Umm… yeah. I have been unspeakably awful about updating this thing. I've had half this chapter written since the summer, and I kind of lost inspiration to work on it till like 24 hours ago. I credit Mianne for getting me off my lazy rear - her Robin Hood tale got me all excited to write about adventure and romance and such. Hopefully there will be more coming before another year passes.
Chapter Two: Fair Ravenclaw, From Glen
Part One
The crisp autumn wind whistled gleefully around the many turrets and towers of Hogwarts, skimmed gaily over the lake, and frolicked merrily above the swaying boughs of the Forbidden Forest. It dived down to tug playfully on the hair of the lovely young witch who had just stepped out of the castle's great double doors before whisking away to chase after a flock of birds flying southward.
But Rowena Ravenclaw had never cared much for appearances, and she took no notice of the mess the impish wind was making of her long dark locks. An involuntary smile touched her upturned face as her eyes scanned the sky, squinting in the brilliant sunlight. In the distance, a crimson speck was winging its way back to the castle.
I might have known, she reflected wryly.
The grounds were quiet as she crossed to the stables situated at the edge of the Forest. It was too early yet for the students to be up and about, but soon they'd be rousing themselves, blinking sleepily through breakfast and suppressing yawns as they went on their bleary-eyed way to class.
She had nearly reached the stables when Fawkes swooped down to greet her. At the same moment, thundering hooves announced the arrival of a laughing madman on a galloping horse. They burst from the trees, Godric letting out a great whoop as he brought the panting Lion down to a trot.
Rowena wondered idly, for the thousandth time, how it was that Godric had gone so long without breaking his neck. By all rights, he should have been dead several times over, but some lucky star seemed to be looking out for him. Well, cats were said to have nine lives.
Even her customary pragmatism, however, couldn't stop her from smiling at the sight of his antics. "Godric!" she called, waving.
It was a mistake. His eyes lit up at the sight of her, and a moment later his face had broken into a wicked lopsided grin as he turned Lion her way.
"Godric, what…" Rowena broke off, her eyes widening as he came charging at her. She realized what he was about to do a split second before it happened and tried to dodge out of the way, but a moment too late; she shrieked as he leaned down, reached out an arm, scooped her up, and deposited her backwards onto Lion's back in front of him.
"Put me down, you crazy great oaf!" she cried, wriggling in her seat as she struggled to turn away from him and face forward properly. Godric was being most unhelpful; the idiot was laughing so hard he barely seemed aware of where they were going, but then one of her flailing arms hit him in the face and brought him back to his senses.
He grabbed her arms to steady her and brought Lion to a halt. "Easy, easy," he gasped, still shaking with mirth. "Merlin, Rowena, what's got you so excited?"
She shot him one of her patented death glares. Undeterred, he bumped his nose against hers. "Hullo, love," he murmured with an infuriating smile.
She huffed. With his face so close to hers, she could see every freckle that dusted his nose. His hazel eyes sparkled with amusement and his grin nearly overwhelmed her defenses at such close proximity. She strove to keep her face severe. It was difficult.
"Well, sir," she said in the clipped, no-nonsense tones of her best professor voice, crossing her arms. "What do you have to say for yourself?"
"Not too much," he mumbled unrepentantly, kissing her neck. She laughed in spite of herself as his curly, windblown hair tickled her face and pushed him away.
"You forget yourself, Professor Gryffindor," she said demurely. "The children could be watching."
He raised an eyebrow. "Oho! Excuse me, I thought you were Rowena Ravenclaw, not her mother. Terribly sorry, ma'am, my mistake…"
He made as if to get down from the horse. Rowena smacked his arm.
"You like to live dangerously, don't you?" she said, and gave him a kiss the likes of which her mother would no doubt disapprove.
"And what about the poor, innocent children?" he inquired a moment later when they drew apart.
"Oh, I think they'll survive," she said dismissively, playing with the ties of his cloak. "And they're not so innocent," she added darkly. "Always gossiping about their professors' sordid love lives, the nosy little twits. How was your ride?"
Godric's smile faded.
"It was fine," he said briefly.
Rowena frowned. There was tension in his voice, and his expression had grown distant. "Everything all right?" she asked tentatively.
He stared absently at a nearby tree, his brow furrowed. "Godric?" she prompted.
