The Merqueen (The Witching World Book 3) Read online

  There, nestled inside the compartment as if it had been designed to fit just this one book, was what we were looking for. The book that Mirvela assumed we’d never find, guaranteeing her omnipotence over a magician who was her superior in knowledge and skill.

  Marcelo removed the book from its hiding place. He ran a palm across its worn cover. The book was old, very old, too big to fit in one hand. Marcelo handed me the candlestick.

  I moved it toward the cover. “The Magyke of the Darke Elementes,” I whispered, afraid to draw out the darkness from the pages of the book. Enough darkness haunted us already.

  “The forbidden book.” When Marcelo turned to look at me, I witnessed its unspoken dangers across his face as clearly as if he himself were a book and I an avid reader of its pages.

  Chapter 23

  “The Magyke of the Darke Elementes contains magic so dangerous that the magical council of the time—ages ago now—tried to get rid of it forever. The council members attempted to destroy every copy of the book.” Marcelo cradled the book in his hands, unwilling yet to open it. “I’m tempted simply to destroy the book without ever opening it.”

  “But Marcelo, what of Mordecai?” I couldn’t believe he’d suggest something like that after he tore over here to find the book as if his own life depended on it.

  “Mordecai would understand my choice.”

  “Marcelo, your saying this doesn’t make sense. We can’t leave Mordecai to Mirvela.”

  “Yet we might have to. I can’t be certain what we might unleash when I open this book.”

  “But the brothers had it. They didn’t consider it dangerous.”

  “That you’d believe that reminds me that you haven’t had the chance to get to know them properly. The brothers love things that are dangerous and forbidden. It’s something different, exciting, in a world where the ordinary grows boring. Long life can bring its own challenges. One must become more creative to continue with the same level of excitement as before. The brothers have been mastering magic for more than three hundred seventeen years—or at least, Albacus had; Mordecai still is. Something new to try, or to work against, is more interesting than the spells they’d learned as children hundreds of years before.

  “Yes, I can understand all that. But if Mordecai still has it in his study, it must mean it’s not so dangerous that the mere opening of it would cause harm, right? If not, the brothers wouldn’t keep it here where anyone could find it, would they?”

  “They wouldn’t assume anyone would find the book here. Its hiding place isn’t obvious, it was designed specifically for this book. It fits the space perfectly in length and width.”

  “All right then. But wouldn’t they have just destroyed it if it’s so dangerous?”

  Marcelo gazed at the book and rubbed his hand across the faded words. “Dark magic is difficult to do, and one of its greatest perils is when a magician without sufficient skill attempts one of its charms.”

  “Marcelo, you aren’t a novice magician like I am. You’re experienced and possess a great level of skill. The brothers told me so themselves.”

  I put my hand on Marcelo’s, and I thought I might have felt something pass from the book to his hand and then to mine. I quickly withdrew it.

  He noticed, and I tried to pretend nothing had happened, that it was every day that we sat with the most forbidden book on the planet and that the book sent some kind of spark through me.

  “Marcelo, is this our only chance at saving Mordecai from Mirvela?” I asked.

  “I can’t be certain, Clara. We still don’t know exactly how Mirvela’s wielding her power over Mordecai. But there’s a good chance that it’s from this book, especially now that we know Sylvia saw her consult it. I think our theory’s strong, and a counter spell for the dark magic Mirvela’s using may be contained within its pages. We might eventually find another way to help Mordecai, even without the book.”

  “But that could take awhile.”

  “Yes, it could.”

  “You’ll go crazy if we have to wait any longer to help Mordecai.”

  Marcelo looked so sad, it tore at my heart. He said, “Yes, Clara, that’s true.” He stopped to swallow. “But if I open this book, going crazy might become the least of our worries.”

  “Can it really be all that bad?”

