by Mark Hockley
haven't answered my question," Miriam said blandly.
Glancing around the chamber, trying to assess her chances of escaping, Ellie saw that she was trapped. The three woman had positioned themselves to cut her off from the exit. And she had no doubt that they intended to kill her. Or at least try to anyway. "Grace is dead. There was a trap." She said this with casual indifference and Miriam's features registered a subtle shift. She looked uneasy now.
"You may be lying of course, but it does not matter. Give me the contract."
The girl just gazed at her, her eyes unwavering. "No." Ellie was very aware of the gentle pressure of the document in her pocket now, but she resisted the impulse to glance down at it.
The three Red Coven witches watched her warily. "We will take it if we have to." Miriam was visibly tensing herself and her associates began to move gradually around, putting distance between them so that it was more difficult for Ellie to keep them in view.
"You can try."
These words and the confidence that was evident in them gave Miriam pause. "There are three of us," she stated, almost as if to reassure herself.
Ellie gave a quick smile, but her eyes were hard. "Come on, you are all level fours and I'm only a level three. Should be easy."
With a snarl, Miriam stepped forward, but the sound of footsteps approaching on the stone floor caused her to spin around abruptly.
A man entered with a relaxed air of nonchalance. He was dressed in shirt and jeans and Ellie recognised him as the same person she had noticed earlier. There were a few seconds of silence as they all regarded each other.
Miriam glared at one of the other woman and spoke. "I thought I told you to make sure no one could come in."
"I did," came the reply. "He shouldn't have been able to get in here." The witch turned her attention to the man. "You should leave," she said with irritation. "This place is out of bounds."
The intruder glanced at each of them in turn, his attitude remarkably calm. "I don't think I'll do that."
Even Ellie was caught off-guard by this. But Miriam had clearly heard enough. "Control, " she voiced, focusing her full attention on him.
"Neutralize," countered the man and all four women's expressions mirrored each other as they looked at him with a combination of wonder, horror and genuine fear.
Now the man turned to regard Ellie and in his eyes the girl saw something intense and powerful. "Now would be a good time to do something," he told her with just the smallest sign of urgency. He tilted his head as if to say, well?
With a start, as if she had finally got a grip on herself and what was going on, Ellie spoke. "Darkness." With all of her concentration on the women, she felt her amulet begin to charge with energy.
All three witches staggered back a little, groping out to try to support themselves, their eyes distant and unseeing. The woman who had just addressed the man cried out in alarm. "Protect!" She obviously feared attack while vulnerable, but Ellie saw that it was a mistake.
Already the man had moved beside her. "Get some cover," he hissed at her, nodding to the nearest column. Ellie did as she was told.
The only Red Coven witch to have not spoken now called out a Word of Power in a furious roar. "Obliterate!" But already her two intended targets were out of sight and the Word had no effect.
Miriam gave a terrible scream, not of pain but anguish. Ellie couldn't see her from the position she held, but it was a disturbing sound.
"She will be able to speak again very soon," the man said to the girl in a harsh whisper. He was very close beside her now, their arms almost touching.
"Who are you?" the girl asked. Despite everything, this seemed the most important thing of all in that moment.
With an affable grin, the man stepped out into the open again. "A friend," Ellie heard him say.
Then everything became a cacophony of sound and vibration. The entire building appeared to shudder and throb around her. And Ellie knew it was caused by the single word the man had spoken. Vortex.
Ellie sat on a park bench. It was beginning to get darker by slow degrees.
She had wandered about for quite some time in a daze, not knowing what to do or what to think.
What had happened in the chapel had been so incredible, so unbelievable, she could only sit there turning the memories around in her head, trying to make them fit together and make some kind of sense.
