Charlotte
Making a choice
The bird drew my attention first. It uttered a caw as we walked into the darkened parlour. Despite the sun outside, inside was dim. The single window had glass so thick and wavy it was as though sunlight tried to penetrate through deep water. The shafts of light quivered, mimicking the movement of being rocked by an unseen tide. The walls were panelled in a dark wood, and even the tapestries depicted a night-time scene of people cavorting around a bonfire. The raven was perched upon the top of a high-backed chair that faced the window.
"Hush, Walter. Miss Jeffrey is a neighbour and soon to be part of our family," a rich, lyrical voice said.
"I was wanting a quick word about the wedding, Lady Leithfield. Mother wants to know how many people could fit in the garden because ever so many are expecting an invitation." I glanced at Ella, expecting her to do something, like leap at the duchess waving a sword.
"You are so very early to call, Charlotte, how uncouth of you. I was on my way to bed after a rather productive night." Millicent rose from her chair. Her tall body was draped in a red velvet gown. A gold tasselled cord cinched the gown at her narrow waist. Long black hair rose from a widow's peak and then fell past her shoulders. Her face was angular, with high cheekbones and an aura of superiority in the tilt of her nose. There was a vague resemblance to mother, but she was a poor reflection of the original.
Black eyes peered at me and then moved to a point over my shoulder where Ella stood. "Oh. You brought Eleanor. This isn't a social call, is it Charlotte? How delicious to catch you in a lie." Her gaze narrowed and she held out her arm. The raven cawed and hopped onto her forearm. Now two sets of black eyes stared at me. As one, both tilted their heads to regard me on a slight angle.
"You have changed, Charlotte. You have shed your ordinary skin. You have discovered what lay dormant in your blood, and there is now a glow of power about you. Who would have imagined little Charlotte lying and practicing witchcraft? Whatever next—murdering your husband?" Her lush lips pulled into a full smile and exposed her canines.
Chills ran over my skin. Embracing the power within me didn't mean following her dark path. I would walk in the light.
"I'm sure we'd love to chat, Millicent, but we came here to defeat you, end the vermin war and send you back to Hell," Ella said. Her gaze caught on the crossed blades over the fireplace and she lunged for them.
Ella grabbed the handle of a double-headed axe and pulled it free of the mount. She weighed the weapon in her hand. "Much heavier than what I'm used to, but it will do the job."
I could only watch as Millicent laughed. Then she lashed out one hand, not the one with the perched raven, but the other. Ella was thrown across the room and landed with a thud by the door.
"Did you think it would be so easy? Louise said you were rather thick, and now I see she spoke true. This is not the physical world, but my domain." Millicent advanced on Ella like a walking thunderstorm. The air cracked and fizzed around her. The ember deep inside me responded to her presence. It heated and spread its intoxicating brew through my veins.
Ella scrabbled to her feet, two hands clutching the weapon. The footman rushed through the door, drawn by the commotion. Ella swung the axe and I cringed as the blade sliced into his gut. Ella pulled the axe free and then brought it down on his neck, severing his head in one blow.
"A sharp blade usually works," Ella said as the headless footman slumped to the ground, clutching the entrails that spilled from his opened stomach. "And what works on one, will work on another."
Then a curious thing happened. Matthews' headless body pushed his guts back into his body and they stayed there. His hands reached out blindly and found the head and lifted it back onto his neck. Flesh, blood, and tendons knitted together. He pulled his knees under himself and looked up, intact, without a mark upon him.
"Bloody hell," Ella said.
Millicent laughed and her raven cackled. "You still haven't figured it out yet, have you?"
Ella cast a wide-eyed gaze to me. "Any help you can offer, Charlotte, would be much appreciated."
I didn't know what to do. My feet were nailed to the floor. I wasn't a fighter. Ella always took up the sword in this war. I sat in the parlour, useless. Mother never allowed me to do anything worthwhile. Nobles didn't dirty their hands.
Except I did in my new life. I learned to cook, keep house, tend the garden, and look after the chickens. I delighted in the dirt under my nails because it meant I had done something productive. I only had one fledgling skill I could offer.
I reached out and touched the footman as he staggered to his feet. His head swung in my direction. Mentally I reached for the warm stone in my stomach. I remembered the night on the train roof and my feeling of wanting to help the Turned, to give them freedom. Then I met his gaze and whispered, "I release you."
His eyes widened and his body froze for a second. Then he sighed and crumpled to the ground. Again. This time he didn't get up. His body simply… dissolved. As though he were made of morning mist and a light breeze scattered him into nothing.
"You have a talent, Charlotte, but then Anne was a powerful witch. Soon I will return to your world and all shall fall under my dominion. I will have Louise at my right hand, and you could be at my left." Millicent reached out and caressed my face.
