Doctor Who_ Battlefield - Marc Platt [55]
Ancelyn shrugged off such courtly nonsense and devoted his time to training for the battle that he was destined to fight. He still maintained his armour himself and cleaned the barrel of his own gun. He would not be unmanned by any castlebound maiden.
Yet strangest to tell, he would be content to do no more than watch the movement of Winifred’s eyelashes across her pool-dark eyes. No more than that.
‘Ancelyn?’ said Bambera.
‘Yes, my lady,’ he replied in a reverie.
‘On this world we have a great and honourable tradition of tactical withdrawing.’
He suddenly heard the shouts of the hunters closing on their quarry. ‘You wish to run?’ he asked. ‘There can be but thirty of them.’
Bambera grabbed at his jerkin and pulled him close.
‘Ancelyn, if you don’t start moving, I’ll kill you myself!’
She grasped his hand and started to run. ‘Now come on!’
He ran downhill with her, not too swiftly, to allow her the illusion that she was leading him. ‘Winifred?’ he shouted.
‘What?’
Behind them, the shouts of the hunters grew fiercer.
‘Art thou betrothed?’
She cursed. ‘Not now, Ancelyn!’ But her grip on his hand grew tighter.
Through the trees, they saw the glint of water. The convoy was closer than they had thought. Bambera let go of Ancelyn’s hand.
Guards shouted as they emerged from the trees.
Zbrigniev threw down the foam cup of tea he was holding.
They started to run. ‘Get down,’ yelled Bambera. ‘Get under cover!’
Behind them, the woodland exploded in flame.
In the weightless crystal sphere, patterns of light were refracted through space by spells of revelation. In their focus, they showed a yellow carriage that sped along a sunlit trackway.
‘You fool, Merlin,’ muttered Morgaine, ‘to place such a trust with children.’
The patterns within the sphere shifted and revealed the room of the hostelry where she had found Mordred. The two girls were there, and with them, like a beacon in Morgaine’s mind, was the sword Excalibur.
‘I swear that you shall rue this day...’ She stepped from the octogrammaton and threw up her arms in a gesture of power.... if you live!’
She was alone. She had sent away her son with specific instructions. He had gone, eager to please, eager for a final meeting with his sworn enemy, the traitor Ancelyn ap Gwalchmai.
She took only moments to prepare herself, to quieten and concentrate her mind. Steeped in the study of lore, the conjuring of spirits came as easily to her as breathing.
As was her custom, she had partaken of no food or water for that only weakened her as the vessel through which her magic must flow.
In a normal summoning, she no longer needed the complex rituals that other magicians relied upon, but there were still spirits in the darkness that even she must fight to control: the manifestations of total power in essence. Such demons must be bound close to obey their summoners’
will. They cheated and lied in their struggle for release.
And their forces could rebound on the wizards who sought to use them.
In her hands, Morgaine held the silver chains with which she would bind the darkest power of all.
And with that power she would destroy Merlin for ever.
A column of raw energy began to grow from the sphere within the octogrammaton.
‘With this fire I shall summon thee.’
Before its radiance, all the shadows in the priory seemed to scuttle across the surfaces of the walls. Whispering like dead leaves, they gathered and sought refuge within the long shadow cast like a pall behind the Queen.
The shadow grew.
‘With this silver I shall bind thee.’
The chains were gone from her hands.
Darkness slithered across the sky above the rafter beams. A cold wind blew against Morgaine’s cloak and hair. She had opened the gate of hell and a foul, chill draught issued forth.
Somewhere cruel hidden eyes were watching her, but the demon could not resist her summons.
She heard the great breathing and the thud of its cloven feet. She turned and saw her massive shadow rearing up the wall. The silhouette had a life and shape of its own. It towered grotesquely above her, black