Preternatural (Worlds & Secrets)

by Lloyd Harry-Davis

  I adjusted my midnight black blazer on me. On its left pocket was the school crest, a green clover in a badge. The trousers were also midnight-black, matching the blazer. We wore plain, crisp, long-sleeved white shirts and were forced to keep the top button buttoned at all times. The tie was striped emerald green and black and we were asked to wear any shoes of our choice as far as they were black and formal.

  The girls were to wear either tight fitted black trousers or a black pencil skirt with black tights, a long-sleeved white shirt, the school blazer and tie. The same rules of footwear applied to them too – unless off course you were a senior, where your code of dressing was given some amount of leniency.

  “I feel uncomfortable,” I complained to my brother. We walked out into the hallway through the student crowd who were either unnecessarily blabbing away or going to their lockers. Jaden was the pacifist and smart twin – no words needed to describe me because I was his exact opposite.

  We attended an enormous, intimidating, private school called Cressile in Richmond upon Thames; London. We were in year nine. It got annoying, looking identical when we were younger – but our physical differences kicked in later during puberty. However, Jaden and I had the tendency of looking older than we were.

  We were both freakishly tall for our ages (6’1” to be exact), the same height; marble-skinned and had the same hazel coloured eyes. But I was the curly devil, with a vast amount of frizzy russet hair. I had a thin and long face with a defined jaw. My nose was somehow long and my ears were small – always hidden behind my curly mane of brown hair. Matching my tall and elastic body, my arms were long and thin. But uncharacteristically, my legs were longer than my torso.

  Jaden, on the other hand – with a head full of long, drooping, dirty blonde hair with hints of black here and there – seemed a little more normal and so did his name: Jaden Dyfan Blue. Unsurprisingly, his limbs were very similar to mine. He often gave the impression he was always angry, since the edges of his eyes seemed to mostly be in slits. His face however, was generally like mine – long and thin. We were different from everybody. We never really knew how. These differences were physical – everybody we saw or looked at had some sort of ‘norm’ to them, something common. In fact, something that looked relatively easy to the eye. But for us, we were so strange and bizarre, just seeming to pop from a crowd. Why, a family once walked up to my mother, siblings and me and asked what part of the world we were from. I always thought we got it from our mother. She was naturally, unbelievably beautiful – a siren, almost. She had been graced with effortless beauty.

  We walked through the hall slowly, clutching the straps of our bags behind our backs and a few books in our hands. The end of school was a moment I could definitely not wait for.

  “No, seriously, my neck feels sore,” I grumbled. I rubbed the back of my neck and itched madly.

  “Let me see,” Jaden said, pushing his way past. He lowered my collar. My neck was turning pink and I had red blotches starting to surface. Jaden winced.

  “Urgh, looks like you’re breaking out in a heat rash.” I scowled and continued itching. Jaden pinched me brutally.

  “Stop itching! You’ll make it worse!” he said. Suddenly, through the main double swinging doors down the hall, came a girl nudging herself past other students – it was either that or students were terrifyingly moving away from her. No – wait….yeah, they were terrified of her.

  She was an average height, sixteen-year-old girl with a silver stud piercing on her lower lip. She seemed classy in a black pencil skirt and black tights. Her white shirt seemed uncommonly clean and her blazer had not a single crease on it. She was a senior in the graduating class here. I guess that explained why she was allowed to wear black and white knee-high Converses. She was a back-length chestnut brunette with a thick fringe over her forehead and was gifted with the thin, yet athletic, figure of an acrobat. Her skin seemed slightly paler than Jaden’s and mine and I couldn’t help noticing how incredibly smooth it was. She was on her phone, texting as she strutted down the hallway. People practically made an aisle for her in fear as she advanced.

  We walked ahead and she stopped right in front of us, dropping a hip, slamming her phone shut and stuffing it in her pocket.

  “Hey, losers,” she snarled viciously at us. She had no care in the world. At least, that was the only expression I got from her gleaming hazel eyes.

  “Is mum here?” she asked us whilst folding her arms. Yes. She was Jade. Jade Mallory Blue, our elder sister and unfortunately the first Blue offspring.

