The Oracle's Secret (The Oracle Saga Book 1) (2 page)

The audience chamber is just how I remember it - large, imposing, richly decorated, deliberately intimidating. I spent so much time playing in here as a child that it doesn’t usually have much of an effect on me, but this time I’m so afraid that I see it how ordinary petitioners must - looming, terrifying.

The Prince - a thin, angular man in his late sixties - is sitting on a throne at the end of the room. He watches me as I walk towards him, but he doesn’t say anything, just looks. His eyes are piercing, hawk-like. I sway but keep walking. I can feel the strength of his magic from across the room.

‘My Oracle,’ he says when I reach him. ‘Welcome back.’

I kneel, looking at the patterns on the parquet floor. It’s a minute or two before he commands me to rise. I stand before him and look him in the eye.

‘Now,’ he says, deceptively friendly, ‘I remember what it’s like. You young folk crave novelty and excitement. And now you’ve had some. If you can make a blood oath to me that this nonsense is over now, we’ll speak of it no more. I’m not an unkind man.’

A blood oath. I shudder. That will bind me to my word with magic - if I break it, the consequences could be hideous. Death would be the best outcome possible. I know there’s no good way out of this situation, but a blood oath will put me in thrall to the Prince for the rest of my life. There’ll be no escape for me ever again. I breathe, trying to think.

‘Your mother has missed you,’ the Prince continues. ‘She was very upset when you disappeared. She kept saying she wished she could tell us where you had gone.’

I freeze. ‘Did you do something to her?’

He laughs lightly. ‘No, of course not. She’s fine. She was just very worried about you. The whole thing has taken a toll on her. If you were to disappear again... I dread to think what sort of state your poor mother would be left in.’

It’s a threat, I know it, but there’s nothing I can do except glare at him.

‘So,’ he says, ‘I think it will be best and safest for everyone if you make your blood oath now, and then we can put this little adventure behind us for good.’

I think about my choices. If I refuse, I’m still trapped here for now, and if I try to escape he’ll hurt my mother, the only family I have. We’ve had our differences, my mother and I, but I’d never let that happen.

I knew from the moment they found me that it would come to this. I knew that if they caught me I’d be going back for good. Nobody escapes the Prince twice. Making the blood oath would only set in stone what was already decided. My life was his anyway.

‘Of course,’ I smile. ‘I’d be happy to make a blood oath, my Prince.’

‘Good,’ he grins. He pulls a basket from behind his throne. ‘Prepare the ritual,’ he says.

I’ve never done this before but I know how it works. I take the basket and dab my wrists and forehead with the bottle of oil I find there. Then I do the same to the Prince while he sits calmly and watches me. I make a circle of salt around us, reaching behind his throne and back to close us both in together. I take the jewelled knife and hand it to him. He makes a wide cut across his palm and touches it to each side of my face in turn, leaving bloody patches. Then I hold out my hand to him and he cuts my palm too. I hiss as the sharp knife slices my skin. We clasp bloodied hands, his above mine. He takes a piece of rope from the basket and deftly ties it in a complicated pattern around our hands and wrists, fastening them together. He makes me hold it in place so that he can pull the knot, and the rough rope tightens around my forearm, the criss-crossing lines biting into me, squashing my flesh to his. A trickle of blood escapes from the place where our hands join and runs slowly down my arm, but I don’t dare wipe it away. I can feel the magic building in the room as we perform the ritual, like a heat haze or a thick smell in the air. When the last knot is tied the space is so heavy with magic that I can hardly breathe. There is only the final step to perform.

Awkwardly now that we are attached, I kneel before him again and he stands, pulling my arm up with him. It’s beginning to feel numb. I look up at him and he smiles benevolently at me.

He moves the fingers of his free hand, making a sign in the air. ‘Do you swear upon your blood and mine to obey my orders in all things, from this moment until your death?’

I make a corresponding sign and whisper my reply. ‘I swear upon my blood and yours to obey your orders in all things, from this moment until my death.’

There is a moment that feels like a silent explosion. Energy bursts through me and scatters the salt on the ground. I feel lightheaded.

‘It’s done,’ he says.

He picks up the knife again and slices through the rope that binds us with a casual flick, like he does this all the time. He probably does. He drops the knife, nods to me and then turns on his heel and leaves through the private door behind his throne, leaving me on the ground surrounded by salt and blood. I rock back into a sitting position and examine my hand and arm. The cut across my palm is deep - deeper than the one he made on himself. My hand is sticky with blood. The rest of my forearm is sickly white, with pale lines crossing it where the rope was. It’s numb up to the elbow. I try to move my fingers and nothing happens, I just feel a tingling. I’m not sure if this is the magic or just the lack of circulation. Tears pool in my eyes as I start to tidy up, picking up the knife and the pieces of rope one-handed and putting them back in the basket.

