The Dark Remains (7 page)

Evidently the guardsman was as surprised as Aryn, for he stepped back. The woman on the horse turned her head, as if searching. Then her gaze locked on the window through which Aryn watched, and a smile touched her lips. For a moment Aryn gazed into sea-green eyes. Then, with a gasp, she hurried from the window. It seemed like the woman in the bailey had seen her watching. But that was impossible.

After breakfast, Aryn went in search of Lady Tressa, for there was much to do before the dark of the moon and the start of the coven, which—from what scant knowledge Aryn had been able to glean—was to span four days. She was near the entry gallery of the castle when she caught a scent like nightflowers. This was odd not because it was midday, but because for all its beauty—and like all castles Aryn had ever been in—Ar-tolor smelled more like a privy than a garden. She turned in time to see a tall, slender figure all in black vanish between two columns. Aryn hurried after but found nothing save a scattering of white, fragrant petals upon the stone floor.

It was after midday when Aryn finally finished counting all the candles stored in the castle’s cellar. It seemed an odd task, but that was what Tressa had bid her do and so she had. Aryn walked down a corridor, trying her best to brush the dust and spiderwebs from her gown. Working in the cellar had been grimier than she had imagined.

“Mind if I have some of that cobweb, deary?”

Aryn looked up to see an ancient woman clad in a shapeless brown frock. There was little hair left on the
woman’s knobby head, but her blue eyes were bright in her wrinkled face.

Aryn shrugged. “No, not at all. Here you are.” She handed the other a gauzy, gray ball.

The old woman gave a cackle—she was quite toothless—and spirited the cobweb into a pocket. “Thank you, deary.” She hobbled past.

After several steps, Aryn stopped and blinked. She glanced back over her shoulder, but the old woman was already out of sight. Aryn turned and hurried to Lirith’s chamber. She found the dark-eyed woman inside, grinding something with mortar and pestle. It smelled fresh but bitter.

“Something peculiar is going on in this castle,” Aryn said, shutting the door behind her.

Lirith did not look up from her work, but she smiled mysteriously. “Five witches have arrived since dawn, last I spoke to Tressa.”

“I knew it!” Aryn flopped into a chair. “I
knew
they had to be witches. Each of them was strange in her own way.” A thought occurred to her. “But how can they be arriving at the castle when Ivalaine only announced the High Coven last night?”

“You mean she only told us about the High Coven last night. For all we know, she might have sent out messages weeks ago.”

A thrill coursed through Aryn, and she sat up straight in the chair. “Yes, but what sort of messages?”

Lirith crumbled a few dried leaves into the mortar and said nothing. That was answer enough for Aryn. Ivalaine
had
sent out a message about the coven, but not one written with ink on paper. And perhaps that was why Melia and Falken were here; perhaps Lady Melia had overheard.

Then why didn’t you hear it, Aryn? Or Lirith?

But maybe the message had not been intended for them. And Aryn’s ability to speak across the Weirding was limited at best, although she certainly intended to
improve. And Lirith was going to help her whether she wanted to or not.

A sigh caught Aryn’s attention. The pestle lay motionless in Lirith’s hand; the witch stared into space.

“Are you well, sister?” Aryn said, excitement replaced by concern.

Lirith smiled, but the expression seemed fragile somehow. “Lady Tressa is looking for you. I believe she has another task for you to start.”

Those next days passed swiftly. As it turned out, Lady Tressa had many more tasks for both of them before the coven began. They helped to air out dozens of the castle’s spare chambers, and they spent long afternoons venturing into the groves that dotted the land near Ar-tolor, searching for goldleaf, moonbell, and other herbs Tressa bade them find—all of which could be ground into a heady incense, good for purifying air and clearing vision.

However, there were other tasks that made little sense to Aryn. They burned three candles—one to a stump, one halfway, and one just for a moment—before extinguishing them and wrapping them in red-linen cloths. They drew water from the castle well in the blackest hour of the night, although Aryn could hardly see how it would differ from water drawn in daylight. Wet was wet. As she discovered when, in her bleariness, she spilled a chill bucket on herself.

“At least that woke you up,” Lirith said with a laugh, then lowered the bucket back into the well.

