Betrayal by Gillian Shields Read Free Book Online Page B

both day and night. I was buzzing with adrenaline, hungry to learn, and it didn’t seem to matter what. Whether I was in the grotto turning water into silver mist, or drawing liquid essences from the stones of the cave, or hunched in the cold classrooms studying Latin verbs or chemical reactions, I was on fire. Knowledge was power, I kept telling myself, and it seemed to me that the knowledge I sought might lie anywhere: in an obscure bit of poetry, in a scientific formula, or in an ancient spell. This term I was going to be at the top of every class and ahead of every idea.
    All that week the snow lay around the Abbey, white and blank and cold. Any lingering hope that Sebastian would contact me had withered like a green shoot in the bitterfrost. But I refused to despair. I was young and strong, I would outwit the coven; I would find Sebastian; I would soon know every secret of the Mystic Way.
    Wherever there was darkness, I would bring light, and that light would never be overwhelmed.

Eleven
    FROM THE PRIVATE PAPERS OF S EBASTIAN J AMES F AIRFAX
    It is so dark here, Evie.
    I light a candle but it does not seem to ease the darkness of my mind.
    I said I would be patient and wait without complaint, but it is so hard, when every hour, every minute drains me of strength.
    Have you forgotten me?
    I should not blame you if you have. I have nothing to offer you. My powers are fading. I am a prisoner. I am trapped.
    At times a faint gray gleam peeps through the cracks and crannies of this dusty room, and I guess that somewherethere is light and freedom. But that has nothing to do with me now. I have forgotten the outside world. I have forgotten yesterday. Only the old memories remain.
    I remember the gray-haired parson at Wyldcliffe Church, when the world was younger and I was innocent of its dangers. What was that he said? “I go whence I shall not return, even to the land of darkness and the shadow of death…where the light is as darkness.” It seems an eternity since I sat in the little stone church in the village, watching the sparks of dust dance in a shaft of sunlight, trying not to yawn as the parson droned on, whilst Agnes shook her head reprovingly at me, half frowning, half laughing.
    If only I had not been so proud and stubborn all those years ago! If only I had listened to Agnes, and never meddled with forbidden knowledge! I have been so blind and crazy, from the beginning—
    And yet, if I had not traveled this road I would have lived my life and died and passed from this world before you were ever born. I would never have met you, never have heard your voice, or touched your hand, or felt your lips on mine. That would have been the worst punishment of all.
    There is something I must tell you.
    I must warn you.
    They are coming closer—
    Oh, Evie, such fear! I see their pitiless, undead faces. I see their king, his iron crown flickering with red flames, as he reaches out to me with his fist of steel, pulling me closer into his trap. I hear the howling and gibbering of demons and I feel myself fading into that endless night—
    Yet I will face this horror with open eyes rather than hurt one single strand of your bright hair.
    They tried to make me betray you once before, but they couldn’t. They shall never succeed. I may become a creature of darkness, but I will never, ever forget that I love you.

Twelve
    I couldn’t forget Sebastian, not for a single moment. He was in my thoughts and dreams and in the very air I breathed. Sometimes I seemed to feel the touch of his hand on mine, or hear the echo of his voice in Wyldcliffe’s gloomy corridors. Part of me just wanted to skip my classes and go looking for him out on the moors, but I knew it would be a hopeless task. He could be anywhere, concealed by the remnants of his powers. But no, I had to stick to my plan to open the talisman. Once I could do that, I was sure it would lead me to him. I had to work without thinking, and the image of him, pale and sick and