by Taylor Leon
Moira was on him in a flash. Right in front of him, blocking his charge down the alley. Mundy didn’t even have time to register surprise that she had somehow raced ahead of him, as he collided into her.
By the time he sat up, we had formed a circle around him, our arms raised horizontally as though we were trying to hold hands but just couldn’t reach.
We started the incantation which only took a few seconds. As with all the others before him, once he was back on his feet he tried to push his way out of the circle. But it was too late and he just hit the invisible barrier between us and him. Then the small bat-like demons rose up, smothering him as he screamed out. A silent scream that couldn’t be heard outside the circle.
I was facing the entrance to the alley and saw a police car drive slowly past. Even if they looked down the alley all they would see would be four women standing in a circle in the darkness. As long as they didn’t climb out of their car and approach us, we’d be okay.
A few seconds later and it was over anyway. One final cry for help from Mundy and then the demons were gone, and Mundy with them.
We headed out of the alley, just as the police car reversed back across the entrance. They must have sensed something as they drove past and had decided to check it out.
The side window slid down, just as we stepped into the street.
‘You ladies okay?’ a young officer asked.
‘Fine,’ we chorused together, and linking arms we carried on down the street. A normal group of ladies leaving a nightclub together late at night.
Maybe it was a sixth sense, the same kind we all get when we “feel” someone staring into the back of us, but I turned around and saw a figure staring at us from down the other end of the street. She was young, a pale face and bright red lipstick, lots of eyeshadow giving her a goth look, and she was dressed from head to toe in black.
‘That girl is watching us,’ I said, and they all turned after me.
‘What girl?’ Frankie said.
I looked at her in disbelief, and then looked back down the street. ‘There…’ the words had barely left my mouth when I realised the girl had gone.
‘Maybe a shadow?’ Bella said.
‘She was standing right in front of that store,’ I said.
‘She ain’t there now,’ Bella said.
‘Wait here,’ Moira whispered, and disappeared in a blur, down the street and past the store. The air whipped around her loudly as she turned at the next corner and then came back. Seconds later she was once again at my side.
‘Nobody there,’ she said, her voice steady and even, despite the distance she had just covered at speed. ‘Trust me, if there was anyone, I would have caught up with them.’
I looked back down the empty street.
Shadows late at night, playing tricks.
15
WAYNE HAD BEEN patiently waiting for almost an hour before he heard the key in the lock, the front door creak open and slam shut, followed by footsteps in the hallway, the clack clack of high heel shoes on the parquet floor.
They were waiting inside the bathroom, half way up the narrow hallway that led into the kitchen. They’d deliberately left the door slightly ajar so they could see her pass. And there she was, a tall shadow in the darkness, striding obliviously down the hall.
Wayne pushed the door open and stepped out behind her. She spun around, the streetlight that filtered through the windows highlighted the shock on her shadowed face, the wide eyes, and the open mouthed silent scream.
It always got to him, that look of genuine fear. It wasn’t a sexual thing. He wasn’t interested in that. Hadn’t been for a long time. But he felt a warm fuzzy feeling in his stomach, as though this power was his calling.
Wayne pulled Angel Tanner close, clamped one hand over her mouth, and started dragging her, kicking, through into the kitchen.
They had a bit of time before her father, Detective Lloyd Tanner, came home.
16
HE WAS SITTING in the corridor outside my apartment when I arrived home just before midnight. I’d seen my father like this enough times to know Cade had been drinking. It was the slumped posture, the glazed eyes, the embarrassed smile. And I hadn’t even caught the whiff of alcoholic fumes yet. He struggled to stand, pushing up against the doorway.
‘You gave me a shock,’ I told him. ‘It’s late; what are you doing out here?’
‘Dunno,’ he said in a slurred voice. ‘I guess I just wanted to see you.’
I glanced at the other two front doors on this landing. ‘You need to keep your voice down,’ I whispered. ‘There are others asleep up here.’
He held up his hands apologetically. ‘I’m sorry, I should just go.’
He stepped forward, almost falling flat on his face. His balance was shot to pieces. I couldn’t let him go anywhere in that state.
‘Come inside for a minute,’ I said, opening up and ushering him in ahead of me.
I flipped on the light just as Sampson bounded into view. He stopped and reared back when he saw Cade. I stepped in front and bent down. ‘It’s okay sweetie, mummy’s home.’
Now he came forward into my arms. Cade leaned down and tentatively stroked his back.
‘We don’t get that many visitors,’ I said dropping down onto one knee. ‘I don’t think he knew what to make of you.’
We stayed like that until Sampson pushed past me and sat in front of the door.
‘I’m going to have to take him for a quick walk,’ I said. ‘Make yourself comfortable. There are glasses in the cupboard up there on the left, and juices in the fridge. Stick the TV on and I’ll be back in a few minutes.’
I put the lead on Sampson and took the lift down to the ground floor and outside into the warm night. The main reason I’d wanted to live here was because it was a comparatively safe neighbourhood. I didn’t step outside thinking I was going to be robbed or worse. I’d like to think with my police training that I’d be able to look after myself if I had to, but I didn’t need to invite trouble.
