by Sarah Kelly
“Freedom!” people in the crowd shouted back at him.
“That’s right,” he said. “Freedom to do as we please, without consequences. I see this as a very simple case. This so-called ‘good witch’ has refused to comply with the favor presented. Then he put up a fight and had to be silenced. I admire his will, to go against even the Magic itself, which could have perhaps made him one of us. But as he seems so adamant to fight everything we stand for, and his will is in the service of ‘justice’ as he calls it, we might as well dispose of him.”
Many of the crowd started cheering.
“Psychically, or physically?” someone shouted over the crowd’s noise. “Kill him bodily, or kill his soul?”
India couldn’t believe what she was hearing. It was like living and breathing in the worst nightmare she ever could have imagined.
“What a good question,” the man said, smiling. “Well, either would have him off our backs for long enough. Though psychic torture is so much fun… Plunging a knife into his chest would be enjoyable, for sure, but it’s rather crude.”
“No,” one of the men at the head of the cross said, and unsheathed a huge dagger from his belt with a clinking sound. “It’s easy, it’s quick, and we can use his blood for our next ritual. Nothing more powerful than fresh blood from a dead victim. Think of all the transfer of energy. We could take his life force and channel it into our next project.”
India felt her blood run cold. She had no idea people and powers so heinous as this ever existed.
“Or you could change the favor!” a voice shouted from the back. She could have sworn it was Luis but couldn’t be 100% sure – his voice had an evil streak in it.
“No, no, no,” the man with the dagger said. “Let’s spill his blood and claim his power!”
The cavernous room erupted in noise as the crowd agreed, thirsty for violence.
“Very well,” the striding man said. “I shall take your place, and you shall do the honors.”
His back toward where India stood, the man with the dagger threw his hood back. She wondered, her pulse racing, just who it would be when he turned around.
“Silence!” he yelled, then turned to stand in front of Xavier.
What felt like a bolt of lightning struck through India as she saw him? She didn’t know him at all, not recognizing his bald head or large stature, but the look of pure evil in his eyes pierced right through her.
Now! Luis said. Do something! Save him!
The man lifted the dagger high above his head, about to plunge it into Xavier’s chest.
“Wait!” a woman’s voice shouted from under a dark cloak. She had been among the crowd, but pushed through with a piece of paper in her hand. It was so long it trailed on the ground behind her.
The man lowered the dagger, looking annoyed. “What is it?”
“There is a traitor in our midst,” she said, walking up to him and pointing to something on the piece of paper. “A psychic message advising that this worthless piece of human nothingness should be helped immediately. Someone in this room.”
A certainty swept over India then – she was going to die. Xavier was going to die. Luis was going to die. This would all be over. Their blood would be spilled, their bodies sacrificed to the evil schemes of these people.
And something deep within India rose up, and she spoke without meaning to, her voice booming loudly around the room and sounding thick with evil and malice. “I say we put an end to this once and for all. I’ve got the perfect idea of what favor we should make this miscreant do. We should make him kill himself with the dagger,” India said, pulling her hood down a little.
“No!” the dagger man hollered back. Exactly what India had been counting on. “Then we couldn’t take his life force! Don’t you know anything?”
India’s voice deepened, swirling with threatening overtones. “So you think the favor you’ve requested is better?” Please say what it is, please say what it is.
“Are you stupid or what?” the dagger man spat. “Tchort needs that gardener killed, and someone local to pin it on. It makes total sense!”
“Indeed I do,” a British male accent spoke out coolly from a nearby hood.
“That’s right,” the woman with the papers said. “But he can’t do it if you’re going to kill him, are you?”
The man with the dagger raised it again, and the crowd cheered.
“Kill him!” someone shouted.
“We’ll find someone else to kill the gardener,” the dagger man said. “We’ll spill the blood of this one. We’ll capture his strong will through his blood and use it for our own ends.”
The woman with the papers nodded. “That seems reasonable!”
“Don’t kill him!” India blurted out. She needed to bide just two seconds to make the chant. “Make him do it! Torture him until he does it.”
The man who had been striding around peered at her. “Just who are you, anyway? You speak like an elder and yet I do not recall who you are.”
India coughed as loudly as she could, then began, the bridging was in error, completed by the fallen. The favor will bring terror, defying Magic’s order. She felt all her strength seeping out of her, like her legs were going to buckle under her, but she knew she needed to reach Xavier and touch him. Her head was thumping like crazy again. He refuses… to kill Liam.
“Someone’s reversing the bridging and favor magic!” the woman screeched, looking down at the paper.
“You!” the man with the dagger said, pointing at India.
The whole world was going fuzzy, and India’s legs felt like lead. She felt like she could drop down dead at any second. People began to rush toward her, and she knew she was going to either die from giving out so much energy to that spell, or by this crowd who were ravenous for blood.
But just then, she had one last energy boost. Luis, she felt. And it gave her just enough strength to push the hooded figures in front of her aside and grab Xavier’s dangling, lifeless hand. And the last tiny bit of energy left she used to finish the chant. He refuses!
And everything went black.
***
India had been listening so intently that her concentration lapsed, and she leant on the door a little too hard, making it creak.
