December Moon (The Raven Saga)

  "And what about the boy, can you explain what he looks like?" Tabitha asked.

  Nodding again, she described him as best as she could, "but the thing that got me was the fact that he was so sad. So incredibly sad. He carried something in his pocket. It clearly meant something to him. It was a little crystal. An angel, I think,"

  "No!" yelled Lilly. "No... not Oliver. Not Oliver!" screamed Lilly, "Oh my God, we've got to find him," she screamed hysterically.

  "Jo, go to Lilly's bedroom and find a photo of Oliver. We need to be absolutely sure it is him," he ordered as Jo ran as fast as she could there and back. Being a vampire did have its perks.

  December's eyes grew larger as she looked across at Lilly. She remembered being told about Oliver in emails when she was still in England, but Lilly had never sent a picture, otherwise she would have recognised him.

  Carrying Lilly's laptop, she opened it and clicked on the desktop. The photo she had seen before stared back at them.

  With a deep creased brow, December looked back at her best friend and nodded, "I'm sorry, Lilly, but it's him. Oliver is in serious danger."

  Gabriel immediately grabbed the nearest telephone and dialled.

  "Come on, come on... pick up... Ben... it's Gabriel. Yes, yes. Sorry I can't explain... no, I can't talk right now. I need to know where Oliver is living now. It's urgent. No I can't say. Look, Ben, I'm sorry but Oliver is in serious danger and we need to help him before it's too late. Whistler? Yes, no and you don't know? I'll ring you back in a moment. Just stay there, don't go anywhere." Gabriel snapped the phone shut and looked up, "He's been living in Whistler but he's gone away for a few days. He didn't tell Ben where he was going. He sent him an email telling him he was going away for a little while."

  Standing abruptly, Rose walked over to her old friend Gabriel and put her hands on his shoulders. Looking deep into his eyes, she said, "Gabriel, calm down my dear. First things first, we must get Ben over here at once. He will just have to deal with it. Tell him to bring Crystal with him. She'll be able to offer some support when he learns the truth."

  Nodding, Gabriel phoned Ben straight back and told him to shut down the practice. "It's an emergency, Ben. Bring Crystal too. Just get here... fast."

  Rose smiled sadly and nodded. "Secondly, December, we need to know everything... every tiny detail about your vision. Okay, dear?"

  December sat down and closed her eyes. As if in a trance, she described everything exactly as it had happened, as the group listened on quietly.

  "Right, that's what we need to focus on. Where are the nearest beaches with tsunami warning signs?" asked Carmelo.

  "That'll probably be the west parts of Vancouver Island" suggested Hope, one of the other witches.

  "We need to narrow it down," said someone else.

  December was holding Lilly's hand and trying to reassure her while all of this was going on, but nothing she could do would make her feel better. There was only one way to help and that would be to get Oliver back safe and sound.

  Meredith, who had been sitting calmly on the sofa with her eyes closed suddenly jumped up. "Tofino... he's in Tofino!" she yelled.

  "But how do you know?" asked December who wondered who this strange little rotund woman was.

  Smiling, Meredith tapped the side of her head, "I've known Oliver since he was a little 'un and I can sometimes sense what's going on in the minds of people I know. It took me a little while to get through to him but he's surfing in Tofino."

  "How fast can we get there?" asked Lilly.

  "I'm afraid it's a lengthy journey. We need to get across the water and then travel all the way across the island," said Tabitha, "Zoltan and I have been before and it takes ages."

  "We could fly," said Sammy.

  Shaking her head, Moira added, "getting a flight would take even longer, I'm afraid."

  "That's not what I meant," he said, turning and letting his wings fan out to his side. "I mean, I could fly..."

  December's large eyes flew open even more than ever before and she was unable to contain herself. She stood up and walked over to Sammy, admiring his big black wings.

  "Wow," she said, "they're amazing, can I touch them?" After he nodded, December gently placed her hand on his shoulder blades and then followed the wings down, feeling the silkiness of the feathers beneath her fingers.

