A Body Displaced (Lansin Island 2)

by Andrew Butcher

  ‘Your grandmother would like to speak with you, but she needs rest. Try not to keep her long.’

  Juliet left the hallway and entered the ward, hushed conversations and general shuffling sounds picking up around her. In the corner by a window was Lillian’s bed, the curtain drawn halfway for privacy. Lillian was propped up, looking drowsy and dazed. Her eyes were rheumy, her face wan.

  ‘Gran? How are you feeling?’

  Lillian stared blankly for a time.

  ‘Gran?’

  Lillian blinked repeatedly then gave her granddaughter a tired but warm smile. ‘Sweetheart …’ After Austin had pushed her over the night before, the paramedics arrived and took her to hospital, suspecting a fractured hip. She was operated on that night. This was the first chance Juliet had had to speak with her since.

  ‘How are you feeling?’

  ‘I’m very … tired, but … the pain is okay,’ she said through laboured breaths. ‘If I keep still.’ She laughed gently and winced. Juliet moved forward instinctively but didn’t touch her gran at all, fearing she’d hurt her somehow.

  ‘The doctor said you wanted to talk to me.’

  Lillian frowned slowly. ‘I always … want to talk with you,’ she said innocently, giving her genuine smile. Sunlight fell in through the window, pushing through a cloud-white sky to bathe Lillian’s ashen face in an angelic glow. She looked beautiful to Juliet, no matter her condition.

  ‘Nothing specific then?’

  ‘No, sweetheart.’ Lillian’s smile turned wistful for a split second, but then her face relaxed. She closed her eyes.

  ‘I spoke with Mum last night,’ said Juliet.

  Lillian replied without lifting her eyelids back up. ‘She’s down … as my next of kin. I never had that changed. I think they asked me about contacting her … before the operation. But I don’t remember what I said.’

  ‘The hospital rang her. I don’t think she’s coming to see you.’

  ‘No … I doubt she will.’

  Juliet recalled the night before. After her gran was taken in for surgery, she went outside of the hospital, expecting her mum to call or text. But she didn’t. So in the cold, dark outdoors, she rang her mother herself.

  ‘Yes, sweetie?’ her mum answered. ‘You need something?’ She made her greeting sound as if it was only a matter of time before Juliet came around to calling her.

  ‘Mum. The hospital contacted you, I take it?’

  Her mother took a while to answer, but said, ‘Of cooouurse they did, sweetie.’

  At that point it was clearly a hopeless conversation, but she tried anyway. ‘Will you be coming to see your mum? She’s in surgery now, but tomorrow should be okay for you to visit.’

  The line crackled with the sound of Mrs Maystone expelling air. ‘I won’t be visiting Lillian.’

  Juliet’s blood boiled. So much energy coursed through her. We were both nearly killed! ‘What is wrong with you, Mum? You’re not even acting human. Gran has been badly hurt, and I’m the one who’s been lied to by you, yet you’re acting like I need to make it up to you.’

  No reply. For a long time.

  ‘Mum?’

  ‘Yes, sweetie?’ she finally said, as if she hadn’t just ignored Juliet’s last comments.

  ‘Gran’s an elderly woman … This could put a lot of strain on her. She deserves our support.’

  ‘Do you think I don’t know how old she is?’

  ‘Well, shouldn’t you be making amends with her? After what you did? … And what does Dad think of this? Won’t he even come to see her? Does he hate her like you do, or is he just afraid to talk back to you?’

  ‘Juliet,’ Mrs Maystone snapped. ‘You will not talk to me like this, and you will not tell me what Lillian deserves.’

  Juliet lost her steam. There was a tone in her mother’s voice she didn’t understand, making her wonder ... She can’t be so angry over just a few rows on my upbringing.

  ‘Let your father and I think on it.’ Mrs Maystone sounded reluctant.

  ‘Fine.’

  Without another word, Juliet had hung up.

  Now she stood by her gran’s side, staring down at her, pondering the idea that Lillian was less innocent than she had made out. But that notion didn’t jibe with Juliet’s impression of her gran. Maybe Lillian had missed out some facts about the past, but she’d also shown more love and care these past months than Juliet had ever received from her mum.

