by Katie M John
“Looks like you’re definitely going to be here for the night; the snow shows no sign of letting up.”
“Will your sisters be okay?”
Lilith glanced towards the window. “Oh, they’ll be fine; they know how to survive the elements.” A crooked little smile lit up the corners of her mouth. “I’ll expect that they’ll probably make it back in time for dinner.”
“Really?” Jeremiah couldn’t contain his surprise. “But the roads are blocked?”
Lilith turned and headed towards the door. “Don’t worry about them, they won’t be taking the roads.”
Before he could ask her exactly how they might be travelling home through a blizzard, she’d gone out of his hearing, leaving him sat alone and slightly afraid.
He clicked open the PC, desperate with the hope that Daniel might have some advice on surviving a night’s stay in a nest of witches.
Daniel.
There’s no way out. I’m trapped. Tell me what to do. I think she suspects me.
Jay.
The e-mail pinged back almost instantly as if Daniel had been waiting.
Sit tight. Play innocent. Don’t give them ANY cause to further suspicion. Do exactly as you are told. You’re not much use to them so they will probably not be interested in you. Lock your door and place a cross beside your bed whilst you sleep. I’m on my way. I’ll try to be there by morning latest. Cursed weather!
Dx
Jeremiah heard the sound of the front door bang and the laughter of the two sisters tinkle through the house.
“Lilith!” Thalia called. “Lilith, are you home?”
Jeremiah closed the PC and made his way out into the hallway. His game plan was to play it as naturally as possible; ask no questions, get no lies – hopefully not get into trouble.
“Hi, Thalia!” Jeremiah said as cheerfully as he could.
She flashed him a confused look before recovering her social grace. “Hey, Jeremiah, what are you doing here?”
“Caught in the snow storm. I’m afraid I’ve gatecrashed your hospitality.”
She bounced over to him, flashing him a grin. “Oh, what fun – so I guess you’re here until the morning?”
Jeremiah hesitated, resisting the temptation to ask them how they had managed to travel through such weather but he knew he wouldn’t like the answer. He glanced over at the middle sister who was eying him appreciatively.
Time to use your Chase charm, Jay old boy! he thought. He walked over with his hand extended and introduced himself. “Jeremiah Chase. It’s a pleasure to meet you…”
She smiled and returned her hand. It was slim and cool under his touch, reminding him of a bird. “Nigella.”
“Nigella! What a pretty name.”
He turned his attention back to Thalia, conscious of keeping both ladies happy.
“Well, Thalia, it’s going to be so nice to spend some time getting to know you properly; we just don’t seem to have had the opportunity since I arrived.”
Thalia twirled her hair between her fingers and tipped her head, “No, well you’re always with that Meadowsweet girl; she seems to have quite monopolised your attentions.” She turned to throw a look at Nigella, who was listening with a keen interest at the mention of a Meadowsweet. “More’s the pity, hey?”
“Well,” Jeremiah cleared his throat, “quite an oversight on my part.”
“Quite. You don’t know what you’ve been missing!” Thalia crooned, placing a hand on his shoulder. She smelt of snow and perfume; the effect was enchanting to the point he almost forgot he was meant to be defending himself against possible impending sacrifice.
“If you give me a minute to go and get out of these damp clothes…” she paused to give Jeremiah time to fully appreciate the dramatic effect of her already undoing the buttons of her blouse. He let out a small, embarrassed laugh and turned his face away in an attempt to hide his blushes. He knew he was being played but far from minding, he was quite enjoying it. “…then I’ll come back down and entertain you.”
“Okay,” he laughed, flashing her a smile designed to melt hearts.
He watched the sisters head up the stairs arm in arm, whispering about their visitor in a voice loud enough for him to hear. Reaching the top of the stairs, they both turned before collapsing onto one another in a pile of giggles. Jeremiah heard Lilith’s voice travel crisply along the corridor.
“Get a grip!”
