A Discovery Of Witches Part 56

"n.o.body could have protected me-except me. Satu was right. I'm a sorry excuse for a witch." My head went back to my knees again. "I'm not like my mother at all."

Matthew stood, extending one hand. "Get up," he said abruptly.

I slid my hand into his, expecting him to comfort me with a hug. Instead he pushed my arms into the sleeves of the blue parka and stepped away.

"You are a witch. It's time you learned how to take care of yourself."

"Not now, Matthew."

"I wish we could let you decide, but we can't," he said brusquely. "The Congregation wants your power-or the knowledge of it at the very least. They want Ashmole 782, and you're the only creature in more than a century to see it."

"They want you and the Knights of Lazarus, too." I was desperate to make this about something besides me and my ill-understood magic.

"They could have brought down the brotherhood before. The Congregation has had plenty of chances." Matthew was obviously sizing me up and gauging my few strengths and considerable weaknesses. It made me feel vulnerable. "But they don't really care about that. They don't want me to have you or the ma.n.u.script."

"But I'm surrounded by protectors. You're with me-Sarah and Em, too."

"We can't be with you every moment, Diana. Besides, do you want Sarah and Emily to risk their lives to save yours?" It was a blunt question, and his face twisted. He backed away from me, eyes narrowed to slits.

"You're frightening me," I said as his body lowered into a crouch. The final, lingering touches of morphine drifted through my blood, chased away by the first rush of adrenaline.

"No I'm not." He shook his head slowly, looking every inch a wolf as his hair swayed around his face. "I'd smell it if you were truly frightened. You're just off balance."

A rumbling began in the back of Matthew's throat that was a far cry from the sounds he made when he felt pleasure. I took a wary step away from him.

"That's better," he purred. "At least you have a taste of fear now."

"Why are you doing this?" I whispered.

He was gone without a word.

I blinked. "Matthew?"

Two cold patches bored into the top of my skull.

Matthew was hanging like a bat between two tree limbs, his arms outstretched like wings. His feet were hooked around another branch. He watched me intently, little flickers of frost my only indication of the changes in his focus.

"I'm not a colleague you're having an argument with. This isn't an academic dispute-this is life or death."

"Come down from there," I said sharply. "You've made your point."

I didn't see him land at my side, but I felt his cold fingers at my neck and chin, twisting my head to the side and exposing my throat. "If I were Gerbert, you'd be dead already," he hissed.

"Stop it, Matthew." I struggled to break free but made no progress.

"No." His grip tightened. "Satu tried to break you, and you want to disappear because of it. But you have to fight back."

"I am." I pushed against his arms to prove my point.

"Not like a human," Matthew said contemptuously. "Fight back like a witch."

He vanished again. This time he wasn't in the tree, nor could I feel his cold eyes on me.

"I'm tired. I'm going back to the house." After I'd taken only three steps in that direction, there was a whoosh. Matthew had slung me over his shoulder, and I was moving-fast-the opposite way.

"You aren't going anywhere."

"Sarah and Em will be out here if you keep this up." One of them was bound to sense that something was wrong. And if they they didn't, Tabitha would surely kick up a fuss. didn't, Tabitha would surely kick up a fuss.

"No they won't." Matthew set me on my feet deeper in the woods. "They promised not to leave the house-not if you screamed, no matter what danger they sensed."

I crept backward, wanting to put some distance between me and his huge black eyes. The muscles in his legs coiled to spring. When I turned to make a run for it, he was already in front of me. I turned in the opposite direction, but he was there. A breeze stirred around my feet.

"Good," he said with satisfaction. Matthew's body lowered into the same position he'd taken stalking the stag at Sept-Tours, and the menacing growl started up again.

The breeze moved around my feet in gusts, but it didn't increase. The tingling descended from my elbows into my nails. Instead of pushing back my frustration, I let the feeling mount. Arcs of blue electricity moved between my fingers.

"Use your power," he rasped. "You can't fight me any other way."

My hands waved in his direction. It didn't seem very threatening, but it was all I could think of. Matthew proved just how worthless my efforts were by pouncing on me and spinning me around before vanishing into the trees.

"You're dead-again." His voice came from somewhere to my right.

"Whatever you're trying to do isn't working!" I shouted in his direction.

"I'm right behind you," he purred into my ear.

My scream split the silence of the forest, and the winds rose around me in a cyclonic coc.o.o.n. "Stay away!" I roared.

Matthew reached for me with a determined look, his hands shooting through my windy barrier. I flung mine in his direction, instinct taking over, and a rush of air knocked him back on his heels. He looked surprised, and the predator appeared in the depths of his eyes. He came at me again in another attempt to break the wind's hold. Though I concentrated on pushing him back, the air didn't respond as I wanted it to.

