Townsend, Lindsay - The Snow Bride (BookStrand Publishing Romance) (29 page)

She prayed to the Virgin Mary and to the old Mother, remembering the ancient flint figure of the Mother that her own father had given her. It was buried under her threshold at home, a protector.
Like Magnus,
she thought, and again fell to wondering about him—a beguiling habit, she found. He was so strong, so brave, so stalwart and honorable. He would never lie. He had done nothing but protect and care for her, and she had turned on him, scolded him,
tested
him.

I wish we had parted differently, in more harmony
, she thought, although in truth she wished they had not parted at all. Yet they had parted friends, had they not?

“Stop.” Her voice rang in the wooden tower, and she heard, almost as an echo, a low moan of wind outside. Was it snowing again? Was Magnus out in poor weather?

She closed her eyes a moment and forced her mind away from Magnus. Magic needed a clear, calm heart, and hers was always racing these days. What had her mother told her? “There are maids who do magic and men who do magic, but few womenfolk. ’Tis a rarity, for a woman has a full heart and once children come, she has little time or clarity. I am rare, Elfrida, and you may be, too, but it will take work, believe me.”

She had not understood her mother’s words until now.

She had the dark mirror in the circle. She had washed it in snow and smeared it with garlic and salt and washed it a second time with the mead Magnus had left her. It was as pure as she could make it, and now she intended to use it.

First she burned the nail clippings and hair, herbs, seeds and parchment in the brazier, saying a prayer for Christina and for the other girls. As the parchment writhed and burned, she thought she heard it hiss and spit, so she quickly made the sign of the cross above the brazier, and all was well again. Fire would purify, and the Forest Grendel would not be able to use these. Even if it did not defeat him, it should delay him.

“And now I seek you,” she said aloud, making her words a vow. She knew it was a risk, using the Grendel’s own seeing glass, but she had to know more. And she was desperate to see Christina.

It was very hard to blow out the lantern, but for what she needed to do next, she must. She settled back on the wooden floor, sitting cross-legged, and stared at the glowing flames and embers in the brazier. She was aware of a gathering dark, a closing cold, and knew it was time.

She placed the rosemary amulet she had made for Christina into the middle of the brazier. “For my sister,” she whispered, as the rosemary burned. She yanked at her hair, pulling three long strands, wound those up, and placed those into the guttering flames. “Protect Christina, keep her safe from all spirits and all harm,” she chanted in her own dialect and the old speech. “Send my protection to her.” She made the sign of the cross as the last of her hair burned away.

The wind moaned again outside, but she refused to grant it power by worrying over it. She picked up the dark mirror, feeling its weight resting snugly in her palm. It was a blue-green glass, and she could see her own reflection in it, hazy and faint. Her face looked pale, surprisingly thin. She stared into her amber eyes and held them, thinking of Christina.

“Blue eyes for amber eyes,” she murmured, remembering her sister’s pale, light eyes, wider than hers, more trusting.

“Blonde hair for red hair.” Christina had beautiful, long, golden tresses, smoother than cream, bright as a gold coin.

“Dimples in her cheeks, not chin.” Her sister had a pretty smile, a charming laugh.

“Rounder face, a smaller nose.” She imagined tweaking Christina’s pert little nose and grinned.

She blinked, and there in the mirror was her sister, a shadowy form behind hers, slowly swaying like a young birch tree in a spring breeze.

Where are you, sister?
Elfrida laughed in pleasure, in relief, in love.
Walter still loves you
, she sent on, watching Christina clap her hands and smile her sweet smile.
Are you close?
Sometimes Christina liked to tease.

Christina raised her arms. She was still wearing her bridal gown, richly dyed and patterned, excerpt there seemed to be ribbons trailing from her outstretched arms...

They were cobwebs, Elfrida realized as a choking whiff of sulfur stole through the room and the darkness about her deepened.

Keep away from her!
she yelled in her mind, striking out, willing herself through the mirror, her knife at the ready.

Her vision blurred, and she slashed out wildly, seeking to cut those disgusting webs, and now when she shook her head to clear it, she was inside another chamber, lit by a good wax candle.

Be nimble and quick, see the whole
, she told herself when all her feelings strained to fix on that small, seated figure. She jerked her head side to side, glimpsing a stone staircase leading off the chamber, a shuttered window with a slither of moonlight shining down between the casement, sprays of fresh mistletoe standing in an earthenware jug. Then she could stand the gnawing wait no longer and looked straight.

Christina, golden and whole, wonderfully alive, the glow of health and vigor in her cheeks, looked up to her from her stool. Her eyes widened. “Elf—”

Elfrida put a warning finger to her lips but was too late. Alerted, another presence in the small, round chamber now filled her senses, turning the world black and formless, without shape or scent.

Not yet, Snow Bride
, hissed a still, cold voice as Elfrida battered at the dark.
You come later.

“Never!”
Elfrida shrieked, thinking of the brazier, of cleansing fire and light to put between herself and the dark. Thrust between the world of man and the world of the spirits, she knew she had only a moment. “Holy Mother, guide me back!”

As if at the end of a tunnel, the brazier in the wooden tower appeared, and her own hunched figure, gripping the dark mirror. She lurched for her own self, and then she was back, returned to her body, gasping and in a cold sweat.