  Mum’s trying to turn me against her, she reasoned, to get me back under her thumb.

  Quietly, Lillian croaked, ‘Do I need to … speak with the authorities …? The man who pushed me …’ She opened her eyes, peered at her granddaughter.

  Juliet had spent half the night worrying over how to solve this issue. And of course the answer she feared was the one she also dreaded: lie. Because of Austin’s threat, she couldn’t have Lillian telling the authorities that it was Austin who put a knife to her throat and pushed her over. ‘Do you know who grabbed you, Gran? Who pushed you?’

  With a squint, Lillian said, ‘I … I didn’t see. He grabbed me from behind. I don’t remember … I’m sorry.’

  Juliet sighed. Some good news, at least. ‘Don’t worry, Gran. I didn’t know the man either. He broke into the house a while before you came back. I suppose he thought no one was home. And I spoke with the police earlier; they said they don’t need a statement from you.’ The lies tasted bitter, but having committed to them, she reckoned it wouldn’t harm to embellish them to make her gran feel better. ‘You saved me by arriving when you did.’

  ‘Saved you?’ Lillian’s eyes widened a little. ‘The man didn’t … hurt you, did he?’

  ‘No, no. Nothing like that. He made threats, but he left after what he did to you.’

  Lillian managed a laugh, but winced again. ‘I didn’t save you … You were very clever scaring him off with your … alarm. Apparently you were right … about learning self-defence.’ She smiled wanly. ‘The doctor says I should rest … They want to get me up and walking about tomorrow.’ Gently, she laughed. ‘Test out my new hip …’

  ‘Sure. I called Susan this morning and told her what’s happened. She’s going to visit you later, if you have enough energy.’

  ‘Okay, sweetheart … thank you.’

  Juliet moved closer and kissed her gran’s forehead. I love you, she thought.

  Before leaving the hospital, she stopped in the toilets. She stood and stared at her reflection in the mirror, but found she didn’t like the person looking back: a woman with weakness in her eyes, hung up on self-pity, and needing to pull herself together. A woman she never saw herself becoming.

  I have to do something.

  There was only one person she could talk to about the situation: Nicolas Crystan. If Austin knew about her complicity in Aldrich’s murder, then surely he knew who else was involved, too. Maybe Nicolas, one of his brothers, or even Ryan had something to do with Austin.

  He was lying to me. Like my parents. The words urged her on, forcing her to concoct a plan. She could go to Creaky Crystals to find Nicolas, assuming he still worked there. Even if he did, she might have to wait for a day he was in or waste time trying to contact him outside of work. Not good enough. She wanted answers. Now. Another reason not to visit Creaky Crystals was that being seen there could incriminate her, if the police managed to link Nicolas and her to Aldrich’s death.

  Why? Why did he deceive me? As much as she hated herself for it, she kept thinking, Did he care about me at all? It was a backwards thought, really, because there was no moving forward with Austin after this … So why did it matter if he ever cared or not? But the question joined the thoughts echoing in her head.

  She remembered Austin’s words from the day before and took down her mental shield, letting the spirits in. The notion of summoning one had come to her. She once tried to call forth her gran’s spirit, back when she had believed her dead, but was unsuccessful, of course.

  The dead flooded her mind. Too many. Sh
e turned and saw shapes in the cubicles, blurs in the mirrors, flickers on the ceiling. The chill was enough to send prickles over her entire body. She closed her eyes and forced the spirits away. I can’t do it here. When she lifted her eyelids, she jumped at the sight of a woman who’d entered the toilets.

  ‘Are you okay?’ the lady asked while Juliet scrutinised her outline, making certain there were no disturbances in the surrounding air.

  ‘Yes, sorry. I was deep in thought …’ She brought forward an excuse, one with painful truth to it. ‘I received some bad news a moment ago, and you startled me.’

  The woman, frizzy-haired and short, smiled in a way that aimed for understanding but came across anxious. ‘I’m sorry to hear that.’ She ducked her head, entered a cubicle, and Juliet heard the sound of the lock being hastily applied.

  She left the hospital and found herself not far from Amiton town centre. She considered trying to summon the spirit somewhere quiet nearby, like down an alley or in an unfrequented area of Wood Park, but decided the best place would be her home; she knew for certain few spirits haunted the street.