Being bound to him by a blood oath shouldn’t be any different to being a part of his court - I’d have to obey him either way - but it feels like it is. A tear falls onto the floor.

Maybe it’s the residual magic in the room that tilts me into the vision. I blink the tears away and when I open my eyes I’m somewhere else, somewhere dark, and he is with me again, the one from my dream. I can’t see him but somehow I just know it’s him. He’s taking care of me and I feel safe. He draws me close to him and holds me. I’m crying in the vision too but he wipes the tears away gently, speaks softly - his voice sounds like it’s coming to me though water, I can’t make out anything he’s saying, but I know it’s soothing. I feel his hand stroking my hair, a calming rhythm that slows my heart and stills my shaking. I forget for a moment that this isn’t real and let myself sink into it, not wanting to go back to my present, but a sound jars me back to the real world and I find myself back on the floor of the audience chamber. I feel a little better already.

The sound turns out to be my mother shrieking. I guess you leap to certain conclusions when you see your only child on the floor covered in blood and unresponsive, but as she gets closer and sees the paraphernalia scattered about she slows, understanding in her face.

‘A blood oath?’ she asks.

I nod.

She kneels beside me and helps me to tidy up. ‘Well, perhaps it’s for the best. We’ll be safe now. Here, let me look at your hand.’

She tuts at the cut. ‘We’ll go to the healer,’ she says. ‘Come on, I’ll get one of the guards to finish cleaning this up.’

She leads me briskly out of the audience chamber and through the corridors to the infirmary. She doesn’t ask where I’ve been or what I was thinking, just chatters about what a mess I am and how I’ll feel lots better. I’m still spacey from the ritual and the vision so I don’t really say anything back, but she doesn’t seem to mind. She doesn’t even seem upset that I’ve been gone for five months.

She’s good at not seeming upset. She’s had years of practice. I remember when I was little, she was angry and sad so much of the time, but none of it ever got her anywhere and finally she learned not to rock the boat. She’s the perfect calm, obedient courtier now. Even I’m not sure any more how much of it is an act.

The healer, a redheaded, tawny-skinned woman called Emmeline, smiles at me when we come in. She’s one of my mother’s best friends, and when I was a kid she’d always sneak me treats and let me play with her medical instruments as long as I put them back afterwards.

‘Welcome back, Livya,’ she says. ‘Are you all right?’

I shrug.

‘She’s not really feeling up to talking,’ my mother explains. ‘Blood oath.’

‘I see that...’ says Emmeline, sitting me on a bed and starting to gently wash the blood from between my fingers with a damp cloth. ‘So I guess this means you’re back in town for good.’

‘Looks like it,’ I say hoarsely.

Emmeline finishes cleaning my hand and holds it in hers for a moment, concentrating. My skin feels warm and I watch as the cut across my palm neatly fastens itself back together, leaving only a thin raised line of reddish flesh. Emmeline must have done this a thousand times for my childhood cuts and scrapes but it’s still fascinating to watch.

‘If you leave that alone, it should be fully healed by this time tomorrow,’ she says.

I flex my hand. It still hurts, but only a little, and the feeling has come back to my arm. Emmeline turns her attention to wiping the drying blood from my face.

‘There you are, sweetheart,’ she says. ‘Good as new. You’re going to look lovely for the party tonight.’

I blink. ‘Party?’

Emmeline looks at my mother. ‘Mari, you didn’t tell her yet?’

My mother shakes her head. ‘She wouldn’t have taken it in, after the ritual, she was pretty out of it.’

‘What party?’ I ask.

My mother sighs. ‘The Prince is having a party to celebrate your safe return. Your attendance is mandatory.’

Great. Just great. You’d think after everything I’ve been through I could have a quiet evening with Cherry and my mother and maybe an early night. But of course the Prince wants everyone to know that he’s found me and I’m back in his power. The Prince never has a party without some sort of ulterior motive.

It’s going to be a very long night.

When we’re done, my mother takes me back to our apartments and leaves me to get settled while she goes to check on the details for the party. My room is just the same as I left it. I’d say it was untouched if it wasn’t so clean. My four-poster double bed is made with satin sheets, the curtains neatly tied to the posts. When I was little I’d close the curtains and hide in there whenever I wanted to be by myself. I don’t think that would help much now but I’m tempted anyway.

I look around at everything - my wardrobe full of clothes, my dressing table, my bookcase full of novels and history books and the picture books I couldn’t bear to give away once I got too old for them. The walls are covered in my pictures, the floor is covered in the thick, fluffy carpet I was allowed to choose for myself when I was eight.

