Soaked and shivering in the front seat of the Mini, those consequences stretched on endlessly. Or so it seemed, trapped in a traffic gridlock of blaring horns and gears grinding. Exhaust fumes seeped inside on the heater fan. I contemplated breathing deeply in order to lapse into a coma and avoid the tirade, but the blue of carbon monoxide poisoning was never my colour.
Smith gave me yet another withering sidelong gaze. Aside from blond strands plastered to his forehead, the rain had no discernible impact on him, his skin unmarred by goosebumps and teeth gritted because of my recklessness, rather than chattering from cold. The tempest obscured the view over the bonnet, red tail-lights in front scattering prisms across the windshield. A trip that should take ten minutes occupied half an hour, only those pushed by necessity willing to brave morning peak hour in the city.
“When we discovered you gone, I couldn’t believe you’d do it,” he yelled above water bombarding the car’s roof and the mad swish of wiper blades. “I’ve a good mind to hand you over to Hugo and give him free rein. He’s fuming.”
“Oh, what’s he going to do? Put me across his knee and spank me?” My irritation at being treated like a toddler overcame any instinct for self-preservation. I blotted puddles from my seat with my damp towel and used it to squeeze out my braid.
Smithy burst into laughter and shook hair from his eyes with a hail of droplets. “I’d like to see that.”
“You’d let him touch my bum?”
“No way in hell. It’s the concept that’s appealing. Maybe I should put you over my knee.”
The frost thawed slightly and he smirked. I stared out the passenger window to hide my blush, noticing grey canyons of high-rises instead of the expected blue haze of Sydney Harbour and the towering sandstone foundations of the bridge.
“Not that it would make a speck of difference,” Smithy said. “Why, Bear? Seriously, why worry your guardians to such a degree? They’re already suffering. The Amulet’s wearing off. It’s horrible to watch.”
Smithy knew how to push my buttons best: my remorse eclipsed the physical discomfort of sodden gym gear and the chill. The light ahead turned green and we inched forward into the intersection leaving Oxford Street, dawdling through the central business district and onwards in the direction of Chinatown. Bea had premises as a dealer of antiquities there, but I’d never seen her office and found it weird she’d be there now. My nerves, already harp-string taut, plucked at the thought of the upcoming confrontation.
And Smithy was right. How could I so blithely put Aunt Bea, Mrs Paget and Fortescue through it? What sort of lousy, thoughtless person was I? But some irresistible impulse had drawn me from the warehouse to Bondi at that precise moment, as though animated by a force guiding me to Smithy’s friends. Perhaps, in spite of the risks and the trouble, it was meant to be. I clung to any idea that would excuse my grubby behaviour.
“They can see my Deltas,” I blurted. “Your friends, all three of them.”
“I mean,” Smith continued, oblivious. “I understand how frustrating it must be, stuck inside with not much to do–”
“Hud, Bickles and Andie can see my tatts.” I held up my arms. “These tatts, that no one outside of the Trinity are supposed to detect.”
He stared over at me, weaving and darting through the congestion without as much as a glance. “Pardon?”
“Are we going to meet Bea? We need to find out what it means.”
Smith frowned. “How do you know they’re visible to my mates?”
“Andie pointed them out. Tiffany couldn’t see a thing, nor could any of her circus. Hud and Bickles were surprised. They described the Deltas in detail. And Andie commented on how the tatts match my necklace. She even nailed their colour.”
“So you’re telling me Tiffany and anyone in the vicinity who heard, now has a description of something they shouldn’t?”
This wasn’t quite the response I’d envisaged. “Um, aren’t you missing the point?”
“What point? That Anathema are on the global hunt for you and you’re signposting the way for any member who happens to pursue Tate?” In profile, his jaw worked as he gnashed his teeth, a sure sign of a reignited temper. “That you’re not taking seriously the plight of your guardians and their many sacrifices to keep you alive? That Finesse could break out at any second and you’re immune to the danger? That your role is to keep Trinity secrets? That you don’t consider needs other than your own. Enough points for you, Bear? Or should I go on?”
“No, please don’t,” I mumbled, hanging my head. The list was long and incriminating and all because I’d dared a run. We crept across town in silence, the cabin thick with my shame.
“You’re not the only one in this.” Smithy’s damaged face spoke volumes his soft voice hadn’t.
“I’m sorry.”
He sighed. “Save it for Bea. Who’d have predicted you could ever outstrip me in the apology department.”
