There was no one there and when he returned his gaze to the path ahead, the four odd people he had been following had vanished. He stopped and looked around. There was nowhere they could have gone. With a deep frown, he set off again at a brisk walk and as he neared the end of the street he was struck by the silence. The road behind him no longer hummed and there was no sound coming from ahead either. A strange, twisting sensation formed inside him and he swayed. He blinked it away and reached out for the nearby brick wall. His fingers pinched the bridge of his nose and he shook away the sensation. When he opened his eyes and looked up he was back in the last side street where he had picked up the strange people.
‘What the…’ He looked up and down the street. There was no mistake, he had somehow ended up back near the museum in a matter of seconds. The street was empty. He set off at a sprint and when he reached the traffic-clogged road he dashed straight across it, between the slowly moving cars. Someone honked their horn but he shrugged it off and darted up the second side street. He sprinted full pelt towards the other end of the street, determined not to get distracted or turned around. As he neared the end again the familiar dizziness swept through him, but he gritted his teeth and pressed on. He burst out of the end of the street and was faced with the front of the museum.
He had somehow doubled back on himself and wound up on the other side of the museum from where he started. He leaned over and planted his hands on his knees. Nausea rushed over him and he fought the urge to be sick right there in the bustling street. His chest ached from running so hard and he groaned with the effort of simply breathing. His knee complained too but the physiotherapy wasn't for nothing and he found himself able to flex out the discomfort.
When Felix stood up straight a sense of grim determination flooded his veins. He checked the traffic and crossed the road, heading straight for the museum. He went up the wide steps and in through the huge double doors into a grand entrance hall. He had visited the museum once on a school trip twenty-odd years ago and again just before joining the army on one of those odd, reflective days. He stopped in the entrance and looked around, unsure what he was looking for. He moved up the hallway towards a display at the far end.
There were photos and information cards behind glass and a quick glance over them told him that they were pictures of museum staff. There was a row of professional headshots of people all titled “Doctor” and the labels revealed which departments they headed. At the end of the row was a stern-looking woman with her dark hair pulled back in a tight bun. She was wearing a dark suit and looked down her nose toward the camera. Felix focused on her and drew a sharp breath as recognition clicked into place. He had seen her with the group at the back door. She was the curator of the whole museum. The big boss. What was she doing sneaking out the back in the middle of the day with a group of weirdos? Where had they all disappeared to?
Felix drifted away from the staff display and into the heart of the museum. He wasn’t really looking at anything. He needed to wrap his head around things and this was as good a place to loiter as any. A whole area of Caerton had somehow vanished. No one could remember it properly, people were getting sick when they tried. He couldn’t get to where it should be. He kept getting turned around. Maybe that had happened to those other people too but they’d ended up somewhere different.
He had to find his sister. If the streets had vanished, what had happened to the people? He pulled out his phone and tried his brother-in-law again. No answer. But at least his phone was actually ringing, unlike Julie’s.
‘Peter,’ Felix said brusquely when he got through to the voicemail. ‘It’s Felix. Please call me when you get this.’ He hung up and with a disgruntled sigh he realised that Peter was probably frantically trying to get to Julie too. Assuming he hadn’t also vanished. Felix made his way through the museum and searched for a door out into the back alley. Eventually he found a fire door and yanked the bar down to open it. He swung the door open and stepped out into the street. It had started raining again and he turned his face to the grey sky to feel the cool drizzle on his skin. He let the fire door swing shut behind him and wiped the rain off his face.
He heard voices and his head whipped in the direction of the babble. He looked around for somewhere to conceal himself, unsure why he even felt the need to do so. Opposite the fire door was a large dumpster and dark doorway to the industrial building opposite. He dashed across the street and ducked into the shelter of the doorway, tucking himself out of sight. He peered carefully around the dumpster and saw the people he had followed striding into the narrow street, the curator of the museum leading them.
