Guardians of the Dead

by S. L. Wilson

  India’s eyes clouded over, and she looked at the floor, a cloak of shame hanging over her head.

  ‘The Guardians can turn up at any time to claim their recruits. Once they make their presence known…I am instructed to cast a spell over the town which would draw out these young men.’

  ‘Why the hell didn’t you tell me that?’ Connor stood up abruptly. ‘That spell would have affected me this year.’

  India nodded. ‘I know…that’s why I didn’t cast the spell.’

  Connor and Amber looked at each other, confusion etched on both their faces. How was it possible that India’s role as coven leader was to work with these barbarians?

  ‘If you didn’t cast the spell then how are they recruiting these boys?’

  ‘I honestly don’t know. I think your friend Dan was a simple accident, but now this boy Carl has disappeared…I don’t know how they are being drawn out and guided to the churchyard, but I know for a fact it isn’t by my hand.’

  Connor ran his hands through his hair as he paced up and down the shop. ‘They have two recruits already, they can’t both have been accidents. Nobody goes near that church if they can help it, especially now, after the headless body incident.’

  ‘Could someone else be drawing out the boys?’

  India leant down and grabbing a small book from the coffee table, flicked through it until she found the page she wanted. The colour drained from her face.

  ‘Necromancers have a similar ability. They can draw out a demon or an undead spirit, so it’s possible that they would be able to use a similar spell to the one I should have worked on the town.’

  Connor halted his pacing. ‘Why would a necromancer want to help the Guardians? They’re only interested in raising the demons for their own…oh!’

  ‘Oh…oh what?’ Amber watched as Connor’s expression hardened.

  ‘Once the Guardians have their three recruits, they leave and return to Phelan. They have to perform the ceremony to transform the boys’ blood, and if they are busy in Phelan…’

  ‘…then they aren’t guarding the demons,’ India finished.

  Amber had to warn Tom. He needed to know how important it was to stay away from the church. She was annoyed that he hadn’t been in touch.

  ‘Why don’t we drop you home and we can tell him together?’

  India snatched up her car keys and made for the door. Connor followed her out into the bright sunshine and climbed into India’s battered old Volkswagen Beetle.

  THEY SET off down the high street, and Amber noticed the small clusters of neighbours milling around outside their front doors. Through the open window she could hear each little faction discussing the macabre goings-on at the cemetery. Amber knew that India was right about the slaughter if the demons roamed free, but seeing her local community in such a panic made her feel unsettled.

  Ten minutes later they pulled up outside Amber’s terraced house and stepped out. Connor uncurled himself from the back seat and hovered at the end of the path leading to Tom’s house next door, like he was her own personal bodyguard.

  Tom’s mum answered the door, her floaty kaftan flapping in the light breeze.

  ‘Hey, Amber, how are you?’

  ‘Hi, Mrs Southwark, is Tom in?’

  She shook her head. ‘Sorry, honey, I thought he was with you. Said he was having dinner with you last night so I figured he’d stayed over. I haven’t seen him all day.’

  A deep chill spread through Amber. Starting at the base of her neck the trickle of icy fear flowed down the length of her spine and radiated outward down her limbs until her bones felt frozen. She bunched her hands into tight fists to stop herself from crying as she thanked Tom’s mum with a forced smile, ‘No problem, catch you later.’

  Connor was at her side before the front door had even closed, his arm wrapped tightly around her shoulders. Amber was too shocked to even care, and when she got back to the car she felt numb.

  ‘He’s not home, it doesn’t mean anything bad has happened,’ India tried to comfort her. ‘He’s a sensible lad, Amber, and he knows the secrets of Hills Heath, he will be careful.’

  ‘He wasn’t careful though…’ she snapped, ‘…he went past the cemetery last night to run an errand for Patricia, and I haven’t seen him since then.’

  India tensed and a soft cry escaped her lips. Amber followed her line of sight and felt the scream rise up in her throat.

