The Hidden Gift

by Ian Somers

  ‘Listen, if you don’t want this investigation then just say so. I have another case that you might prefer.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘Our old friend Boxer has been sighted in Brazil. If you want a real challenge, we can have someone else take care of Bentley while you can go to Brazil alone, and try to apprehend Boxer.’

  ‘No way. That’s one I’d rather avoid. I’ll head to Newcastle tomorrow and find this kid – on one condition.’

  ‘Shoot.’

  ‘That I get transferred to the investigation in Switzerland after I bring her in.’

  ‘You can’t travel overseas with Bentley.’

  ‘I’m not married to Bentley! He can go live with his girlfriend for a while.’

  ‘I’ll discuss it with the Council tomorrow. The faster you find the girl, the more willing they’ll be to let you join Sakamoto and the others.’

  Ballentine didn’t hang around and wanted to get back to London without delay. Apparently there were some important meetings that he could not miss. Hunter walked outside with him and once I heard the car engine start I went back to my room and climbed into bed.

  I felt a strange mixture of excitement and fear when I thought of going on my first mission for the Guild. Excitement that I was to leave the isolated cottage and to have an opportunity to save someone from the clutches of Golding. Fear that it might result in combat. Fear also in that I might let the Guild, and Hunter, down. I hadn’t always seen eye to eye with Hunter, but I always desired his respect. It felt great that he told Ballentine that I was ready to go on a mission – and also that he liked me despite my problems with authority – and that made it more important that I shouldn’t fail him.

  After a while I focused on what Ballentine had said about Marianne Dolloway. He’d told Hunter that the Guild was confident she was dead and buried. That felt like a giant weight off my shoulders. The psycho who was responsible for so much destruction – as well as Romand’s death – was no more. The world was now a much safer place.

  CHAPTER SIX

  The Road

  I slept for no more than an hour and was out of bed just after 6am. The prospect of leaving the cottage for a week on a mission for the Guild had me bursting with enthusiasm and I couldn’t wait to get the day started. I found Hunter sitting at the kitchen table sipping a mug of coffee and there were two packed sports bags by the back door. I pretended I hadn’t overheard the conversation he’d had with Ballentine and glanced nonchalantly at the bags before turning to him.

  ‘What’s with the bags?’ I asked with a casual nod. ‘Going somewhere?’

  ‘Yes, and you’re coming with me. We leave in an hour.’

  ‘Well, this is a surprise,’ I lied. ‘Where are we going? Butlins?’

  ‘You wish. We’re headed south to Newcastle.’

  ‘What’s in Newcastle that’s so important?’

  ‘I’ve been asked by the Guild to find some kid who might have a gift. I don’t trust you to stay here on your own so you’ll have to tag along.’

  ‘Cool!’

  ‘There’s nothing cool about it, Bentley. You’ll be stuck in the 4x4 for most of the trip and it’s likely that the kid is just some fake who likes attention. But if she is gifted we might run into trouble so you’ll need to have your wits about you.’

  ‘What kind of trouble are you talking about?’

  ‘The kind of trouble that will try to snatch the girl and kill us both if we get in the way. You’re about to go on your first official duty as an agent for the Guild and that means your life will be in constant danger. Does that sound cool to you?’

  ‘It does actually. I like a bit of danger.’

  ‘Me too,’ Hunter replied with a dry smile. ‘I’m going to give the 4x4 a once over before we leave. Make sure to have a breakfast because it might be a long time before we have another opportunity to eat a square meal.’

  Some of my anticipation had been quashed by how stern Hunter was and I quickly realised that this wasn’t a simple adventure I was about to embark on. This was a mission that could turn into a life or death situation in the blink of an eye. I managed to force down a bowl of porridge and I had some toast with goat’s cheese on it; this was about the most appetising dish I could create using the meagre contents of the fridge and cupboards.

