The One Marked By Willow (Book 3)

By Laraine Anne Barker

“Who are you?” she whispered as she felt the full force of his magnetic power.
“Come home, dear Esmé, and forget all this nonsense. The Earthling Mark is unworthy of you. He betrays you at every opportunity. You’ve seen how he flirts with all the girls in sight.”
Esmé’s eyes filled with tears ... and she felt again the bitter pangs of jealousy. “Yes,” she said sadly.
“Come home, Esmé. ... Come home and forget him.”
... “Yes,” she repeated in a whisper. “Yes, I will.”

With Esmé in the power of the wizard Ignarius, whom she thinks is her father, Mark has a hard time ahead of him in his battle to save Lazaronia and its princess. And, to make matters worse, the wizard has brought Will Marksby—a handsome 19-year-old Earthling—to Lazaronia and has spelled Esmé into accepting him as the One Marked by Willow. Ignarius wants the Princess either married to Will or dead. And he’s determined to try both.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Laraine Anne Barker
• Release date: May 25, 2012
• ISBN: 9780987665027

Laraine Anne Barker

Laraine Anne Barker has always enjoyed telling stories. As a child, when playing with dolls with her younger sisters became boring, she would make up stories featuring the dolls. She also remembers how she and her sisters wrote stories into exercise books and even illustrated them, using crayons to colour them because they found that rubbing on the crayon pictures gave them a shine similar to that of glossy colour pictures in magazines. Laraine submitted her first book (for adults) to a publisher at about the age of 21 and received a very kind rejection letter in which the editor suggested the story could be rewritten for young readers. She regrets she didn't keep the rejection and follow up on the advice. She didn't start writing fantasy for young readers until 1986. After many rewritings the book started then became The Obsidian Quest (published under the Hard Shell imprint of Mundania Press). The Obsidian Quest was a finalist in The Dream Realm Awards 2001 and was followed by Lord of Obsidian and The Third Age of Obsidian, also published under the Hard Shell imprint of Mundania Press. The Mark Willoughby series was started in 1992. Silvranja of the Silver Forest was short-listed (one of three) in 1998 for a major New Zealand prize, The Tom Fitzgibbon Memorial Award.

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About The One Marked By Willow

Who are you? she whispered as she felt the full force of his magnetic power.

Come home, dear Esmé, and forget all this nonsense. The Earthling Mark is unworthy of you. He betrays you at every opportunity. You’ve seen how he flirts with all the girls in sight.

Esmé’s eyes filled with tears … and she felt again the bitter pangs of jealousy. Yes, she said sadly.

Come home, Esmé. … Come home and forget him.

… Yes, she repeated in a whisper. Yes, I will.

With Esmé in the power of the wizard Ignarius, whom she thinks is her father, Mark has a hard time ahead of him in his battle to save Lazaronia and its princess. And, to make matters worse, the wizard has brought Will Marksby—a handsome 19-year-old Earthling—to Lazaronia and has spelled Esmé into accepting him as the One Marked by Willow. Ignarius wants the Princess either married to Will or dead. And he’s determined to try both.

Chapter 1: The Birthday Ball

So Lisa Marksby wants you to be her partner at her birthday ball.

Mark started and looked up, feeling his face redden, as his mother’s voice came over his shoulder. Hastily he shoved out of sight the stack of invitations she had handed him a few minutes before. If he hadn’t thought she’d left his bedroom he wouldn’t have started opening them. Mothers, he thought with slight irritation, could sometimes be unbearably nosy—although, to be fair, his own wasn’t usually too bad.

Mark’s mother, apparently not noticing his irritability, continued blithely, That’s nice isn’t it? And I suppose the other letters are also from girls wanting you to be their partners? You’ll be grateful now for those dancing lessons you grumbled about.

Lisa’s parents are loaded. I ’spect her mother wants to show off, he mumbled, frowning sullenly. Then, to forestall the expected objection to a statement that could be taken as spiteful, Why do people always have to have dancing at a birthday party?

Helen Willoughby looked at her younger son puzzledly. He’d long since overcome the shyness of his childhood days, she thought, and his unfailing courtesy and friendliness made him very popular with the girls at college. She also suspected the skill at ballroom dancing of which he appeared more ashamed than proud—and the zealous way he threw himself into the peculiar jerking around that passed for dancing among young people—had something to do with that popularity. But as soon as a girl showed any interest that might be described as romantic he instantly shied away. Strangely, though, she mused affectionately, nothing stopped the girls from having another go at becoming what in her days would have been known as Mark’s ‘steady’. He’d been rather dreamy over the last few years—but then most teenagers went through that sort of stage and at least he did well at school.

Then Mrs Willoughby’s gaze fell on something among Mark’s homework books—something he had accidentally uncovered in shoving the invitations out of sight. It was a watercolour sketch—a portrait by the look of it. And it seemed to be quite skilfully done. Curiosity getting the better of her, she pulled it out.

