Waking the Witch (The Witch of Cheyne Heath Book 1)

by W. V. Fitz-Simon

  “Why did you ask about Mick and religion?” He passed the joint back to her.

  She could lie and make an excuse about wanting to know about the funeral, but her buzz mixed with her borrowed emotions. She just didn’t want to lie anymore, didn’t want to be only half of herself.

  “I saw something,” she said, consequence be damned. “I saw him standing outside a building just north of here, waiting to enter. It seemed like a church. He was very excited.”

  “When was that?”

  “Just now, at the club.”

  He frowned, and she held her breath, worried that she’d made a mistake, and prepared herself to make excuses and beat a quick retreat.

  “Like a vision?”

  She nodded.

  “Like my Auntie Greta.” He took another drag. “She always knew when we were up to mischief. It was a pain in the arse. Do you see things a lot?”

  “Yes.” She didn’t dare volunteer more.

  “I know he was into spiritual stuff. He was always reading books about meditation and Buddhism. It drove my mum nuts. She’s a big bible thumper, raised by missionaries in Indonesia. She said he was going to hell for reading that stuff. Auntie Greta and her Tarot cards used to give her a conniption.”

  Relief washed over her. She had told no one other than George about her visions. It had taken a four-hour car ride from Liverpool to convince him, and from then until now to deal with the consequences.

  “Did you see anything else about Mick?”

  Johnny may have been unfazed by her admission, but to lay the full burden of how Mick died at his feet would be unkind.

  “Just a few things. Nothing much. Can you show me Mick’s room? If it’s not too upsetting.”

  “No, I slept in there last night. It’s across the landing.”

  Mick’s room was much like Johnny’s, only with more musical instruments and equipment. A rack of synthesizers stood against one wall. Three guitars on their stands were spread out under the window, effects pedals lined up underneath like soldiers. A gentle stream of Influence trickled from a small altar bearing incense sticks and a strange symbol drawn on a strip of parchment tacked to the wall behind it.

  Above the altar, on a bookshelf filled with well-worn books, a single volume tucked away at the end glimmered in her second sight. The other books on the shelf were mass-market paperbacks, all by authors she had never heard of with grand titles of spiritual importance announcing the wisdom they claimed to hold within. The glimmering volume was modest in comparison, clothbound and uninscribed, the size of her hand. As she opened its pages, Influence flooded out from it into the room, swirling around her like the wake of an ocean liner.

  “This was the book he had. I’m sure.”

  “I’ve never seen it before.” He took it from her and flicked through its pages. “The writer’s name is Emerson Margrave. Do you know who that is?”

  She shook her head.

  He looked at the back page. “Order of the Lotus Temple of Light. 42 Barge Street.”

  “That’s it,” she said. “I know where that is.”

  She took a deep breath. In for a penny, in for a pound.

  “Johnny,” she took his hands in hers. “I saw something else. It wasn’t drugs that killed Mick.”

  “Yeah.” She’d never seen him look more solemn. “I figured. He never touched anything harder than weed in his life. Three of our mates from school OD’d. I know what a junkie looks like. What did you see?”

  “I’m not sure, but I know he didn’t realize he was hurting himself. He thought he was doing something good.”

  He frowned. “And you think this lot put him up to it?”

  “I honestly don’t know.”

  He turned and bounded down the stairs.

  “Are you coming?” he called up from the landing.

  18

  Driving through London with a buzz was a complicated experience. The swirling trails of Influence around her distracted her at every turn, but Johnny directed them to Barge Street without incident, her giant street atlas spread across his lap.

  As they drove, Johnny quizzed her about what she saw in her visions. At first, she held back, but his questions were blunt, frank, and hard to deflect. By the time they found the temple she had told him about the widow’s weeds, the fractured ghost images, and the techniques she used to manage them. Nothing she told him was too outrageous. He believed everything, adding stories about one or other of his German aunts as proof he wasn’t just humoring her. She had never been so open to another human being, the discomfort that came with so much honesty slowly eaten away by his acceptance.

