‘You ok,’ he called out but she did not respond. Her neck was throbbing and each breath burned her throat while shock numbed her for she had thought she was going to die.
‘Just keep going,’ said Jason turning his head awkwardly to look at the driver. ‘Wow, have you seen your face?’
‘My face?’ shouted back the driver. ‘My bloody face? What about my bloody car, you’re gonna owe me for life for this.’ He paused as he jerked the steering wheel to the left, barely slowing as he took the corner. ‘Who the hell were those guys?’
‘Hey, sorry TJ, I’ve never seen cops act like that before.’
‘Yeah well, you’re on your own,’ he replied braking hard as they approached a junction. Without stopping he swung the car out onto the road and floored the accelerator again. He reached up and began to feel his face, testing to see if his nose was broken.
‘I have to go back,’ whispered Nicola.
‘You can’t be serious TJ,’ said Jason not hearing her over the roaring engine and the slipstream blowing through the open window frame. ‘What am I supposed to do with her?’
TJ turned to him, his eyes glinting dangerously.
‘You can do what the hell you want with her Jason, but I’m out of this. Jesus, they were crazed.’
‘I have to go back,’ said Nicola again a little louder. Paul was in the square. Like a lifeboat in a violent storm she clung onto this belief, this knowledge, and it was the only thing that was keeping her from breaking down. She had to find him. Despite everything that had happened he was the only thing left that she could believe in.
Hearing her now, Jason looked down sharply while TJ turned to him shaking his head and laughing.
‘Man, that’s the funniest thing I’ve heard. We just rescued her from some total psychos intent in killing her and she wants to go back. Wow.’ He turned back to watch the road still shaking his head in disbelief. ‘She’s nuts. You’re welcome to her.’
‘What do you mean you have to go back?’ asked Jason incredulously. She stared back at him.
‘This will have to do,’ said TJ pulling into the darkened entrance to a supermarket. He sped across the car park to the far side and then skidded to a stop, engine idling. He turned to Jason, his face set with menace.
‘Get out the car Jason. And take your mad woman with you.’
‘Shit man, ok.’
Jason scrabbled for the door handle feeling bits of glass brushing against his fingers. He popped the door open and rolled out of the car just managing to land on his feet. He held his hand out for Nicola seeing the dark red marks around her neck already beginning to turn to blue black bruising.
Gripping his podgy fingers she began to pull herself out of the car. Flecks of glass fell away from her clothes as she stood unsteadily next to him. Pushing the door shut he shouted out. ‘Great, thanks TJ.’
‘Don’t push it Jason, I’ll be seeing you about this.’
With that the car revved viscously, spun round in a squeal of tyres and then was gone, speeding across the deserted car park before braking sharply and disappearing around the corner and back out onto the main road. They stood side by side in the emptiness, the engine noise gradually fading away. In the silence that followed Jason shifted uncomfortably on his feet as he cast sidelong glances at Nicola who just stood and stared at the shadowed supermarket. She could feel her neck throbbing, the sensation of the man’s fingers choking her still fresh. She knew they were something more than police, wanted to shy away from the sensation she had experienced when looking at the man with the ponytail. It had seemed like he was not really there, a shadow of a person and within that shadow had been darkness and beyond that something more sinister. It was that which frightened her the most, for the intent had been clear. Her heart began to race as the realisation hit her. He had wanted to kill her. She felt her legs trembling. Paul was right, Falk was right. As much as she wanted to deny it, to pretend normality was what was real, that magic did not exist, her brain could no longer accept that. Something had definitely happened to her, her mind was changed, perceptions altered and now something was trying to kill her. It hit her then. Jason had saved her. She turned to him.
‘Thanks,’ she said, her voice sounding distant to her, her gratitude overwhelming, ‘I think you just saved my life.’
Jason gulped wondering just how intense this evening was going to get. A sense of pride welled up in him for he had never had something like that said to him in his life.
‘It was nothing,’ he mumbled. ‘Hey, are you okay?’