I was exhausted and miserable and we hadn’t even faced a real challenge yet. Smithy misjudged my apathy. Every particle of my being pulsed with the knowledge the enemy was coming for us. We could not hide this time. Feeling exposed and defenceless wore me down. So, my coping strategy had been to shut the angst out, to pretend my life was someone else’s. The occasion to find a new approach had arrived: I would not disappoint my guardians or Smithy again. I rested my head against glass and battled the dark veil of sleep, finally succumbing against the odds.
It was an unusual structure: a long triangular frame of wood about the size of an average modern house, sloped sides thatched to a spine, one end protected from the elements by weathered slats that contained a door. A huge set of antlers jutted over the entrance at the wall’s pinnacle. Smoke trickled into a sky fading to dusk from a gap halfway along the roof.
Built at the corners of two fields of knee-high grain with a path between, a stone well edged by colourful wildflowers occupied a small clearing in front of the dwelling, where several scruffy grey wolfhounds lounged in the packed dirt. One of the dogs had recently birthed a litter of four pups that rowed along her belly nuzzling engorged teats.
A pigsty was at a remove to the side, its inhabitants snuffling and grunting. A sturdy wooden fence ringed the land, upon which hung several drying deer hides from animals that must have been huge. Each supporting post was carved by intricate runes, giving the sense that although isolated, these were the holdings of someone important. At the rear, a dense forest of soaring oaks blocked the view, a blackberry bramble laden with fruit tangling the base of the trees. Their sweet scent hung heavy on the air, encouraging a swarm of humming bees.
A tall, muscular man, shirtless and wearing coarse tan britches, split logs on a stump next to the well, stacking the firewood in a pyramid within easy reach of the entry. The rhythmic crack of his axe disrupted the scene’s tranquillity, his broad back sweat-sheened and rippling on every swing. A rag on top of his head tied his dark hair. Just as he dropped another chunk onto the woodpile, a woman’s voice emanated from inside the house.
“Tilly?” she called. “Tilly.”
A little girl’s giggles grew louder, until the front door swung wide and their owner waddled at full speed from the house. Fear clenched my belly and I struggled to rouse from the scene, but as always, the noose released to a schedule not of my choosing. The youngster, dressed in a hand-sewn smock of pale blue linen, had startling golden curls. I had seen them before.
“I have her, Bonnie,” the man yelled, his accent thick Gaelic. He leaned the axe against the chopping stump, dipping to one knee. I knew his voice, but shied from recognition. He reached out his arms to receive her.
“Pa,” she cried, veering unexpectedly for the mewling puppies. “Pap, pa, pa!”
“No child, the word is Da. Da!” He laughed and took three long strides to intercept Tilly, scooping her up and blowing a raspberry on her belly with more giggles and squirming. She stretched for the pups from his grip.
“Pup!”
Wrestling her to a perch in the crook of his elbow, he went to the dogs, who thumped their tails. Two fully grown animals earned a vigorous scrub about the ears for their efforts. He soothed the nursing hound with quiet words, before gently setting Tilly onto her feet, kneeling behind her and showing her from the rear how to cup her pudgy little hands.
“Softly now, Tilly.”
Collecting the largest pup, while stroking its mother’s head, he lay the tiny, whimpering creature in her grasp. She squealed with delight and for a moment, it seemed the father’s trust in his child was misplaced and she’d inadvertently squeeze the life from it. Instead, she brought the pup up to nuzzle tenderly beneath her chin. He smiled proudly and petted the puppy’s smooth grey back with a forefinger.
“There’s a good lass.”
Tilly lofted the puppy to inspect it closely. She frowned and her lip quivered, hinting at tears to come. The man took the baby from her, returning it to the teat, and she pointed at her eyes and blinked in demonstration.
“Aye, he’ll open them soon enough. Don’t fret, Tilly.”
She clapped her relief and launched at him for a hug. He bundled her up in time to see a heavily pregnant woman with her child’s sunshine-bright hair barrel towards them from the house, huffing her ire. And for the first time, the aspect changed and I could not mentally squirm from a clear picture of his too-handsome face.
“Daniel!” she scolded, wiping her hands on a grubby apron that covered her loose-fitting dark red tunic. “Tilly is due in her cot. Keeping her all excitable will make for a grumpy bairn come sun-up.”
With her long flaxen tresses and fair skin, cheeks rouged by exertion, she looked very young and angelic and was a true ethereal beauty. Her daughter buried her face in the nape of her father’s neck.
“Tilda needs no help from me to be excitable, love.”
