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ELLE101
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BLACK MAGIC BY MARJORIE BOWEN CONT
CHAPTER XII.
YSABEAU
Dirk and the lady entered the room he had just quitted; he set a chair for her near the window and waited for her to speak, but kept his eyes the while on her shrouded figure.
She wore a mask such as he had often seen on ladies; fantastic Italian taste had fashioned them in the likeness of a plague-stricken countenance, flecked green and yellow, and more lively fancy had nicknamed them “melons” from their similarity to an unripe melon skin; these masks, oval-shaped, with a slit for the mouth and eyes, and extending from the brow to the chin, were an effective concealment of every feature, and high favourites among ladies.
For the rest, the stranger’s hood was pulled well forward so that not a lock of hair was visible, and her mantle was gathered close at her throat; it was of fine green cloth edged with miniver; she wore thick gauntlets so that not an inch of her skin was visible.
“You are well disguised,” said Dirk at last, as she made no sign of speaking. “What is your business with me?”
He began to think that she could not be Jacobea since she gave no indication of revealing herself; also, he fancied that she was too short.
“Is there any one to overhear us or interrupt?” the lady spoke at last, her voice muffled a little by the mask.
“None,” answered Dirk half impatiently. “I beg that you tell me who you are.”
“Certes, that can wait;” her eyes sparkled through their holes in contrast with the ghastly painted wood that made her face immovable. “But I will tell you who you are, sir.”
“You know?” said Dirk coldly.
It seemed as if she smiled.
“The student named Dirk Renswoude who was driven forth from Basle University for practising the black arts.”
For the first time in his life Dirk was taken aback, and hopelessly disconcerted; he had not believed it possible for any to discover the past life of the learned doctor Constantine; he went red and white, and could say nothing in either defence or denial.
“It was only about three months ago,” continued the lady. “And both students and many other in the town of Basle would still know you, certes.”
A rush of anger against his unknown accuser nerved Dirk.
“By what means have you discovered this?” he demanded. “Basle is far enough from Frankfort, I wot… and how many know… and what is the price of your silence, dame?”
The lady lifted her head.
“I like you,” she said quietly. “You take it well. No one knows save I. I have made cautious inquiries about you, and pieced together your story with my own wit.”
“My story!” flashed Dirk. “Certes! Ye know nought of me beyond Basle.”
“No,” she assented. “But it is enough. Joris of Thuringia died.”
“Ah!” ejaculated Dirk.
The lady sat very still, observing him.
“So I hold your life, sir,” she said.
Dirk, goaded, turned on her impetuously.
“Ye are Jacobea of Martzburg——”
“No”—she started at the name. “But I know her——”
“She told you this tale——”
Again the lady answered—
“No.”
“She is from Basle,” cried Dirk.
“Believe me,” replied the stranger earnestly, “she knows nothing of you—I alone in Frankfort hold your secret, and I can help you to keep it… it were easy to spread a report of Dirk Renswoude’s death.”
Dirk bit his finger, his lip, glared out at the profusion of roses, at the darkening sky, then at the quiet figure in the hideous speckled mask; if she chose to speak he would have, at the best of it, to fly Frankfort, and that did not suit his schemes.
“Another youth lives here,” said the lady. “I think he also fled from Basle.”
Dirk’s face grew pale and cunning; he was quick to see that she did not know Theirry was compromised.
“He was here—now he has gone to Court—he was at Basle, but innocent, he came with me out of friendship. He is silly and fond.”
“I have to do with you,” answered the lady. “Ye have a great, a terrible skill, evil spirits league with you… your spells killed a man——” She stopped.
“Poor fool,” said Dirk sombrely.
The stranger rose; her calm and self-possession had suddenly given way to fierce only half-repressed passion; she clasped her hands and trembled as she stood.
“Well,” she cried thickly. “You could do that again—a softer, more subtle way?”
“For you?” he whispered.
“For me,” she answered, and sank into the window-seat, pulling at her gloves mechanically.
A silence, while the dying red sunlight fell over the Eastern cushions and over her dark mantle and outside the red roses shook and whispered in the witch’s garden.
“I cannot help you if you tell me nothing,” said Dirk at length in a grim manner.
“I will tell you this,” answered she passionately. “There is a man I hate, a man in my way—I do not talk wildly; that man must go, and if you will be the means——”
“You will be in my power as I am now in yours,” thought Dirk, completing the broken sentence.
The lady looked out at the roses.
“I cannot convey to you what nights of horror and days of bitterness, what resolutions formed and resolutions broken—what hate, and what—love have gone to form the impulse that brought me here to-day—nor does it concern ye; certes enough I am resolved, and if your spells can aid me——” She turned her head sharply. “I will pay you very well.”
“You have told me nothing,” repeated Dirk. “And though I can discover what you are and who is your enemy, it were better that you told me with your own lips.”
She seemed, now, in an ill-concealed agitation.
“Not to-day will I speak. I will come again. I know this place… meanwhile, certes, your secret is safe with me—think over what I have said.”
She rose as if to take a hasty departure; but Dirk was in her way.
“Nay,” he said firmly. “At least show your face—how shall I know you again? And what confidence have you in me if you will not take off your mask? I say you shall.”
She trembled between a sigh and a laugh.
“Perhaps my face is not worth gazing at,” she answered on a breath.
“I wot ye are a fair woman,” replied Dirk, who heard the consciousness of it in her alluring voice.
Still she hesitated.
“Know ye many about the Court?” she asked.
“Nay. I have not concerned myself with the Court.”
“Well, then—and since I must trust you—and like you”—her voice rose and fell—“look at me and remember me.”
She loosened her cloak, flung back the hood and quickly unfastening the mask, snatched it off.
The disguise flung aside, she was revealed to the shoulders, clearly in the warm twilight.
Dirk’s first impression was, that this was beauty that swept from his mind all other beauty he had ever beheld; his second, that it was the same face he and Theirry had seen in the mirror.
“Oh!” he cried.
“Well?” said the lady, the hideous mask in her hand.
Now she was disclosed, it was as if another presence had entered the dusky chamber, so difficult was it to associate this brilliance with the cloaked figure of a few moments since.
Certainly she was of a great beauty, smiting into breathlessness, a beauty not to be realised until beheld; Dirk would not have believed that a woman could be so fair.
If Jacobea’s hair was yellow, this lady’s locks were pale, pure glittering gold, and her eyes a deep, soft, violet hue; the throwing back of her cloak revealed her round slender throat, and the glimmer of a rich bodice.
The smile faded from her lips, and her gorgeous loveliness became grave, almost tragic.
CHAPTER XII.
YSABEAU
Dirk and the lady entered the room he had just quitted; he set a chair for her near the window and waited for her to speak, but kept his eyes the while on her shrouded figure.
She wore a mask such as he had often seen on ladies; fantastic Italian taste had fashioned them in the likeness of a plague-stricken countenance, flecked green and yellow, and more lively fancy had nicknamed them “melons” from their similarity to an unripe melon skin; these masks, oval-shaped, with a slit for the mouth and eyes, and extending from the brow to the chin, were an effective concealment of every feature, and high favourites among ladies.
For the rest, the stranger’s hood was pulled well forward so that not a lock of hair was visible, and her mantle was gathered close at her throat; it was of fine green cloth edged with miniver; she wore thick gauntlets so that not an inch of her skin was visible.
“You are well disguised,” said Dirk at last, as she made no sign of speaking. “What is your business with me?”
He began to think that she could not be Jacobea since she gave no indication of revealing herself; also, he fancied that she was too short.
“Is there any one to overhear us or interrupt?” the lady spoke at last, her voice muffled a little by the mask.
“None,” answered Dirk half impatiently. “I beg that you tell me who you are.”
“Certes, that can wait;” her eyes sparkled through their holes in contrast with the ghastly painted wood that made her face immovable. “But I will tell you who you are, sir.”
“You know?” said Dirk coldly.
It seemed as if she smiled.
“The student named Dirk Renswoude who was driven forth from Basle University for practising the black arts.”
For the first time in his life Dirk was taken aback, and hopelessly disconcerted; he had not believed it possible for any to discover the past life of the learned doctor Constantine; he went red and white, and could say nothing in either defence or denial.
“It was only about three months ago,” continued the lady. “And both students and many other in the town of Basle would still know you, certes.”
A rush of anger against his unknown accuser nerved Dirk.
“By what means have you discovered this?” he demanded. “Basle is far enough from Frankfort, I wot… and how many know… and what is the price of your silence, dame?”
The lady lifted her head.
“I like you,” she said quietly. “You take it well. No one knows save I. I have made cautious inquiries about you, and pieced together your story with my own wit.”
“My story!” flashed Dirk. “Certes! Ye know nought of me beyond Basle.”
“No,” she assented. “But it is enough. Joris of Thuringia died.”
“Ah!” ejaculated Dirk.
The lady sat very still, observing him.
“So I hold your life, sir,” she said.
Dirk, goaded, turned on her impetuously.
“Ye are Jacobea of Martzburg——”
“No”—she started at the name. “But I know her——”
“She told you this tale——”
Again the lady answered—
“No.”
“She is from Basle,” cried Dirk.
“Believe me,” replied the stranger earnestly, “she knows nothing of you—I alone in Frankfort hold your secret, and I can help you to keep it… it were easy to spread a report of Dirk Renswoude’s death.”
Dirk bit his finger, his lip, glared out at the profusion of roses, at the darkening sky, then at the quiet figure in the hideous speckled mask; if she chose to speak he would have, at the best of it, to fly Frankfort, and that did not suit his schemes.
“Another youth lives here,” said the lady. “I think he also fled from Basle.”
Dirk’s face grew pale and cunning; he was quick to see that she did not know Theirry was compromised.
“He was here—now he has gone to Court—he was at Basle, but innocent, he came with me out of friendship. He is silly and fond.”
“I have to do with you,” answered the lady. “Ye have a great, a terrible skill, evil spirits league with you… your spells killed a man——” She stopped.
“Poor fool,” said Dirk sombrely.
The stranger rose; her calm and self-possession had suddenly given way to fierce only half-repressed passion; she clasped her hands and trembled as she stood.
“Well,” she cried thickly. “You could do that again—a softer, more subtle way?”
“For you?” he whispered.
“For me,” she answered, and sank into the window-seat, pulling at her gloves mechanically.
A silence, while the dying red sunlight fell over the Eastern cushions and over her dark mantle and outside the red roses shook and whispered in the witch’s garden.
“I cannot help you if you tell me nothing,” said Dirk at length in a grim manner.
