twenty-nine

anagarika

Eijaz let me into the flat. The hallway was dark and silent. “Everything okay?” I asked. “Only you didn’t phone me en route, so I’m guessing Shell is still here.”

He looked down at the ground, nudged a dust ball into a corner with the sharp point of his black leather shoe. For once, he wasn’t wearing his shades. His eyes were points of deep brown in the gloom. “No sign of them. I’m sure they’ll be back.”

“Eijaz! I’ve used a lot of petrol coming here.”

He lifted his hand. He was holding Shell’s phone. “Why should she leave it behind?”

“Isn’t Ricky answering his?”

“It’s dead. Not surprising—he didn’t take his charger to London, left it plugged into the kitchen socket.”

“So they’re both incommunicado.”

“I’m wondering how accidental that is.” He held my gaze for the first time. A lot of his natural cockiness was missing. “I got something I wanna show you. You better prepare yourself.”

The hallway was silent, but I could hear a regular plop-plop from the kitchen. A dripping tap. My heart was thudding in sympathy behind my ribs. “Show me what, Eijaz?”

“You know.” It was almost an accusation. “When I phoned you, I could tell. You know, don’t you?”

“I don’t know a thing.”

It wasn’t the truth; I did know something. Not in the same way that Rey would piece a case together—not like Pippa would methodically reach a conclusion. But my way, the way of the shaman. The things Ricky had told me, crouched in the shrubbery at the crematorium, and the journey Sabrina of the Severn had sent me on had become a succession of keys fitting into locks.

He walked away, taking the stairs. “Up here, Sabbie.”

I didn’t move. My feet were lodged in some sort of groove that held them fast.

“You gotta to confirm this,” he said, “or tell me I’m completely off my rocker.”

Finally, I was up the stairs. Eijaz pushed Ricky’s bedroom door half open, but he didn’t step inside. He was waiting for me to take my look and make my comment. “I’d prefer to be off my rocker, okay?”

The room was dim, the blinds pulled to the sill. I almost turned to ask what I was supposed to be looking for, but thought better of it. I fumbled with the light switch; it was hidden behind a long piece of black paper, pinned in place. A low-watt energy bulb flickered on overhead, taking its own sweet time to illuminate the scene, so that, as my sight adjusted, the surreal nature of the room became apparent in increments.

Ricky’s bedroom had once been as orderly as a pharmacy. Now it was a maelstrom. There was total chaos, yet the chaos seemed to have a purpose, almost a plan within itself. Books and files were scattered over the floor, layered one on the next, each open at a specific page, as if Ricky had so much to remember, he didn’t dare lose the pages he’d read.

I closed my eyes and heard the whispers.

The last time I was here, the spirits of the room had spoken to me, but I’d failed to listen. Today, they forced me to hear their lament, which rose and fell, moving from croon to wail. Even the walls cried out. Perhaps Ricky knew they did, for there were no walls to see. They were plastered with reproductions depicting Arthurian legends, posters of sea eagles, and photographs of pagan sites he’d maybe taken himself. Long sheets of paper hung down the walls, some placed so high he would have to use a chair to check what was on them. They were filled with scribbles and diagrams and archaic runes. The picture of Glastonbury had strips of white paper pasted over them—single phrases in thick black marker, like “playing tonight” flashes on flyers.

I stepped into the room. A tight line snatched at my hair. Another dug into my cheek. I raised my hands and they were caught too. Threads stretched tight across my path. It felt like an attack; a trap laid for trespassers. As if Ricky had brought a mutant spider into his room and I was caught in a web that was taut with menace and control.

The ceiling light finally reached its full brightness. Ricky had used strands of nylon cord to join up his ideas. The lines of connection ran from the pictures to the paper strips, up and down the walls and across the room. I dragged the twine from my face and heard pins pop out from the plaster.

A desperation crept up my spine, begging me to get out—to turn and run.

I glanced back at Eijaz. He was hanging onto the doorframe as if in some house supposed haunted.

“Yeah … like, he put his mattress on the floor and he crawls onto to it.”

The stink of unwashed slumber rose from the bare pillow and duvet. His clothes still lay in knotted heaps below the bed frame, which was piled with even more open books and files and a half-eaten shop-bought cake.