She saw a girl of about twelve with milky-white skin, eyes so dark they looked black—eyes both haunted and haunting in their intensity—and thick hair fringed in front and reaching unfashionably past her waist in shining black waves. She wore a red gingham dress heavy with frills and lace—so out-of-date Mark could never have seen a girl wearing anything like it.

Before Mrs Willoughby could ask who she was, Mark snatched the sketch back, his face even redder than before, his eyes sparking with fury. Mum! That’s private!

Mrs Willoughby jumped back as though she’d been stung.

Sorry, she said—rather huffily, for she wasn’t used to rudeness from either Mark or his older brother Adam, even when, as in this instance, she deserved it.

Now look what you’ve done, Mark said, smoothing the creases from the paper.

Who is she? Mrs Willoughby dared to ask.

Her name’s Esmé. Mark’s flat tone clearly added, and that’s all I’m telling you.

You’ve never painted anything like that before. I didn’t know you were so good at art.

Mark grinned, his annoyance instantly vanishing. I guess I’m finally improving.

May I see it?

Mark shrugged and handed the picture over, trying to look as offhand as possible.

Mrs Willoughby looked at it thoughtfully, noting the dirty and curled-up corners. Mark’s last words had suggested he’d painted it fairly recently, so she could only assume he’d been handling it rather too frequently. She’s very pretty—beautiful in fact, in spite of her pallor. But she looks unreal, almost like someone from a fairy tale.

Mark’s grin widened as he saw a way out of his dilemma. Well, she is of course. Girls don’t wear things like that these days. He tried to put as much scorn into the stressed word as he could.

Almost reluctantly, Mrs Willoughby handed the portrait back.

I never knew you were such a romantic, she teased, giving his hair a quick, fond rumple—and quickly leaving the room before he could jump down her throat again.

But Mark was unaware of his now dishevelled hair. He looked thoughtfully at the portrait. Was he really a romantic? The thought made him uneasy. It sounded like a rather sissy thing to be. And if the boys at college ever caught him poring over the portrait the way he had every day since he’d painted it nearly two years ago he’d be the butt of some very coarse jibes. He sighed. Why did this unknown girl who was still only a child haunt him the way she did, when he knew nothing about her apart from her first name? Why did this figment of his imagination make all the girls he knew—even their names—seem dull and plain? Why did her image always intrude whenever he so much as spoke to any girl apart from his brother’s girlfriend Julie?

Resolutely Mark settled back to his homework. Studying was one of the few ways he’d found to push the girl conjured up by his imagination into the back of his mind, if only for a while.

* * *

Lisa’s birthday ball started off even worse than Mark had expected. First, in his hired evening clothes he insisted he felt like a turkey trussed up for Christmas dinner. Then he found he and Lisa were expected to take the floor on their own at the beginning of the first dance—a waltz—while Lisa’s brawny older brother Bill glowered at him from the edge of the dance floor.

And as if that wasn’t bad enough, Lisa’s appearance made Mark feel immature and clumsy. In her finery and makeup, and with a fancy hairdo topped by a small diamanté tiara that emphasised her likeness to the late Princess of Wales, she looked much older than her sixteen years.

But as the music started and they began to dance it was as though she sensed how he felt for she spoke so only he could hear. You look fabulous and dance divinely.

He grinned broadly at her, suddenly oblivious of all the watching eyes—even the hate-filled glare of Bill Marksby. He was about to return the compliment when he saw the portrait of Esmé floating in the air behind Lisa’s shoulder, looking at him accusingly as it always did when he spoke to or danced with another girl. Only this time the portrait appeared to have come to life. The black eyes sparked dangerously at him.

But when the apparition spoke it was all Mark could do to stop himself gasping aloud. You’re supposed to be dancing with me. You promised me this time you wouldn’t forget me.

Before he could think what to say or do, an unseen force pulled him away from his partner and he found himself dancing with a girl with dark eyes and hair that swung out behind her in a shining black curtain—a girl wearing a full-skirted red gingham dress.

Why did you make me wear this dreadful thing? Esmé said as he swung her round and the gingham skirt billowed out as gracefully as any ball gown. No wonder you keep forgetting me.

And abruptly Mark remembered everything. Esmé was the Princess of Lazaronia and he had been formally betrothed to her and created Prince of Lazaronia by the Queen Regent Esmeralda before returning home on the back of a white dragon called Flare the Fearless some two years ago. Esmé had been wearing the red gingham dress when he’d first met her—and she must have been no more than nine years old. She was now at least fourteen. No wonder she was irritated because he’d chosen to paint her in it!

Mark, aware the music had faded to silence, stopped dancing and burst out laughing. Outraged, Esmé pulled her hand from his shoulder and snatched the other from his grasp. What’s so funny?

Instantly Mark sobered down as he took in the fact that the girl he remembered was now a young woman. Then his face broke into another grin as he recalled how, shortly after he had first met her, Esmé had borrowed from the wardrobe of casual clothing provided for him by the wizard Ignarius.

"You’re lucky I didn’t paint you in shorts and tee-shirt—that would have looked