by Mark Cassell
It was a red baseball cap.
“What?” One of his bushy eyebrows arched. “Why?”
“The driver of the van wore this…when we were rammed, this was the last thing I saw. And then we hit that tree.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah. Exactly.”
“But Annabel was with Polly that day. All of us were in Goodwin’s office. Annabel was there. She came with Polly. Drove her as always.”
“Polly stayed with Goodwin for the rest of the afternoon. That would allow enough time.”
“You’re right.” Victor’s shoulders slumped. “How did she get the van there? She drove Polly to the House by car.”
“It was all perfectly planned.”
Victor’s eyes fixed on me.
I rubbed my neck. “Knowing that we’d meet at the House, she’d parked it nearby, ready to follow us. She waited for us to leave.”
“Why only ram us off the road? If she is Tulip Moon, she’s got a gun. We know that. So why not get out of the van and shoot us?”
A familiar thought crashed into my head, the gun pointing at me. “I don’t know. Maybe it was more of a warning.”
“Of what?”
“To stop searching for Stanley. Or the Fabric. Stop searching for The Book of Leaves, maybe. I don’t know.” I hated not knowing, yet I was getting used to it. I didn’t know my past, and now my present made no sense either.
“Lots of questions.” Victor grabbed the hire agreement and scrutinised it as though hoping further information would leap from the paper. “If this is the case, then she’s close to accomplishing whatever her goal is.”
I thought about Victor’s book, the one titled Necromeleons and its illustration of the man who climbed into the shadows. My head throbbed. “And what could that be, do you think?”
“If Annabel and Tulip Moon are the same person, then she gave Stanley the Fabric.”
“They have to be the same person.”
“That, my friend, is all we can assume.”
“If she gave Stanley the Fabric, maybe she wants it back. You reckon she ransacked your flat looking for it?”
Victor’s lips thinned. “Certainly possible.”
“Why give it to Stanley in the first place?”
“She knew his arrogance wouldn’t keep him quiet. He’d end up showing me. And I had the Witchblade.”
The man in the antique shop—the guy called Josh—had claimed a witch killed the others. I asked a question which wouldn’t have come easily a week ago: “Is Annabel a witch?”
Victor didn’t answer me directly. “Annabel’s cunning, and if she managed to set all of that into motion, she’s definitely a key player. She knew Stanley and I would meet to show each other our finds. Sibling rivalry…as it always has been.”
“She played you guys off each other.”
Victor tugged at his collar. “She’s clearly sharper than any of us, and she knew the athame would feed off our fragile relationship.”
“Knowing how the Fabric would react.”
“She knew I would kill Stanley.”
“And she wanted him to die,” I said, thinking of his dead eyes as they disappeared into the shadows.
“She knew the Fabric needed a dead body to energise it. To recharge it and bring it back to power.”
“But Stanley’s not dead.” This was getting confusing. “Goodwin said so.”
“Then her plan has failed.”
“More questions.” I shook my head.
“We can assume it was Annabel who stole the Witchblade from us.”
“Not sure about that, Victor. She didn’t look like Annabel.”
“Who else could it be? She disguised herself.”
Again, I thought about the gun pointing at me. “I don’t know.”
“And we still can’t trust Goodwin.”
“What’s his role in all this?” I bunched the baseball cap in my hand and threw it down.
“No idea,” Victor said. “Polly’s in danger. We have to find her. Annabel’s been up to all this right under her nose.”
“Taking advantage of Polly’s blindness. Sick.”
“She’s playing with all of us. Me and Stanley in particular. Polly’s vulnerability, too. Using all of us. Now we even doubt Goodwin.”
“We have every right.” When I thought of Goodwin, it was as if my brain boiled.
“Annabel wants the Fabric for her own means. To whatever end that might be. Throughout history there has always been someone opposed to the Shadmen, and to us. Someone in opposition to those who’ve kept darkness at bay throughout the ages.”
I shook my head again. Crazy. All of it.
“And now it’s beginning again,” he added, and stood up, “after three and a half centuries.”
