Longbow Girl (17 page)

W
hile Merry was out riding, James arrived back at the Black Castle. He had an exhausting reunion with his parents and his sister, Lady Alicia. They switched between delight at seeing him and anger at what they described as his desertion. Then there was the inevitable interrogation with its mixture of threats and bribery. After two emotional hours, he was rescued by the arrival of Dr Philipps, who brought with him some fascinating news. Now more eager than ever to see Merry, James extracted himself from his family's clutches, headed to his room and texted her.

Can I come round?

You're back???

For a few days.

Perfect timing! Everyone's out. I just got back from riding.
Come when you can.

On my way.

He found her outside at the stables, cleaning tack, when he turned up twenty minutes later, puffing hard. He glanced at his watch, smiled.

‘Almost a PB. Probably would have been if I hadn't trained so hard yesterday.'

‘What was special about yesterday?'

‘Let's go and sit on your bench,' he replied. He didn't need to rest. He just didn't want to blurt out his news standing here by the stables.

They walked together across the grass and sat down side by side.

‘Like I said,' James began, angling his body towards Merry. ‘I had a hard day's training. Then, at the end of it, the manager called me into his office.' James tried to talk normally, but all he wanted to do was yell out his news. ‘They want to sign me when I turn sixteen. They've offered me a contract.'

Merry shouted out, grabbed him, pulled him to his feet and into a hug. He hugged her back.

‘That is amaaazing! James, I am so happy for you.' Merry released him and he saw she had a tear in her eye.

‘I did it, Merry,' he said quietly.

‘You did it, James,' she echoed. ‘I am so proud of you.'

He nodded, felt suddenly bashful. ‘Thanks,' he said, cheeks reddening. They both sat down again.

‘I'm guessing they're not quite so happy at home.'

‘Could say that. But I had to tell them face to face and
tomorrow's my birthday too. It seemed wrong not to be at home.'

‘So what's going to happen then?'

‘I'll sign. Even if my parents disinherit me.'

‘They won't.'

James gave a brooding look towards the Black Castle. ‘Who knows? They're lurching between threats and persuasion at the moment.'

He held out his hand, twisted it so that a glint of rose gold caught the light.

‘My mother just gave me this, in advance of my birthday. The de Courcy signet ring. You know the drill, every son and heir gets one at sixteen. It marks him as an adult, ready to fight, ready to go to war, ready to assume the responsibilities that go with the privilege of being the lord of the Black Castle.'

Merry reached out, grabbed his hand, studied the ring on his little finger. ‘But it's different!' she exclaimed. ‘It's not like the normal de Courcy crest!'

‘No, it's not,' agreed James. ‘This one's an antique. From 1520.'

‘1520 . . .' repeated Merry, looking away, her voice barely a whisper. She turned back to James. ‘Where did she get it from, your mother?'

‘She was very coy about that,' replied James. ‘You know what she's like, trying to buy bits of the castle's history – like she tried to buy your book,' he added with a half-smile. ‘So she was very pleased to find this. She has a network of antique dealers on the lookout. I guess she got lucky,' he concluded.

Merry said nothing. She just looked away again, her face hard. James was having difficulty keeping up with her. She'd been overjoyed by his news; now she brooded like something truly terrible had happened. What the heck was going on in her head?

‘And there's something else,' James said, hoping to shift her mood back to sunny.

‘Full of news today, aren't you!' said Merry. ‘What is it?'

‘It'll blow your mind. It blew mine.'

‘Go on!'

‘Dr Philipps just paid us a visit. He—'

‘He's come back?' Merry interrupted. ‘Was Professor Parks with him?'

James shook his head. ‘Surprisingly not this time. Apparently he went to London a few days ago on some urgent business.'

Merry swore. ‘Bit my lip,' she explained.

James carried on. ‘Anyway, Dr Philipps discovered something in an old Welsh text he unearthed. He was pretty excited about it.'

‘And . . .'

‘You know that King Henry, Henry VIII, stayed with us . . .'

‘Oh, yes. I know,' Merry responded with some bitterness.

James glanced at her. It was a strange reaction.

‘Well, apparently he asked for a tourney to be held. Archery, of course, and jousting, which he also loved, and falconry. We used to supply him with peregrine falcons from the Beacons. And this is where it gets deeply weird.' James paused, kept his
gaze on Merry. ‘He called for a longbow contest. And he called upon the pledge that your ancestor made to the Black Prince. That each generation of Owens furnishes him with a longbowman, if their king asks for one. And King Henry did.'