He snapped back to the present. "Aye, fine," he said carelessly. "Let's get this lad" – he clapped a hand against Lion's neck – "back in his stall and head up for some breakfast, shall we?"
Rowena rolled her eyes. Godric, she knew, was an accomplished liar; with his life, he'd had to be. He could concoct brilliant stories at the drop of a hat and tell them with unblinking ease, a talent which had saved his skin more than once. When it came to hiding something from Rowena, however, he was like a student with a feeble excuse for not doing his homework. She could always tell.
"Did something happen on your ride?" she pressed.
He heaved a sigh and shook his head, planting a swift kiss on her forehead before swinging down to earth. It was not a denial, she recognized, but simply a sign that he wasn't quite ready to talk about it. Though she itched to know, she was quiet as he led Lion into his stall, letting him collect his thoughts.
It wasn't until the horse had been rubbed down and fed that Godric finally spoke.
"I had an interesting conversation this morning," he said lightly, hanging the damp towel up to dry.
"With whom?" Rowena asked, intrigued. The inhabitants of the Forest that were capable of speech were a curious and varied assortment of creatures.
"Helga's centaur friend. Banyan."
"In daylight?" she said, taken aback. She'd thought centaurs were only abroad at night.
"I was surprised, too. The rest of the herd was asleep, I gather. He'd sneaked away to come and talk to me." Godric hesitated. "He wanted to warn me about something."
Furrowing her brow, Rowena sat on a bale of hay and pulled him down to sit beside her. "Go on," she said.
Godric stared broodingly at the floor. "He said that some kind of… crisis is coming, a sort of turning point which will influence events centuries from now, if you can imagine that. I'm having a hard time wrapping my mind around it myself, but he said this is something that they've seen coming for a while now." He ran a frustrated hand through his hair. "And… and it's something that the four of us will play a part in." He sighed heavily. "One of us in particular."
He glanced at her. As difficult as it was to take all this in, she knew immediately to whom he was referring. The full weight of the situation suddenly hit her, leaving her cold and frightened.
"Salazar," she said faintly.
She'd have had to have been blind not to see that things between Salazar and Godric had been growing more and more strained lately. The two had been very careful not to acknowledge it to one another, but all four of them knew the rift was there. Helga, naturally, had seen it even before Rowena had. The forced smiles and averted eyes. The sudden absence of their usual bantering. Salazar's unwarranted and frightening tirade when the Muggle-born girl had knocked over her cauldron in class. The look on Godric's face when Salazar had, once again, chosen all pure-bloods for his house at the start of the year.
It had pained her to see such friends drifting apart, but some things in life were certain, and one of those things had always been Salazar's and Godric's opposing convictions. For years, they'd operated under a careful sort of understanding about the issue, and she'd just imagined that they would manage to patch things up and go back to that wary peace. The centaur's warning, however, had suddenly thrown the situation into a much more foreboding light.
Godric's eyes were bleak. He drew her close wordlessly and took her hands in his, playing with her fingers as she leaned her head against his chest. When he spoke, she could feel the vibration as his voice resonated through his shirt.
"Banyan said nothing was certain. That we can… ah, what was it? 'To some extent control our destinies, but there may be forces at work that we can't influence because the pieces have been in place for a long time.'" He gave a short, hollow laugh. "Or something like that. So we try to make the right decision, but we might be doomed to failure no matter what. Comforting, isn't it?"
He blew out a breath and rested his cheek on the top of her head. "Rowena, it's Salazar." His voice cracked on the name. "What in Merlin's name am I going to do?"
Lord Douglas Ravenclaw and his wife, the Lady Nairne, had always maintained that the difficulties with their daughter began three weeks after her birth.
The baby was born with fine golden curls crowning her head, setting off her big blue eyes to perfection. The entire manor was in raptures at the birth of the child, who not only looked like a little cherub with her fair ringlets and button mouth, but was really the sweetest, best-behaved little tot one could ever hope to see. With her flaxen hair as their inspiration, the happy parents named her Rowena, or "fair-haired one."
Mere days after her christening, precious little Rowena proceeded to go bald. When her hair started to grow back on her twenty-first day of life, it took after her surname instead: as black as a raven's wing. Her mother insisted Rowena had done it out of contrariness; it was the first sign of a wayward nature that would be a blight to her parents' existence for years to come.