Jeremiah didn’t hear the obviously comical reply that set them all off giggling again. He turned back towards the kitchen but not before glancing up, where he saw Lilith staring down at him curiously.
15
“Have you seen Jeremiah today?” Fox asked her sisters.
Both of them shook their heads and returned to their canteen hot chocolate.
“Nope, not seen him all day. Maybe he’s ill?”
“Maybe he read the weather forecast and made a smarter move than we did,” Swan said with irritation. “Do you think we’ve still got time to make it home?” she asked, looking out of the window.
It had started with a light flurry about an hour ago but the wind was picking up and the snowflakes had turned from powder to small cotton wool balls.
“I think if we’re going to make it, we need to leave now,” Fox said.
“Do you think they’ll send out the school bus?” Bunny asked, flushed with the excitement of a possible afternoon of snowballing and sledging with the village boys.
“I doubt it. I think we need to think about making our own way home.”
“Shall I ring Mum?”
“I don’t think she’s about; she said she had something on.”
Their conversation was interrupted by the sound of Swan’s mobile ringing. She checked the name before clicking the answer button and mouthed the name, “Violet” at her sisters.
After a brief exchange, Swan clicked off and smiled. “Good news! Violet is going to swing by and take us home. She’s about to leave the library now and will collect us from the gate in about twenty minutes.”
“Great. Time enough to grab a refill,” Bunny said, placing the three mugs onto a tray and heading off in the direction of the counter.
“I could really do with talking with Primrose about the visions. Something’s going on; something bad. I’ve a horrible feeling Martha Paisley was just the beginning,” Fox said.
Swan, more cautious than her sisters, instinctively glanced around to make sure no one could overhear them. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, I think Martha was the first attempt and as that clearly failed, it’s just a matter of time before they try and do it again.”
“How soon?” Swan asked anxiously.
“Very.” Fox picked at the label of her water bottle. “Like soon as in the next couple of days.”
“We should have started planning,” Swan said.
“Planning what exactly? You make out this is something we can solve with a bit of careful planning but we don’t even know what it is that we are up against. All we’ve got is my stupid, unhelpful visions and a suspicion the Ravenheart sisters are involved.”
“It’s not exactly a suspicion, is it? You’ve seen them. You saw exactly what they did to Martha Paisley.”
“What if I just dreamed all of that because I was mad with Thalia for what she did to you and Fred?”
“Don’t kid yourself, Fox. You know your vision was just as good as being there yourself. More than that, you know Thalia knows you know, and she isn’t happy about it. That’s why she’s been so keen to keep a track of you.”
Fox fell silent. She had a terrible feeling the snow was an omen – after all, there had been snow in her last vision. Snow, which had turned to feathers – angel feathers.
“Who are you two gossiping about?” Bunny asked, plonking the tray of steaming hot-chocolate down. Catching the look on her sisters’ faces, Bunny changed key and her face fell serious. “So is one of you going to tell me what is going on?”
“It’s nothing
!”
“So there is an it then, meaning something is going on.”
“Leave it alone, Bunny!” Swan warned.
“No, I won’t leave it alone. You two have been having secret little chats for weeks now. Whispering in the hallway, hanging out together at lunch, sneaking in to each other’s room in the middle of the night. You’ve got a secret and it’s not fair to leave me out.”
“Not fair! Don’t be stupid, Bunny. You sound like a whining five-year-old. You don’t need to know everything that goes on – some things are not your business.”
“I’m not behaving like a five-year-old. You two are! Anyway, I know what it’s all about! It’s to do with Fox and her freaky…
Swan grabbed hold of Bunny’s arm and dragged her into her seat with a cry.
“Why are you being such a bitch?” Bunny snarled.
Swan raised her hand as if to strike her sister, but instead, she laid it on Bunny’s arm. At her touch, Bunny instantly calmed.
“We’re trying to protect you because we love you,” Swan said. “I know it’s hard to feel left out, and you probably think we’re being cruel, but we don’t want you to get hurt.”
