Into the darkness

  “You okay?”

  “Bad memories,” she replied. “I guess I’m just restless. I mean, this is what I was born to do.”

  “But?” he pressed.

  “Sometimes I just wanna be a normal girl. Thanks – for being here.”

  Alex smiled. She didn’t just mean she was thankful that she had a friend with her; but that she was glad someone who believed in her when she didn’t. “You’re never alone, Amber,” he told her. He tenderly fingered his broken arm and winced as he touched on a sore spot. “Feels better already.” And it did.

  “See, with me around you need never visit the doctor again.” Amber had never made a healing potion before – she had tried an assortment of other potions, but never a healing one – so Alex was kind of her guinea pig. She didn’t tell him that though. “Say hello to your local witch doctor.”

  “Hello, witch doctor. Hey, I don’t have to pay for this, do I?”

  “Not this time,” she yawned, coughing at the same time. “Maybe in the future though. If you insist on breaking bones all over the place.” She sat up and launched into a violent coughing spasm. Her theory of swallowing too much dust over the last few days was backed up by the fact that her throat felt like sandpaper. She settled back into the plush cushions and let her eyes fall shut. “I didn’t know you liked Marmite.”

  It was a well-known fact that Alex detested Marmite, as many people did. “You didn’t!”

  Amber-Louise didn’t answer. She had fallen asleep.

  It wasn’t really an option to wake her up and take her home. It was best to leave her where she was and let her sleep as long as she could. She hadn’t slept in days and probably wouldn’t sleep for a while after this.

  White noise.

  If she could only find out where it was coming from, maybe she could stop it. But it seemed to be coming from everywhere – the walls, the floor, the ceiling, even inside her head. She covered her ears with her hands and felt an ocean of hot tears gushing down her cheeks. Why wouldn’t it just stop? It was one of a dozen or so things that were driving her crazy, but it was also one of the only things keeping her sane. It was the utter quiet that freaked her out most; she had created this noise to keep the quiet out. But now, she’d give anything to be able to savour the silence. Amber had been here so long that she was no longer 100% sure if the noise was just in her head, or if the guards had started pumping it into her cell – she wouldn’t put it past them.

  Amber-Louise had now been here for almost two years and had cried more tears than ever before. She hated crying because she thought it was a sign of weakness; and because she knew that once one tear had dropped, more would follow. The young woman was afraid that once she started crying, she wouldn’t be able to stop. She had no more tears left now, though. There was nothing left inside any more. The intense exercise regime she’d developed what seemed like centuries ago took longer each day as she tried to get her muscles more and more toned.

  The guards had started to leave their stun guns outside now – whether it was because they trusted her not to try anything, or they were trying to lull her into a false sense of security, she didn’t know. But she intended to use it to full advantage. She might not have anywhere to go, no-one who was missing her; but no matter what horrors waited outside, it had to be better than the physical and psychological torment she was forced to endure here.

  Amber had no idea what she was going to come across when she got out – if she got out – or what she was going to do. A memory sparked in the furthest recesses of her mind; but just like that – it was gone. There was something she was supposed to do, but she couldn’t remember. If only she could bring it back... Here, Amber-Louise was just a girl trying not to do anything that might get her killed. If she could just focus and remember something, anything... If she could just feel...

  The door opened and a hulking figure in black set a plastic tray down on the floor. “Food’s here, witch.”

  “Witch?”

  He dropped his guard for a split second and Amber-Louise bolted.

  The boy and his ‘uncle’ were wandering around town in the grey van they had stolen from a garage, as they did most nights. The older man had received an injury (a dislocated shoulder) in their previous battle, and grunted in pain as he drove on. The boy was learning to drive but was too unsure of himself to start driving around at high speeds as was often required of them. They were both bruised and battle-weary but were geared up for another round.

  “Remind me why we do this,” said the older of the two.

  The younger man kept his eyes on the road in front of them, constantly on the look-out for bad guys. “Because there’s no-one else to do it.”

  Amber leant back against a brick wall, which was uncomfortable to say the least, crouched down as she was. Everything seemed strange and unfamiliar. She didn’t recall how the town was supposed to look and feel, but she knew enough to know that something was wrong here. Her long hair was tucked in the neck of the ill-fitting sweatshirt she wore, and her face was hollow and gaunt looking. Something was wrong with her too. She didn’t remember anything.

  Straightening up, she looked around her with wild eyes. What was she doing here? As she had walked through the alleys, that were different and yet, somehow, familiar, she heard the sounds of a fight. Something stirred inside her – but what? Breaking into a leisurely jog, she rounded the corner and looked up the street. There was nothing to be seen and no sounds to be heard. Amber-Louise squinted her eyes in that direction and listened for more sounds. What was she going to do even if she did hear the sounds again? Again, that weird feeling stirred in the pit of her stomach and she shot a kick out to her side. It connected with a body and bone broke. I remember how to do that.

  “We were almost completed,” said the grounded figure.

  She crouched down and stared at her before punching the woman in the stomach. She felt good about beating up this person, as if this was what she was meant to do.

  “You’ll pay for this,” said the older woman as she ran off. I’ll pay?

