by CJ Bridgeman
This caught Oliver’s attention. He sat up and his eyes widened in surprise and recognition. “You’ve got it,” he breathed, and then his brow furrowed into an expression of anger. “Give it to me,” he demanded.
Felicity held the book close to her chest.
Suddenly, Oliver lurched forwards, knocking his chair over. “Give it to me!” he shouted, pulling hard and in vain on the ropes that secured him. They straightened to their longest length - which wasn’t much more than a few feet - as he threw all of his weight towards her.
Felicity had staggered backwards in surprise, but upon seeing how helpless Oliver was, she was reassured. She held the book towards him, but still far beyond his reach. “You know what this is?” she asked, her voice shaking.
“Of course I know what it is,” Oliver growled. “I’ve been searching for it for all this time -”
“Then tell me!” Felicity cried. “Tell me what it is!”
Oliver’s anger left his face almost instantly, replaced once again by an intense bewilderment. It seemed like hours had passed before he actually spoke, and when he did his voice was quiet and his eyes full to the brim with utter disbelief. “You... you don’t know, do you?” he breathed. “You don’t know who you are.”
The door to the cellar opened and Hollie and Jamie clambered noisily down the stone steps. Jamie positioned himself between Oliver and Felicity.
“Get away from her,” he said intently.
It was a moment before any of them moved or made a sound. Oliver’s eyes were locked on Felicity as if her two friends were invisible. Slowly, he moved away. It seemed as though he wanted desperately to say something but had been shocked into silence. Felicity stared back, confused and deeply disturbed.
Hollie appeared beside her and tugged on her hand. “Come on, Fliss.”
As the two of them began to leave the cellar, Oliver finally found the words he had been searching for. “You can’t stay here forever,” he called to Felicity. “Sooner or later you’ll have to go back. The others are coming - they’ll find you!”
“What was all that about?” Hollie asked quizzically as the two of them left the cellar.
But Felicity wasn’t listening. She didn’t reply, and upon her face there hung a troubled expression that twisted her features into a frown. Her hands were shaking. Her heart knocked almost violently against her ribs. She had to get out of there.
She ignored Hollie’s protests as she left her side, running down the hallway and practically falling through the front door of the house. The freezing cold air was like a stinging slap but she relished it; she gulped at it hungrily like a starving animal. The cellar had suddenly become un underground prison and she felt trapped between those four immovable, concrete walls. But even out in the freedom of the snowy streets, she still felt too close to Oliver and his strange words.
Once she had taken enough deep breaths to feel calmer, she glanced about the almost deserted streets, unsure of what to do and where to go. On the other side of the road was a park surrounded by tall, leafless trees so she headed for it, instantly comforted by every step that nourished the distance between her and Oliver. She still clung to her mother’s journal but kept it tucked under her arm, and she kept flicking nervous, uneasy glances in all directions as if she expected someone to come and snatch the precious thing from her. It was special. She knew that now. It had to be protected.
The park was quite idyllic, even in the winter. Brick woven paths led between shrubs and gardens that were covered in snow. She could hear the sound of children playing and soon caught sight of them wearing their brightly coloured coats, scarves and hats. They ran to and from each other, throwing snowballs, pulling sledges and building snowmen, all of them blissfully ignorant of the strange things that existed in the world. Felicity had been like that once. She always knew that there was a great deal she didn’t know and hadn’t experienced, but she could never have guessed that it involved magic spells and mysterious books. That kind of the thing only existed in the imagination, and she had never placed much importance upon dreams and fantasy.
Felicity turned her back on the playing children and brushed some snow from a nearby bench before sitting down. A beautiful stone fountain stood in front of her, featuring a cherub tipping water from a vase. Felicity shivered. In her haste to leave the house and put as much distance between her and Oliver as possible, she had neglected to bring a coat.
But that wasn’t a problem for long, for suddenly Hollie was sitting beside her and had draped her coat around her hunched shoulders. She didn’t speak, which was unusual. Felicity expected a barrage of questions and exposure to Hollie’s endless theories and observations, but they didn’t come. Recent events had changed the both of them.
“I think I’m involved.”
Felicity was shocked at how the words had left her mouth without her even realising it, but once it began, it couldn’t be stopped. The flood gates were open.
“Oliver talks about things, strange things to do with magic and stuff, and he talks about them as if I should know about them, too. He came after me that night in September and then he came after me again.”
“You mean when we found you in the alleyway?” Hollie asked. She had almost forgotten about that night.
Felicity nodded. “He - he tried to do - I think he tried to cast a spell on me or something.”
Hollie was surprised. “Why didn’t you say anything?” she asked.
“Because I wasn’t sure it had even happened. I just - I doubted myself.”
After her near-miss with a flaming hand, Hollie understood perfectly.
“I think it has something to do with my mum,” Felicity continued.
Hollie looked at her. “Why do you think that?” she asked softly, and her voice had not a single trace of confusion in it; it was open and accepting.
