The Old Religion

by Martyn Waites

  Any sense of triumph totally disappeared from Kai’s features. He looked helplessly between the two of them, then back to Lila, the pit.

  Tom moved forwards. ‘Let her go, Kai. Let her walk away.’ Moving steadily closer all the time. ‘I just want Lila. That’s all. Just hand her over. She and I will walk away and that’ll be that. Yeah?’

  Kai kept staring at him, eyes wild. He pushed Lila back towards the rim of the pit.

  Tom kept his voice calm and steady. ‘Come on, Kai . . . you can do it . . .’

  ‘Get back . . . get back . . .’

  Kai moved closer to Lila. Tom stopped moving.

  Kai turned his attention to Noah. ‘What’re you here for? What d’you want?’

  ‘Kai,’ said Noah, matching Tom’s measured tone, ‘it’s over, mate. Finished. Everything’s gone. We’ve got to get out of here. Quickly.’

  Kai looked between the pair of them. He opened his mouth to reply but the voice that spoke wasn’t his.

  ‘You’re going to stay just where you are.’

  They turned. A huge, crow-like shadow detached itself from the wall, walked forward.

  ‘Isobel,’ said Tom.

  ‘Call me by my real name,’ she hissed. ‘It’s Morrigan. Morrigan . . .’ The knife glittered in her hand. She moved towards Kai and Lila.

  ‘The girl’s mine. The ritual must be completed.’

  ‘Put the knife down, Morrigan,’ said Tom, the name coming reluctantly to his lips. ‘It’s all over. Don’t make things even worse.’

  She didn’t move. No one did.

  Tom held out his hand. Began edging towards her. ‘Give me the knife. Let it go.’

  ‘Stay where you are . . .’ The words spat out, the knife extended.

  Tom stopped moving. He glanced at Lila, noticed that behind Kai, unseen by the others, she was slowly doing something with her hands.

  Morrigan stared at Noah, eyes wide, red-rimmed. ‘Traitor. Traitor . . .’

  Noah seemed momentarily conflicted, once again weighing up his options. He shook his head. ‘That’s it,’ he said. ‘I’ve had enough. I’m off.’

  Tom reached for him, grabbed his sleeve. ‘What you doing?’

  ‘Getting out of here. This shit’s just . . .’ He laughed, shook his head. ‘You’re on your own, mate.’

  He turned to go. Morrigan moved quickly, slashed him with her knife. He gasped in pain and surprise, looked down at his arm where she had caught him.

  ‘No,’ she screamed. ‘Traitor . . .’

  Noah didn’t stop to think. He ran. Kai looked after him, wanting to follow, but missing his moment. He stayed where he was, transfixed by the blade in Morrigan’s hand.

  In the confusion of Noah’s exit, Tom tried to move forward against Morrigan. She swung the knife out towards him in a glittering arc. He stopped.

  ‘All of you . . . all of you, letting me down, disappointing me . . .’ She swung her gaze at them, spat the words out. ‘I did this for you. For the village. For the community. For us . . . for us, all of us . . . for the future . . .’

  Tom noticed that Lila had loosened the rope around her wrists, had pulled her hands free while the others were distracted.

  Morrigan kept talking. ‘Well, it’s not too late . . . The sacrifice is still here.’ She pointed the knife at Lila. ‘She’s worthless. Not one of us. No use to anyone, won’t be missed. I’m doing you a favour, my dear . . . You can be part of something wonderful . . .’

  She swung the knife at Lila. But Lila wasn’t there. She’d jumped out of the way.

  ‘Bitch . . . you’re going to suffer, you’ll die slowly . . . and I’ll enjoy every exquisite minute of it. I’ll feed on your fear, your pain . . . I’ll make it slow, you’ll feel everything . . .’

  Another slash forward of the blade.

  Lila shifted once more, tried to reach Tom but Kai was in the way. Rooted to the spot by fear and indecision, Lila’s movement seemed to wake him. He turned.

  ‘Hey . . .’ he shouted, making a grab for her, ‘you’re . . .’