CHAPTER 19
Skipping lunch we headed out again, this time to meet Lucas. But not at his bookshop. Victor didn’t reveal what the man wanted, and he remained silent during the entire journey. I was getting used to that, though I suspected it had something to do with The Book of Leaves. We were in the countryside, even more rural than Mabley Holt, approaching a farm. As I drove us past several outhouses, avoiding a horse that had evidently got loose, I missed the name of the place. I pulled up, and Victor got out first. When I slammed my door the horse charged off.
Lucas stood near a row of corrugated barns, his overcoat flapping around his boots. He slapped a crowbar in his palm.
“Lucas,” Victor said. Mud squelched as we strode towards him.
Across the yard from a barn, another horse stuck its face out into the cold afternoon. Its breath plumed as though fed up to be held in what I initially thought was a derelict barn. The smell of animals and hay clogged the air.
The man ignored Victor and stepped towards me. Unlike the first time I’d met this guy, he addressed me by reaching out a hand. “We haven’t properly met.”
His grip was as firm as I’d expected from such a large man, and cold, rough. Where his cheek sported a deep cleft from forehead to chin, his hands were a mess of spidery scar tissue as if a hundred razorblades had once danced over them. I recalled their conversation in the bookshop, about torture, the jungle, and being held for days, imprisoned while he believed Victor had abandoned him.
I kept quiet, eyeing the crowbar. I didn’t like the way he swung it. When we parted, I noticed Victor stared at it. He said, “What’s going on, my friend?”
Lucas’s jaw muscles rippled. They tugged at the scar. “I told you. I’m not your friend. Not anymore.”
I expected him to swing the crowbar at Victor’s head. Perhaps it had all been a ruse, we weren’t there for Victor’s Book of Leaves. Once Lucas finished with Victor, he’d do the same to me, the only witness. The guy was massive. We had little chance against him. I doubted he’d even stop there. He’d finish us off, being certain we were dead, leaving us at this quiet farm. I could almost see the revenge in his eyes, feel it in the chill breeze.
“I have contacts,” said Lucas, and as he spoke, it was as though he shrank. The crowbar became only a tool. “These days, I rely on them. One reminds me of myself when I was younger, and he has a gift for it. I’ve been getting him to do a lot for me of late.”
I was conscious of my tight forehead, and after an effort, I relaxed. Where was this heading?
Lucas stroked the crowbar as he added, “He was here, the last I heard from him. At this farm.”
“Why are we here?” Victor’s voice was unusually tiny. “Have you found it?”
“The Book of Leaves. Possibly Thomas has found it.”
I couldn’t recall anyone mentioning a Thomas before, but I kept quiet.
“Why didn’t you tell me on the phone?” Victor said, “Why all this secrecy?”
“I didn’t hear from him when I should have,” the big man replied, “which is unlike him. And because I’m true to my word, Victor, I’ve brought you here. This is your game.”
“What happened to him?”
“There’s a saying of wanting
a job done right, you do it yourself. Well, here we are, just like old times.” Lucas didn’t smile.
“You could have told me this on the phone.”
“I owe you nothing.”
“You’ve traced the book for me. You must believe you owe me something.”
“Victor, shut up.” Somehow, Lucas grew upwards and outwards, looming over his old friend. “I said I’d do this for you. We’re going to find Thomas. And your book.”
Victor’s eyes flicked to me, and I raised my eyebrows. Lucas grunted and headed for the farmhouse. It wasn’t too far. I hoped we weren’t going to find any corpses.
Flanked by great oaks, the farmhouse seemed in better condition than the surrounding buildings. The windows looked recently installed, and pot plants lined the path to the front door. A pair of gnomes guarded the edge of the garden. Lucas stomped up the path. With crowbar and swaying coat, he made the gnomes look ridiculous. He threw a glance over his shoulder and raised the weapon. I reminded myself it was only a tool.
When we reached his side, I expected a swing to take off Victor’s head. This paranoia was now irritating. He lowered it and crammed the metal edge between frame and door. He pushed his weight into it and the wood splintered. Maybe Victor flinched, I wasn’t sure. Perhaps it was I who’d flinched. I did exhale, certainly. Then I remembered how Victor overcame the guy in the antique shop. Victor wasn’t worried.