When the man had stepped out to face the Red Coven witches and spoken the Word, Vortex, Ellie felt the power all around her. At first she had wanted to just pin herself to the comfortingly solid mass of the stone pillar, but her need to see, to know what was taking place was greater than her apprehension. She had peered out then to witness a rift in the air, that was the only way she could describe in, like a whirlpool of coiling energy. And the three women were being drawn into it, pulled by a force greater than they could resist. There were shouts, screams and a pulsing rhythmic hum.
And standing there, his face quietly composed was the man who had created it. His focus was on the witches as they were dragged into the heart of the swirling mass. The noise grew even louder and Ellie had needed to put her hands over her ears. Then one by one, the witches were consumed, taken into the vortex with a horrible suction, the sound of it awful to hear.
The girl had pulled herself back behind the column, not wanting to see anymore.
Then there was quiet, nothing stirred, all was silent.
Ellie stayed there for several moments, breathing fast, her thoughts in a jumble. But when finally she looked out again the chapel was deserted. No sign of the women and more perplexing still, the man was nowhere to be seen either.
She had stepped out quickly, scanning the interior for where he might have gone. But everything was just as it had been when they first entered, except for the altar which still revealed the hidden stairwell beneath it. Except for the dead body of Helen still laying there like some awful reminder of what had just taken place.
The memory of dragging the poor woman down into the stairwell and then coming out to speak a Word to seal both her and Grace's remains within what would now become their tomb still caused Ellie to shudder.
Now seated on the bench, the girl remembered rushing out from the chapel, hoping to still catch sight of the man among the visitors who incredibly still ambled around the Tower, unsuspecting and unknowing, but he was gone.
But this had not been the only thing to have disappeared she had discovered. Because it had been then that she had felt her pocket and realised that the document was also missing. And she didn't have to think very hard to know who had taken it.
John greeted Luke as he entered the house. "There is a message for you."
The older boy stared at him blankly. "What kind of message?"
Offering a sealed envelope out towards him, John gave a deferential smile. "It is private."
Luke took the note and scowled slightly. Who would send him a letter in Witch Town? Beth!?
He tore it open and read the inscription.
Please meet me in the library. Come quickly. We are all in danger.
Ellie.
The boy stared at the page. He read it over again. The handwriting was neat and in black ink. Luke tried to recall what Ellie's script looked like, but he had to admit he had no idea. It wasn't something he had ever taken any interest in.
All in danger? Luke thought that much was obvious. They were trapped in a town full of witches after all. And then there was the fact that Ellie was also one of them.
But could he afford to ignore it. Could he really just go up to his room and pretend he'd never read it?
He had been very angry and hurt by some of the things that had happened since they had come to this dreadful place, but at least today he had been reminded of some of what he used to have, his friendship with Zack, enough to restore his mind just a little and also his heart.
Luke realised that this town and the attitudes of its inhabitants had been eating away at him ever since he arrived.
He would never be able to forget how he had been responsible for the death of the young woman. That had been the moment when he had begun to change. Taking a life, however unintentional, had scarred him permanently.
He really didn't have a choice when all things were considered. He would have to go. Even though he knew he was putting himself in even more danger.
"I'm going out," he informed the boy.
"Is that allowed?" John queried with some concern.
Luke just rolled his eyes. "Let's find out."
Ellie knew she needed to do something, to get up and take some action. But she felt at a loss. Already, before she had arrived at this place and stopped to mull things over, she had walked past a number of police officers and debated with herself about blurting out the whole bizarre story.
The fact that she hadn't disturbed her and yet there were just too many reasons why she had had chosen not to. And the most pressing was the ultimate safety of her friends.
This thought finally got her motivated again and she was about to get up and leave when a small group of teenage boys came ambling towards her.
They had a swagger that told Ellie that they thought they were something special. At least in their own minds. But there was also something dangerous about their expressions. A raw hunger that was unpleasant to witness.
She gave a sigh and watched as one of their number, a very tall, very thin boy hailed her.
"What this fine lady doin here? You lookin to party, innit?"
Ellie just stared back at him with an expression of
