Blood & Baltazar

by Liam Inscoe-Jones

  “Yes, lets.” Lylith snarled. “What’s going on, you tell me to wait here and then you come back like nothing’s happened. Did you find out what they’re planning, did you stop them?”

  “I found out their plans and I met they’re people. It’s not as big an operation as I thought. There’s a man who hates cauliflowers and another who’s going to need to see an orthopaedic nurse but no - I didn’t stop them.”

  “Then why are you back here?”

  “I told a woman who I was and she told her leader, now I’m on the run. I’ve been on the run before, it’s good isn’t it?”

  Lylith White spluttered as she tried to digest the information. “Is it?”

  “Well, no, not this once because now you’re on the run too.”

  “What, I’m on the run? Why am I on the run?”

  “Because I came here, and you’re here with me.”

  “Then why did you come?” She spluttered, her previous paranoia seeming now rather justified.

  “They knew all about me, so they’d of known about your involvement right from the off.” Josiah explained. “Whatever happened, after they’d dealt with me they’d be here for you. But they’re coming now. I had to warn you...” Hartt smiled reassuringly and raced back into the building, digging through cupboards and heaps of junk, the paper thin walks shaking as he ran.

  Lylith’s heart beat like a drum in her chest. She looked around, not daring to move even an inch until Josiah was back by her side. The room suddenly began to feel quite hot, perhaps it was because she was panicking. But no - there was something else, she was sure of it. She shrugged off her coat, sweat dripping from the back of her neck. She rubbed the aching heat and looked in the mirror.

  Lylith saw them there in the corner of the pane as she rubbed her pale skin, so small she had to look twice. Three tiny flames in the darkness.

  “Fire!” She screamed, sharply turning to the inferno which roared beneath the window. The heath was blazing with firelight, moss like tinder smoking in the wind. A thick grey mist bellowed through the cracks in the window frame. Josiah Hartt appeared behind her, a bowl and a few spatulas piled up in his clutches.

  “What do you mean fire?” He spluttered.

  She stumbled over a few words. “No…” She concluded. “There’s no other way to say it - we’re on fire!”

  “Oh God, how did that happen?” Josiah flustered, throwing his bundle aside and racing to the window frame. The sight before him answered his own question as through the shaking spikes of flame he spotted in the shadows three distinct figures, each working furiously beyond the chaos.

  They picked up bottles from a pile they’d hidden in the moss, then struck a match and placed it inside so the liquid ignited and an orange glow roared within glass. In turn each figure threw their flaming bottle and watched them shatter against the building, spurting a boiling liquid and sending hungry sparks flying across the blackened wall.

  Josiah muttered slowly, his voice grave. Protective. Focussed. “Top floor, get up there now I’ll be right behind you.”

  Lylith was transfixed; the room was like a sauna as the heat spilt in through the doorways, bringing with it a surging red light. She couldn’t move, she couldn’t even speak.

  Josiah turned from the furnace and looked at her with eyes ablaze.

  “Lylith!” He bellowed. “Top floor, now! Move!”

  With his angry words her feet allowed her the first few inches and she started to stumble across the cluttered floor at last, disappearing into the shaded stairwell with the clatter of her boots on the steps.

  Josiah lifted the cushion off the sofa and found beneath another long coat, crumpled and creased but perfectly tailored and he placed it over himself. He then bolted into the kitchen, tearing out the drawers and the cupboards, pots and pans tumbling onto the floor as he reached inside one of the shelves. Hartt yanked out a length of rope, a good dozen metres long, and rolled it around his arm, weighing like a tonne of bricks as he abandoned the segment and vanished in the smoke.

  Lylith White looked upon the ground and wept. From the top of the tower the bellowing flames looked like mere embers, the smoke piping from the top just dust drifting through the wind. Still, as the bottles shattered against the stone and erupted with bolts as bright as lightning she could hardly forget how horrific it was.

  The mountainside was a few metres across from her, the rippling of the heather buried in the hillside was so serene if she stared too long she became a little hypnotised. But then the loud stamping of Josiah’s feet would echo in the corridor and she was reminded just how far from danger they were.