“Who’s there!” Laurence cried out immediately.
His footsteps sounded on the flagstone, and India and Xavier looked at each other in terror for a split second. Xavier grabbed her wrist and yanked her into the space between the climbing peas on frames and the wall. They shimmied through, their feet silent on the moist, soft soil. The creak of the door opening rang out just as they turned the corner where the wall skimmed the other side of the pond.
“Who’s there?” Laurence called again, stomping through where they had been, wrenching pea frames from their places and tossing them to the side.
India’s breath caught in her throat – they were going to be found out. There was nowhere else they could go. The wall was too long for them to get around to the other corner in time, and the vegetable frames were too sparse and bare for them to hide behind.
And then Laurence stood above them. “Ha!” he said, making a dramatic turn around the corner.
India, her heart flooded with fear, was about to try and explain, or at least to talk her way out of it, when a hand closed around her mouth.
“Shh,” Xavier whispered, so close to her ear and so quiet it almost got lost in the gentle breeze.
“No!” India cried out. “Don’t do the spell, Xavier!”
Laurence’s face brightened when he saw them. “Hey, guys.”
India stood up on shaking feet. “You… you killed Felicia? You’ve been fooling us all along?”
Laurence’s face creased into bemused confusion. “What? What on earth are you talking about?”
“Don’t pretend,” India said. She looked at Xavier and squeezed his hand, so glad to have him back by her side. “I heard you talking to Liam just now. He was blackmailing you. And you said
you were going to pay out after the exhibition.”
Laurence looked genuinely perplexed, his brow furrowed. “India, are you all right?”
“I’ll be fine once we’ve gone to the police,” India said. She felt righteous power pumping through her body. “And don’t even try to harm us and think you’ll get away with it. We have… strength you know nothing about.”
Laurence shook his head. “I don’t understand. I haven’t been talking to Liam. I was looking for him myself.”
“W… what?” India said, unsure of herself. “Don’t lie. He was right there.” She pushed past Laurence. “Come with me, Zave.” Then she went into the pond area where she had seen them talking. The pond was covered with a blue plastic cloth she was sure wasn’t there before. “He was right there, smoking pot,” she said, pointing to where Liam had been.
Laurence came through after them. “I was here two minutes ago and I didn’t smell any weed. I haven’t seen him at all.”
“But he was here, and he took the wheelbarrow over…” India was about to point to the rest of the garden, when she spotted the wheelbarrow propped up against one of the walls. “What the…? Zave, isn’t it true what I’m saying? Didn’t you see him go over there?”
Xavier rubbed his forehead. “I… I don’t know. I feel funny. It’s like I blacked out or something.”
India looked from him to Laurence, who looked his charming, regular, friendly self, and felt like she was going crazy. What on earth had just happened? She looked Laurence up and down suspiciously. “Why were you looking for Liam anyway?”
Laurence laughed sheepishly. “Well, I’m having something I call painter’s block, you know, like writer’s block. And I often come out by the pond here to think. I like to look in the water. And he’s only gone and covered it with this bloody plastic thing again. He says it’s so he doesn’t have to fish out leaves all the time, but I tell him that he gets paid to fish out leaves. I can’t stand it, it make the whole place look unnatural.”
India felt like she’d just stepped into a parallel universe. “Uh huh.”
Laurence sighed. “He’s probably off smoking a joint somewhere, or with his girlfriend. I’ll just take it off myself.”
India leant against the wall, looking between Laurence and Xavier over and over, trying to work out what in the world was real and what wasn’t.
Laurence, sighing all the while, walked to each corner of the pond in turn, where the plastic tarpaulin was attached to a nail. He removed the nail at each corner and the tarpaulin crumpled down on the water. Then he grabbed the edge of the tarpaulin and pulled it back in a swift swoop. “There, that’s better,” he said, gathering it all up. “I’ll just put it behind this bush…”
He trailed off and looked down at the water. He gasped, looking truly shocked.
India had been looking toward the gardens for any signs of Liam, and Xavier had had his eyes closed. They both looked toward Laurence at his gasp, and then gasped themselves. India felt like all the breath had been sucked out of her.
Liam’s body was floating upside down in the pond.
CHAPTER 9
“No, no, no,” India said, shaking her head as she packed her bag. “This is getting too weird.”
Even though she and Xavier had talked through what had happened probably a thousand times, India still couldn’t make head or tail of it. No matter how many times she heard their story over, it just wouldn’t sink in. She felt like she wanted out – out of the whole mystery, out of the whole magic thing, even out of investigating all together. She and Xavier would just go live in Mississippi, buy a house with a wrap around porch on a 30-year mortgage, have 2.3 kids and drive their Ford to their regular 9 to 5s. Maybe get a cat. That would make much more sense.
Xavier was much slower at packing his suitcase. India just tossed things in and worried about wrinkles later, but Xavier was more precise and careful and it was driving India up the wall.
“Can’t you just hurry up?” she snapped. “There’s a killer on the loose, probably Laurence, and you’re fussing about folding socks?”
“Don’t snap at me, India.”