Merry began to look odd.

‘Thing is, your ancestor, the man of the house at the time, was, er, apparently in prison.' James hesitated just as Merry spoke out.

‘Your dungeons!' she exclaimed.

‘How'd you know that?'

‘Just guessing,' Merry said. ‘After all, your dungeons are the only prison hereabouts, and they're notorious.'

James frowned. ‘Want to hear the story?'

‘Sorry. It wasn't you,' said Merry.

James raised his eyebrows. ‘No. It wasn't. Anyway, your ancestor couldn't honour the pledge, so the king declared that unless an Owen came forward to compete in the tourney, a longbowman who was skilled enough to fight for him in time of war, that Nanteos Farm and all your lands would be confiscated.'

Merry gasped. ‘D'you know what happened? I'm assuming someone came forward.'

‘Someone
did
come along. An Owen, given away at birth. Just in time, they came back and entered the competition. And this is where it gets truly spooky. It was a woman! They called her the Angel Warrior. There are legends about her.'

Merry said nothing. Ashen-faced, she just stared across the valley.

‘And there's more,' said James. ‘It was predicted in your book!'

‘What d'you mean?' asked Merry, turning back to him.

James pulled a crumpled piece of paper from his shorts pocket.

‘Dr Philipps just gave me this. He was beyond excited at this point! It's a translation of one of the pages. Listen . . .

‘There will come, it is foretold, from a kingdom long away, an angel warrior young and bold, though warned against by watcher fey. With skilful eye and hair of gold, with bow and arrow does she fight, to save the land of families old and triumph under kingly sight. But foes remain and freedom's lost and family betrays its own. The Traveller does find to cost and must flee to lands and worlds unknown . . .'

James watched in shock as Merry rushed away and retched. He waited till she had composed herself, then he walked up, reached out, touched her shoulder. She turned, offered him a weak smile.

‘You all right?' he asked.

‘Something I ate.'

‘Seemed like something I said.'

‘Must have had too much sugar.'

‘What is it, Merry? You turned white, looked like you'd seen a ghost,' he said, searching her face.

Merry walked back to the bench, sat down heavily.

‘You look so troubled,' said James, sitting down beside her and gripping her arm. ‘What's going on? Let me help you! I'll
do anything. You know that!'

But Merry shook her head. ‘No,' she said. ‘No one can help me.'

S
he'd known somehow that she'd have to go back. That she was infected. Contaminated. She'd feared that she'd
want
to. She'd never thought that she'd
have
to. She was the only one who could save her ancestors and her own family's heritage.

But could she really risk being spotted by the countess and arrested as a horse thief?
We hang horse thieves . . .

She let out a sob, felt the nausea rising, braced her hands on her thighs, sucked in deep breaths, fought it down.

She stood at her window and watched James heading back across the green acres to the Black Castle. She'd hurt him, she knew. She hated pushing him away, keeping this from him but it was the last thing he needed. What she was doing was beyond dangerous. She would risk her life but not his, especially now, when all of his dreams were beginning to come true.

This was her destiny. It was as if she'd been meant to find the book. It was the key to saving her family, both
then
and
now
. . .

Everything in it had been leading to this moment, when she'd learn what she had to do. No wonder she'd felt bound to the past, as if somehow she couldn't escape it. Her fate had been written nearly a thousand years before she was born. She'd never be free unless she fulfilled it.

She would swim through the River of Time. Again.

She would answer the king's summons.

She would fight in the longbow tourney.

And she would have to win.

There'd be a cost to going back, Merry had no doubt of that, but she felt too that there'd be a terrible price to pay if she stayed. She didn't know how exactly, just that her family would pay. She'd had to trust her instinct. There was no manual for this. No one she could ask, no past lesson to learn from.

She knew she had to go now, before she changed her mind, before time ran out and the cost fell due.
Think
.
Plan
. What did she need?

She wished she could take her own longbow, knew she could not. She'd never be able to swim through the river with it. She'd have to use whatever bow she could find. But if it was a typical longbow of the time, the pull would be far too great for her. All she could do was hope to find a bow with a lesser pull. Then, with a sinking heart, she remembered something her father had once told her. Tudor archers were required to
shoot their arrows huge distances: a minimum practice range of two hundred and twenty yards. That was much further than she was used to. She'd need a much more powerful bow to do that, a bow with a draw weight that she wouldn't be able to manage, strong as she was.

