by M. J. Hearle
‘Don’t touch me!’ Winter yelled, struggling against Sam’s grip.
‘I don’t want to hit you, Winter, but I will!’ Sam warned, stifling her frantic efforts. Winter could tell by his expression that he meant it. Damien managed to pull the necklace over Winter’s head, untangling the stone from her hair, and hid it in one of the pockets of his uniform. As she watched the green crystal disappear from sight, Winter felt her hope vanish with it. What was she going to do now? How could Blake save her if he didn’t know where to find her?
‘Let’s go.’ Sam dragged her through the open door. Once they were outside, Winter began to plead with Sam. Maybe he would take pity on her now he was away from the others.
‘Sam, why are you doing this?’ Her eyes darted around for a sign of the Skivers in the surrounding darkness.
Sam ignored her question and pulled her across the wet grass. It had stopped raining, but the wind was still strong, whipping Winter’s hair about her face. There was the black van idling in Blake’s driveway – the same vehicle that had driven her and Blake over the cliff. Sam and the others belonged to the Bane.
Sam yanked Winter to the rear of the van, wrenched open the door and threw her inside. The back of the van was more like a cage, with no windows and a wire mesh barrier separating it from the front compartment. Winter picked herself up from the cold steel floor and faced her kidnapper.
‘Please, Sam! You don’t know what’s out here!’
Sam avoided her tearful gaze and surprised her by answering with a note of genuine regret. ‘I’m sorry.’ He slammed the door shut, locking her in the gloom.
Chapter 51
Winter waited until Sam’s footsteps had faded before trying to kick open the van door. When this failed, she attempted to pry apart the mesh barrier so she could slip through into the front seat. Unfortunately she wasn’t strong enough, and after several minutes of this frenzied activity she collapsed onto the floor, exhausted. Even in the depth of her despair, there was some small consolation that Blake had escaped this ordeal. Winter didn’t know how the Bane had found Blake’s home, but was glad he was far beyond any harm Sam and the others could do to him.
Sam’s reaction when he was first introduced to Blake in the surf club suddenly made much more sense to her. What Winter had taken to be simple jealousy on Sam’s part, she now saw as being something much deeper. She wondered if he’d been behind the wheel when the van rammed them over the cliff.
She recalled the story Sam had read aloud in English class. It hadn’t been a work of fiction at all, but a thinly veiled allegory of the Bane’s history. In the story the young man, who Winter guessed was a surrogate Sam, expressed remorse at the merciless execution of the creatures he and his family hunted. There had been a definite longing in the character for a more peaceful existence. Maybe Sam too had doubts about what he was doing, doubts that might allow Winter to appeal to his compassionate side.
A sudden clicking sound outside the van banished all thoughts of Sam.
Winter held her breath, silently praying that her ears were playing tricks on her. Maybe the sound was some kind of auditory hallucination brought on by extreme stress and fear? It was a stretch, but one she clung to desperately. The alternative was too terrifying to consider.
As quietly as possible, Winter got onto her knees and looked through the wire mesh into the front of the car. Due to the angle of the van, she couldn’t see much through the windscreen, save for the woods faintly lit by the house lights. A luminous ground mist had begun to seep in through the undergrowth, slowly creeping its way towards the van. There was no sign of the Skivers. Maybe they’d abandoned the siege and returned to the Dead Lands. Maybe . . . Winter gasped as a shadowy figure fluttered in her peripheral vision. By the time she snapped her head around to follow it, the black shape had vanished.
Fearfully searching the darkness, she slowly backed away from the mesh into the deeper gloom of the van, wary of making any unnecessary sound. If she was quiet, maybe the Skivers wouldn’t know she was in the van. They might think she was still in the house. Desperately, Winter clung to this notion, breathing through her nose so as to limit the sound of air rushing in and out. Agonising seconds ticked by and she began to believe the danger had passed.
CLICK! CLICK! CLICK! CLICK!
Crying out, Winter threw herself to the opposite side of the van. This time the clicking had come from right outside the thin sheet metal next to her head.