Her touch was cold. Like the grave. Yet the ember inside me flared even brighter.
"How can you return? Won't you be like they are?" I pointed to where the footman had lain before he evaporated.
A cold smile graced her elegant face. "At the moment, my physical body is suspended between life and death, neither one nor the other. But when I have sufficient souls to power me, I shall be reborn into the world in a new immortal form."
While we talked, Ella crept up behind Millicent. She struck out with the axe, slicing through Millicent from the right side of her neck down and across to come out under her left arm. I expected her body to slide into two pieces, but nothing happened. The blow moved through her torso unimpeded by flesh or bone, as though Ella sliced at thin air. The blow continued on its arc and the blade wedged in a side table.
Ella stared at the axe and then the untouched Millicent. A frown pulled her brows. "Time to think of a new plan," she muttered.
"Enough of this. I am so close, I believe one more soul will be sufficient. How fitting it is you, Eleanor, who will herald my return." Millicent waved her hand and more footmen marched into the room. One, two, and onward until at least ten men surrounded us. They grabbed Ella and she disappeared underneath them. Her muffled cries and struggles were mere ripples in their solid mass.
"To the dining hall." Millicent waved her hand. The raven took flight and pursued the men bearing Ella with them. "Walk with me." She took my hand and my body obeyed as she led me away.
I wanted to cry, I felt so helpless. Yes I could release one person, but Millicent controlled thousands, if not millions by now. I could labour for my entire lifetime and only free a fraction of them. She was so powerful—she was the ocean and I, a mere puddle.
What could I do?
The dim hallway opened out into the enormous dining hall, a long, narrow room with a soaring arched ceiling. A long table that could accommodate fifty people dominated the room. A fireplace taller than a man sat in the middle of the room. The mantel was far above my head and a cold fire blazed. No heat came from the flames. Millicent's touch sucked the warmth from everything.
The men hauled Ella up on the table and stretched her body between them. Still she struggled, never giving up or giving in. She continued to fight and yell insults.
I bit back a sob. This was too familiar. How many times had mother hauled Ella over the table and made Louise and me hold her arms while she took the lash to Ella's back? I never defended her. I was frozen while Ella was beaten, my mind trying to pretend it wasn't happening.
But no more.
This wasn't Ella's fight.
It was mine.
For years I lived under my mother's cruel regime. Never in a million years could I find the courage to stand up for myself, let alone defend Ella or anyone else. I could never answer back or question her humiliating treatment of either me or others. Now I could. Millicent was my torment in a tangible form, a fitting target for two decades of pent up frustration.
I was a new-born witch, untested, with no knowledge or repertoire of spells. But it didn't matter that I wasn't as powerful or experienced as Millicent. What mattered was I had to try. I had to do something.
You never know what you can achieve until you take a step and try.
Millicent kept hold of my hand and pulled me near. "I never had a daughter, yet you are the child of my dear sister. I would claim you as my own, Charlotte. I can lay the world at your feet, and you will be a princess at my court. Everything you could ever dream of having will be yours and more. All you have to do is prove your loyalty to me by severing the connection between Eleanor's physical body and her soul."
As Millicent spoke, she waved a hand and the raven flew around the room. Its black wings brushed the walls as it circled higher. Behind it, the walls quivered and shook. The wooden panels wavered and then transformed into a dense forest. Tree trunks pressed tight to each other, forming an impenetrable wall. Branches were raised to the roof, leaves and twigs entwined and sprouted large, four inch long thorns.
The raven flew higher until its feathers scraped against the roof and it gave a shrill cry. The ceiling dissolved to reveal a strange, purple-hued sky. The moon hung low, and a single shaft of silvery light dropped through the tree branches to illuminate the struggling form of Ella. Other ravens flew past the moon's face and called to Millicent's pet. We now stood in an enchanted wood, the trees formidable guards to ensure we didn't escape.
Magic soaked into my body, drifting from the leaves on the trees and sprinkled over my skin. The ember in my centre grew hotter and I grew drunk on the power flowing through my limbs. "You offer me anything I desire, and all I have to do is sacrifice Ella?"
"Anything Charlotte, and everything. What value is the life of one worthless scullery maid compared to being royalty?" She smiled at me, a cold empty smile that didn't reach her dead black gaze.
Over the last few months I had done a lot of thinking. When Elizabeth and Louise left our house and Henry deposited me at the manse, I was angry at Ella. She ripped my safe world from me and thrust me into the unknown. Me, a woman with noble blood, was forced to undertake menial work. I had muttered curses against my step-sister as my hands reddened from washing the dishes.
Then as days turned into weeks, I stopped complaining and no longer saw Ella as the source of all my problems. I found a quiet satisfaction in the small things. Like a well-baked biscuit. A happy hen laying me a big warm egg. Words of friendship from the other village women.