“I will tell you this,” answered she passionately. “There is a man I hate, a man in my way—I do not talk wildly; that man must go, and if you will be the means——”
“You will be in my power as I am now in yours,” thought Dirk, completing the broken sentence.
The lady looked out at the roses.
“I cannot convey to you what nights of horror and days of bitterness, what resolutions formed and resolutions broken—what hate, and what—love have gone to form the impulse that brought me here to-day—nor does it concern ye; certes enough I am resolved, and if your spells can aid me——” She turned her head sharply. “I will pay you very well.”
“You have told me nothing,” repeated Dirk. “And though I can discover what you are and who is your enemy, it were better that you told me with your own lips.”
She seemed, now, in an ill-concealed agitation.
“Not to-day will I speak. I will come again. I know this place… meanwhile, certes, your secret is safe with me—think over what I have said.”
She rose as if to take a hasty departure; but Dirk was in her way.
“Nay,” he said firmly. “At least show your face—how shall I know you again? And what confidence have you in me if you will not take off your mask? I say you shall.”
She trembled between a sigh and a laugh.
“Perhaps my face is not worth gazing at,” she answered on a breath.
“I wot ye are a fair woman,” replied Dirk, who heard the consciousness of it in her alluring voice.
Still she hesitated.
“Know ye many about the Court?” she asked.
“Nay. I have not concerned myself with the Court.”
“Well, then—and since I must trust you—and like you”—her voice rose and fell—“look at me and remember me.”
She loosened her cloak, flung back the hood and quickly unfastening the mask, snatched it off.
The disguise flung aside, she was revealed to the shoulders, clearly in the warm twilight.
Dirk’s first impression was, that this was beauty that swept from his mind all other beauty he had ever beheld; his second, that it was the same face he and Theirry had seen in the mirror.
“Oh!” he cried.
“Well?” said the lady, the hideous mask in her hand.
Now she was disclosed, it was as if another presence had entered the dusky chamber, so difficult was it to associate this brilliance with the cloaked figure of a few moments since.
Certainly she was of a great beauty, smiting into breathlessness, a beauty not to be realised until beheld; Dirk would not have believed that a woman could be so fair.
If Jacobea’s hair was yellow, this lady’s locks were pale, pure glittering gold, and her eyes a deep, soft, violet hue; the throwing back of her cloak revealed her round slender throat, and the glimmer of a rich bodice.
The smile faded from her lips, and her gorgeous loveliness became grave, almost tragic.
ELLE101
kiwifarms.net
- Joined
- Jun 18, 2020
https://youtu.be/F2Z2CklSxM0?si=UMZWe6c7SQaVf4A7
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- Joined
- Oct 28, 2018
That is exactly the one.
I love how uncompromising and bleak it is, and how rooted in reality it feels.
- Joined
- Oct 11, 2014
Excellent choice! And it really is! I actually looked far and wide for the modified NB-39 bomber and the XK-Pluto nuclear ramjet cruise missile. Stross described them so matter-of-factly I was sure they were real and happy as hell to find out the real things had never even gotten as far as prototypes, just a single nuclear engine test before both concepts were abandoned. He did an amazing job imagining how the world would have turned out if the Cthulu mythos was real.That is exactly the one.
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- Joined
- Apr 15, 2025
Wait did the Russians stop working on the SSC-X-9 Skyfall ?
- Joined
- Oct 9, 2018
They decided to put their money into SNES-9X instead.
- Joined
- Oct 11, 2014
Not as far as i know, but it is a piece of shit compared even to the original Project Pluto from the 1960s. As it is subsonic and completely unstealthy it would be incredibly easy to pick off the Skyfall long before it gets close to where it could be effective in enemy territory, meanwhile it's spewing fallout all over it's own territory. Not to mention once intercepted it's a radiological disaster wherever it is hit. And it's failed and exploded a bunch of times already in testing.
If it's not formally cancelled yet for propaganda reasons, it's likely to be cancelled by Russia's broke-ass military R&D.
ELLE101
kiwifarms.net
- Joined
- Jun 18, 2020
https://youtu.be/F2Z2CklSxM0?si=UMZWe6c7SQaVf4A7
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- Joined
- Apr 15, 2025
eat something and go back to sleep were having a conversation about ill though out doomsday weapons
- Joined
- Oct 9, 2018
BLACK MAGIC BY MARJORIE BOWEN CONT
The smile faded from her lips, and her gorgeous loveliness became grave, almost tragic.
“You do not know me?” she asked.
“No,” answered Dirk; he could not tell her that he had seen her before in his devil’s mirror.
“But you will recognise me again?”
Dirk laughed quietly.
“You were not made to be forgotten. Strange with such a face ye should have need of witchcraft!”
The lady replaced the mottled mask, that looked the more horrible after that glimpse of gleaming beauty, and drew her mantle over her shoulders.
“I shall come to you or send to you, sir. Think on what I have said, and on what I know.”
She was obscured again, hidden in her green cloak. Dirk proffered no question, made no comment, but preceded her down the dark passage and opened the door; she passed out; her footstep was light on the path; Dirk watched her walk rapidly down the street, then closed the door and bolted it. After a pause of breathless confusion and heart-heating excitement, he ran to the back of the house and out into the garden.
It was just light enough for the huge dusky roses to be visible as they nodded on their trailing bushes; Dirk ran between them until he reached a gaunt stone statue half concealed by laurels; in front of this were flags irregularly placed; in the centre of one was an iron ring; Dirk, pulling at this, disclosed a trap door that opened at his effort, and revealed a flight of steps; he descended from the soft pure evening and the red roses into the witch’s kitchen, closing the stone above him.
The underground chamber was large and lit by lamps hanging from the roof, revealing smooth stone walls and damp floor; in one side a gaping blackness showed where a passage twisted to the outer air; on another was a huge alchemist’s fireplace; before this sat the witch, about her a quantity of glass vessels, retorts and pots of various shapes.
Either side this fireplace hung a human body, black and withered, swinging from rusted ropes and crowned with wreaths of green and purple blotched leaves.
On a table set against the wall was a brass head that glimmered in the feeble light.
Dirk crossed the floor with his youthful step and touched Nathalie on the shoulder.
“One came to see me,” he said breathlessly. “A marvellous lady.”
“I know,” murmured the witch. “And was it to play into thy hands?”
The air was thick and tainted with unwholesome smells; Dirk leant against the wall and stared down the chamber, his hand to his brow.
“She threatened me,” he said, “and for a moment I was afraid; for, certes, I do not wish to leave Frankfort… but she wished me to serve her—which I will do—for a price.”
“Who is she?” blinked the witch.
“That I am come to discover,” frowned Dirk. “And who it is she spoke of—also somewhat of Jacobea of Martzburg”—he coughed, for the foul atmosphere had entered his nostrils. “Give me the globe.”
The witch handed him a ball of a dark muddy colour, which he placed on the floor, flinging himself beside it; Nathalie drew a pentagon round the globe and pronounced some words in a low tone; a slight tremor shook the ground, though it was solid earth they stood on, and the globe turned a pale, luminous, blue tint.
Dirk pushed back the damp hair from his eyes, and, resting his face in his hands, his elbows on the ground, he stared into the depths of the crystal, the colour of which brightened until it glowed a ball of azure fire.
“I see nothing,” he said angrily.
The witch repeated her incantations; she leant forward, the yellow coins glistening on her pale forehead.
Rays of light began to sparkle from the globe.
“Show me something of the lady who came here to-day,” commanded Dirk.
They waited.
“Do ye see anything?” breathed the witch.
“Yea—very faintly.”
He gazed for a while in silence.
“I see a man,” he said at last. “The spells are wrong… I see nothing of the lady——”
“Watch, though,” cried the witch. “What is he like?”
“I cannot see distinctly… he is on horseback… he wears armour… now I can see his face—he is young, dark—he has black hair——”
“Do ye know him?”
“Nay—I have never seen him before.” Dirk did not lift his eyes from the globe. “He is evidently a knight… he is magnificent but cold… ah!”
His exclamation was at the change in the ball; slowly it faded into a faint blue, then became again dark and muddy.
He flung it angrily out of the pentagon.
“What has that told me?” he cried. “What is this man?”
“Question Zerdusht,” said the witch, pointing to the brass head. “Maybe he will speak to-night.”
She flung a handful of spices on to the slow-burning fire, and a faint smoke rose, filling the chamber.
Dirk crossed to the brass head and surveyed it with eager hollow eyes.
“The dead men dance,” smiled the witch. “Certes, he will speak to-night.”
Dirk turned his wild gaze to where the corpses hung. Their shrivelled limbs twisted and jerked at the end of their chain, and the horrid lurid colour of their poisonous wreaths gleamed through the smoke and shook with the nodding of their faceless heads.
“Zerdusht, Zerdusht,” murmured Dirk. “In the name of Satan, his legions, speak to thy servant, show or tell him something of the woman who came here to-day on an evil errand.”
A heavy stillness fell with the ending of the words; the smoke became thick and dense, then suddenly cleared.
At that instant the lamps were extinguished and the fire fell into ashes.
“Something comes,” whispered the witch.
Through the dark could be heard the dance of the dead men and the grind of their bones against the ropes.
Dirk stood motionless, his straining eyes fixed before him.
Presently a pale light spread over the end of the chamber, and in it appeared the figure of a young knight; his black hair fell from under his helmet, his face was composed and somewhat haughty, his dark eyes fearless and cold.
“ ’Tis he I saw in the crystal!” cried Dirk, and as he spoke the light and the figure disappeared.
Dirk beat his breast.
“Zerdusht! ye mock me! I asked ye of this woman! I know not the man.”
The brass head suddenly glowed out of the darkness as if a light shone behind it; the lids twitched, opened, and glittering red eyeballs stared at Dirk, who shouted in triumph.
He fell on his knees.
“A year ago to-day I saw a woman in the mirror; to-day she came to me… who is she? … Zerdusht—her name?”
The brass lips moved and spoke.
“Ysabeau.”
What did this tell him?
“Who was the knight ye have shown me?” he cried.
“Her husband,” answered the head.
“Who is the man she seeks my aid to… to… who is it of whom she spoke to me?”
The flaming eyeballs rolled.
“Her husband.”
Dirk gave a start.
“Make haste,” came the witch’s voice through the swimming blackness. “The light fades.”
“Who is she?”
“The Empress of the West,” said the brass head.
A cry broke from Dirk and the witch; Dirk shrieked another question.