  “Clara, magicians are, as a rule, reckless individuals. We skirt the line between the permissible and the forbidden every day. I’ve mentioned the magical council, but it’s incredibly rare for the council to prohibit something. It happens about once every hundred years. The council trusts that magicians can govern themselves. The magical council joined to ban this book. Because they deemed it so dangerous that magicians couldn’t be allowed to decide for themselves whether to use its magic or not.”

  “I see. And simply opening its pages is dangerous, even if you don’t perform any of the spells?”

  “I don’t know, Clara. That’s the problem. I just don’t know what I can and can’t do with this book. Neither Mordecai nor Albacus ever mentioned it to me. I had no idea they possessed a copy. There aren’t supposed to be any in existence. Although now I know of at least one other that still survives.”

  “Don’t tell me.” I thumped my head back against the wood of the seat. I was exhausted by these invisible threats that hung over my head. “Count Washur has one.”

  “Yes. I saw it in my father’s memories. Count Washur has a copy of The Magyke of the Darke Elementes, and he isn’t afraid to use it.”

  We sat in silence for a long moment while Sylvia and Sir Lancelot studied us. I’d grown accustomed to the little owl’s almost constant presence, especially now, when he wasn’t yet his usual sharp self. But there was something unnerving about a firedrake glaring at you from right above, with anger so evident in her dragon-like face. She was waiting for us to do something to save her master.

  More moments passed, and I stared up into Sylvia’s fiery eyes. “We have to do something, Marcelo. Something’s better than nothing, I think.”

  “Even if the risks we take are greater than we could imagine? We don’t even know what could happen if I open this book.”

  “We don’t. You’re right. But we owe it to Mordecai to try.”

  “I don’t know, Clara. I’m not sure he’d ever forgive me, or himself, if I were to open this book to save him and something horrible happened.”

  I breathed out sharply through my nose. “This is all too much. So be it, Marcelo. Whatever it might be, so be it. I’ll open the book.”

  I reached for it. Marcelo snatched it away. “You will not. If it’s dangerous for me to open the book, it’s a hundredfold more so for you. We’ve only had the faintest glimpse of your capabilities. We aren’t about to discover their potential with dark magic. No way.”

  I tried for the book again. I wanted to do this for Marcelo, to ease the burden from him. Finally, this was something I could do for him.

  “No, Clara.”

  “But we have to try, Marcelo.”

  “Fine then.” And Marcelo snapped the book open.

  All eyes fell to Marcelo. then to the book, and back again. Even Sir Lancelot followed the action, though I wasn’t sure what he understood of it.

  We waited. We released a breath we hadn’t realized we held. And we waited some more.

  Finally, Marcelo slumped back against the wooden seat. “Oh thank goodness. I thought I was about to unleash the caged torments of hell onto all of us. At least now we know there was no curse protecting the book from being opened.”

  I laughed nervously. I hadn’t thought it could be so bad as that. No wonder Marcelo hadn’t wanted to open the book. Had I known more specifically what he was afraid of, I wouldn’t have been so courageous in offering to open it myself.

  Marcelo leaned over the book in his lap. “All right. Let’s see what we have here.” He flipped back to the front of the book.

  I read the first page that announced the terrifying nature of its content. “The Darke
Mag—”

  “Shhhhh,” Sir Lancelot whispered vehemently at the same time as Marcelo harshly spoke, “No, Clara.”

  Marcelo took one hand from the book and rested it against my back. I felt another spark run through his hand into me. It was the book again.

  “No, Clara,” he said, “you can’t speak aloud anything in this book. Ever. The power of speech can make any spell stronger. In fact, it’d be better if you didn’t read it at all.” He tilted the book almost imperceptibly, angled away from me.

  “Fine.” I stood, taking Sir Lancelot with me. I knew Marcelo was right, especially since I could feel the book reaching out for me, but I still didn’t like being told what I could and couldn’t do. Who did?

  “So does this mean you’re back to yourself then, Sir Lancelot?”

  “I beg your pardon, Lady Clara. Whatever do you mean?”

  “You told me not to read that book.”

  “I most certainly did. Do you have any idea what might happen to us all if you read a single spell out of that book?”

