Torch Page 6

  Ivy turned to face him, mouth stern and eyes expressionless. Trying to look like a queen passing judgment, instead of a girl saying goodbye to the boy she loved.

  “Well, then,” she said. “One spriggan can do little harm to anyone. But you must leave this homestead and never return so long as my people dwell here. And you must swear not to cast a spell or raise a weapon against us as long as you live.”

  “Not even to defend myself?” Martin’s eyes narrowed. “You drive a hard bargain, lady.”

  “Harder where there’s none,” Ivy told him, aching with memory. So much tenderness had passed between them since they last spoke those words to each other, but she couldn’t falter now. “Do you want to live? Then swear.”

  “I swear it.” He shifted to one knee and bowed his head before her. “I will go far away, and do no harm to you or your followers even if it costs me my life. I swear it by my blood, my hoard, and my true name.”

  “If you break your promise,” Ivy warned, “my men will kill you. You must never be seen here again in any form, do you understand?”

  Please understand, she begged silently, hoping Martin could hear her. I’d rather lose you forever than have to watch you die.

  “I understand.” Martin looked up at her, his gray eyes rimmed red. “I will obey you—my Joan.” Then he vanished.

  “My Joan.” Teasel clucked her tongue. “Can you believe the cheek!” She tucked another blanket around the sleeping Yarrow and rose, brushing straw from her skirt. “But you served that spriggan right, I’d say.”

  Ivy stood silent, her throat too tight for words. She’d never meant to claim the title of Joan at all, let alone so boldly. If she’d had enough confidence she’d have told the truth about the Lighting days ago and let her people choose someone else to lead them—but now she was glad she hadn’t, for Martin’s sake.

  “He’d better not show his pointy nose here again,” Teasel went on darkly. “Or he’ll find my fist in it. My Joan indeed! As if a spriggan had any right!” She patted Ivy’s shoulder. “You’ve had quite a shock, me bird, but it’s over now. Go and get dry.”

  She’d never have dared talk to Betony like that, let alone touch her with such familiarity. But she thought nothing of doing it with Ivy. How could her fellow piskeys obey her one moment and boss her about the next? They might call her their Joan, but they hardly acted as though they believed it. No more than Ivy did herself.

  Yet a strange thing had happened when she’d spoken up to save Martin. She’d been playing a role at first, trying to imitate Queen Valerian’s grave dignity and imagine what she would say. But as she did so, she’d felt a strange peace inside, and the right words had come to her lips with no thought or preparation at all . . .

  “What in the name of all that’s green and growing—?” Thorn spluttered. She stood in the doorway with fists on hips, staring up at the clumsily patched roof. “Which one of you pebble-heads made such a crow’s dinner of this?”

  A roar of laughter rose from the piskey-men as Gem got up and sauntered over, grinning at her. “We’re miners, me lover, not carpenters. We’ll mend the slates and mortar, if you’ll sort the rest.”

  Thorn only wrinkled her nose at the endearment—she’d got used to the piskeys’ Cornish slang and knew better than to take it literally. “The wood needs to dry out first,” she said. “And in this weather that won’t be easy.”

  Gem glanced hopefully at Ivy, who pretended not to notice. With any luck he’d think up his own reasons why his Joan might not choose to conjure fire in such an awkward, high-up place, and never guess it was because Ivy couldn’t do it.

  “As soon as you’re ready, then,” Gem said with a shrug. “We’ll get to the slates dreckly.”

  Thorn probably didn’t know that meant “when we feel like it” instead of “straight away,” because she looked mollified and said no more. Ivy was about to take her outside and tell her what had happened with Martin when little Thrift cried, “She’s woke up!”

  Yarrow had bolted upright, eyes wild and face ghastly. Ivy hurried to her. “It’s all right. You’re safe here.”

  Fern and Teasel bustled over to make the young healer more comfortable, while Daisy shut the door of the box stall to keep the other piskeys from peering in. “How do you feel?” Ivy asked.

  Yarrow’s gaze darted in all directions, as though reassuring herself the barn and the other piskey-women were real. “Like I’ve woken from a nightmare,” she whispered.

