Phantom Stag (A King's Watch Story Book 1)

by Mark Hayden

  Phantom Stag

  Table of Contents

  Welcome

  Prologue

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  Author’s Note

  Table of Contents

  PHANTOM STAG

  A King’s Watch Story - Book 1

  by Mark Hayden

  As told by Vicky Robson

  Copyright © Paw Press 2019

  www.pawpress.co.uk

  Front Cover © Lawston Design 2019

  www.lawstondesign.com

  Images © Shutterstock

  Welcome to the Phantom Stag…

  This story is a shorter adventure from the tales of the King’s Watch.

  It takes place about one third of the way through Tenfold, the Fourth Book of the King’s Watch.

  You don’t need to have read any of the other books to follow this story.

  All the characters mentioned here, and all the special magickal terms are explained in the Who’s Who and Magickal Glossary on the Paw Press website:

  www.pawpress.co.uk

  Prologue

  The Hunter

  It had been a clear night. A cold one, too. Over the Hunter’s shoulder, the stars in the east were dimming as the sun limbered up to replace them. Another half an hour and it would all end in failure, ignominy and recriminations. Unless…

  There. A light in the trees. Two lights. Maybe three.

  The Hunter didn’t take his eyes off the leading light as he picked up his bow and straightened up, his knees creaking just a little from squatting on the damp grass. He touched the Artefact on his chest and felt the threads and patterns of the Charm come alive under his fingers. He drew some Lux and wove the net of magick that would hide him from the onrushing deer. They were nearly at the edge of the forest, and he would soon have a clear shot. So would the enemy, the other Hunter who must be chasing them – deer wouldn’t break cover like this unless they felt in danger. He took an arrow and notched it to the bow.

  The first deer broke through the bushes at the edge of the forest, and the Hunter started to draw the bow and take a bead on the stag…

  Just in time, he saw it. That was no stag: it was a doe, heavy in calf and clearly in distress. He shuddered at the thought of what would happen if he’d brought her down. Then the second deer broke through and he saw them gleaming against the black trees – the curving, elegant points of silver antlers, the crowning glory of a Phantom Stag. The arrow was in the air before his head knew what his hand was doing. When the arrow struck the beast, an enormous flash of Lux burst across the meadow, blinding him and sending a horrible shiver up his spine.

  The doe had disappeared into Home Wood before his eyes cleared, and the Hunter placed his bow carefully down before jogging a little unsteadily over the grass to finish the job.

  He reached for his knife as he approached the beast, a few spots of light still cartwheeling around his mundane and magickal sight. And then he stopped, hand on his knife, jaw hanging slack at what lay on the ground before him.

  With an enormous shudder, he took out not his knife but the short hunting horn.

  The Priestess

  She hadn’t moved for over an hour, and wouldn’t move until Bríd showed her face over the hills and brought the hunt to an end, perhaps with a smile, more likely with a frown at the horrible incompetence of the so-called Hunters. Eight hours they’d had to find the Phantom Stag. Nothing. They were a disgrace to the Foresters.

  She had been looking at the main part of the forest, rising gently across the valley. The flash of Lux over to the left took her by surprise, and she gasped. So much magick. That could not be a good omen.

  She turned to look at the source, well away to the south west and somewhere near Home Wood. She opened her Sight and saw a rising plume of Lux, a spirit dissipating and blowing away. That was some Stag indeed.

  And then she heard the horn. Not the notes of a clean kill but the repeated blasts of distress. On and on they blared.

  By her side, Tanya struggled to her feet. The Priestess turned to her handmaiden and said, ‘Quickly. Get me there as fast you can.’

  Tanya lifted her skirts and jumped on to the quad bike, fumbling off her gloves as she reached for the ignition. The engine was roaring into life as the Priestess climbed more sedately onto the pillion. Neither woman bothered with helmets. Tanya flicked on the headlamps and set off across the field.

