The Witch’s Blood. Katharine Corr

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      There was the sound of wood against stone, and sunlight hit his face. He blinked, half-opening his eyes.

      ‘Ronan?’ Leo reached up to touch his boyfriend’s face. They’d been at Ronan’s campsite together, and then they’d walked to the lake, and Ronan had lit a fire, and then …

      And then.

      Leo gasped and scrambled backwards, away from Ronan, to the edge of the room. ‘What did you do to me?’ He clawed at the pattern burnt into the skin of his chest, making it bleed.

      ‘Leo, don’t—’ Ronan took a step nearer.

      ‘No! Stay away!’ Leo remembered now. The figure of the King of Hearts, emerging from the water. The unbearable, suffocating pain as it took control of his body. And then his sister –

      Merry. He’d tried to warn her. To scream at her to run. But the thing inside him had laughed. And Ronan had laughed. And then his sister and Ronan had started fighting, hurling spells at each other. ‘Merry?’

      ‘She’s alive. Safe.’

      ‘You tried to kill her.’

      ‘I didn’t—’ Ronan broke off and dropped into a wooden chair, crossing his legs. ‘I just couldn’t let her stop me, Leo. I had to get away. Even in our world, I’m not,’ his mouth twisted, ‘not normal.’ He meant the world of witches, and wizards, and half-remembered magic. ‘I needed the power that was trapped under the lake.’ Ronan looked up again, and Leo could see the hunger blazing in his eyes. ‘I still need it. And I needed you to act as,’ he waved a hand through the air, ‘a vessel, to transport that power. But even if I hadn’t, I would never have left you behind. I love you. I thought you loved me.’

      ‘Love?’ Leo shivered and took a deep breath, wincing as the skin across his chest stretched. ‘How can you even use that word after what you’ve done?’ He glanced around, taking in his surroundings for the first time: a stone room, like the inside of a castle; rushes on the floor; a low bed with furs strewn across it. Nowhere he recognised. Panic twisted his gut. ‘Where are we?’

      Ronan shrugged slightly. ‘Somewhere safe. Another time. Another reality. Somewhere I can properly exist.’

      ‘I don’t understand.’

      ‘I couldn’t stay in our time, Leo. D’you think I liked stealing from other witches and wizards? Living on the dregs of their power? Knowing that I would always be despised, always hunted?’ He laughed; it was a hard, bitter sound. ‘I was a parasite! At least, that’s how they saw me. The King of Hearts has taken us to a place where I can use its power and the power of the shadow realm. Permanently. No more stealing. But there’s no way back, for either of us now.’

      Leo swallowed hard. ‘The King of Hearts …’

      Ronan leant forward, steepling his fingers. ‘It’s not inside you any more. I promise.’

      Was he telling the truth? The King of Hearts was a creature of the shadow realm created by the evil wizard Gwydion – a malevolent, bodiless entity that needed a human host to exist. Leo remembered being sealed inside his own head at the lake, remembered the suffocating presence that had taken his limbs and mouth for its own. He felt as if he was in control of his body again. But was he truly free of the creature?

      His abductor was watching him. ‘We can be together now, Leo, and no one can—’

      ‘She’ll come for me.’ Leo hugged his knees to his chest, digging his nails into the flesh of his arms, focusing on the pain to keep from screaming. ‘Merry will find me.’

      Ronan shook his head.

      ‘No, she won’t. They won’t let her. The coven, I mean. Besides, she has Finn now.’

      Finn, the wizard who’d shown up in Tillingham just after Gran had gone missing? It was true that he and Merry had been spending a lot of time together, but Leo couldn’t quite remember whether his sister had actually been dating the guy. Finn had been there too, hadn’t he? At the lake, that night. Ronan was still talking.

      ‘Finn will take her back to Ireland and she’ll forget all about her big brother. He’ll make sure of that.’ Ronan stood up, dragged one of the furs off the bed and tossed it to Leo. ‘That’s what you never understood about witches and wizards. We’re selfish. We might try to hide it with oaths about helping plebs and so on, but that’s just a veneer. Even for your precious sister. She has her power. And now she’s with Finn, she’ll have position and wealth as well – everything she could possibly want. To be sure, she’ll grieve for you, for a while. But then she’ll move on.’

      ‘No. You’re lying, you’re—’ Leo tried to force himself back through the wall as Ronan walked towards him. ‘Merry wouldn’t leave me here with you. She wouldn’t.’

      Ronan crouched down in front of him. ‘We’ll see. But in the meantime, you need to trust me, Leo. You belong to me now, and I’m going to take care of you …’

      

       ACK.

      Nearly five months had passed since they’d last stood face to face. But Merry would have known him anywhere. Sure, his hair was shorter. And his clothes were different. Gone were the princely garments with the rich embroidery and fur trimming. Instead, he was wearing coarse woollen trousers, a cloth shirt and a ragged leather tunic. His forearms were painted with patterns and symbols, dark blue lines swirling and interlocking. The only hint of luxury was a gold belt buckle, which gleamed with hints of red and green, despite the dull grey light. And he looked older. Wearier.

      Still, she knew him.

      He was the same boy she’d fallen in love with. The same cursed prince who had been put into an enchanted sleep fifteen hundred years ago and had woken in her own time, still possessed by a creature summoned from the shadow realm. Of course, he’d been a corpse the last time she’d seen him. Actually seen him, not just dreamt about him. His dead body had been lying on the floor of the wizard Gwydion’s chambers, beneath the Black Lake. She’d knelt by him, wept over him, kissed him –

      The temptation to run to him now, to throw her arms round his neck, was almost too strong to resist.

      But Jack – this Jack – was holding a long, angular knife to Finn’s throat. Finn was on his knees in the snow, panting, his face pale and rigid. Jack had hold of Finn’s hair, and as Merry stepped forward he yanked the wizard’s head further back, making the other boy cry out in pain. The blade was hard against Finn’s skin now, and Merry could see a bead of blood welling up against the dark metal.

      Jack frowned at her. There was no recognition.

      ‘Who are you? And how do you know my name?’

      She tried to read his feelings, to use that ability to pick up emotions that she’d gained a few months ago. But there was nothing. СКАЧАТЬ