Panic threatened to take over, but Winter fought it, gritting her teeth and trying to muster some – any! – courage. She didn’t want to die in abject terror. Another shadow fluttered past the windscreen. They were playing with her! She crept towards the mesh panel again, terrified at what she might see gliding towards her through the mist.
Nefertem suddenly jumped up from the front passenger seat of the van, making Winter scream. The cat stood on his hind legs, resting his paws against the wire mesh. He meowed in greeting, his yellow eyes regarding her warmly.
Winter let out a long shaky breath, feeling relief flood through her.
‘You gave me a fright, you silly cat!’ She pushed her fingers through the wire and tried to stroke Nefertem’s fuzzy cheeks. The cat nuzzled her hand, licking her fingers. Winter didn’t know how the tabby had found her, but was too grateful to care. He was here, that was the main thing. As long as Nefertem remained with Winter, she knew she would be safe. Safe from the Skivers, at least.
The front door of the house slammed, followed by the sound of footsteps and voices. The speakers sounded like Damien and Marcus.
‘Did you kill all of them?’
‘Yeah – the black one bit me!’
‘What the hell was going on in that room? All that stuff on the walls. I never seen nothing like it.’
‘I’ll check my books when I get home. I recognised some of the symbols. I think it was a containment spell.’
‘Why was there nothing inside the circle?’
‘That’s what’s bothering me. Why make a containment spell with nothing to contain?’
The front van doors were pulled open. Damien was first in, jumping back when he saw Nefertem. The cat leapt off the mesh and growled at him.
‘Woah! There’s another one in here!’
‘Kill it,’ Marcus said casually from behind him.
As Winter watched in horror, Damien swung a crossbow off his shoulder and aimed it at the coiled tabby.
‘No!’ she cried out before Damien could pull the trigger. Sam leaned in through the driver’s side door, and looked at her curiously through the mesh. ‘Please, Sam – he’s my cat! Don’t kill him!’ It was a lie, but a good one. She’d begun to feel as though Nefertem was her cat.
Sam seemed to deliberate for a moment. His cold eyes met Winter’s and she used the opportunity to silently plead with him. Don’t kill the cat! Please, Sam! If he dies, I die! Winter felt a glimmer of hope at what she saw reflected back in Sam’s gaze – a flicker of compassion. She hoped she hadn’t imagined it. Sam turned away from Winter and nodded at Damien, who seemed far too eager to employ his deadly weapon.
‘Give her the cat.’
‘But Sam, Dad told us to kill all the cats!’
‘Only Blake’s. She says this one’s hers.’
‘You believe her?’
Winter didn’t think Sam believed her in the slightest. Something about her distress had appealed to him – she could see it in the conflicted emotions on his face.
‘Give her the cat,’ he repeated sternly.
‘Sam —’ Damien whined again.
‘You heard me, Damien!’
Damien looked to Marcus for support but received only a shrug. Pouting, the expression making him appear even younger, Damien unlocked and lowered the wire mesh. Before he could pick up Nefertem, the cat leapt over the barrier and into Winter’s waiting arms.
Nursing the cat, she offered Sam a shaky smile. ‘Thank you.’
He ignored her and slid in behind the steering wheel.
Winter suspected she’d exhausted any preferential treatment she could expect from him, but was grateful nonetheless. She doubted either of the other two would have shown her the same kindness. Marcus seemed like a sullen brute, and Damien a creepy little weasel. Sam might not be the boy Winter had thought he was, but he still seemed capable of empathy.
Stowing their crossbows, Damien slid into the middle, while Marcus took the window seat. There was a strange scent in the air – a pungent chemical aroma that Winter couldn’t identify. They all absolutely reeked of it! She was still puzzling on what the smell was when Sam revved the engine, taking off at speed.
Winter fell backwards onto the metal floor, dropping Nefertem as she tried in vain to keep her balance. The cat landed nimbly, skittering away to a safe spot behind the rear right wheel. From there he watched Winter, his yellow eyes glowing faintly in the low light.
