Her attention was drawn back to the center of the circle as a woman joined Pomeroy. Linnet remembered the woman’s bird mask and black curls. This was the woman who had lain naked on the table last time—the woman who had had sexual congress with the wolf-man right before Linnet’s eyes. God have mercy, she did not want to see that again.
And now, Linnet knew who the woman was—Margery Jourdemayne, the Witch of Eye.
Linnet began crawling faster. Then, without warning, Margery fell prostrate on the ground. Linnet went still as the room fell silent and all the dancers stopped to watch Margery.
Pomeroy raised his arms. In a deep voice that reverberated against the walls of the cavelike room, he called out, “Conjuro te!”
Margery thrashed about on the ground making strange sounds. Then she grew still. Slowly, she lifted her head, her eyes bulging. In a voice that sounded more like an animal’s growl than human, she said, “Adsum!”
Linnet knew just enough Latin to know this meant, “I am present.” But who was present? She ignored the shiver that went up her spine and set her mind to slipping past the group while their attention was on Margery.
“What fate awaits the bishop with tainted royal blood?” Pomeroy called out.
Why would he ask about Bishop Beaufort? And just who was he asking? And then she knew: The witches were conjuring the dead. In addition to their other sins, they were necromancers.
“John of Gaunt’s bastard shall wear the red cardinal’s hat,” Margery said in her rasping animal voice, “and die an old man.”
Linnet could not wait to hear more, from the living or the dead. She crept forward, her belly just off the ground.
Pomeroy’s voice rang out above her. “What of the boy-king? What is his fate?”
Linnet halted in place and held her breath. Asking this question of the dead was not just heresy, but treason.
“He shall go mad and be king two times,” Margery said in her slow, rough voice. “He shall die with a pillow to his face.”
King twice, mad and murdered?
“Spirit, can you tell us the day and hour of his death?” Linnet’s blood froze in her veins at the menace in Pomeroy’s voice. For a certainty, these sorcerers meant the child harm.
“Many years! Many years!” The words spewed forth from Margery’s mouth as she fell to thrashing about on the ground again.
There was a rumble of low voices and shuffling of feet; the witches were not pleased with this last answer.
Linnet scooted forward a few more inches. From the corner of her eye, she watched Pomeroy go to the small table and stick his blade into the steaming pot. When he lifted it, a waxen shape was skewered on the end of it.
With a flick of his wrist, he flung the waxen image to the ground and shouted, “Cut short the life!”
Suddenly, voices swelled and filled the room. “Cut short the life! Cut short the life!”
This was an evil Linnet could not fathom: a wish to hasten a child’s death. And the child they wished to harm was the great King Henry’s heir, his only living legacy. Her friend’s four-year-old son.
This evil must be stopped before they harmed the young king. She must escape and give warning.
The chanting echoed in the room and inside her head, repetitive and pulsing as she crept behind them. She moved slowly, hampered by the effort to keep the flimsy red silk wrapped about her.
“Descend into the darkness and the burning lake!” Pomeroy shouted in a voice like thunder.
Linnet dropped flat on her stomach as silence descended upon the room once more. She prayed none of the witches noticed that she was several feet from where they had left her.
Into the silence, a woman said, “To change so strong a prediction will require a blood sacrifice.”
An argument ensued, with repeated calls for a “blood sacrifice.” Then a single voice—Pomeroy’s—rose above all the others.
“Bring the prisoner to the altar!”
Chapter Forty-one
Jamie rode hard for Winchester, the bright moonlight on the London Road serving as a constant reminder of the danger Linnet was in. Sorcerers and witches! He crossed himself and beseeched God to protect her.
