The Enigma on Eden Road

by Jessica Lancaster

  “How long have you been waiting?”

  “Hours,” he said, slumping into a seat across from me. “I need to ascend or—or—”

  “You okay?” Cass asked.

  He waved a hand in the air. “I’ll probably die.”

  “That’s awful,” I said. “But you’d probably best not die. As banshees, we may scream the place down.”

  The entire room of people stopped what they were doing and stared at us. Perhaps I had underestimated people’s reactions to the word, banshee, they scared humans and monsters alike. It brought a smile to my face—it meant nobody would question us.

  “Oh, banshees,” he wheezed. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have bothered you.” He stood once again, wheezing and coughing as he moved, dragging the dirt up with him as his feet hit the ground.

  I held Cassandra’s hand once again.

  ‘If we’re not out of here before six in the morning, we need to leave,’ I told her.

  ‘Good idea. I’m nervous people will question us.’

  I smiled, I’d just been thinking about that. ‘The reason I chose banshee is because nobody would question us. Banshees camouflage themselves into the human world. They don’t look any different from how a human looks.’

  Cass pulled her hand away, severing the connection. She rolled her sleeve up to look at her wristwatch. “It’s not moving,” she said after a few moments watching it. “The second-hand timer isn’t moving.”

  “It won’t move,” a voice snickered. “We’re too far underground for anything like that.” The voice of one of the men from earlier. He chuckled with his friends, and their leader joined.

  “Have somewhere to be?” their leader asked.

  “A screaming match, perhaps,” I replied. “You don’t want to be around for when the competition kicks in.”

  “It’s like the Highland Games, except without any brute physical force,” Cassandra added. It was a nice touch. “It can be quite competitive.”

  “One-hundred and ninety-nine,” the announcer called. “Please make your way through to the next door.”

  The waiting room of monsters gasped and cooed in awe.

  Everyone waited for their turn. I’d never been in a room with so many creatures, creatures I couldn’t arrest. They’d have had a field day to know that they were amongst two witches, and the Council would’ve equally had the same field day to know we were amongst so many monsters.

  I took Cassandra’s hand.

  ‘Once we’re through with this, you’ll be an asset to the Council.’

  She smiled.

  It was the truth. No witch has ever come this far, and if they had, there were no reports of it in our history books.

  As more numbers were called, I became suspicious about the way time worked underground—perhaps if that’s even where we were. If there really was a witch at the centre of all this, we could’ve been anywhere, and it would explain why our wristwatches weren’t working.

  “Two-hundred and eight,” the announcer called. “Please make your way through to the next door.”

  Cassandra nudged me. “That’s you.”

  I glanced at the paper. It was me.

  We must have waited for hours, my brain was slipping into overdrive, thinking too much and too deeply.

  “Please make your way through to the next door,” the announcer called again.

  I stood, clutching the bag on my shoulder. “I’ll take this,” I said.

  She nodded back at me. “I’m next, maybe I’ll see you out there.”

  I hurried before the announcer asked again.

  Spitting out dust, she coughed and smiled, holding the next door open.

  It was a long dark hallway that slowly lit with candles along the side of the wall, dun dun dun, the sound as fire crackled on candle wicks. I stepped foot across the threshold, and I was inside.

  Walking down the hall, a smell hit my nose. It was acrid and vile, like old wood burning in a fireplace. At the end of the hall were another set of stairs. The smell crept around my nose once again, the closer I found myself walking to the stairs, the more intense the smell.

  A smell I recognised.

  The smell of cigars.

  EIGHTEEN

  It was the same smell from the office at the town hall. The same exact smell from where the Lord Mayor had been when he was dead on the ground.

  I’d thought it was Harry, but he was locked away. The smell moved and soon, I realised it was similar to that from the back garden.

  I turned. I hadn’t planned on being killed, but that’s what they appeared to be doing here. They were killing people for their power. If they killed a witch, even in disguise, it could escalate the growth of their beacon to beyond anything I knew.

