Was John Hassell, on his way to Stonehenge, remembering his golden Joy? And if so, was it adding rage to his corrupted intent – or opening for him a chasm of doubt? Such wondering was wasted effort; they would need all they could summon up to feed power to Moira and Dan and the others.
Rosemary closed her eyes and slid her hand into Greg's. Curling her fingers, she could feel the fine hairs on the back of his hand and she was overcome with love for him. He gave a faint rumble in his throat, his habitual acknowledgement of any love-signal when other people were around and squeezed her palm against his own.
'Moira and the others are ready,' Tricia said suddenly. 'I can see the dark woodwork and the open fireplace… They're in their Circle, holding hands.'
With slow deliberation, Rosemary strengthened her union with Greg, and expanded it in her mind to include their whole coven. She could feel the ring of individualities closing and integrating, the group mind awakening, and when she knew it was ready she said quietly, 'Deosil now, deosil. She urged the power to her left clockwise, into Greg and the girl beyond him, and felt the surge from the man on her right. Soon the current was flowing as they had practised, a flywheel of psychic power through their unmoving bodies, deosil, deosil, amplifying itself with its own momentum. She knew, on the fringe of consciousness, that the other covens were picking up her cue and doing the same and she could sense the growing battery of sunwise whirlpools around them; but she diverted no attention to them, that was not her function. Her coven's power must all go to their link at Avebury, young Olive Sennett of the quicksilver mind, while the others concentrated on their own links. The flywheel of power was building, growing into a cone with its tip a shimmering vortex above the centre of their Circle, vividly clear to Rosemary's astral vision. Rosemary said: 'Olive.'
She visualized Olive, sitting as they had arranged on Dan's left; the rather bony young body, the pony-tailed brown hair, the wide mouth and surprised-looking eyes, the habitual crouch with one leg curled under her and the other thrust straight out… She felt an echo, an interlocking, and knew they had her. She said: 'Feed her.'
She was barely aware of the cave around them or of their physical bodies any longer; only of the ring of astral bodies, of linked minds, of the bright vortex of power they had created. On her command, the vortex reached out, not leaning, not losing its momentum, not changing its shape, but reaching out in another dimension to mesh with Olive and invigorate her.
Olive felt it, and exulted, and Rosemary knew. The current was flowing, steadily and strongly.
Then, astonishingly, with the current still unwavering, the cave and the hills and the forest recaptured Rosemary's awareness. The earth was real and alive around her; and not only here but Avebury as well, the mandala village with its sidestepped crossroads, its tree-crowned earthworks, its immemorial ring and avenue of stones. And all the land between, the rock and soil and water of Wales and England; a living organism, living and breathing and feeling, and they all a pan of it.
The vision sank again into the background, leaving the astral power-line to fill Rosemary's world. But she knew.
The Earth had spoken to her and She was on their side.
Miriam, sitting in a corner outside the ring of the Group with her earphones clamped to her head, broke the silence with one word: 'Aconite'.
Moira said 'Thank you', and the Group, unmoving, braced themselves.
The Army helicopter settled outside the ditch, west of the Henge and facing it. As the pilot cut his switches and the noise died, John could see the main group pacifying their frightened horses, three hundred metres away to the north of the perimeter, their reins tied to the road fence.
The main group of the Angels of Lucifer had come ahead on horseback, leaving Karen, John, Stanley Friell, Sonia and the six prisoners with their guard to arrive just before sunrise in the helicopter Harley had provided. John had not seen the necessity for the helicopter but had acquiesced. Only Karen knew its real purpose. It was to stay with her till Harley signalled that the success of Operation Skylight was beyond doubt and then fly her to Harley's side with the dozen or so Angels who really mattered and whom she had already secretly briefed. John and the others would be left to fend for themselves. If they caused any trouble -which Karen, despising them, did not envisage – a word from Harley to the Army would settle the matter.
But that was for later and Karen barely thought of it. Her whole mind was on the coming sunrise and the magical offensive whose impact would be felt across the length and breadth of Britain. Of that, Karen had not even a subliminal flicker of doubt. And when the smoke of battle cleared, she, Karen Morley, would be High Priestess – not merely of a handful of black witches, however effective, but of Britain itself. Power was her destiny. And on the path to power, John was an outworn tool and Harley a new and keen-edged one.
Karen stepped to the ground, the others following.
When his passengers were all clear, Captain Brodie leaned back in his seat and blew out his checks. 'What an incredible bunch,' he said to his co-pilot.
'That boss-woman gives me the creeps,' Lieutenant Denning replied. 'And who are those poor sods with their hands tied? They look bloody hypnotized.'
'Drugged,' Brodie said. 'The other chap's a doctor, the one with the bush-jacket on. And you know what, Den? If my guess is right, I hope those "poor sods" stay drugged.'
Denning grunted. Neither of them had any real doubt what was afoot. Harley's relationship with the Black Mamba was no longer a secret in Beehive and stories of her magical powers (most, but not all, apocryphal) had been circulating for weeks The name 'Angels of Lucifer' had been whispered, though cautiously. Once Beehive had got used to the idea, the general reaction had been 'At least they're on our side'. From that, among people already attuned by the witchhunt to the idea of magic being powerful and dangerous, it was an easy step to accepting as reassuring the knowledge that a group of black witches had been enlisted as Beehive's allies in Operation Skylight.
But like meat-eaters with abattoirs, acceptance was one thing, and having to watch the physical reality was quite another. The two officers gazed after their departing passengers with an uneasy fascination. The two young women naked to the hips, made up and jewelled, the black-skirted and black-haired one vibrant with a terrifying authority, the white-skirted and auburn-haired one surrounded by an aura of spiritual madness almost as terrifying. The unsmiling man in the black robe with the knife at his belt. The bush-shirted doctor, the very ordinariness of his garb unnerving beside the others. The six drugged prisoners, barefoot and clad in plain shifts like the Burghers of Calais. Their watchful guard in jeans and boots, carrying a shotgun. All moving towards the heart of the Henge, around which the twenty or thirty men and women who had been with the horses were now arranging themselves, all stark naked and even at this distance grimly but eagerly purposeful.
‘I don't think I want to watch this,' Brodie said.
'We're not going to be able to help watching it,' Denning told him, and, sickly, the captain knew he was right.
Sonia shed her skirt, laid herself gracefully supine on the Altar Stone and began to sing. The song was wordless, a quiet atavistic keening, an enraptured salute to the Master she longed to embrace, a resonant consecration of the blood still imprisoned in her veins and demanding the freedom of sacrifice.
The sound cut through John like a knife, sharper than the blade in his right hand. It was scarcely to be borne and Karen's evident gratification at it enhanced the torment. Still John did not doubt; he was here for a purpose and the purpose had been grasped to his soul since he had first set out for Savernake Forest. But would the sun never rise so that the unbearable song could be ended?