  Morrigan swung the knife again, trying to follow Lila’s movements. She was too slow. Lila was no longer in that space.

  But Kai was. The knife caught him just below the ribcage. His forward momentum, reaching for Lila, thrust it straight up inside him.

  Morrigan stared, face etched in shock, as understanding slowly dawned on Kai’s face. He staggered backwards, blood erupting from his chest. He stared at the knife, not believing it was actually there, and though he tried to react his body wouldn’t respond. He moved as if to sit down but suddenly disappeared into the darkness of the pit, the only sound that of his body hitting the metal bed frame, the noise reverberating round the chamber.

  Morrigan stared after him, fascinated. A voice startled her from her reverie. She looked up, uncomprehendingly.

  ‘Worthless, am I?’ Lila was shouting. ‘No use to anyone? That’s what he said. That’s what my mother said. And you’re liars, the whole fucking lot of you . . .’

  Lila swung her fist, connecting directly with Morrigan’s face. The crack of her nose splintering echoed round the cave. Morrigan put her fingers to her face. Blood gushed between them. She slumped to the ground.

  Lila moved in, ready to administer another blow.

  Tom rushed forward, grabbed her.

  ‘It’s OK, I’ve got you . . . I’ve got you . . .’

  Lila stood rigid, a beacon of trembling anger. Then collapsed sobbing into his arms.

  PART FOUR

  66

  Morrigan hated waiting. Like death before death. Anger-inducing in its stupidity. And Morrigan knew all about anger. Its power, its energy. Its beauty. Morrigan was anger.

  Here, in this cell, separated from her partner, she had time to think. To plot. To plan. Dissect what she had done wrong. Plan how to improve. For next time . . .

  She had always hated her birth name and now she could dispense with it completely. Isobel was a lost girl. A dull girl. An ignored, hurt girl. A weak girl. Morrigan was strong. Powerful. Everything Isobel wasn’t.

  A long journey from her childhood. That wretched child, born into an illiterate family in a remote Cornish community. A family that created children because they had nothing else to do with their lives. They had neither the education for college, nor the wherewithal for social interaction. They’d kept themselves to themselves, in almost complete isolation.

  She had brothers and sisters. Father and mother. But she had trouble remembering which was which. She could recall those times only through abstract images and sounds, feelings and emotions rather than concrete memories. Darkness, screams, grunts. Pain on her skin, in her body. Cries in return. Black and grey smudged blurs of faces, eyes small and red, screaming again. Sobbing. Cold. Her body untouched when she wanted it, touched too much when she didn’t. Numbness. And when the outside world removed her from her parents, she was neither grateful nor upset. Just accepting.

  She soon had a new family. Two foster brothers and a new mother and father. She remembered them smiling at her. Remembered those smiles curdling into fear as they reached her eyes. The wild child. The savage. The other names the two boys called her. Behind their parents’ backs at first, then later to her face. She was hurt by them, cried. But recovered and showed them what a real wild child could do.

  She was given another set of parents after that. Placed under what they said was supervision. A therapist was brought in. A large, smiling woman swathed in too-bright voluminous clothes and scarves. She asked her questions. Suggested that she play with certain dolls while she watched. Made notes. Blind to what the therapist was doing, she went along with it. The therapist talked lots to her, and she found her voice, talked back. And talked more. And more. And the therapist told her she was a clever little girl and she would do all she could to help her. She didn’t think she needed any help so just nodded and said thank you, t
he way she knew the therapist would like.

  Then another family. And attending school. By now she had learned to watch the other children, see how they behaved. She didn’t want to be the wild child any more. So she kept those parts silent inside her and copied what the other children did. The more she copied, the more they seemed to like her and let her join in with them. She liked that. It gave her acceptance, made her feel like she could move amongst them unobserved. She felt superior in every way. And that gave her power. The biggest thrill she had experienced in her small life.