  “Do they want to kill us?” She asked as he stumbled into the room.

  “They’re not here for tea and biscuits…” He began, rolling out the rope along the floor. “They’re trying to smoke us out, I don’t know what they’d do then but I stole from them, I lied to them, I practically disabled one of their men; I can’t imagine it’s going to be good.”

  “What are you doing?” Lylith quizzed as Hartt pushed her aide, reeling the rope back on itself carefully.

  He answered hurriedly, “I once got a taste for Benjamin Franklin, he’s was a rather clever man and I was mightily impressed by his work which, coming from me, is an accolade indeed. One night I tried to replicate his most famous experiment, just to see if he’d gotten the facts right, and so I placed a hook in the ground across the mountainside in line with the window and waited for a storm. When one finally came I threw the rope across and watched to see if his findings were correct. The system I put in place then could come in handy now - I’m thinking rope, big gap and two brave, conveniently athletic souls fleeing from the baddies; it’s a perfect cliché.”

  Lylith spluttered, “Did you get a taste for Ian Flemming as well by any chance? No way is that happening Josiah, I mean – I literally can’t do that...” She looked back out the window and down at the ground. The nerves in her knees promptly turned to jelly.

  “Why not?” He asked disappointedly, testing the knot he’d tied at one end.

  “I’m not all that good with heights.” She answered as she turned breathlessly around and leant against woodwork.

  “You came up here okay.” He pointed out.

  “Yes, but here is rather nice. Here there’s a roof and a floor and tea, out there – out there there’s none of these things…” She was cut short as the window promptly shattered into a thousand shards of glass, first crumbling, and then bursting from the seams like frozen teardrops.

  They punctured Lylith’s skin as she instinctively dropped to the ground, and over her head came flying a large stone, rocketing through the frame and across the room until it dropped and rolled wonkily over the waning floorboards.

  “What the hell was that?” She panted, dusting specs of glass from her hair. Josiah jumped to the window, peering down to the ground.

  Another rock spun up into the air, hurtling towards him and slamming into the wall beside the window. “They’re throwing stuff.” He unhelpfully stated, pushing her away from the open sight. “I didn’t see that one coming.” He muttered.

  Lylith White looked at him with scared, wide eyes. “Why not?”

  “Because we’re at the top.” He explained like she should be mightily impressed. “That’s pretty high up.”

  “Josiah, this is the third floor!” She exclaimed, “Who can’t throw up to the third floor?” Lylith glanced to the open window just as a small rock cleared away the remaining jagged spikes of glass. “You’re right.” She realised breathlessly. “We’re going to have to climb out of there. But no way am I tightrope walking with Christ-knows what flying towards my head. We’ll have to jump.”

  “Crossing on a rope, that was ambitious.” He retorted. “Jumping is mental.”

  “Well no, we’d be killed instantly. But not if we use a parachute…”

  Josiah Hartt sighed as yet another rock hurtled through the window and shattered in two a test tube lying on a far shelf. “I
don’t have a parachute.”

  “No, obviously – nobody has a parachute, but it’s not that hard to make one.” She explained. “You just have to tie your rope through four holes you cut in a sheet, or a quilt, and fashion it around yourself.”

  He looked at her in mock disbelief. “You didn’t have a privileged upbringing did you Lylith?” He examined the doorway, counting the seconds between each new flying stone.

  Six. That was surely enough.

  “Look, we don’t need to parachute out of here because there is another way. It was too close for comfort before and it will mean going downstairs again, I know there’s fire and smoke and shenanigans but we’ll just have to brave it. We don’t have a choice anymore.”

  Lylith White ducked as something large slammed into the wall just behind her, rumbling with a plume of dust through the loose stones. It didn’t sound like a rock, more like a boulder. “Okay.” She panted. “Anything, what is it?”

  “I’ve got a secret tunnel.” He replied, assessing the damage to the doorway.