Felicity had been hugging her mother’s precious journal close to her chest, guarding it and protecting it. Anyone around her could be an Oliver, someone who looked like everyone else but who could conjure flames at their fingertips. Being used to seclusion, Felicity had wanted to find somewhere small, dark and secret to retreat, but the park, complete with its noisy fountain and the sound of laughing children seemed oddly safe.
She showed the book to Hollie, and the sense of relief that followed was like a massive weight lifting from her burdened shoulders.
“What’s this?” Hollie said as she flicked through the pages.
“I don’t know,” Felicity replied. “It was my mum’s.”
A frown creased the perfect complexion of Hollie’s brow. “It doesn’t make any sense,” she observed.
“Oliver knows what it is.”
“What?” Hollie was surprised. “Have you asked him?”
“Not yet.”
Hollie passed the book back to her friend. “Then that’s what you have to do.”
Felicity’s reply was instant. “I can’t.”
“Why not?”
Felicity opened her mouth to respond but found herself snapping it shut again. This time the response was not so clear. Just why couldn’t she ask Oliver? Could she trust him to tell the truth? What if the truth was something she didn’t want to hear? Would he even answer her questions at all? She shook her head helplessly.
“Fliss.” Hollie tilted her head to one side. When she spoke, she had the demeanour of a teacher giving a pep talk to a student. “If Oliver knows something about you and your mum, then you need to find out what it is. Yeah, he might lie to you, but if you don’t go down there and at least try, then you’ll probably spend a really long time thinking about it, and then you’ll get really miserable and you’ll be no fun to be around and then we won’t be BFFs any more.” She paused deliberately. “I don’t hang around with boring, miserable people, Fliss. It would do terrible things to my complexion.”
Felicity managed a weak, unconvincing smile.
“Seriously, though,” Hollie said, placing her hand on hers. “What have you got t
o lose?”
It was a sensible question. Whatever the reason, Felicity found the very idea of returning to the cellar almost repulsive, and it was only now that her friend was questioning her that she considered why. It didn’t take her long to figure it out.
It was fear. She wasn’t afraid of Oliver, for since his capture he had proven himself to be harmless. No, it wasn’t what he could do - it was what he knew. The knowledge he possessed had a power beyond that of any strange, magical spell he could perform. It wasn’t even his knowledge of magic and other mysteries that scared her - it was what he knew about her mother. He had to know something; his desperation to get hold of the journal made that quite blatant, but it also forced Felicity to a difficult realisation.
This strange, mysterious boy knew more about her mother than she did, and she needed to know how.
9.
The remainder of Boxing Day passed, taking with it the leftover festivities of the Christmas holiday. The merriment and cheer became a thing of the distant past as people returned to work, shops reopened and radio stations ceased airing jolly Christmas tunes. A thick layer of snow still covered the streets like icing on a cake, but as it began to contort into a slushy, brown mess the weather became more of an annoyance than a welcome novelty.
Felicity had not wanted to act upon Hollie’s advice to go and speak to Oliver straight away. Jamie’s house still felt much like a warehouse for far too many secrets, mysteries and impossibilities. Instead, she went for a walk around the neighbourhood, idly tracing the icy footprints that led across the pavement and hoping that the cold air would help to clear her mind. It didn’t.
Had Felicity known that Oliver’s head was filled with just as many anxieties, she would have been very surprised indeed; he was so arrogant that it would have been impossible for she and her friends to believe that he had any problems or worries at all - save, of course, for his imprisonment.
That was something that Oliver felt particularly ashamed of. He had spent several days amongst the teenagers at that contemptible high school, watching them fritter from class to class like ants, hopelessly studying trivial subjects that had no real importance. He had tried to close his ears to their foolish whims and ridiculous problems, but couldn’t stop all of it from getting in. It felt as though the stories of relationship breakdowns and sporting defeats was making him stupid, too. If only they knew what was coming.
They were so ill-prepared it was laughable. Oliver had spent around six months amongst these people and couldn’t find one shred of evidence that indicated that they had any means of defence against magic. They had plenty of ways of attacking one another - indeed, they were particularly skilful in that area - but they wouldn’t have enough time to amass any armies or launch any nuclear missiles if the others decided to attack, and any defence or pre-emptive strike would be useless anyway. It would all be over before these idiots even realised it had started.
And that was what made his capture all the more humiliating. He had been careless; he had thought it was Felicity lying asleep on the sofa, and was quite surprised when he realised it was Hollie. But by then it had been too late, for that simpleton brother of hers had knocked him out with a wine bottle. A wine bottle, of all things. It was so pathetic that Oliver shuddered to even think of it, and now he was trapped in a cellar with his hands bound and his ability to spellcast stripped from him. The fools didn’t even realise what they’d done to him; with his arms and hands restricted, he couldn’t form the gestures and movements essential to creating magic. He was, to put it quite simply, stuck.
Still, there was one glimmer of hope that shed a grateful light on his predicament: Felicity had the book. Oliver should have been elated that the item he had been seeking so arduously for all this time was finally so near, but however close it was, it was still out of his grasp. His helplessness both infuriated and terrified him, for the others were close now, so close that he could feel it, and they would not be impressed that he had failed in his mission. The situation could not have been more dire; the others did not take failure lightly, and the utter incompetence that Oliver had displayed would not go unpunished.