  She didn’t tell him everything, though, leaving out the demonic apparition in the darkroom and the horrible details of Mick’s last minutes. He didn’t need to know that.

  “May I have another hit of that joint?” She turned off the engine and wound back her seat belt. “Rolling around on the floor clutching my stomach if I have another vision won’t make the best impression.”

  There was nothing remarkable about number 42 Barge Street, save for a shiny brass plaque above the doorbell announcing the Order of the Lotus Temple of Light and a motto: ‘we seek, we strive, we aspire.’

  She pushed the ringer and an antiquated mechanical trill rang within. The ambient Influence swirled around her in the afternoon sun in a languid ebb and flow. She waited a minute, but no one answered, so she pushed the button again, and a third time after waiting a minute more.

  “Maybe there’s no one h—” Johnny stepped back, startled, as the door swung open on a scowling older woman ripped from a Georgian period piece, with thick white hair piled up in sausage curls atop her head. Her sensible tweed skirt and floral blouse suggested a tray of teacups and Battenberg cake might be in the kitchen, ready to be deployed at a moment’s notice. From behind her came murmured chanting and the slow, clear ring of a chime.

  “What do you want? We’re very busy!”

  The woman looked them up and down and didn't like what she saw, her upper lip curling with poorly restrained disapproval, a habitual expression for her given the arrangement of wrinkles etched into her face.

  “We’ve read about your organization,” said Gosha, “and were wondering if we could find out more about it.”

  “Information sessions are scheduled at seven o’clock in the evening on the first Tuesday of every month. Come back then.”

  She swung the door to close it in their faces, but Johnny stepped forward to block it.

  “That’s past our deadline, I’m afraid.” He grinned. “We’re writing a piece for Time Out on the rich cultural history of London. We want to feature the Lotus Temple of Light. I’ve brought my photographer.”

  Gosha dug into her handbag, took out her Nikkormat and waved it at the old woman with her friendliest smile as Johnny pushed inside.

  The foyer was bland and institutional, with stone tile floors and dark, wood-paneled walls. Coat hooks lined one side of the front door. Along the other, leaflets and booklets that hadn’t been disturbed in many a month stood in ranks like dutiful soldiers on a large wooden table. They could have stepped back in time to a boarding school or a vicar’s parish somewhere in the home counties in the nineteen-fifties. Top of the Pops, Face Magazine, and punk rock were a million miles away.

  The intrusion only hardened the old woman’s expression even further.

  “Thank you, but no. We are a respectable organization. Time Out is hardly an appropriate publication for a group such as ours. Please leave the premises immediately.”

  She spread her arms to usher them out, but Johnny stood his ground.

  “I’m delighted to hear you say that.” He stood a little taller, his back stiffening, and his accent shifted up several social strata toward the aristocratic. “I find it a necessary evil in my line of work, keeping one’s finger on the pulse and all that. Have no fear. That despicable rag shall never hear a word about you.”

  The old woman tilted her head in confusion at Joh
nny’s transformation. He reached out to shake her hand.

  “Allow me to introduce myself. Jonathan Fredericks at your service. Please forgive my appearance. As journalists, we are forced to alter our attire to fit in with the youthful masses.” He grimaced. “Though I find it personally distasteful. I come to you under false pretenses, Madam. I am, in fact, working on a piece for the Telegraph, a feature for the Sunday Magazine, shining a light on the spiritual trailblazers of London.” At the mention of the Telegraph, the woman’s demeanor softened, revulsion turning to interest. “A trusted source led us to your organization. He told us the temple is the pinnacle of spiritual seeking. I’m hoping you’ll agree to be the centerpiece of my article.”

  The woman’s eyes twinkled at the thought, but she wasn’t quite sold. Gosha scanned around for anything that might help push her over the edge. All the pamphlets and booklets were written by the same person, a Peter Walker.

  “Jonathan, look.” She put a hand on Johnny’s arm to draw his attention. “Peter Walker,” she said with all the breathless awe she could muster. “This is Peter Walker’s organization!”