  She sighed briefly. “Of course you do.”

  He turned back to her with the widest of grins. “Of course I do!”

  Lylith battled through the smoke. It wasn’t like mist as deceivingly it seemed, more like murky water, and she felt as if she was drowning in it. Josiah Hartt held her hand, both of them clammy in the thick heat pressed around them. Everything was almost completely masked by smoke, both of them blinded as they raced towards the farthest wall. The reinforced walls seemed to be holding the fire at bay, but the roaring flames and chocking heat were just a poisonous, stinging her eyes and making Lylith’s skin feel like butter.

  For a moment she panicked as Hartt dropped her hand and left her alone, standing while the inferno roared in her ears. It almost drowned out the creaking of wood as Josiah pulled open a panel in the floor and took her hand again.

  “Steady yourself.” He whispered in her ear, ensuring her free hand was clasped firmly on a part of the stone wall. As she touched it her skin blistered, the walls in themselves piping hot. Lylith White realised they were standing in a kiln. Before she had chance to gasp with pain Josiah’s hand pulled her - not forwards, but down, down, falling into the floor.

  She dropped for just a few seconds. Hartt couldn’t hold her hand for long enough and as he let go she was left falling alone, tumbling down a wall of dirt and sliding off its dampness. Lylith rolled over from her back and toppled for just a moment more before sliding to a cold, wet halt.

  “Lylith, it’s okay now.” He smiled at her through shallow breaths.

  As she went to look around she realised her eyes were instinctively closed. She reluctantly forced them open. Through the bleak darkness she could see the flickering light cast by the fire above them. They were in a passage, not very long but deep enough, gradually ascending to a hole at the edge of the forest, a good few metres clear of the attackers.

  “Come on.” Josiah muttered, gently tapping her shoulder and pushing her forward. Even the fire hadn’t warmed the bitter ground beneath her palms, the lines of her skin now creased with damp earth. They crawled along the passageway and with each shuffle forward the roaring got louder.

  As they reached the top Hartt poked his head out from the hole, silver breath seeping from his lips as he kept his frenzied panting quiet. He waved his hand and dived forward, leaping out of the cavern like a hound from its kennel.

  There was a small forest on the edge of the hillside, a row of stump like trees embedded amongst the ferns. Josiah pulled Lylith towards it. The panting and shouting and scuffing of heels didn’t go unnoticed. All three figures sharply turned their heads, and with a quick shouting of commands they sharply gave chase.

  The shadows followed them deeper into the woods, heavy feet stomping against the earth. The forest was like an obstacle course, roots hidden under moss and fallen trees at ever juncture. Lylith grabbed hold of a branch and swung herself over. Josiah followed, pressing against the wind that tore across his face.

  The figures seemed so much faster and so much more determined, jaws snapping and snarling at them like dogs as they ran. If it was an attempt to scare them it was working. Lylith could feel them bearing down, their breath grew closer, their heartbeat rang in her freezing ears.

  As Josiah stumbled over a branch and looked back to see if Lylith was okay they gained a couple more inches, arms and legs flailing as they ran. One pressed against a fallen log and propelled themselves forward, flying towards them and rolling to the floor. Lylith picked up a rock and through it backward, narrowly missing one of the women who quickly ducked to avoid it. She screamed as another flew back at her, a stone that would surely have killed her if it had hit. Her eyes grew wide as Josiah stopped and began rummaging in the undergrowth.

  “What are you doing, we have to go!” She screamed into the gale, the determined chasers thudding into the dirt.

  “I know, keep running, I’ll be right behind you…” He replied, still digging into the ground with his hands. He looked at her as she stood and trembled. “Don’t stand there… Run!” He ordered.

  Instead of moving she stubbornly remained, legs fastened to the ground. It was as if she couldn’t move even if she’d wanted to. Josiah caught a glance at the imposing figures as he stood, taking her by the shoulders and looking her in the eye.

  “I’m scared Josiah, I don’t want to go on alone…”

  “I know.” He whispered. “Lylith, trust me. I’m right behind you.”