  The lights picked out one of the Hunters in the meadow between Home Wood and the edge of the forest. The Priestess rose a little in her seat to peer over Tanya’s shoulder as they approached the scene. The Hunter was standing slack and slumped, the silent horn now lowered, and staring at something by his feet. Something large.

  Something human. With a hunting arrow sticking out of its chest.

  Tanya slowed and stopped. The Witches dismounted and stared. Not its chest – his chest. The dead man was heavily camouflaged, but there was no mistaking him. The standing Hunter was Colwyn, and at his feet was one of his rivals in tonight’s Royal Hunt. Ioan. The Priestess’s great nephew.

  Tanya let out a whimper, chewing her knuckles.

  ‘What happened?’ snapped the Priestess to Colwyn.

  ‘The Stag,’ said Colwyn, half in a daze. ‘I shot the Phantom Stag.’

  ‘Clearly you didn’t.’

  She heard a noise from the edge of the forest and saw a light bobbing towards them. She waited until the third Hunter, Aaron, had arrived.

  ‘In the name of Bríd, what’s happened?’ said Aaron when he’d seen the body.

  ‘The Stag,’ repeated Colwyn. ‘I shot the Phantom Stag.’

  Tanya and Aaron looked at the Priestess. What happened next was up to her. She knelt down and touched Ioan’s body before turning to Tanya. ‘Get my phone and switch it on. It’s in the bag.’

  ‘Are you going out of the Circle?’ said Aaron.

  ‘Of course. If the Foresters are going to survive this, we need someone else to investigate. I’m calling in the Witchfinders.’

  ‘The King’s Watch? But Mack’s left the country. They’ll send Rick James. The Foresters will never speak to him.’

  ‘They’ll send the Dragonslayer,’ said the Priestess as she accepted the phone.

  ‘Why? How?’ said Tanya.

  ‘Because he’s a friend of my son, that’s the Why. The How is more difficult. The cost to me is going to be very high.’

  She found a number in her phone and stabbed the green icon. Calling Chris appeared on the screen.

  Captain Victoria Robson FGW MC KW RMP

  At least, that’s what I think happened out in the Forest of Arden this morning. That’s what people told me happened. I wasn’t there. I was thirty miles away in Clerkswell and fast asleep in me bed.

  I am not a morning person. Never have been, probably never will be. Besides, five o’clock isn’t morning in my book. More like the middle of the flipping night, though I do understand that other people think differently. One of them is Myfanwy.

  I didn’t hear the hammering on the door. I didn’t hear her shouting my name. I didn’t hear anything until she came in and shook me. Credit her, she tried to be gentle.

  ‘Vicky! Wake up!’

  ‘Umngrr.’

  ‘Vicky! Wake up! I’ve got the Constable on the phone.’

  By the gods, is that a huge pink bunny holding a phone?

  ‘Mngggrrr! Wha?’

  ‘Hannah. The Constable. Your boss.’

  At that point, my conscious reflexes took over from my automatic ones, and I sort-of woke up. Sort of. The large fluffy shape by the
bed turned into a blond Druid and not a huge rabbit. She was still pink though. That dressing gown…

  ‘I knaa who she is, Myvvy.’

  ‘Yes, and she’s on the phone.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Yes. Here.’

  ‘What time is it?’

  ‘Half past five.’

  She held out her iPhone. At least she’d put call on mute. With some reluctance, I took it from her.

  ‘Put the kettle on, pet,’ I said, struggling to sit up. ‘And why did you wake me? Why not his lordship? And what was she doing ringing you in the first place?’

  ‘She said I wasn’t to wake Conrad until I’d given you the phone, and she called me because she knew you’d sleep through it if she rang you. I’ll be in the kitchen.’

  I rubbed my eyes and unmuted the phone. ‘Ma’am?’

  ‘At last! I hope you feel like shit, because I do at this time in the morning.’

  Good old Hannah. When it comes to suffering, she’s very much an equal opportunities employer.

  ‘Is everything all right, ma’am?’

  ‘No, and I’ll tell you why. You know that Cora’s only just come out of hospital?’