  She had no idea who this Walker character was, but Johnny took the prompt and rolled with it.

  “The Temple of Golden Light!” He walked around the foyer as if it were a cave filled with arcane wonders. “Of course! I should have realized this was Peter Walker’s temple. Is he here now?”

  He slunk over to the doors leading to the meeting hall, chanting and bell-chiming coming from beyond, and placed an ear against them.

  “Is he in there?”

  His eyes widened with awe at what he heard, and he ran back to Gosha.

  “I can’t believe it. Peter Walker himself.”

  “You’ve heard of him?”

  He took the woman’s hands in his.

  “Have I heard of him? He is a legend.”

  Her face lit up.

  “He is a superb orator. So dynamic.”

  “May we go in?” He clutched her hands to his chest. “I promise we shall be as quiet as mice. To see the great man in action! What a dream fulfilled.”

  “We don’t normally admit newcomers to the Tuesday services, but an exception can be made for the Telegraph.” Thoroughly charmed by Johnny’s antics, the woman ushered them over to the doors and cracked one open to let them through.

  “You must be very quiet.”

  She gestured to a row of chairs at the back of a hall large enough to seat a couple of hundred, though the attendees only filled the front three rows.

  “Nice work,” whispered Gosha as they slipped into the nearest seats. “Jonathan Fredericks?”

  Johnny winked.

  “My grampa. That performance has everyone rolling on the floor at Christmas.”

  The congregation faced a lectern and a peculiar display of posters and objects from different religious backgrounds. To one side stood three shop mannequins wearing elaborate Egyptian-styled robes and headdresses. At the lectern stood an elderly man, presumably Peter Walker, in a similar outfit struggling to turn the pages of an enormous tome and ring two tiny cymbals together as he read from the book in a thin and reedy voice that didn't quite fill the room. The words he spoke sounded Latin, but Gosha took enough of it in school to know the meaning was gibberish. The setup reeked more of masonic stuffiness than spiritual adventure.

  Johnny leaned in to whisper.

  “Are you getting anything?”

  Save for Johnny’s aura and the Influence pouring out of Mick’s book in his pocket, the ambient flow in the hall was anemic.

  “Nothing. Anyone with any strength of character or potential to affect the world around them gives off a powerful aura. I doubt this lot could draw enough attention to hail a taxi.”

  Though the ceremony finished quickly, Gosha was already nodding off from the tedium of it. Peter Walker went to the entrance to shake hands with the congregation, none of them under the age of sixty. As they filed out, every eye turned toward Gosha and Johnny with distaste.

  The woman whispered in Peter Walker’s ear. His eyebrows shot up with excitement, and he nodded vigorously. As he did his best to hurry the receiving line along, the woman approached Gosha and Johnny and bobbed enthusiastically as they rose to speak to her. She beamed at them and spread her arms to encompass the meeting hall.

  “As you can see, we are a small but dedicated group of the spiritually curious who have come together to explore alternate forms of inquiry into reality and the self.”

  Her voice rose and fell in a liturgical lilt as she spread her arms wide to show off the uninspiring room. Her expression suggested strongly they should be dumbstruck with awe, an effect rather diminished by the wilted flower arrangements against the walls and the layer of dust that covered everything.

  “Peter Walker, our founder, will be only happy to go into the spiritual underpinnings in more detail, but suffice to say, we are adventurers in the higher realms. May I ask who told you about us?”

  “A friend of ours was part of your group,” said Gosha. “Perhaps you remember him? His name was Mick…”

  She trailed off, unsure that the name “Mick Trash” would go down well with this woman, and unable to remember his real name.

  “Taggart,” said Johnny. “His name was Mick Taggart.”

  The old woman frowned. “I can’t say I know anyone of that name. Many congregants come and go. The Daily Mail published a lovely article about Mr. Walker a few years ago. We had a brief influx of fresh blood after that, but Mr. Walker’s method is very precise, and not always to everyone’s taste. I love it though. So stimulating and refreshing, don’t you agree?”

