‘Do you want something to eat?’
He shrugged.
‘Please, try. It might make you feel better.’ She went to get a blanket out of her bag, and fill Finn’s water bottle at the spring. When she returned, he was picking at the bread. She shook the blanket out and wrapped it round his shoulders, crouching down in front of him. ‘Why don’t you come and sit nearer the fire?’
Finn glanced over at Jack, who was eating rapidly and cutting slices off something – cheese? – with a smaller knife.
‘No. I don’t feel like chatting. And I’m not really hungry. I, um … I guess I’ll try to get some sleep. I’m already useless enough without being exhausted too.’
‘Don’t say that: you’re not useless. I need you. Besides, the magic – it’ll come back.’
‘Maybe.’ He gave her a small smile, took her hand and dropped a kiss into her palm. ‘Don’t worry about me, Merry. Eventually I’ll stop feeling sorry for myself. And I’ll probably feel better once I’ve had some sleep.’
‘Well, give me a shout if you need anything.’
‘I will.’ He wrapped the blanket round himself and lay down, facing the wall of the cave.
Merry went back to the fire, settled herself next to Jack and took a hunk of bread and a handful of nuts.
‘Here.’ Jack poured something from a leather bottle into a horn cup and passed it to her. She took a sip.
‘Mead?’ Jack nodded. Merry felt the honeyed liquid warming her as it slipped down her throat. She was tempted to drink more. But the fire was already making her drowsy, and there was still too much she needed to know. ‘So. Ronan arrived in the autumn, if not earlier. And ever since then he’s been laying waste to the countryside. And he’s killed the queen, and is besieging the king, and if he takes the king he’ll control the kingdom.’ It sounded like a game of chess. ‘Do I have it right?’
‘Yes.’ Jack stuck the small knife into one of the apples, splitting it in half. ‘I was only told a few months ago that my parents – the people who brought me up – were not actually my kin. I travelled to Helmswick and met the king and queen, my natural parents. I spent a day with them. One day. And then …’ His features twisted with anguish. ‘And then I watched my birth mother die.’ He hunched over, wrapping his arms round his knees. It was so familiar a gesture. Merry began to reach out her hand towards him. But she stopped, remembering: this Jack didn’t know her. Had never kissed her, or held her.
‘I’m sorry, Jack.’ She hesitated briefly. ‘How did Ronan kill the queen?’
‘He cut out her heart.’
Merry shivered and took another sip of mead. It sounded as if Ronan was working blood magic, of the darkest kind.
‘My father,’ Jack continued, ‘my blood father, I mean – the queen’s death broke him, I think.’ He nudged a stray brand back into the fire with his foot.
‘Has he given up?’
‘No. But his mind … King Aidan was not, from what I’ve been told, an intolerant man. But now …’ He glanced up at her. ‘He believes magic was responsible for his wife’s death. He blames your kind: witches and wizards. He’s outlawed them, ordered them to be hunted down and executed. And Ronan, he has been searching them out too, offering wealth and position in return for their aid, taking by force those who refuse. Some have joined him willingly, eager for gain, although there are many more who have gone into hiding. It is not a good time to have magical power.’
Now, Merry understood Jack’s earlier caution. If both Ronan’s forces and the king’s servants were searching for witches and wizards, then neither she nor Finn were safe. ‘What about the harpies? Did Ronan create them, or bring them from somewhere?’
Jack looked confused by her question.
‘Harpies? No. They’ve always been here. They’re far more dangerous since Ronan arrived, of course. They thrive in the dark magic he has unleashed across the land, and have grown bolder and more numerous. Do you not have such creatures where you dwell?’
‘No. Only in stories.’ Merry felt a current of panic snake through her guts. ‘What about, um, unicorns?’
‘Yes. Not in the forest we journeyed through today, but further south.’
Oh. ‘Mermaids?’
Jack nodded, frowning at her, as if the existence of mermaids was so obvious that only an idiot would even ask.
‘Dragons?’
‘No, no dragons. They were mostly killed by the elves.’ Jack’s eyes narrowed. ‘Where exactly are you from, Merry?’
‘I’m from …’ Merry hesitated, trying to picture a map of England and remember which counties had been around in Anglo-Saxon times, ‘Northumberland.’ It came out sounding more like a question, but Jack seemed satisfied: he grunted, though, in a tone that suggested he didn’t have a high opinion of people from Northumberland.
Did that mean they were in fact in England, just in a different time? Merry wasn’t convinced. Given what Jack had just told her, she wasn’t sure this was a real place at all. It sounded more like she and Finn had fallen into a story book …
A huge yawn overtook her, and she wondered what the time was; she didn’t have a watch, and her phone was dead. Past midnight, probably. Definitely time to sleep. But she had one further question. ‘Have you ever heard of a wizard named Gwydion?’
Jack face darkened. ‘I have. He was a monster. But no one has seen him for years.’
‘Oh. So, Jack, how old are you?’
‘Nearly nineteen, I believe.’
Nineteen? Her Jack had been snatched by Gwydion just after his eighteenth birthday. Had Ronan’s arrival just messed up the sequence of events, or had Ronan put a permanent stop to Gwydion’s plans? Or was Gwydion still alive and plotting?
Jack stood up. ‘I must check on Sorrel. Then I’ll take the first watch. You should get some sleep.’ He hesitated, turning the short knife he’d been using on the food over and over in his fingers. ‘Thank you. For saving me from the harpy earlier, instead of leaving me.’ He nodded at her. ‘I am in your debt.’
‘You’re welcome. But I would never have left you. I …’ Merry paused. Because what could she really say?
I thought I’d lost you …
I used to love you …
At least, I loved someone almost exactly like you …
Jack tilted his head, quizzical.
‘What?’
Merry pressed her hands to her cheeks.
‘The fire’s hot. I should check on Finn. Then I’ll sleep.’
‘Good.’
Jack grabbed the sword and the belt he’d discarded earlier. Merry waited until he’d left and then tipped the remaining nuts back into a leather pouch and took the empty bowl over to the spring. There was one other thing she had to do before she could rest. Filling the bowl with water she took off her silver bracelet and murmured the incantation.
Show me my brother.
The water went black. And then … And then, she saw Leo. He was alive. Her heart quickened and she squinted at the little picture, taking in every detail. He was alive, and sitting at a table, and he was concentrating – she could tell, because of the way he was biting on the side of his lower lip, the same way he always used to when he was studying.