  It was an unimaginative meal, but it would set me up for the day ahead and by 7am I grabbed the only thing I was taking with me: my jacket. It was a little reminder of how basic my life had become. It still felt a bit strange not having a phone or cash or a laptop. I had more or less adjusted to life without those things. I was now free to be myself and not dependent on technology or the media to tell me who I was meant to be, and how I was supposed to live my life.

  In truth, I’d been forced to cast aside all belongings by Hunter and Romand before him. This was the way of the Guild. It was never openly talked about, but I knew the reason they didn’t permit their members to have much in the way of possessions was because if a member was killed in action the authorities wouldn’t be able to link them to any other members of the Guild. It made perfect sense. We were meant to be like phantoms who came and went without anyone being able to track us or to know our business. While the rest of society was becoming more and more traceable because of their mobile phones or email accounts or social network profiles or banking details, we remained clandestine. We were shadows that crossed the world and could never be captured.

  Though the mission could turn out to be perilous my mood was as bright as it had been for months. I was no longer confined to the wilderness and I was about to take my first step to becoming a proper agent of the Guild of the True. I was also chirpy because Hunter had said to Ballentine that he liked me. I wasn’t an attention seeker, but it was always nice to be liked, and despite the rocky relationship I had with him, I did want Hunter to believe in me and to deem me a worthy successor to his old friend, Romand.

  Hunter had been a mystery to me for so long and now in the last twenty-four hours I’d discovered he wasn’t the selfish creep he’d first appeared to be. He was now almost human in my eyes. He even had a fling with Linda Farrier – who was rather hot as far as I could remember. I don’t know why he denied it to Ballentine; any man would be proud to be associated with her. Maybe he was just shy. That meant I would have to take a sly dig at him about it. We were no longer enemies, but I was still going to wind him up from time to time and this tidbit of information would provide me with a lot of ammunition.

  He was gaining my respect too. He’d obviously had a tough life and he was also proving to be exceptionally brave. He’d actually requested to be sent to Switzerland to hunt down the person who murdered all those people. Ballentine had said the murderer must have been extremely powerful yet Hunter didn’t hesitate to volunteer to find this person. I’m not sure I would have been so quick to put myself forward for such a task.

  I stepped outside and shielded my face from the rain that was carried on a steady breeze. Did it ever stop raining in this part of the world? I really should have brought a hoodie or a hat with me, but there didn’t appear to be time enough to go back inside. Hunter was hanging out the driver’s window and staring at me.

  ‘Get a move on, Bentley! You’re worse than a woman!’

  ‘Nag, nag, nag. I don’t see why you’re in such a big rush because you drive like a granny.’

  ‘You’ve got a real smart mouth for someone who hits like a granny!’

  ‘You weren’t saying that yesterday when I gave you that black eye.’

  ‘You weren’t too clever when I electrocuted you in the forest. It looked like you were doing the moonwalk!’

  ‘The moonwalk! Jesus, you’re really showing your age. I’m surprised they haven’t offered you retirement from the Guild by now.’

  ‘All right, any more of your lip and you can stay out here on your own.’

  I sat into the passenger seat and pointed at the driveway. ‘I thought you said we were in a rush. Let�
��s get going.’

  ‘I hate teenagers.’

  With that he floored the accelerator and we were soon speeding along the lonely road that led from the cottage into the open countryside. It was a sombre looking place, lifeless fields on either side that stretched out to the highlands, a faint mist was weighing down on the land and a bruised sky hung above the distant mountains, and the rain never ceased. It was the quietest and most isolated place imaginable. There wasn’t a house, other than Hunter’s cottage, for many miles. Only a member of the Guild would choose to live in such a place.

  Within twenty minutes I was getting bored. Hunter hadn’t said a single word since we left the cottage and was probably mulling over his strategy to find the girl and we couldn’t tune in any radio stations on his prehistoric car stereo because no signal could find its way through the mountains. I wondered what he was planning and couldn’t resist being nosey. It would be interesting to see how he worked. Despite being around many of the Guild members, I was yet to witness how they conducted their investigations.