  “How should we know? We only just got out,” Jaden and I said simultaneously. We had the tendency of doing that. Jade quickly grimaced and put her manicured hand on her mouth.

  “Aden, why do you smell like vomit?” she asked with her eyes clamped shut. My eyebrows squeezed together in confusion.

  “Oh, right, that’s not vomit – it’s frog guts.”

  “What, did a practical joke backfire on you?” my sister asked sarcastically.

  “No it…it combusted,” I said, scratching my neck madly.

  “Stop…itching, you mongrel!” Jaden snarled, grabbing my arms and keeping them in an arm lock. “All right, okay,” I succumbed, before he let go.

  “What’s wrong?” Jade asked confusingly.

  “He’s breaking out in a heat rash,” Jaden answered. Jade sighed and looked at her watch.

  “We should get going,” she said, with a somewhat saddened look in her eyes.

  “Why?” I immediately quizzed. Jade exhaled and looked at me, slightly disappointed.

  “A.J.,” she said softly.

  “You don’t remember?” Jaden interfered.

  “Remember what?”

  “We planned to go to dad’s gravestone today. Mum doesn’t know. If she did she would get all…emotional,” Jade answered.

  “Well, sorry for forgetting…this itch – kind of distracts you.” I replied, attempting to scratch. Jaden simply stared at me with his eyes uncomfortably wide open every time my hand came centimetres away from my neck.

  “Oh my goodness, I have to scratch – it’s starting to burn!” I complained.

  Jade kept looking ahead curiously at the main door down the hallway.

  “We should go. It’s going to take us at least an hour to get there,” she sighed.

  It was so serene and peaceful… beautiful…calm….

  Jaden, Jade and I sat down in front of the arched cement stone planted in the ground inches from us. We were surrounded by a field of tulips for acres to go. I wasn’t even sure if we were still in London – Jade made us take three trains – but it did seem worth it.

  The sky was azure and completely clear. Although, hints of a fiery orange were starting to set in. The clouds had all thinned into cotton lines that stretched across the heavens, and the few aeroplanes that flew past left their trails.

  There was only one tree, arching towards dad’s gravestone with emerald leaves and a dark brown trunk. Jade rested her head on my shoulder as we stared at the memorial, consecutively repeating its inscription in our heads.

  “Here Lies

  Jerricho Murdoch Dyfan Blue

  Humble son, Cherished father, and Beloved husband.

  1964 – 1995

  May His Soul Rest In Peace”

  “Are we sad?” Jade asked through the natural silence. The birds tweeted as the sky darkened to orange. Twilight began painting itself into the world.

  “I ‘dunno’. Are you?” Jaden asked while she sighed.

  “I shouldn’t be. We barely knew him – but I feel sad…ish,” she mumbled.

  “Maybe the ‘dad’void is getting to you,” Jaden replied.

  “I wonder if his body’s beneath us,” I asked quietly. Jade smacked her forehead with her hand.

  “It’s a gravestone not a grave you idi– I won’t insult just because we’re in the presence of dad’s symbol of remembrance,” she retorted light-heartedly, but still having her head rested on my shoulder
. I swore in my head and may God help me if she could have heard.

  “So…is that a yes?” I asked quietly. Jaden and Jade sighed, out of patience for my idiocy.

  “How is it Jaden’s smarter than you?” Jade giggled.

  “I know, we asked that earlier,” Jaden and I responded concurrently.

  “Even weirder, he’s blond and you have brown hair. Hey, aren’t blonde’s meant to be dumber?” Jade continued.

  “Explains why I have a higher IQ than Aden. Ha! I disproved a stereotype,” Jaden replied, overly joyous.

  “Yeah, so have a thousand people before you,” I mumbled loudly.

  “It doesn’t count if you dye your hair!” Jaden quickly snapped. We laughed lightly and I looked up.

  “It’s getting late. We should go, or mum will be worried,” I said, finally standing up. Jade stood up gloomily and Jaden followed. Jade kissed her hand and lightly pressed it against the stone.