  I ran away from it, following the hall back in darkness from where torches had been extinguished.

  Thud.

  Face first into a solid lump.

  I was being blocked.

  “Wrong way,” a rough voice called from above.

  I hadn’t collided with a wall of dirt. It was a man the size of the tunnel itself. “Phil?” I called out beneath my breath. “Phil, come on.”

  “Wrong way.”

  “Ivory?”

  “Wrong way!”

  “Cassandra?”

  He laughed. “Nobody can hear you.” Grabbing me and pulling me into his arms, the man began stomping forward. “The boss will see you now.” With my face against his chest, all I could smell was the same cinder.

  He wasn’t alive. He wasn’t real. This wasn’t a creature at all.

  I opened my mouth wide and chomp. I bit down on his chest. My teeth sunk into dirt, spitting it out seconds later. He was a clay puppet, made entirely of mud. It filled my mouth with disgust.

  As he faded, he sealed up the hall from me getting back to where I was. Getting back to Cassandra in the waiting room. She had no idea, and I couldn’t get in contact with her.

  From the tote bag swinging wildly on my arm, I reached inside and grabbed a crystal. In the darkness, there was no way of knowing which one it was. I couldn’t get a read on it, and the surface was smooth; polished and slick. It felt like every other stone.

  “Phil? Ivory? Cassandra?” I called out. I closed my eyes, trying to extend my mind, trying to vibrate through the thick of dirt. “Philp? Ivory? Cassandra?” Still nothing, I tried again, this time holding several stones.

  Reaching into the crystal, I tried calling on its energy, pulling from it.

  Nothing.

  Slamming it against the wall in my fist, the crystal stuck with a thud. I tried pulling the energy once again, and not a single thread of juice came through.

  Slowly, the crystal and my hand were entering the wall. I pushed, trying to dig my hands deeper inside. To get out, I’d have to get through. I pushed with one hand and dug with the other.

  Until I stopped pushing.

  I was being pulled

  Swallowed whole by the dirt wall.

  I grabbed another crystal from my bag. I hit at the wall again, whacking and thumping, trying to chip away at the dirt.

  It didn’t come easy. It didn’t come at all.

  Pulling away from the wall I was being sucked inside, I heaved my weight back, kicking my free leg.

  After five minutes of trying, it stopped altogether.

  A door opened.

  A hand appeared.

  “Phil?” I asked.

  Darkness thumped me over the head.

  NINETEEN

  Inside the womb of darkness. Seated against a hard-wooden chair. I feared leaving, I feared moving my feet in case the there was something else around me. I didn’t know if I was in dirt, or if I was in a concrete room.

  Perhaps I was unconscious, and this was the space of my mind.

  I knew my hands were in my lap, and my rings were attached to the fingers of those hands. I knew that. I knew they were there, but I didn’t know if I could use my powers, especially since my attempt at summoning energy from a
fairly powerful crystal hadn’t gone down all that well.

  Twisting my fingers into knots with each other, I was trying to feel any sensation to tell me I was still alive and functioning.

  “Hello,” I said aloud.

  It didn’t echo. There was no space for an echo.

  A slow metallic creak squealed out beneath door hinges.

  “Hello?” I called out.

  Light flooded the dirt room I was in.

  There was nobody at the door, but a bright light shone through into me. I stood on my jellied legs, pushing forward for the next room. A lamp hung from the ceiling of dirt. It wasn’t a dingy yellow candle, at least.

  My eyes followed the light down, until I reached Cassandra’s body on a chair, her head flung forward and her hands on her lap, wrapped in a dirty rag. I ran to her, dropping to my knees. Our time must have been up, they must have known about her when it wore off.

  My shaky fingers panicked to pull away the tie from around her hands, but the rags were wet and stiff in place. I wondered how long she’d been in here for, and how long they’d known.

  “Cassandra?” I called out, tipping her head to see her face. “Cassandra, I need you to wake up.”