Most inexplicable of all, with the help of Ivalaine’s ladies-in-waiting, Tressa bade them sew three robes. The first was white and woven from the wool of lambs. The second was brilliant green, colored with fresh rushes. And the third was dark as smoke, dyed with ashes. What were the robes for?

Tressa smiled when Aryn asked this. “Why, she has three faces, and so she wears three robes: one for her waking, one for her fullness, and one for her waning.”

“But who is she?” Aryn asked, more perplexed than ever.

Tressa’s smile only deepened.

“All right, Lirith,” Aryn demanded that night at supper in the great hall, speaking low under her breath, for the queen sat only a few places away. “What is this High Coven really all about?”

“You will see,” Lirith said, and took a sip from her wine.

Aryn started to groan—it was a typically enigmatic answer—then her eyes narrowed. “You don’t actually know, do you?”

Lirith did not meet her gaze. “I have … an idea.”

Aryn wasn’t certain what it was: luck, instinct, or some unspoken message translated across the threads of the Weirding. All the same, she knew the word on Lirith’s mind.

“Runebreaker,” she whispered.

Now Lirith did look at her, eyes sharp, face hard. “You will not speak that word again, sister. Not unless it is spoken to you first. Do you understand me?”

Aryn had never heard Lirith speak so harshly before. She gave a jerking nod, then finished her supper in silence.

As the moon waned to a sliver, more witches arrived in Ar-tolor. Some came openly under the bright light of noon, while others drifted into the castle with the purple air of twilight. And sometimes Aryn would awake in the deep of the night, move to her window, and see dim shapes gliding across the bailey, bending heads close in silent speech. Soon the very stones of the keep seemed to echo with whispers, and the castle’s servants and guardsmen walked with the quick-footed nervousness of mice who know a cat’s afoot, looking always over their shoulders.

Finally Aryn counted the days, thinking that if the High Coven did not begin soon she would burst with
questions. Some relief did come in her time with Melia and Falken. They told her stories of the great lost kingdom of Malachor, and of the city of Tarras when it was still the shining heart of a vast empire. But though interesting, the stories were only diversions. It was not the past that interested Aryn, but what was to happen in mere days.

It was the morning of the day the High Coven was to begin that she woke to find the Mournish had left Artolor. Sometime during the night they had folded up bright awnings, packed their fantastic wagons, and rolled away down the road, wandering to their next destination.

After breakfast—which Aryn could barely swallow for her excitement—she and Lirith walked down to the commons below the castle, for Tressa had said all was ready for the coven. They walked among tall trees, which swayed back and forth, murmuring a tired song. Summer was passing. Keldath, the gold month, was over. It was Revendath, and the wheat in the field fell before the blades of scythes.

It was easy to make out the yellowed places on the grass where the Mournish wagons had stood. At one of these, Lirith knelt and plucked something from the withered grass. It gleamed in the dappled light: one of the cheap bronze charms the Mournish sold to ward away sickness, to ease pain, or to bring love. This one was shaped like a spider. Aryn wondered what effect it was supposed to have.

“I wish we could have seen them again. The Mournish.”

“It is well we did not,” Lirith said flatly.

Startled, Aryn glanced at her friend. Lirith seemed to gaze into a far-off place.

“What is it, sister?” Aryn said, touching her hand.

Lirith drew a deep breath, then smiled. “It’s nothing. Really.”

Aryn nodded; she thought maybe she understood. The old woman’s words had affected all of them. Once again Aryn thought of the image she had glimpsed in Ivalaine’s ewer and again on the old woman’s card. But what did it mean? Of all the castles Aryn knew, only Ar-tolor had seven towers. And Ivalaine was mistress here.

“We should return to the castle,” Lirith said. “This evening we will have far more on our minds than the Mournish.”

Aryn nodded, and they started back the way they had come. But she did not fail to notice that Lirith carefully coiled up the spider necklace and slipped it into the pocket of her gown.

The remainder of that day seemed to drag on for an eternity. Aryn tried to occupy herself with embroidery, but the thread seemed determined to tangle and knot. Lirith had told her the first meeting of the coven would be a welcoming incant, in which all the witches might greet one another. The real work of the High Coven would come in the days that followed. Aryn wasn’t entirely certain when things were to start, but instinct told her it would not be until the sun slipped beneath the horizon, leaving other, deeper powers to steal over the world.