She thought furiously. There must be a way around it. She cast her mind back to everything her father had told her about the period. Bow, arrow, string, archer . . . Then an idea rocketed into her brain.

She couldn't take her bow or arrows, but she
could
take her strings. Modern strings were made of something called ‘fast flight'. It was much less yielding than the hemp and linen strings that Henry VIII's archers would have used and also a lot thinner. It would propel the arrows much faster. Much further.

Feeling a throb of excitement, she hurried to the tallboy to get her strings. Three. All of different lengths. At least one of them should fit whatever bow she managed to get hold of. She coiled them in her hand. Now she felt she had a chance.
There's just one problem
, said the voice in her head.
Modern strings put the bow under much greater strain
. There was a real risk that with modern strings, a Tudor bow would break. Merry silenced the voice. Lightning never strikes twice in the same place, she told herself.

She wrapped a Danish pastry in tinfoil and grabbed a small plastic bottle of water. She took them upstairs to her room and packed them inside the waterproof backpack her father had given her last Christmas. She'd swim with it strapped tight to
her back. Designed for hill running, it was lightweight, slim fit and one hundred per cent waterproof. It would need to be. She took her coiled strings, wrapped them in a plastic bag just in case, and pushed them deep inside the pack. The head torch went in next, then her catapult and lucky stones. A weapon if she needed one, and a souvenir of James. She added her knife and leg strap.

She moved fast, not allowing herself to linger over anything, not allowing herself to feel.

She changed into her swimming costume and pulled on her skins over it: leggings and long-sleeved T-shirt. She added a long-sleeved fleece, plaited her hair, pulled on her black beanie. Then she dug around for the box she kept in her chest of drawers with all her odds and ends, the box she'd nearly thrown away many times but for some reason had kept, even though she never used what lay inside.

She opened it up. Shining back at her was a sapphire-blue eye. She disinfected it by pouring over a dilution of hydrogen peroxide from the first aid box; then she dried it with a clean towel, put it back in its box and zipped it inside the backpack.

Now she was ready. She wanted to see her parents and Gawain one more time. But they were out and it was not to be. She took pen and paper and she wrote a note for them.
I may be gone a few days. PLEASE do not worry. I'll be quite safe
. That much was a lie but what else could she say?
Please just wait calmly for me. I love you all
. They were the hardest words she had ever written. She wanted to cry but the tears would not come.

She hurried downstairs, pulled on a thin pair of water shoes. She could run and swim in them. She slipped out of the back door. Didn't turn around, didn't allow herself to look back.

The sun had dipped behind the mountains, but there was still plenty of light. It was eerily quiet. It seemed as if the whole countryside was becalmed, waiting for something to happen. Waiting for her.

Merry couldn't take Jacintha this time. She had no idea how long she'd be away. So she walked through the fields, skirting the hedgerows, trying to stay out of sight. She wanted to run but needed to save her energy for what lay ahead. Her pulse raced. She knew she was doing the right thing, but she was still terrified. Her mind was full of warring thoughts about her family now . . . and her family then, about leaving James with hurt and anger in his eyes when all he had wanted to do was help.

As she headed up towards the forest, storm clouds blew in on a freshening wind, darkening the day prematurely. It was even gloomier once she was under the thick canopy of leaves. She didn't worry now about being seen or heard. She made no effort to move stealthily. Twigs cracked under her feet and roosting birds erupted from the branches overhead. Caught up in her own thoughts, she didn't hear the soft, persistent sounds of pursuit.

Night had fallen by the time Merry reached the pool. Flickers of moonlight forked through the canopy of dark leaves and
danced on the black water. It looked eerily beautiful. And sinister.

Merry drank from the bottle in her backpack. She took out the Danish pastry, wolfed it down. She knew she shouldn't eat before the swim but she was tired and hungry and she needed energy. She gave herself a few minutes for the pastry to settle, but hanging around didn't help her nerves. She stripped down to her swimming costume, tightly rolled her clothes and just managed to fit them into her pack. She pulled on her head torch, switched it on, then walked into the coiling water. It swirled around her thighs as she waded deeper, pushing her back like it didn't want her there.

Stay calm, preserve oxygen
. She called to mind once again the lessons of the Navy SEAL. Despite the cold, despite the fear, she willed herself to relax. She pushed deeper until her feet were swept from under her. She launched forward in a butterfly stroke, under the waterfall, into the cave. She breathed in, out, in again, then she propelled herself forward and down into the tunnel.

She kicked hard, pushing through the darkness, fighting one more battle with the River of Time.