“She wishes to put another in the Emperor’s place?”
“Yea;” the light was growing fainter; the eyelids flickered over the red eyes.
“Whom?” cried Dirk.
Faint, yet distinct came the answer—
“The Lord of Ursula of Rooselaare, Balthasar of Courtrai.”
The lids fell and the jaws clicked, the light sank into nothingness, and the lamps sprang again into dismal flame that disclosed the black bodies of the dead men, hanging slackly with their wreaths touching their chests, the witch crouching by the hearth——
And in the centre of the floor Dirk, smiling horribly.
The smile faded from her lips, and her gorgeous loveliness became grave, almost tragic.
“You do not know me?” she asked.
“No,” answered Dirk; he could not tell her that he had seen her before in his devil’s mirror.
“But you will recognise me again?”
Dirk laughed quietly.
“You were not made to be forgotten. Strange with such a face ye should have need of witchcraft!”
The lady replaced the mottled mask, that looked the more horrible after that glimpse of gleaming beauty, and drew her mantle over her shoulders.
“I shall come to you or send to you, sir. Think on what I have said, and on what I know.”
She was obscured again, hidden in her green cloak. Dirk proffered no question, made no comment, but preceded her down the dark passage and opened the door; she passed out; her footstep was light on the path; Dirk watched her walk rapidly down the street, then closed the door and bolted it. After a pause of breathless confusion and heart-heating excitement, he ran to the back of the house and out into the garden.
It was just light enough for the huge dusky roses to be visible as they nodded on their trailing bushes; Dirk ran between them until he reached a gaunt stone statue half concealed by laurels; in front of this were flags irregularly placed; in the centre of one was an iron ring; Dirk, pulling at this, disclosed a trap door that opened at his effort, and revealed a flight of steps; he descended from the soft pure evening and the red roses into the witch’s kitchen, closing the stone above him.
The underground chamber was large and lit by lamps hanging from the roof, revealing smooth stone walls and damp floor; in one side a gaping blackness showed where a passage twisted to the outer air; on another was a huge alchemist’s fireplace; before this sat the witch, about her a quantity of glass vessels, retorts and pots of various shapes.
Either side this fireplace hung a human body, black and withered, swinging from rusted ropes and crowned with wreaths of green and purple blotched leaves.
On a table set against the wall was a brass head that glimmered in the feeble light.
Dirk crossed the floor with his youthful step and touched Nathalie on the shoulder.
“One came to see me,” he said breathlessly. “A marvellous lady.”
“I know,” murmured the witch. “And was it to play into thy hands?”
The air was thick and tainted with unwholesome smells; Dirk leant against the wall and stared down the chamber, his hand to his brow.
“She threatened me,” he said, “and for a moment I was afraid; for, certes, I do not wish to leave Frankfort… but she wished me to serve her—which I will do—for a price.”
“Who is she?” blinked the witch.
“That I am come to discover,” frowned Dirk. “And who it is she spoke of—also somewhat of Jacobea of Martzburg”—he coughed, for the foul atmosphere had entered his nostrils. “Give me the globe.”
The witch handed him a ball of a dark muddy colour, which he placed on the floor, flinging himself beside it; Nathalie drew a pentagon round the globe and pronounced some words in a low tone; a slight tremor shook the ground, though it was solid earth they stood on, and the globe turned a pale, luminous, blue tint.
Dirk pushed back the damp hair from his eyes, and, resting his face in his hands, his elbows on the ground, he stared into the depths of the crystal, the colour of which brightened until it glowed a ball of azure fire.
“I see nothing,” he said angrily.
The witch repeated her incantations; she leant forward, the yellow coins glistening on her pale forehead.
Rays of light began to sparkle from the globe.
“Show me something of the lady who came here to-day,” commanded Dirk.
They waited.
“Do ye see anything?” breathed the witch.
“Yea—very faintly.”
He gazed for a while in silence.
“I see a man,” he said at last. “The spells are wrong… I see nothing of the lady——”
“Watch, though,” cried the witch. “What is he like?”
“I cannot see distinctly… he is on horseback… he wears armour… now I can see his face—he is young, dark—he has black hair——”
“Do ye know him?”
“Nay—I have never seen him before.” Dirk did not lift his eyes from the globe. “He is evidently a knight… he is magnificent but cold… ah!”
His exclamation was at the change in the ball; slowly it faded into a faint blue, then became again dark and muddy.
He flung it angrily out of the pentagon.
“What has that told me?” he cried. “What is this man?”
“Question Zerdusht,” said the witch, pointing to the brass head. “Maybe he will speak to-night.”
She flung a handful of spices on to the slow-burning fire, and a faint smoke rose, filling the chamber.
Dirk crossed to the brass head and surveyed it with eager hollow eyes.
“The dead men dance,” smiled the witch. “Certes, he will speak to-night.”
Dirk turned his wild gaze to where the corpses hung. Their shrivelled limbs twisted and jerked at the end of their chain, and the horrid lurid colour of their poisonous wreaths gleamed through the smoke and shook with the nodding of their faceless heads.
“Zerdusht, Zerdusht,” murmured Dirk. “In the name of Satan, his legions, speak to thy servant, show or tell him something of the woman who came here to-day on an evil errand.”
A heavy stillness fell with the ending of the words; the smoke became thick and dense, then suddenly cleared.
At that instant the lamps were extinguished and the fire fell into ashes.
“Something comes,” whispered the witch.
Through the dark could be heard the dance of the dead men and the grind of their bones against the ropes.
Dirk stood motionless, his straining eyes fixed before him.
Presently a pale light spread over the end of the chamber, and in it appeared the figure of a young knight; his black hair fell from under his helmet, his face was composed and somewhat haughty, his dark eyes fearless and cold.
“ ’Tis he I saw in the crystal!” cried Dirk, and as he spoke the light and the figure disappeared.
Dirk beat his breast.
“Zerdusht! ye mock me! I asked ye of this woman! I know not the man.”
The brass head suddenly glowed out of the darkness as if a light shone behind it; the lids twitched, opened, and glittering red eyeballs stared at Dirk, who shouted in triumph.
He fell on his knees.
“A year ago to-day I saw a woman in the mirror; to-day she came to me… who is she? … Zerdusht—her name?”
The brass lips moved and spoke.
“Ysabeau.”
What did this tell him?
“Who was the knight ye have shown me?” he cried.
“Her husband,” answered the head.
“Who is the man she seeks my aid to… to… who is it of whom she spoke to me?”
The flaming eyeballs rolled.
“Her husband.”
Dirk gave a start.
“Make haste,” came the witch’s voice through the swimming blackness. “The light fades.”
“Who is she?”
“The Empress of the West,” said the brass head.
A cry broke from Dirk and the witch; Dirk shrieked another question.
“She wishes to put another in the Emperor’s place?”
“Yea;” the light was growing fainter; the eyelids flickered over the red eyes.
“Whom?” cried Dirk.
Faint, yet distinct came the answer—
“The Lord of Ursula of Rooselaare, Balthasar of Courtrai.”
The lids fell and the jaws clicked, the light sank into nothingness, and the lamps sprang again into dismal flame that disclosed the black bodies of the dead men, hanging slackly with their wreaths touching their chests, the witch crouching by the hearth——
And in the centre of the floor Dirk, smiling horribly.
- Joined
- Oct 28, 2018
My first non-Lovecraft post in quite a while, but this is still a Mythos story, and I think it's one of the best.
A Colder War
a novelette by Charles Stross
Analyst
Roger Jourgensen tilts back in his chair, reading.
He's a fair-haired man, in his mid-thirties: hair razor-cropped, skin pallid from too much time spent under artificial lights. Spectacles, short-sleeved white shirt and tie, photographic ID badge on a chain round his neck. He works in an air-conditioned office with no windows.
The file he is reading frightens him.
Once, when Roger was a young boy, his father took him to an open day at Nellis AFB, out in the California desert. Sunlight glared brilliantly from the polished silverplate flanks of the big bombers, sitting in their concrete-lined dispersal bays behind barriers and blinking radiation monitors. The brightly coloured streamers flying from their pitot tubes lent them a strange, almost festive appearance. But they were sleeping nightmares: once awakened, nobody -- except the flight crew -- could come within a mile of the nuclear-powered bombers and live.
Looking at the gleaming, bulging pods slung under their wingtip pylons, Roger had a premature inkling of the fires that waited within, a frigid terror that echoed the siren wail of the air raid warnings. He'd sucked nervously on his ice cream and gripped his father's hand tightly while the band ripped through a cheerful Sousa march, and only forgot his fear when a flock of Thunderchiefs sliced by overhead and rattled the car windows for miles around.
He has the same feeling now, as an adult reading this intelligence assessment, that he had as a child, watching the nuclear powered bombers sleeping in their concrete beds.
There's a blurry photograph of a concrete box inside the file, snapped from above by a high-flying U-2 during the autumn of '61. Three coffin-shaped lakes, bulking dark and gloomy beneath the arctic sun; a canal heading west, deep in the Soviet heartland, surrounded by warning trefoils and armed guards. Deep waters saturated with calcium salts, concrete coffer-dams lined with gold and lead. A sleeping giant pointed at NATO, more terrifying than any nuclear weapon.
Project Koschei.
Red Square Redux
Warning
The following briefing film is classified SECRET GOLD JULY BOOJUM. If you do not have SECRET GOLD JULY BOOJUM clearance, leave the auditorium now and report to your unit security officer for debriefing. Failing to observe this notice is an imprisonable offense.
You have sixty seconds to comply.
Video clip
Red Square in springtime. The sky overhead is clear and blue; there's a little wispy cirrus at high altitude. It forms a brilliant backdrop for flight after flight of five four-engined bombers that thunder across the horizon and drop behind the Kremlin's high walls.
Voice-over
Red Square, the May Day parade, 1962. This is the first time that the Soviet Union has publicly displayed weapons classified GOLD JULY BOOJUM. Here they are:
Video clip
Later in the same day. A seemingly endless stream of armour and soldiers marches across the square, turning the air grey with diesel fumes. The trucks roll in line eight abreast, with soldiers sitting erect in the back. Behind them rumble a battalion of T-56's, their commanders standing at attention in their cupolas, saluting the stand. Jets race low and loud overhead, formations of MiG-17 fighters.
Behind the tanks sprawl a formation of four low-loaders: huge tractors towing low-sling trailers, their load beds strapped down under olive-drab tarpaulins. Whatever is under them is uneven, a bit like a loaf of bread the size of a small house. The trucks have an escort of jeep-like vehicles on each side, armed soldiers sitting at attention in their backs.