  “Ha!” a rough voice broke through the panic.

  I turned, almost giving myself whiplash.

  At the far side of the wall, standing in the light of a doorway stood a familiar face and his rotund body protruding out into the room.

  “Your Greg’s neighbour?” I asked in a mumbled whisper.

  He coughed, slamming a hand to his chest. “Well, it’s Mick,” he said. “Nice to be formally introduced.”

  “I remember you,” I said. “You tried to steal from Greg’s house.”

  He scoffed. Entering the room fully, his face illuminated by the light, I saw the long beard and the ash collecting into it from the cigar he had haphazardly dangling from his lips. “It’s been a pleasure,” he said.

  I fiddled with the rings on my fingers, trying to tease a single ounce of power from the stones. “Come on,” I grumbled.

  “Not in here you won’t,” he chuckled, moving forward, his feet thumping into the dirt with each step. “Once you’re in those doors, all crystals become grounded.”

  Turning back to Cassandra, I pulled at the cloth around her hands one more time. Trying to pull her free. I tried, but it became tighter in all my attempts. “Are you going to kill us for your little sacrifice chamber?” I asked, turning back to him.

  A tail waggled behind him, sweeping the floor. “I wish,” he chuckled, pulling the cigar from his lips with the tail. “My investor told me not to kill you.” He puffed smoke through his nostrils. “They were adamant about it.”

  “Who?” I asked. “Who is it?”

  He chuckled, dusting ash from his beard. “Not that I’m going to tell you. It has been nice, watching you these past few weeks, scurry around like a headless chicken. You were plugging one problem, but the boat had several holes, and each one was filling the sinking ship up faster.”

  “You’re to blame for it all then?” I asked, standing on my feet. “Because you don’t look like someone who has a lot of power anyway. What are you? A lizard? Some half-and-half? A dragon?”

  He cocked a finger at me, like firing a gun. “A dragon,” he said, puffing more smoke out in my direction.

  The acidic smell and aftertaste burnt my taste buds. “How nice,” I grumbled. “So, why are they keeping us alive?”

  “To watch the world burn, of course.”

  “Of course.” It knotted my stomach.

  A tug came at my hand from behind. Cassandra?

  “Nora,” she whispered, her voice hoarse and croaky. “Use my crystal.”

  “Oh, the trainee is awake,” he chuckled, moving around us in a circle, his lizard tail wrapping around Cassandra’s hands, untying the handiwork it must have done previously. “You’ll have a front-row seat to the massacre.”

  Free, Cassandra stood beside me, she grabbed my arms, like a baby deer her legs weren’t quite used to standing. “My crystal,” she said.

  “It won’t work.”

  “She’s right,” Mick shouted. “Once we’re at capacity. The investor wants us to expand. You’ll both be useful in that department.”

  Cassandra grabbed the crystal from around her neck and thrust it into my hand. “Let’s go,” she said.

  But there was nothing. Not a single flicker of our bodies moving through space. We weren’t leaving this place anytime soon.

  “You weren’t easy to spot for my employees,” he said, dragging deep on the cigar in his mouth. “But once we had you both hauled off. I knew your faces, and I knew your spells and incantations would wear.”

  “What is he?” Cass asked.

  “A dragon!” his voice boomed in her face as the lizard tail yanked the crystal from her hand. “And as I already told your mentor here, your crystals are useless. They were all grounded from the moment you stepped foot inside this place.”

  We stood still for a moment, watching Mick stomp around and kicking up dirt with his tail. Cassandra nudged at me several times, nodding to the open door ahead. There was no use trying to get out that way. This place was a maze.

  “If the power was grounded, it means the power is in the soil, it’s in the dirt,” she said to me, nudging me one more time.

  “And?”

  “That means—”

  “What that means is, you’re going to get yourself killed,” Mick scoffed. “Or at least one of you.” He puffed out smoke into our faces. “My investor didn’t mention keeping both of you alive. I’m sure one would suffice.”