He deserved it, that much he knew, even if it meant his life; the others had been known to execute their own in order to set the example that failure would not be tolerated. But this was more than failure. This was utter ineptitude, stupidity, foolishness. To have been captured by these inferior surface walkers, creatures who could not even grasp the idea of magic, let alone use it themselves, was unacceptable. It would bring shame upon the entire order - unless Oliver could do something before the others arrived.
If he could somehow escape the cellar and capture both the book and the girl, no one would need to know about his humiliation. He would be seen as a hero, the one who saved the world. The others wouldn’t punish him, the book would be in safe hands and the girl would no longer be a danger. With that thought in mind, Oliver began a renewed attempt at severing his bonds.
He was in luck. The surface of the pipe to which he was tied was not completely smooth; it had several lips at certain intervals where different parts of metal had been soldered and screwed together. In the dim light of the street lamps that was seeping through the tiny cellar window, Oliver saw that if he could just move far enough upwards, he could try to use the lip of metal to cut through the rope tied around his wrists. He needed about a metre; if he could stand on his chair -
The door to the cellar opened. Oliver looked up and saw someone coming in.
It was Felicity.
The sight of her enraged him, though he was an expert at hiding it. He watched her descend the stone steps, one hand on the iron railing, the other clutching the book that he was so desperate to possess. He clenched his fists. Could it be true that she really had no idea what she had? Who she was? Or was she simply insulting him by playing deceitful games and feigning ignorance?
He would find out.
He kept his eyes locked on her as she walked slowly and nervously into the cellar. He thought he saw her shaking. Her cheeks looked flushed, their redness a stark contrast to the rest of her white skin. He could see that she was struggling to keep herself composed and he had to give her credit, for however much he stared at her, trying to unnerve her, she stared right back at him.
It seemed like an age before she spoke, and when at last she did, her voice was calm and steady. “You knew my mother,” she said to him.
But it was Oliver, not Felicity, who was the seasoned professional at concealing his emotions, and he could see how afraid she was. This in itself wasn’t a telltale sign about how much she knew or how much she was trying to hide; she was smart to be frightened of him.
“No,” he replied. “I didn’t.”
Felicity frowned, and her eyes dropped to the book. “But this is her journal, and you’ve been looking for it. Haven’t you?”
“You’re right,” he said. “I have. So why don’t you just give it to me and I’ll leave you and your friends alone?”
She stared. “I don’t believe you.”
Oliver’s shoulders sagged, though he shouldn’t have been disappointed. He knew that she wasn’t stupid. He was going to have to try harder if he wanted to capture both her and the book before the others arrived.
“Then why are you down here talking to me?” he asked her.
Felicity seemed to consider this. She looked from him to her mother’s journal, and then back at his staring face. Then, in a distinctly decisive manner, she began to walk towards the cellar steps.
He had pushed her too far. He couldn’t let her go; there was too much at stake.
“Wait,” he said.
She turned around.
“If you tell me something, I’ll answer your questions. Does that sound fair?”
Felicity bit her lip, apparently considering his offer. After a moment, she nodded slowly.
“I want you to tell me the truth,” Oliver said. “No games.”
She nodded again.
&nb
sp; “Tell me whether or not you’re pretending.”
The command caught Felicity off guard, and it showed. Her eyebrows raised in surprise and then furrowed in confusion as she processed what she had heard. Oliver studied her changing expressions, watched as her eyes flicked about the room as if searching for an answer. Her mouth opened slightly; she was about to speak - no sound came. She released her breath. Finally, her eyes came back to him.
“I don’t understand,” she said. “What do you mean, ‘pretending’?”
He didn’t respond to her question; there was no need. Her reactions and response had told him everything he needed to know. She had no idea who she was, who her mother was and what manner of thing she held in those pitiful, weak hands. She had no concept of magic and what the world was really like. Somehow, it had been kept from her.
She was lost - lost and alone.
Inside, Oliver smiled. It had to be on the inside, for he didn’t want Felicity to see it. Her ignorance was to be his salvation. The less she knew about her heritage, the better it would be for him. He could make it work; with a few well-placed revelations and some misleading statements, he would have her eating out of his hand. The question was whether or not he could do so before the others arrived.
Felicity watched him as he leaned back in his chair. It was evident that he was not going to elaborate on what he had just said, and whilst she was curious, she somehow knew that if he didn’t want to tell her something, he wouldn’t; after all, he had no reason to. She wasn’t going to release him in exchange for information and he knew it. Her heart sank as she realised that he had absolutely no incentive whatsoever to tell her anything at all, and she wondered whether or not it had been worth the trouble coming down to the cellar to talk to him.
But still, she had to try. “What do you know about my mother?”
She was somewhat relieved when Oliver broke off his unnerving stare and looked upwards, as if in thought, and then he shrugged. “I know a few things.”
