hoping to spare himself the embarrassment of seeing me after last night’s debacle? Did he think we could continue to avoid each other at Court?

If so, he had another think coming. I wasn’t going to play that game any longer. Not when he thought of us as strangers.

“His Majesty sent his sympathies,” the maidservant added, “and asked if you would follow him to Whitehall as soon as you’re able.”

I threw back my covers. “I’ll go right now.”

Now
turned out not to be possible. My ankle was only mildly sprained, but it needed wrapping, which slowed me down, and the captain of the pinnace had to make his own preparations. When we finally did set sail, the weather was foul. Rain sluiced down without any letup, delaying our progress.

I hoped the sky would begin to clear by the time we reached Whitehall, but it was pouring there, too. After the pinnace deposited me on the covered landing, I looked back at the Thames. The rain was so heavy, it made London’s houses and wharves and towers look gray and washed-out, like a city of watery shadows. Shivering, I covered my head with my cloak hood and hurried inside.

Rowan Knollys met me as I came in. “Chantress, we didn’t look for you so soon. I heard you were unwell?”

“It’s nothing to worry about, only a sore ankle.” I pushed back my hood and shook off the raindrops. “Where is the King? Meeting with the Council?”

“The meeting is over, but I believe he’s in the State Rooms.”

“I’ll go straight there then, and I’ll meet you in the guardrooms afterward.”

There was nothing straight about Whitehall, however, and that included the path to the State Rooms. Catching sight of myself in a gilded mirror along the way, I decided I would go to my rooms first after all. The trip upriver had left me bedraggled and windblown, and I wanted to be as composed as possible when I saw the King, especially if Nat happened to be with him.

Several twists and turns later, I heard the sound of singing. I halted in my tracks, immediately on guard; the incident with the mermaid had made me vigilant. But then I heard a burst of laughter, and when it tapered off, a duet began—a tenor and soprano singing one of the new Italian love songs that were all the rage. I drew a sigh of relief. This was innocent enough.

The music was coming from a room around the corner—a large room near the Queen’s chambers, where the younger set at Court could sometimes be found larking about. My route would take me past it, and I was curious and just a little wistful as I approached. Being a Chantress left little time for larks. Even when I was at Court, I rarely joined in, and every time I did the result was awkwardness. The ladies-in-waiting, the courtiers—everyone knew I didn’t really belong there. And they were right. Forced to choose between Court capers and the demands of my magic, I’d have chosen the magic every time.

Still, I slowed as I came toward the open door. It was beautiful singing, by any standard, full of pleasing harmonies, plaintive and passionate by turns. Yet when I glanced through the door to see the singers, I had a shock. The tenor was Nat.

I didn’t even know he could sing.

His partner was Lady Clemence.
She’s been besotted with him for months
, Sybil had said. And there were other women there too. Now that the song was ending, at least half a dozen ladies-in-waiting were crowding around Nat, buzzing like bees around honeycomb. They all appeared to be on very friendly terms with him, and he with them.

The only stranger here was me.

Heart skittering, I backed away. But not quickly enough. Nat glanced up and saw me.

How must I appear, to have him look at me that way?

My cheeks throbbed. Averting my face, I darted back into the maze that was Whitehall. I thought I was well away, when I heard him call out to me.

“Lucy, wait.”

I turned. He was alone—a small mercy, that. With easy grace, he loped up to me, till we were merely a few spaces apart on the checkerboard floor of the passageway.

Trying to hide my distress, I said as calmly as I could, “So you sing. You never mentioned that.”

“It’s not really something you say to a Chantress, is it?”

It was an honest response, and if things had been different between us, it might even have made me laugh. Instead I had to look away, remembering a time when I’d been Lucy to him, not “a Chantress.”

“I owe you an apology,” Nat said.

My heart seemed to stop beating.

“I thought I was doing what was best for us both,” he went on. “I rode out into the world like a knight on a charger, willing to pay any price to prove I was worthy of you. But I didn’t stop to think about what it would cost you. I had no idea how much you were suffering. I don’t say that to excuse myself—I should have known, or guessed, or made it my business to find out. But I didn’t. You’re right. I was expecting we would come back together and have everything be the same, just better.”

I could only shake my head. “It doesn’t work that way.”