  “So, what you’re saying is, you can kill one of us?” I asked, I kicked off of my shoes; slip-on plimsolls because I knew we’d be doing a lot of walking. “But won’t that be a difficult decision? And would you really want all this power on your hands?” I attempted to manoeuvre my feet, trying to pull my socks away.

  The dirt was cold, squishy between my toes.

  “It’ll be the younger one,” he said immediately with a snap. “It’s already been decided. As the older one, Evanora, you’ll get to live.”

  “What? No!” Cassandra snapped back. “It doesn’t sound fair. I have more life to give, more power. She’s almost completely useless.”

  I wasn’t sure if it was a bit she was doing, or something she truly believed in to save herself. But if what she was hinting to earlier was true, then all I needed to do was pull energy from the earth, and it could no longer keep us.

  It bubbled in my stomach. “Cassandra! As your mentor, you will—” I grabbed her hand and—

  Whoosh.

  The stale air was gone, replaced by the wash of an icy breeze. I looked around. We were still in the forest. We were free, but we weren’t getting anywhere quick.

  I nudged Cassandra with my leg. “We did it,” I said.

  “I’m glad you did it,” she grumbled, scratching at her head. “I feel so weak. After you left, I waited five minutes before someone called me. I was taken into that room and—and I was out cold.”

  “We’re out now,” I said, glancing at my hands, my rings were pitted in dirt and filth. “But they’ve kept all the crystals.”

  “It’ll be powering them,” she said with an eye roll. “I knew we shouldn’t have brought the powerful ones. I bet they’ve been drained. My family will kill—” her straight face turned into a smile. “They won’t do anything, because I’m never seeing them again.”

  A flock of birds cawed from above, branches whooshed as they sprung into action, flying away.

  “Over here!” Ivory shouted. “They’re over here.”

  Phil was instantly at our sides. He grabbed my hand and stared me in the eye. “You’re alive. You’re both alive.”

  “We thought you were dead,” Jinx said, jumping into Cassandra’s arms.

  I shook my head. “It’s not over.” My dry throat wanted to cry out with all the information. I held it back. “We need to get
back to Eden Road.”

  TWENTY

  Eden Road was eerie. Quiet. Stillness invading the street from all corners. I’d stayed silent as Phil teleported us back to the house. We were stood at the front door. I didn’t want to go inside. I couldn’t think about the next step.

  “Who’s that?” Cassandra asked, tapping me on the shoulder.

  I looked up from my bare feet on the ground, soiled in dirt. A line of people, mindless, walking like zombies, they stepped in formation, walking directly down the path into Mick’s house. “I—I—” I had no idea.

  “They’re being controlled,” Phil said. “They must be.”

  “Are dragons real?” Cassandra asked. “Because he—”

  “Inside,” I said before she could utter another word. We were vulnerable outside the house, and if he had a powerful witch as his investor, they could’ve attacked us already. “Quick. Quick.”

  As we piled into the house, Ivory was in a state of quiet. She was tired, she was scheduled to sleep soon. Jinx the same, but not quite a nocturnal beast. I triple-locked the door once we were all over the threshold; once with the key, a second with the deadbolt, and a third with magic.

  There was no time for me to be down in thought. I hurried them into the living room, slapping my hands together so they’d move faster.

  “What do you think he is?” Cassandra asked again once seated.

  “A dragon,” I said, glancing to Phil out of curiosity, and to make sure I wasn’t saying anything silly.

  He nodded. “It’s incredibly possible,” he said. “Dragons have been known to exist, but not many still alive, at least not to public knowledge.”

  “And they hoard gold?” Cass asked.

  “No, not quite,” he said, tapping a finger to his chin. “In a situation like this, they will be harvesting power. It would be for that very reason he’s here.”

  “He mentioned an investor,” I said.

  Phil snapped his fingers. “He’s being paid for the job.”

  “So, he does like gold?” Cass continued.