Halloween Magic Page 4

  A maelstrom of emotions swirled over her, alien emotions she’d never experienced before. She was conscious of a deep longing, an unidentified craving that upset her composure far more than his confrontation with her uncle.

  Feeling he had lost this opening skirmish, Joshua decided to bring the meeting to a close. “Come, Verity, we were about to go home,” he said firmly.

  She lowered her eyes. “Yes, Uncle.”

  Nicholas raised her hand to his lips again. “Good-bye, Miss Windsor,” he murmured.

  “Good-bye, Lord Montacute.”

  He gazed after them as they made their way back toward Windsor House. What on earth had come over him? He felt like a gauche schoolboy beset by the first pangs of adolescent infatuation! And all because of Joshua Windsor’s hitherto uninteresting niece!

  But as he stood there he was suddenly conscious of someone watching him. He turned to the willows on the riverbank, where he saw an elegant woman dressed entirely in black gazing in his direction. He didn’t know who she was, but guessed it had to be old Admiral Villiers’ widow. News traveled, especially startling news, and his agent had told him of the goings-on at the manor house. Who would have thought the old seadog would rush to the altar with a beautiful amnesiac found in his garden in the middle of a Halloween storm?

  He continued to look at her, and quite suddenly it seemed her clothes just fell away. His breath caught, for she appeared totally naked. Her mane of red hair tumbled in abandon over her shoulders, and he could see every contour of her body, even the tiny shadows cast by her nipples.

  But she was fully dressed, he knew she was! As he stared, she pursed her lips into a kiss that seemed to reach across to caress his mouth. Then she was clothed again, once more the demure, dignified widow,

  Nicholas was shocked. “Dear God above …” he whispered.

  “I beg your pardon, my lord?” said the vicar, who had just come over to speak to him.

  Nicholas turned. “Oh, er, Reverend Crawshaw ...”

  The clergyman peered curiously at him from behind thick-lensed spectacles. “Are you all right, my lord?”

  “Er, yes, quite all right, thank you. Tell me, who is the lady in black?” Nicholas nodded toward the willows, but the woman had gone.

  “Admiral Villiers’ widow is the only lady in black at the moment, my lord.”

  Nicholas glanced around, but couldn’t see her anywhere.

  The vicar spoke again. “Are you back here for long, my lord?”

  “Hmm? Oh, er, I don’t really know.” Nicholas made himself put the startling widow from his mind, and concentrate on the clergyman. “I haven’t decided yet, Reverend.”

  “I trust we will see something of you?”

  “I trust so too.” Nicholas managed a smile. “Tell me, how have things been in my absence? Is there anything you think I should know?”

  “Well, my lord ...” The clergyman launched upon a lengthy list of parish matters, and as Nicholas listened politely, from the corner of his eye he caught another glimpse of the admiral’s widow. She was by his carriage, which still waited by the ford, and she seemed to be looking down at something in the damp earth. Then she walked away toward the manor house.

  * * *

  It was twilight half an hour later when Nicholas drove on to the castle. Judith held a lace curtain aside to watch his carriage negotiate the ford before turning on to the Ludlow road. She smiled, knowing he had seen her naked, just as she had hoped he would. It was reassuring to know her command of the black arts was powerful enough to influence him a little, even though Verity now possessed the seal.

  Her malignant gaze went toward the ford and the spot where the carriage had waited. The imprint of a fashionable London boot was plainly visible in the mud, and her lips curved into another cool smile.

  It was a smile that would have faded in an instant if she’d realized the extent of Verity’s intrusion into her magic, and the effect the magistrate’s niece was already having upon Nicholas Montacute. But the sorceress didn’t realize. Not yet anyway.

  Chapter Six

  That night Verity awoke with a start, frightened by a dream that fled the moment her eyes opened. Her heart was beating uncomfortably fast, and she felt so hot she had to fling the bedclothes aside.

  The dream’s influence waned, and as she lay there she became aware of her uncle’s restless pacing in his room across the passage. Dyspepsia, she thought. Well, she had tried to warn him.