  ‘Aye. She’s not relapsed again, has she?’

  ‘I wouldn’t blame her if she did. Her poor husband is sleeping in the spare room and had her phone. He gets a call and has to wake her up. She rang me and now I’m passing it on to you.’

  ‘Right.’

  I had no idea what she was on about. Cora is Cora Hardisty, Dean of the Invisible College and a Very Important Magickal Person. Also a very injured magickal person. I should know – I had held her hand while we waited for the ambulance and we had both tried not to stare at the metal spike sticking out of her abdomen. My mind wanders at the best of times. Half past five in the morning is not the best of times.

  Hannah dragged me back to the present. ‘There’s been an incident in the Forest of Arden. One of the Foresters is dead and they’ve called us in to investigate.’

  I sat up straight. ‘No way! They hate the King’s Watch. They still call us the Witchfinders, or so I’ve heard.’

  ‘They do. They tolerated Mack McKeever, but now he’s gone, and the Priestess has called in a favour.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Yes. She called her son.’

  I had no idea who the Priestess of the Arden Foresters might be, still less who her son was, and how come he had the Dean’s private mobile number.

  ‘Who’s he when he’s at home?’

  ‘Chris Kelly.’

  ‘Aah. I see.’ Chris Kelly is the Earth Master, professor of Geomancy and one of the big cheeses at Salomon’s House. He’s a really nice bloke, but sooo boring. He’s also a friend of Conrad’s.

  Hannah gave a big sigh. ‘I doubt you do see, Vicky,’ she said. ‘Chris and his mother haven’t seen each other for years.’

  I had no idea. Why should I?

  ‘Is that because she’s a Witch and he’s a professor of Quantum Magick?’ I asked.

  ‘They got over that years ago, and got over him changing his name. No, it’s his wife. His mother can’t stand her, and the feeling’s mutual.’

  ‘Ouch.’

  ‘Exactly,’ said Hannah. ‘I’ll text Conrad the location. Don’t hang about. You can have breakfast when you get there. Oh, and don’t let him mess it up.’

  ‘Am I not capable of messing it up on me own, ma’am?’

  I was wasting my breath. She’d disconnected.

  There was a light tap on the door.

  ‘Vic?’ said Conrad. ‘What’s all the racket, and why have I got a set of co-ordinates on my phone?’

  ‘Come in,’ I sighed.

  I don’t mind Conrad seeing me with bed hair and no make-up. He’s seen me when I was both naked and dead, and you don’t get much more exposed than that.

  He stuck his head round the door, and the rest of his great lanky body followed behind when he’d seen that I wasn’t armed. I have been known to attack people who disturb my beauty sleep.

  ‘We’ve got a case,’ I said. ‘In the Forest of Arden. We need to get a shift on.’

  Conrad pulled his lip. It’s not so much that he’s a morning person, it’s more that he’s an ever-ready person. He was in the RAF for so long that he can switch himself on at a moment’s notice, day or night.

  He nodded. ‘It’s nearly freezing outside, but it’s going to be hot later. I’d suggest layers.’

  ‘Yes, Uncle Conrad. Shall I lay me clothes out on the bed for you to check?’

  He pulled his lip again. ‘I think I can trust you to get dressed on your own. I’ll go away now, shall I?’

  If it wasn’t so early, I’d have chucked a pillow at him.

  ‘Swap?’ said Myfanwy when I got to the kitchen. She held out a slice of toast and a travel mug full of tea, and I swapped them for her phone.

  Conrad had been down long enough to slurp an espresso and get a nicotine hit before I appeared. Men. They have it easy. He had a big map spread over the table and was staring at his phone. Other people, normal people, would have been staring at a map on their phone, but not Conrad. His phone doesn’t have GPS, or the Internet, or a camera. It doesn’t even do emojis when I text him. He says it’s to stop people tracking him. I’m not so sure.

  ‘Got it,’ he said. ‘Right. Let’s go.’