  He was back. Mirvela’s hold over the owl had finally worn off completely. The dullard was gone, and the prodigy had returned, tall in his petite plumed shell. “You could have killed us all, Lady Clara. That much is certain. I haven’t seen one of these books for at least five hundred years.” Large, yellow owl eyes examined that dark magic he thought the world had rid itself of forever. “I’d hoped I’d never see it again.”

  “I understand why you think that, Sir Lancelot,” Marcelo said from his place at the window seat. He was flipping through the book’s pages slowly, one at a time. Every other page elicited a gasp, a groan, or silence filled with dread. And all I could think was that Count Washur had access to a book just like this, with every single one of its dark words.

  Chapter 24

  “This is the spell Mirvela used to control Sir Lancelot’s mind. It has to be.”

  I left Marcelo to study the book’s contents while I toured the large study by myself. I looked at the spines of the worn books on the shelves, guessing as to how dangerous each one of them might be.

  Sir Lancelot and Sylvia stayed with Marcelo, each perched on facing benches, waiting for what they knew would eventually come.

  I turned toward the others, and I took the steps back to the window, knowing that each one brought me closer to a confrontation with Mirvela.

  I stood behind Marcelo, pretending I could still be an outsider to the path that was proving unavoidable. “Is there a counter spell included with it?”

  Marcelo smiled. “Yes, there is.”

  I bent over to look, doing my best not to read, though that was impossible for me. My brain automatically reached out to any written word greedily. “What’s all this writing in the margins? It’s in another hand than the text of the book.”

  “There are quite a lot of these additional notes, aren’t there? But I must say I’m grateful for them. Most magical books have spells that continually update them. This is a wonderful feature, which means that you’re always accessing the most recent version of the spell, and that any unanticipated effects have been fixed. With a book like this one, that isn’t supposed to exist anymore, the book isn’t being updated. Even if a spell were to have ill effects that no one foresaw, there’s no one left to change it. So I’m particularly grateful for the scribbled notes in the margins. They’re changing the spells to make them safer and more predictable. I recognize this writing here as Albacus’ script. He at least has examined this spell, and since he did, chances are very high that Mordecai was at least aware of it as well.

  Marcelo continued. “I feel better about using the spell since it appears that Albacus himself tried it and modified it. At least I know that he survived it and found it a workable spell, with his changes.”

  “I understand. Will you do the counter spell now?”

  “I suppose so.” Marcelo pinched the bridge of his nose, put the open book on the seat beside him, and stood.

  He stretched and then walked with his arms crossed toward the window on the opposite side of the room that overlooked the courtyard. I could tell by looking at him that he was remembering what had taken place on the stones below. The visible signs of blood and death were absent, but they’d never be wiped from Marcelo’s memory.

  He turned to face me. The moonlight was faint as it explored one side of his face across his shoulder. It outlined the ridges of his face in silver. He looked both older than his years and younger at the same time. The burden of his choices weighed heavily on him, turning down his shoulders, but the magic in him was evident. It glowed faintly along with the moonlight.

  He stepped away from the wall and rocked there for a moment, unsupported by anything or anyone but himself. “I’m ready. With any luck, Mordecai and Mirvela will be asleep in separate rooms. That will make it easier for the counter spell to break Mirvela’s hold over Mordecai.”

  He returned to the book. Sir Lancelot was reading the open pages from above. Marcelo didn’t seem to mind. It was only me that he didn’t want reading the spells.

  “Excuse me, Sir Lancelot,” Marcelo said. Sir Lancelot moved aside while Marcelo picked up the book and held it in both hands, open to the page that would change Mordecai’s fate.

  “Clara, would you please bring the candlestick too?” Marcelo walked across the brothers’ study and set the book down on the scarred wooden table that occupied the center of the room. I could only imagine how many spells the brothers had performed in their long lives, hunched over this same table.

  I set the candleholder on the worn wood and passed my other hand across it. The wood was old and polished, and it felt warm and comforting to the touch.