‘Can you just call him, please?’ the curator snapped, glaring at the old man with the staff.
‘Of course,’ he replied, casting his gaze down.
‘Just find out what they’re dealing with over in St. Mark’s. I can’t very well approach Fortune, but you have a friendship with Shadow’s Step.’ Her voice had softened.
‘Warden,’ one of the other men behind the curator said, frowning. He was Chinese or something, Felix couldn't tell. ‘What are we dealing with here? How can St. Catherine’s just vanish like this? Have you ever heard of anything like it?’
‘Never,’ the curator replied. Why was he calling her Warden? St. Catherine’s? Felix felt that wave of blackness sweeping over him again and the feeling that he was going to hurl. He clamped a hand over his mouth and lurched back against the door. That was where he grew up. His childhood home was in St. Catherine’s. His school. The park he and Julie played in as children, where they had gone sledging one particularly snowy winter. He remembered it vividly. And yet at the same time he had no idea what he was thinking. They couldn’t be his memories because that place wasn’t real. Julie lived there with her husband. Felix caught the number six bus to get there from his flat. But the number six stopped just up the road from here. It didn’t go any further. But it should.
He could take no more and collapsed to the floor, his mind going blank.
Something wet and hot brushed against his face and Felix jerked awake. A large, scruffy dog was licking his face.
‘Hey!’ He yanked his head away and waved his hands at it. It yelped and ran away. It was still raining and the stench of the dumpster filled Felix’s nostrils. He grimaced against it and pulled himself up to his feet. He looked at his watch. He’d lost about an hour. The back door of the museum burst open and he leapt back into cover. The old man with the staff came out on his own, a scowl etched onto his leathered face. Rapid footsteps splashed in the wet road and Felix peered carefully out to see a skinny lad running down the street. He had rat-like features and was dressed all in black. The old man looked towards him and the lad skidded to a halt beside him, pausing to catch his breath.
‘No change,’ he gasped.
‘Shadow’s Step said they’re looking into it,’ the old man said in a gruff voice. He passed his staff from one hand to the other. ‘Come with me.’
‘Where are we going?’
‘No questions.’ They set off up the street, towards the missing neighbourhood. Felix carefully peeled himself out of his hiding spot and followed them at a good distance. They turned the corner and he ran to reach it as quickly as possible. He looked carefully around it and saw them crossing the road and heading for the road that Felix couldn’t go up. He dashed after them. The traffic had picked up some speed since earlier and he jogged across between passing cars. He got to the corner the two men had turned, and looked carefully around it. They were marching up the middle of the road, the old man’s wooden staff clunking on the ground with every alternate step. Felix gritted his teeth and set off after them. They came to a halt suddenly where the street ended. Felix stopped stock still, hoping they wouldn’t turn around and see him. He looked for somewhere to hide but was completely exposed. Huge metal shutters covered entrances to the warehouse to his left and he lurched sideways to tuck into what little cover there was. He kept one eye on the odd couple, who just stood ther
e staring. Felix’s vision blurred suddenly. There had been another street running across the end of this one, he was sure of it, but as he stared it all went hazy. There was nothing there. No street, no traffic, no sky; nothing. He groped in his jacket pocket for his cigarettes and fished one out of the packet, along with his lighter, without even looking. He popped the cigarette into his mouth and held his lighter halfway up to it. His gaze was still fixed on the blank space beyond the two men. The one with the staff held his arms up as if placing his palms against a wall, the staff still in one hand. Felix watched in awe, unsure of what he was seeing.
‘Humans are getting turned away from the border, they aren’t seeing this,’ the young, ratty lad said softly. But his voice carried down the alley straight to Felix. He was seeing it. He hadn’t got close enough to get turned around this time. He felt as though he had walked in on a couple having sex. Dirty and horrified and yet unable to look away. ‘Ragged Edge, what’s happened to the people in there?’
A good question and one Felix desperately wanted the answer to. What was with the weird names? Hang on… humans?
