Free The Swan Kingdom by Zoe Marriott

there!” shouted John above the boom and roar. The trap lurched on the uneven path. “You could fall!”
    Reluctantly I eased back, but the savage gales still whipped my cheeks and hair. Too soon the path veered away again, and the sea sank out of view. I sighed. I had never seen anything that looked so much like the currents of enaid that ebbed through the land.
    As the sun began to fall down behind the horizon, we rounded a bluff; and there, like a rocky fist thrust out of the land, was my aunt’s house.

CHAPTER SEVEN
    It was a hulking three-storey structure, hewn from dark stone, its windows shining in the dying sunlight. The iron-braced door stood several feet taller than a man. At the house’s side an enormous dead tree, twisted by the sea winds into a tortured S, tangled its bony white branches with the sky. Not a bird sang; not an animal stirred. The only noise was the susurration of the hidden sea.
    John drew the trap to a halt and climbed down, coming round to help me out. My feet touched the ground, but I clutched his hand when he tried to withdraw it. “John – you will stay a little, won’t you?” I asked. “You won’t just leave?”
    “You won’t miss me, Lady, once you’ve settled. You have family here. They’ll look after you.”
    I stared at the house, unhappily aware that I
would
miss him. I was a stranger in this land, with its wild beauty and sad, tired enaid. He was my last link to my old life, and I did not want to be alone. Then I reminded myself that my brothers were searching for me and they would surely come for me soon. I wasn’t alone. I released John’s hand and straightened my shoulders.
    He smiled reassuringly at me, then went to the door and knocked smartly. After a long moment it swung open to reveal a girl – a few years older than I – dressed in a severe black gown.
    “Yes?” she said, face blank.
    “Lady Eirian’s niece, the Lady Alexandra, has arrived,” he said grandly.
    The girl cast a doubtful look at me, then looked back at John. “Wait here, please.” She shut the door gently in John’s face.
    I blinked. This was not hospitality as I knew it.
    After a few minutes the door reopened.
    “Her ladyship will see her niece in the small parlour,” the maid said tonelessly. “Please take your … conveyance to the rear of the building. The footmen will help you unload it.”
    She stepped back, gesturing for me to precede her. John gave me a nod and an encouraging look. I straightened my back once again and stepped through the door.
    The vestibule beyond was dark and narrow, the walls lined with polished wood tables and chests that held dozens of ornaments. Little pottery figurines, vases, glass balls, candlesticks – what light there was gleamed dully on these trinkets as if their purpose was to capture and soak it up. My steps were muffled by a thick, dark red carpet. I moved tentatively, my greatest impression that of stillness. If I screamed or jumped up and down and stamped my feet, would the stillness absorb the noise, so that all anyone would hear would be a faint whirring, like a trapped butterfly’s wings?
    The corridor ahead branched into three. The maid stepped past me with a quick bob and went to the left-hand branch, opening the first door we came to. I walked into the room she had revealed.
    I noticed first the tall thin windows, reaching up to the ceiling. They were swathed with dark curtains so the only light that could penetrate was an eye-smarting hard white line which seemed to go no further than the well of the window itself. The rest of the room was draped in cobwebby shadow that lay over the dim shapes of massive furniture like a physical thing. It was a moment before I even saw the woman in the throne-like chair at the centre of the room. I could make out no more than the hint of finely worked lace at her throat.
    I stepped forward hesitantly. The woman lifted her head and I saw her face for the first time. It was all I could do to contain a