She flopped on the bed and let out a long sigh. “Don’t call me India. And sorry. It’s just… I feel like nothing makes sense anymore. I thought this whole Magic thing was a good thing, to help people and make life easier and stuff. But now, it seems like we’re in some big war or something.” She shuddered at the memory of the hooded figures, and the knife they raised to plunge into Xavier’s torso. “I didn’t sign up for that.”
Xavier folded his T-shirts meticulously, looking disturbed. “I know.” Then he swallowed, sticking his chin up to try to look brave. India could still see the vein throbbing in his forehead, though, and the slight shaking of his hands. “But isn’t that just like life? We’re here investigating a murder. Well, now, two murders. We’re on the side of justice, they’re on the side of their own selfishness, and they’ll do anything, even kill again, for their own ends. Isn’t that a kind of war already? In life, some people are evil and selfish and hurt people. I guess… why should Magic be any different?”
“I guess.” India felt like crying. “I just wish it wasn’t. I wish there was just one thing in the world that… that could be 100% good. With no corruption or arguments or anything negative.”
“Nothing in the world’s perfect, In,” Xavier said, then his eyes brightened and he took her hands in his. He pulled her up to sitting and planted a kiss on her lips. “Though you’re pretty close.”
India rolled her eyes and giggled. “I’m far from perfect, Zave. I’ve got extra love handles and an overactive imagination… oh, and murder follows me around wherever I go.”
“Wherever we go,” he said. “I’ve been there all the while. An overactive imagination is good, because you can see all the possibilities.” He went back to packing his case and said casually, “Oh, and I love your love handles.”
India couldn’t help a huge smile spreading over her face. She watched him, with his deep brown eyes, inky lashes, and soft black hair coiling tightly at his scalp. His broad shoulders and strong chin. And you’re perfection to me, Zave, she thought.
***
“Thank you so much for having us, Mrs Clitheroe,” India said, sipping on sweet tea in the dainty china cup she’d been given.
“You’re welcome, dears,” the elderly lady said, still fussing about with what she called the ‘biscuit tin’ and saucers for each of them. She passed a flowery saucer to Xavier and opened the tin for him. “Mrs Rowan was sad to see you leave. She said so when she called me. But she understands you feel uncomfortable there. She does herself, but of course she needs the wage Laurence pays her.”
“Of course,” India said. In all honesty she was a little worried about Mrs Rowan, seeing that everyone who worked at Aston Paddox Hall seemed to be dropping like flies. But when India had asked if she still wanted to work there, she told India she wasn’t an easily intimidated woman.
Mrs Clitheroe smiled kindly. “I hope you like your room.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Xavier said. “It’s very comfortable.” He picked out something they’d both come to like immensely since their stay in England – a bourbon biscuit. It was a sandwich-style cookie, a bit like an Oreo, but rectangular. The filling was chocolate buttercream, and Xavier and India just couldn’t get enough of them.
“This whole case is turning very sinister indeed,” Mrs Clitheroe said, holding the biscuit tin out for India, and looking as if she were enjoying the whole drama a little bit too much. “Two people murdered at the Hall.” She shook her head. “Very wise for you to come and stay here. Who knows who the next victim could be.”
India nibbled on her bourbon biscuit and shook her head. “I really hope there isn’t a next victim at all.”
“I hold out hope,” Mrs Clitheroe said, then hurried to the living room door and shut it. She then bustled back over to them, nimble on her aging feet despite her curved over frame. “Well, it’s quite a
possibility, isn’t it?” she said in a stage whisper. “You know, that Liam is the last victim.”
Xavier sipped on his tea, frowning. “Why do you say that, Mrs Clitheroe?”
The elderly lady lowered herself down into her chair, her eyes shining with conspiracy. “Well, think about it. I know this is ghastly to say, but one can’t help but wonder…”
India braced herself, waiting to hear Laurence’s name. Again, her faith in humanity would be torn apart. In truth, she was feeling rather fragile, and could have done with a day tucked up in bed, hiding under the covers and pretending the world didn’t exist.
“Tasha,” Mrs Clitheroe whispered, her eyes darting around like there might be gossipy villagers hidden behind her TV set or armchair, ready to spring out at any moment. “I’ve heard – though you mustn’t repeat it – that Felicia and Liam were quite the item.”
“Yes,” Xavier said, looking at India with shocked eyes. “We’ve heard that, too.”
“Well, pregnancy hormones can do all sorts of things,” Mrs Clitheroe said matter-of-factly. “She could have flown into such a rage that she killed Felicia, then finished off the job with Liam.” Then she laughed. “Oh, goodness, that sounds horrible. I’m sure that’s not true.”
India’s brain started ticking. “It does seem unlikely, but often the killers are the last people you’d expect. The only thing is, though, she’s quite a small woman. She would have been able to strangle Felicia, I’m sure, but how on earth would she have dragged her all the way to the freezer?”
“Unless she killed her in that room,” Xavier suggested. “Maybe lured her there under some pretence.”
“Something to do with the baby, I’m sure,” Mrs Clitheroe said, suddenly animated. “Maybe pretended to bond with her over the pregnancy.”