‘Have you tried crossing the veil?’ The old man glanced at his companion and Felix pressed himself back against the shutter gently so as not to make it rattle.
‘What veil? There isn’t one here.’
‘Well, no. But have you tried?’ The lad flashed the old man a withering look. He took a step forward and there was a ripple in the air. He was standing in the nothing and as Felix stared he saw something materialise in the distance. A bizarre landscape of crystal. It was pink and blue and white and utterly breath-taking. The ground was rough beneath the lad’s feet and beyond him were what looked like hills of quartz. Julie kept a few pieces of the stuff around her house. She liked clear quartz and amethyst. This looked just like them, but not just little fragments, a whole field of it. The lad stepped back to his companion’s side and the crystal rippled away to nothing again. The cigarette dropped out of Felix’s mouth to the ground, landing softly in a muddy puddle. He glanced down at it and let out a small sigh.
‘Happy?’
‘No. I think I know what’s happened, but we need to go in there to investigate properly. You game?’
‘Sure.’ The two of them took a few steps into the nothing and again the crystals appeared. Felix stared in wonder as they set off cautiously into the bizarre landscape without a backwards glance. He took a few steps towards them but stopped the moment he started to feel the sickness creeping up on him. He stepped back and felt a little better. He looked up again and saw the two men walking away from him shimmer and shift. Their dark figures morphed, their clothes vanished, as did the old man’s staff, and in place of the men were two large dogs. They had dark, shaggy coats and alert ears. Felix blinked several times and gawked after them as they trotted away into the haze.
He staggered backwards, stunned disbelief washing over him. He turned and fled from the alley, bursting out into the noisy street. He grasped for the wall and steadied his breathing. The world was falling apart right around him and somehow he felt that he was the only one who knew that everything was wrong.
Chapter Three
Felix paced his flat, no clue where to even begin processing everything that was going on. He had been alternating between watching the news and repeatedly calling every person he could think of. The local news reported the collision with the lorry and a few other things, but made no mention of the missing area of Caerton. It was as if it wasn’t even happening, or that people simply couldn’t process it enough to even talk about. He supposed it was the latter. If there had been any doubt before seeing the men turn into animals, he knew with absolute certainty that there was something supernatural at work. He had uncovered a hidden world of magic right under the noses of the people living here.
How far did it extend and what was to be done about it?
It was dark outside now and he went to the window to see if anything was different. Would the old man with the staff walk by as usual? What was he really and what did he have to do with the missing place?
He and his companion had certainly seemed immune to whatever power was causing this mess. Felix rubbed his face and the thought struck him: Could those creatures, or others like them, be responsible?
He dropped his hands and gazed at his reflection in the glass.
His mind suddenly made up, Felix turned, grabbed his phone and keys and stormed from his flat. He had to act. He had to find Julie and bring her back. Above all, he had to stop those creatures from harming anyone else.
It was a cold night and he gripped his jacket around him as he marched up the cobbled hill into the oldest part of the city. The narrow streets were packed with small shops in buildings that seemed to crowd overhead with their wonky Tudor beams and upper floors bigger than the ground floors. He passed a pub overflowing with drinkers all talking animatedly. The tantalising smell of burning cigarettes tempted him as he walked through the smoky street, but he hadn’t sparked up all day and he wasn’t going to cave in now.
Down a narrow passage between two buildings, Felix could hardly see where to place his feet, but he knew it like the back of his hand and made his way quickly away from the bustling pub and into a back street that was still and quiet. One dull street lamp lit the wet cobblestones. Felix jogged over to the single shop that stood on this out-of-the-way street. It was dark inside. The shop had closed for the night, but Felix knocked hard on the wooden door. Inside the darkened window was a display of dark hoodies and t-shirts, cargo trousers, boots, lighters and other smoking paraphernalia. He hammered on the door again and a light flicked on in the back of the store.