  She was an exceptional student. The school was proud of her, gave her more work, harder questions to answer. She enjoyed it, devoured it. Felt even more superior to her peers as a result. Her teachers recommended university.

  But what and where to study? She had discovered a real and profound passion for history. Especially the history of her land, Cornwall. They suggested Oxford or Cambridge, told her she would definitely get in. She didn’t want to go to either of those places. Too far away. She was connected with the land, and it with her. She would wither and die if she was removed from it. So she stayed local, went to Falmouth University.

  But her real study took place away from the university. Her quest to understand the history of the land of her birth led her to paganism and witchcraft. That was when she truly came alive, felt herself flowering and blossoming. Like simultaneously coming home and bursting out of it. Like she had found what she had been looking for all her life and would only serve this path from thereon.

  Her birth name was now inadequate for the person she was becoming. She needed a real name. A witch name. Morrigan. The crow sighted flying high above wars, the goddess of battle, sovereignty and prophecy. The warrior queen. Perfect.

  She started a pagan society at university. It attracted a few like-minded souls but none of them took it as seriously as she did. Except one. And Morrigan knew as soon as she saw him that he was the one for her.

  Small and unprepossessing in appearance, but as soon as their hands touched she felt a spark of electricity flow between them. She felt her power rise within. He was to be her perfect partner. And he understood that too, for he had been looking for just such a person as Morrigan to submit himself to. They recognised their need in each other. The perfect mirror image.

  They began to pull away from the rest of the group, performing rituals involving only the two of them, more and more extreme as they began to understand each other, and their place in the world. They used their earth magick to pleasure themselves and each other. Morrigan had the power. He was the submissive.

  Beatings. Knife work. Scarring. Burning. All part of their self-invented sex-magick rituals. Morrigan also found herself slipping back into her childhood during particularly intense rituals, absorbing the violence inflicted on her, utilising it, acknowledging it and turning it outwards, throwing it onto her new partner. For his part he took it gratefully, understanding his function, gratifying his goddess.

  It was their sort of lovemaking. Each fist to the face, each knife wound, each nail hammered into his soft flesh delivered with delicacy and care. The most intense, erotic, beautiful experience either of them had ever known, ever would know.

  Morrigan needed the power the rituals gave her. To sublimate one personality allowed the other to soar free. It became a drug to her, wanting it more and more frequently and in more intense measures. Chasing that initial high, never sufficiently recapturing it, always pushing further. Further.

  Her partner recognised this. Told her she needed to stop. She would kill herself in pursuit of something she could never attain. And she would kill him too. She listened. But knew she couldn’t stop, so what would they do instead? How would they capture that exquisite high?

  Involve other people, he said. Exercise our ritual magick on them.

  They knew the secret societies where their kind of magick was practised, sought out the most adventurous, or sometimes foolhardy, of them. Brought them into their ambit. Performed rituals.

  Morrigan loved the screams. The pain. None of them were as adept as her partner at receiving pain gratefully and graciously, which made the experiences all the more visceral and thrilling. He assisted, enjoying the pain vicariously. Morrigan was in charge. And she discovered something about herself. The pain of her victims, their suffering, was like meat and drink to her. She fed on it, gorged on it, subsumed it into her body. It gave her power she hadn’t felt before, strength she couldn’t previously have imagined. It gave her life.

  But eventually, those highs also passed. They needed more and more extreme rituals, more pain, more suffering. And victims were harder to come by. So it fell to her partner to find a way forward once more.

  You’ve gone as far as you can at this level, he explained. Use your rituals, direct your power towards the outside now. Luxuriate in a world remade in your name, by your hand. As for him, he would have the pleasure of seeing his goddess succeed.

  So began the next chapter of Morrigan’s life.

  What did she want? Control. Power. How would she get it? By following his instructions.

  But remember, he told her, operate through fear. They must be scared of you. A scared populace is a pliant populace. A suggestive populace. This is a grand experiment but it needs to be carried out thoroughly to ensure its success. So scare them. The way you scare me . . .