  “Never you mind,” said Teasel, draping a blanket around her shoulders. “You had a fair stank from the Delve in that foul weather, and it’s a good thing Mica found you in time. But you were right to come to us.”

  Yarrow gave a hysterical laugh. “Right? Nothing’s right. We’ll never be right again.”

  “What do you mean?” Ivy asked sharply. The Delve’s healer had always been calm and levelheaded; this wasn’t like her at all. “What happened?”

  The healer’s face crumpled. “Shale,” she faltered, and burst into tears.

  It took a long time for Ivy and the women to comfort her: every touch and kind word only seemed to make Yarrow more distraught. But at last she wiped her eyes and stammered out her story.

  Last night she’d gone down to Betony’s stateroom as usual, to bring the Joan her evening dose of medicine. Her wound was healing, but she was still flushed and slightly feverish, and Yarrow feared she might have an infection. When she reached the Joan’s chambers she’d lifted the ring to knock, only to hear a horrible scream from inside. Alarmed, Yarrow rushed in—and found Shale lying on the stones by Betony and Gossan’s feet, charred almost beyond recognition.

  “She’d burned him to death,” she choked. “Just like she did Jenny.”

  Moss’s hands flew to her mouth, and Ivy’s stomach twisted in horror. She still had nightmares about Jenny, as did all the people who’d loved her. No one who’d seen her die would ever forget it.

  “But why?” blurted Daisy, her hands over Thrift’s ears. The little girl squirmed, but her mother refused to let go. “What harm could poor silly Shale do anyone?”

  “He talked too much,” Ivy said heavily. “He told Mattock what was happening in the Delve.”

  “I thought it was the poison,” Yarrow murmured. “I thought she’d grown sick in her mind, and I pitied her. But she’s worse than mad—she’s evil—”

  A sob wracked her, and she buried her face in her arms. Teasel patted her gently and gazed at the circle of women.

  “So,” she said. “Betony’s got her fire back.”

  And she’s angry, Ivy thought, feeling queasy. Angry enough to kill.

  The road beyond the house was littered with fallen branches, the front garden flat and muddy as a giant’s footprint. Ivy stood at the front window, rubbing her arms. She’d dried off and changed her clothes, but she still felt cold.

  “I really thought we had a chance,” she said to the faeries, who sat on the sofa behind her. “Even if Gossan and his men came. But now . . .”

  “You’re not doomed yet, by the sound of it,” Thorn pointed out. “We’re a three-mile walk from the Delve here, and if Betony’s still weak, she won’t be making it soon.”

  “Which means there’s time to move your people,” added Broch, “if we can find a safe place for them.”

  Ivy let out a slow breath. They were right, but that was a big if. And Gossan could still attack at any time, even without Betony’s help.

  “We could teach your people battle magic,” Thorn suggested. “Broch and I know a few spells from when we fought the Empress.”

  “I don’t think they’d let you.” Ivy turned away from the window and slumped into a chair. “Every time I think my people are changing for the better, something happens to remind me they don’t really want to change at all.”

  Thorn sighed. “I’m going to regret saying this, but if Martin’s been poking the wasps’ nest, then Queen Valerian ought to know about it. I’m pretty sure she didn’t spare his lif
e just so your people could execute him instead.”

  Ivy looked up sharply. “How did you . . .”

  “We saw you and Martin by the barn,” Broch said. “And when the roof started breaking, we heard the wind change. After hearing all your people’s tales about spriggans, I doubt they took well to finding one on their doorstep.” His mouth gave a rueful twist. “Literally.”

  “They would have killed him if I hadn’t banished him first.” Ivy rubbed her eyes. “He’s the only spriggan left in the world, and they’re more scared of him than they are of Betony.”

  “That’s because they know what to expect from her,” said Broch. “She may be cruel, but she’s still a piskey. Spriggans are . . . something else.”

  “And Martin is definitely something else,” added Thorn dryly. “Though I’m guessing they don’t know how you feel about him, or we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Where is he now?”

  “I have no idea. All I know is it’s a long way from here, and he’s alone, and cold, and hungry.” Anger flared up in Ivy, and she slapped the arms of the chair. “Why does this keep happening to him? He’s spent his whole life running. He’s never had a moment’s peace!”