  She was nearly remembering things. How could she profess to be better than any of them when they were on equal terms? Neither of them remembered much about their old lives. Neither of them knew right from wrong. Neither of them could feel any of the emotions that made them human.

  So engrossed was she in these thoughts that she never heard the engine of the van that was roaring down the street. She rose from her crouched position and put a hand to her eyes as the headlights hurtled towards her. Before she even had time to realise what it was and move, the van had hit her full on. The vehicle had been travelling at such a speed that anyone else would have been killed instantly. Amber flew a few feet through the air, thunked into the metal lamppost, and crumpled to the ground. She barely whimpered with the pain of what must have been several broken bones, and, quite possibly, some internal bleeding.

  Two men rushed from the drivers compartment of the pulled up van. “I honestly didn’t see anything, Rich. I should’ve been looking properly.”

  They both bent over the broken girl lying at the side of the road. She was spitting blood and looking up at them. Rich went down onto his knees and took one of her hands. “Amber?”

  “Dad? Alex?” There was a sudden moment of clarity as memories, good and bad, came rushing back to her. Now she remembered who she was and what she was meant to do.

  The younger man – Alex – smoothed her hair away from her face. He touched her cheek, making sure she was really real. “Amber. I can’t believe it’s you.”

  She coughed up more blood and closed her fingers tight around his hand. “It’s me,” she confirmed. “I got run over.”

  “Does it hurt?”

  “I remember. I can remember all of it.”

  “Remember what?”

  Her mouth filled up with blood again and she spluttered, letting it drip from the
corner of her mouth. She remembered who the two men were, but she didn’t feel the love or the bond she thought she should. She didn’t feel anything.

  Amber could feel a couple of bust ribs, had felt a few vertebrae shatter as she hit the post – she had never shattered her spine but imagined it felt like this. Given time, she knew she would heal – only just conscious or not, she knew what was going on around her.

  “I think she’s ruptured something vital,” said Alex, wondering if they could get her to the van without hurting her more.

  “Like what?” frowned Rich, watching her cough up more blood. She had a far away look in her eyes as if they were losing her. Her broken back arched suddenly. “It could be coming from anywhere.”

  Amber-Louise started to spill the tears she didn’t think she had left. “Dad. My heart hurts.” She looked between the two of them with wide eyes. “Kill me?”

  Alex was sleeping on the floor next to the couch and pulled the blanket up to his chin as he dreamt about having a pet rabbit made of candy floss. It might well be weird but it was the most regular dream he’d had for months. At least it’s not whatever Amber’s dreaming about, he remembered thinking in the heavy fug of sleep. He hated the thought as soon as it popped into his head, hated feeling glad that it wasn’t him. Still, he didn’t want Amber-Lou to have to go through all this on her own. Which is why he was sleeping down here; she wasn’t ready to be left on her own yet, and he didn’t want her to think that he had left her.

  So it came as quite a surprise when she let out a short scream and rolled off the sofa to land on top of him. “Sorry,” she apologised. “You did break my fall.”

  “Glad I could be of assistance. Even if I have punctured a lung,” he wheezed. Amber climbed off of him and sat back down. “Bad dream?”

  She nodded. “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome. What for?”

  “Never mind. It’s not important.”

  Chapter 7

  Frankly, Liatruz was disappointed and a little hurt that the Sisterhood had seen fit to only send this pesky little child-witch to face him. While it was true that he had been lying low for a few decades after his last recorded battle, he had hoped that it his reputation was still going strong. It certainly seemed to be, as he heard his name whispered in paranormal conversation, but why should he be thought so little of to be offered this child.

  Ah, yes – his last battle against a Sister. 28 years ago, if he remembered rightly. She’d been a resilient little thing. Fiery too, with unruly flame-coloured hair which had earned her the nickname Red. It occurred to him that he’d never bothered to learn her name, though Sinead rang a bell. It had taken him nearly 25 years to recover fully from that encounter. She’d thrown every trick in the book at him – hell, if it had been to hand, she’d probably have thrown the actual book at him. Sinead (as he had decided to call her) had hit him with beams designed to burn flesh and balls of white energy that were meant to blur vision. He’d shaken these off without much more than a few scratches and a slight headache. Then she’d unleashed a verbal attack on him, not realising that the warlock was human and susceptible to physical violence. His expertise in the black arts had given him the ability to morph into almost any form, but he opted to remain human most of the time.

  Sinead was cocky, too. She was sarcastic and had an answer for everything. Liatruz had simply smiled her remarks away, not giving much rise to any of it. He spat out a few of his own replies and took his own shots, but kept his cool. Every word she said was answered, every spell she cast was returned, and after a few hours, Sinead was lying in a heap on the ground, her skin burning and crackling with magick residue. The sight of her crying and pleading gave the warlock immense pleasure, but even he couldn’t to watch her like that for long. And Liatruz was as kind as any other person with an evil agenda. So, he had walked over to her, gave her some tissues tp mop up some of the blood and tears and swept her up into deceptively strong arms. He had taken her to a smaller room and cleaned her cuts up. Obviously, the witch hadn’t believed that he was doing this out of the non-existent goodness of his heart. But she had let him clean her up nonetheless, and intended to restart the battle the following day.

