Jack of Ravens(184)

She flung open the casket lid. The spiders roiled in the depths.

Laura screwed up her face. ‘That is disgusting.’

Ruth was oblivious to the spiders. All she could see was Church’s face; it pulled her in and refused to let her go, speaking to some deeply buried part of her. It was distressing, for on the surface she did not know the man at all, yet in the well of her unconscious he was all she knew. The bonds that had been forged were unbreakable, tying them together for all time, however many miles or years lay between them. Now she knew why her recent life had been swathed in sorrow, why she felt as if she had been frozen in a living death, like Church.

Her heart swelled until it felt as if it was pressing against the prison of her skin. The sadness and the loneliness were part of the past. Now she could return to life.

Without thinking, she leaned in and kissed Church on the lips. There was a discharge of blue light and the spiders rushed from the casket. She heard their torrent hit the ground and the loud rustling as they fled into the undergrowth.

And still she kissed. His lips were cold at first, but gradually warmth came back to them, and they moved in union   with hers. She broke away as his eyes flickered open.

He sat up and looked around. ‘How long have I been asleep?’

‘A while, but you’re awake now,’ she said softly.

‘I had the strangest dreams.’

His eyes locked on hers, and gradually realisation dawned in them. His smile was like the sun coming up. They embraced again, passionately this time, and for that moment no darkness could touch them.



9



It was the strangest reunion   Church had every experienced. Though it felt as if they barely knew each other, a deeper part of them recognised the coming together of best friends, with bonds forged over time that were now unbreakable.

Shavi hugged Church warmly. ‘I do not understand it, but you feel like my brother.’

‘I am,’ Church replied. ‘We’re Brothers of Dragons. Apart, we’re just who we are. Together we’re something better. Or so I’m led to believe.’ Shavi nodded, smiling. ‘That sounds right.’

Laura threw herself at Church, embracing him with a tangle of arms and legs. She kissed him passionately on the lips. ‘I don’t feel as if you’re my brother,’ she said with a wink.

And then his eyes fell on Ruth, who was standing away from the group in the shade of an elm tree. She was studying Church fiercely, uncertain emotions playing across her face.

‘Give us a moment,’ Church said quietly to Shavi and Laura. He took Ruth’s hand and led her away into the trees. She went compliantly, but he could feel her desperately trying to make sense of what she was feeling.

‘You don’t know me,’ Church began.

‘No. But I also feel as if I know you better than anyone else in my life. I feel—’ She caught herself.

‘That’s good. Because I was afraid when it got to this moment, I’d be just another stranger.’ He could feel her curious eyes on him. ‘You won’t believe how long I’ve been thinking about this meeting,’ he said.

‘Was it worth the wait?’

‘Yes. It was worth everything I’ve been through to get here. And more.’ He was shocked to realise how true that statement was. The weight of his feelings as he stood there, trapped in her gravity, crushed all the terrible things he had experienced on the long road from the Iron Age. ‘Do you want to know,’ he began, barely daring to hope, ‘about you and me, about what we’ve shared, and what we lost … ?’ He wanted to add, And what we’ve found again, but it was still too soon to presume.

‘I do. More than anything.’

The hairs on his neck stood erect. And so he began, with his clearest, earliest memory – of their meeting at Albert Bridge one misty morning, and how their eyes met, propelling them into a shared journey of adventure and fear, struggle and victory. As the memories surfaced of what he had witnessed in the depths of the cauldron, he spoke clearly and profoundly of his feelings, of how they had matured and deepened and transformed him from base metal into gold. He told her of the ache in his heart that felt like bereavement as he stood on the slopes above Carn Euny, and of his times before the Wish-Post, of Rome and Krakow and Roanoke and London, when the gulf of years separated them while in his heart and his head she was as close as this, close enough to touch.

When he had finished he waited for her response, but there was only silence. Dreading what he might see, he turned to her only to find tears in her eyes.

She grasped his hand so tightly it was as if she would never let it go. ‘I knew it all. In my heart, I knew. That feeling like someone I loved had died, only not knowing who, not being able to mourn. Feeling that my life was winding down to nothing.’