  He folded the map carefully and slipped it in one of the enormous pockets of his Barbour, picked up his own travel mug and said goodbye to Myfanwy. He was out the door and expecting me to follow before I’d finished chewing one mouthful of toast.

  Myfanwy gave me a kiss. ‘Take care, Vicky, love.’ Then she gave me a gentle push towards the door. Who needs enemies when you’ve got housemates like Myfanwy and Conrad? He already had the engine running and was de-misting the windows when I got round the front of the house. His house.

  It’s a very nice house, of course. Big and old and comfy, and all that, but it’s not my house, nor even my parents’ house, and Conrad is my work partner, not my uncle. Myfanwy may be a friend, but she’s also part-prisoner and part-housekeeper. Neither of us are living in Conrad’s house by choice.

  If it wasn’t so early, I’d start to wonder how I ended up in a guest bedroom in the middle of nowhere. Instead, I shivered. Conrad was right: it was bloody freezing out here.

  ‘What we got, Vic?’ he asked when we were racing along the A46 and I’d finished my toast. And a granola bar from the stash in the glove box.

  I took a moment to relay what Hannah had told me about the death. I was keeping the business about Chris Kelly to myself for now.

  ‘That’s it?’ he said. ‘A death? That’s all we’ve got to go on?’

  ‘Aye. Obviously it’s suspicious, or they wouldn’t have called us in.’

  He grunted. ‘What should I know about the Arden Foresters?’

  ‘It was started by a breakaway group from the Daughters of the Goddess sometime in the 1840s. It was one of the first Circles to admit men and women equally. Before that, all the mixed Circles had the men in charge. The Foresters were different from day one, and they’ve always been run by a Priestess with a man as her second in command. They thought it reflected ancient practices.’

  He looked over at me. ‘And?’

  ‘And what?’

  ‘Is that all you know about them?’

  Conrad thinks I keep things from him. I might have done, once, but not now. Not now it’s my life on the line, too.

  ‘Howay, man, they’re a closed group. You have to sign up to get in. I never met Mack McKeever before he tittled off to America, so how could I know anything about them unless I lived in the Esoteric Library? I know they’re very big in the Midlands, but that’s about it.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘And I know that they don’t like the Watch.’

  ‘Who does like the Watch? Don’t answer that, you might depress me with how short the list is.’

  ‘I know something else, too. The Priestess is your pal Chri
s’s mam.’

  ‘Chris Kelly?’ he asked, bemused.

  ‘Who else? She’s why we’re on the case. I don’t think she sees eye to eye with her son, though. Something to do with her daughter-in-law.’

  There. Done. I thought I slipped that in quite subtly for me. He slowed down for a second, then raced past a milk tanker. It was the first thing we’d come across on the road, and at this speed we’d be there in … I hadn’t a clue. We were in the countryside, south of Birmingham, and that’s about all I could tell you. Conrad used to fly helicopters without an autopilot and can tell which way North is without a compass. Sometimes that skill is actually useful. I shut up and let him drive.

  We bumped over a cattle grid, and Conrad pulled up next to a pair of black 4x4s. Definitely Mages.

  ‘Showtime, Vic. I’ll get my gear,’ he said.

  I got out, too, and while Conrad fiddled with his arsenal in the back of the car, I soaked up the atmosphere. It wasn’t quite as cold out here, and the countryside was already giving off those smells that everyone gets so worked up about: cowshit, mostly. And then I stared.

  I stared down the hill, where wisps of mist were hiding from the sun and a small stream cut through the grass like a bread knife through a warm cob. I stared across the grass, and I saw it. I saw the Forest of Arden. Wow.

  Think of the greenest grass you can think of. Think of the perfect, pillowy shape of an oak tree in spring and multiply it by a thousand, by a hundred thousand oaks, ash, beech and elm, and every tree of an Old English forest, spreading away across the gentle hills. I let out a sigh.

  ‘What’s up, Vic?’

  ‘I never thought it could be so … perfect. Thanks for this, Conrad.’

  He gave me that What have you been taking? look.