  “You can’t say he didn’t earn at least some of it,” said Thorn. “He hasn’t exactly been a little snowdrop of virtue, either.”

  “He wouldn’t deny that. But he never would have had to live that way if my ancestors hadn’t murdered his entire clan!” Ivy shoved herself to her feet and began pacing. “And the war between our tribes only started because one jealous knocker killed the Joan and blamed a spriggan for it.” Or maybe the spriggan had been guilty, after all. The legend didn’t say, and probably no one would ever know.

  Broch sat up, alert as a hunting badger. “I haven’t heard that story. Where did you hear it?”

  “It doesn’t matter. My people wouldn’t believe it anyway. The last thing they want to hear is that the spriggans used to protect our treasure instead of stealing it, and that the Joan was their queen too.” Ivy sighed. “Piskeys have done too many terrible things to spriggans to admit we were wrong to do it.”

  “They did terrible things to faeries too,” said Broch. “But that didn’t keep them from accepting us.”

  Ivy gave a wan smile. “You have a beard like a piskey-man, and you work hard and show respect for our traditions. And Thorn looks more like a piskey than I do. They’ll accept you as long as you don’t start acting different.” She raised a hand to the window, tracing a trickle of rain down the cold glass. “Or remind them how their fathers and granfers treated your people a hundred years ago.”

  There was a long silence. Then the sofa creaked, and Broch rose to his feet. “I’ll find Martin,” he said, stooping to kiss Thorn. “If you put some food and supplies together, Ivy, I’ll see he gets them.”

  Ivy blinked, but the faery man had already vanished. “Typical sentimental Green Isles nonsense,” grumbled Thorn, but her cheeks were pink and she didn’t look half as annoyed as she sounded. “At this rate he’ll be singing Martin a lullaby and tucking him in at night, too.”

  “I found him in an old dolmen, an hour’s flight southwest,” Broch said as they sat down to supper that evening. “If he banished himself any further, he’d be in the sea.”

  But Martin had taken the food, blankets, and winter coat Ivy had sent him; that was something. And although Broch hadn’t looked beneath the quoit that sheltered him, Ivy guessed it was more spacious than it seemed. Maybe even big enough for two.

  “I’m in your debt,” she told Broch. “We both are.”

  He shrugged and passed the potatoes to Cicely. “It was not a hard journey. And now that I know the place, I can leap there with a thought. If you have any messages, I’ll deliver them.”

  Piskeys, like faeries, did not say thank you except in extraordinary circumstances. So Ivy could only bow her head in gratitude, but Broch’s answering smile told her he understood.

  “That storm was horrible,” said Cicely abruptly. “I watched the news when the power came back, and there were pictures of trees ripped up and cliffs falling into the sea. And barns like ours, with their roofs torn right off.” She shivered. “I’m glad Martin was here to help. Even if he is a spriggan.”

  Ivy’s heart warmed. She reached to put an arm around her, but Cicely stiffened. “What is it?” Ivy asked.

  “I heard . . .” Cicely clutched her braid. “Someone told me you can’t make fire, you’re just letting people think you can. Is it true?”

  Heat flooded Ivy’s cheeks, but with an effort she stayed calm. Thorn and Broch hadn’t even reacted: they already knew the truth, after all. “Mica, I suppose?”

  Cicely hunched her shoulders. “He made me promise not to tell anyone.”

  Of course he had. If the truth got out, he’d be in trouble too. Drat Mica and his meddling! “It’s only for a little while,” Ivy told her, hiding her clenched fists under the table. “Until I find our people a safe place. Then I’ll tell them everything, and let them can decide what to do.”

  Cicely’s gaze slid to the faeries, then to her lap. “Oh.”

  Of course she was disappointed. She’d been so happy at the Lighting, thinking her sister really was the Joan. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. There’s just been so much going on.”

  Cicely said nothing, but picked up her fork and started eating. Ivy forced herself to relax, glad the conversation was over. Being reminded that she couldn’t make fire was never pleasant. Especially now she knew that Betony could.