When she was one, her wet nurse was dismissed and another woman was brought in to fill her place. Rowena immediately took an intense dislike to this intruder and proceeded to make her disapproval known. The moment the woman took the infant in her arms, little Rowena would begin bawling, her face turning a mottled purple under her black hair. It got so that the unfortunate woman had barely to set foot in the same room as the baby to elicit indignant shrieks of protest, and she later swore bitterly that the child regularly waited to be placed in her arms before spitting up her dinner. It wasn't long before Rowena's faithful old nurse was restored to her by her disgruntled parents.
By the age of two, she had mastered the art of escape from her bassinet, and her technique improved considerably throughout the following year. Even raising the bars didn't help, and no one was able to figure out how she did it, because she always waited until she was alone in the room before making her bid for freedom. She was always turning up in the oddest places, too: the pantry, with pie and a big smile covering her face; the armory, idly playing with a spiked ball; the stables, curled up with a kitten in her arms. It drove her nanny to distraction, and determined to see an end to it, she resolved to stay awake and catch the girl in the act. Her vigil was in vain; Rowena didn't budge for three nights, and the poor sleep-deprived woman gave up.
These were minor difficulties, and taken by themselves the Lord and Lady Ravenclaw would have overlooked them; however, when it transpired that they were unable to have any more children, the minor misgivings they'd had about their daughter multiplied a hundredfold. She was cursed, or worse! They resolved to keep an extremely close watch on her as she grew. The following years did little to allay their fears.
It wasn't that Rowena was a particularly bad child – on purpose, at least. Oh, she was more spoiled than most, perhaps, and a little beauty from the start, a fact of which she became keenly aware very early on in life. She used this to her best advantage, as children do, learning the most effective ways of smiling winningly and sobbing heartbreakingly in order to manipulate the adoring adults around her. She had two brothers, Tavish and Euan, who were three and four years older and resented her existence for her first few years of life but accepted her readily as a chum when she grew old enough to become interesting.
No, it was more that her nature was too inquisitive to be seemly for a young lady of her station. She had a thousand questions about every topic under the sun, and her nanny started hearing the word "Why?" in her sleep. When she was old enough to wander around by herself, she would spend hours prowling through the glen, examining the trees and plants, watching the birds with wide eyes, and collecting insects and birds' eggs to study. Her beetle collection broke loose one day to wreak sensational havoc upon the bed linens and her mother's nerves. Another time, certain she had spied some great beast moving about in the loch, she climbed out on a slippery rock to get a better look, toppled in, and had to be fished out by a passing groundskeeper. When the frightened man had pulled the sobbing girl out of the water and asked her anxiously if she was all right, she explained tearfully that the splash had made the creature disappear.
Rowena became obsessed with books before she even learned to read. The written word was a fascinating puzzle to the eager little girl, and she yearned to be able to decipher the strange marks that adults understood so quickly. Her mother frowned on book learning for girls, so she began wheedling lessons out of her brothers' teachers, then sneaking off to the library to curl up with a book and puzzle out the words. Some were too difficult and others too boring, but she improved rapidly and before very long, reading was as natural to her as breathing. It was then, as she began to take in the wonders that books had to offer and travel to extraordinary, undreamed-of places in her mind, that she first learned the word "magic."
"Mummy," she asked one day, her mind still spinning with the fanciful tale she had just read, "is magic real?"
Lady Nairne's reaction was peculiar. Her face turned purple and her mouth opened and closed silently, her hand making little fluttering movements over her heart.
"Certainly not, Rowena," she managed finally. "Where did you ever hear of such a wicked notion?"
The only book of which her mother approved for her daughter's eyes or ears was the Bible. Unwilling to divulge the truth about her excursions to the library, Rowena mumbled something about overhearing a conversation in the kitchen and walked away, disappointed that there was no such thing as magic. Her mother watched her fearfully as she traipsed off.
For, quite unbeknownst to her daughter, the Lady Nairne was a witch, or rather, had once been a witch. As a young woman, she had fallen under the tutelage of a man of God, and he had convinced her to renounce her powers as the work of Satan. She had married a Christian knight and was determined that her child would not succumb to the devil's temptation with which she had been cursed; it was, after all, only by the grace of God that she herself had escaped with her soul. She forbade anyone to utter the word in Rowena's hearing and prayed that the girl would not start displaying any unusual abilities.