  "Amazing!"

  "Yes, Sammy has flown with me before, he can carry me over there and we can save Oliver!" Lilly yelled, jumping up and grabbing her bag.

  "Not so fast, Lilly" said Gabriel. "You can't very well go flying across the water and over the island in broad daylight. You will be seen by just about everybody."

  Sobbing, Lilly's hunched shoulders fell to her sides and she leaned against the wall and let her knees buckle beneath the weight until she sat crying in a heap on the floor.

  The sound of Ben's pick-up could be heard arriving on the gravel outside the house but nobody moved. All eyes were on the young girl as she sobbed her heart out for the boy she had never given up on.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Ben rushed into the house, taking absolutely no notice of the weird and wonderful characters scattered all around the room.

  "What's going on, Gabriel? Where's Oliver?" he said as his eyes fell on the old man who had become like a father to him, "and what are you doing back? I thought you'd moved away from Powell River for good?"

  "That's not important right now, Ben. What is important is that we find your brother. We've managed to figure out that he's surfing in Tofino. We just need to get there... and fast. We've tried calling his cell but he's not answering."

  Nodding, Ben turned to look at the faces around the room and his face turned very pale. "Who are these...?"

  "Ben?" asked a gentle voice.

  "I'm in the living room, Crystal."

  A beautiful young African woman with short cropped golden hair walked into the room and smiled widely at everybody.

  "Crystal... how lovely to see you. It's been a long time" said one voice.

  "My dear Crystal... you're looking beautiful as always," said another.

  "Hello Felix, Victoria, Hope... oh Margot. How lovely to see you. Philippe! It's been ages!" she said as she hugged some of the people around her. People Ben had never seen before.

  "You know these... people?" he asked her as she finally reached her boyfriend. She held out her hand and he took it, gripping tightly.

  "Yes, they are like family to me," she said with a smile. She nodded to everybody else and flashed a lovely set of white teeth in a big grin.

  "Sammy... it's so great to see you back home and settled."

  Ben's pale face turned even paler as his eyes settled on the tall, dark haired man.

  "Sammy... Sammy Morton?" he whispered.

  "Ben, I think you'd better sit down," said Crystal, "can somebody get Ben a glass of water. Actually, can you make that something a little stronger. I think he's going to need it."

  She led Ben over to the settee as a couple of people kindly stood up and let them sit down, all the while Ben never took his eyes from Sammy and when Sammy turned his back, Ben gasped, nearly dropping the crystal tumbler in his shaking fingers.

  As Gabriel, Meredith and Crystal proceeded to explain the truth about themselves and about many of the people in the room, the rest of the group gave them some privacy and gathered outside to discuss how they would reach Tofino quickly.

  "Do we have any friends in Tofino that we can contact for help?" asked Moira to the group of witches.

  "I'm afraid not, we are all either here with you or even further north," replied Margot. "And we don't actually know of any witches in Tofino."

  "What about vampires?" Lilly asked Carmelo.

  "Not any that I know of, I'm afraid."

  "And werewolves?" Tabitha asked her boyfriend, Zoltan, who shook his head.

  "Changelings?"

  Again, everybody shook their heads.

  "The fact is, we don't know anybody
in Tofino... nobody we can trust with our secrets anyway. We have no choice but to get there ourselves," said Carmelo.

  "Guys... can you all come inside. Ben is a little shaken up but he's all right. He thinks he can help," said Wyatt who had poked his head out of the kitchen door.

  Everybody turned to follow him back inside. December and Lilly were the first ones to reach Ben who looked deathly pale, and he visibly shook a little when he spoke.

  "I think my flying lessons might finally pay off," he said in an attempt to make a joke, "I've got a client with a sea plane who will happily take me anywhere I want to go. I'm sure he'll take me to Tofino but I can only take a few others with me."

  "I'm coming. There's no way I'm staying here," said Lilly firmly.

  "I don't like it. It's too dangerous, Lilly. You're the one that Duran wants," said Gabriel.

  "I don't care. I have to do something to help Oliver."