We walked up the road and back in about ten minutes. It was as we got back to my block of flats that I saw her again, across the road in front of Howell’s Court, a block like mine. Closer-up now, I reckoned she was in her mid-twenties, slim, still dressed all in black, with her red hair styled into a bob. And she was watching me.
I stopped, turned and stared right back at her.
She didn’t move, and didn’t say anything. She just carried on looking, like she was waiting for me to make the first move.
Sampson started pulling on his leash, trying to get me to keep walking. I held him tight.
A car slowly came down the road and briefly hid her from me as it passed between us.
Then she was gone.
I narrowed my eyes to see if she had stepped back into the shadows down the side of the block of flats behind her. Surely she couldn’t have got down there so quickly?
‘I didn’t imagine her, did I?’ I asked Sampson.
He wasn’t interested, just carried on pulling the lead towards home. But I had to cross the road and see for myself. The girl had been there. There was no way I could have imagined her twice.
‘Come on, let’s go see,’ I said. One quick tug on his leash and he gave in, dutifully following me across the road. ‘She has to still be here somewhere,’ I whispered.
We went down the side of the block, behind where the girl had been standing. It was a small car park for residents lined with garages on the far side. One tall street- lamp, the new powerful type which the council had installed last year, lit the area up. I stood in the centre with Sampson and slowly made a 360 degree turn. She could be hiding behind one of the parked cars. Maybe she slipped into the narrow space that split two sets of garages. Maybe that gap in turn led into another alleyway, or garden. Only one thing was for sure, and that was I hadn’t imagined her. She was real and she had followed me out here, wanting to be seen. More than that, she had been watching us earlier just after we had carried ou
t a damnation. What had she seen and what did she know?
I looked down when Sampson started whimpering, his eyes fixed on the side of the block of flats. I looked back up but the light was creating strange shadows and at first I couldn’t see what was bothering him. And then, as if to prompt me, he barked loudly at something ahead and above us. He wasn’t pulling me forwards, which told me that he knew something wasn’t right with what he was seeing.
I squinted when one shadow caught my eye, and then morphed into the red-haired girl.
‘No way,’ I breathed.
She was standing horizontally half way up the wall, defying gravity, arms folded across her chest, staring straight down at the ground below.
‘Who are you?’ I called out.
She turned on the wall, so she was facing up and then, seemingly without effort and against all logic and physics, walked up towards the roof.
It was all in slow motion. While Sampson continued barking by my side, I froze, and I’m sure my jaw dropped open. Although I had seen plenty of extraordinary feats with The Coven, those things had been brought to me, explained and controlled. This just seemed so…so random and outside The Coven’s remit.
Or was it?
The girl reached the top of the wall, and without breaking stride, stepped up onto the roof. She was standing straight up and continued walking until she disappeared from our view.
I fumbled in my pocket for my phone. Sampson had stopped barking now she had gone, and was waiting by my side. This was so far out of my comfort zone. Sure, I was part of The Coven, but I was still learning about that world. My natural habitat was the real world, real crime, real criminals, not this hocus-pocus shit.
I called Frankie on her mobile.
‘Erin, have you any idea what time it is?’ she said.
‘I’m sorry, but I saw her again. Just now. Here. Near my flat.’
‘What are you babbling on about? Saw who?’
‘The redhead. The goth-girl. The same one I saw when we were out earlier.’
She shook her head. ‘I thought we agreed she wasn’t there. Moira went down the street and couldn’t see her. Unless you’re saying this person is faster than Moira, which of course is impossible.’
Maybe she is quicker. Nothing “is impossible” anymore. But that wasn’t why Moira missed her.
‘Moira didn’t see her because she walked up a building,’ I said, ‘and was probably standing just above her.’
I heard Frankie laugh nervously. A very fake laugh, trying to convince herself that I was having a joke. A crap joke, but a joke nevertheless. This was outside her comfort zone as well.
‘You are being ridiculous,’ she said.
‘I’m telling you,’ I continued. ‘She walked up the outside wall of these flats, and away across the roof.’
Frankie, who had introduced me into The Coven, and had been pretty much my mentor, had no answers.
‘I’ll speak with someone in the morning, okay?’ she said. ‘It’s late. This person isn’t going to attack you or she would have done so by now. You’re not in any danger.’
‘Who will you speak to?’
‘Victoria, I guess.’
I waited in silence, thinking she was going to say something more, but she didn’t.
‘Is there something you aren’t telling me, Frankie?’ I don’t know what made me ask that. Police intuition maybe. After the many criminal interviews I’ve conducted I have a sense of when someone is holding information back.
‘Get some sleep,’ she said, ‘and we’ll talk in the morning.’ So, she was hiding something. I was about to ask her what that something was. But she’d already cut the connection.
17
I WAS SHAKING when I came through my front door. I took the lead off Sampson and followed him as he padded through into the lounge. Bless him, he had the luxury of being able to forget about things straight away. To him it was a strange occurrence, nothing more. He was going to climb up onto his usual spot on the sofa, curl up and wait for me to watch TV with him. But Cade was there, lying across the length of his seat, a forearm over his face.
