but the world still waits for you, just as it always was. Nothing has been lost.’ Will understood well her doubts and sorrows — they were too much alike, the two of them. ‘That is a second chance few people get.’
For a moment longer, she kept her head down. But when she looked back at him with a seductive grin and the fire alight in her eyes once more, he saw the Meg he knew. ‘Then let us waste no more time on miserable thoughts. The sooner we can overpower the mad magician, the sooner we can return home. And then we can dance and make merry and. . perhaps. .’
He smiled at the promise in her eyes. Before he could reply, calls and the sound of running feet echoed from the path ahead. As the sailors drew their knives and rapiers, two men careered out of the gloom and the wall of rain. Will recoiled, fearing he was seeing ghosts. Hair plastered to their heads and clothes sodden, Carpenter and Launceston skidded to a halt. Will stared for a moment, stunned.
‘At last,’ Carpenter said, breathless. ‘I could not bear to run another mile.’
‘John!’ Will exclaimed, grasping the other man’s shoulders. He beamed, barely believing his own eyes. ‘Robert! You survived.’
‘The Unseelie Court took us aboard their ship,’ the Earl replied, his whispery voice almost lost beneath the pounding of the rain. ‘But we escaped them.’
Will laughed, relief flooding him. His conscience had been stained by many things, but here was one that would no longer haunt him. ‘Fortune indeed smiles on us. Grace has recovered, and Meg here and the two of you have wriggled out of death’s grasp. Only a day ago, I never would have believed it possible.’
‘Pfft. We have survived worse,’ Launceston sniffed, wiping the rain from his face.
‘Let us save our tales for another time,’ Carpenter insisted, glancing over his shoulder. ‘Lansing marches towards the tower to seize Dee, with the pirate le Gris and his dead crew alongside him. We have little time — they know a short cut.’
Will felt on fire. His spirits had been low, but now it seemed as if no obstacle was too great. ‘Come, then, lads. Now we are reunited, let nothing stand in our way. For England!’
Even as the other men gave full voice to his cheer, another oath seared through his mind:
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
From out of the driving rain, the dark finger of the tower appeared. Thunder boomed and lightning flashed, turning the world white. The column of sodden men raced up the final steps of the crumbling path into a forecourt of broken flagstones where yellowing grass pushed through the cracks. A low wall ran round the edge, overlooking a deep drop down the rocky hillside to the woods below. One by one the torches fizzled and went out in the deluge until they had to splash through pools to cross the final few feet to the foot of the soaring structure. Will looked up, but the summit was lost to the dark. No lights gleamed from the slit windows. Worn by the elements, the tower looked ancient, as old and rough as the stones standing in circles on England’s moors. Above his head, he could just glimpse carvings running round the periphery, their original shapes lost to the slow erosion of the years so that it appeared strange creatures were being birthed from the rock itself.
Carpenter returned from a circuit of the tower’s foot and yelled above the gale, ‘There is no doorway.’
‘Dee has hidden it since I departed,’ Meg shouted, ‘with his magics.’
‘The good doctor is greatly changed by his experiences,’ Will explained to the other men, his words barely audible above the blasting wind, ‘and he has powers now that allow him to walk with the gods. We must not underestimate him.’
‘All well and good,’ Strangewayes bawled, ‘but how do we get inside before the Enemy get here?’
Meg peered up the vertiginous walls of the tower, pointing. ‘Up there, at the height of five men, there is an arched window.’
‘Are we apes?’ Carpenter raged. ‘You expect us to climb that smooth wall, and in this storm? Even if we could find finger-holds, we would be dashed off by the gale in moments.’
The Irish spy narrowed her eyes at him. ‘Then it must be my second suggestion: ram your hard head against the wall enough times and you may batter your way through.’
When Carpenter bristled, Will rested a calming hand on his shoulder. ‘What choice do we have, John? Cup your hands for my shoe — I will try first.’
‘How high must one climb before bones break in the fall, I wonder?’ Launceston mused, stroking his chin. ‘Before organs burst?’
‘Curb your hunger, Robert,’ Will said. ‘You may find out for yourself once the rest of us have failed.’
‘Wait.’ Meg stepped forward, pressing the palms of her hand together as if in prayer. ‘There is another way. But it has many dangers-’
‘More dangers than climbing this tower in the storm?’ Strangewayes growled.
‘More suffering before you die,’ Meg said, arching one eyebrow. ‘The Mooncalf could climb this tower with ease. Indeed, I have seen him do it many a time. He could carry one of you on his back. But at any moment he might unleash the savagery in his breast, and rip you limb from limb and eat your heart before it has stopped beating.’
Will nodded to Meg. ‘Very well. We cannot be defeated at this stage. I will take that risk.’
‘Why not let him try?’ Meg said in a wry tone, pointing at Carpenter, who glowered back.
‘I have asked you all to put your lives in jeopardy in recent times. Now it is my turn,’ Will said. ‘Summon Dee’s beast.’
He instructed the
At the last, Meg stepped in front of him. She held her head up in a commanding stance. ‘Mooncalf, heed me,’ she called out into the night. ‘Do not harm these men. You will have other food soon enough.’
At the crack of her voice, the beast slowed and came to a stop two sword-lengths away. ‘She controls it like a prancing pony,’ Strangewayes hissed. ‘How so?’ The spies took a step back as they took in the horror before them.
Will studied the shadows pooling in Meg’s face and thought he glimpsed the softening of her features. As the Mooncalf raised itself up on powerful legs, he caught sight of the outline of a broad, flattened head that reminded him of the bulls baited in the bear garden on Bankside. The skin was blacker than the night and seemed to gleam as it moved, like pitch. White eyes burning cold moved across the spies. Strangewayes gasped as a lightning flash revealed a face like melted candle wax, the flesh running down to the broad shoulders. The mouth was a black gash showing a hint of sharp, stained teeth. The strong body looked twisted, as if the Mooncalf had been tortured on the rack, yet its muscular power was unmistakable. Despite its terrifying appearance, though, Will sensed something oddly human about it.
‘Do not harm them,’ Meg repeated as a threatening growl rumbled deep in its throat.
‘You are mad to risk your life with that thing,’ Carpenter whispered. ‘It is a wild animal, barely tamed at all.’
‘I would be mad to stand here and do nothing,’ Will replied.
Meg flashed him a look of concern, but then put on a confident face and spoke to the Mooncalf so quietly that none could hear what she said. The beast lurched forward, its breath reeking of meat. It flung its arms round Will and lifted him effortlessly. Pinning him in the crook of its right arm, it bounded at the tower wall. Taloned feet and the long fingers of its left hand found cracks and crevices barely visible to the naked eye in the dark. With a rolling movement, the Mooncalf began to climb.
Pressed tight against the leathery flesh, Will glanced sideways and saw those eyes flicker towards him. In them, he recognized some semblance of intelligence, and it troubled him. What was this thing, not beast, not man?