When Rowena was nine, her mother's worst fears were realized. A maid who had been scolding the mutinous child for keeping a family of mice under her bed suddenly found herself with the snout, whiskers, ears, and beady eyes of a mouse. Frantic squeaking roused the household, a commotion ensued, and Lady Nairne sank into a well-bred faint.
Excorcists, priests, and doctors were brought in by the dozen to drive the evil spirits out of the child. For the next few weeks, Rowena was prayed over, poked, prodded, and forced to swallow so many unpleasant concoctions that she was ready to scream, and did. Quite loudly. The magically amplified shriek drove the offending do-gooders from the manor in fright and caused every wizard within a twenty mile radius to start and look round for a banshee.
With it now painfully clear that Rowena's magic was not something that could be driven out of her, Lady Nairne was forced to go with what she saw as her only option: she forbade her daughter to practice magic and started preparing her for life as a nun.
Needless to say, this did not go over well with Rowena. Quite apart from being indignant in the first place that she'd been kept in the dark about magic all her life, now that she not only knew it was real, but she was a witch, she wasn't even allowed to experiment with it! To add insult to injury, her mother planned on packing her away to a nunnery to live with fussy, humorless old biddies for the rest of her life. For someone with a mind as active and curious as Rowena's, this was intolerable, and she had no intention of tolerating it.
"It's not fair," she stormed to her second eldest brother, Tavish, who was much more inclined to be sympathetic than the overly serious Euan (Euan was his mother's son to the core). "I don't want to be a nun! Church is boring. Magic is interesting."
"D'you really think magic is wicked?" Tavish asked, his freckled face alight with curiosity. He sounded more intrigued than alarmed by the prospect.
"No!" Rowena said defiantly. Then, with an apprehensive look skyward, she amended sulkily, "At least not always. It depends on what you do with it. If I used it to help sick people, how could anyone say it was evil then?"
He nodded eagerly. "And think what else you could do with it! I bet you could make the plants grow when there's a drought, or put out fires. You probably could have saved that girl who drowned in the loch last year!"
"I know!"
Both children fell silent, their minds teeming with the endless possibilities magic offered. A thoughtful moment passed. "I could turn Mummy into a bat," Rowena added wistfully.
Unfortunately, there was a snag in the face of her newfound resolve to learn to use her powers. Both times she had done magic had been unintentional, and purposeful magic required the use of a wand. She had no way of getting hold of a magic wand, even if she'd known where to look, which she didn't; she had no money of her own, and these days, she went nowhere unaccompanied by an adult. Grudgingly, she gave up on the practical part of her idea and began reading every book on magic she could get her hands on. She persuaded the butcher's boy who delivered meat to the manor to smuggle them in from a witch he knew of in town; he wasn't a particularly bright boy, and after a few smiles and kind words from Rowena he was wax in her hands. It was hard to find time to read them, though; her lessons with her mother and the chaplain were becoming more and more time-consuming.
But as time passed and the girl grew, it became increasingly clear that the blooming beauty was not suited for a life as a nun. Rowena, who had never been allowed any real contact with boys or young men, was as yet unaware of how captivating they found those expressive grey eyes of hers, or how very winsome her smile was. She knew she was pretty – she'd been told so often enough – but she had no real idea of the timelessness of her beauty. As for her changing body, she frankly considered her breasts a nuisance and tried to hide them as best she could.
Lord Douglas, who had for fourteen years behaved more or less as though he wasn't aware he had a daughter, suddenly began to take more of an interest in her existence. Rowena was too delighted that her aloof father was finally paying her some attention to notice the calculating gleam in his eye.
"Hello there, little hen."
The term of endearment made Rowena look up curiously as she passed through the entrance hall to see a big man with a booming voice and a wild red beard standing by the door. "Good evening, sir," she replied with a curtsy.
"You'd be Rowena, then." At her surprised nod, he doffed his hat and bowed. "Lord Ranulf Macrae, miss, here to see your father."
"Pleased to meet you," she said automatically, her mind already dismissing him as slightly creepy but mostly uninteresting and moving on.
He looked at her speculatively. "Well, you're a bit younger than I expected, but I see the stories weren't too far off the mark."
"That's nice," Rowena replied vaguely, wandering off to the stairs just as he was about to continue speaking.