Fox placed her arm around Bunny and pulled her into a hug. “We love you.”
Bunny pushed her away. “Get off! Look, please just tell me what’s going on. It’s to do with the Ravenhearts isn’t it?”
Swan and Fox exchanged concerned looks. “What makes you think that, Bunny?” Fox asked.
“Something Thalia said yesterday when I knocked into her.”
“What did she say?”
“She said I was dead – that we were all dead and it was just a matter of time until they buried us.”
“Don’t you think you should have told us?”
“I thought it was just Thalia being her usual bitchy self but it wasn’t, was it? Something has happened.”
“Look, I’ll cut you a deal,” Fox whispered. “If you can keep your nose out until Sunday then I’ll tell you exactly what’s going on.”
Bunny took a moment to consider the proposal. “You promise you’ll tell me everything on Sunday?”
“Promise!” Fox said, holding out her little pinky finger to seal the pledge in the way they’d done since childhood.
“Do you also promise to tell me what’s going on between you and Will?” Bunny asked, giggling.
Fox gave her a playful shove. “I’ll tell you that right now. Nothing!”
By the time they moved outside to wait for their lift with Violet, the snow was falling thick enough to make Fox feel slightly motion sick. They would be cutting it fine to get back to Heargton before the roads became completely impassable.
Violet had had the foresight to drive the four-by-four to work, offering them some snow protection and a lot more luxury than the school bus. Once all of them were in and the excited greetings finished, they settled down for the half-hour drive home. Bunny sat next to Fox in the back and plugged herself into her music pod and Swan and Violet chatted quiet enough to make listening too much of an effort. Fox pulled out her phone and checked her text messages. She had thought Jeremiah might have texted to say why he wasn’t in, but then again, why should he? It wasn’t as if she had any claim over him. She watched as the endless fields gradually hid themselves under a blanket of snow. She was lost deep in her thoughts when the sound of the radio jogged her out of them. Swan was staring over her shoulder at Fox, who was taking a moment to catch up on what the news report was about.
“Police and local residents are out searching for the toddler who is believed to have gone missing from St. Ursula’s playgroup sometime this morning between ten and ten thirty. The two-year-old is described as blonde with blue eyes and was wearing a red snow suit when she was last seen. Fears are growing as the weather situation intensifies. Anybody with information that might be of use should contact Heargton Police office on…”
Swan flicked the radio off before the details could be given and waited for Fox to respond. The tension in the car was solid. Bunny pulled out her earbuds.
“What’s happened? What’s going on?” she asked.
At first, nobody answered, then Violet spoke. “Does the description match with your vision, Fox?”
Fox didn’t want to respond in words, all she wanted to do was to cry.
“Did you see this happening, Fox?” Bunny asked, trying to play catch-up.
“Yes,” Fox croaked. “The description matches the little girl in my vision. They’ve taken her to Heathmoor Cottage.”
“You need to phone the police!” Bunny said, almost bouncing in her seat. “Doesn’t she, Swan? Tell her she needs to phone the police.” Bunny jabbed her finger towards Fox’s phone. “Ring them!”
“It’s no use phoning the police, Bunny.”
“But why?”
“Because they won’t get anywhere near Heathmoor Cottage. Fox and I tried to get up there the other day but the Ravenhearts have put a protection shield around the area.”
“The Ravenhearts! Oh my God! They’re involved in this? Did they kill Martha?”
Fox let out a heavy sigh, “This is exactly why I didn’t want you to know, Bunny – you go over the top with things!”
Bunny threw herself back into the leather seats and pouted with her arms crossed. “You still see me as the baby in the family but you don’t know me at all.”
“Oh, Bunny, really! We’ve got more pressing matters than dealing with your ego at the minute,” Swan snipped from the front seat.
“Really? Matters that involve a protection shield exactly like the ones I know how to break?”
All three of the Meadowsweet girls turned to face Bunny at the same moment, causing Violet to skid perilously before regaining control of the car just before it headed into the hedge.