I grew content with my situation. And while I still dreamed, I did not want for anything.
Millicent was a woman like Elizabeth and Louise—those who have everything and yet can only see what they do not possess. As a duchess, Millicent yearned to be a queen. Would even that be enough to satisfy her? When our world fell before her, would she then try and reach for the moon?
In those quiet moments as I considered her offer, I gathered the power swirling in the vaulted room to me. I smiled at Millicent, and rather than using hate or revenge as she would do, I filled myself with compassion and understanding.
"I understand what needs to be done," I said.
Millicent's cackle turned into a raven's call from above.
Ella continued to struggle, her eyes wide. "No! Don't do this, Charlotte!"
I placed my hand over Millicent's and met her midnight gaze. The power swelled inside me, a wave racing toward the shore, and I rode the crest of it.
"It's time to wake up," I said and released the spell as a continuous flow that swept over Millicent's form and embraced her.
She frowned as my words wound themselves around her. "Wake up? Don't be silly, Charlotte. End Eleanor, do it now."
I kept hold of her hand and pulled her closer toward me.
"Wake up, Millicent," I whispered again.
Each letter of each syllable took on a life of its own as they burrowed into Millicent's body like hungry little caterpillars. Her gaze widened and she pulled her hand away from mine.
"No. You cannot do this." Millicent spun away from me.
Yet my words devoured her flesh, forming holes that showed the trees behind her. Millicent staggered to the table. The raven dropped from the purple sky and perched on her shoulder.
I took the opportunity to move among the men holding Ella. "I release you," I whispered to each in turn. One by one they let Ella go and dropped to the floor. Their bodies dissolved like small puddles under a summer's sun.
"No. This cannot be. A stupid girl cannot stop me!" Millicent pointed a finger at me and screamed. More pieces of her disappeared. She now resembled a colander that I used to drain the washed lettuce. "I will lock you in a world of torment and pain!"
"I've already been there, and thanks to Ella, I escaped," I murmured. Never again would a cruel woman control me.
Millicent pushed off the table and stepped back. She made circles in the air with her hands, drawing power to her. The raven cackled from her shoulder, laughing as though it knew what would come next.
I had freed enough men that Ella could shake off the rest and slide off the table and to her feet. I joined her and we threw ourselves to one side as a bolt of energy shot from Millicent's hands and split the huge table into two pieces. Splinters rained down upon us.
"What did you do?" Ella asked.
We stood and brushed slivers of wood from our clothing. "Millicent is waking up after being asleep for over three hundred years. You can't end her here, she's too powerful, but you can finish her when she revives in our world."
"I assume she doesn't like mornings, since she seems rather upset." Ella grabbed me and pushed me to one side as another bolt slid past us. Heated air ruffled my hair. The bolt struck the mass of trees, and trunks fractured and groaned.
"No!" Another shriek rent the air. Millicent tried to form more witchcraft, but her hands and arms were eaten by my spell. She no longer had fingers to make the required shapes to work her magic as inch by inch her flesh and bone disappeared.
"We need to get out of here if she is going to wake up in our world. Seth and your lieutenant will be unprepared." Worry for the others wrinkled the corner of her eyes.
Another scream erupted from Millicent and, like her captured creatures, she buckled at the knees and fell to the ground. It was as though we existed in a fairy tale and the witch dissolved when a bucket of water was thrown upon her. Millicent did something similar. My simple spell consumed her until there was nothing left, and she disappeared.
Ella and I exchanged quick smiles and a brief hug. The battle wasn't over. With Millicent gone, her world in the between realm also ceased to exist. The trees creaked and fell forward. Crashing giants split the floor, revealing a chasm of nothing beneath us.
"What's happening?" Ella asked.
"Without Millicent and the Turned to maintain it, the other realm is splitting apart. We need to get back to the manse, now. We have to wake up." I tried to remember the ancient book that lay open in the table. What did the spell say about how to return the sleeper to their physical body?
"Pinching won't work. Alice tried that this morning and I was still here. How was Alice here? She's still alive, and what happens to them as this place crumbles?" Ella pulled me to one side as another rift opened up in the floor.
More trees fell and shattered the floor under our feet. Pieces dropped into the space below to spin away into nothing.
"I don't know. Maybe it was because Alice and that life are familiar to us?" I stared at the void that devoured wood and edged closer to our feet. "I think we need to jump."
Ella's gaze widened and she glanced down. "Are you sure?"
"No." I had no idea; I stopped trying to think and relied on whatever witch instinct could guide me.
Ella took my hand. "Let's do it together, as friends."
"Friends," I repeated. Then as another tree fell and crashed toward the exact spot where we stood, we jumped into nothing.