Strange men had begun to turn up in the glen, and they were always particularly polite and attentive to her. She barely noticed, too perplexed was she by the tension she'd noticed lately between her parents to pay much attention to anything else. Normally they were very sweet and devoted to one another, but she had the sense lately that her mother was furious with her father. It bewildered Rowena, because for as long as she could remember he'd always let her have anything she wished and do whatever she wanted – he allowed her an extraordinary amount of liberty compared to most husbands.
It was a week after the encounter with Lord Macrae when Rowena's old nanny informed her that her parents wished to speak with her in their bedchamber.
A little apprehensive, but hopeful that she would at least be able to learn the reason for the ill feeling that had been hanging about the manor so oppressively, Rowena pushed open the great wooden door. It swung silently to reveal her parents waiting for her by the fire, Lord Douglas with a smile a little too wide on his face, and Lady Nairne fairly trembling with indignation, her mouth set in a thin line beneath her well-bred nose.
"Mother? Father? You asked to see me?"
"Yes, yes, come in, my girl," said her father heartily. "I – we - have wonderful news to impart."
Not much encouraged by his tone, she ventured closer, her eyes flicking from his beaming face to her mother's outraged countenance. She smiled cautiously. "Yes? And what might this news be?"
Douglas took her hand and drew her closer, touching her face and turning it so her features caught the light. "You are a beautiful, girl, my daughter. And you will soon be a beautiful young woman."
What did he mean by this? "Thank you, Father."
"So beautiful, in fact…" He winked. "That I feel it would be a disgrace to see you packed away to a nunnery for the rest of your life."
Her mouth dropped open and she stared at him in what must have been a comical display of shock, because he let out a great guffaw.
Of course! This was what had her mother so furious. This all fit, this made sense, this was wonderful!
"Father, thank you!" she cried, overcome with sweeping relief and delight, and although she had never been much given to displays of affection toward him, she flung her arms around his neck. "Thank you, thank you, thank you!"
"I never thought it was a life that would suit you, my dear. And this does not mean that we are changing our stance on… well, your, ah, capabilities."
"No, no, I never thought… I understand… and I never wanted to be a nun, Father, thank you so much!"
Her mother let out a strangled noise. Her father ignored it.
"Well, I have eyes, my girl, and I could see that – which is why I have come up with an alternative for your future. Many men are fascinated by that pretty face of yours – you've seen several about the manor these past weeks, no doubt - and several of them have entered into negotiations with me for your hand in marriage."
Marriage?
The word had never crossed her mind with reference to herself. Whenever she had envisioned her future, it had involved her parents trying to pack her off to a nunnery, then revealing her magical prowess to their great shock and horror, and making a grand exit, sweeping off to begin her life as a beneficent witch. But marriage?
She let go of Lord Douglas, her lips still smiling from his earlier news while her brain struggled to process this extraordinary pronouncement. Well, of course marriage would be inevitable if she weren't to enter a convent – it was just such a new idea to her that she had no idea how to feel about it.
"Marriage?" she repeated. It was all her fazed brain could direct her to say. Then, a moment later, it followed logically – "To whom?" In the instant before he replied, she found time to hope that it wasn't that Lord Macrae – he was too old, and thinking back on it, she hadn't liked how he'd looked at her.
"I haven't accepted any of them as yet – I'd like to have your impressions of them before I do so. Also, my dear –" he leaned forward, bursting with excitement – "Sir Padraig Buchanon has sent word that he will be coming next week to meet you."
"Sir Padraig!" Thunderstruck, she stared at her father. The man was already a legend – young, handsome, wealthy, and Scotland's fiercest warrior in a century. Why on God's green earth would he have any interest in the daughter of a minor, semi-impoverished nobleman like her father?
He nodded, his face positively glowing. "He's heard a great deal about you, Rowena. The others weren't pleased when they learned he was coming – understandably, I think, because they can hardly compete with such a man's prospects. That Ranulf Macrae – big fellow, lots of red hair, I think he mentioned meeting you? – was very put out in particular."
She heard the details of the man's impending arrival as if in a trance, nodding when expected to do so but lost in her own thoughts. She wasn't sure yet how angry she wanted to be with her father, and she had to think about how to handle these surprising developments before she said anything she would regret. She left a few minutes later, still turning it over in her mind.
