the right thing to do? She stared down into the grey surface of the stone. ‘What happened next, Mora?’ She touched the crystal lightly.
She hadn’t meant it to happen. Not now. Not with Kier so close, but she could see Flavius approaching his brother’s house. Her stomach clenched with apprehension. ‘Be careful.’ The words of her whisper went unheard in the roar of the wind across the mere.
Flavius stood in the doorway looking down at Petra as she knelt by the fire feeding twigs under the pot of water. She glanced up and screamed.
He gave her a chilly smile. ‘There is no point in screaming, niece. There is no one to hear.’
‘What do you mean?’ She stumbled to her feet, her eyes darting into the shadows. There were no servants in the house, no slaves, no farm workers. They were all out in the fields, or the woods, or fishing on the mere. Her mother and father had gone across to Afalon to speak to Mora’s father. She had told them of her dream, to study with Mora; to become a druidess, to fulfil her brother’s ambition for him and they had agreed. Now it was for them to see if the college would accept her.
She clenched her fists in the folds of her gown and stared at him defiantly. ‘Yeshua isn’t here. He has gone. You will never lay hands on him.’
He held her gaze. She was a pretty girl, now she was standing upright, with clear skin and bright eyes, albeit swollen and red from weeping. ‘I will find him, never fear. If I have to follow him to the end of my days, I will find him.’ He folded his arms. ‘He cured your agues and your crippled bones, I hear.’ There was a sneer in his voice. ‘But did his healing last? Can you still skip around the fire, and dance for your supper?’
She straightened her shoulders. ‘I am well now. As well as you are.’ She looked him in the eye. ‘A testament to what Yeshua did. I will tell the whole world what he did for me, and everyone else around here. He was a good man.’ She paused. ‘Not like you. My father will never forgive you for what you did to Romanus.’ To her own surprise she had stopped being afraid of him.
Flavius smiled coldly. ‘What did I do to Romanus?’ The smile vanished as he waited for her to answer.
‘You killed him! You know you did.’
‘And you can prove that, can you?’
She hesitated.
‘I thought not. I don’t think anyone will ever know who killed the boy. Perhaps it was the druid. Perhaps they killed each other. Perhaps they killed themselves. It is the Roman way when life becomes insupportable.’
She shook her head. ‘Cynan would never kill anyone. Nor would Rom.’ There were tears in her eyes. ‘It was you.’
He turned away towards the door. ‘Nonsense! Be very careful of the accusations you throw around, young lady. They could get you into all kinds of trouble. I should if I were you be more worried about the fact that your pain is already returning, and your fever is building again and you are beginning to realise just how much of a fraud your friend Yeshua was.’ Turning to look at her over his shoulder he fixed her with an icy stare. ‘It will happen so quickly you will wonder why you ever thought you were cured.’ Again the hard cruel smile as he gave silent thanks to the seeress, all those years ago in Rome for her curses, which he had never forgotten.
‘No!’ Petra burst into sobs. She was looking down at her hands. Already they seemed to be swelling again, her fingers bending into claws, and slowly she was aware of the dull ache starting in her wrists and ankles.
He smiled again. ‘So, are you going to attest that the man was a fraud?’
‘No.’ She shook her head, tears pouring down her face. ‘No. He was a good kind man; a great healer.’
Flavius sneered. ‘You stupid girl. Don’t you see, I was offering you a chance to live!’
She shook her head again. ‘No, you weren’t. You wanted me to lie.’ She was still standing facing him, her face white with pain.
He shrugged. ‘So be it. You will go to join your brother.’ His short sword reflected the small flames licking up from the logs onto the softly glowing metal of the cauldron over the fire.
Her final terrified scream was lost in the hiss of steam as he tipped the cauldron over and lunged towards her.