“I know,” he said quietly. “If I still thought it was that easy, I’d have come after you last night.”

So that was why he hadn’t followed me.

“What’s done is done.” Even in the dark passageway, I could see the sadness in his eyes. “We really are strangers now. Maybe something worse than strangers. It’s not what either of us intended, but it’s how it is.”

He was only speaking the truth, but something gave way inside me. I hadn’t realized that I’d still harbored a spark of hope, until it went out.

With a patter of light slippers, Lady Clemence appeared at the door. She gave me a half-fearful, half-apologetic look, but her face softened as she turned to Nat. “I’m so sorry to interrupt. It’s just that the others are insisting we sing for them again.”

“Not just now,” Nat said, but there was a gentleness as he spoke to her, and a warmth in his smile that startled me. Perhaps the admiration was not entirely one way.

“Go,” I said to Nat. “I don’t mean to keep you.”

The words were barely out of my mouth when the shouting started.

It was far louder than the cry I’d heard the night before when I’d been out on the landing—a shout that came not from one voice but dozens, perhaps even hundreds. Building to a terrible roar, it went on and on, fearful and agonized. I started running toward the commotion, and so did Nat.

Because of my ankle, Nat easily outdistanced me. When I caught up with him, he was pushing his way through a crowd of guards by the entrance that led out onto the river landing. By now it was clear that the noise was coming from the river. I followed Nat out the door.

Outside, standing on the stormy embankment, I couldn’t tell at first what was wrong. I could see only boats pulling hard for the shore and people running from the riverbank. But then, through the curtain of rain, I glimpsed a monstrous gray-green head rising out of the Thames, and a thick, coiled tail lashing behind it.

Bearing down on us was a creature straight out of myth and legend and nightmare—a sea monster.

CHAPTER TEN

HERE BE DRAGONS

Impossible to believe, and yet there it was, a sea serpent writhing in the river. Not a small snake, this, but a great eel grown to a monstrous size, its vast body longer than a man-of-war. For a moment I gaped at it. Then I started to sing, calling on the river to pull the beast down to its depths.

I thought it would work. And it almost did. But as the river swirled up against the monster, I felt the magic buckle and break. For a moment, I was swamped by cacophony. Something was stopping me, just as it had with the mermaid. Something with a magic stronger than mine.

The sea is coming. We are coming. And we will drown you all.
Was this what the mermaid had meant?

“Can’t you stop it?” Nat asked.

“The water won’t listen,” I told him. “I don’t know why.”

Maybe I just needed to find the right music. I tried another tune—a song meant to draw the water out of the monster itself and leave it parched and dry. The only thing my singing accomplished this time was to attract the attention of the monster. Through filmy eyes it searched for me, trying to find the source of the sound.

“Stop.” Nat flung out an arm, as if to shield me. “If you keep singing, it will find you.”

At another time, I might have been moved by his desire to protect me. But right now I didn’t want to be shielded. While some boats had made it to safety, others were still midriver, full of terrified passengers. I needed to defend them. I needed to defeat the monster.

How could I do that? Looking out to the edge of the landing, where several skiffs were tethered, I had an inspiration. Ducking past Nat, I ran down and jumped into one of the boats. Even as my ankle bumped up against the bottom, making me wince, I was reaching for the oars.

As I cast off, Nat leapt into the skiff, nearly knocking the oars from my hands.

“What do you think you’re doing?” I shouted through the rain. “Are you crazy?”

“No, but I think you are,” he shot back. “You should fight the beast from land, where it can’t get you.”

“No good,” I gasped out, pulling hard at the oars. “Must try and get closer, see what I can hear.”

Maybe I’d convinced him—or maybe he simply saw there was no turning me back. At any rate he took up one of the oars, helping to take us through the choppy seas toward the monster. I sang to the river to speed us, and when it obeyed, I felt hopeful. Yet before I could turn my magic on the monster, its fearsome jaws snapped at the nearest boat, a ferryman’s sturdy craft. The gleaming teeth crunched through the timber, splintering off the prow. The passengers screamed as they went sliding into the cold, churning waters.

How could I not sing them to safety? Passing my oar to Nat, I knelt in the bottom of the boat. Soaked through by seawater and rainwater alike, I used my music to float the monster’s victims to shore.