"Stop trying to force it," Matthew said. He was fearless and had made his way through the cyclone, his fingers digging into my upper arms. "Your mother spellbound you so that no one could force your magic-not even you."

"Then how do I call it when needed and control it when it's not?"

"Figure it out." Matthew's snowy gaze flickered over my neck and shoulders, instinctively locating my major veins and arteries.

"I can't." A wave of panic engulfed me. "I'm not a witch."

"Stop saying that. It's not true, and you know it." He dropped me abruptly. "Close your eyes. Start walking."

"What?"

"I've watched you for weeks, Diana." The way he was moving was completely feral, the smell of cloves so overpowering that my throat closed. "You need movement and sensory deprivation so that all you can do is feel. feel." He gave me a push, and I stumbled. When I turned back, he was gone.

My eyes circled the forest. The woods were eerily silent, the animals shielding themselves from the powerful predator in their midst.

Closing my eyes, I began to breathe deeply. A breeze ruffled past me, first in one direction, then in another. It was Matthew, taunting me. I focused on my breathing, trying to be as still as the rest of the creatures in the forest, then set out.

There was a tightness between my eyes. I breathed into it, too, remembering Amira's yoga instruction and Marthe's advice to let the visions pa.s.s through me. The tightness turned to tingling and the tingling to a sense of possibility as my mind's eye-a witch's third eye-opened fully for the first time.

It took in everything that was alive in the forest-the vegetation, the energy in the earth, the water moving underneath the ground-each vital force distinct in color and shade. My mind's eye saw the rabbits crouched in the hollow of a tree, their hearts thundering in fear as they smelled the vampire. It detected the barn owls, their late-afternoon naps brought to a premature end by this creature who swung from tree limbs and jumped like a panther. The rabbits and owls knew they couldn't escape him.

"King of the beasts," I whispered.

Matthew's low chuckle sounded through the trees.

No creature in the forest could fight Matthew and win. "Except me," I breathed.

My mind's eye swept over the forest. A vampire is not fully alive, and it was hard to find him amid the dazzling energy that surrounded me. Finally I located his shape, a concentration of darkness like a black hole, the edges glowing red where his preternatural life force met the vitality of the world. Instinctively turning my face in his direction alerted him to my scrutiny and he slid away, fading into the shadows between the trees.

With both eyes closed and my mind's eye open, I started walking, hoping to lure him into following. Behind me his darkness detached from a maple tree in a gash of red and black amid the green. This time my face remained pointed in the opposite direction.

"I see you, Matthew," I said softly.

"Do you, ma lionne ma lionne? And what will you do about it?" He chuckled again but kept stalking me, the distance between us constant.

With each step my mind's eye grew brighter, its vision more acute. There was a brushy shrub to my left, and I leaned to the right. Then there was a rock in front of me, its sharp gray edges protruding from the soil. I picked up my foot to keep from tripping.

The movement of air across my chest told me there was a small clearing. It wasn't just the life of the forest that was speaking to me now. All around me the elements were sending messages to guide my way. Earth, air, fire, and water connected with me in tiny pinp.r.i.c.ks of awareness that were distinct from the life in the forest.

Matthew's energy focused in on itself and become darker and deeper. Then his darkness-his absence of life-arced through the air in a graceful pounce that any lion would have envied. He stretched his arms to grab me.

Fly, I thought, a second before his fingers touched my skin. I thought, a second before his fingers touched my skin.

The wind rose from my body in a sudden whoosh of power. The earth released me with a gentle push upward. Just as Matthew had promised, it was easy to let my body follow where my thoughts had led. It took no more effort than following an imaginary ribbon up to the sky.

Far below, Matthew somersaulted in midair and landed lightly on his feet precisely where I'd stood a few moments before.

I soared above the treetops, my eyes wide. They felt full of the sea, as vast as the horizon, and bright with sunlight and stars. My hair floated on the currents of air, the ends of each strand turning into tongues of flame that licked my face without burning. The tendrils caressed my cheeks with warmth as the cold air swept past. A raven swooped by me in flight, amazed at this strange new creature sharing her airs.p.a.ce.

Matthew's pale face was turned up to me, his eyes full of wonder. When our gazes connected, he smiled.

It was the most beautiful thing I'd ever seen. There was a surge of desire, strong and visceral, and a rush of pride that he was mine.

My body dove toward him, and Matthew's face turned in an instant from wonder to wariness. He snarled, unsure of me, his instincts warning that I might attack.

Pulling back on my nosedive, I descended more slowly until our eyes were level, my feet streaming behind in Sarah's rubber boots. The wind whipped a lock of my flaming hair in his direction.