“Oh it’s love now, is it? You’ll heed how I bloat up like a ripe pumpkin whenever you bandy those four letters about.”
He roared laughter, grabbing his wife around the waist and planting a kiss upon her forehead. “Come inside and I’ll rub your weary back. When does your sister arrive?”
She shook her head and slapped his muscled upper arm, but did not attempt to break free, smiling warmly. The family headed for their shelter, Tilly sucking her thumb with sleepy eyes, her head in the crook of his shoulder.
“You know Isadore, she will get here when she’s a good mind to get here.”
“Well, it had better be soon, love. You look as though you’re ready to burst the seams of your dress.” They paused for a moment at the entrance, while she bent and bunched her apron to deposit a couple of chopped logs into the sling. He patted her bottom. “Though, that would be a most welcome sight.”
“Rude man.” She laughed and hit him again, before the evening light failed and their happiness faded.
I jolted awake, choking for breath and scratching at my throat. The stench of burned human flesh filled the close space of the Mini and I punched the button in the armrest to open my window, not caring about rain that spattered my cheek. The five-spice aroma of Asian food swirled in on a gust, but notions of eating only made my stomach lurch.
We were in a slim laneway, easing along for its middle at a snail’s pace. A high edifice of bricks extending either side for thirty metres left scant room. Smithy edged the car via a roller door embedded on the left into a tight garage. A sharp-angled glass-walled building towered nearby at the end of the alley, blocked once the door closed automatically at our rear. I figured I’d only been out of it for roughly ten minutes. What hell would my dreams conjure during a longer nap?
He peered over at me, dismay on his face as the gloom descended, abandoning the gearstick to prise my fingers gently from their protective chokehold. “Same nightmare?”
The Mini was now trapped in a small empty box. I began to wonder at the purpose of sitting here in a pall of fumes, when the fake panelling in front of the bonnet slid apart. We inched forward onto a lift that dropped us below for several storeys, which slowed to a halt beneath Chinatown. This place must be Bea’s basement storage for retail antiquities. Her public offices were located on the top floor of the swish apartment complex I’d glimpsed.
“No, something worse. I finally know who they are … That poor, poor little girl.”
The words came out barely audible, the pain of acknowledgement hurting my heart. This latest had been a nocturnal descent more special than the usual pointless slaughter, giving full meaning to Enoch’s appeal for pity. The bitterness, spite, outward disregard for the lives of others, all of it made sense. Insufferable loss blighted everything he did, even after the great expanse of years. I dreaded the discovery of how it had happened, but was certain.
“Seth. The witch destroyed Seth’s family. Isadore, the first Keeper, was his murdered wife’s sister.”
Smithy nodded sadly, showing no surprise. “Man, that’s a heavy sentence. Even for that bastard.”
I didn’t bother to point out that his family’s demise was probably the reason Seth was a bastard. Smithy was just too biased against him. And he hadn’t witnessed Seth’s joyful, smitten face on greeting his wife, his laughter or a parent’s affection and patience that revealed the man he’d been before Finesse decimated his existence like a ravenous flesh-eating tumour. He’d had another name. Daniel.
The elevator doors glided wide, the warehouse beyond blasting fluorescence. I blinked to regain focus. Mrs Paget waited in greeting, leaning her thin frame on a newly acquired walking stick. She still wore a wide smile, regardless of floral pants and a white shirt swimming on her in a testament to relentless weight loss. And there wasn’t a lot of her to start with.
“Oh, no.”
“It’s bad, huh? They’re aging faster than Enoch predicted. It’s the wasting influence of the unclaimed Stone.” Raphaela’s desertion had foisted this disaster upon us, but I carried the blame. Smith’s expression changed from sorrow to one of clear confusion, his knuckles white on the steering wheel. “I don’t want to seem insensitive, but how do you know what happened to … Seth?” He uttered the name grudgingly. “Should you be dreaming about the enemy?”
Although tinged with accusation – as if I exercised the barest control over my psychic forays – I understood the crux of what Smith meant. Up to this point, all of my visions had been instructive or related to the Keeper’s path. Yet Seth’s story was now at the forefront of my mind.
“Are we sure he’s an enemy?” It was out of my mouth before good sense could prevail.
Smith gifted me with a furious glare. “Damn. Straight. Are you under his spell?”
“His enchantment isn’t supposed to have an enduring effect on me.”
“So you’ve got no excuse then.”
I had thin evidence, but Seth just didn’t feel like an enemy. Still, a question niggled: how could he ever have given up fighting the monster who ripped his wife and child from him?