  After reaching the station, she caught a bus to Chanton and made her way to New Avenue. In her downstairs living room, she stole a moment to sit on the sofa and collect herself, focusing on the goal in mind. You know we can summon them, right? We can force them to come to us, she heard his voice, his unique laugh. It hurt to recall the feelings he’d evoked in her.

  Having spent all night at the hospital, she hadn’t had the chance to clean up her gran’s vomit from the day before, or to address the smashed vase in the kitchen and the hole Austin had left in a wall. The sour stink of sick had permeated the downstairs, but there was no time to clear the mess this moment.

  Juliet dropped her mental wall again and reached out with her will, visualising the person she had in mind. There was a tugging, like she’d snagged something but was struggling to reel it in. Her mind drifted after a while, and then she imagined herself reaching an arm into quicksand and pulling out a victim who’d sunk far into the wet gloop.

  Amazed by the sensations, she hauled the spirit towards her. Her eyes opened, the temperature shifted … and there Samantha Crystan was, with chocolate-coloured hair and eyes, and a face so pretty. Seeing her brought images of Nicolas and his brothers to mind. Their mother was in all of their faces, the twins’ more so than Nicolas’s. With a horrible lurch in her gut, she realised, Samantha has the same colour eyes as Austin …

  Surrounding the spirit, the air shimmered and twitched. Objects in the room fidgeted, swayed, clattered, but Juliet reminded herself that the strange disturbances were only her interpretations of the Spiritworld overlapping with this world. Only I can see them. And if that was true, then hopefully the unearthly happenings were unable to harm her. ‘I need to find Nicolas,’ she said to the spirit.

  The first time Samantha had ever appeared to Juliet, her eyes were distant and emotionless. Now they were full of panic. ‘You can’t hold me here. It’s not safe.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Not safe for you. Not safe for me.’

  ‘I don’t understand. You’re a spirit … How can you be in danger?’

  ‘I can be made to suffer.’ Samantha’s voice sounded overlaid, the way vocals were edited in music; it gave the effect of her speaking from every corner of the room.

  Feeling rushed, Juliet said, ‘If you can’t lead me to Nicolas, then can you answer my questions? Who is Austin? How does he know about Aldrich’s death? Aldrich didn’t leave a ghost, did he? He’s not behind this?’ The questions rolled out, and more could have followed if Samantha hadn’t cut her short.

  ‘There is much going on!’ Her voice shrunk the room, and the phenomena increased in her fervour.

  Juliet waited, stunned, as the spirit shifted and peered about. ‘Can you answer any of my questions?’

  ‘Aldrich’s not behind it. He never left a ghost.’ Her shape flickered in and out of existence, then she shook her phantom head. ‘I can’t … I don’t … aaahhhh!’ she wailed, seeming to shake the house. ‘I’ll return.’ The air collapsed in on itself with a sudden fffhh-whoomp! as she vanished.

  Then she was back. ‘Quick! You have to be quick! Go to the old Rest-Easy-Beds factory in Etherby. Nicolas is there. Go prepared.’

  ‘Prepared for what?’

  ‘No … no … windows, doors, closing in on me, fragments. Time … time.’

  ‘What’s happening to you?’ Juliet had seen a spirit talk this kind of gibberish before, babbling about windows and reflections and information the spirit hadn’t known in life.

  ‘Something is pursuing me. Here in the Spiritworld. I wanted to visit you before this, when I realised Nicolas was in danger, but I’ve been running since. By summoning me, you’ve cornered me.’

  Juliet saw fear in the ghost’s eyes. ‘Can I help somehow?’ Is another spirit after her? she wondered. Or do other things exist in the Spiritworld? When she had more time to ponder the chilling possibilities, she would.

  ‘No! You must go to Nicolas. Now. Don’t summon me again. It’s too dangerous.’ Samantha Crystan dissolved out of sight. A scream and rapid patters followed … like footsteps, chasing and chasing. Then it was quiet.