Don't harm him. My every thought was focused on his safety. Air and fire obeyed me, and my third eye drank in his darkness. My every thought was focused on his safety. Air and fire obeyed me, and my third eye drank in his darkness.

"Stay away from me," he growled, "just for a moment." Matthew was struggling to master his predatory instincts. He wanted wanted to hunt me now. The king of beasts didn't like to be bested. to hunt me now. The king of beasts didn't like to be bested.

Paying no attention to his warning, I lowered my feet until they floated a few inches above the ground and held out my hand, palm upturned. My mind's eye filled with the image of my own energy: a shifting ma.s.s of silver and gold, green and blue, shimmering like a morning star. I scooped some of it up, watching as it rolled from my heart through my shoulder and arm.

A pulsing, swirling ball of sky, sea, earth, and fire sat in my palm. The ancient philosophers would have called it a microcosm-a little world that contained fragments of me as well as the larger universe.

"For you," I said, voice hollow. My fingers tipped toward him.

Matthew caught the ball as it fell. It moved like quicksilver, molding itself to his cold flesh. My energy came to a quivering rest in the scoop of his hand.

"What is it?" he asked, distracted from his urge to hunt by the gleaming substance.

"Me," I said simply. Matthew fixed his attention on my face, his pupils engulfing the gray-green irises in a wave of black. "You won't hurt me. I won't hurt you either."

The vampire cradled my microcosm carefully in his hand, afraid to spill a drop.

"I still don't know how to fight," I said sadly. "All I can do is fly away."

"That's the most important lesson a warrior learns, witch." Matthew's mouth turned what was usually a derogatory term among vampires into an endearment. "You learn how to pick your battles and let go of those you can't win, to fight another day."

"Are you afraid of me?" I asked, my body still hovering.

"No," he said.

My third eye tingled. He was telling the truth. "Even though I have that inside me?" My glance flickered to the glowing, twitching ma.s.s in his hand.

Matthew's face was guarded and careful. "I've seen powerful witches before. We still don't know all that's inside you, though. We have to find out."

"I never wanted to know."

"Why, Diana? Why wouldn't you want these gifts?" He drew his hand tighter, as if my magic might be s.n.a.t.c.hed away and destroyed before he understood its possibilities.

"Fear? Desire?" I said softly, touching his strong cheekbones with the tips of my fingers, shocked anew at the power of my love for him. Remembering what his daemon friend Bruno had written in the sixteenth century, I quoted it again. "'Desire urges me on, as fear bridles me.' Doesn't that explain everything that happens in the world?" Doesn't that explain everything that happens in the world?"

"Everything but you," he told me, his voice thick. "There's no accounting for you."

My feet touched the ground, and I pulled my fingers from his face, slowly unfurling them. My body seemed to know the smooth movement, though my mind was quick to register its strangeness. The piece of myself that I'd given to Matthew leaped from his hand into mine. My palm closed around it, the energy quickly reabsorbed. There was the tingle of a witch's power, and I recognized it as my own. I hung my head, frightened by the creature I was becoming.

Matthew's fingertip drew aside my curtain of hair. "Nothing will hide you from this magic-not science, not willpower, not concentration. It will always find you. And you can't hide from me either."

"That's what my mother said in the oubliette. She knew about us." Frightened by the memory of La Pierre, my mind's eye closed protectively. I shivered, and Matthew drew me near. It was no warmer in his cold arms, but it felt far safer.

"Perhaps that made it easier for them, to know you wouldn't be alone," Matthew said softly. His lips were cool and firm, and my own parted to draw him closer. He buried his face in my neck, and I heard him take in my scent with a sharp inhalation. He pulled away with reluctance, smoothing my hair and tucking the parka more closely around me.

"Will you train me to fight, like one of your knights?"

Matthew's hands stilled. "They knew how to defend themselves long before coming to me. But I've trained warriors in the past-humans, vampires, daemons. Even Marcus, and G.o.d knows he was a challenge. Never a witch, though."

"Let's go home." My ankle was still throbbing, and I was ready to drop with fatigue. After a few halting steps, Matthew swung me onto his back like a child and walked through the twilight with my arms clasped around his neck. "Thank you again for finding me," I whispered when the house came into view. He knew this time I wasn't talking about La Pierre.

"I'd stopped looking long ago. But there you were in the Bodleian Library on Mabon. A historian. A witch, no less." Matthew shook his head in disbelief.

"That's what makes it magic," I said, planting a soft kiss above his collar. He was still purring when he put me down on the back porch.

Matthew went to the woodshed to get more logs for the fire, leaving me to make peace with my aunts. Both of them looked uneasy.

"I understand why you kept it secret," I explained, giving Em a hug that made her gasp with relief, "but Mom told me the time for secrets was over."