While she didn't much fancy the idea of an arranged marriage, at least her father was allowing her the opportunity to meet her suitor and hear her opinions before closing the deal – a courtesy she knew wouldn't have occurred to many fathers. While she had a realistic idea of how much it would factor into his choice, she conceded it was decent of him to make the gesture of hearing her out. In any case, she had faith that he wouldn't marry her off to an old monster, no matter how rich.
Depending on the man, a married woman could hold a great deal of power, she mused. Especially if the husband was powerful. And if she were finally allowed to use her magic…
Sir Padraig Buchanon. It was scarcely to be believed that such a man could have an interest in her. She had seen him once, several years ago when he rode through the village; the whole glen had turned out to see him, and she had thought him an impressive sight on his tall war horse.
She would wait until meeting him, she decided, before choosing a course of action.
The night before Sir Padraig was scheduled to arrive, Rowena couldn't sleep. She curled up by her open window, a little cold in her light shift but enjoying the night spring breeze. She plaited her dark hair into a long braid as she allowed her mind to roam – mostly considering various plots for getting back at Tavish, who had been teasing her relentlessly all week about her heroic suitor. Euan, ever the sober, gentlemanly brother, had rolled his eyes and told Tavish to grow up.
There was a huffing noise outside, like that of a horse blowing out its breath. Curious, she craned her neck to look out the window. Partially obscured by the tall bushes that grew outside, she saw three of them, all being held by a tall man whose face she couldn't make out. Her heart jumped with excitement. Was he here?
A horrible yell abruptly splintered the silence of the night, making Rowena start and fall from her perch at the window. There was a clash of metal and a dreadful groan, followed by the tread of heavy, booted feet and guttural exclamations emanating from the floor below her. More screams followed, and Rowena picked herself up, her mouth going dry and her heart pounding with foreboding. What was going on?
Picking up her skirts, she ran to the door. It flew open just as she put her hand out for the handle and Euan burst inside, his normally reserved face vivid with fear. He was holding his sword, still in its sheath.
"They've come for you, Rowena!" he hissed, grabbing her arm and dragging her across the room.
"What?" she gasped. "Who?"
"That man Father rejected – Macrae. His men just killed the door guard and Tavish is wounded. You must hide! Quick, get in the wardrobe!"
She hesitated, and he threw her bodily inside with the strength born of the self-imposed discipline and training he'd endured for most of his eighteen years of life. He closed the door before she could protest, and when she pushed at it, realized it could only be opened from the outside.
"Euan – "
"Hush! They're coming!"
Frozen with fear, she pressed her ear against the heavy door as the footsteps entered the room – two men, from the sound of it.
"This is her chamber – look everywhere!" She recognized Macrae's voice and her skin crawled.
The footsteps moved to the left, where her bed was, and then began crossing the room toward the wardrobe. They had almost reached it when she heard a cry from Euan as he leaped out from wherever he'd been hiding, followed by the ring of metal on metal. Her hand flew to her mouth – she tried to perform a spell to open the door, but nothing happened. She felt so helpless she almost vomited.
It was over in no more than fifteen seconds. She could hear Euan's labored breathing as he strove to fight off the two older men and Macrae's grunts of effort as they sparred; and then a cry of horrible agony from her brother. She shuddered, tears streaming from her eyes.
There was a moment of silence, followed by a spasm of wet, convulsive coughing. One of the men took a step closer, and she heard a bone-chilling sound, an indescribable sound, a life-ending sound. There was a thud.
She retched.
An instant later, she saw light stream into the wardrobe through blurred eyes as the door opened, and before the reaching arms of Ranulf Macrae could snatch her she leaped onto him with a wordless scream, scratching at his eyes and biting like a wild animal. The other man dragged her off his master in an instant. She caught a glimpse of Euan's bloodied, lifeless form on the floor before he hoisted her, still struggling, over his shoulder and they escaped out the door.
I didn't mean to leave it there – but it was getting a bit long and decided to continue this in the next part. Sorry, I'm evil… I also realize that parts of it may not be exactly historically accurate, and I apologize to any medieval scholars out there, but if you'll pardon my French I don't really give a rat's a. As always, I love to hear from my readers – if you have feedback, or just want to yell at me for being a lazy updater, the review button is right down there.