by S E Holmes
increasingly commonplace affliction.
“No, just routine maintenance. You are out of bed early, Winnie.”
She completed work on our statue Mike. Skilfully made of pinned bone (mostly human), reinforced by a fine tracery of golden wire, he crouched on a huge slab of ebony granite in the exact middle of the collection space. Poised with every joint straining, he partially spread enormous ribbed wings as if about to tear the bonds of the material world and blast into the heavens.
One outstretched arm punched the air, elongated by a gold sword studded with sparkling diamonds. On his brow perched a gold circlet, diamond-encrusted spines projecting from it – his halo. Empty orbs yearned skyward, his death-head’s leer a caution to all sinners. The avenging Archangel Michael, who threw Satan out of the Garden of Eden, watched over us. He was one-of-a-kind and priceless.
“I couldn’t sleep. I had to check …”
Aunt Bea knew what I’d been up to already, I was certain. “Of course you did. We’ll fix that ankle first. The occasion has arrived to open the golden box.” I scratched at my wrists. They were suddenly itchy. “Something wrong with your wrists?”
“Probably just a heat rash.” A funny one isolated to two identical red patches. “You didn’t answer my question! And you weren’t surprised at the mention of that name, which tells me it’s familiar to you.”
“I do not deny I know that name, Winsome. You have always been exceptional at spotting untruths, less so at unravelling the intent behind them. And your questions will be answered in intricate detail in due course. But for the moment, you are bleeding all over my nice clean floor. We do not wish to make more work for Mrs Paget.”
The four of us eventually met in the kitchen. Again. I’d showered and changed into a playsuit and sandshoes. Fortescue placed a bowl of brown sludge and a glass in front of me, filled with something that resembled radioactive slime.
“You must eat something, Winsome. Keep your strength up. Stewed fig and black-quinoa compote with wheatgrass juice.”
“Mouth-watering.”
It was the truth! There was often a surge of saliva before vomiting. The Keeper’s diary rested nearby on the table – innocent looking until closer inspection. Its fiendish partner sat next to it: the stunning golden box, flattish and as long as my forearm. I wasn’t deceived by its appearance; something harmless wouldn’t require a lock. That Bea, Fortescue and Mrs Paget refused to handle either item did nothing to lessen the foreboding.
Their faces were solemn. Oddly, no one demanded an explanation for my ankle, which was bandaged and resting on its very own chair. My throat grated as if I’d swallowed a fistful of staples. It seemed trundling home with peculiar wounds was now the norm. Added to my skirmish in the bushes last night, I was forging a new, utterly undesirable battle habit.
The anticipated blow-up with Fortescue had also been a fizzer. He’d taken one look at the bandaids-and-twine arrangement that failed so spectacularly to operate as a one-piece and been mortified. He didn’t buy it. He had never seen it before and declared it an abomination, throwing the swimsuit in the bin. It was a hunch, but to me Mrs Paget looked especially devious. Poker would never be her game. But my hypothesis lacked a plausible motivation. Why would she buy me something so revealing?
I simply refused to think about Vegas. If I was at all honest with myself, he had actually behaved faultlessly at the pool and I was jealous Tiffany had been with him in a way I would secretly like to. But being honest with myself called for maturity, which was in lean supply. So, I continued to project my anger and humiliation onto Smith instead. It was for the best. I did not want to get my heart crushed by a manwhore.
Bea cleared her throat. “The time has come to open the box.”
“How is this an education, exactly? Aunt Bea?”
I kept my tone light but had difficulty hiding my growing irritation. Mrs Paget’s gaze slid towards Bea. In other circumstances her eyes glittered with mischief, but I could not help but notice how watered and rheumy they were. Fear swirled in my gut; their declining health was definitely not symptomatic of the flu.
“In. Due. Course,” Bea said.
Distracted, I let them keep me in suspense. I pulled the box towards me and snatched the key, fiddled with the lock until it popped, held my breath and opened the lid. A dagger with an odd wavy blade was embedded in red velvet, etched with the same symbols as those on the triangle in the diary cover. The ornate handle was gold and studded with rubies of myriad size. The knife looked very old, very valuable and very sharp. I stared at its point.
“Is that …”
“Pick it up, Winsome.”
“Blood?”