  “Goodnight, dad,” she mumbled. We turned around about to leave when I suddenly tripped. I looked back at my foot, startled and not understanding what I was doing back on the floor. A vine had tightly attached itself around my foot. Maybe it was just me but it seemed to tighten itself as I struggled against it.

  “Hey, guys –” they didn’t seem to pay attention as they spoke and went on ahead. I gripped the vine tightly and tried to tear it but nothing worked. I sighed hopelessly. It was then that I struggled to bend to my foot and rip the vine apart with my teeth.

  “Hurry up!” Jaden yelled. Great, he answers when I finally don’t need him anymore.

  Bizarre though, I don’t remember having a vine wrapped around my feet. I quickly stood up and ran to the others.

  “Hey, wait up!”

  The atmosphere seemed hostile and dull. The region of Hydrottes was submerged in an irrepressible fog, had demolished buildings and shattered windows. The sky was not visible through all this gloom. Tantrus walked down the pavement, holding somewhat of a pendulum in his hand by a cord.

  It was his pocket watch. He bounced it up and down as if it were a toy. He wore smart pinstriped russet trousers, a long white-sleeved shirt and a brown and black striped waistcoat; all topped off with a long, ankle-length grey coat. His point-tipped brown leather shoes cracked and crumbled rubble as he gently swaggered through the obliterated pavements and cratered streets at his own desired pace.

  His brown silky hair sagged on his forehead in thick spikes saturated in gel and he had a clean, thin unshaven face. His nose was pointy, his Caucasian skin was tanned disproportionately and, up close, his hands seemed lighter than his face.

  He pertained an expression of boredom and remained indifferent to anything he laid eyes on; his demeanour was somewhat frightfully unapproachable. A coin was span consecutively in Tantrus’ hand as he walked down the pavement. He stopped and faced the road – still bearing the same expression on his face. He turned the coin faster and faster and then flipped it into the air.

  “Reveal to me the hidden world covered and protected by this realm of shadows,” he muttered under his breath. The coin landed into his hand and he remained ignorant to it – until he took the coin and smacked it onto the back of his fist seeing that it had landed on the face which had a large ‘V’ engraved on it.

  He then flicked the coin onto the cracked road. He watched as a sudden gust of wind raged through the deserted streets. The man did not look the least bit surprised. It started out with hints of colours unravelling through the wafts of fog. The gloom began to fade away to reveal people walking about with open shops and ringing bells. The world underneath the gloom leapt forward. Each time something was pieced together, a golden electric spark surged through and mended it.

  A bird swooped down from the sky, zooming past Tantrus and suddenly morphing into a person who then carried on walking away casually. Tantrus almost had a faint smile on his face as though he was satisfied of his doing.

  He headed for the shop opposite him and walked on nonchalantly, climbing two steps and then opening a glass door with a red and silver frame. A bell concurrently sounded as he gently pushed the door open, still at his own pace. The shop was nothing special. More of a tedious, dust-harbouring shack to anyone’s eyes. All that was there were dusty shelves on the walls occupied by vials and worn-out- books, a fireplace constantly burning and a long, broad wooden table between the main door through which Tantrus had entered and a plain wall at the far end.

  Tantrus clicked his tongue and calmly walked around the table distancing him from the far wall. He stopped and briefly looked at the empty birdcage in the corner. He reached the end of the room to see the tunnel going underneath the shop. Its steps seemed narrow and wrongly tiled. However, the tunnel was arched, paved immaculately and the bricks were of a bright sandy colour. He went in, bending his head. The steps he had already taken suddenly began to close up behind him and blended into an innocent large brick wall as he descended, creating the illusion that no tunnel existed.

  He still bore the same expression – bored and indifferent. His mouth was clamped shut, looking like he was pouting most of the time. As soon as Tantrus’ foot touched the last step, he stood up straight and bold, flexing the muscles in his back.

  Tantrus released a low-toned ‘tut’ from his mouth. A large, arched, thick, metallic door with black hinges stared him right in the face. His eyebrows furrowed in misperception. The door was covered in concaved fist-shaped dents. The knuckles’ prints were the most defined of the several imprints. There were about ten of them, nearly in the same direction – as if someone was trying to penetrate the safe protection provided by the door. Both of Tantrus’ left and right hand sides had endless tracks which eventually led to pitch black oblivions at the end of the tunnels.