There are big five-pointed stars painted in silver on each tarpaulin, like outlines of stars. Each star is surrounded by a stylized silver circle; a unit insignia, perhaps, but not in the standard format for Red Army units. There's lettering around the circles, in a strangely stylised script.
Voice-over
These are live servitors under transient control. The vehicles towing them bear the insignia of the second Guards Engineering Brigade, a penal construction unit based in Bokhara and used for structural engineering assignments relating to nuclear installations in the Ukraine and Azerbaijan. This is the first time that any Dresden Agreement party openly demonstrated ownership of this technology: in this instance, the conclusion we are intended to draw is that the sixty-seventh Guard Engineering Brigade operates four units. Given existing figures for the Soviet ORBAT we can then extrapolate a total task strength of two hundred and eighty eight servitors, if this unit is unexceptional.
Video clip
Five huge Tu-95 Bear bombers thunder across the Moscow skies.
Voice-over
This conclusion is questionable. For example, in 1964 a total of two hundred and forty Bear bomber passes were made over the reviewing stand in front of the Lenin mausoleum. However, at that time technical reconnaissance assets verified that the Soviet air force has hard stand parking for only one hundred and sixty of these aircraft, and estimates of airframe production based on photographs of the extent of the Tupolev bureau's works indicate that total production to that date was between sixty and one hundred and eighty bombers.
Further analysis of photographic evidence from the 1964 parade suggests that a single group of twenty aircraft in four formations of five made repeated passes through the same airspace, the main arc of their circuit lying outside visual observation range of Moscow. This gave rise to the erroneous capacity report of 1964 in which the first strike delivery capability of the Soviet Union was over-estimated by as much as three hundred percent.
We must therefore take anything that they show us in Red Square with a pinch of salt when preparing force estimates. Quite possibly these four servitors are all they've got. Then again, the actual battalion strength may be considerably higher.
Still photographic sequence
From very high altitude -- possibly in orbit -- an eagle's eye view of a remote village in mountainous country. Small huts huddle together beneath a craggy outcrop; goats graze nearby.
In the second photograph, something has rolled through the village leaving a trail of devastation. The path is quite unlike the trail of damage left by an artillery bombardment: something roughly four metres wide has shaved the rocky plateau smooth, wearing it down as if with a terrible heat. A corner of a shack leans drunkenly, the other half sliced away cleanly. White bones gleam faintly in the track; no vultures descend to stab at the remains.
Voice-over
These images were taken very recently, on successive orbital passes of a KH-11 satellite. They were timed precisely eighty-nine minutes apart. This village was the home of a noted Mujahedin leader. Note the similar footprint to the payloads on the load beds of the trucks seen at the 1962 parade.
These indicators were present, denoting the presence of servitor units in use by Soviet forces in Afghanistan: the four metre wide gauge of the assimilation track. The total molecular breakdown of organic matter in the track. The speed of destruction -- the event took less than five thousand seconds to completion, no survivors were visible, and the causative agent had already been uplifted by the time of the second orbital pass. This, despite the residents of the community being armed with DShK heavy machine guns, rocket propelled grenade launchers, and AK-47's. Lastly: there is no sign of the causative agent even deviating from its course, but the entire area is depopulated. Except for excarnated residue there is no sign of human habitation.
In the presence of such unique indicators, we have no alternative but to conclude that the Soviet Union has violated the Dresden Agreement by deploying GOLD JULY BOOJUM in a combat mode in the Khyber pass. There are no grounds to believe that a NATO armoured division would have fared any better than these mujahedin without nuclear support ...
A Colder War
a novelette by Charles Stross
Analyst
Roger Jourgensen tilts back in his chair, reading.
He's a fair-haired man, in his mid-thirties: hair razor-cropped, skin pallid from too much time spent under artificial lights. Spectacles, short-sleeved white shirt and tie, photographic ID badge on a chain round his neck. He works in an air-conditioned office with no windows.
The file he is reading frightens him.
Once, when Roger was a young boy, his father took him to an open day at Nellis AFB, out in the California desert. Sunlight glared brilliantly from the polished silverplate flanks of the big bombers, sitting in their concrete-lined dispersal bays behind barriers and blinking radiation monitors. The brightly coloured streamers flying from their pitot tubes lent them a strange, almost festive appearance. But they were sleeping nightmares: once awakened, nobody -- except the flight crew -- could come within a mile of the nuclear-powered bombers and live.
Looking at the gleaming, bulging pods slung under their wingtip pylons, Roger had a premature inkling of the fires that waited within, a frigid terror that echoed the siren wail of the air raid warnings. He'd sucked nervously on his ice cream and gripped his father's hand tightly while the band ripped through a cheerful Sousa march, and only forgot his fear when a flock of Thunderchiefs sliced by overhead and rattled the car windows for miles around.
He has the same feeling now, as an adult reading this intelligence assessment, that he had as a child, watching the nuclear powered bombers sleeping in their concrete beds.
There's a blurry photograph of a concrete box inside the file, snapped from above by a high-flying U-2 during the autumn of '61. Three coffin-shaped lakes, bulking dark and gloomy beneath the arctic sun; a canal heading west, deep in the Soviet heartland, surrounded by warning trefoils and armed guards. Deep waters saturated with calcium salts, concrete coffer-dams lined with gold and lead. A sleeping giant pointed at NATO, more terrifying than any nuclear weapon.
Project Koschei.
Red Square Redux
Warning
The following briefing film is classified SECRET GOLD JULY BOOJUM. If you do not have SECRET GOLD JULY BOOJUM clearance, leave the auditorium now and report to your unit security officer for debriefing. Failing to observe this notice is an imprisonable offense.
You have sixty seconds to comply.
Video clip
Red Square in springtime. The sky overhead is clear and blue; there's a little wispy cirrus at high altitude. It forms a brilliant backdrop for flight after flight of five four-engined bombers that thunder across the horizon and drop behind the Kremlin's high walls.
Voice-over
Red Square, the May Day parade, 1962. This is the first time that the Soviet Union has publicly displayed weapons classified GOLD JULY BOOJUM. Here they are:
Video clip
Later in the same day. A seemingly endless stream of armour and soldiers marches across the square, turning the air grey with diesel fumes. The trucks roll in line eight abreast, with soldiers sitting erect in the back. Behind them rumble a battalion of T-56's, their commanders standing at attention in their cupolas, saluting the stand. Jets race low and loud overhead, formations of MiG-17 fighters.
Behind the tanks sprawl a formation of four low-loaders: huge tractors towing low-sling trailers, their load beds strapped down under olive-drab tarpaulins. Whatever is under them is uneven, a bit like a loaf of bread the size of a small house. The trucks have an escort of jeep-like vehicles on each side, armed soldiers sitting at attention in their backs.
There are big five-pointed stars painted in silver on each tarpaulin, like outlines of stars. Each star is surrounded by a stylized silver circle; a unit insignia, perhaps, but not in the standard format for Red Army units. There's lettering around the circles, in a strangely stylised script.
Voice-over
These are live servitors under transient control. The vehicles towing them bear the insignia of the second Guards Engineering Brigade, a penal construction unit based in Bokhara and used for structural engineering assignments relating to nuclear installations in the Ukraine and Azerbaijan. This is the first time that any Dresden Agreement party openly demonstrated ownership of this technology: in this instance, the conclusion we are intended to draw is that the sixty-seventh Guard Engineering Brigade operates four units. Given existing figures for the Soviet ORBAT we can then extrapolate a total task strength of two hundred and eighty eight servitors, if this unit is unexceptional.
Video clip
Five huge Tu-95 Bear bombers thunder across the Moscow skies.
Voice-over
This conclusion is questionable. For example, in 1964 a total of two hundred and forty Bear bomber passes were made over the reviewing stand in front of the Lenin mausoleum. However, at that time technical reconnaissance assets verified that the Soviet air force has hard stand parking for only one hundred and sixty of these aircraft, and estimates of airframe production based on photographs of the extent of the Tupolev bureau's works indicate that total production to that date was between sixty and one hundred and eighty bombers.
Further analysis of photographic evidence from the 1964 parade suggests that a single group of twenty aircraft in four formations of five made repeated passes through the same airspace, the main arc of their circuit lying outside visual observation range of Moscow. This gave rise to the erroneous capacity report of 1964 in which the first strike delivery capability of the Soviet Union was over-estimated by as much as three hundred percent.
We must therefore take anything that they show us in Red Square with a pinch of salt when preparing force estimates. Quite possibly these four servitors are all they've got. Then again, the actual battalion strength may be considerably higher.
Still photographic sequence
From very high altitude -- possibly in orbit -- an eagle's eye view of a remote village in mountainous country. Small huts huddle together beneath a craggy outcrop; goats graze nearby.
In the second photograph, something has rolled through the village leaving a trail of devastation. The path is quite unlike the trail of damage left by an artillery bombardment: something roughly four metres wide has shaved the rocky plateau smooth, wearing it down as if with a terrible heat. A corner of a shack leans drunkenly, the other half sliced away cleanly. White bones gleam faintly in the track; no vultures descend to stab at the remains.
Voice-over
These images were taken very recently, on successive orbital passes of a KH-11 satellite. They were timed precisely eighty-nine minutes apart. This village was the home of a noted Mujahedin leader. Note the similar footprint to the payloads on the load beds of the trucks seen at the 1962 parade.
These indicators were present, denoting the presence of servitor units in use by Soviet forces in Afghanistan: the four metre wide gauge of the assimilation track. The total molecular breakdown of organic matter in the track. The speed of destruction -- the event took less than five thousand seconds to completion, no survivors were visible, and the causative agent had already been uplifted by the time of the second orbital pass. This, despite the residents of the community being armed with DShK heavy machine guns, rocket propelled grenade launchers, and AK-47's. Lastly: there is no sign of the causative agent even deviating from its course, but the entire area is depopulated. Except for excarnated residue there is no sign of human habitation.
In the presence of such unique indicators, we have no alternative but to conclude that the Soviet Union has violated the Dresden Agreement by deploying GOLD JULY BOOJUM in a combat mode in the Khyber pass. There are no grounds to believe that a NATO armoured division would have fared any better than these mujahedin without nuclear support ...
ELLE101
kiwifarms.net
- Joined
- Jun 18, 2020
https://youtu.be/F2Z2CklSxM0?si=UMZWe6c7SQaVf4A7
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- Joined
- Oct 9, 2018
BLACK MAGIC BY MARJORIE BOWEN CONT
CHAPTER XIII.