I stretched out my fingers and touched the rust-coloured stain. As I did so, my consciousness jerked from the kitchen to another place altogether. I found myself in a large, windowless office that flickered dimly by candlelight. It was a well-appointed room with stylish furnishings and a rug rolled out of the way on the floor. Bare shelves with dust-free voids of various shapes and glassed cabinets, their doors partly open, spoke of ornaments and artefacts recently cleared and sent elsewhere.
There was a diagram on the ground – a triangle – drawn in red wax. The same ornamental knife from the kitchen rested in the middle. A woman stood off to one side grasping the very diary I’d read aloud from yesterday between her shaking hands. I knew her from my dreams. Raphaela. She faced away from me, but it was clear she was in a bad state.
Her thick chestnut hair, once pinned up, had come loose and hung in stringy clumps down her back. Her light pants and sleeveless top were grubby and stuck to her body with perspiration. She was barefoot. Raising the diary – my diary – to her forehead, she pushed the golden triangle on the cover against her brow.
“Come to me now, Enoch the Watcher. I call on you, in this my last hour.”
And before I’d blinked, a slight man in a black suit and tie appeared in a flash of blinding light. He was so utterly bland, his features so average that he seemed deliberately designed to blend in, able to come and go without ever attracting notice. He would not be recalled in a police line-up, witnesses unable to describe him for an identikit drawing. It was a convincing camouflage.
His voice echoed in my head. “Your time is now, little one. You are no longer the Keeper-in-waiting.”
“Oh, Enoch. What have I done? I’ve ruined everything! I saw what they did to Billie. My Warrior is dead because of me!”
“Do not berate yourself, Raphaela Baptiste. Your Warrior fulfilled her pledge with honour. We have time, yet.” He spoke softly, nearly inaudible, but of course I heard him clearly in my mind.
“There is only one Keeper left,” she said, the words rushed. “I was so selfish! So lonely. It was a single moment of weakness after four hundred years of steadfast service. I wanted a baby and he could give me one. I didn’t think I would really fall in love with him. I didn’t think he could fall in love … with me.”
Such a misery-tinged admission there never was. That ominous word ‘Keeper’ again, which had popped up more than weeds lately. Well practised at avoidance by now, I ignored the diary reading that clamoured for recognition.
“Don’t hurt him. Finesse,” Raphaela spat the name as though a mouthful of spoiled food, “forced Seth to reveal my whereabouts! Forgive me, please.”
“I give you the gift of Celestial Blessing to soothe your sorrow and conquer the coming trial. My forgiveness was already yours. Be at peace, Raphaela.”
And suddenly I perceived the most glorious and magical sight of my life. Enoch the Watcher showed his true self. He erupted in white flame, growing too large for the room and his suit to contain. A wheel of fire writhed about his huge torso, his massive multiple wings, and the glowing bright eyes that covered every millimetre of his powerful body. But the inferno did not consume him.
He shimmered and changed like a mirage in the desert and I had to concentrate on keeping him in my mind or he slipped from view. He was as luminous as the sun and hi
s incandescence filled every particle of my being with a joy so intense that, if I never had an emotion again, this would be enough. And then he turned and gazed directly at me. It was impossible, as his face never left Raphaela, like he could see in all directions at once.
“I will be with you soon, Winsome Light. Be safe, my child.”
I had no time to examine anything else as the enormous, angelic spirit of the Watcher departed and in its place stood the ordinary man once more. He’d shared telepathic knowledge, calling his physical body Enoch Smalls, Solicitor and executor of the upcoming will for Raphaela Baptiste, who was about to give her life for the supposed sin of wanting a baby. His job, among many, was to oversee the transference between the old and the new Keeper. I still stubbornly denied what this meant. Raphaela straightened with renewed energy.
“Was any affection Seth displayed towards me real, Enoch? Or did he trick me in order to do the Crone’s bidding?”
“You awoke a love in Seth he thought he had lost forever. You are carrying his child.”
“It is a girl.” I sensed she did not need affirmation. “Well this is for the best then,” her voice caught. “I wouldn’t wish the Keeper’s fate on anyone.”
“Are you determined to follow this path?” Enoch said, his doubt poorly disguised. “For the first time in my reckoning, the future is unclear. Only one Keeper remains