‘What do you want?’ shouted a gruff voice from inside.
‘Ray! It’s Felix. Open up will you? I’m freezing my nuts off out here.’
‘What the hell are you hammering on my door for?’ Ray grumbled as he unlocked the door. He opened it and Felix slipped inside. Ray closed and locked the door again. The army surplus store was one of Felix’s few haunts beyond the confines of his flat.
‘Ray, we go back a long way and I wouldn’t be here asking for your help if it wasn’t an emergency.’
‘Sure,’ Ray said, nodding and looking Felix up and down. He was in his late forties, balding, and carrying a little extra padding around the middle these days. ‘What’s up?’
‘I need to find my sister. She lives in St. Catherine’s.’
‘Where?’
‘St. Catherine’s. You know? The area of the city that’s disappeared?’ Felix frowned at Ray’s bewildered expression.
‘What have you been taking, mate?’ He cracked into a grin and let out a low rumble of laughter.
‘Nothing. What do you mean? How can you not know what’s going on out there?’
‘Business was a little crazy this morning, but it all died down after lunch. I haven’t spoken to anyone but you in a few hours. What’s going on?’ Ray’s laugh had died and he looked concerned.
‘A whole borough of Caerton has vanished. No one can get in or out of it. My sister is wherever it’s gone. I have to find her and make sure she’s safe.’
‘Of course you do,’ Ray said, frowning. He patted Felix hard on the shoulder and Felix sighed with relief. He wasn’t in this alone. ‘What do you need?’
‘Supplies. Weapons.’
‘Mate, I don’t have anything—’
‘I know about your back room.’ Felix cocked an eyebrow at his old friend. Ray hung his head and clucked his tongue.
‘Of course you do. Come on, then.’ He led Felix to the back of the shop and through a narrow door into a hallway. A curtain was hung across the end of the hall and Ray brushed it aside. A heavy door stood behind it and he flicked through a keyring that jingled with all of its keys. He found the correct one and unlocked the door. The two men filed into the back room and Ray flicked on the light. A bare bulb hung in the centre of the ceiling and cast its yellow light over racks upon racks of guns, grenades, knives and armour. ‘
Felix, you can’t be serious about that missing neighbourhood thing. I’ve never even heard of it.’
‘St. Catherine’s? You’ve never heard of it at all?’
‘No. I feel like you’re pulling my leg.’
Felix stared at his friend, unsure how to react. Could it be the effects of whatever supernatural thing was at work?
‘I’m not. I’m serious. Have you ever seen something so strange that it made you question everything you thought you knew?’
‘I can’t say that I have. But I believe you’re serious. Who you going after with this gear?’
‘I’m not sure yet.’ Felix turned his attention to the weaponry. He grabbed an armoured vest and flipped it over to examine both sides. ‘Is this bulletproof?’
‘Just stab proof. You expecting to get shot at?’
‘Not really, I guess. This’ll do.’ Those things had claws, but probably not guns. He grabbed a rifle from the rack and looked it over. Ray watched him with a bemused smirk. Felix didn’t care much whether Ray believed him or not, as long as he let him borrow the equipment. ‘I’ll get it all back to you and pay you for any ammo I use. Is that okay?’
‘Fine. But if you leave a great big trail of corpses, do me a favour and leave me out of it.’
‘That seems fair.’
‘Felix, have you considered the possibility that you’re losing your grip?’
‘That was my first thought. But no, I know what I saw.’ He put the rifle into a large bag, along with some smaller weapons, several boxes of ammunition for the various guns, and the armour.
‘Don’t get caught with that,’ Ray said as he showed Felix out, locking the door again behind them. Felix waited while Ray unlocked the front door of the shop and lingered when it was opened for him.
‘If you don’t hear from me in twenty-four hours, assume I didn’t make it.’
‘What have you seen that has you thinking like that?’
Magic Underground: The Complete Collection (Magic Underground Anthologies Book 4) Page 55