The Blurred Lands

by Ian W. Sainsbury

  He stepped inside and swept the torch around the small space. Toilet, sink and a bath, his toothbrush in a glass on the windowsill.

  The spare bedroom contained a single bed and a cheap desk.

  The bathroom and the spare room were empty. Which left the bedroom.

  Back out on the landing, he put the flat of his hand on the bedroom door and pushed it open. It was the last thing he wanted to do, but he wouldn't let irrational fear stop him.

  Inside, to prove to himself that he wasn't afraid, he shut the door, although his hand shook as he did it.

  He half-expected the torch to turn itself off. When it didn't, he shone its weak light into every corner of the room. It was exactly as John had left it. Just the old dresser and the hideous iron bed. Nothing else. The cottage was hundreds of years old. It would make noises at night as ancient timbers expanded and contracted.

  He was dry-mouthed and breathing too fast.

  John took a small step backwards. His muscles obeyed him, and he moved, causing the bare floorboards—rather than the deep carpet John remembered—to creak.

  John had watched plenty of ghost and horror films because they gave him ideas for new tricks. He liked the mechanics. He admired the way a sharp script, directorial devices and musical flourishes could manipulate the viewer. If this was a film, a cat would burst out from under the bed, scare everyone stupid, and puncture the tension.

  He waited for a moment, but no cat appeared. As the skin on his neck and shoulders prickled into goosebumps despite his lack of belief in the supernatural, he turned his back on the iron bed and took a step towards the door. At the moment his hand closed on the doorknob, he froze, almost dropping the torch.

  There had been a sound behind him. So subtle, it might have been nothing at all, or just one of the myriad sounds an old house makes.

  Only it wasn't.

  John knew that sound although he hadn't heard it for over thirty years.

  It was the tiny, wet, alluring sound of a lipsticked mouth parting into a smile.

  Not just anyone's lips, though. Ash's lips.

  He swung around, eyes wide, a grunt of fear escaping him.

  No one was sitting on the bed, waiting. No one was smiling as she waited for her lover to join her. The room was empty, the vast iron bed facing him like a gravestone.

  Ash is dead. She's dead.

  John went downstairs without rushing, put his pillow at the other end of his bedding roll so he could see the staircase, and deliberately closed his eyes.

  He left the light on.

  Sixteen

  It was difficult to recall the fear of the previous night while he had a strong cup of tea, a piece of toast layered with thick-cut marmalade, and the sun was warming his face.

  John leaned on the gate at the end of the path and enjoyed the birdsong. No birds sang in the cottage garden, but they kept up an impressive chorus beyond its boundaries.

  He put the empty mug on the gatepost and walked back out towards the car, mobile phone in hand. There was no signal until he was standing on the edge of the road near the layby. Two bars then appeared on the screen. He called Fir Trees. The dream had reminded him it was a week since he had checked on his mother. Not that it made any difference to Mae. She often called her carers John, Harry, or Graham, confusing them with her son, grandson or long-dead husband.

  "Fir Trees, hello?"

  The line was awful, crackling with static. John walked along the road as he spoke.

  "Hello?"

  More static.

  "Hello? Hello?"

  "Yes, Fir Trees, Claire speaking, how can I help you?"

  "Ah, good. This is John Aviemore. My mother is staying with you, Mae Aviemore."

  John still found the euphemistic language of the care home disconcerting. The patients were referred to as 'guests' who were 'staying' there, as if Fir Trees were a five-star holiday resort and spa, not a hospice. All guests would check out, but there would be no repeat bookings, no reviews on a travel website.

  "Mr Av... wh... if... do you...?"

  "I'm sorry? Can you hear me? I'm calling about my mother. Mrs Aviemore."

  Then, much clearer, but muffled, as though someone was covering the phone—"Gary? Gary? Can you check Aviemore? I've only just started me shift. She wasn't the one last night, was she? Can you check? Mr Aviemore? Hello?"

  "Yes, yes." John stopped walking. The reception was better in this spot, although he was standing in the middle of the road. John stood side-on, watching for traffic.

  "My colleague is just checking for me. Did someone call you?"

  "No. No. Why? Has something happened?" He remembered the sparrowhawk's yellow eyes and crimson beak.

  "I don't know. I only just arrived."

  John's phone emitted a low beep, and he took it away from his ear. Battery life four percent.