She nodded, feeling numb.
‘I’m sorry about your friend’s car.’
‘Oh, don’t worry about him,’ he said quickly. ‘He’s a bit fiery. We know someone who’ll fix it. Anyway, just who were those guys?’
‘I wish I knew,’ replied Nicola quietly.
‘They were not like any police I’ve seen before,’ Jason continued. ‘Normally they arrest you. Not try to choke you to death.’
‘I don’t think they were police,’ said Nicola.
He turned to her.
‘You know a lot more, don’t you?’
‘Jason,’ said Nicola staring at him, a strange look in her eyes.
‘Yes.’
‘Something weird is happening to me.’
‘I gathered that,’ he said as he wondered just what else could happen on this night.
‘I met someone a couple of days ago, Paul. He told me things, things you would not believe, things I did not believe until now.’
She shifted her weight from foot to foot feeling suddenly chilled in the cool night air. Something was prickling at the edge of her awareness.
‘He,’ she began but did not know how to continue. She swallowed fighting back sudden tears. ‘Something happened to him too. I thought he was gone but back in the square, just when we got in the car I heard his voice. He called my name.’
Jason did not know how he could feel so suddenly jealous of someone he had not even met.
‘Ok,’ he said guardedly.
She looked at him earnestly. ‘That’s why I have to go back now. To find him. I have to know it’s true.’
‘Are you serious?’ he said incredulously. ‘We just got you out of there. What if those creeps are still hanging around?’
‘They will find me anyway,’ she replied with certainty, knowing now that it was true.
‘Not if we hide, get you out of town, you don’t have to go back,’ said Jason suddenly scared for her.
‘You don’t understand. They can find me, I don’t know how exactly but they can. He’s the only one that can help me.’ She thought of the man Falk. Why did she not trust him?
‘But they tried to kill you,’ cried Jason.
‘I know,’ she whispered wondering herself why she was going to do this but what choice did she have?
He looked at her in disbelief and then shrugged.
‘Ok, but I’m coming with you.’
‘No,’ she said touching his arm. ‘You’ve done too much for me already and they’re dangerous. I don’t want you to get hurt, or worse.’
He felt her touch. That someone seemed to actually care what happened to him was something he had never experienced before. It made him more determined to help her.
‘What if I get hurt?’ he questioned her in disbelief. ‘What about you? It’s you they’re after. I don’t know what you’ve done but, wow, they want you bad, dead or alive.’
She looked at him sharply.
‘Ok, perhaps not the best choice of words,’ he said holding his hands up.
It was then that they heard it. A low moaning that cut across the night, like a faint howl.
In the moment of silence that followed Jason found himself looking around, fear tugging at his chest. The car park was ringed by trees and bushes and, apart from the front of the supermarket, everything was shadows and beyond were even darker shadows that could be hiding anything. A breeze ruffled the trees behind them sending empty crisp pac
kets and coke cans slivering across the tarmac and Jason jumped, turning sharply, heart pounding, but he couldn’t see anything. Suddenly scenes from the hundreds of horror films he had seen flashed into his mind and a prickling sensation walked itself up and down his spine, the kind you’re supposed to get when something monstrous is stalking you in the dark.
‘Erm, what was that?’ he said shakily.
Nicola turned to him, aware now that time was running out.
‘I’m sorry Jason, I have to go.’
‘What? No,’ he said as she began to back away from him.
‘Thank you,’ she mouthed to him and then turned and began to run across the car park towards the exit.