I remembered the altar inside the wardrobe space that Freaky had admired last time we were here. I slithered across the carpet, trying not to get caught in the lines of twine. The ancient coffee spills felt sticky below my hands. The doors to the wardrobe were open. The interior beckoned.

“He’s been burning candles here,” I murmured. The nightlight holders contained nothing but their black wicks. They might still have been alight when Ricky had left for London.

I sensed the reverence Freaky had picked up; this was Ricky’s place of devotion. A scent of joss stick lingered inside the wooden frame. The wind chimes tinkled slightly as my movement disturbed the air currents.

A photo of Alys’s face had been pinned to the back of the wardrobe, blown-up to such a size that everything was slightly pixelated. She was laughing, her teeth glinting toothpaste-white in the flash. I could see the outline of St. Michael’s Tower behind her, and the deep purple sky as the shortest night fell. This wasn’t here last time, and I fancied he’d got Shell to print it out from her camera. I think he’s in love … with the dead Alys, Shell had confessed. As he had also loved his own sister.

At the very centre of the wardrobe floor stood the framed picture Babette had sketched. Now Ricky wasn’t breathing down my neck, I felt able to pick it up and look closer.

Babette had used black ink with a fine-pointed pen. Thousands of lines built the image up. The face was long, with raised cheekbones above hollowed cheeks. The raven hair was wayward, escaping from a clip at the back, perhaps. The lips held the only defining colour, blocked in with red ink. The woman had stunning eyes—Babette had cleverly created a glint within them that made them feel alive. They were looking directly at me. They were boring into my eyes. Along the bottom, Babette had scrawled her name as artist. I brought the surface closer to my face, in order to see the signature clearly.

For almost a minute, I crouched on my hands and knees, staring at the woman’s image and the words Babette had written beneath it. I was seeing the likeness of someone I had longed to meet, face to face.

Eijaz coughed in his throat. “Like I said, yeah? Ricky’s nutty method of revision, innit?”

His words brought me back to life. I sucked in a breath and rocked on my heels. I crawled to the door and snapped off the ceiling light, sending the room back into shadow. I had brought Babette’s picture with me.

“Any chance of a cup of tea?”

Eijaz made two teas using one tea bag and broke open a packet of cheap digestives. We took our drinks to the kitchen table and I laid Babette’s picture flat upon it.

“It’s shocking,” said Eijaz. He stared down at his mug. “When somebody changes. Like, they’re another person. He’s not the Ricky I knew no more.” He barked a laugh. “Right—we all pretend a bit, don’t we? Put on an act? Get all dressed up to make a statement an’ all, but this ain’t no act, man. This is like … a takeover.”

I nodded. “Can you remember when it started?”

“I dunno. Months, maybe. It was more under control, you get me? Like, it’s escalating lately.”

“Did it start when Alys died?” I asked.

There was a silence. “He told me he saw her spirit rise. I’m like, man … you can’t see no thing like that. But he couldn’t shut up about this Alys. Like a trigger set something off inside his head.”

“You can get obsessed with death.”

“Yeah, Sabbie, but that’s what I meant about this shaman shit he’s been getting into. Like, what I was saying that time. You didn’t want to hear, I know you didn’t, but after that shaman workshop, he got weirder and weirder.”

“There was no workshop. It was cancelled when Alys died.”

“I only spoke true, man. It worried me, even back then. What I think is, meddle with that shit that and … pop!” he slapped his hands together.

“Shamanism can’t make you crazy,” I said. “But walking in the otherworld can make you feel powerful. It’s important to remember it’s not your power. If you have mental health issues and the wrong person to guide you, I’m not disputing your emotions could go out of control.”

It was easy to forgot that Eijaz knew nothing about Brice’s emails, or Morgan le Fey or Marty-Mac. All he knew was that his flatmate was behaving strangely. Before we’d gone to Dennon’s party, Eijaz had voiced his concerns. I’d assumed he was slamming shamanism without knowing about it. That happened a lot and it always got my hackles raised. I’d bitten back, shut him up. If only I’d waited, listened to what he was really saying.

I pushed the picture frame towards him. “There are names on this sketch. Does he ever mention them?”