  *

  It worked. She used her ritual magick for all who came calling. Asking nothing in return but to speak for her when the time came. And it would come. No doubt.

  They accepted her magick, these farmers, these rural folk. Kept their silence, gave no dissent. Complicit through their fear of her and her power. She never doubted her own abilities. That ensured they never doubted them either. Every outcome was the one she wanted, and she always convinced them that it was the one they wanted too. Fearful, they never argued.

  Word of her abilities spread. As did her power, her influence. And soon came the challenge her abilities needed.

  The marina.

  She smiled when she saw the news, understood the implications. Could she get the whole community to support her? Follow her? Use her power, exert her control over all of them? Of course she could. And as for complicity . . . Get a whole village not only to be complicit in, but actively to take part in, the ultimate ritual, the blood sacrifice of another human being? Oh, yes. She had positioned herself perfectly. She could do that. She held the power of life and death over all of them. And she loved it.

  That was all in the past now. But Morrigan was still here. She wasn’t scared in this cell. It would only be a matter of time before they released her. Her rituals would ensure that. Then she could start again. Not repeating the same mistakes. This time she would get it right. She smiled. This time she would truly fly . . .

  67

  ‘So,’ said Janet, ‘I hear you’ve had a busy time of late.’

  ‘You could say that.’ Tom nodded. Almost smiled. ‘Although obviously I wasn’t there at all.’

  ‘Obviously. And how did you manage that?’

  ‘Ducked out quickly. Made a few phone calls. Then just kept a low profile. No one else was up for talking about it much. The police are still working through it all now.’

  ‘And what about you?’ she said, leaning forward. ‘Are you still working through it?’

  He was beginning to regard the room as a comforting place that he could retreat to. The sloping ceilings with only glimpses of treetops and sky meant the rest of the world could be miles away. And his therapist’s smiling face, calming manner. No, not calming exactly, but encouraging. Creating a space for him to say what he never could anywhere else.

  Or thought he never could.

  ‘I’m still . . . I don’t know what’s changed since the last time. Well, everything, kind of. Lila, the girl, is still staying with me.’

  ‘How long for?’

  Tom shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Is that wise? How d’you feel about that?
’

  ‘She needs somewhere to stay. Somewhere to be anchored to.’

  ‘Someone?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘And is that someone you? D’you feel up to it?’

  ‘I don’t know. But I can’t just throw her out when she’s got nowhere else to go.’

  She glanced down at her notes, back up to him. ‘And what about you? Do you need someone to be anchored to? And if so, is it her?’

  He thought long and hard before answering, playing out so many possibilities in his head, running through various ways to explain. ‘I don’t know,’ was all he could eventually come up with. Then before she could say anything he spoke. ‘I do know one thing, though.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘If she stays, and I mean for any length of time, I’m going to have to tell her.’

  ‘Is that wise? Are you sure?’

  Tom smiled. ‘Wise? I doubt it. But it’s the right thing to do. She needs that honesty from me.’

  Janet couldn’t argue with that.

  *

  Later, he sat in the garden opposite Lila. Spring had announced its presence and people were rushing to make the most of it. Tom had cleared a space in the semi-wilderness of the garden, found furniture for them to sit on. It felt homely. Relaxed. He sipped whiskey. Lila had a Coke.

  After the night in the cave Lila had gone home with Tom. Neither talked about it, both expected it. She slept for hours, nearly the whole of the next day. At first she suffered night terrors but they subsided the longer she slept. Tom knew because he had been awake all that time, looking out for her. Ensuring that nothing else happened to her.

  He had done the same for her in the aftermath of that night with the police. Shielded her from them, kept her in his house. He had done the same for himself too. Kept out of the ambit of the police. No one was in any hurry to incriminate him in anything because that would mean that they would be incriminating themselves. So his part was, through no special pleading, covered up.

  Emlyn and Isobel Chenoweth were in custody. Isobel had been charged with Kai’s murder. The body of Pirate John had been found at the base of the cliffs. It was announced as murder but the police didn’t know where to begin to look for suspects.