  ‘How long will it take to reach Newcastle?’ I asked.

  ‘This road will lead us close to Sterling. We can get onto a motorway from there and it should be about four hours to Newcastle. I’m hoping we’ll get there by midday.’

  ‘Thanks for keeping me in the loop, Hunter. I know you could have kept me in the dark and I appreciate you being candid about this whole thing.’

  ‘Don’t get carried away, Bentley. We’re not going to be holding hands on this trip. We’re partners for the next couple of days so I’m cutting you some slack until we have the girl and have her delivered to the Guild. The more you know about this case the more benefit it is to me. So, I’m not doing you a favour by giving you information, I’m doing me a favour.’

  He reached into his coat and handed me the newspaper clipping that Ballentine had given the night before. I took it from him and unfolded it on my lap. It said that the girl had recently been taken into state care and while she was at a temporary foster home she had made two predictions: the sinking of a trawler in the North Sea that killed five fishermen, and a bus crash in Wales that claimed the lives of seven people. The article didn’t name her and there was one photograph where her face was blurred out. It went on to explain that her foster parents couldn’t handle her unruly behaviour and that she had recently been moved to a new home in Newcastle. It was a big city and there were no real clues to her exact whereabouts. To me this would be a virtually impossible task.

  ‘How on earth are we going to find her?’ I wondered. ‘It says she’s in care which means she could be anywhere.’

  ‘We won’t be able to locate her through conventional methods. The social services go to great lengths to keep this information protected. We have someone working in that area who usually helps us out in situations like this, but she’s ill at the moment – perfect timing! The only option we have right now is to question the newspaper people responsible for that article. That will have to be our first port of call.’

  ‘But they’re not going to be willing to tell you where she is.’

  ‘We’ll get the information one way or another,’ he assured me. ‘Let’s go to the newspaper offices first and we’ll see how it goes from there.’

  ‘No master plan?’

  ‘We’ll have to think on our feet. This is usually the way investigations go; we never have clear leads and we have to improvise in any way we can. Sometimes it’s better not to have a set plan because it can lead to complacency, which can lead to sloppiness which can lead to us getting killed.’

  ‘I was thinking …Wouldn’t the work of the Guild be made a lot easier if we just killed Golding?’

  ‘You think we haven’t tried before?’ He shook his head and snorted.

  ‘Does an agent or an assassin have to get clearance from the Guild before they can kill someone?’

  ‘Not exactly. If an agent is working on a case and their life is in danger then they have the freedom to protect themselves. That often means killing. But you only kill if there is no other option. You can’t just go around killing anyone who doesn’t share your point of view. On the other hand, an agent cannot make a decision to hunt and kill someone because they see them as a threat. Those decisions are made by the Council, and trained assassins normally do that type of work.’

  ‘Why hasn’t the Guild sent assassins to snuff out Golding?’

  ‘Golding rarely appears and when he does he’s usually being followed closely by the media, not to mention his own assassins, and the police like to have a presence when he’s out and about.’

  ‘Where does he stay when he’s not out and about?’

  ‘He used to have a big facility in the US but it was more secure than Fort Knox, we could never get near him while he was there. When Marianne started threatening him he moved his operation.’

  ‘Where to?’

  ‘I don’t know. Finding Golding is often like chasing your own shadow.’

  ‘Now that you mention shadows, how did you create those shadows in the forest? It was like fifty people were running through the trees.’

  ‘I’m a light-tuner. I can create light, I can alter light, and I can remove light. That’s how I made those shadows; I simply created a space that was emptied of light. It’s taken many years to perfect the technique so that the shadows appear humanlike.’

  ‘I don’t like giving you compliments, Hunter, but it was fairly impressive. It had me dumbfounded for a while.’

  ‘That’s the best use of light-tuning: distraction. Remember that if you ever come into conflict with someone who has that gift. They will distract you using light, just remain focused and remember it’s nothing more than an illusion.’