Just as the music of doves drifted through the window, a soft knock came at the door of her chamber. Outside was a woman Aryn had never seen before. She was exceedingly tall and thin, curved like a tree; her brown hair was cropped close to her head in a man’s style. The woman wore a simple robe of light green, and a similar robe hung over her arm.

“It is time,” the woman said before Aryn could speak. She held out the spare robe. “I am Nayla, your guide. Don this, then follow me.”

Minutes later Aryn moved through the dim corridors of Ar-tolor, treading after Nayla along with several more young women. One by one they had gone to the chambers of the others, waited as each donned the spare green robe the witch always seemed able to produce, then continued on their way in silence.

As they walked, Aryn glanced at the young women to either side of her. Most were pale and pretty, while one was dark and lustrous like Lirith. All of them looked lovely in the simple green shifts, their shapely arms left bare by the garments’ half sleeves. Aryn tried to ignore her own withered right arm that flopped out the end of its sleeve. Even as a small girl she remembered being aware of the need to keep her arm concealed. Now that it was in plain view, she felt strangely naked.

A tingle danced across Aryn’s neck. She turned to see one of the young women staring at her. No, not at
her
, but at her arm. The other quickly looked away, but it was too late; Aryn had seen the horror in her expression. After that, Aryn kept her own gaze fixed rigidly ahead.

They reached a crossing of ways and came upon another group of women in green shifts. All of them wore wide-eyed expressions. They were even younger than the witches of Aryn’s group; the eldest couldn’t have been more than fifteen, and the youngest was surely not beyond her twelfth winter. Could she truly be a witch at so young an age?

As if sensing eyes upon her, the girl looked up, a knowing expression on her face, her lips curving in a smile. Aryn looked hastily away.

It was only when Nayla nodded to the woman leading the second group that Aryn realized the other was in fact Lirith. The dark-eyed witch looked elegant in her green
robe, her black hair tumbling behind her in tight ringlets. Aryn opened her mouth to say something, but a slight shake of Lirith’s head stilled her question.

Not just yet, sister
, Aryn thought a voice whispered in her mind.
Follow now, speak later
.

Lirith nodded in return to the tall witch, then without exchanging words the two led the way down a corridor. The others trailed after in a single group.

It was only when they stepped through a door into cool, purple air, and Aryn breathed in the perfume of evening flowers, that she realized what their destination must be. They left the stone walls of the castle behind, walking down winding paths deeper into Ar-tolor’s gardens.

The gardens of Ar-tolor were both larger and wilder than Calavere’s, with its neat paths and well-tended hedge maze that Aryn had played in so much as a girl she could navigate it with her eyes closed. Here, the walkways tangled back on themselves, leading at every turn to unexpected grottoes, shaded fountains spilling over mossy stones, and thickets where gods peered from leafy shrines with serene marble eyes.

They passed through an arch of moss-covered stone Aryn never recalled seeing in all her garden wanderings and stepped into a great space beyond.

It was like a temple all of green. Ancient trees formed twin colonnades, their trunks like columns arching into slender beams overhead. Flowering vines wove among the branches, completing the walls and vaulted dome. Silver moonlight tinged with emerald filtered down from above, and fallen petals glowed on the ground. Leaves stirred on the night breeze like the whispers of many voices. Then Aryn shivered, and she knew it was more than just the leaves that were whispering.

The garden was filled with witches.

All of them wore the same light green robes, and in the dimness the garments melded with the shadows of the
trees, so that it was impossible to be certain how many there were. But Aryn was certain it was tenscore if it was one. A thrill rose in her chest.

Oh, Grace. I wish you could be here for this. It’s so marvelous—I never knew there were so many like us. You’d see that you’re not alone, that you’re never alone
.

At the far end of the grove, marble steps led up to a circular rostrum. On the rostrum were seven pedestals, and atop each one shone a globe of light. At first Aryn wondered if they were glass balls filled with fireflies, but that was absurd. How could they be kept alive? Besides, it was too late in the year, and the light the globes gave off was not yellow but greenish like the leaf-filtered moonlight.