THE SNARING OF JACOBEA
The great forest was so silent, so lonely, the aisles of a vast church could have been no more sanctified by holy stillness.
Even the summer wind that trembled in the upper boughs of the huge trees had not penetrated their thick branches and intertwined leaves, so that the grass and flowers were standing erect, untroubled by a breath of air, and the sun, that dazzled without on the town of Frankfort did not touch the glowing green gloom of the forest.
Seated low on the grass by a wayside shrine that held a little figure of the Madonna, Nathalie the witch, hunched together in a brown cloak, looked keenly into the depths of cool shade between the tree trunks.
She was watching the distant figure of a lady tremble into sight among the leaves of the undergrowth.
A lady who walked hesitatingly and fearfully; as she drew near, the witch could see that the long yellow dress she held up was torn and soiled, and that her hair hung disarranged on her shoulders; breathing in a quick, fatigued manner she came towards the shrine, but seeing the witch she stopped abruptly and her grey eyes darkened with apprehension.
“What is amiss with Jacobea of Martzburg,” asked the witch in her expressionless way, “that she walks the forest disarrayed and alone?”
“I am lost,” answered Jacobea, shrinking. “How do you know me?”
“By your face,” said Nathalie. “How is it you are lost?”
“Will you tell me the way to Frankfort?” asked Jacobea wearily. “I have walked since noon. I was accompanying the Empress from the tournament and my horse broke away with me—I slipped from the saddle. Now I have lost him.”
Nathalie smiled faintly.
“I know not where I am,” said Jacobea, still with that look of apprehension in her sweet eyes. “Will you set me on my path?”
She glanced at the shrine, then at the witch, and put her hand to her forehead; dazed, she seemed, and bewildered.
“Of what are you afraid?” asked Nathalie.
“Oh, why should I be afraid!” answered Jacobea, with a start. “But—why, it is very lonely here and I must get home.”
“Let me tell your fortune,” said the witch, slowly rising. “You have a curious fortune, and I will reveal it without gold or silver.”
“No!” Jacobea’s voice was agitated. “I have no credence in those things. I will pay you to show me the way out of the forest.”
But the witch had crossed softly to her side, and, to her manifest shrinking terror, caught hold of her hand.
“What do you imagine you hold in your palm?” she smiled.
Jacobea endeavoured to draw her hand away, the near presence of the woman quickened her unnamed terror.
“Lands and castles,” said the witch, while her fingers tightened on the striving wrist. “Gold and loneliness——”
“You know me,” answered Jacobea, in anger. “There is no magic in this… let me go!”
The witch dropped the lady’s hand and smoothed her own together.
“I do not need the lines in your palm to tell me your fortune,” she said sharply. “I know more of you than you would care to hear, Jacobea of Martzburg.”
The lady turned away and stepped quickly but aimlessly down the shaded glade.
Nathalie, dragging her brown cloak, came lightly after.
“You cannot escape,” she said. “You may walk in and out the trees until you die of weariness, yet never find your way to Frankfort.”
She laid her small thin fingers on the soft velvet of Jacobea’s yellow sleeve and blinked up into her startled eyes.
“Who are you?” cried the lady, with a touch of desperation in her faint voice. “And what do you want with me?”
The witch licked her pale lips.
“Come with me and I will show you.”
Jacobea shuddered.
“No, I will not.”
“You cannot find your way alone,” nodded the witch.
The lady hesitated; she looked around her at the motionless aisles of trees, the silent glades, she looked up at the arching boughs and clustering leaves concealing the sky.
“Indeed I will pay you well if you will guide me out of this,” she entreated.
“Come with me now,” answered Nathalie, “and afterwards I will set you on your way.”
“To what end should I go with you?” exclaimed Jacobea. “I know you not, and, God help me, I mistrust you.”
The witch shot a scornful glance over the lady’s tall figure, supple with the strength of youth.
“What evil could I do you?” she asked.
Jacobea considered her intently; indeed she was small, seemed frail also; Jacobea’s white fingers could have crushed the life out of her lean throat.
Still she was reluctant.
“To what end?” she repeated.
Nathalie did not answer, but turned into a grass-grown path that twisted through the trees, and Jacobea, afraid of the loneliness, followed her slowly.
As they went through the forest, the green, still forest, with no flower to vary the clinging creepers and great blossomless plants, with no sound of bird or insect to mingle with their light tread and the sweep of their garments on the ground, Jacobea was aware that her senses were being dulled and drugged with the silence and the strangeness; she felt no longer afraid or curious.
After a while they came upon a pool lying in a hollow and grown about with thick, dark ferns; the sunless waters were black and dull, on the surface of them floated some dead leaves and the vivid unwholesome green of a tangled weed.
A young man in a plain dark dress was seated on the opposite bank.
On his knees was an open book, and his long straight hair hung either side of his face and brushed the yellow page.
Behind him stood the shattered trunk of a blasted tree, grown with fan-shaped fungi of brilliant scarlet and blotched purple and orange that glowed gorgeously in the universal cold soft greenness.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE SNARING OF JACOBEA
The great forest was so silent, so lonely, the aisles of a vast church could have been no more sanctified by holy stillness.
Even the summer wind that trembled in the upper boughs of the huge trees had not penetrated their thick branches and intertwined leaves, so that the grass and flowers were standing erect, untroubled by a breath of air, and the sun, that dazzled without on the town of Frankfort did not touch the glowing green gloom of the forest.
Seated low on the grass by a wayside shrine that held a little figure of the Madonna, Nathalie the witch, hunched together in a brown cloak, looked keenly into the depths of cool shade between the tree trunks.
She was watching the distant figure of a lady tremble into sight among the leaves of the undergrowth.
A lady who walked hesitatingly and fearfully; as she drew near, the witch could see that the long yellow dress she held up was torn and soiled, and that her hair hung disarranged on her shoulders; breathing in a quick, fatigued manner she came towards the shrine, but seeing the witch she stopped abruptly and her grey eyes darkened with apprehension.
“What is amiss with Jacobea of Martzburg,” asked the witch in her expressionless way, “that she walks the forest disarrayed and alone?”
“I am lost,” answered Jacobea, shrinking. “How do you know me?”
“By your face,” said Nathalie. “How is it you are lost?”
“Will you tell me the way to Frankfort?” asked Jacobea wearily. “I have walked since noon. I was accompanying the Empress from the tournament and my horse broke away with me—I slipped from the saddle. Now I have lost him.”
Nathalie smiled faintly.
“I know not where I am,” said Jacobea, still with that look of apprehension in her sweet eyes. “Will you set me on my path?”
She glanced at the shrine, then at the witch, and put her hand to her forehead; dazed, she seemed, and bewildered.
“Of what are you afraid?” asked Nathalie.
“Oh, why should I be afraid!” answered Jacobea, with a start. “But—why, it is very lonely here and I must get home.”
“Let me tell your fortune,” said the witch, slowly rising. “You have a curious fortune, and I will reveal it without gold or silver.”
“No!” Jacobea’s voice was agitated. “I have no credence in those things. I will pay you to show me the way out of the forest.”
But the witch had crossed softly to her side, and, to her manifest shrinking terror, caught hold of her hand.
“What do you imagine you hold in your palm?” she smiled.
Jacobea endeavoured to draw her hand away, the near presence of the woman quickened her unnamed terror.
“Lands and castles,” said the witch, while her fingers tightened on the striving wrist. “Gold and loneliness——”
“You know me,” answered Jacobea, in anger. “There is no magic in this… let me go!”
The witch dropped the lady’s hand and smoothed her own together.
“I do not need the lines in your palm to tell me your fortune,” she said sharply. “I know more of you than you would care to hear, Jacobea of Martzburg.”
The lady turned away and stepped quickly but aimlessly down the shaded glade.
Nathalie, dragging her brown cloak, came lightly after.
“You cannot escape,” she said. “You may walk in and out the trees until you die of weariness, yet never find your way to Frankfort.”
She laid her small thin fingers on the soft velvet of Jacobea’s yellow sleeve and blinked up into her startled eyes.
“Who are you?” cried the lady, with a touch of desperation in her faint voice. “And what do you want with me?”
The witch licked her pale lips.
“Come with me and I will show you.”
Jacobea shuddered.
“No, I will not.”
“You cannot find your way alone,” nodded the witch.
The lady hesitated; she looked around her at the motionless aisles of trees, the silent glades, she looked up at the arching boughs and clustering leaves concealing the sky.
“Indeed I will pay you well if you will guide me out of this,” she entreated.
“Come with me now,” answered Nathalie, “and afterwards I will set you on your way.”
“To what end should I go with you?” exclaimed Jacobea. “I know you not, and, God help me, I mistrust you.”
The witch shot a scornful glance over the lady’s tall figure, supple with the strength of youth.
“What evil could I do you?” she asked.
Jacobea considered her intently; indeed she was small, seemed frail also; Jacobea’s white fingers could have crushed the life out of her lean throat.
Still she was reluctant.
“To what end?” she repeated.
Nathalie did not answer, but turned into a grass-grown path that twisted through the trees, and Jacobea, afraid of the loneliness, followed her slowly.
As they went through the forest, the green, still forest, with no flower to vary the clinging creepers and great blossomless plants, with no sound of bird or insect to mingle with their light tread and the sweep of their garments on the ground, Jacobea was aware that her senses were being dulled and drugged with the silence and the strangeness; she felt no longer afraid or curious.
After a while they came upon a pool lying in a hollow and grown about with thick, dark ferns; the sunless waters were black and dull, on the surface of them floated some dead leaves and the vivid unwholesome green of a tangled weed.
A young man in a plain dark dress was seated on the opposite bank.
On his knees was an open book, and his long straight hair hung either side of his face and brushed the yellow page.
Behind him stood the shattered trunk of a blasted tree, grown with fan-shaped fungi of brilliant scarlet and blotched purple and orange that glowed gorgeously in the universal cold soft greenness.
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BLACK MAGIC BY MARJORIE BOWEN CONT
“Oh me!” murmured Jacobea.
The young man lifted his eyes from the book and looked at her across the black water.
Jacobea would have fled, would have flung herself into the forest with no thought but that of escape from those eyes gazing at her over the pages of that ancient volume; but the witch’s loathsome little hands closed on hers with a marvellous strength and drew her, shuddering, round the edge of the pond.
The youth shut the book, stretched his slender limbs, and, half turning on his side, lay and watched.
