Windsor Castle Book 4 Chapter II

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CHAPTER II HOW HER AND THE HUNTER APPEARED TO HENRY
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ON THE TERRACE Henry again sat down to his dispatches,
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and employed himself upon them to a late hour. At length,
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feeling heated and oppressed, he arose, and opened a window.
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As he did so, he was almost blinded by a
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vivid flash of forked lightning. Ever ready to court danger,
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and convinced, from the intense gloom without, that a fearful
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storm was coming on, Henry resolved to go forth to
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witness it. With this view he quitted the closet, and
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passed through a small door opening on the northern terrace.
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The castle clock told the hour of midnight as he
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issued forth, and the darkness was so profound that he
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could scarcely see a foot before him. But he went on.'
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Who goes there?' cried a voice as he advanced, and
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a partisan was placed at his breast.' The king,' replied Henry,
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in tones that would have left no doubt of the
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truth of the assertion, even if a gleam of lightning
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had not at the moment revealed his figure and countenance
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to the sentinel.' I did not look for your majesty
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at such a time,' replied the man, lowering his pike.
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has your majesty no apprehension of the storm i have
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watched it gathering in the valley and it will be
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a dreadful one if i might make bold to counsel
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you i would advise you to seek instant shelter in
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the castle i have no fear good fellow laughed the
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king get thee in yon porch and leave the terrace
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to me i will warn thee when i leave it
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as he spoke a tremendous peal of thunder broke overhead
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and seemed to shake the strong pile to its foundations
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Again the lightning wrenched the black canopy of heaven in
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various places, and shot down in forked flashes of the
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most dazzling brightness. A rack of clouds, heavily charged with
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electric fluid, hung right over the castle, and poured down
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all their fires upon it. Henry paced slowly to and fro,
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utterly indifferent to the peril he ran, now watching the
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lightning as it shivered some oak in the home park,
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or lighted up the wide expanse of country round him,
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now listening to the roar of heaven's artillery. and he
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had just quitted the western extremity of the terrace when
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the most terrific crash he had yet heard burst over him.
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The next instant a dozen forked flashes shot from the sky,
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while fiery coruscations blazed athwart it, and at the same
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moment a bolt struck the Wycombe Tower beside which he
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had been recently standing. Startled by the appalling sound, he turned,
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and beheld upon the battlemented parapet on his left a
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tall ghostly figure, whose antlered helm told him it was
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Hearn the Hunter. Dilated against the flaming sky, the proportions
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of the demon seemed gigantic. His right hand was stretched
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forth towards the king, and in his left he held
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a rusty chain. Henry grasped the handle of his sword,
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and partly drew it, keeping his gaze fixed upon the figure.'
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You thought you got rid of me, Henry of England?'
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cried Hearn.' But were you to lay the weight of
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this vast fabric upon me, I would break from under it. Ho! ho!
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What wouldst thou, infernal spirit?' cried Henry. I am come
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to keep company with you, Harry, replied the demon. This
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is a night when only you and I should be abroad.
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We know how to enjoy it. We like the music
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of the loud thunder and the dance of the blithe lightning. Avant, fiend,
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cried Henry. I will hold no converse with thee. Back
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to thy native hell. You have no power over me, Harry,
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rejoined the demon, his words mingling with the rolling of
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the thunder. for your thoughts are evil, and you are
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about to do an accursed deed. You cannot dismiss me.
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Before the commission of every great crime, and many great
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crimes you will commit, I will always appear to you,
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and my last appearance shall be three days before your end. Ha! Ha!
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Darest thou say this to me? cried Henry furiously. I
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laugh at thy menaces, rejoined Hearn amid another peal of thunder.
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but I have not done yet. Harry of England, your
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career shall be stained in blood. Your wrath shall descend
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upon the heads of those who love you, and your
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love shall be fatal. Better Anne Boleyn fled this castle
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and sought shelter in the lowliest hovel in the land
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than to become your spouse, for you will slay her
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and not her alone. Another shall fall by your hand,
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and so if you had your own will would all
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what meanest thou by all demanded the king you will
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learn in due season laughed the fiend but now mark
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me harry of england thou fierce and bloody kin thou
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shalt be drunken with the blood of thy wives and
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thy end shall be a fearful one thou shalt linger
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not a living death a mass of breathing corruption shalt
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thou become And when dead, the very hounds with which
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thou huntest me shall lick thy blood. These awful words,
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involving a fearful prophecy, which was afterwards, as will be shown,
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strangely fulfilled, were so mixed up with the rolling of
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the thunder that Henry could scarcely distinguish one sound from
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the other. At the close of the latter speech a
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flash of lightning of such dazzling brilliancy shot down past
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him that he remained for some moments almost blinded. and
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when he recovered his powers of vision, the demon had vanished.