  He turned away and dipped his hand into the soil, leaving her no choice but to reluctantly turn and run away. Josiah pulled up a chord from the dirt and snapped it in two. He felt the ropes tension release and fall away, and he looked up just in time to see Elisa’ grinning face catch up with him. She was swept away as a bag of captured rocks swung from the tree and knocked her aside, slamming into her stomach and in turn the oncoming Edgar Mulligan.

  Hartt grinned at their bewildered faces before turning on his heels and running again. He thought it was a victory, he thought they were about to escape. Then his heart sank as he found himself stuck as a hand clasped onto his heel. He fell face first into the earth. Josiah turned around in time to see Edgar pull himself forward and bring his swollen fist down upon him.

  Lylith White obediently ran - her ragged breath her only companion as the forest became silent. She stopped and panted, leaning on her thighs and looking back at her tracks. There was nothing there, only the footprints she’d embedded in the dirt. A cold wind wafted, rustling the leaves which grew in colour as the blackness above her simpered into grey. She turned sharply as she heard the breaking of a twig and a sharp, powerful thud.

  She opened her mouth to call Josiah’s name but found she could muster no words. Lylith felt a strange sensation overcome her and she looked nervously downwards. Her white shirt had turned the brightest red, and as she touched her chest she found a dampness that stunk of the unmistakable metallic stench of blood. She didn’t have chance to look confused as her eyes rolled up into her head and she collapsed to the floor.

  A Case to Solve

  T he light of dawn sprung through the glass between the oak frames of the windows. The peach haze soaked the walls, drifting across the long rows of paintings as the sun rose across the sky and further down the valley. Stone Hall was busy - Cedric’s expansive personal study was its most grandiose of rooms and so was overwhelmed with servants swarming from the passages of the building. Boxing Day lived up to its title, every corner filled with cardboard cubes crammed against the walls. Tired helpers plunged their hands inside and pulled out long silk tapestries and silver platters, with busy hands tucking handkerchiefs into cupboards and knotting the strings of balloons around the pipes of radiators.

  Beside one such radiator was a simple beach doorway and further behind that sat Cedric Baltazar, rocking alone back and forth on his seat. Many times he’d made his grand entrance, hands clenched and eyes alight with furious anger, all unleashed upon an empty ro
om. So many times now, infact, it was beginning to look ridiculous. So instead he sat, listening to the clatterings of his own servants around him as bit by bit they assembled a ball which he was so desperate not to attend. He preferred to sit in his chair and wait for his wife. His wrench rested on a small table beside a bottle of port. His shaking hand pressed flat against the rim of his empty glass.

  Cedric had been hoping and praying for Lucy Baltazar to walk through the door for such a long time, when she finally did it almost seemed like an anti-climax as she traped across the floor in her slippers and robe.

  “They’re putting up balloons in there.” She groaned, wiping sleep dust out of her eye and seating herself opposite him. “Actual balloons - this is meant to be a sophisticated event, if you don’t stop them soon they’ll be pulling out the party hats. You want to have a word with that Michael Prince, he’s got a sharp tongue but there’s no accounting for taste…” She paused as, for the first time since she had walked in, she actually lifted her head and looked at him. “Is this about the file?” She muttered, reading the look in his eyes.

  “Michael wants me to get it back.” Her husband sighed.

  “And so here you are.” Lucy snorted softly. “The puppet master pulled your strings in my direction and you came running I see?”

  “No!” The Patriarch exclaimed. “I didn’t need persuading to see that if I didn’t come back here it would be an end for both of us, all he suggested was that I ask a little more forcefully this time…”

  “Like when you went to hit me on Christmas Eve?” She retorted bitterly, her eyes growing nervous as they flickered across to Cedric’s table and saw the thick, dirty metal of the wrench resting on the oak. “Will you?” She asked quietly.

  He paused for a moment before his tensed shoulders relaxed and he exhaled with relief, offering his lover a brief, reassuring smile. “No, of course not. I could never do that to you sweetheart...”