Marked for Magic. Daisy BanksЧитать онлайн книгу.
its depths. “I can’t go back. I have the mark. They said I belong here.” Tremors shook her so she couldn’t control the babbling words. “They closed the gate behind me.”
He pushed his hood back to reveal more of his face as he bent his head toward her.
“If you won’t take me, I’ll be lost to the forest…” Her voice drained down to a whisper.
His eyes gleamed like January lake water. Green, with dark flecks, and much colder than the lake ever got. “Show me this witch’s mark. Utter superstitious nonsense, but show me.”
Sickened he should name the horror, she held out her cursed palm.
“I can see nothing. Go home. Tell them they are wrong.” He turned away.
No! He mustn’t go yet.
His fine green robe swirled in his haste. She grabbed at his sleeve. He must hear her out.
From the moment Agnes discovered the mark, terror threatened to swallow her. She’d cowered while the old woman jigged about, screeching her discovery. The revulsion on the faces of those she’d known from childhood, who had applauded as the wise woman dragged her by her hair to the vile wicker cage, still filled her vision. Their contempt would haunt her forever.
With no cloak for warmth, no shoes on her feet, she shivered at what her fate might hold. Held captive in the tiny wicker cage, she’d no choice but to listen to the old wise woman who had not left her side, dripping words like poison. Those wounds festered to consume her.
“I can’t go back! They’ll kill me. You know it.” She squashed the need to run. “Please listen. I’m one who is lost. I’m not like them. I’m a witch. I have the mark. If you don’t keep me here, I’ll die.”
He grabbed her hand as he emerged from the shadows and yanked her forward so she scurried after him into a patch of bright sunlight.
She trembled in wait for his judgment. One bare foot lodged on a jagged rock, but she dared not move. While he angled her palm back and forth, she bit her lip, not brave enough to look up from where a beetle scuttled about on the dusty earth. Long seconds passed until, unable to bear more, she glanced up.
The green hood nodded.
A rush of relief surged through her.
“Aye, true enough it is there, but faint. How did anyone see it?”
His words overwhelmed. Her skin crept as if ants crawled on it. She moved her mouth to speak but no sound came.
He gave a loud tut.
The movements tiny so he would not notice, she inched her bare foot off the jagged stone. He gave no sign of understanding her fears and dropped her palm. “What is your name?”
Somehow, she found her voice. “Nin. It’s short for Ninian, but no one calls me that. It’s a boy’s name.” She rubbed at her sore hand. “Aunt Jen said my mother was so disappointed it killed her. You see, Mother was told I would be a boy.”
The mark meant the whole village now shared the regret of her birth. “And I’m not a child. I’ll be nineteen this autumn.” Small in size, she always had to put people right on her age.
He didn’t seem impressed, and with a long finger flicked a greenfly off his cuff. “Then tell me, why have they only found the mark now? If it meant something, the sign should have appeared years ago. You should have been trained from childhood.”
“I don’t know. One day it wasn’t there, the next it came.” Her words fell over each other in her haste. “Agnes. The wise woman, she saw it. They held a moot and cast me out. I am meant for you. Agnes said so.” Unable to face him after saying such a thing, she angled her head so she only saw the leaves moving in the breeze.
He gave a huge sigh. “By the sun and the moon, I don’t want you here. I have no need for an apprentice.”
Any hope of life dissolved, blasted apart by his words. She should return to the woods where all outcasts belonged, but her feet would not budge. Each breath grew harder to take while she waited for him to say something. Anything.
He crossed his arms, shoving both his hands into his wide sleeves. When she still did not move, he turned from her toward the trees. His boot tapped while a leaf sailed to the ground. Her future hovered with the oak leaf.
“Oh, come in, wench. We’ll see what you can do.”
Her mouth dry as ash, her knees unsteady, she followed him into the dark interior.
“Close the door, girl.”
The final crack of daylight was lost as she did as he asked. Darkness shut out the last vestige of her old life. A lump choked her throat. He strode through another doorway. Blinking to accustom her eyes to the gloom, she hurried after him into a circular kitchen.
Two torches burned on the walls. A massive, blackened, stone fireplace took up a huge amount of space, but the low fire gave off little heat.
The Mage sat near a round table. He cast back the hood. His dark hair reached past his shoulders, tied at the nape of his neck with a leather thong. Lodged in the loop was a large tawny owl feather, its black stripes almost as glossy as his hair. Head bowed, she stepped in front of him when he beckoned, then slid to her knees to await his words. The long silence pained her, so she glanced up from where she knelt.
So beautiful.
Struck to stillness, she studied his features. Fine cut, slender, and pale. Tales of childhood had told that messengers of the gods were joys to behold. He must be one.
He sat back and rested his chin on his fisted hand as he inspected her. A blue snake tattoo wound its way in spirals around his wrist before the head disappeared beneath his sleeve. “What can you do?”
She swallowed hard, unable to say a word. Instead, she stared down to his boots, following the pattern made by the flicker of flames from the hearth on one shiny patch of leather by his ankle. Eventually she managed to whisper, “Nothing.”
“What do you mean nothing? If you have the mark, you must have a talent. Fire lighting? That’s easy. Can you call clouds on a hot day?”
Gnawing her lip, she shook her head.
“Do you understand the thoughts of others? See the future in the flames?”
She shook her head again. The silence lengthened to become a physical weight. When she glanced up, his hair glittered in the torch light, his sour expression crushing her fragile hope.
“So, you can do nothing, you know even less, yet I’m stuck with you. Oh, just bloody splendid. You’re as rare as a cockerel’s egg!” He drummed his fingers on the table as he studied her.
The lump returned to her throat. She blinked hard and struggled not to sniff until she could hold the tears back no more. Defeated by them, she gulped froglike. Stinging hot, they trickled down to her chin. She had no voice.
He shoved up from the chair and paced around the room, his hands clenched. “I swear since I arrived here, I am interrupted daily by the most inconsequential matters.” The green robe wafted around his legs, flesh showing above his scuffed brown boots. He strode away toward the door. “Don’t snivel. Allow me to think.”
She wiped her nose on her sleeve and fisted the tears away as she focused on the feather in his hair. While the dangling feather twirled, she dragged up the last tiny drop of her courage. “I’m sorry. I’ll think of something I can do.”
He spun back to face her, eyes narrowed. “Oh, do not bother. I can’t spare the time for your intellectual struggles. If I must have you here, I will make sure you earn your keep. You can cook, yes?”
“Of course I can.”
“Do that for a start. You can clean, wash, and sweep, I hope, but most of all”—he glared, his eyes leaf dark—“you keep out of my way when I’m working.”
Every