  With a sigh she got up and went to the window to draw the curtains back and stand in the cool draft that crept in beneath the raised sash. It was a beautiful night. The stars were like diamonds against the inky sky, and she could smell the wallflowers beneath the dining room window below.

  She gazed toward the crescent moon. How low it was, almost

  as if it were touching the treetops near the old mill….

  * * *

  As Verity looked out of her window, Judith was in the oak grove casting a second spell before the Lady. The mill loomed silently above the pool, and as the water ceased to flow through the race, the unearthly howling began in the distance. Green candlelight swayed over the witch’s body, and as the hellhounds’ baying reached a peak, Hecate’s face appeared on the suddenly pliable stone. Then there was silence again.

  Judith danced anticlockwise around the circle, intoxicated by the ointment on her warm skin. Reality became blurred, and soon she could no longer feel the grass beneath her feet. Incantations whispered on her lips, and her eyes were closed as she conjured Nicholas into her thoughts.

  In her mind’s eye she saw him. He was walking on the castle terrace, above the beautiful azalea gardens, where pink and carmine blooms were turned to crimson and mauve by the pale light of the moon. He paused by one of the stone urns that stood beside the flight of steps leading down from the terrace.

  Judith stroked herself. “Hecate, fill him with passion for me tonight…” she breathed, sighing as she rubbed trembling fingertips over her breasts.

  Still she could see him. He descended the steps and along the path between the azalea beds. Fountains splashed as he neared the laburnum walk, which folded in a tunnel over the path. At the leafy entrance he paused again, turning as if he sensed the supernatural force directed from the grove.

  Judith slid her hands between her thighs. “Hecate, let me go to him, let him be denied of the will to resist. Now, Hecate, now...”

  She felt her body changing. She was no longer human, but animal, a hare, wild, agile, and swift as she bounded from the grove toward the castle.

  * * *

  Nicholas had been too restless to sleep. He was exhausted after the journey, and he had had several large measures of postprandial cognac, but still he couldn’t relax.

  It was pleasant by the laburnum walk, where the cool of the night seemed to release the scent of a thousand flowers. Behind him the castle was a romantic battlemented outline against the sky, and in front the valley stretched away toward Wychavon, where the church spire reached up above the trees. The primitive ways of the countryside had never seemed more close, and London more distant. On a night like this it was possible to believe in magic, old wives’ tales, and folklore.

  And only too possible to dwell on the unfathomable depths of Verity Windsor’s compelling emerald eyes ... He was almost resigned to the train of thought, for she had hardly been out of his mind in the hours since his return, and yet before today he’d been completely indifferent to everything about her. All of a sudden he had a fancy for Joshua Windsor’s niece! Why? Why was he suddenly seeing her so differently?

  There was a sound behind him, like a cat running down the path, but when he turned he was shaken to see a naked woman approaching, it was the admiral’s beautiful widow, and she cast no shadow as she came toward him. Her hair flowed in profusion over her shoulders, and the motion of her body was seductive. A beguiling sense of otherworldliness began to settle over him, like invisible shackles tightening around his limbs. He wanted to speak, to bac
k away, but he couldn’t move at all.

  A strangely alluring scent filled the air, making him feel light-headed and almost euphoric. She seemed to lack all substance as she slipped her slender arms around his neck and raised her lips to his, but the sweetness of her kiss was real enough. Her tongue flicked between his lips, and her body pressed excitingly to his. He couldn’t resist, he didn’t want to, for she was temptation so carnal and persuasive that he felt himself becoming aroused.

  She sighed, slipping a hand down to the front of his breeches, and stroking him through the silk. Her fingers were knowing, exploring his erection until he felt he would explode with excitement. This couldn’t be happening, it couldn’t. He was dreaming... She seemed to coil around him drawing out his very spirit with her kisses, and all the while caressing him to the edge of climax.

  But Verity was about to unwittingly interfere again. She was still at her bedroom window, and suddenly noticed the seal on the sill, where she had placed it earlier. Puzzled by the way the moonlight seemed to glow green through the tiger’s eye quartz, she picked it up, and immediately destroyed Judith’s magic for a second time.