  ‘There are so many different gifts and each have so many applications. It’s impossible to create defences against each one. It would take a lifetime!’

  ‘True. It’s healthy to have knowledge of each of the true gifts because it gives you a fighting chance.’

  ‘Which is the strongest of the true gifts?’

  ‘Hard to say.’

  ‘In your own opinion.’ It was hard to believe I was having a coherent conversation with Hunter for the first time. Within the space of a single day he’d been transformed from my tormentor to someone I could relate to. ‘Come on, you have to have an opinion, Hunter.’

  ‘Psychokinesis is very effective when a person has precise control over it. Mageletonia is devastating when someone has a pure from of it. Mind-switching is less flamboyant, but is just as deadly – they can transport their minds into someone else’s body and use them to kill.’

  ‘What about the Seductor Mortis, isn’t that the strongest?’

  ‘What are you talking about?’ He straightened up at the mere mention of the fabled sixteenth gift, almost as if he were frightened. I had been expecting a reaction but not like this.

  ‘Romand told me the story of the Kematian. I’m pretty sure you know all about it, Hunter.’

  He gave me the ‘don’t-ask’ look then turned back to the road without making comment.

  ‘Pretty creepy story …’

  ‘No one knows what really happened, Bentley.’

  ‘I thought there was talk of people rising up from the grave?’

  He let out a snigger with a slight element of nervousness in it.

  ‘What’s so funny?’

  ‘Nobody rises from the grave – thankfully. Most of the stories about the Kematian are nothing more than urban legends. Barkley was a good man who was twisted by the deaths of his friends. He wasn’t the first to go that way and he certainly won’t be the last. It was said he had some higher power, but I never really believed that. He was most likely a raving lunatic who drew up enormous amounts of power because he was so severely deranged.’

  ‘Romand believed otherwise.’

  ‘Romand also drank too much wine when he was telling stories.’

  ‘You did go looking for him. You admitted that at Romand’s funeral.
’

  ‘I’ve been on a lot of wild goose chases over the years. I just hope we’re not on one right now.’

  ‘You want me to change the subject?’

  ‘Please do.’

  ‘All right. What’s the deal with you and Linda Farrier?’

  ‘How did you know about that – I mean, what are you talking about? There is no deal with me and Farrier!’

  ‘How come her raincoat is in the cottage then?’

  ‘We were working together. She left some of her stuff behind. There’s nothing more to it than that.’

  ‘I believe you.’

  ‘Bentley, shut up!’

  ‘What? I’m just saying that I believe you. I also believe that’s why you were so angry that I was sent to stay with you. It meant you couldn’t sneak old Linda to your lair for a cuddle.’

  ‘You think you’re funny, don’t you?’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘We’ll see how funny you are when I tell Farrier that you were making fun of her. I’ve seen her beat the crap out of grown men for less.’

  ‘Stop it, you’re scaring me now!’ I laughed. ‘What gift does she have?’

  ‘The same ability that you have.’

  ‘Which one?’

  ‘The ability to drive people insane by never shutting up!’

  ‘I see. She talks too much which doesn’t fit in with your strong, silent type routine. I can see how that could create problems in your relationship.’

  ‘Talking about relationships, I had a good laugh when you were leaving little Cathy Atkinson a couple of months ago. I really thought you were going to cry that morning. Poor Bentley … Poor, poor little Ross.’

  Hunter laughed out loud and I couldn’t help joining him. I thought the journey to Newcastle would have been a boring one but I was starting to enjoy it, and the banter with Hunter was becoming more and more amusing the more I got to know him.

  When we cleared the mountains the radio static cleared up and an echo of music came from the crackling speakers. Hunter reached out to the stereo and used his electropsyching powers to clear up the reception. I was hoping it would be some decent music – a bit of hardcore or indie rock – it turned out to be traditional Scottish music, which didn’t agree with me. Hunter loved it. He whistled along to the tune and I didn’t complain. It was quite an experience to see him happy for a change.