  Ivy got up early the next morning, when all the others were still asleep and the dawn no more than a seam of pale gold at the tin-black edge of the sky. She dressed in her warmest clothes and stepped outside, shutting the door quietly behind her. Then she took a running leap, transformed to a peregrine, and soared away.

  The farmstead fell behind, and the landscape of mid-Cornwall spread out before her, bristling with rusty bracken and clumps of yellow furze. Drystone walls marked the borders of old pastures, lined with ranks of spindly, leafless trees. Ivy flew on, her sharp eyes sweeping the ground, until she’d passed all the abandoned buildings and old mines she’d already searched and the scenery no longer looked familiar. There had to be somewhere she could hide her people, even if only for a little while.

  But though she stopped to investigate every ruin and old tunnel she saw, none offered enough room to house nearly thirty piskeys. She flew past several carns, the ancient rock piles that marked the sites of old spriggan troves—but she had no way to enter them without Martin, and their buried chambers were too small to hold for more than a few piskeys in any case. The caves Ivy spotted along the coast were too open to harsh winds and rising tides, their rocky mouths too prone to crumbling. And despite all the scattered wreckage of the storm, humans swarmed everywhere. There was no place to escape them except underground, but the mines Ivy visited proved no safer or drier than any of the others she’d seen.

  By the time she gave up and winged home, Ivy was exhausted. Desperate for a solution, she’d barely rested or eaten all day. But though the piskeys swarmed her eagerly when she came into the barn, all she could tell them was that she’d look again tomorrow. She’d seen no sign of movement outside the Delve, so they ought to be safe for tonight, but they had no time left to spare.

  When Ivy came into the house, Cicely was waiting for her. “Mum rang an hour ago,” she said. “Where were you?”

  Ivy fought the urge to snap at her. “Out. What did she say?”

  “She and David got married today at some sort of . . . office. They’re having a special party in a few days, and she wants us to come.” Cicely clasped her hands under her chin, jittering with excitement. “Can we? She says she’ll buy us train tickets, and I’ve always wanted to ride one.”

  Martin liked trains, too. But thinking of him only made Ivy feel worse. “I’m not going anywhere. Especially not to some human party.” She threw her scarf onto a hook and flung her coat after it. “If she calls ag
ain and I’m not here, tell her I’m busy and I’ll ring back when I can.”

  “But we’d only be gone a day or two,” Cicely protested. “And it’s not like you can do anything to—”

  “Enough!” Ivy rounded on her. “You had your chance to go with Mum, and you said no. If you’ve changed your mind, call her back and ask her to come get you. But I don’t have time to play games, Cicely.”

  Cicely backed away, lips trembling and cheeks red. Then she fled to her bedroom, slamming the door behind her.

  The study door opened, and Thorn stuck her head out. “What’s going on now?”

  “It’s not important,” Ivy told her wearily. “Never mind.”

  Ivy spent two more days searching the countryside, but her efforts were fruitless. She found a couple of places that would serve for one night, but nothing better or safer than what they had now. Which left them no choice but to dig deep, as Hew put it, and defend the barn as best as they could.

  The first priority was to repair the barn. Copper, the old knocker who’d joined them at the Lighting, slowly puzzled the broken slates together, while the other men mended them with magic and crafted stout nails to hammer them back in place. Inside, Thorn inspected the roof from one end to the other, testing the wooden laths for weakness and replacing them as needed. Soon the broken corner of the roof was fixed, and all the leaks stopped up as well.

  Ivy laid wards around the farmstead to alert them to coming danger and flew over the Delve each night to make sure Gossan and his hunters weren’t on the march. The piskey-men took to patrolling in pairs, one armed with a knife and the other with a thunder-axe. Yet her people balked at learning any new magic, no matter how Ivy urged them to reconsider.

  “It’s all right for you to know a few tricks we don’t,” Feldspar told her kindly, “especially as you’re the Joan. But we’ll stick to what we know, and no doubt we’ll be better off for it.”

  Ivy doubted that herself, but there was no moving her people once they’d made up their minds. All she could do was hope the crude weapons and armor they’d made would be enough.