Page 93 of The Moorwitch
It works the moment he turns back from the now closed window; I feel a surge of relief as the magic rushes from my fingertips to light the worsted. The pattern flares brightly, its light faintly tinged by the red dye in the wool.
“Now,” I say, rising with two spools of white thread in hand, “defend yourself.”
Tossing him one spool, I pull thread from the other and Weave a slow cat’s cradle; he rushes to mimic my movements, managing to create his ward knot just in time—a series of bright red lights suddenly burst from the illusion spell on the pegboard. Shaped like small fiery dragonflies, trailing sparks in their wake, the wisps dive and dart, attacking Conrad. I know from experience that where they strike him, they’ll leave sharp stings that take a few minutes to fade.
Conrad discovers this right away, when he fails to channel quickly enough and a wisp stings his neck. He yelps and finally lights his Weave, generating a flash of blue light that spreads like a web in front of him. The five remaining wisps collide with it and explode in a shower of glittering sparks.
“That’s it!” I say. “Now move quickly—there are more!”
Six more times my illusion knot sends a burst of wisps into the air, and six more times Conrad manages to Weave the ward spell, each time faster and more sure of the movements. Then the yarn on the pegboard burns away to ash, and he is left breathing harder, flushed and triumphant and looking to me with shining eyes for approval. There are a few red marks on his neck and face where the wisps stung him, but he seems hardly to notice. His dark hair flops over his eyes, and when he rakes it back, the collar of his shirt flexes open, revealing a plane of muscled chest.
“Fates,” I breathe, my throat suddenly knotted.
“What’s that?” he asks.
“I said,great! You did great.”
“I did, rather, didn’t I?” Looking entirely too satisfied with himself, he tosses the spool back to me. “C’mon, now.Reallytest me.”
Feeling a flicker of mischief, I smile sweetly and pick up my pegboard, brushing the ashes off. “If you so command.”
Minutes later, Conrad abandons his threads with a yelp and scurries into an empty stall, where he is forced to take refuge under a horse blanket as my band of enchanted broomsticks attempts to clout his ears. When the animating knots I tied around their shafts disintegrate and they drop harmlessly onto the floor, he emerges, panting and wide-eyed. “I wasn’t ready that time!”
With a shrug, I channel into my next Weave—and the bale of hay beside me suddenly rises up and forms itself into the rough shape of a man. It jolts forward, rushing across the wooden floor with a dry, raspy sound. Conrad shouts and struggles out from under the blanket, lunging for his threads. He manages to Weave another ward spell, but not before the straw man thumps him a few times, knocking him into the walls and floor.
“Mercy!” he bellows, as the straw man finally bursts apart and rains down on him. “Have mercy!”
Leaning against the wall, presenting nonchalance to hide the fact I’m on the verge of collapsing after all that channeling, I let out a laugh. “If you so command.”
“’Tis not a command,” he says, thoroughly out of breath. “’Tis a plea.”
Straw sticks out of his hair, and half the buttons on his shirt are undone. But for all his dishevelment, he looks to me in that moment as bright as a sunrise. His smile hides no secrets, his laugh unfettered by weariness. This, I think, is who Conrad was meant to be, before he was ever chained to his duties to Elfhame. He was meant for breathless horse races over a sunbathed moor, for hearty rowing on the Thames with a dozen other bright and ruddy boys, for raucous nights in the pubs with an ale in his hand and a song on his lips.
He was never meant to be shut away in a moldering mansion, away from the world. His life is a shadow of what it might have been, as he is a shadow of himself. This Conrad, the one before me now, is one that must be stowed always in the back of a closet, like a costume worn once a year, while the grimmer, older Conrad must bear the yoke of the Gatekeeper of Elfhame, with so much suspicion in his heart he has no room for mirth.
“What’s wrong?” he asks, and I realize I’ve been staring for too long, while my frown deepened and my brow furrowed.
Smoothing my features, I smile and say, “I think you’re ready for the bigger wards now.”
He brightens, but then his smile drops away.
“Do you hear that?” he whispers.
Footsteps. Right outside the stable door.
“Sylvie?” I ask.
“Quick—hide!”
He points to Bell’s stall. Pulling open the door, he lets me go in first, then he blows out the lantern and shuts the stall behind us—just as the stable door swings open and someone with heavy footsteps plods in.
Conrad and I duck into a pile of hay, with Bell snorting over our heads. Breathing in hay dust, I hold back a sneeze, gripping Conrad’s arm so tightly he winces.
Conrad lifts his head a bit, then ducks down again. “’Tis only Mr. MacDougal. He must have argued with his wife and got himself kicked out again.”
Mr. MacDougal lights the lantern Conrad just extinguished and begins shuffling around, muttering to himself. He fiddles with the lantern, sighs, and then the stable fills with the smell of sweet pipe tobacco. Something heavy scrapes along the floor, and Mr. MacDougal grunts.
“He’s pulling out a cot,” Conrad whispers, rubbing his face with an expression of weary disbelief. “We’re trapped until he falls asleep.”