  “They lead to nowhere…” he whispered to himself, with his eyebrows still pressed together. He turned to look on his right side only to notice one of the lights flickering and giving out irritating noises of sharp static. He stared deeply into it as the dim light blinked continuously. His eyes squinted as he observed the area until the door swung open. He quickly looked back to the door, revealing a man that looked at him intensely and then gave a bellow sigh.

  “Tantrus,” he said in a husky voice.

  “Mr Tarchall,” he replied courteously. This man was Nicholas Tarchall, a lawyer in the Supremacy Court. His height was overwhelming and he displayed a look of superiority that struck intimidation into those that stared at him.

  “Do come in, Mr Wittle,” Mr Tarchall growled to his visitor.

  “Thank you, sir,” replied Tantrus, stretching a brief and wide sheepish smile across his face. The room was small and compact. The air conditioner sent a refrigerating sensation coursing through Tantrus’ rough skin. A large circular glass table was placed in the middle of the room and on the wall behind, was a broad shelf with a collection of jars atop it containing unusual specimen.

  Pressed against the back wall was a comfortable-looking, spongy, velvet sofa that encircled the room. A Roman numeral clock hung above the evenly-positioned shelves. There was a pin-up board on one of the walls with all sorts of information on yellow sticky-notes and glass chairs that matched the wide table.

  Tantrus and Mr Tarchall weren’t alone; there were three other people in the room. There was a tall dark skinned fourteen-year-old boy, a half-caste fourteen-year-old girl who was shorter than the boy by a couple of centimetres, and a tall Caucasian woman. The woman went by the name Angelina, a tall blonde with a sophisticated posture and an appearance of someone in her late thirties.

  Her eyes were a piercing and icy blue, in fact they were so light and glacial they almost blended with the whites of her eyes. Her head was filled with long, wavy-tipped, back-length flaxen hair that coiled like exotic springs. She was in every way, the epitome of beauty, class and elegance.

  The boy was named Robbie Roxeth. He was a unique individual with the ability to alter matter. He looked a bit odd wearing a brown, laced leather wrist wrap that was tied a
round his right wrist; the threadlike laces crossing each other in x’s.

  The girl was Tammy Roxeth – sister of Robbie, despite the differences in skin complexion. She too was very unique in her own way. She was able to see past, present and rarely, slight futures. Her powers strangely acquired her telekinetic abilities. She was almost as tall as Robbie and was slender. Her constant widely opened eyes seemed too big for her face and this was probably due to the fact that she was always busy searching through wonders that could not be seen by common mortals. She kept her long, full, very rich black hair in a perfect French plait. The golden light in the room seemed to make its sleek and slight afro texture stand out.

  Tammy always had a pendant around her neck, hung on a thin, glowing, silver wheat chain. A silver snake was coiled around the heart-shaped pendant, looking as if it emerged from its centre. The coiled and visible part of its body was at the bottom, with its mouth wide open and giving the impression of swallowing the heart whole. Tammy’s appearance screamed innocence and kindness: a frilly pink skirt, exploding with fabric of different violet shades, a white t-shirt and a black waistcoat that she wore on top, with a pair of pink and black knee-high Converses. But her voice – dear God it was another story to be told.

  The girl was fourteen but her voice could move mountains and shake planets. The dominance and regal resonance with which it sounded was uncommon for a girl that age. Despite the siblings’ age however, they looked and behaved exceedingly mature, speaking with an accent and tone that was so imperial, they were often mistaken for miniature adults.

  They all sat down on the glass chairs around the table. Tantrus looked around as if he was acknowledging everyone’s presence before seating himself. Angelina sat upright and fiddled with her thumbs nervously as a long coil of her golden hair dangled over one of her eyes. However, Tammy and Robbie both seemed on edge.

  “So? What did the king say?” Angelina said, practically pouncing on Tantrus as he sat.

  The man seemed unsettled; his eyes were wide open and had a maddened look running through them. He seemed to choke as he spoke.