“What do you mean you can break protection shields?” Violet asked. “That’s powerful magic!”
“What? I’m not worthy of it?”
“Jeez, Bunny, are you due on your period or something!” Swan snapped. “Get over whatever your issue is and start trying to help us out here. How long have you been able to do this?”
“More to the point, how do you know you can do it?” Violet asked.
“Don’t you remember how Mum used to stick us in protection shields as babies when she was doing jobs like pegging out the washing or when she wanted to go to the bathroom; she used to throw a protection shield over us in the same way most normal parents use a playpen.”
Fox and Swan laughed at the memory. Mum’s protection shields had sent the little Meadowsweets into full temper tantrums as they fought invisible bars. Now Bunny mentioned it, they had both forgotten how their mum used to despair at the antics of their baby sister, who managed somehow to escape the protection shield and wreak havoc throughout the house. It had seemed nothing more at the time than the cheeky antics of an over-lively baby, but clearly it was Bunny’s gift coming in early; one which it seemed had not left.
“I really didn’t know I had the gift until about six months ago when I got myself into a stupid situation with a group of boys at a party?”
“What party?”
“Which boys?”
Bunny screwed up her nose. “It doesn’t matter what or which, that’s not the point. Anyway, things got a little out of hand. I’d had too much to drink and I didn’t really know what was happening. One thing led to another and I found myself on my own with a group of college boys who clearly thought I was up for… Everybody was drunk so it’s all a bit of a haze but one minute one of them is trying to pin me to the bed, and the next, they’re shouting at each other at the end of the bed and banging their fists against this invisible barrier, just as if they were behind a glass window. After a couple of minutes of being completely freaked out, they left and I got home as fast as I could.”
“Jeez Bunny, why didn’t you tell us?” Swan asked.
“Because you two freak out about things like that – and you’d have told Mum.”
“Damn right I…”
Violet interrupted, breaking up the escalating sibling squabble. “So you can make them as well as break them, Bunny?” Violet asked, still reeling from the revelation.
“Yep.”
Violet glanced back at Bunny through the rear-view mirror. “It would seem we’re going to need your help then, Bunny.”
Bunny flashed a satisfied smile and straightened herself in her seat.
“Okay, so what’s the plan then?” Bunny asked.
Silence filled the car as each of the girls thought about Bunny’s question. Their original plan had been sketchy enough, which would have been okay given they thought they had time on their side, but with news of the little girl being already taken, a sketchy, long term plan was no longer going to cut it.
At last Violet said, “The news said the villagers were out looking for the child. I suggest that when we get home, we wrap up warm, grab some searchlights, and join in with the search party. We’ll head off through Raven Woods, past The Rookeries, and up around to the west of Heathmoor Hill. We’re less likely to bump into other members of search parties that way.”
“You know that takes us through the grounds of Ravenheart Hall don’t you?” Fox said.
“No matter,” Violet replied. “It’s not as if there’s going to be anyone home.”
Fox looked out across the fields, which were now almost entirely lost. It was not the weather to be undertaking stealthy rescue missions; there would be evidence of their tracks everywhere, and it would be far too easy to get lost in the snow.
“Do you think we should call your sisters?” Swan asked Violet.
Violet took a moment to think. She sighed heavily before nodding. “Yes. I really didn’t want to involve them, especially not Primrose; you know how fragile she is.” She glanced at Fox in the mirror. “Your visit the other day sent her quite off on one, but I think we are going to need them both.”
Fox fidgeted, “I’m sorry about Primrose, I didn’t mean to…”
“It’s alright, that wasn’t a telling off. You just need to understand that Primrose is different from the rest of us. She feels things very keenly; she has acute empathy skills. When you speak with her, she isn’t just hearing the words but she’s reading your thoughts, too – all of your desires and fears – even the ones you don’t want to admit to yourself, are open to her. I guess you must have been carrying around a lot of both when you went to visit her.”