  Marcelo bent over the book, though he didn’t sit at either of the two chairs that lined this side of the table. I tried to resist temptation for several moments, mindful of Marcelo’s warnings, but in the end I couldn’t help myself. I peered over Marcelo’s shoulder, trying to make out any of the words in the flickering light. I caught only fragments of the spell. Nevertheless, the words intrigued me, and I wanted nothing more in that moment than to know all of it.

  The candle flickered violently, causing Marcelo to look up to discover the source of the disruption. He found my eyes trained on the one thing in the room they were supposed to ignore. He scooted the book closer to him, and his eyes never left mine as he said, “Will you check that the windows are secure, please? The flame shouldn’t be quivering as it is.”

  Then he took one of the seats and leaned back in it with the book in his lap. He read through the spell from start to finish several times before he concluded he was ready. “I hope everything goes as it’s supposed to. If it doesn’t, we’ll be in enormous trouble.”

  “I thought we already were in enormous trouble.”

  “We are. But it can get worse. So hope with every bit of you that it doesn’t.”

  With his reminder and earlier admonition that my still unknown powers could worsen things if I got involved, I remained by the window I’d been checking—they were all closed. I couldn’t help myself from reading anytime I was near a book, so this was the safest choice. I leaned into the cold stone of the windowsill, and the chilled air of an early springtime night met my back. I crossed my arms and shivered, but I stayed where I was.

  “All right. Here we go.” He turned to look at Sir Lancelot, Sylvia, and, finally, me, where his gaze settled. Marcelo was tense, and his nervousness reached me all the way across the room. Hope was etched across the features of his face, drawn tight by worry of what could happen. “Please, no one speak at all. There can be no interruptions. This spell is dangerous enough as it is. Nothing can upset it as I cast it.”

  Two supposedly impossible creatures nodded along with me.

  Marcelo cleared his throat, stretched his fingers, and cracked his neck. He rubbed his hands together and licked his lips.

  His voice started out slow and quiet, but it grew as he went. “A spell was cast that disturbed a mind, allowe
d the magician to enter it and hold it forevermore. This spell was recorded in this book; I found it within your pages. The spell first cast allowed one mind to control another. It was read into being by a merwoman named Mirvela, and through and by it, she stole the ability from the lord of this house, Mordecai, to know his true thoughts. Now, with my own power as a magician, and with the additional power that is conferred upon me because Mordecai considers me like a son of his own blood, I recall the spell Mirvela cast that gives her power over Mordecai. Through these following words, I break all power that the spell from this very book entitled Steal Thee Another’s Mind conferred on Mirvela, and I declare through my power, that she can never cast another spell like it to give her power over Mordecai. Control a mind ye have done, but the time for it now doth pass. A window open for mind control closeth now forevermore. The spell Steal Thee Another’s Mind is now complete. Its power returneth to its source, and the victim of thine spell is free once more for him to choose who he might be. Through my declared power, I decree this counter spell to dissolve any and all power that Mirvela ever held over Mordecai. It is now complete, and Mordecai’s mind returns to him.”

  Marcelo stared at the book some more. He poured over the one page earmarked as Mordecai’s salvation. Then he looked back toward me, where I hadn’t moved more than to breathe while Marcelo spoke. The counter spell wasn’t the most elegant one I’d read or heard, but it would work, and that was all that mattered.

  “That’s it,” he said. “I can’t think of what more to say to erase Mirvela’s hold over Mordecai.” He removed the book from his lap to place it on the table. He closed it and got up. He walked toward me, already running his hands through his hair. “I don’t know if it worked or not.”

  “It worked.” I pushed away from the windowsill and left the worst of the cold behind.

  “How can you be sure?”

  “Because I felt it. Didn’t you?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t know. I usually do feel the spells as I’m doing them, but this time I don’t think I did.” Another pass through his hair. “I hope the effect of Mirvela’s spell is faster to wear off with Mordecai than it was with Sir Lancelot.”