Winter slowly picked herself up, wincing at the fresh pain of her bruises. She was jostled to and fro as the van left the bumpy terrain of Blake’s driveway and turned onto Holloway Road. Once the journey had smoothed out, Winter pushed herself against the left-hand side of the back compartment, pulling her knees up to her chest. What was going to happen to her? How long could she survive without Blake to protect her?
She conjured an image of Blake’s face and held it in her mind like a talisman. She hoped that, wherever he was, Blake would come for her soon. Winter knew the danger grew every second they were apart.
Chapter 52
Winter couldn’t be sure how long she was in the van before it eventually came to a stop, but guessed they had crossed from one side of town to the other. During the trip, the others were mostly quiet, except for a few mentions of ‘the old man’ and ‘the creature’ – a reference to Blake, she assumed.
Once the van’s engine was switched off her kidnappers exited the van, leaving Winter and Nefertem to wait in the back. She could hear their footsteps crunching on the gravel outside as they walked around to open the rear doors, and steeled herself for action. Winter had spent the journey psyching herself up to this point, figuring it was probably her one chance to escape. She rolled herself into a crouching position, ready to leap out as soon as the doors opened. They were probably expecting her to be frightened and malleable, something she planned on using to her advantage.
The doors were thrown open and Winter launched herself out – straight into the waiting arms of Marcus.
‘Woah! You didn’t tell me she was such a fighter, Sammy,’ Marcus said, laughing as he gripped Winter’s wrists to stop her beating him.
Sam watched Winter struggle in Marcus’s embrace with a bored expression on his face. ‘Stop fooling around and bring her inside. Somebody might see her.’
‘Let go of me!’ Winter managed to yell before Marcus covered her mouth with his hand and dragged her towards the house. Even in her panicked state she was surprised to see Sam’s house was a modest one-storey bungalow, indistinguishable from the homes on either side. Owl Mountain rose up against the night sky in the distance, and by its location she was able to guess where they were in town. Somewhere near Handley Drive, not far away from school. After imagining that they would take her to some isolated shack somewhere beyond the outskirts, she felt a little comforted by the familiar surroundings. At least if she managed to escape there would be help close at hand from one of the neighbours. If she managed to escape . . .
Winter tried to wriggle around in Marcus’s grasp to see if Nefertem had been lifted out of the van too. There was no sign of the cat. She prayed silently that he was somewhere nearby, otherwise she’d have much more to fear than these thugs.
Marcus carried her over the threshold into the house, with Damien and Sam following close behind. Once they were all inside, Sam locked the front door.
‘Take her out back. He’s waiting for her.’
Winter didn’t like the sound of that. Just who was waiting for her out back? She continued to kick and struggle against Marcus, but his grip was too strong.
As she was dragged through the central hallway, Winter caught glimpses of the rooms; the first contained three inflatable mattresses lined up next to each other, while another was packed with gym equipment – weights, dumbbells, a flat bench. Another room displayed much more intriguing contents: Winter saw some kind of workbench with a collection of crystals and weirdly shaped pieces of metal spread across it. There was an open laptop computer running some kind of graphic simulation that made no sense to her.
The remaining rooms were virtually barren save for the odd cardboard box or packing crate. The entire house had a cold, impersonal feel to it – there were no family pictures, scattered magazines or books, not even a television. It was more like a makeshift military barracks than anything else.
Marcus carried Winter through a doorway and finally released her. Glaring at him angrily, she turned around, her breath catching when she saw the old man sitting at the table watching her. He had long, straggly white hair, swept back from a gaunt face that wouldn’t have looked out of place on a Halloween mask. There was something alarmingly cadaverous about him, as if he were slowly being eaten away from the inside by flesh-eating bugs. His skin was stretched so thinly across his bones that Winter was surprised the skull didn’t burst through when he smiled.
‘And what do we have here?’ he asked in deceptively friendly tones as Marcus nudged Winter towards him. A slight European accent sharpened his vowels.
‘Her name’s Winter. She’s the one I told you about before,’ Sam answered.
The old man looked sympathetically at Winter. ‘I imagine you must be quite alarmed, young lady. Please allow me to introduce myself.’