  “May I have the book?” whispered Gosha as the old woman launched into a rapturous description of their Sunday services.

  “Our friend gave us this book that he got from here,” Gosha cut in when the woman paused to take a breath. “He absolutely loved it. Do you have more by the same author?”

  “Is that one of Mr. Walker’s? He’s so very eloquent, isn’t he.” The old woman was unfazed by having her train of thought derailed.

  “No. It’s by a man called Emerson Margrave.”

  The name went down like a burlesque act at a church fete. The old woman hardened, her brow furrowing into a mask of disapproval.

  “Oh, you’re one of those. I’m very sorry, but we don’t harbor that kind of filth in here.”

  The woman’s response took Gosha aback. The verses in the book were nothing more than innocuous spiritual pablum.

  Free at last of his parishioners, Peter Walker came over, bright with excitement.

  “Mrs. Harriet, do introduce me.”

  “Mr. Walker, these people have asked about Emerson Margrave.”

  Walker’s expression hardened to match Mrs. Harriet’s on the spot. She moved behind him as if to shield herself from Gosha and Johnny.

  “Mr. Margrave is no longer part of this congregation,” said Walker, his back stiff with indignation. “He is a thief and a corrupter of innocents. He insinuated himself into our community with false charm and the promise of a new dawn of interest in our vital work. That man is nothing more than a poacher and a plagiarist.”

  Walker bore down on them, herding them out of the service hall and back to the foyer.

  “He bewitched our congregants with cheap philosophy and showy effects and turned more than half of them away from our righteous path. Enlightenment and realization of the human soul is hard work. It requires years of dedication, not a weekend of deep breathing and cavorting around the forest in one’s underwear. If you’re after that sort of thing, you’ve come to the wrong place. There are brothels in Soho better suited to your needs. I would like you to leave.”

  Walker worked himself up into a lather, spittle flying from the corners of his mouth, his pallid face turning red as Mrs. Harriet opened the front door behind them. He drove them out onto the steps.

  “Be warned.” He jabbed his finger at them. “Terrible things have happened over there. A you
ng woman died out at his retreat center. Beware of that when you go knocking on his door. Don’t come here again.”

  He slammed the door in their faces, leaving Gosha and Johnny blinking in the afternoon sunlight.

  “Well, that took a surprising turn,” said Johnny. “I feel like we’re onto something. Where do we go next?”

  “There’s a price sticker.” Gosha turned Mick’s book over in her hands. On the back cover, a white strip of paper had scrawled on it in felt-tip pen ‘95p.’ “If he didn't get this from here, do you know where Mick might have bought it?”

  Johnny considered the question for a moment.

  “There’s a funky little bookshop near the market he was always going to. Maybe it’s from there.”

  19

  Morel Road had been the backbone of Cheyne Heath since the seventeen-hundreds. It began life as a thoroughfare between the farms and villages of the area, long before the City of London expanded out to enfold them. By the end of the next century, the thriving neighborhood severely shortened and contained the road. Its days of being a sleepy country lane were well behind it as its four meandering miles became a growing center for commerce.

  A street market lined with shops stretched along much of its length, and other businesses stretched out along the side streets around it. The less wholesome ends of many waves of immigrants that spread across London and lodged themselves in Cheyne Heath over hundreds of years forged a diverse culture in Morel Market. You could buy anything from anywhere in Morel Market, legal or otherwise.

  The bookshop Johnny took them to was at the edge of the shopping district. A gay cornflower blue covered the Victorian facade. The shop’s name, ‘Esoterica,’ and the slogan, ‘books for inquiring minds,’ was painted in gold leaf across the window in elegant cursive script. As they opened the door and the scent of lavender enveloped them, a bell rang out once in a bright and inviting tone.

  “Afternoon,” said the middle-aged Caribbean woman behind the counter, a pair of glasses perched at the end of her long nose as she unpacked a carton of books. “Let me know if you need help.”