But I know where Christina is! I know!

Chapter 21

Magnus hated drinking games, but he was careful to disguise it. No man would be brave enough to accuse him of being soft, but he well knew how some men thought nonetheless. He had subverted it in Outremer by sticking to the finest wines. In the Denzil keep, he raised his arm frequently and vigorously, ensuring most of his ale was spilled on the floor.

His men were doing the same, pray God, or else he would know the reason why, once they were out of this dung heap.

He sat on a stool, with the fire baking his left side and Gregory Denzil on his right, asking yet again where his girl was, and he felt the rough blindfold prick against his eyelids. The game was a version of “hot cockles,” where he had to guess who struck at his hands—or in his case, his hand and his stump—before he could pass the blindfold on to another. As entertainment, it was pitiful—often the girls were sent against him, and they all cried and screamed, calling him a monster. Sweating by the fire, Magnus felt another pair of slim hands dart against his palm and endured the ear-piercing cry, worse than an angry pig. He let his head hang down, as if broken by such petty malice, and when he thought of Elfrida, it was easy to let his mind grow dark indeed.

How did she fare? Had she kept within the tower? Had she locked the door? If they did not find her sister, would she blame him for taking her away, instead of leaving her for the Forest Grendel? Had they a future past this Christmas, this solstice? Would she grow weary of others recoiling from him?

“What, man? You are looking sour as well as ugly!” Gregory Denzil grated, and his men hooted like
Barbary
apes.

A new hand pawed his, and he recognized Mark by the scar close to the man’s right thumb.

“Do not know me!” Mark hissed. “The men are ready to go. Some have slipped out already, and the rest are acting as drunk as Benedictines! Denzil’s are fast catching up!”

Magnus slapped Mark’s hand in triumph and mouthed “Gregory?” for all to see. Around the hall there was more delighted laughter and jests, increasing to a blazing roar when the next fist clobbered his hand.

“There she is!” Stumbling forward off the stool, Magnus grabbed the man and planted a smacking kiss on his beard. “My own Snowflake!” He girded his tormentor in a bear grip and, as the fellow squirmed and yelled, puckered his lips for a second kiss.

“No! Not even you are that drunk!” Gregory, on the dais, shot to his feet. “Never, even on campaign in Outremer, and however much wine you’d taken, did you embrace any man, not even so much as a beardless lad. You have overplayed your feint,
Sir
Magnus!

“Take the fool and and disarm him,” Denzil went on. “He knows more than he is saying, and I will know it. And his plans.”

Still playing the drunken fool, Magnus felt himself roughly hauled and kicked to his feet. Hoping to confuse Denzil and make the fellow doubt his own judgment he allowed his dagger to be taken from him, without any struggle or remark, and sagged on his captors as he was dragged away, asking plaintively, “Where are you, my heart, my little pigeon?” Behind him he heard Mark throwing up on the herb-strewn floor, to more derisive shouts. Denzil’s men were indeed slack and idle, even as his own men pretended to be blind drunk.

“
Take him to the cellar and lock him in there for the night,
”
Denzil ordered, his mask of crusader fellowship fallen now and whiny with scorn.

Elfrida is right. He is not a decent host. I was mistaken, too, when I told her that not even the Denzils turn on their guests.
Still Magnus pretended to be drunk, gulling the whole filthy, unruly mob into thinking they had bested him,
for then they will drink even more tonight, in triumph.

“
You—stay with him. Make him stand at guard.
”

“
On his wooden leg!
”
bawled one of Denzil
’
s bullies.

“
On his peg leg? Why not? And tomorrow we shall see that he talks.
”

Keep playing the sot who knows and cares nothing.
Magnus whistled a carol, off-key, and took more kicks and blows than he had suffered since his days as a page as he was bundled away.

* * * *

Elfrida felt as weary as a mother must after a long labor. She had no child yet, but she had enough, the precious knowledge that Christina still lived.

Magnus will be here soon, and I can tell him the good news.

She
lay down, curled within her salt circle, and listened to the woods. The Forest Grendel had seen her in the plane of the spirit world, had known she was his enemy, but he did not know she was at the very heart of his plans. The very quiet and stillness of the mistletoe outside told her that.

He is powerful, but he has not defeated me.

She closed her eyes in sheer relief and whispered a prayer of thanks.

She did not realize she was dreaming until she saw a rose, a summer flower, in full bloom, in a small meadow in a woodland clearing. Even as she scolded herself for falling asleep, her dream changed.

She wore a strange gown, white as a snowdrift yet softer than thistledown, with many cunning tucks and gathers in the bodice and skirts, and all gathered in by a belt of blue ribbon.

“You make a fair, bright bride, Elfrida,” remarked Magnus as he appeared beside her, handing her a posy of buttercups. Gaudy and bold in a bloodred-scarlet tunic and black braies that showed off his long, sinewy legs and powerful hips, his scars seemed less grooved and terrible in the sunlight. His deep, brown eyes glowed with love as he kissed her, his breath tasting of apples and ginger. He drew her hand through his arm and strolled with her about the meadow, lifting her once over an ant mound so the insects should not bite her.