Jacobea’s noble and lovely figure, clothed in a thick soft velvet of a luminous yellow hue; her blonde hair, straying on her shoulders and mingling with the glowing tint of her gown; her grave and sweet face, lit and guarded by grey eyes, soft and frightened, made a fair picture against the sombre background of the dark wood.
A picture marred only by the insignificant and drab-coloured figure of the little witch who held her hand and dragged her through the dank grass.
“Do you remember me?” asked the youth.
Jacobea turned her head away.
“Let go of her, Nathalie,” continued the youth impatiently; he rested his elbow on the closed book and propped his chin on his hand; his eyes rested eagerly and admiringly on the lady’s shuddering fairness.
“She will run,” said Nathalie, but she loosened her hold.
Jacobea did not stir; she shook the hand Nathalie had held and caressed it with the other.
The young man put back his heavy hair.
“Do you know me?”
She slowly turned her face, pearl pale above the glowing colour of her dress.
“Yes, you came to my castle for shelter once.”
Dirk did not lower his intense, ardent gaze.
“Well, how did I reward your courtesy? I told you something.”
She would not answer.
“I told you something,” repeated Dirk. “And you have not forgotten it.”
“Let me go,” she said. “I do not know who you are nor what you mean. Let me go.”
She turned as if to move away, but sank instead on to one of the moss-covered boulders that edged the pond and clasped her fingers over the shining locks straying across her bosom.
“You have never been the same since that time you sheltered me,” said Dirk.
She stiffened with dread and pride.
“Ye are some evil thing,” she said; her glance was fierce for the passive witch. “Why was I brought here?”
“Because it was my wish,” answered Dirk gravely. “Your horse does not often carry you away, Jacobea of Martzburg, and leave you in a trackless forest.”
The lady started at his knowledge.
“That also was my will,” said Dirk.
“Your will!” she echoed.
Dirk smiled, with an ugly show of his teeth.
“Belike the horse was bewitched—have ye not heard of such a thing?”
“Santa Maria!” she cried.
Dirk sat up and clasped his long fingers round his knees.
“You have given a youth I know a post at Court,” he said. “Why?”
Jacobea shivered and could not move; she looked drearily at the black water and the damp masses of fern, then with a slow horror at the figure of the young man seated under the blasted tree.
“I do not know,” she answered weakly, “I never disliked him.”
“As ye did me,” added Dirk.
“Maybe I had no cause to love you,” she returned, goaded. “Why did you ever come to my castle? why did I ever see you?”
She put her cold hand over her eyes.
“No matter for that,” mocked Dirk. “So ye liked my comrade Theirry?”
She answered as if forced against her will.
“Well enough I liked him. Was he not pleasured to encounter me again, and since he was doing nought—I—but why do you question me? Can it be that you are jealous?”
The young man pulled his heavy brows together.
“Am I a silly maid to be jealous? Meddle not with things ye cannot measure, it had been better for you had you never seen my comrade’s fair face—ay, and for me also,” and he frowned.
“Surely he is free to do as he may list,” returned Jacobea. “If he choose to come to Court…”
“If ye choose to tempt him,” answered Dirk. “But enough of that.”
He rose and leant against the tree; above his slender shoulder rose the jagged tongue of grey wood and the smooth colour of the clustering fungi, and beyond that the forest sank into immense depths of still gloom.
Jacobea strove desperately with her dull dread and terror, but it seemed to her as if a sickly vapour was rising from the black pool that chilled her blood to horror; she could not escape Dirk’s steady eyes that were like bright stones in his smooth face.
“Come here,” he said.
Jacobea made no movement to obey until the witch clutched her arm, when she shook off the clinging fingers and approached the spot where Dirk waited.
“I think you have bewitched me,” she said drearily.
“Not I, another has done that,” he answered. “Certes, ye are slow in mating, Jacobea of Martzburg.”
A little shuddering breath stirred her parted lips; she looked to right and left, saw nothing but the enclosing forest, and turned her frightened eyes on Dirk.
“I know some little magic,” he continued. “Shall I show you the man you would wish to make Lord of Martzburg?”
“There is no one,” she said feebly.
“You lie,” he answered. “As I could prove.”
“As you cannot prove,” she returned, clasping her hands together.
Dirk smiled.
“Why, you are a fair thing and a gentle, but you have rebellious thoughts, thoughts ye would blush to whisper at the confessional grate.”
She moved her lips, but did not speak.
“Why did your steward come with ye to Frankfort?” asked Dirk. “And his wife stay as chatelaine of Martzburg? It had been more fitting had he remained. What reward will he receive for his services as your henchman at the Court?”
Jacobea drew her handkerchief from her girdle and pressed it to her lips.
“What reward do you imagine I should offer?” she answered very slowly.
“I cannot tell,” said Dirk, with a hot force behind every word. “For I do not know if you are a fool or no, but this I know, the man waits a word from you——”
“Stop!” said Jacobea.
But Dirk continued ruthlessly—
“He waits, I tell you——”
“Oh God, for what?” she cried.
“For you to say—‘you think me fair, Sebastian, you know me rich and all my life shall prove me loving, and only a red-browed woman in Martzburg Castle prevents you coming from my footstool to my side’—said you that, he would take horse to-morrow for Martzburg and return a free man.”
The handkerchief fell from Jacobea’s fingers and fluttered on the dark ferns.
“You are a fiend,” she said in a sick voice. “You cannot be human to so touch my heart, and you are wrong, I dare to tell you in the name of God that you are wrong—those evil thoughts have never come to me.”
“In the name of the Devil I am right,” smiled Dirk.
“The Devil! Ye are one of his agents!” she cried in a trembling defiance. “Or how could you guess what I scarcely knew until ye came that baleful night?—what he never knew till then—ah, I swear it, he never dreamt that I—never dreamt what my favour meant, but now—his—eyes—I cannot mistake them.”
“He is a dutiful servant,” said Dirk, “he waits for his mistress to speak.”
Jacobea sank to her knees on the grass.
“I entreat you to forbear,” she whispered. “Whoever you are, whatever your object I ask your mercy. I am very unhappy—do not goad me—drive me further.”
Dirk stepped forward and caught her drooping shoulders in his firm hands.
“Pious fool!” he cried. “How long do you think you can endure this? how long do you think he will remain the servant when he knows he might be the master?”
She averted her agonised face.
“Then it was from you he learned it, you——”
Dirk interrupted hotly—
“He knows, remember that! he knows and he waits. Already he hates the woman who keeps him dumb; it were very easily done—one look, some few words—ye would not find him slow of understanding.” He loosened his grasp on her and Jacobea fell forward and clasped his feet.
“I implore you take back this wickedness, I am weak; since my first sight of you I have been striving against your influence that is killing me; man or demon, I beseech you, let me be!”
She raised her face, the slow, bitter tears forced out of her sweet, worn eyes; her hair fell like golden embroidery over the yellow gown, and her fingers fluttered on her unhappy bosom.
Dirk considered her curiously and coldly.
“I am neither man nor demon,” he said. “But this I tell you, as surely as he is more to you than your own soul, so surely are you lost.”
“Lost! lost!” she repeated, and half raised herself.
“Certes, therefore get the price of your soul,” he mocked. “What is the woman to you? A cold-hearted jade, as good dead now as fifty years hence—what is one sin the more? I tell you while you set that man’s image up in your heart before that of God ye are lost already.”
“I am so lonely,” she whispered piteously. “Had I one friend——” She paused, as though some one came into her mind with the words, and Dirk, intently watching her, suddenly flushed and glowed with anger.
He stepped back and clapped his hands.
“I promised you a sight of your lover,” he said. “Now let him speak for himself.”
Jacobea turned her head sharply.
“Oh me!” murmured Jacobea.
The young man lifted his eyes from the book and looked at her across the black water.
Jacobea would have fled, would have flung herself into the forest with no thought but that of escape from those eyes gazing at her over the pages of that ancient volume; but the witch’s loathsome little hands closed on hers with a marvellous strength and drew her, shuddering, round the edge of the pond.
The youth shut the book, stretched his slender limbs, and, half turning on his side, lay and watched.
Jacobea’s noble and lovely figure, clothed in a thick soft velvet of a luminous yellow hue; her blonde hair, straying on her shoulders and mingling with the glowing tint of her gown; her grave and sweet face, lit and guarded by grey eyes, soft and frightened, made a fair picture against the sombre background of the dark wood.
A picture marred only by the insignificant and drab-coloured figure of the little witch who held her hand and dragged her through the dank grass.
“Do you remember me?” asked the youth.
Jacobea turned her head away.
“Let go of her, Nathalie,” continued the youth impatiently; he rested his elbow on the closed book and propped his chin on his hand; his eyes rested eagerly and admiringly on the lady’s shuddering fairness.
“She will run,” said Nathalie, but she loosened her hold.
Jacobea did not stir; she shook the hand Nathalie had held and caressed it with the other.
The young man put back his heavy hair.
“Do you know me?”
She slowly turned her face, pearl pale above the glowing colour of her dress.
“Yes, you came to my castle for shelter once.”
Dirk did not lower his intense, ardent gaze.
“Well, how did I reward your courtesy? I told you something.”
She would not answer.
“I told you something,” repeated Dirk. “And you have not forgotten it.”
“Let me go,” she said. “I do not know who you are nor what you mean. Let me go.”
She turned as if to move away, but sank instead on to one of the moss-covered boulders that edged the pond and clasped her fingers over the shining locks straying across her bosom.
“You have never been the same since that time you sheltered me,” said Dirk.
She stiffened with dread and pride.
“Ye are some evil thing,” she said; her glance was fierce for the passive witch. “Why was I brought here?”
“Because it was my wish,” answered Dirk gravely. “Your horse does not often carry you away, Jacobea of Martzburg, and leave you in a trackless forest.”
The lady started at his knowledge.
“That also was my will,” said Dirk.
“Your will!” she echoed.
Dirk smiled, with an ugly show of his teeth.
“Belike the horse was bewitched—have ye not heard of such a thing?”
“Santa Maria!” she cried.
Dirk sat up and clasped his long fingers round his knees.
“You have given a youth I know a post at Court,” he said. “Why?”
Jacobea shivered and could not move; she looked drearily at the black water and the damp masses of fern, then with a slow horror at the figure of the young man seated under the blasted tree.
“I do not know,” she answered weakly, “I never disliked him.”
“As ye did me,” added Dirk.
“Maybe I had no cause to love you,” she returned, goaded. “Why did you ever come to my castle? why did I ever see you?”
She put her cold hand over her eyes.