  Lying in the gutter, almost hidden from sight, was Tom’s talisman. Connor scooped it up and showed the girls. The crystals were covered in dirt from the gutter and the chain was broken.

  India studied the chain, wiping the grime away with her thumb. ‘This was broken using magic,’ she said. ‘See here?’

  She held the links on her outstretched palm and pointed at the break. The metal was scorched as if it had been held over a Bunsen burner for too long, and the link had been ripped in two.

  ‘The Guardians?’ Amber asked weakly.

  ‘No, they don’t have this kind of magic. Their powers are concentrated for physical prowess and brute strength, not this.’

  ‘Necromancer!’

  ‘Yes, it would appear so. It’s the only explanation. If the Guardians have Tom, then he didn’t walk willingly into their open arms; another magical force drove him there.’

  ‘Without his talisman, he didn’t stand a chance, did he?’ Amber turned the charm bracelet over and over in her hands.

  India folded her arms around her in a tight hug, ‘I can do a locator spell at the shop, and we will find a way to get him back. Connor and I will work the spell and you can come by later after you’ve rested. Don’t lose hope just yet, Amber.’

  As she watched them drive away, she pulled her phone out of her pocket and sent a single message [I will find you].

  PATRICIA WATCHED her stepdaughter and her friends as they gathered together at the roadside. She couldn’t make out their words, but it was painfully obvious to anyone watching that Amber was distressed.

  They had found something on the street, and this had been the cause of the upset. Although she couldn’t see the object from her concealed spot behind the lounge curtains, she knew exactly what it was.

  The three friends hugged and the velvet-clad woman with her young companion drove away. Patricia watched as Amber pulled out her phone and began pressing the keypad.

  She pushed her own manicured hand deep into her pocket and closed her fingers around the object in there, her lips curling up in a cruel snarl as the object vibrated. She lifted it out and looked at the tiny screen. It read [I will find you].

  Patricia twitched the curtains back again to watch Amber as she made her way up to the house.

  ‘I very much doubt that, sweetie,’ she hissed, before burying the stolen phone back in her pocket and silently moving through to the kitchen.

  INDIA STARED at the three faces displayed on her Skype screen, each box showing three very different women. Hettie was a feisty red-headed witch from the Yorkshire Dales, choosing to teach her meditation classes to the smaller villages rather than promote her healing gifts in the city; her green eyes matched her aura. Softly spoken Lydia practised homeopathy from her tiny cottage in the Welsh hills where she preferred to surround herself with cats rather than people. The third was Fay, a tough witch from the Emerald Isle, who ran a cattle farm with her five brothers. They were the closest of friends and they were coven sisters.

  It was India who was chosen to move to Hills Heath as the head of the coven. Her parents had been adamant that she take on the responsibility that the High Coven offered. There had been strange circumstances surrounding the disappearance of the town’s former representative, whispers that her predecessor had tried to break the town’s bond with the Guardians. The head of the High Coven had assured her the Guardian pact remained intact, and she would be perfectly safe so long as she cooperated with the general. Her own coven had wanted to relocate with her, solidarity in numbers, but she had promised them she would call upon th
em if she needed their help.

  When her brother and sister-in-law had been killed, the task of raising her nephew had fallen to her too. Moving from Hills Heath had not been an option, so she raised the boy to understand his heritage and helped him to integrate into a life of witchcraft. She taught him the true history of the town and trained him to fight, as her father had done with her.

  Now, the time had come to call upon her sisters for help.

  ‘What if it can’t be done?’ Hettie’s face filled the screen as she leant up close to the webcam. ‘It’s not like this situation hasn’t arisen before, and look what happened there.’

  ‘There have been hundreds of disappearances, India. The payment to the Guardians must be honoured, why must we meddle in this one?’

  ‘It’s very unorthodox,’ said Fay.

  India looked at the faces of her coven sisters. They were right. These rituals were ageless, but the coven had remained detached…until now.

  ‘I understand your concerns, and believe me when I say I have lost sleep over this situation, but I can feel a great force brewing in the town.’