  But, while she slept, Liatruz strapped her wrists together and tied that piece of leather behind a metal strut beneath the wooden bed. When she’d woken up the next day, he subjected her to what he proudly described as a Nazi-style interrogation – actually, the Gestapo had stolen the technique from him but he wasn’t going to be petty – and the old torture techniques that had been developed centuries, possibly millennia, before he was ever thought of. He could easily have killed her in their initial meeting (sometimes he wished he had) but prolonging the agony was a vice of his. His downfall, some might say; yet he prided himself on being one of very few men to have succeeded in turning torture into an art. If it was done right, he could makes victims last for days, even weeks. Sinead had lasted almost a week.

  It had been her 29th birthday when Sinead had finally died. Her intermittent bouts of screaming were driving him nuts, as was her refusal to tell him anything remotely useful. After 5 days, he got bored of her and killed her with a single blast

  It had been a relatively entertaining fight but one of his most his most draining, also. The witch had been powerful, persistent, but certainly not the strongest he had ever faced. Not by a long shot. It was times like this, when the memories came creeping up on him, that he felt his age. His 350 year old mind was contained in this body of a laid-back, 50-something, ex-surfer, but even this age didn’t show in his movements. The length of time it took for him to recuperate from that particular battle indicated just how old he really was, though this hadn’t prevented him from regaining his fighting – killing, he grinned – form. A lengthy series of bar-fights and supernatural exchanges against increasingly tougher opponents had raised his game considerably, both physically and mystically. He told himself that he was just stopping himself from slipping, but if the reports coming back to him from his troops were to be believed, he would need every second of that practice.

  The warlock felt patronised – no, insulted – that the Sisterhood would present him with this kid as his first proper witch in nearly 30 years. Had he not been tracking this girl’s movements over the last couple of days, he would’ve sorely doubted she possessed half the prowess he’d been promised. But, more than once, she had out-manoeuvred him and had one upped his magick. She was so young; she couldn’t have been a fully-fledged member of the Sisterhood for much more than a week before her incarceration. He’d known she was powerful then, when she refused to be broken by the total lack of hope. But she was young and still held onto hope. It was her youth that made her all the more appealing to him; her power was strong and fresh. He was comforted by the fact that this energetic young woman relied heavily the assistance of a friend. Together, they were tough. But the friend could not help her down here. She was beatable alone. Everyone was beatable on their own, but he was in no doubt that he could fight them both if it came to it.

  Most of the terrified people he still held captive told him how evil and heartless he was, but no-one ever asked why he was so evil. There was a story.

  A good boy in the mid 1600s, he had never drunk ale just as his father had instructed him never to do. There was no danger of that; he was afraid that he might end up like his father. He drunk too much and was often to be found in the ale-house drinking long after the servants had set out their supper in the dining room. Getting as inebriated as he did gave no favours to his infamously short temper. Liatruz (or Samuel, as he was then known) was beaten regularly by his father, along with his mother, and sister Catherine. Sometimes it was for stupid things like being late down to supper, but most often just because he was in the way.

  One night, he found himself on the receiving end of a vicious verbal attack, which hurt just as badly as the physical abuse. In anger and pain, h
e turned to his sister, who was playing in the kitchens and generally getting in the way of the servants, and raised his fist to her at her constant pleas that she played with him. He hit her. It felt good and, even though it was his sister, he didn’t feel guilty. It felt good to have an outlet. He just laughed when she cried, and for the first time, felt strong and in control. He took a third swing at his little sister, but this time she screamed and ducked away. Samuel twisted round, trying to find her. The door to the cellar was open and he banged down the stone steps. But even in the moment before he did, he didn’t feel the tiniest bit of remorse for hitting the girl.

  He was reaching for the light – his escape from this life-long pain. The light; where nothing would ever hurt him; where he would be able to look down, smugly at everyone else’s suffering; where he would be invulnerable. But suddenly, as if Almighty God had looked down on those final moments, he was torn away from the light and returned to the world he’d left. When he opened his eyes, he was in eternal darkness.

  The power he had felt at hurting that tiny girl was probably where his desire to kill witches had come from. The control he had always been subjected to as a child was probably why he turned people into his Masses. His chronic fear of the night probably stemmed from coming to life again in his coffin. The pure and unadulterated evil in his heart came from… well, he wasn’t sure where that came from. But he didn’t care how it got there – it was fun! He was glad he had spent a lot of time in America when Sigmund Freud was around – he could’ve had a field party with Liatruz.

  But enough about him. He had to fine tune his plan to lure the girl into his death grip. Liatruz had decided upon the tried and tested ‘bait’ plan. He was going to have one of her loved ones kidnapped and held here until she came for them. That had all been going swimmingly until he had realised that the youngster wouldn’t let her friend out of her sight. If he didn’t know better, he would have toyed with the idea that she knew what was being planned. That was impossible, so he chose the next option and had sent his minions after her father. From what he had seen of her lately, she was very protective of him and would give up her life for him. Maybe the girl didn’t realise it yet but she loved him more than she would admit to. And that was what made him the perfect choice after the boy.