He dropped his arm when he heard us come in. He looked a little better than he had when I left him, but that wasn’t saying much. He gave a half smile as I dropped onto the sofa opposite. Sampson jumped up next to me.
‘You feel okay?’ I asked him.
‘Marginally,’ he croaked. ‘I should get a cab home.’
I didn’t reply. I was fine for him to stay and sleep on the sofa. Maybe if I didn’t work with him, I might have pushed for something more. But the cards land where they fall.
‘I shouldn’t have just turned up like this,’ he said.
He didn’t add anything, and so I asked him, ‘Where did you go drinking?’
‘Here and there.’
‘Your friends couldn’t take you home?’
He hid his face behind his forearm again and I heard a muffled laugh. ‘Friends? I was on my own.’
It took a moment for that to sink in.
‘As a one off?’ I asked him.
He ducked the question. ‘Fiona, my ex. She’s moving,’ he said. ‘She told me this evening. She’s taking Sean with her up North.’
There wasn’t an awful lot I could say to make him feel better about that. I’d seen several couples split up or divorce, it was rarely pleasant, and when kids were involved it was often a disaster.
He dropped his arm again, and looked across at me. He was still handsome, even with the long face. But whereas before tonight he had seemed so strong, now there was a real vulnerability about him that I found endearing.
‘I thought as we were partners,’ his voice trailed off before he started again. ‘Well, you seem like someone I can talk to.’
I leaned forward and pressed his hand between both of mine.
‘I met Fiona when we were both twenty-three,’ he whispered. ‘She was the love of my life. Only the second serious relationship I’d had. We didn’t have ten pence between us. She worked as an assistant in an estate agent, and I was training with the police-force at Hendon. But we thought “to hell with it” and got married anyway. We had to wait a little longer until we could afford to have Sean. I wanted more than one. I reckon we would have done as well, if we had stayed together.’
‘What went wrong?’ I asked him.
He frowned searching for the right answer. ‘There wasn’t a specific event,’ he said. ‘But then, there never is. You know how it is. We work long, unpredictable hours, get heavily involved in some of the cases. Deal with scenes and emotions that…take their toll.’ He cleared his throat before adding. ‘We drifted apart, and then she met someone else. At her yoga class, would you believe?’
We sat in silence for several minutes and when his eyes closed, I thought he had drifted off to sleep. But then he asked. ‘When was your last serious relationship?’
His eyes remained shut, as though he was feigning indifference.
Serious relationship? I’d avoided them like the plague. Several casual flings. No one night stands mind you. But the longest relationship had been six weeks.
‘Why don’t you just sleep it off here tonight?’ I asked him.
‘You didn’t answer my question,’ he said.
‘And I’m not going to,’ I said, standing up.
I went over into the kitchen area and took out a small bottle of water.
I sighed. ‘There was one guy,’ I called back over. ‘His name was Jake. I liked him, but even that fizzled out after a few weeks. I guess I just haven’t met the right person yet...’
I turned around when I heard the first light snore and realised this time he had fallen asleep. I went into the spare bedroom, grabbed a blanket, came out and laid it over his sleeping form. Leaning down, so my face was only inches from his cheek, I felt an almost irresistible urge to give him a quick kiss. But it was as though my dog’s worried look warned me off and I reared back.
‘You're right,’ I whispered to Sampson. �
��Come on baby, you can sleep with me in my room tonight.
****
At some point I fell asleep.
And dreamed.
I sat up blinking in the bright early morning sunlight which filtered through the thin curtains.
I pulled on my dressing gown and went out to the kitchen diner, calling for Sampson at the same time.
Edward Cryle was sitting out there on the sofa waiting for me. The same smile as in the police file. The short dark hair, the small scar. He hadn’t changed at all in fourteen years.
‘Good morning Erin,’ he said.
I couldn’t see Cade or Sampson anywhere. I thought maybe Cade was lying on the sofa that had its back to me. Out of sight, out of mind.
As I crossed over I saw red splotches down Cryle’s front. I could have sworn they hadn’t been there a few seconds ago. But they were there now. And he was holding a kitchen knife. Not just any kitchen knife, the kitchen knife. The one I had kept in my bedroom after the attack, in case the monster ever returned. The knife I kept until I joined The Coven. Until I promised myself that I wouldn’t wait for him to find me. No more fear, no more hiding. I would one day find him.
But he was here. He had come back and found me. He had found my old kitchen knife and he was holding it in his lap. The knife that was dripping with blood.
His chest had got worse. Now it was a mass of blood and organs, looking like a mud-filled waterlogged football pitch. And as I stood behind the sofa I could see two bodies which had suddenly appeared on the floor next to him.
Cade and Sampson lying in deep, thick pools of blood.
‘No! No! No!’ I screamed.
Cryle cocked his head, contemplating me. ‘What’s wrong Erin?’ he said. ‘Surely you didn’t expect me to stay away forever?’
I screamed again and felt myself falling, swallowed up by the ground. Cryle was a demon come to drag me down. My own personal damnation.
This wasn’t real.
It was a dream.
Another, yet another.
18