‘Nicola, wait,’ he shouted as he began to follow but quickly realised he would never catch her and stopped already feeling out of breath. She had to be going back to the square and was following the main road back down to the town centre. He knew there was a footpath that went along the side of the supermarket and through a small wood that would cut the corner off. If he was quick he might still be able to catch up with her. He began to head towards the entrance to the path which was hidden in the shadows. He stopped, his breath coming hard, eyes jumping left and right. His imagination of what was hiding in the dark was running wild. Did he really want to do this? He could walk away now, go back to his foster parents’ house and his Playstation and then he would not have to be scared of walking through a wood in the dark, of meeting those men who could swat him down as easily as they would a fly. If he went back and they were there what good could he do? He actually turned and took a step but then he stopped. The memory of her touch on his arm, that she actually cared what happened to him sent a pang of guilt through his system. Was he really going to just abandon her in response? He stood torn between his fear and his desire to do something for someone. For a few seconds he was motionless, the battle raging in his mind. Then, with his decision made, he turned back to the path and was soon swallowed into the darkness.
Chapter Twenty Two
Nicola ran as hard as she could along the streets. Her head was swimming and emotions were running chaotically through her body. Guilt, terror, fear, desire, need, love. Images and feelings generated from the last hours of her experience were now totally out of control and swamping her until she could no longer think. Occasionally cars flashed past while darkened houses and streetlamps were a blur in her peripheral vision that no longer registered. Then, from deep within her mind energy stirred again sending a trembling fear and awareness through her, pulling her back with a force she could barely resist, yet still she ran for there was nothing else but him. Her mind registered the ground flattening out, houses and buildings crowding in on either side, and she knew she was nearing the square. In her mind she held an image of him and she projected this outwards with all the force of her consciousness in the hope that he would sense it and find her.
She turned a corner. A tall shadow framed by orange light stood on the pavement in front of her. Before she could react she had slammed into it knocking the breath out of her body. She felt hands like iron gripping her, expertly harnessing her momentum to spin her round and pull her to one side and, before she knew what was happening she was in an alley, everything dark, and she tried to scream but a hand was over her mouth. She kicked hard, her legs contacting nothing, yet still she struggled with all her might, desperate fear coursing through her.
‘Nicola.’
A voice. His voice.
‘It’s me, Paul.’
She carried on struggling wondering why now, at the end, she should hear his voice.
‘Shh Nicola shh, calm down please, just relax, you’re safe now.’
She was still alive. No-one was choking her or stabbing her or anything else to kill her. He was speaking to her, telling her to be calm for everything was ok.
She felt the hand leave her mouth, the grip on her lessen slightly. Her body registered this quicker than she did, the struggling lessening until she became still, a curled ball on the ground. All she could hear was the sound of her own rapid breathing, the pounding of the blood through her body. Slowly her eyes flickered open and she saw Paul kneeling over her, his face in shadow, his eyes gleaming faintly, and, as she took him in, her world began to fall to pieces around her.
‘Paul,’ she whispered in disbelief. She reached out to touch him, her hands moving across his face.
He responded, pulling her to him and kissing her urgently. Then he was hugging her tightly, feeling her tears against his skin.
‘It is real,’ he said.
‘Don’t leave me again.’
His own tears flowed freely.
‘We have to move.’
Reluctantly they pulled apart. Nicola looked into his eyes that held so many secrets.
‘Are you going to kill me?’
He looked at her, unable to move or speak, his heart thudding heavily in his chest.
‘He said you wanted to kill me. That you were the Rider, bound to somebody called Myrkur. He said you were bad.’ Her eyes flicked between his, searching for some truth yet they gave nothing away. ‘Is this true Paul? Please tell me.’
She felt his body stiffen.
‘Who said these things?’ he asked.
‘A man, Falk. He called himself a warrior of the forest, that he served someone called Gwen. Was that your Aunt Gwen?’
Paul remained kneeling, his body as heavy and unmoving as stone.
‘He said she died saving me. I was there Paul. I saw the Rider, the same as I saw that night outside my hotel window.’ She reached up as the tears fell down her cheeks, her hands caressing his face. ‘It was you, wasn’t it?’
He felt her touch on his skin and it burned until he could not breathe.
‘I tried to wait for you, after I was awakened. But it made me go outside. I couldn’t control it. But you never came to find me.’
‘I had no choice,’ he said.
Her eyes fell away from him.