Eijaz took it and read aloud. “‘Morgan le Fay by Babette Johnson.’ I don’t know neither of them names.”

It was time for some honesty. “Babette is Ricky’s younger sister. Morgan le Fay is an assumed name—a writer of poison pen emails—whoever this person is, they’re vile and destructive.”

“There is someone he’s seeing. He goes AWOL for, like, days—leaves looking good, his usual gothic image, but when he comes back—he’s in a state. Not shaved, not washed. Then for days after, he don’t come outta that room. Nose in a book or Googling things or doing bits to his wall. Then he bursts out, gets showered at last, gets all gothed up, and disappears again.”

“Where does he go? Would he be with Shell, perhaps?”

“No. Shell’s phoning up, asking where the hell he is.”

“So is he with Juke Webber?”

Eijaz shrugged. “Could be.”

My heart had got out of place; somehow it was up in my throat and thudding like some archaic steam engine. I’d long ago worked out that any of the workshoppers could have attacked Anthony Bale, if they’d caught his bus to Yeovil. But I’d never thought to ask them where they were the day that Gerald Evens was attacked. However, I did know who had been close to Marty-Mac the day he’d been killed.

“Look,” I said to Eijaz, “can you give me a minute to make a phone call?”

I waited until he’d left the room before I called Juke’s number. He replied with a brief “Yep?” His breath came down the line in fast huffs.

“You okay?”

“In the gym—hotel.”

“You don’t happen to know where Ricky is at the moment, do you?”

“No—frankly—past caring. Hey—wait a sec.”

I hung on. The background noise echoed with piped music and loud voices. “That’s better,” he said at last. “I’m off the treadmill. I deserve a break.”

“I won’t hold you up, Juke. I just want to know if Ricky was with you when you came to the Angel Shopping Centre.”

He didn’t need to stop to think. “That was why I rang you that day—remember? I was going to cancel my session with you because he’d turned up, which had become a problem. Since we reconnected at the Solstice, he’s become a bit of a pest.”

“So he was with you that day.”

“He arrived out of the blue, begging a bed for the night. When I said I had an appointment with you, his eyes lit up. He wanted to come with me. I didn’t think it was appropriate; I was ringing to find out how you felt.”

“I didn’t see Ricky at the mall.”

“We agreed he should hang back while I dealt with things. After you left, I couldn’t find him. I went home; I was thoroughly pissed off with the guy. After I got back from seeing you at the pub, he turned up.”

“Juke, can you tell me how he was?”

“Huh? Well, it’s strange that you put it like that because he was all over the shop. And wet. Very wet. Said he’d fallen in the canal, which is hard to believe because it’s nigh impossible to get out again, but his clothes were stained dark with mud so I guess he must have.”

I felt my phone slipping from my grasp. “Ricky’s a bit …” The word unhinged came to me. “Upset. About the cremation. He’s come back home with Shell, but now they’ve disappeared.”

“Frankly, he can stay disappeared, for all I care. The guy’s a liability.”

“If he rings, can you find out where he is and what he’s doing, then let me know?” I broke off, remembering Ricky’s phone had run out of juice.

“Yeah, yeah,” said Juke. He was longing to get back on the treadmill and push his cardiovascular rate back up.

“I’ll let you go, shall I?”

I stared at the sketch of Morgan le Fay. Babette Johnson must have drawn the likeness at least five years ago. Did that mean they both knew the woman back then? Was that part of the implication of Babe’s disappearance? If Morgan had been some kind of shamanic mentor to either of them, perhaps Ricky had asked me to search for Babette because I, too, was a shaman.

Ricky was a star-child—an innocent—the sort who rescues spiders from baths even though they’re terrified of them. I sometimes meet people like Ricky in my practice. They arrive at my therapy room hoping that I will cure them of the charm or spell worked on them by some strong and beguiling necromancer. Mostly what I find is a pattern of events which had nothing to do with their previous mentor, who they’re blaming for the mysterious illness that’s beset them. Rather, it’s an innate part of their themselves—perhaps an early trauma that’s left them vulnerable. Trendle will help me retrieve the part of their soul that had been shocked away from their whole. I could guess that Ricky’s soul might have been broken into pieces by the disappearance of his sister.