  Left with only a sense of dread and the stench of vomit, Juliet spurred herself. Quick. I have to be quick. She pushed to her feet and hurried to the front door, but her own thoughts stopped her. Go prepared. What did she mean? Last time she had done Samantha’s bidding, she ended up running through woodland in wedge boots, which was not pleasant. Wearing trainers was definitely on the agenda this time. But Juliet doubted the spirit had meant ‘wear suitable footwear’ when she said to go prepared.

  A weapon? Was that what she had meant? No … I won’t. I’ll be safe with my personal alarm and my mobile … and I can defend myself now. I can. She left the house, more at a run than a walk, and realised that being able to drive would be of great help, but as her café was nearby and she could afford public transport or taxis for longer journeys, she’d had little reason to learn. At least until now …

  If this kind of drama was to continue, then she’d need a quicker way to get from A to B.

  The nearest bus stop with a route to Etherby was a ten-minute walk away, moving at a reasonable pace. Juliet got there in five. It was of no benefit, though; she had to wait quarter of an hour for the next bus. The delay was torture, but the journey itself was worse.

  Luckily she knew the location of the industrial estate with the closed-down Rest-Easy-Beds factory. Her parents once purchased a memory foam mattress from there when the business had been open. Superking size, of course. Juliet had accompanied her mum and dad when they went to inspect the beds.

  She exited the bus in a rough area by a general store and a bookie’s, where loutish youths loitered outside. Maybe Samantha meant I should be prepared to face this unpleasant town, she considered with a hint of dark humour, though in seriousness, she figured people who waited idly on corners, looking for trouble, were like poorly trained dogs: If they sensed someone’s anxiety, they’d be compelled to attack … If someone tried to run from them, the chase would be irresistible.

  Keeping a confident pace, she acted as though nothing were amiss when she passed by. The group paid her no mind, or if they did, she was ignorant of it. After navigating a few streets of plain and unimpressive houses, she found herself in the large and quiet area segmented by factories.

  In the morning, there’d been a light shower, at the same time Juliet had exited the hospital to call Susan. Now it was afternoon. The sky was white, the air mild. On her approach, she wondered if any workers from the other warehouses would see her here, or if anyone would hear and heed her alarm if there was a need to set it off. She hastily circled the building until she spotted a slightly open green door.

  Okay. I can face whatever’s inside. All I want is answers.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  AS IF SOMETHING were about to strike his face, Nick�
�s eyes clamped shut, his head tilting down to the side. No. She can’t be. His chest began to rock uncontrollably. I won’t believe it. It doesn’t make sense. ‘H-how? How can she be dead?’ He sounded so pathetic, so weak. ‘She’s … moving.’

  ‘After I ripped her throat to shreds, I forced her spirit into her dead body. Now I have control over it.’

  The graphic language surged anger through Nick, and the rage fought against the tears. For now. ‘Why did you kill her?!’ he shouted. ‘Who are you? What are you?’

  The man barked a sudden laugh. He plodded around in circles, acting like he ruled the world and shouldn’t deign to answer. ‘Alright, alright! Calm down. I’ll answer your second question, and your third.’ He strolled about some more, mocking Nick, wasting time.

  Kerra had limped away, and now stood facing a metal wall, her posture slack. Nick couldn’t bear to look at her for long. If her spirit is still inside her body, maybe she can be saved, maybe her neck can be healed … re-mended … surgery … magic? His mind swam with thoughts of Aldrich, Juliet, his own ability, the portal, the Spiritworld, the Otherworld.

  ‘I think you know I’m not Mark Caraway, as fun as our little act on the phone was. So, just call me Austin. And as for what I am, I call myself a necromancer.’ The corners of his mouth lifted, his eyes filled with conceit.

  The word had a widening effect on Nick’s mind. When he failed to reply, the ‘necromancer’ asked, ‘You know what that is, right? Someone who has control over spirits of the dead.’ Austin looked as if he’d expected a better reaction, like he was waiting for Nick to hold up his free hand and offer a high five (Nice one, I’ve always wanted to be a necromancer myself!). But of course there was no such response.

  ‘I know what a necromancer is in fiction and games … but this …’ He glanced over at the reanimated corpse of his girlfriend, then cringed and turned away. Dead. No. There must be something I can do.

  ‘Oh, get over her, you pathetic pushover!’ The murderer held out his hands, palms facing the ceiling. ‘The bitch cheated on you.’