I feel so lost. I miss my damp, miserable London flat. My mind keeps wandering back to the man in my visions. With him I felt like everything would be ok. He must be in my future somewhere, and he must be important, but I have no idea when he’ll show up or who he might be. I want him to hold me close like he did in the vision, but even if I could find him, he’d be a stranger at first. But I so badly want his comfort.

Instead I wander around my room, looking at my familiar trinkets, until Cherry appears.

‘Hi!’ she says. ‘Want to get ready for the party together?’

I don’t really want to see anyone or do anything, but Cherry seems so thrilled that I’m back and I’d rather see her than anyone else, so I let her in. She sits on my bed and smiles sympathetically at me, and suddenly I want to tell her everything. I sit beside her and explain about the blood oath, trying to keep from crying. When I get to the part about the vision I remember that I never told her that earlier.

‘What dreams?’ she asks. ‘What man? Are these, like, sexy dreams? Come on, give me the details!’

Cherry’s not even slightly interested in sex for her own sake, never has been, but she’s always been supportive about my sex life. I mean, what there is of it - you don’t meet that many guys when you’re basically under house arrest. But Cherry was there for me from my first childhood crush to my few actual encounters, supporting me through it all. She’s even the only person who knows the secret about my powers. I don’t hesitate to tell her about the visions.

‘Well, I never see his face,’ I explain, ‘but I know him, in the visions. He’s definitely someone who’ll be important in my future. I just wish I knew when or where or how...’

‘Well, there’s no point worrying about it,’ she says. ‘Maybe you’ll meet him at the party tonight! Let’s find you something nice to wear, just in case?’

She’s brought her own outfit with her, a dusky pink floor-length gown that glitters when she moves and looks amazing with her blond hair. It looks gorgeous on her.

‘It’s that formal?’ I sigh.

She nods. ‘Of course it is - wow you’ve forgotten a lot in five months...’

‘I hadn’t forgotten,’ I say, ‘I was just hoping I could get away with something a bit less flashy.’

She grins. ‘Nope. Come on, let’s look through your wardrobe.’

She rifles through the dresses hanging in my wardrobe - I do have some pretty nice ones. The Prince is many things, but he isn’t stingy when it comes to providing for his court - and eventually she persuades me into a simple sapphire blue dress that skims the floor and rustles softly when I move. She drags me to the mirror to look.

‘It matches your eyes,’ she notes.

I examine myself as Cherry piles my dark hair onto my head and starts messing about with crystal pins. She’s right, the colour is almost exactly the same. I’d be happier in my waitress uniform, or in the few casual clothes I’d managed to afford back in London, but dressing up is nice too, and I have to admit that I look pretty good. It makes me feel a tiny bit more confident about the evening ahead.

Cherry is just putting the finishing touches on my make-up when the gong rings to summon everyone to the party. It rings three times - the sign that everyone in the building can attend. That’s kind of unusual - mostly it’s either one gong for the Prince’s inner circle or two for the actual courtiers, but three includes servants, visitors, children... I’m surprised. He must really want to show off how he got me back. My stomach flutters with nerves again. I was having so much fun with Cherry that I’d almost managed to forget.

The ballroom is just how I remember it - a wide open space reached by a grand staircase and looked down on by balconies on the floor above. The balconies are already full of children watching, and the ballroom itself is full of well-dressed people chatting. There’s music in the air but nobody playing - a spell, probably. The Prince always has one or two music-casters around the place. I try to get down the stairs as quickly as I can but a hush falls anyway, and everyone turns to stare at me as I make my way down.

‘Awkward...’ Cherry whispers in my ear in a silly voice, and I feel a bit better about it.

When I reach the bottom they keep staring, but nobody says anything to me. I know why. They’re waiting to see what the Prince’s attitude to me is before they express an opinion on my return. That’s fine. I head for the back of the room, Cherry in my wake, and behind me conversation starts up again. We find a corner behind a pillar and sit on a cream-coloured fainting couch.

‘They’ll be fine soon,’ Cherry says. ‘It’s just all a bit sudden. I mean... none of us knew if we’d see you again.’

‘Cherry, I’m sorry I went without telling you,’ I say. ‘If there’d been any way...’

‘I know,’ she smiles. ‘Um... shall I get us some drinks? You can stay here away from the staring.’

‘That would be great,’ I say, relieved, and Cherry runs off.

I sit quietly for a few minutes, enjoying the music. Then a shadow falls over me. I look up. It’s the Finder from earlier - I’d forgotten about him what with everything else. He’s dressed impeccably in a tuxedo, but his hair is as unruly as it was earlier, in waves around his face. I’m tempted to run my fingers through it, or at least I would be if he hadn’t just ruined my day and possibly life.

‘Oh,’ I say. ‘It’s you.’

He gives me an apologetic half-smile. ‘Can I sit?’