  A heavy silence descended as each of the witches processed the information.

  Hettie spoke first. ‘This girl, Amber, is she a witch?’

  ‘No, but her father is definitely of magical origin, although she doesn’t seem to be aware of it.’

  ‘Who was her mother?’

  ‘I don’t know, she left when Amber was just six, walked out on the family and never contacted either Amber or her father again.’

  ‘So she could have been a witch and found it necessary to flee Hills Heath?’

  ‘I guess so; it’s hard for Amber to talk about, so I haven’t pressed the matter.’

  Fay leant in closer to her webcam, ‘I think it may be time to ask Amber Noble just what she does know about her family.’

  India nodded; she had known this would be a possibility ever since Amber’s father had called in to the shop that day. His aura had been a dull turquoise, and she had seen the trail of magical energy rolling off him in waves, but it had also been laced with black and grey flashes, as if he wasn’t really alive but a walking, talking ghost.

  ‘SO YOU’RE going to teach me how to do spells?’ Amber was mildly amused. Although she was now totally convinced that magic did exist, she couldn’t quite help remaining isolated from it.

  ‘I’m doing a locator spell to find Tom, and I thought it advisable to teach you a simple protection spell,’ India sighed, ‘and if you could take this a little more seriously I would appreciate it.’

  ‘Sorry, Indi, it’s just…well I feel like I should be out there, searching for Tom instead of learning party tricks…’ She trailed off as she saw the shadows roll across India’s face.

  Sweeping her arms wide and levelling her palms flat, India closed her eyes and muttered something under her breath. Two balls of blue fire appeared, each one crackling with magical energy, hovering above her hands. The lights in the shop flickered, then went out, and through the shop window Amber could see the sky growing darker as storm clouds filled the air. Clapping her hands above her head India began chanting loudly. Outside, the winds picked up and it began to rain heavily. Amber watched in utter astonishment as the residents of Hills Heath began running for cover.

  As quickly as it had arrived, the storm vanished, leaving the sun to shine and the shoppers to return tentatively to the streets.

  India slumped slightly as she disconnected from the spell and looked directly at Amber.

  ‘Point taken,’ she mumbled as India smiled and prepared the space for their first lesson.

  ‘Are you going to teach me how to do that?’

  ‘No, manipulating the elements isn’t normally how one would start to learn the craft.’

  She opened an old velvet book, and Amber marvelled at the handwritten notes and drawings. Brightly coloured feathers were sticking out of the pages like fluffy bookmarks.

  ‘This is my Book of Shadows,’ she explained. ‘It’s where I record everything about my incantations, potions and talismans.’

  The cover of the book was a deep purple, and each of the creamy yellow pages was etched in gold. Every page had been filled with words, pictures, pressed flowers and herbs. Amber was awestruck. As she thumbed through the pages, the book fell open on one particular spell and her attention was drawn to the title. Destiny.

  ‘What’s this one?’

  ‘When a witch comes into her powers she doesn’t know how to use them, she needs to be taught and guided by her mentor or mother.’

  Amber frowned, but India carried on. ‘If no such mentor exists, this spell can point the new witch in the right direction.’

  ‘So it’s like careers advice for the supernatural?’

  India laughed. ‘A little, we each have different strengths and powers. Finding our right path is very important.’

  ‘Don’t you just point and shoot with your blue fire fingers?’

  India snorted. ‘It’s a little bit more technical than that. I realised I was a witch when I turned ten; my father was a witch and taught me how to feel my power in the palm of my hands. One day we were sitting around a campfire toasting marshmallows when a spark leapt from the flames and set his trouser leg alight. He was hopping around like crazy, and I just “felt” what I had to do. I guess I did point and shoot because I concentrated on the element of fire and it went out…his flaming trousers and the campfire!’

  She chuckled at the memory and continued, ‘My dad was so pleased with me and we realised then that my talent was elemental magic, like the fae but not so powerful.’

  Amber shook her head. ‘The what?’