‘They almost had me Paul, my neck.’ She pointed to the darkened weal around her throat. ‘Are they really wolves?’
He saw the trauma, his blood chilling in his veins.
‘They are real if that is what you ask,’ he said. ‘Wolves is a fitting name for them.’
Her eyes were closing as her head span, tiredness overwhelming her. She forced them open again, focusing on him.
‘Why are they doing this? Why are they hunting me?’
‘To stop the awakening and end the Light,’ he responded watching as she drifted in and out of consciousness. She opened her eyes again to gaze at him.
‘And you,’ she said her voice so quiet. ‘Why are you hunting me?’
‘You ask me questions I cannot answer,’ he said hoarsely, the words sticking in his throat.
‘What’s it like Paul? Being the Rider, having the power to kill.’
He pushed himself away from her.
‘When will you kill me?’ she continued.
‘You ask these things yet you do not run,’ he forced the air across his vocal chords, his voice thick with suppressed emotion.
‘How can I run from you?’ she said so softly that for a moment he thought he must have imagined it.
‘Gwen was wrong,’ he said heavily. ‘I was betrayed.’
She smiled up at him, everything hazy and dreamlike, reality bending around them. ‘And now you will betray me?’
He looked down at her, his heart a dead weight in his chest, his body immobile.
‘So you must,’ she whispered rising up to take his hand and pull him down, her mouth meeting his, her hands gently holding his head as she kissed him.
Jason ran as fast as he could along the path. His legs were pumping like mad, lungs panting for breath. He was in the middle of the woodland now, a dark ominous mass that had appeared in front of him as the path arrowed away from the supermarket and the comforting orange light spill of the streetlamps along the road. Moonlight filtered down through the leaves to give a faint glo
w to everything but there were still too many shadows and he forced himself to keep his eyes to the front, for if he looked to the side he would begin to panic. Instead he tried to keep the image of Nicola in his mind but as he carried on deeper into the woodland he felt his courage begin to fail him but he was committed now and so he forced himself on.
Soon he began to feel a sharp pain in his side, like a stitch when he had run too much when he was little, and after a few more steps he was forced to stop and he stood in the darkness with his hands on his legs, body bent over as he drew air heavily into his lungs. His legs were beginning to feel like jelly and as he thought about it he realised it was probably the most running he had done in the last five years. Now he was stuck for he could not run any further and here he was, probably only half way to the square, in the middle of nowhere with nothing around him but the trees and shadows. As he stood there his imagination began to run riot again and he felt adrenaline begin to pump into his system. A sudden breeze swept through the trees ruffling the leaves and making him jump. Circling around slowly he tried to make out anything in the darkness but he could see nothing.
‘Come on Jason,’ he said to himself. ‘It’s only a wood, nothing to hurt you.’
It was then that he heard it, louder than when they were in the car park, a low moaning that, now he was on his own, sounded suspiciously like the howl of a wolf.
Trembles ran up and down his body as his brain processed this new information and sent panic signals to his nervous system.
‘This is not happening,’ he told himself. ‘There are no wolves in this country. It’s just a trick of the wind.’
He breathed deeply trying to calm himself. ‘Let’s just carry on to the square and meet Nicola.’ He took a step forwards but then another low moan sounded out across the wood, this time from behind him, and his head shot round, eyes flashing wildly from left to right.
‘Shit,’ he whispered his heart thumping in his chest. An answering howl came from in front, a lot closer than the first.
‘Shit,’ said Jason again, a huge surge of adrenaline coursing through his body causing him to shake violently. He looked up and down the path seeing nothing except darkness and then, wait. He looked back. Was that shadow moving? His eyes tried to focus in the darkness and he rubbed them and looked again but the shadow had gone. It was too much for Jason and, turning, he ran as fast as he could back up the path but after a few steps he stumbled on a tree root and felt his ankle go over with an almost audible snap. Sharp pain lanced up his leg and he hopped along a few paces before sinking to the ground clutching his leg and moaning.
The Dark Rider (Fading Light) Page 21
