wanting him urgently.
But as he braced himself above her on the point of making love, her eyes suddenly shot wide open. In the faint light, hovering above her, she saw her worst nightmare. This man poised over her didn’t have dark curls, but straight silver-blond hair. He smiled down at her, eyes gleaming darkly.
‘Sylvie, my beautiful Sylvie,’ he murmured.
She shoved him away with a scream of absolute terror, the heel of her hand catching him hard on the jaw. She rolled to one side and out of bed in almost one movement.
‘Get away from me!’
Chest heaving in panic, she backed away to the door. The dark shape in her bed sat up groping wildly for the light switch and the lamp crashed to the floor.
‘Sylvie! What’s the matter?’
‘Keep away from me! Stay away!’
Sylvie flung the bathroom door wide open, heading for the girls’ bedroom, wanting only to escape.
‘Sylvie!’
She turned and caught a glimpse of Yul kneeling up on the bed with the quilt all tangled around him. He reached out towards her, his face twisted in anguish.
‘Sylvie what is it? Don’t go!’
She shook her head in complete confusion – this was now definitely Yul. Sobbing, she stumbled into the other bedroom and slammed the door shut, climbing into Celandine’s empty bed with all the lights blazing. Yul tried to come in but she shouted at him to leave her alone, and recognising the hysteria in her voice, he returned to their bedroom. He spent a fitful night, worried sick. Sylvie sat bolt upright with Bluebell’s quilt around her shoulders trying to stay awake. Every time her eyelids closed she’d jolt awake until at last she gave in to exhaustion and dozed restlessly. It was a long night and morning couldn’t come soon enough.
Sylvie sat hugging her knees and stared absently at the ragged trees outside, still holding on to brown leaves that longed to let go. Her breakfast sat untouched on the table, as did Yul’s. She closed her eyes and tried to swallow the sharp pain in her throat, a pain that also prickled at the back of her eyes and made hot tears well up suddenly and spill from under her closed eyelids. What was happening to her? What had happened last night?
She felt vulnerable and scared and worried about Yul. What must he be feeling? She’d never rejected him like that, not even during her illness. But she was sure it hadn’t been him in bed with her last night. She was certain it was Magus and not a figment of her imagination, just as his strong scent had been real a little earlier. Somehow, Magus had returned. She sat in a state of misery, unsure of what to do or say for the best. How could you tell your husband that in the middle of the night, just as you were about to make love, he’d transformed into his late and hated father? In the cold light of morning it seemed utterly ridiculous.
Yul had gone now, presumably down to his office. He’d tried to talk about it this morning but Sylvie simply couldn’t tell him what had happened. She’d stayed silent and withdrawn, resisting all his attempts to talk or just hold her, and eventually she begged him to forget the whole thing and leave her be. He’d looked so upset as he left but she was terrified of telling him what had really happened. She started to clear away the breakfast things, putting them in the dumb-waiter to go down to the kitchens. Her hands shook and the crockery rattled as she told herself firmly that her husband was not a shape-shifter and it couldn’t possibly have been Magus who’d come to her bed and almost made love to her last night. That was the stuff of madness.
Yul stomped around the Stone Circle feeling the anger rise within him.
‘Desecrated!’ he spat and kicked at the remains of the funeral pyre, filthy on the soft earth floor. Another great patch of scorched earth very close to the Altar Stone showed where the lightning bolt had struck the night before at Samhain, during the Dark Moon. It was as if the very elements themselves had turned against Stonewylde, striking at her heart. Yul shuddered at the memory of the lightning strike, recalling the terrible sensation when he’d felt his whole being switch polarity and jolt in agonising spasm. He looked up and the black crows and white skulls painted on the great stones leered down, mocking him.
‘Clear