“No matter for that,” mocked Dirk. “So ye liked my comrade Theirry?”
She answered as if forced against her will.
“Well enough I liked him. Was he not pleasured to encounter me again, and since he was doing nought—I—but why do you question me? Can it be that you are jealous?”
The young man pulled his heavy brows together.
“Am I a silly maid to be jealous? Meddle not with things ye cannot measure, it had been better for you had you never seen my comrade’s fair face—ay, and for me also,” and he frowned.
“Surely he is free to do as he may list,” returned Jacobea. “If he choose to come to Court…”
“If ye choose to tempt him,” answered Dirk. “But enough of that.”
He rose and leant against the tree; above his slender shoulder rose the jagged tongue of grey wood and the smooth colour of the clustering fungi, and beyond that the forest sank into immense depths of still gloom.
Jacobea strove desperately with her dull dread and terror, but it seemed to her as if a sickly vapour was rising from the black pool that chilled her blood to horror; she could not escape Dirk’s steady eyes that were like bright stones in his smooth face.
“Come here,” he said.
Jacobea made no movement to obey until the witch clutched her arm, when she shook off the clinging fingers and approached the spot where Dirk waited.
“I think you have bewitched me,” she said drearily.
“Not I, another has done that,” he answered. “Certes, ye are slow in mating, Jacobea of Martzburg.”
A little shuddering breath stirred her parted lips; she looked to right and left, saw nothing but the enclosing forest, and turned her frightened eyes on Dirk.
“I know some little magic,” he continued. “Shall I show you the man you would wish to make Lord of Martzburg?”
“There is no one,” she said feebly.
“You lie,” he answered. “As I could prove.”
“As you cannot prove,” she returned, clasping her hands together.
Dirk smiled.
“Why, you are a fair thing and a gentle, but you have rebellious thoughts, thoughts ye would blush to whisper at the confessional grate.”
She moved her lips, but did not speak.
“Why did your steward come with ye to Frankfort?” asked Dirk. “And his wife stay as chatelaine of Martzburg? It had been more fitting had he remained. What reward will he receive for his services as your henchman at the Court?”
Jacobea drew her handkerchief from her girdle and pressed it to her lips.
“What reward do you imagine I should offer?” she answered very slowly.
“I cannot tell,” said Dirk, with a hot force behind every word. “For I do not know if you are a fool or no, but this I know, the man waits a word from you——”
“Stop!” said Jacobea.
But Dirk continued ruthlessly—
“He waits, I tell you——”
“Oh God, for what?” she cried.
“For you to say—‘you think me fair, Sebastian, you know me rich and all my life shall prove me loving, and only a red-browed woman in Martzburg Castle prevents you coming from my footstool to my side’—said you that, he would take horse to-morrow for Martzburg and return a free man.”
The handkerchief fell from Jacobea’s fingers and fluttered on the dark ferns.
“You are a fiend,” she said in a sick voice. “You cannot be human to so touch my heart, and you are wrong, I dare to tell you in the name of God that you are wrong—those evil thoughts have never come to me.”
“In the name of the Devil I am right,” smiled Dirk.
“The Devil! Ye are one of his agents!” she cried in a trembling defiance. “Or how could you guess what I scarcely knew until ye came that baleful night?—what he never knew till then—ah, I swear it, he never dreamt that I—never dreamt what my favour meant, but now—his—eyes—I cannot mistake them.”
“He is a dutiful servant,” said Dirk, “he waits for his mistress to speak.”
Jacobea sank to her knees on the grass.
“I entreat you to forbear,” she whispered. “Whoever you are, whatever your object I ask your mercy. I am very unhappy—do not goad me—drive me further.”
Dirk stepped forward and caught her drooping shoulders in his firm hands.
“Pious fool!” he cried. “How long do you think you can endure this? how long do you think he will remain the servant when he knows he might be the master?”
She averted her agonised face.
“Then it was from you he learned it, you——”
Dirk interrupted hotly—
“He knows, remember that! he knows and he waits. Already he hates the woman who keeps him dumb; it were very easily done—one look, some few words—ye would not find him slow of understanding.” He loosened his grasp on her and Jacobea fell forward and clasped his feet.
“I implore you take back this wickedness, I am weak; since my first sight of you I have been striving against your influence that is killing me; man or demon, I beseech you, let me be!”
She raised her face, the slow, bitter tears forced out of her sweet, worn eyes; her hair fell like golden embroidery over the yellow gown, and her fingers fluttered on her unhappy bosom.
Dirk considered her curiously and coldly.
“I am neither man nor demon,” he said. “But this I tell you, as surely as he is more to you than your own soul, so surely are you lost.”
“Lost! lost!” she repeated, and half raised herself.
“Certes, therefore get the price of your soul,” he mocked. “What is the woman to you? A cold-hearted jade, as good dead now as fifty years hence—what is one sin the more? I tell you while you set that man’s image up in your heart before that of God ye are lost already.”
“I am so lonely,” she whispered piteously. “Had I one friend——” She paused, as though some one came into her mind with the words, and Dirk, intently watching her, suddenly flushed and glowed with anger.
He stepped back and clapped his hands.
“I promised you a sight of your lover,” he said. “Now let him speak for himself.”
Jacobea turned her head sharply.
ELLE101
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BLACK MAGIC BY MARJORIE BOWEN CONT
A few feet away from her stood Sebastian, holding back the heavy boughs and looking at her.
She gave a shriek and swiftly rose; Dirk and the witch had disappeared; if they had slipped into the undergrowth and were yet near they gave no answer when she wildly called to them; the vast forest seemed utterly empty save for the silent figure of Sebastian.
Not doubting now that Dirk was some evil being whom her own wicked thoughts had evoked, believing that the appearance of her steward was some phantom sent for her undoing, she, unfortunate, distracted with misery and terror, turned with a shuddering relief to the oblivion of the still pool.
Hastening with trembling feet through the clinging weeds and ferns, she climbed down the damp bank and would have cast herself into the dull water, when she heard his voice calling her—a human voice.
She paused, lending a fearful ear to the sound while the water rippled from her foot.
“It is I,” he called. “My lady, it is I.”
This was Sebastian himself, no delusion nor ghost but her living steward, as she had seen him this morning in his brown riding-habit, wearing her gold and blue colours round his hat.
She mastered her terror and confusion.
“Indeed, you frightened me,”—a lie rose to save her. “I thought it some robber—I did not know you.”
Fear of his personal aid gave her strength to move away from the water and gain the level ground.
“I have been searching for you,” said Sebastian. “We came upon your horse on the high road and then upon your gloves in the grass, so, as no rider could come among these trees, on foot I sought for you. I am glad that you are safe.”
This calm and carefully ordered speech gave her time to gather courage; she fumbled at her bosom, drew forth a crucifix and clutched it to her lips with a murmur of passionate prayers.
He could not but notice this; he must perceive her soiled torn dress, her wild face, her white exhaustion, but he gave no sign of it.
“It was a fortunate chance that sent me here,” he said gravely. “The wood is so vast——”
“Ay, so vast,” she answered. “Know you the way out, Sebastian?”
She tried to nerve herself to look at him, but her glance was lifted only to fall instantly again.
“You must forgive me,” she said, struggling with a fainting voice. “I have walked very far, I am so weary—I must rest a while.”
But she did not sit, nor did he urge that she should.
“Have you met no one?” he asked.
She hesitated; if he had encountered neither the woman nor the young man, then they were indeed wizards or of some unearthly race—she could not bring herself to speak of them.
“No,” she answered at length.
“We have a long way to walk,” said the steward.
Jacobea felt his look upon her, and grasped her crucifix until the sharp edges of it cut her palm.
“Do you know the way?” she repeated dully.
“Ay,” he answered now. “But it is far.”
She gathered up her long skirt and shook off the withered leaves that clung to it.
“Will you lead the way?” she said.
He turned and moved ahead of her down the narrow path by which he had come; as she followed him she heard his foot fall soft on the thick grass and the swishing sound of the straying boughs as he held them back for her to pass, till she found the silence so unendurable that she nerved herself to break it; but several times she gathered her strength in vain for the effort, and when at last some foolish words had come to her lips, he suddenly looked back over his shoulder and checked her speech.
“ ’Tis strange that your horse should have gone mad in such a manner,” he said.
“But ye found him?” she faltered.
“Ay, a man found him, exhausted and trembling like a thing bewitched.”
Her heart gave a great leap—had he used that word by chance——
She could not answer.
“Ye were not hurt, my lady, when ye were thrown?” said the steward.
“No,” said Jacobea, “no.”
Silence again; no bird nor butterfly disturbed the sombre stillness of the wood, no breeze stirred the thick leaves that surrounded them; gradually the path widened until it brought them into a great space grown with ferns and overarched with trees.
Then Sebastian paused.
“It is a long way yet,” he said. “Will you rest a while?”
“No,” she replied vehemently. “Let us get on—where are the others? surely we must meet some one soon!”
“I do not know that any came this way,” he answered, and cast his brooding glance over the trembling weariness of her figure.
“Ye must rest, certes, it is folly to persist,” he added, with some authority.
She seated herself, lifting the hand that held the crucifix to her bosom.
“How full of shadows it is here,” she said. “It is difficult to fancy the shining of the sun on the tops of these darkened trees.”
“I do not love forests,” answered Sebastian.
As he stood his profile was towards her; and she must mark again the face that she knew so bitterly well, his thin dark cheek, his heavy-lidded eyes, his contained mouth.
Gazing down into the clusters of ferns at his feet, he spoke—
“I think I must return to Martzburg,” he said.
She braced herself, making a gesture with her hand as if she would ward off his words.
“You know that you are free to do what you will, Sebastian.”
He took off his right glove slowly and looked at his hand.
“Is it not better that I should go?”
He challenged her with a full sideways glance.
“I do not know,” she said desperately, “why you put this to me, here and now.”
“I do not often see you alone.”
He was not a man of winning manners or of easy speech; his words came stiffly, yet with a purpose in them that chilled her with a deeper sense of dread.
She opened her hand to stare down at the crucifix in her palm.
“You can leave Frankfort when you wish—why not?” she said.
He faced her quickly.
“But I may come back?”
It seemed to Jacobea that he echoed Dirk’s words; the crucifix slipped through her trembling fingers on to the grass.
“What do you mean? Oh, Sebastian, what do you mean?” The words were forced from her, but uttered under her breath; she added instantly, in a more courageous voice, “Go and come as you list, are you not free?”
