The figure I can see the clearest is male, he seems familiar, and it takes a moment for me to recognise him. It’s the man who lead the witches and warlocks when they’d set fire to Rita’s house. Michael Ridley.
There are six of them in all, some are female, but it’s another male that my eyes are drawn to. He’s even more familiar than Ridley, he’s tall and has long grey hair held together by a strip of thin leather. Oh my God. It’s Marcel! I think I’m going to be sick. Now I know whose mouth it was I’d recognised in the vision of my dad created by Rita’s magical spell bowl.
Again I look up at the body spread out on the platform, and my sight becomes clearer. I know whose body that is, the body of the man who brought me into this world, who I have been searching for for weeks. Dad.
Tears escape my eyes and confusion clouds my brain, as I try to figure out what the hell they are doing with him. Why has Marcel taken my father? I need to do something to stop this, and I wince as another pain induced scream emits from my dad’s throat. The heat in the cave is too much to take, and the fire grows higher and higher, as though induced through magic.
This is the ritual the dying witch Zara had mentioned my dad’s kidnappers were going to use him for. And it’s New Year’s Eve, surely the day has some kind of significance. Leaving behind the old to embrace the new. But what is the outcome they wish to achieve? Are these the people the warlock had spoken of to Ethan and Whitfield by the lake that time? He’d said they were trying to bring somebody back, but who? These questions and a d
ozen more swirl through my head, no answers presenting themselves, and this increases my fear, anger and frustration tenfold.
My hands continue to tingle. My magic is just waiting for me to use it. It seems that, unintentionally, I have become accustomed to containing it, without even practising the way Rita had instructed me to.
The chanting turns to English now, and it’s Marcel who speaks over the group, he has a brown jug in his hand and he raises it up high above his head. “With this power laden blood, I summon the opening of the worlds.” He stops and gestures to my father on the platform. “With this man, I wish to complete the exchange. A life returned here, for another sent there. Meld the blood of the daughter with the life of the pater familias and bring my great ancestor back to this plane.”
Power laden blood? Oh God, that’s my blood, the blood that got stolen from me when I’d been on my way home from Rita’s. How did Marcel know about it?
Marcel continues to speak. “Once the blood is spilled, so it shall be done.” He tips the jug forward, but I rush into the fray, both arms moving all about, gesturing to summon my magic. The sparks fly out but they don’t burn this time, they circle the jug, holding it in place so that my blood cannot be spilled.
Marcel’s eyes dart to me, as do those of the other members of the circle. “Darling,” he beams, with the falsest of smiles. “Welcome, and please do refrain from what you are doing. The ritual is already in motion, there is no going back now. Unless you want the denizens of hell to be given free reign to move between the realms.”
“Let my dad go,” I breathe, not letting go of my magical hold on the jug.
“I’m afraid that is impossible now. Do not worry, he won’t die, we’re just sending him to another place.” Marcel explains, his face is hard and I can tell he’s doing his best to remain calm.
“LET. HIM. GO!” I scream, and use my other hand to throw sparks at Marcel. He grimaces as they hit his skin, but he doesn’t wail in pain, instead he suffers through it.
I’m about to throw more sparks at him when I’m suddenly knocked to the ground and held down by Michael Ridley. I lose my hold on the jug and it crashes down into the fire. The moment it hits, the fire fades into a gaping, misty black hole in the ground. Dark shadows rise up and seep out of it. One of the female members of the circle reaches up and pulls on a rope. The platform comes apart and my father falls into the hole. A split second later it closes and seals itself shut.
The fire has disappeared, and there is an unearthly silence. I stare at the place where the hole had been as it swallowed up my dad, and there lies a black clad body, with black hair and paler than pale skin. The body stands up while the members of the circle come to surround it, their heads bowed as though greeting a deity.
The deity runs a hand through his hair, and straightens out the black suit he’s wearing. Then, the deepest dark eyes land on me and I shudder in terror as I comprehend the fact that Theodore, the Sorcerer Theodore, Rita’s father and overall evil being number one, is standing right before me.
Theodore turns to Marcel and embraces him. “My kin, I thank you for bringing me back to this world. It really has been an exhausting ordeal.” His kin? Theodore is related to Marcel, he’s a Girard? Theodore speaks as though he’s just been on one of those horrible cheap holidays to some Spanish Island, not like he’s spent the last two years in hell. Actual hell.
“You are most welcome, Great Grandfather,” Marcel bows his head. Yeah, make that great, great, great, great, great grandfather, my brain provides. “There has been terrible devastation for our kind in this city,” Marcel goes on. “But now that you are back, I’m sure that will not be the case for long.”
Theodore laughs, and the sound vibrates around the cave. “I have been estranged from my dear family for many years, it is a wonderful thing to finally gain some of it back.” His eyes land on each member of the circle in turn. “I would like to thank all of you, we may not share blood, but for what you have done for me, you are my family now too.”
Those present mumble their thanks with a mixture of awe, excitement, and a small drop of fear. Perhaps they are wondering if Theodore really is grateful to them for bringing him back. Silence ensues, before Theodore glances back at me again. “And you, little treasure trove, you I thank most of all for the valuable gift of your blood. I could not have returned without it.” Then he laughs, and a purple mist begins to surround him, the others laugh too. My skin is crawling with it. The purple mist seeps closer to me, and the closer it gets the more I lose consciousness. Soon enough, I fall away into a violet tinged darkness.
Chapter Twenty
Truce
I wake up to the dull light of the morning, the sounds of seagulls cawing, and the gentle splash of waves against the shore. My head feels like it weighs a tonne, and it hurts like a bastard because I had been resting it against the hard rock surface of the cave floor.
Where have Theodore and the others gone? There is not one piece of evidence to suggest that anything had happened here last night. And what I really don’t understand is why they let me live. I sit up and find a small note folded at the end of my feet. I pick it up, reading it out loud, my voice is scratchy from exhaustion.
Dear Treasure, you will do well to keep what transpired last night to yourself. You gave me something, so I am giving you something in return. Your life. Live it wisely. From T.
Fuck! Theodore is back. My dad has been sent to a hell dimension in exchange for the Sorcerer’s return. I shove the note into my coat pocket and stumble to my feet, taking a moment to steady myself.
Making my way out of the cave, I take in a deep breath of the fresh sea air to clear my head. Pulling my phone from my pocket, I notice that there are about twenty missed calls from Rita and Finn, and a whole range of messages. Crap, they must be worried sick about me. I’m just about to call Rita when I almost fall over as I stumble into something solid at my feet.
I look down and let out a loud gasp, because there is a stark naked man lying there. Somebody must have had a wild time last night. This is the initial explanation that springs to mind. However, the longer I study him, the more something in my gut tells me that a crazy New Year’s Eve is not the reason why this man is sprawled out naked and unconscious in a secluded part of the beach.
Then something else hits me, this is the exact spot where I had left Wolf when he’d been shaking and convulsing. My eyes rake over the man. He’s got long, dark brown hair, an athletically muscular body, like that of an ancient warrior, and deeply tanned skin. Is this Wolf changed into human form? Funny how this all seems so logical to me after witnessing my dad get swallowed whole by a portal to hell. Perhaps this is some unintentional result of the magic that was released last night during the ritual. I have no other reasoning, all I know is that Finn’s dog is nowhere to be seen.