  In the castle garden, Judith felt a stab of pain as the spell was rent in two again. As she cried out, and fell back, Nicholas felt the invisible shackles unwinding. His desire was extinguished, and the helpless euphoria faded into revulsion and shocked disbelief.

  Her tantalizing perfume suddenly became a vile stench that seemed to choke his breath, and he stumbled away, his senses reeling unpleasantly. When he glanced back again, she had gone, but he thought he saw a small fleet-footed animal darting away toward the terrace steps.

  Judith had felt all control drain instantly from her. She was a hare again, bounding helplessly back to the grove, where she fell exhausted and confused before the Lady. Hecate’s face had gone, and wisps of smoke still rose from the candles. The river was flowing through the race, and she could hear the creaking of the mill wheel.

  For a moment she was weak with nausea, but as the unpleasant sensations died away, she resumed human form and sat up, clenching her fists tightly. Her face was ugly with rage as intuition told her that Verity had intruded again. The magistrate’s niece would pay for this, and pay dearly!

  * * *

  Nicholas was bewildered by what had happened, if indeed it had happened. Common sense told him no one could appear and vanish as swiftly as his mysterious seductress. It also told him he was as unlikely to have really experienced her astonishingly abandoned approaches as he was to have seen her clothes simply fall away on the green. It was all nonsense, and probably the result of the overgenerous measures of cognac he had taken after dinner.

  He ran his fingers through his hair, and closed his eyes for a moment. He was suffering from a lack of tender female company and an overactive imagination, it was as simple as that. Taking a deep breath, he turned to retrace his steps toward the castle.

  His equilibrium began to return, and he pondered why it was the admiral’s widow upon whom his fantasies appeared to center. Why not Verity Windsor, who seemed far more to his liking at the moment. Ah, yes, Verity of the emerald eyes. Now if she were to come to him with her virginal charms naked and her heartstopping eyes wanton with desire, he wouldn’t hesitate to initiate her into the pleasures of the flesh!

  He laughed to himself, imagining old Joshua’s reaction if he were to discover the lascivious thoughts Lord Montacute entertained toward his precious niece. Nelson’s bombardment at Trafalgar was nothing to the broadsides that would be directed at the master of Wychavon, who would sink without trace, the remains of his manhood tied in a reef knot!

  He paused at the top of the steps to look back over the gardens toward the church spire in the distance. “Sleep tight, sweet Verity,” he murmured, then went into the castle.

  * * *

  Judith was at that moment passing the churchyard on her way back to the manor house. She still shook with fury and frustration, and her flowing cloak was tossed around her like a shroud. Her thoughts were savage, and at Sadie Cutler’s little cottage, opposite the vicarage, she halted as she noticed candlelight flickering at one of the bedroom windows. Sadie’s shadow moved against the curtains as she bent over her sick grandson.

  Judith breathed out slowly. She regretted cursing the boy because, if her instinct didn’t deceive her, it may have alerted his busybody of a great-aunt to the possibility of overlooking. So far it was only a feeling that the village wisewoman might suspect sorcery, but such intuition was often only too well founded. Judith exhaled slowly, for if anyone should have been overlooked, it was Martha Cansford, not the child.

  The cottage door opened suddenly, and Judith drew back out of sight in the vicarage gateway as Martha herself emerged after several hours doing what she could to help her sister nurse the ailing child. Judith watched the old woman step out into the roadway and then pause to glance around as if she felt the witch’s eyes upon her. Judith froze, hardly daring to breathe as Martha put a hand to the polished stone on the silver chain around her neck and raise it to her lips for a moment before walking away toward the ford.

  The witch’s eyes turned to flint as she felt the amulet’s aura reaching out to her. A snakestone, the old biddy had a snakestone! The witch recoiled in the darkness, for why would Martha Cansford wear such powerful protection if it were not that she suspected there was sorcery in Wychavon? Maybe she even suspected who was behind it!

  A nerve flickered at Judith’s temple, for while the old woman was protected by the snakestone, no evildoing could harm her. She was shielded by no less a wizard than the great Merlin himself!

