Alchemy, Book Two of the Mercian Trilogy by K. J. Wignall Read Free Book Online Page A

was simply spooked by the strangeness of what he’d just witnessed in Marcus’s room. On the other hand, his instincts told him somebody had been there, and that served as a reminder that Wyndham undoubtedly had more than one person working for him in the school.
    Will gave up and left, and set off across the parkland to the new house, but his thoughts were full of this troublesome sorcerer. Who was he, why so determined to destroy Will, possessed of how much power, how much knowledge?
    Wyndham could summon the dead, that much Will had seen, and yet strangely Will was more unnerved by the oddity of that empty notebook, perhaps because it suggested a magic that worked on many different levels. And that thought in turn gave rise to another question – how dangerous was Marcus to Eloise?
    The potential answers to that question filled him with fear. Without thinking, he reached up and held the broken half-medallion that hung round his neck and was surprised to find it warm, almost as if it had been resting against her flesh, not his.
    The metal’s heat radiated through his hand, reminding him of Eloise and her room. Will didn’t understand how it could be so, but it reassured him nevertheless because it suggested they had a sorcery of their own, and because right now he held within his hand the only piece of warmth in that vast icy landscape.

7
    A t the time of my mother’s collapse she had no way of knowing what this creature was that had reappeared in her life after so long an absence. Nor at the time could I fully understand the role she foresaw for me. Clearly she felt she had been haunted by a demon, and sensed in its return that it wished harm to her soul. What is more, for some unimaginable reason she saw in me, her youngest child, the one person who could save her from it
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    Only with hindsight can I see that William of Mercia had no designs on my mother’s soul. Indeed, given that he resisted his ample opportunities to feed on her, I still wonder to this day what interest he did have. I suspect further that he chanced upon her that night in 1742 quite by accident
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    But when a small child receives entreaties from his mother, asking him to act as her protector, to study hard that he might be equipped for the role, what is his response likely to be? I was an enthusiastic soldier in herarmy against evil long before I even realised that it was evil we were fighting, or that she was training me not to be a foot soldier, but a general
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    My father encouraged me further, seeing the apparent happiness and strength that the scheme brought to Lady Bowcastle. It helped too that it was a whim which could be afforded, for unlike many a younger son, I would not be required to become a clergyman or follow a military career to earn my living
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    My mother was an only child and both families were equally wealthy. Most of my maternal grandfather’s fortune was settled on me, as was that of a childless maternal great-uncle. I would have no title, but my fortune would rival my brother’s
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    So it was decided. I would not go to boarding school. I would be kept close, all the better to offer my mother constant assurance of my progress, and carefully selected tutors would be brought to me. For though I studied many of the subjects familiar to my contemporaries, I studied them towards specific ends and saw them supplemented by lessons of a rather more exotic nature
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    I learned Latin and Greek, better to appreciate the classics, but also that I might understand the arcane and mysterious texts that were acquired for me. I learned science that I might understand the riddles of the world and be better equipped for the work that lay ahead. Ienjoyed sporting pursuits, though with much more emphasis on the combat skills my mother imagined I would sooner or later require
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    I studied the occult too, with a stream of scholars and priests brought to me from all over these islands, and from France, Germany, Italy and beyond. I devoured this part