The wind swept among the trees, and dry bracken drifted over my boots. I kicked it, though my eyes remained on the crowbar.
A laugh rumbled in Lucas’s throat. “You guys really think I’d lure you here to kill you?”
The wind chilled my eyes and I blinked.
“Don’t flatter yourselves,” he added. “Especially you, Victor.”
My boss didn’t say anything.
Inside, a strange smell like overcooked dinner reminded me I was getting hungry. Poor light greeted us in the hallway. I knocked the door back into its frame, the splinters holding it ajar. It didn’t quite block out the sound of the wind.
Four pairs of muddy Wellington boots sat upside down on a rack. Mum, Dad and two girls, going by the colour and size of them. Above them, a family portrait confirmed it. One of the girls wore a tiara, and the other sported a wide smile. An impressive grandfather clock peered from the other end of a worn rug where a staircase vanished into darkness. A smashed mirror crowded one wall, its shards scattered over the floor, reflecting the gloom. Something about a shattered mirror was reason enough to doubt the sanctuary of this place. Plus the knowledge that we were breaking and entering. I was no longer hungry.
I ran my hand over the radiators. Hot. “What the hell are we doing? This isn’t right.” I looked again at the portrait. Where was the family?
“How much do you know, Lucas?” Victor nudged some glass with his shoe. It tinkled as the shards slid over each other.
“I was in two minds to contact you.” Lucas’s voice filled the room. “But I’m good to my word.”
Victor repeated his question.
“I know enough to be worried.” Lucas didn’t come across as a man to be worried about anything, and I again wondered about this pair’s history. What was it with these guys?
Victor glared at him. “Worried about what?”
Lucas ducked into a side room to our left, the crowbar gripped in a white fist. I followed him.
The first thing I saw was another broken mirror, void of nearly all glass. Beneath it stood a side-unit, and there the glass peppered its surface. Fragments covered the sofa and, as though someone lay on the floor, a pair of legs poked out from behind. A lamp flooded the scene and spotlighted the muddy trainers. One lace was untied, the trousers almost flat over the shins. My pace slowed as I entered the room, mouth dry. Lucas dropped to his knees.
“Thomas.” The crowbar thudded beside him. “Who did this?”
The lamp bathed the body in yellow light, adding to the harshness of the flesh. Shrivelled to the bone like the corpse we found at Stanley’s house, its clothes hung loose. Spindly limbs protruded from the sleeves. Mud and straw covered it, and dozens of mirror shards pierced the skin. They glinted. The head was little more than a skull with tiny beads for eyes, the hair only wisps. Stuffed in the mouth, a large shard forced the jaw wide. Wrinkled cheeks split and curled up into a hideous grin. A few teeth lay on the carpet.
My stomach lurched and I gasped, then coughed. I nearly spewed.
“Good God.” Victor’s voice hissed from behind me. He grabbed my shoulder.
“Thomas,” Lucas said again, shaking his head. His eyes were closed. “I am so sorry I brought you here.”
“This is your contact,” I said.
“Yes.”
“How—” I shouted, then in a softer voice, I added, “How can you tell? This could be anyone.”
Lucas stood up and groaned as his knee popped. He held a crumpled piece of paper. “Because of this.”
Victor snatched it and his eyes barely scanned the text. I glimpsed the words before he screwed it up: Farm, Book, Graves.
Beside the corpse’s hands lay a mobile phone. Lucas grabbed it and thumbed the buttons. A red light flashed, its battery almost out. “The last number he phoned was mine. He told me he’d found it.”
I couldn’t take my eyes off the shard buried in the corpse’s face. “Found what?”
“Victor’s book.”
“The police,” I said. “Why didn’t you call the police?”
“The first thing I did was call Victor. This is his territory. Despite everything, he needs to be here. He wants the book.”
“Where is it?” Victor looked around the room. “Is it here?”