Winter glared at him. ‘I know who you are.’
One of the man’s grey eyebrows twitched in curiosity. ‘Is that so?’
‘You’re the Bane.’
Marcus sniggered behind her, while the old man sighed somewhat sadly. ‘We haven’t called ourselves that name for many years,’ he replied. Winter ignored the amused look in the creepy old man’s eyes and quickly scanned the room for anything that might aid her escape. Clearly she couldn’t run back the way she’d come – not with Marcus and Sam blocking the route. However, the sash window at the back of the room was wide enough for her to climb through. She just needed to get past the old man to do it.
‘My name is Caleb Bennet,’ he continued, his overly friendly manner making Winter even more suspicious of him. ‘The boys standing behind you are my sons. Damien’s the youngest, Marcus is the one with the questionable hair colour, and I believe you know Sam.’
Brothers! No wonder Winter had seen some physical similarities between the three. Caleb gestured to the chair closest to Winter. ‘Now that we’ve been introduced properly, will you sit down?’
Winter hesitated, needing some reassurance. ‘My cat . . .’
Caleb frowned and looked to Sam. ‘Cat?’
Sam started to clarify Winter’s question when Damien entered the room, holding Nefertem to his chest.
Winter reached for the frightened tabby. ‘Please give him to me.’
Damien looked to Caleb for permission. He seemed to be deliberating over whether or not to give her Nefertem when Sam spoke. ‘It’s her cat. We killed the others.’
Caleb shrugged and Damien handed the tabby over to Winter. Stroking him, Winter reluctantly sat down opposite Caleb. He smiled at her again, the expression out of place on his hard, cruel face.
‘Growing up in Prague, I had a dog when I was a child – a wolfhound named Lucius. Cats, though, have always bothered me. They see too much. When Satan walked the earth it is said he came in the form of a cat. Did you know that?’
Winter shook her head.
Caleb appeared disappointed she didn’t know this fact. ‘What’s your cat’s name?’
‘Nefertem.’
‘Named for the Egyptian god of luck. I hope he’s brought you some?’
‘Not so far,’ Winter replied honestly and the old man laughed.<
br />
‘Now, may I offer you a drink? Tea? Coffee?’
She had no time for this polite charade. These people had kidnapped her!
‘What do you want with me?’
Caleb seemed surprised at the question. ‘To protect you, of course.’
‘Protect me from what?’
‘You’re in great danger, Winter,’ he replied, staring at her gravely.
Winter returned his stare. ‘No arguments here. But I would be in less danger if you hadn’t kidnapped me.’
‘You think you’re safe with the creature?’
Winter’s back stiffened at the reference to Blake. She did nothing to hide the displeasure in her voice when answering, ‘I know I’m safe with Blake. He’s never run me over a cliff!’
Caleb hung his head as though shamed by Winter’s accusation. ‘I must apologise for that particular action. We were merely trying to bait the creature into using some of its power, thus revealing itself.’
‘You’re insane!’ Winter replied, shocked that they could shrug off her near-death so easily.
‘Shut up, Winter! You have no idea —’ Sam began angrily, but was silenced by Caleb’s raised finger.
‘What did he tell you about us?’ Caleb asked her with a wry smile, as though indulging a small child’s fantasy.
‘He told me how you’ve hunted him across the years like he was some kind of monster.’
Caleb’s eyes widened slightly and leaned forward in his chair. ‘Like he was a monster? My dear girl, what do you suppose it – Blake – is?’
Winter answered him easily. ‘The man who saved my life.’
‘Man?’ Caleb scoffed. ‘My dear, we both know your Blake is no man. He’s a Demori. Just like his father. A creature that drains the life force of poor ignorant girls like yourself.’
‘Blake would never hurt me,’ Winter said defiantly.
‘Of course he would.’ Caleb’s tone softened as he regarded Winter sympathetically. ‘I’m sure Blake doesn’t want to hurt you, but sooner or later he won’t be able to resist. It’s his nature to kill what he loves.’