I shrug. ‘It’s a free country.’

He sits down on the other end of the couch and starts talking, his Welsh accent soft and measured. ‘Look... I’m so sorry about earlier. I know you didn’t want to be found. But...’

I sigh. ‘Yeah, when the Prince says jump, we all say “how high?” It doesn’t make me feel any better, knowing that.’

I understand that it’s not really his fault, but that doesn’t help with the anger I feel when I look at him. I could tear his head off right now, beautiful smile and all.

‘I was thinking maybe we could be...’ he begins.

I shake my head. ‘No. We can’t be anything. I’m sorry. I want you to leave now.’

He nods. ‘All right. I’m sorry again.’

And then he’s gone. I’m relieved that he didn’t get pushy about it, I don’t have it in me to argue tonight. I sit quietly, trying to breathe through my anger, and finally Cherry comes back with drinks.

‘Bad news,’ she says as I sip mine. ‘It’s dancing in a few minutes.’

I groan. Dancing in the Prince’s court is still stuck in the middle ages, or whenever it was they had elaborate group dances where you have to know all the steps and change partners every five seconds. Cherry would know. Both history and dancing are a lot more her thing than mine. I can just about struggle through most of the common ones at court.

‘Maybe I can sit it out...’ I say.

She shakes her head. ‘I bumped into your mum at the drinks table. Apparently the Prince is very keen for you to be visible. He won’t be impressed if you don’t dance.’

‘I was afraid you’d say that.’

‘Come on,’ she says. ‘Maybe we can find some good partners to start with, anyway.’

She pulls me up towards the dance floor. Steele bumps into us, literally, halfway there. I step back and look at him. Even I have to admit that he scrubs up well in his tux, even if it does barely fit over his muscular arms and shoulders.

‘Ah, Oracle,’ he says. ‘The Prince wanted me to make sure you joined in with the dancing, so he asked me to begin the dance with you. Come on.’

He grabs my hand and pulls me away from Cherry. She gives me a helpless look. Awesome.

I’ve had to dance with Steele before, and this time is no different. As the music begins he grips my hands too tightly, so that my fingers hurt. As we start to move, he pulls me around the dance floor like he’s dragging a piece of furniture into place. All around us I can see couples whirling, smiling, perfectly in time with the music. Steele knows the steps, he doesn’t let us break the pattern, but we’re not exactly dancing either. As the pattern changes he moves his hand to my waist, digging his fingers into my flesh through my dress.

‘That hurts,’ I tell him. ‘Stop it.’

He grins and ignores me. So I stomp on his foot with my heel. Then it’s my turn to grin as he turns bright red and stifles a cry of pain. He has to keep dancing, or risk embarrassing himself in front of everyone. I smile like I’m having a wonderful time while he grimaces his way through the next few steps.

‘You’ll pay for this,’ he says through gritted teeth.

I probably will, but it was so worth it.

The moment’s coming when we will change partners. I’m relieved until I see who my next partner is - that bloody Finder again! Steele sweeps me away and turns to his next partner. The Finder takes hold of me gently and we continue the dance. As his hand touches mine I get a shiver of deja vu, but I shake it off. It’s an occupational hazard of being able to see the future. Probably nothing.

‘Do you want me to stop?’ he asks. ‘I had no idea you’d be my next partner...’

‘No,’ I hiss. ‘If I don’t dance the Prince will want to know why. Let’s just get through this.’

He nods and keeps whirling me in the pattern, matching the other couples. Suddenly I’m looking at the room from a different angle and everything looks strange - a vision. But what? People are panicking... the same people who were in the room with me a moment ago, in the same clothes. They’re shouting, running... whatever it is, it’s happening here, tonight...

I snap out of it and the Finder is staring at me, but nobody else is.

‘Are you all right?’ he asked. ‘You spaced out there...’

We’re still dancing. He must have managed to keep me in step. I stop.

‘Steele!’ I call. ‘Guardsman Steele!’

Around us the dance degenerates into confusion. Steele makes his way over, glaring at me.

‘What the hell are you doing?’ he asks.

‘I just had a vision,’ I say. ‘Something’s going to happen - here, tonight. I don’t know what, but it’s going to send everyone into a panic. You need to...’

Steele snorts. ‘This little plea for attention isn’t going to get you anywhere, Oracle...’

‘You idiot!’ I say. ‘It’s not a plea for attention, I’m trying to warn you!’

‘She’s the only Oracle you’ve got,’ says the Finder, still at my side. ‘Why would you disbelieve her?’

‘This is none of your concern, peasant,’ Steele says.

They glare at each other and I’m frantically trying to figure out how to resolve this situation when there’s a piercing shriek from the other side of the ballroom.

‘I told you!’ I say, but Steele is already running towards the sound.