by Amy Casey
There was someone there.
Movement, right up ahead.
My fists clenched. I felt my hands go clammy, my heart picking up even more.
Because there was somebody up ahead.
They were walking towards the construction site.
Right towards where I was heading.
I stayed still a few seconds. Resisted the urge to progress, to keep on going after them. Although I knew in the back of my mind that I wanted to follow them. I wanted to see who they were, why they were heading in the same direction as I was.
And whether they had anything to do with the murders, first and foremost.
I started to move slowly, when I was sure they couldn’t see me and when my eyes were no longer on them. Because I was pretty sure they hadn’t seen me. I had to take advantage of that fact; had to make the most of it.
So I picked up my pace. Kept on moving, going further and further.
And when I reached the edge of the construction site, I felt that pull dragging me back, one final time.
You don’t have to keep on going.
You don’t have to do this.
I took a deep breath as I stood there at the corner of the construction site. My mind was right. I didn’t have to keep on going. I didn’t have to do this.
But then I took another deep breath and sighed.
I was doing it.
Even though I didn’t have to, I was doing it.
I turned the corner.
I didn’t see it immediately. Not at first. It didn’t strike me like I’d expected it to, in any grandiose sort of way.
But what it did do was grasp my attention.
What it did do was sink its teeth into me, slowly, savouring every bite.
I saw the NO ENTRY sign clearly.
I saw the small outhouse that still hadn’t been knocked down; a remnant of the past, and the dark void within.
But more stark and more alarming than anything, I saw something else.
Two things, actually.
First I saw movement heading towards that dark void, stepping inside.
And then I saw a light.
There was somebody in that outhouse.
There was somebody in that void.
And they were waiting for me.
Chapter 41
I looked at the light glowing behind the “NO ENTRY” sign and I knew it was finally time.
The darkness around me felt like it was growing even darker, even more intense, with every step I took. All the background sounds and noises seemed to be drifting further out of touch, slipping out from my grip as the sensory overload of this dark tunnel wrapped its claws further and further around me. I felt that, although I was walking towards it, there was something else in charge now. Something else, like a force from this place itself.
And as I made my way closer towards it, the details of the case further spun around my mind. What must’ve happened. The daisies. The talk of washing up. It could only mean one thing.
Pedro was the murderer. Somehow, he’d made Janice’s ghost look like him. He must’ve had magical abilities. It explained why he could speak to Rocky. And more crucially to the case, it explained why Pedro’s ghost had been speaking so differently. He hadn’t been speaking like Pedro at all. He’d been speaking like Janice.
Which meant that wherever Janice was… that wasn’t Janice inside her anymore. It was Pedro. Somehow, through means beyond my understanding, it was Pedro.
It was complex. It still felt like a bit of a reach. But at the same time, it made sense. Total sense.
And I had a feeling I was walking right towards the killer right now.
I remembered the confusion his ghost had shown. Remembered the words they’d said.
They hadn’t sounded like Pedro’s words because they weren’t Pedro’s words.
They were Janice’s words all along.
I squinted at the light ahead of me in this dark void. I’d seen someone before. Movement. And I knew that someone was waiting in there for me. Deep down, I knew they weren’t exactly going to be up for making friends with me, either. I got the sense that it was only me who could see them—and they knew it.
Pedro knew it.
He was waiting for me.
Whatever being was in possession of him was waiting for me.
I stumbled a little as I got closer to this entry. What if this was all part of his plan? What if I was the final piece of the square? If he was luring me here with the intention of murdering me all along?
And yet even though I knew that all of my fears were distinct possibilities, I still kept on going. Because it was what I had to do. It was what I was here for.
Hell. It was my purpose.
I might finally be getting some seriously good use of my abilities; a chance to actually make my magic work for more than just spying on other people’s thoughts for once.
I thought of the resistance my dad had towards me using my abilities for anything “too gnarly,” in his strange choice of words. And even though he was resistant, I felt proud. Proud that I was finally stepping up. Proud that I was finally putting my abilities to actual good use.
I knew he’d be mad as hell with me if he knew what kind of situation I was throwing myself into. But damn. It was about time I did something with my life besides sell cupcakes and coffee.
Not that I was knocking my cupcake baking abilities. I was pretty damn good.
I reached the NO ENTRY sign. Stared as it sat there all foreboding, half tempting me to turn around, half tempting me to step towards it.
No, wait. More than half tempting me to step towards it now. I was beyond the hesitation by now.
Well. Pretty much.
I stepped beyond it, holding my breath. And as I did, I saw that light getting brighter. There was a blue hue to it, but there was warmth about it, too. I didn’t know how to explain it. There wasn’t any logical explanation for it really. But then I’d seen the realms of the illogical myself. I was a witch, for heaven’s sake—I was basically illogical incarnate myself.
I focused on this warmth, all inviting and drawing me in. I lifted my hand. Tried to ease myself towards it.
Then I heard movement behind me.