Star-children are vulnerable to psychic attack. If Ricky had met someone with charisma, he would be susceptible to sliding under their charms. He’d been the first person to know Alys was dead. His own subtle body would have been raw and open to attack at that moment. And there’s always a predator among a crowd of love-drenched, enlightened hippie types. Someone who relishes domination over others. I visualize a silken cloak to ward off such attacks, but Ricky wouldn’t know what had hit him.

My phone trilled out, making me leap up from my seat. I grabbed it, in the hope Juke was ringing with new information. It was Wolfsbane.

“Things have gone apeshit,” he began.

“Well, hello to you too.”

“No, honestly Sabbie, why did you have to leave London? I need some support here. It’s going to be me and a load of bankers scattering the ashes at this rate.”

“People aren’t keen?”

“Yew and Juke are leaving tomorrow for work on Monday. Freaky’s still here—he’s never stayed in a hotel before and I don’t think we’ll ever prize him out—but Ricky disappeared right after the funeral, and Shell’s gone. Sabbie … I think she’s two-timing me.”

“You’ve been two-timing her, Wolfs, so that sounds fair.”

“Uh?”

“You and Esme.”

There was a pause, while Wolfsbane processed this.

“Anag saw you both in the Chalice Well Gardens, didn’t he? I’m afraid he has trouble keeping his mouth shut.”

“Is that why Shell’s done it? She’s gone off with that Aussie fucker.”

“Wolfsbane,” I barked. “She’s not with Anag.”

“She is now,” he said. “He’s going to show her how to walk the Tor labyrinth.” Wolfs’s voice had deteriorated to whine. “She asked me to walk the labyrinth with her and I didn’t listen. It’s on her bucket list, Sabbie, I should have taken her. Now she’s not even answering her phone.”

“When is this walk taking place?”

“No idea. It must be soon; she’s taken my staff. Said it would add resonance to the occasion, which I couldn’t dispute.”

“And you want your staff back.”

“I want her back! Can’t you speak to her? Make her see sense? Tell her I’ll take her into any labyrinth she chooses.”

I found Anag’s number and dialled.

“Sabs!” he began familiarly. “I was gutted I wasn’t at the funeral, but I wouldn’t have missed my Labyrinth Workshop for a double crate of lager. It was ripper. Hey, did y’know that when you walk into the centre of the labyrinth, you’re walking towards you own soul?”

“Look, Anag—”

“We had these lectures on the history of the labyrinth, we went to see this church that’s got one in the yard there, then we built our own with a pile of boulders. And yesterday, we walked the Tor. It’s not just a question of getting to the bloody top, y’know; it’s hours and hours of bloody hard graft.”

“I’ll come to the point, Anag. What’s this about you taking Shell up the Tor?”

“You got it. It’s a full moon tonight. Not a speck of cloud. Perfect for walking the labyrinth path. How’s that for a bonzo thrill?”

“I’m asking you to call it off.”

“It’s not dangerous. It’s life enhancing, right?”

He was right; with the moon lighting the way better that torches, walking the labyrinth should be inspiring, rather than terrifying. “Not the Tor. I don’t mean walking the labyrinth. I mean …”

I worked my tongue around a reasonable explanation of things, but I couldn’t put my fears into the right words. It was impossible to pass on the monstrous thoughts I was having, and Anag, his mind full of moonlight and labyrinths, would never have believed me.

“Look, Sabs old girl. I gotta go. I’ll be as busy as a cat burying shit before we get going.”

“When are you starting out?”

“Sun’s gotta be right down, moon’s gotta be right up. We’re meeting at the Living Rock.”

“Anag, could I come too?”

“Yeah, no worries. Make it merrier. You ever done a thing like this before?”

“Not really.”

It was hard to slot the pieces of the puzzle into place, sitting in someone else’s kitchen. In the living room, Eijaz had switched on the TV; canned laughter blared. Above my head was Ricky’s bedroom, where long lines of twine connected images of knights rescuing damsels to pictures of the winding paths of Glastonbury Tor.

Shadows in a cave. A dried-out wasteland. A bird plunging in attack. A red hind, shyly blinking in a forest glade. Slowly keys were turning in locks.

“No, Anag,” I repeated. “I have never done anything like this before.”