  "Gabriel, she's right. She needs to be there. It might help us to trap Duran. Don't worry, though, I will take care of her. Ursula, I think you should come too, Zoltan, you as well. I'm sorry but that's all the room there is, five of us and the pilot. Right, let's go."

  December looked crushed as she looked at Lilly.

  "We'll figure out another way to get there. You, be careful," she said as she hugged her best friend as the small group squeezed into Ben's pick-up truck after saying goodbye to everyone and they drove off as fast as they could to try and get there in time to save Oliver.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  Still looking somewhat pale and freaked out, Ben sat quietly right at the back of the six-seater seaplane with Lilly to his side. Carmelo sat upfront with the pilot, trying to make polite conversation while the others sat in between, all deep in thought.

  "I'm sorry you had to find out about us this way, Ben," whispered Lilly as she leaned over to speak softly into his ear.

  Startled, he turned and looked at her, confusion clouding his face. As he searched her eyes, his expression softened and he smiled.

  "I guess I always knew there was something a little different about your family but I'd never have imagined this was it. Changelings? I didn't even know what that meant until Gabriel told me."

  He looked out of the window for a moment, watching the blue ocean spread out beneath them before turning back to look at her, "at least now I know why Oliver ran away. He found out the truth didn't he?"

  Nodding sadly, tears filled Lilly's eyes and she tried to brush them away with her fingers.

  "He... he saw me change."

  "Into a mountain lion?"

  Lilly nodded, unable to speak.

  "I guess that's enough to frighten the living daylights out of anyone," he said with a slow grin as he took her hand and squeezed it.

  "Why aren't you afraid of us, Ben?"

  "Why would I be afraid of you? You guys are like family to me. Plus, I'm a vet... I know how to handle animals!"

  Lilly let her head fall to one side and she let out a relieved sigh with a smile, "I was so afraid that we would lose you too."

  "Never. Lilly, don't ever think that. It's a huge shock to the system, but I can cope. I'm sure Oliver will get over it too, eventually... if we get to him in time," he added with a touch of fear in his voice.

  "We will, Ben. We will. I can't lose him. I won't lose him."

  "How come Carmelo and Ursula and some of those other v...v...vampires were out in the sunlight? I thought sunlight was one of the things that kills their... their kind?" asked Ben as he peered towards the front of the aircraft and saw the light catching Carmelo's face.

  "They're pretty old. They can handle the light. Most new-borns can't handle it the same way and they often get burnt, but it rarely kills them. That stuff is just made up in the movies for effect," she answered with a smile.

  "When you say pretty old... what exactly do you mean?"

  "Hundreds and hundreds of years old," she whispered back.

  "And werewolves don't just change when there's a full moon then?" he asked with a smirk as Zoltan turned and grinned at him.

  "No, they are at their strongest during a full moon, but they can pretty much change whenever they want to," Lilly said as she watched Zoltan smile again and turn back to face the front of the plane.

  #

  "...and that's how Oliver found out about Lilly's ability," said Meredith as she explained to December, Moira and Ruby what had really happened to Lilly since she'd arrived in Powell River.

  "I can't believe it, I wish she'd have told me," said December who was clearly in shock.

  Shaking her head, her mother turned to her and replied, "No, she couldn't have told you, honey. It was a family secret. Just like we can't tell anyone about us being witches. The only people we can tell are those that we trust who also have supernatural abilities... and Lilly didn't know you were special and you didn't know she was special. We have to be so careful with our secrets."

  "But now we all know the truth so you don't have to keep anything from each other any more," added Meredith with a smile, "I'm so glad this has all worked out the way it has and I am so grateful that Lilly had you in England, December. We've obviously heard all about you. She was so sad to have left you behind and now look... you only live a few hours away. It's wonderful!" she added with a chuckle.

  "Okay folks... we're ready for you now," said a voice from the living room.

  "Come on," said Meredith as the women quickly finished drinking their cups of coffee and followed her out of the kitchen to the group of witches who were forming a circle in the living room, where the heavy green velvet curtains had been closed to make the room as dark as possible.