I spun around. For the first time since getting here, I found myself drawn away from the clutches of that blue light. And I realised it was actually rather foreboding when I broke from its draw, and not at all inviting. It scared me a little. Like it’d taken hold of my sanity somehow. I needed to keep my guard up, that was for sure.
But I was in an unexpected position. And that unexpected position was that I was looking back out the tunnel at something walking my way. Not just one something, but two.
My first response was fear. Fear at who this was. Fear at what they were going to do to me.
But as they got closer, something else took over as I realised who it was.
Something more like… disbelief.
Total disbelief at the absurdity.
I watched as the two figures came into view and I narrowed my eyes.
“Annabelle?” I said.
Annabelle cleared her throat. She looked at me, then at the blue light beyond the NO ENTRY sign, clearly in disbelief about what she was witnessing.
“Never mind, Annabelle,” a voice to her right said. “How about you tell me where the hell you think you’re going in the middle of the night without me?”
It was Rocky.
Annabelle was here with Rocky.
And they were both here with me, facing the darkness of the void.
Chapter 42
So, wait a second,” Annabelle said. “You’re going to have to explain this to me very slowly. You’re telling me you’re, like, a magician?”
I’d worked myself up to this moment for quite some time. I mean, I’d suspected that Annabelle might think there was something amiss about me, something that didn’t quite add up. She’d spent enough time working in Witchy Delights to know me, after all—and enough time aroun
d me to know that I wasn’t just an average person.
But to be honest, I hadn’t built myself up to breaking the truth to Annabelle right about now. Now was supposed to be where I walked into the outhouse, into the void beyond, and confronted the killer. Now wasn’t the time I was supposed to be explaining the ins and outs of sorcery to my, respectfully, not-too-sharp friend and work colleague.
Not to mention the fact that she’d gone and brought my talking bloody dog along with her.
“Not a magician, exactly,” I said, trying to keep my cool as I walked further inside the depths of this tunnel that seemed to have formed beyond the small-looking exterior of the outhouse. The bright light was growing gradually further away. I had to keep up with it. But at the same time, I had to be on my guard, just in case. Just in case there was somebody watching. Somebody waiting.
Because there was somebody in here. And I knew they would be just waiting patiently for their moment…
“I mean, I’ve always known you’re a bit of an oddball,” Annabelle said.
“Charming.”
“Well. You are, aren’t you? Bit of a weirdo to say the least. Everyone knows that. Don’t have to work with you for all these years to see that.”
“Again, thanks, Annabelle. It means a lot.”
“No problem,” she said, not detecting my sarcasm. “Question is, what the hell are you doing here of all places?”
I turned around and faced her, frowned right at her. “What am I doing here? Annabelle, what the hell are you doing here? And why have you brought my dog along?”
“Hey. Don’t talk about me like I’m not here—”
“You shut up,” I said.
Annabelle frowned at me. “Stella, did you just…”
I rubbed my hands through my hair. “Yeah. I spoke to my dog.”
Annabelle’s frown expanded. “I mean you’re not only telling me that you’re, like, a magician—”
“A witch.”
“But also you’re telling me you speak to wildlife.”
“Not wildlife in general. Just Rocky.”
“But how—”
“It’s a long story and right now I don’t have a long time. You should leave. The pair of you should get back to Goosridge right now and get away from here. It’s not safe.”
“Actually, that’s why I came looking for you,” Annabelle said. “It’s Mary. I… I had this awful dream. This awful dream that something was happening to her. Like she was being… being drawn towards something. So I came looking for you.”
“You had a bad dream about Mary. So you decided to break into my house and take my dog?”
“Hey. It wasn’t just a bad dream. It was… It was a feeling. That’s the only way I can describe it. A feeling like I’ve never felt before. And anyway. I didn’t break into your house. You’d left the door open, for one, and Rocky was in the street. He pretty much led me towards you. Must’ve been on your scent or something. Which, considering you smell like you need a hell of a shower, doesn’t totally surprise me.”
“Again. Thanks, Annabelle. I’ve had other things on my mind lately.”
“Like this place?”
“Exactly like this place.”
“What… What exactly is this place, anyway? I didn’t realise it went so far down.”
I turned around and looked towards the fading light. The walls of this place were closing in, getting narrower. In all truth, it was triggering my mild claustrophobia, but I knew I had to get superficial mental blocks like that out of my mind if I wanted to get anywhere at all here.
“It’s the place where everything leads to.”
“That’s… not really answering my question.”
“The murders. I believe that somehow, they occurred here. That… that the killer drew the victims here using some kind of force and then they… yeah. They did what they did to them here.”
“And who do you think the killer is?”
I felt a knot in my stomach as I thought back to something Annabelle had said. Something that had slipped my mind when she’d first mentioned it, but that had reared itself in the forefront of my mind now.
“What did you say about Mary?”
Annabelle frowned. “What about Mary?”
“You said you went to look for her. Something about a bad dream. Is she okay?”