‘No!’ Abi’s whisper was a whimper of pain. ‘No, oh no, how could you?’ She put down the stone. How long had she been sitting here? She glanced at her watch, trying to shake off the horror of what she had seen. Standing up she seized a T-shirt from her bag, wrapped up the stone and tucked it under the far corner of the mattress. It seemed a bit obvious, but then she wasn’t planning on Kier getting anywhere near her bedroom. She went to the door and listened. Nothing. Was he already inside? Had Justin offered him a coffee or a drink or something? Opening the door she tiptoed up the short passage, listening. There was no sound of voices from the living room.
Kier and Justin were standing in front of the fire, about four feet apart, awkwardly, both looking into the body of the room, not talking. She took a deep breath and stepped towards them. She tried to make herself smile, but her face refused to comply and she felt herself staring at Kier showing nothing but hostility in every atom of her body. Coming to a standstill on the far side of the central table, she looked from one man to the other. She said nothing.
Justin grinned at her and she saw a flash of mischief in his eyes. ‘I have offered our guest some coffee or tea or a drink, but he has declined.’
She shrugged. ‘His loss.’
Justin scanned her face for a moment, then he turned to Kier. ‘In which case, my friend, perhaps it would be as well to discuss the reason for your visit with as little preamble as possible.’ He paused.
For a long moment there were no sounds in the room but the cracking of logs in the fire and outside the lonely yelping of a buzzard riding the thermals high above the hills.
‘I want Abi to come back with me,’ Kier said at last. He cleared his throat uncomfortably.
‘No.’ Abi’s response was so quick it made Kier step back. He looked surprised and for a moment almost frightened at the force of the one word.
‘But this man is a pagan,’ he said after a minute, sounding more hurt than angry.
‘This man is a gentleman,’ she said softly, and then paused, astonished at her own choice of words. ‘He would never imprison me, or hurt me or make vicious unfounded accusations against me.’
‘He’s not a Christian, Abi.’
‘Do Christians behave the way you have behaved, Kier?’ she retorted.
He was still staring at her, but suddenly he turned away. He slumped into the chair by the fire and put his head in his hands. ‘I’m sorry I frightened you. I didn’t mean to. I left everything for you to make you comfortable. I wanted to keep you safe.’
‘So safe you put wolfs bane in my sandwiches?’ Her voice rose an octave.
He looked up and slowly shook his head. ‘I didn’t put anything in your sandwiches. I said that to make them realise how desperate I was. I would never hurt you, Abi. Never. I swear it.’
‘The police are testing all the food you left with Abi,’ Justin put in at last.
Kier looked shocked. ‘The police?’
‘Of course the police. You kidnapped and falsely imprisoned her and you were threatening murder.’
‘Sweet Jesus!’ Kier rubbed his face with his palms. Abi could hear the rasp on his unshaven cheeks. ‘I don’t know what’s happened to me. I wanted to save your soul, Abi. I could see the danger. I could see the evil spirits spinning round you. They were everywhere in that house. In the church. Back in Cambridge. One day, suddenly, you were surrounded by whirling lights and voices. You didn’t seem to see them.’ He looked up and to her horror Abi saw tears in his eyes. ‘I responded the only way I knew how. To try and surround you with Jesus’ love and protection, to try somehow to protect you myself. I did it all wrong.’ He dropped his face back into his hands, and she saw the tears trickling between his fingers.
Justin frowned. ‘Can you see these spirits round her now, Kier,’ he said gently.
Abi froze. She felt a cold breath circle round her as she stood staring at them. She leaned forward, her hands on the table, feeling the warmth and solidity of the old wood beneath her fingers, waiting in silence for his answer. Kier looked up and stared at her. Then he nodded.
‘Describe them.’ Justin walked over to his desk and produced his jar of smudge bundles. He scrabbled amongst the litter of pens and other oddments on the desk for a box of matches and lit the bunch of herbs, waving them gently until the flame died to be replaced by a wisp of blue smoke. He laid them in a dish and brought it back to the table, standing it in front of Abi.
‘I can see a young girl. Her hands are all strange. She is holding them out, twisted, like claws – ’