  ‘The fae,’ she repeated. ‘Faeries.’

  ‘You have got to be kidding me!’ Amber rose suddenly to her feet and paced back and forth, then stopped to gawk open-mouthed at India.

  ‘Just so we’re on the same page, we have Guardians from another dimension, demons who behead people, witches who mess with the weather, and now you want me to believe that the faeries at the bottom of my garden are real!’

  ‘From now on, Amber, it might be easier for you to believe that everything of myth and legend is real, and then it may not keep coming as such a shock.’ India shrugged her tiny shoulders. ‘Just a thought.’

  ‘Oh great…so what, the postman’s a werewolf, my teachers are vampires and old Mr Parkinson from the bakery is a goblin?’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous, Amber. Mr Parkinson is an orc, and it’s so obvious when you study the shape of his head.’

  Amber threw her hands in the air and started to pace again. This was too much to handle. She hadn’t finished processing the fact that magic was real, and still they kept delivering fresh surprises. Faeries, orcs, demons and witches were all living in her town. The town she had called home and the same town that for hundreds of years had been a bloodbath of gigantic proportions.

  ‘Maybe we should take a break?’

  She was halfway to the door when Connor burst through with a bag of cream cakes and a tray of hot chocolate. The sight of all that whipped cream almost drained her of her anxieties – almost.

  ‘Hey, what’s up?’ Connor glanced between India and Amber, sensing the atmosphere wasn’t quite right.

  ‘Oh, the usual,’ Amber began, ‘just having my first lesson about witches and their unique powers and how tough they can be but not as tough as, oh I don’t know, faeries!’

  Connor glanced at India and gave a nod of his head. He watched Amber continue with her mini meltdown, then he placed the drinks and cakes on the counter and stroked his hand across Amber’s cheek.

  She felt all the anger and confusion drain out of her and a sense of immense peace wash through her. Her shoulders sagged and the tightness in her chest lifted. As she stared up into Connor’s big brown eyes she felt very sleepy all of a sudden. Just when she thought she may nod off in his arms, she saw his eyes change colour. The deep chocolate brown gave way to a bright purple, and she could
see her own reflection bathed in this new colour.

  ‘Your eyes…’ she sighed.

  Connor nodded and his lips curled in a gentle smile. ‘I’m half fae,’ he said in a hushed tone.

  The air in the room seemed to whoosh out all at once and suddenly there was only Amber and Connor, and she was very aware he was touching her, the heat from his hand pressing against her face, and a stronger heat pooling deep in her gut. She raised her hand and caressed his face, her eyes never leaving his. She was falling into them, pools of liquid purple, full of warmth and …

  ‘Okay, Connor, that’s enough.’ India’s voice was sharp as it cut through the air, releasing Amber.

  ‘What the hell was that?’ She recoiled when she realised she was still stroking his face, embarrassed by such an intimate touch.

  Connor didn’t seem to mind and only dropped his hand when she moved beyond his reach.

  ‘I have the ability to calm feelings and lessen physical pain,’ he said, pulling a large slice of Victoria sponge cake from the paper bag.

  ‘My brother, Connor’s father, was a witch but his mother was fae. This union was, and still is, fairly uncommon as the resulting child can suffer from torn personalities. In Connor’s case his parents brought him up to cherish both sides of his lineage: the fae wisdom and the witch power. I have been working with him to hone his skills and manage his abilities.’

  Amber watched Connor as he expertly polished off his second slice of cake before scooping a mound of cream from the top of his hot chocolate.

  ‘I thought only girls were faeries, you know, like Tinkerbell?’

  Connor laughed loudly. ‘I’m also part witch, so I leave my little green dress and fairy wings in my wardrobe on weekdays,’ he teased.

  ‘Funny!’

  ‘It’s taken Connor a long time to master his dual identity,’ India said. ‘He has had to train tirelessly and study the legends and heritage of both cultures.’

  ‘Can you do spells like Indi?’ Amber was now intrigued, her initial shock and fear wavering.