By the time I was done, the creature had me in its sights again, the long slavering tongue flicking like a battle flag in the heavy rain.

“Look out!” Nat cried. “It’s turning!”

There was no time to think. The beast was racing toward us, open-jawed. As Nat pulled hard at the oars, I leaned out over the livid waters and let out a volley of song.

The monster writhed and dived under the water, as if anticipating the force of my blow. But when it came up, sleek and stinking, from the bottom of the river, I felt my music shatter on the back of whatever protected it. A sudden blare of noise made my ears ring. Then, from deep within the water, I heard the faint strains of music, a song with a cadence and resonance like Chantress magic but even richer, with odd tunings all its own. A song as slippery as water. A song full of rage.

Blasted by its intensity, I rocked back in the boat. For a moment, the smell of magic was so strong that I was choking on it. As I tried to catch my breath, the sea serpent thrashed its massive tail and set the waters whirling. Our skiff went spinning.

“The oars!” Nat clutched at one, but the other was lost.

Knocked against the bottom of the boat, I smelled a blast of putrid breath. Turning, I saw the monster closing in on us. It snapped its massive jaws, baring serrated teeth. I heard the glamour of the raging music glistening all around me. Was it one voice, or two, or three? The water distorted the song and magnified it. Or perhaps that was just the confusion in my own head.

How could I defeat this? We were done for.

“Stay down!” Pulling me back, Nat snatched a dagger from his belt. Against the coiling length of the great serpent, the dagger looked laughably small—a matchstick next to a dragon. But when Nat lobbed it at the scaly head, the beast shrieked.

Nat had aimed at the eyes, but at the last second the monster twisted away so that the dagger struck the scales on its back, well down from the head.

I winced in sharp disappointment. It couldn’t possibly be a death blow.

Yet even as I braced myself for the crunch of its massive teeth, the monster started backing away. It was wailing, almost keening, in a language that I could not understand. More miraculously still, the great green coils were turning the color of water and dissolving, first around the spot where the dagger had lodged, and then out and out until the entire monster was gone.

Crouched in the boat, Nat turned to me, bewildered. “Did I do that?”

“It wasn’t me,” I said. “There was strong magic there, but I don’t know what it was. I’ve never heard anything like it. If it weren’t for you, we’d have gone down.”

“But it was just a dagger.” Nat looked out at the spot where the monster had vanished, as if he still couldn’t quite believe it was gone. “Made of the best Toledo steel, but even so . . .”

“Maybe it was a lucky blow.”

“But I only nicked its back. It wasn’t exactly a mortal injury.” And then, more slowly, Nat said, “Maybe that’s it.”

“What do you mean?”

“That creature wasn’t something from the mortal world, was it? It was magic.”

“Yes.” The smell and the sound of magic had been all over it.

“And steel is mostly iron, and iron breaks magic, doesn’t it?”

“Not mine.” Iron had never stopped me.

“No, but lots of kinds, or so the old stories say. It’s death to goblins, witches, faeries—why not sea monsters, too?”

“I don’t know,” I said doubtfully. “Could it really be that easy?”

Humor glimmered in his eyes. “I’m not sure ‘easy’ is the right word for what we’ve just been through.”

I had to laugh, but even as I did, something wrenched inside me. For a moment, he no longer seemed like a stranger. That glimmer in his eyes, that quiet humor—they were part of what I had loved about him.

As he looked back at me, I felt the old spark leap between us. For one shining moment, I could believe that time had run backward and we were in a world where we had never parted. Anything seemed possible.

But then he looked away, and I became conscious once more of the cold rain and my river-drenched clothes and the lingering smell of putrid serpent breath in my hair. Romance on the river? Not here. It would take more than a spark to fix what had gone wrong between us.

“Ahoy there!”

I turned, startled. One of the royal pinnaces was bearing down on our small boat, and the captain was calling out to us through cupped hands. “Marvelous, the way you two finished off that beast! We’ve come to pick you up and tow your boat to shore.”

Before either Nat or I could reply, an enormous cheer shook the waters. A crowd had gathered on the riverbank and was saluting the victory. “Hurrah!”

Moments later, the pinnace drew up beside us. In the commotion and fuss that followed, Nat and I were separated. We were back in the real world, the world of the Court—the world where we were strangers once again.