He saw the crucifix at her feet and picked it up, but she drew back as he came near and held out her hand.
He put the crucifix into it, frowning, his eyes dark and bright with excitement.
“Do you recall the two students who were housed that night in Martzburg?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said. “Is not one now at Court?”
“I would mean the other—the boy,” answered Sebastian.
She averted her face and drooped until the ends of her hair touched her knees.
“I met him again to-day,” continued the steward, with a curious lift in his voice, “here, in this forest, while searching for you. He spoke to me.”
Certainly the Devil was enmeshing her, surely he had brought her to this pass, sent Sebastian, of all men, to find her in her weariness and loneliness.
And Sebastian knew—knew also that she knew—outspoken words between them could be hardly more intolerable shame than this.
“He is cunning beyond most,” said the steward.
Jacobea lifted her head.
“He is an enchanter—a wizard, do not listen to him, do not speak to him—as you value your soul, Sebastian, do not think of him.”
“As I value some other things,” he answered grimly, “I must both listen to him and consider what he says.”
She rose.
“We will go on our way. I cannot talk with you now, Sebastian.”
But he stood in her path.
“Let me journey to Martzburg,” he said thickly; “one word—I shall understand you.”
She glanced and saw him extraordinarily keen and moved; he was lord of Martzburg could he but get her to pledge herself; in his eagerness, however, he forgot advice. “Tell her,” said Dirk, “you have adored her for years in secret.” This escaped his keenness, for though his wife was nothing to him compared with his ambition, he had no tenderness for Jacobea. Had he remembered to feign it he might have triumphed and now; but though her gentle heart believed he held her dear, that he did not say so made firmness possible for her.
“You shall stay in Frankfort,” she said, with sudden strength.
“Sybilla asks my return,” he said, gazing at her passionately. “Do we not understand each other without words?”
“The fiend has bewitched you also,” she answered fearfully. “You know too much—you guess too much—and yet I tell you nothing, and I, I also am bewitched, for I cannot reply to you as I should.”
“I have been silent long,” he said. “But I have dared to think—had I been free—as I can be free——”
The crucifix was forgotten in her hand.
“We do evil to talk like this,” she said, half fainting.
“You will bid me go to Martzburg,” he insisted, and took her long cold fingers.
She raised her eyes to the boughs above her.
“No, no!” then, “God have compassion on me!” she said.
The thick foliage stirred—Jacobea felt as if the bars of a cage were being broken about her—she turned her head and a little colour flushed her cheek.
Through the silvery stems of the larches came some knights and a page boy, members of the party left to search for her.
She moved towards them; she hailed them almost gaily; none, save Sebastian, saw her as they turned towards Frankfort raise the crucifix and press her lips to it.
A few feet away from her stood Sebastian, holding back the heavy boughs and looking at her.
She gave a shriek and swiftly rose; Dirk and the witch had disappeared; if they had slipped into the undergrowth and were yet near they gave no answer when she wildly called to them; the vast forest seemed utterly empty save for the silent figure of Sebastian.
Not doubting now that Dirk was some evil being whom her own wicked thoughts had evoked, believing that the appearance of her steward was some phantom sent for her undoing, she, unfortunate, distracted with misery and terror, turned with a shuddering relief to the oblivion of the still pool.
Hastening with trembling feet through the clinging weeds and ferns, she climbed down the damp bank and would have cast herself into the dull water, when she heard his voice calling her—a human voice.
She paused, lending a fearful ear to the sound while the water rippled from her foot.
“It is I,” he called. “My lady, it is I.”
This was Sebastian himself, no delusion nor ghost but her living steward, as she had seen him this morning in his brown riding-habit, wearing her gold and blue colours round his hat.
She mastered her terror and confusion.
“Indeed, you frightened me,”—a lie rose to save her. “I thought it some robber—I did not know you.”
Fear of his personal aid gave her strength to move away from the water and gain the level ground.
“I have been searching for you,” said Sebastian. “We came upon your horse on the high road and then upon your gloves in the grass, so, as no rider could come among these trees, on foot I sought for you. I am glad that you are safe.”
This calm and carefully ordered speech gave her time to gather courage; she fumbled at her bosom, drew forth a crucifix and clutched it to her lips with a murmur of passionate prayers.
He could not but notice this; he must perceive her soiled torn dress, her wild face, her white exhaustion, but he gave no sign of it.
“It was a fortunate chance that sent me here,” he said gravely. “The wood is so vast——”
“Ay, so vast,” she answered. “Know you the way out, Sebastian?”
She tried to nerve herself to look at him, but her glance was lifted only to fall instantly again.
“You must forgive me,” she said, struggling with a fainting voice. “I have walked very far, I am so weary—I must rest a while.”
But she did not sit, nor did he urge that she should.
“Have you met no one?” he asked.
She hesitated; if he had encountered neither the woman nor the young man, then they were indeed wizards or of some unearthly race—she could not bring herself to speak of them.
“No,” she answered at length.
“We have a long way to walk,” said the steward.
Jacobea felt his look upon her, and grasped her crucifix until the sharp edges of it cut her palm.
“Do you know the way?” she repeated dully.
“Ay,” he answered now. “But it is far.”
She gathered up her long skirt and shook off the withered leaves that clung to it.
“Will you lead the way?” she said.
He turned and moved ahead of her down the narrow path by which he had come; as she followed him she heard his foot fall soft on the thick grass and the swishing sound of the straying boughs as he held them back for her to pass, till she found the silence so unendurable that she nerved herself to break it; but several times she gathered her strength in vain for the effort, and when at last some foolish words had come to her lips, he suddenly looked back over his shoulder and checked her speech.
“ ’Tis strange that your horse should have gone mad in such a manner,” he said.
“But ye found him?” she faltered.
“Ay, a man found him, exhausted and trembling like a thing bewitched.”
Her heart gave a great leap—had he used that word by chance——
She could not answer.
“Ye were not hurt, my lady, when ye were thrown?” said the steward.
“No,” said Jacobea, “no.”
Silence again; no bird nor butterfly disturbed the sombre stillness of the wood, no breeze stirred the thick leaves that surrounded them; gradually the path widened until it brought them into a great space grown with ferns and overarched with trees.
Then Sebastian paused.
“It is a long way yet,” he said. “Will you rest a while?”
“No,” she replied vehemently. “Let us get on—where are the others? surely we must meet some one soon!”
“I do not know that any came this way,” he answered, and cast his brooding glance over the trembling weariness of her figure.
“Ye must rest, certes, it is folly to persist,” he added, with some authority.
She seated herself, lifting the hand that held the crucifix to her bosom.
“How full of shadows it is here,” she said. “It is difficult to fancy the shining of the sun on the tops of these darkened trees.”
“I do not love forests,” answered Sebastian.
As he stood his profile was towards her; and she must mark again the face that she knew so bitterly well, his thin dark cheek, his heavy-lidded eyes, his contained mouth.
Gazing down into the clusters of ferns at his feet, he spoke—
“I think I must return to Martzburg,” he said.
She braced herself, making a gesture with her hand as if she would ward off his words.
“You know that you are free to do what you will, Sebastian.”
He took off his right glove slowly and looked at his hand.
“Is it not better that I should go?”
He challenged her with a full sideways glance.
“I do not know,” she said desperately, “why you put this to me, here and now.”
“I do not often see you alone.”
He was not a man of winning manners or of easy speech; his words came stiffly, yet with a purpose in them that chilled her with a deeper sense of dread.
She opened her hand to stare down at the crucifix in her palm.
“You can leave Frankfort when you wish—why not?” she said.
He faced her quickly.
“But I may come back?”
It seemed to Jacobea that he echoed Dirk’s words; the crucifix slipped through her trembling fingers on to the grass.
“What do you mean? Oh, Sebastian, what do you mean?” The words were forced from her, but uttered under her breath; she added instantly, in a more courageous voice, “Go and come as you list, are you not free?”
He saw the crucifix at her feet and picked it up, but she drew back as he came near and held out her hand.
He put the crucifix into it, frowning, his eyes dark and bright with excitement.
“Do you recall the two students who were housed that night in Martzburg?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said. “Is not one now at Court?”
“I would mean the other—the boy,” answered Sebastian.
She averted her face and drooped until the ends of her hair touched her knees.
“I met him again to-day,” continued the steward, with a curious lift in his voice, “here, in this forest, while searching for you. He spoke to me.”
Certainly the Devil was enmeshing her, surely he had brought her to this pass, sent Sebastian, of all men, to find her in her weariness and loneliness.
And Sebastian knew—knew also that she knew—outspoken words between them could be hardly more intolerable shame than this.
“He is cunning beyond most,” said the steward.
Jacobea lifted her head.
“He is an enchanter—a wizard, do not listen to him, do not speak to him—as you value your soul, Sebastian, do not think of him.”
“As I value some other things,” he answered grimly, “I must both listen to him and consider what he says.”
She rose.
“We will go on our way. I cannot talk with you now, Sebastian.”
But he stood in her path.
“Let me journey to Martzburg,” he said thickly; “one word—I shall understand you.”
She glanced and saw him extraordinarily keen and moved; he was lord of Martzburg could he but get her to pledge herself; in his eagerness, however, he forgot advice. “Tell her,” said Dirk, “you have adored her for years in secret.” This escaped his keenness, for though his wife was nothing to him compared with his ambition, he had no tenderness for Jacobea. Had he remembered to feign it he might have triumphed and now; but though her gentle heart believed he held her dear, that he did not say so made firmness possible for her.
“You shall stay in Frankfort,” she said, with sudden strength.
“Sybilla asks my return,” he said, gazing at her passionately. “Do we not understand each other without words?”
“The fiend has bewitched you also,” she answered fearfully. “You know too much—you guess too much—and yet I tell you nothing, and I, I also am bewitched, for I cannot reply to you as I should.”
“I have been silent long,” he said. “But I have dared to think—had I been free—as I can be free——”
The crucifix was forgotten in her hand.
“We do evil to talk like this,” she said, half fainting.
“You will bid me go to Martzburg,” he insisted, and took her long cold fingers.
She raised her eyes to the boughs above her.
“No, no!” then, “God have compassion on me!” she said.
The thick foliage stirred—Jacobea felt as if the bars of a cage were being broken about her—she turned her head and a little colour flushed her cheek.
Through the silvery stems of the larches came some knights and a page boy, members of the party left to search for her.
She moved towards them; she hailed them almost gaily; none, save Sebastian, saw her as they turned towards Frankfort raise the crucifix and press her lips to it.
ELLE101
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