“Oh,” Annabelle said. “Like I say. That's why I came to find you. Because I couldn’t find her.”
My stomach dropped. I turned ahead, and I saw the light had stopped. It was completely still, right ahead of me.
And then I saw something else.
Just a glimmer of light. But in that glimmer, I saw her clearly.
I saw Mary.
“Mary,” I said.
I stumbled forward then. And something happened. Something… shifted.
The ground went uneven under my feet. For a second, everything shook.
I lost my balance. Tumbled below.
And when I got back to my feet, the movement stopped.
“What was…” I started. But my voice was echoey. It didn’t sound the same as before.
I looked over my shoulder for Annabelle, for Rocky.
But they were nowhere to be seen.
They were gone.
They were somewhere else entirely.
And I was somewhere else entirely.
I looked back ahead of me.
And then I saw her.
She was hovering above, elevated in the air. Her eyes were closed. She looked so peaceful. Like she was sleeping.
And then I saw who was beneath her.
I’d been expecting to see Pedro, in all truth. Or his true form, whatever that was. Because he’d made it look like he’d died while shifting into Janice’s body. But surely wherever this place was, that magic had dropped now and I’d see him for who he really was.
But I didn’t.
Instead, I saw Janice.
She was smiling at me. She wasn’t bent over like she used to be. She didn’t look like she was struggling to stay on her feet. She looked totally assured. Totally confident.
Almost inhuman.
She was looking right at me and smiling.
“Hello, Stella,” she said. “Nice for you to finally get here. I’m guessing you have a lot of questions, don’t you?”
Chapter 43
Pedro?”
Janice smiled at me when I said Pedro’s name. But it wasn’t a smile like she was impressed by my intuition. It wasn’t anything like that.
It was a smile like she was still one step ahead, somehow.
“I thought you might fall for that. Well, I kind of hoped you wouldn’t. Part of me figured your intelligence went far beyond mere games. But alas. Here we are. And I can see from the confusion on your face that you still aren’t totally certain what is going on at all.”
I wished I could answer. But honestly, I was stumped. Because this sounded like Janice, not Pedro. It looked like Janice.
And although some of her mannerisms were different, there was no denying what I was looking at.
This was her.
“It’s pleasing to see you bought into the whole ‘body shift’ angle. I mean, I did a good job of making ‘Pedro’s ghost’ look like him while embodying my own characteristics, didn’t I? Pedro’s ghost. Pah. I knew you’d fall for that sorcery. If only that man had a ghost, maybe then he would’ve been able to truly help you.”
My heart began to pound. Slowly but surely, it felt like the pieces were all falling into place. The pieces that had been there all along.
The pieces that I’d been looking right at without truly seeing for so long.
“You… you killed Pedro all along,” I said. “His ghost… that was just an illusion. An illusion made to look like him and sound like you to confuse me. You’re behind this whole thing, right from the start.”
“I needed a distraction. I knew you were on Pedro’s tail. And sure, it would’ve been nice to keep you going down that path a while longer.
But the truth was, I needed you here. I needed a way to bring you here. And when it looked like I wasn’t going to get you here at all, I figured Mary would be good enough bait—as well as an important edge of the square. But as it turns out, you found your own way here after all, somehow.”
I rubbed my hands through my hair as I looked up at Mary. She looked higher up than I’d initially thought, more out of grasp than she’d first seemed.
“I did just enough to make you believe Pedro was the culprit. Just enough to lead you down that path. He didn’t help himself, really. Very nosy. Very inquisitive. I almost admired him. But anyway. I did all I could to make sure you ended up here. Because that’s how the square closes. That’s how it always closes. With someone truly powerful. With someone who has… gifts.”
I felt my mouth begin to dry. I knew I was running a risk by coming here, but it looked like I’d fallen right into Janice’s trap all along.
“That night,” she said.
“The night when your cat went missing.”
“Oh, that’s when it began. Truth be told, I knew what you were, Stella. I’ve known for a long time. Our ancestors, they go a long way back. The conflict between us goes through generations. Your father, I believe he tried to warn you. I believe he tried to keep you from getting involved in this conflict. You should’ve listened. Truly.”
It all started to add up. All started to make sense. Pedro was a distraction, and nothing more. His murder wasn’t a part of the square. That explained why the killings in the past were all women, and Pedro’s murder didn’t fit in to that pattern.
It was all to pique my curiosity.
It was all to draw me here.
Right into this trap.
“I mean, did you not even think to query where poor Peter happened to find his Hemlock, after all? Did you not think there was a possibility that somebody like me, with my knowledge, could create an almost identical Valerian concoction to the one Collette was selling? Did you not think it would be possible that I might be able to plant an idea in someone’s head? An idea so strong that it ties them up in the case once and for all?”
I should’ve known that the signs were there from the start. The floral smell, as benign as it was, that was the key. And the daisies. All those daisies in the kitchen. Innocent enough, but a sign of this woman’s love for flowers and plants.