“As far as I know, yes,” Lucas said. The phone bleeped and the screen went dark. He dropped it on the sofa. If he intended to leave it there, I wondered about fingerprints. This had to be reported…and here I was, an accomplice. I looked at the mirror fragment in the corpse’s mouth. What the hell happened here?
Victor’s frown looked painful.
“Thomas followed a trail to this farm,” Lucas added. “The answer is on that paper, Victor.”
“Graves?”
“Yes,” Lucas mumbled. “That’s what it says.”
Again, I wondered if he was going to strike Victor. This time it would be a fist in the face; the crowbar too far to reach for any instinctual reaction. The man’s eyes were tiny. His scar twitched.
“We must leave,” Victor announced. The ball of paper disappeared into his pocket. He straightened his back as he added, “But not before we have the book.”
Lucas turned slowly. “I wanted out of this shit years ago, Victor, yet you still bring me back.”
“Luc—” Victor began.
“Bad enough when I shave that I remember you left me to die, and here you are again.” His voice rumbled. “Back in my life, stepping through my front door and asking for help.”
“You were willing.”
“Because I am more than you.” Lucas loomed over Victor. His arm straightened and I waited for the punch. “I am so much more than you, Victor.”
“Guys, calm down,” I shouted, and their heads spun in unison.
Lucas’s lips whitened as he said, “Keep out of this, boy.”
“What happened to this man?” I asked, desperate to keep my voice even.
No one spoke for a moment, and I felt my cheeks warm. My heart hammered.
“His life force has been drained,” Victor eventually said. “That’s obvious.”
“It’s not obvious to me. Seriously, what about the glass?” I thought about the corpse we’d found at Stanley’s house. There were no broken mirrors there.
“The Shadow Fabric has returned,” he said.
“We already know that.” Then I thought about Stanley vanishing into its embrace and I looked at the near-empty mirror frame. “What did it do, come through the mirror?”
“Quite possibly.”
“Possibly?” Spit flew from my mouth.
&
nbsp; “I don’t know everything.”
If Lucas wasn’t going to hit him, perhaps I would. “That corpse is like the one we found in Stanley’s house, remember?”
“I can’t forget that, Leo.”
“Too right.” I turned on Lucas. “And you? You ever seen this before?”
Lucas eyed Victor, the corpse, and then me. His head bobbed and his scar twitched.
“What are we going to do now?” Victor squinted into the shadows beneath the stairs. I understood why. It was dark there.
“The Shadow Fabric could be here, right?” I said.
“Yes. And the Witchblade would be bloody handy right now.”
I wondered how that ornate blade could help us, and I remembered him explaining that it had power over the Fabric. It could hold it back apparently. I hoped I’d never get into a situation where I needed to witness that.
“What’s with all these broken mirrors?” I asked, no longer wanting to hit him. In truth, I knew I couldn’t. The thought of actually hitting him, hitting anyone, unnerved me and I wondered about my past. I shivered, hating, as I often did, the absence of memories.
“I have no idea,” Victor said. “Lucas?”
“Nope, can’t help you there. I’ve never seen that before.”
“You’ve seen a shrivelled body like this before, then?” I said and bent over the body. The stench climbed into my mouth, down my throat, and made me gag. I clamped tight my jaw and wrinkled my nose. I don’t know why I needed a closer look, perhaps it was to bring my thoughts to the present, away from my past. I scratched my chin and heard my watch. Its tick reminded me of my mortality, counting the seconds towards my death.
“Drained, yeah, but not pierced with glass.” Lucas crouched beside me. “Help me check his pockets.”
“No. You do it.” I straightened and tried to breathe normally. “He’s your friend.”
“Suit yourself.” Lucas searched, careful to avoid the glass. The body shifted and the head tilted. With a rustle of splitting skin it detached from the neck and fell sideways. The shard stopped it from rolling further. My stomach lurched.
Victor’s voice floated over to us. “This is not looking good.”
Lucas leapt to his feet and faced him. I was relieved the sofa and coffee table separated them. “Did you think that when you knew I was taken by the tribe?”