  * * *

  Verity was still at her window and had observed how Judith drew out of sight as Martha left Sadie’s cottage. Now, hearing the nurse coming up the staircase, she put the seal down on the sill again and hurried to open the door.

  “Martha?” she whispered, keeping her voice low because her uncle’s pacing had ceased and she was sure he had gone back to bed.

  The old woman gave a startled gasp, and her lighted candle shivered so that shadows leapt over the walls. “You startled me, Miss Verity!”

  “I’m sorry. How is Davey?” Verity asked before mentioning anything else.

  Martha gave a sad smile. “He’ll be carried to the Lady at dawn.”

  Verity put a gentle hand on her sleeve. “I’m sure he’ll recover after that, Martha.”

  “I hope you’re right.”

  “Dr. Rogers will visit him tomorrow, and Uncle Joshua says that of course I can take some strawberries.”

  She hesitated. “Martha, I think you’re right about Judith Villiers.” She described what she had witnessed from the window. “She was just standing there, staring at Davey’s window, until you came out, then she hid by the vicarage. She saw you kiss the snakestone, although I don’t know if she realized what it was.”

  Martha smiled a little. “Oh, she realized, Miss Verity, for every witch recognizes the snakestone. She now knows I protect myself from sorcery, and that will tell her I suspect there to be such a thing here in Wychavon.”

  “Martha, I—”

  “It’s time we both went to our beds, Miss Verity,” the old woman interrupted quietly.

  Verity stared at her for a moment, then obeyed. As the door closed, Martha lowered her gaze thoughtfully. Something would have to be done before the admiral’s widow perpetrated any more evil. But what? What power did Martha Cansford have that was strong enough to counteract the magic of a witch like Judith Villiers? The answer was simple. She had no such power at all.

  Chapter Seven

  After two broken nights in a row, it was hardly surprising that Verity overslept the next morning. The sun was shining yet again, the church bells were ringing for Sunday service, and her uncle had already left for Ludlow by the time she had dressed and finished laboring over a suitably elegant coiffure for church, but he had remembered the strawberries for Davey, and a full basket waited on the hall table.

  Ve
rity had to dispense with breakfast in order to attend morning service, where the Reverend Crawshaw’s sermon was taken from Romans, chapter twelve, verse twenty-one—”Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.”

  A singularly appropriate text, she thought, glancing toward Admiral Villiers’ pew, which hadn’t been occupied since Judith’s memorable Halloween arrival in the village. Given what she now knew, she supposed it was hardly surprising, since witches weren’t likely to attend church, and with hindsight there seemed much more to Judith’s insistence on a special license and marriage ceremony at the manor house, than had appeared at the time. The admiral had wished to marry in church, but his unusual bride had been responsible for changing his mind.

  Nicholas didn’t come to church. The ornate Montacute pew was as empty as the admiral’s, a fact upon which much comment was made as the congregation began to leave. He was expected to observe the customary duties, of which attending church was but one, and Verity wished he had complied, but not for the same reasons.

  Now that he had returned to Wychavon, she longed to see him again, and apart from that, in the cold light of day she was sure the dream that had awoken her during the night had concerned Nicholas in some way, although she still couldn’t recall any details, just that he’d seemed to be in danger. What she did know, however, was that she found it difficult not to think about him.

  She was one of the first to leave the church, and waited by the lychgate for Martha and Sadie in her neat white lawn gown, navy blue velvet spencer, and matching bonnet. She had the basket of strawberries ready to give to Sadie, but was ashamed to admit that at the moment it was once again the ninth lord of Wychavon Castle who occupied her thoughts, not poor little Davey Cutler.

  Her feelings had been in chaos since Nicholas had looked into her eyes on the green the previous evening. Too late she realized that a good deal of her excitement about going to London was due to his presence there. Now that he had returned to Wychavon, the Season was less enticing. She was cross with herself for being so affected by him, after all, it wasn’t as if he’d ever danced attendance on her, in fact he had always been a little cool because of her uncle.