  In the centre stood Margot with some strange piece of electrical equipment, clearly taken from her RV. "Okay, we haven't tried this before but it's something I've been working on. It should help us to pinpoint the exact location where Duran finds Oliver. I just need all the witches to link arms in a circle. December, I need you to link arms with me towards the centre. Ruby, I think it would help if you also stand with us in the centre seen as you have history with Duran too. Yes, that's it. December, we need you to focus all of your energy to your vision and everybody else focus your energy on December. Ruby, think about Duran. If my machine works, it should give us the coordinates to where it's going to happen... if it hasn't already," she added quietly.

  The room descended into silence and all of the witches closed their eyes and focussed as hard as possible. Several minutes went by. Nothing.

  "December, try talking aloud, describe exactly what you see. Leave nothing out. Everybody else, listen and focus."

  As if back in a trance, December began to speak, once again relaying the events that happened in her vision. Soon the other witches' voices matched hers as they spoke in perfect unison, describing the event exactly as if they had tapped into the vision themselves.

  A faint buzzing could be heard from the centre of the machine, growing louder and louder until it was so high pitched that the voices began to fade away.

  "We've got it!" yelled Margot. "It worked!" she added, laughing, "excellent work ladies and gents. Gabriel, would you like to phone the coordinates through to Carmelo?" she said, as she wrote them down and handed him a piece of paper.

  Everybody unlinked arms and smiled. December fell to the floor.

  "December!" shrieked Ruby as Moira and the other witches rushed to her side.

  "It's all right, don't panic, she's just fainted. She'll be fine," said Emilie as she inspected the young girl.

  "Was this her first circle?" asked Agnes.

  Moira smiled and nodded.

  "It's to be expected, then, nothing to worry about."

  "Goodness me, I'd forgotten all about that. I do believe I fainted at the end of my first circle and if I recall correctly, you did too, dear," said Ruby to her daughter.

  "Pretty much every witch does. It's just part of the process. Don't worry. She'll come to any moment now," said Agnes as December opened her eyes an
d looked up at all the faces staring down at her.

  "Wh...what happened?" she asked as she was helped up from the floor and over to the sofa where she sank down and rested her head on the back.

  "It's all right, my dear. You just fainted, that's all. It's all part and parcel of becoming a witch. You'll be fine," said Ruby who floated to her side.

  "Excuse me... here's a cup of sweet tea. It usually helps you feel better after a faint," said Meredith as she approached with a steaming cup in her hands.

  As everybody began to disperse, Tabitha sat down on the sofa beside December, "that was pretty cool. I've never seen a witches circle before. Are you okay?" she asked the pretty young girl with the huge blue eyes.

  December nodded and smiled, "I'm guessing you're Tabitha?" she asked.

  "How did you know?"

  Pointing to Tabitha's spiky hair, "the hair... Lilly told me about it!" she chuckled.

  "I guess there aren't many teenagers around with short spiky grey hair are there?" she laughed, "It's from my mother's side of the family. Rose is my grandmother and she went grey very young too," she said as they looked across the room to the elegant feline-like lady chatting to Gabriel. December took notice of the similarities between the two.

  "So, are you a changeling as well?"

  Nodding her head, Tabitha explained that, although she'd been having the strange dreams for quite a while, she'd only recently made the transformation.

  "It was pretty painful, though, but apparently the pain will completely disappear... eventually. Until that happens though, I've been dreading it. Once I get over that hurdle, it'll be pretty exciting, I guess!"

  "Exciting? The idea of changing into a wild beast would scare the heebie jeebies out of me!"

  Tabitha laughed, "The heebie jeebies?... where on earth are you from?!" she joked, "I've always been a bit of a daredevil... so it's only natural for me to be excited about it. Plus, Zoltan, he's my boyfriend, is a werewolf and it'll be fun to go out running together."

  "Won't you want to attack one other?"

  "No more than we do already," Tabitha chuckled.