  "Look, my phone is about to die. Can you get someone to call me back?"

  "Yes, Mr Aviemore. It'll probably be my manager. She'll call you."

  Why the manager?

  "What's happened?"

  A tractor came round the corner, and John stepped onto the verge. The line stopped crackling and—combined with the roar of the tractor—he struggled to make out what she was saying.

  "Hello? Hello? I'm sorry, I didn't get any of that. Can you say it again? Hello?"

  He looked at his phone. The screen was blank.

  "Shit."

  John had come prepared for his stay at Sally Cottage. Rather than bring his notes and magic books, he would make a start on redecorating the place. After the events of the previous night, he decided to start with the bedroom. Just because he didn't believe in the supernatural didn't mean he didn't fear it; that was a redundant instinct baked into his DNA. But he wouldn't let it affect him.

  John fetched the last tins of paint from the car. There were no dog walkers today.

  He remembered the first time he had walked back to this layby. That first dawn, he'd left Ash face down, naked, in a tangle of sheets. He'd heard the expression 'taken my virginity' before, but never understood it until Ash had led him upstairs. She took his virginity with wild delight, reaching her orgasm as quickly as he did, with a cry of victory more suited to a field of battle.

  He had left that morning feeling as if something were pulling him back to her, something more powerful, and more strange, than young lust. It grew in intensity every time he left her until the last evening in the woods. Invisible hands fastened onto his shirt that night and tried to force him back as he stumbled away in shock. From somewhere, he had found the strength to keep walking, then running, not daring to stop even when he reached his bike, but continuing until he collapsed on the outskirts of Bristol.

  John opened the car, sat in the driver's seat, and turned the key in the ignition.

  What if Helen's wrong? What if, by confronting my memories, I feed them, I give them the power to break me again?

  The weeks after his collapse were lost to him. The few memories that survived were enough to make him want to drive away, and to keep driving. He thought of it now. He had opened his eyes in the hospital room, looked at his hands, the bed, the walls, the window, and, finally, at the pale face of his mother, and had not known what any of those things were. And he, John Aviemore, was not present. He was gone, lost in the featureless white plain of dreams.

  John stared out of the windscreen at the trees, then turned off the engine and got out of the car.

  He thought of what Helen had told him.

  If I leave, this place will always have power over me.

  He lifted the large paint cans and trudged back to the cottage.

  Painting walls was a job John had always enjoyed. He had the kind of mind that thrives on introspection, and ideas often came to him when he was performing a repetitive task that required little mental input. Decorating was ideal.

  John wore old jeans and a T-shirt from a 1983 David Bowie tour.

  He started with the cottage bedroom, defiantly
heaping paint tins, old sheets, cloths, brushes, and sponges onto the monstrous iron bed. He had genuinely been afraid the previous night. If Helen's cognitive behavioural therapy was going to work, he needed to confront that fear head-on. Of course, the smell of wet paint meant he wouldn't be able to sleep in the bedroom, but John was certain that wasn't a factor in his decision. Well, reasonably certain.

  He opened the shutters and the window, letting as much light and air as possible into the room.

  It took an hour to clean the walls. There was no wallpaper to strip. The current choice of paint was a dark pink that reminded John of his blood-tinged spit in the sink at the dentist's.

  When the sheets were tucked up to the edge of the skirting board, he made a start, concentrating first on the corners with a two-inch brush. As the morning wore on, he moved on to a bigger brush.

  Even the ache in his arms, increasing his discomfort as the hours passed, gave him pleasure. He didn't do manual work often, but on the rare occasions he needed to, he liked going to bed feeling physically tired. Sleep came more quickly. Like many with a sedentary lifestyle, John took regular exercise, jogging on Wimbledon Common three times a week. The way his biceps were burning prompted him to think about buying weights. Or to start doing more digging in the garden.

  John's mind drifted from thought to connected thought, his consciousness soon reaching the point where fresh ideas or insights often came to him. Instead, a memory, clear and sharp, emerged. It was from his time in the psychiatric hospital. Instinctively, he flinched away from it, as he might twitch the wheel of a car to avoid flattening a rabbit.

  John put the brush down. He had made tea, and he took a sip now, grimacing when he realised it had gone cold. He thought again about Helen's advice. Perhaps he should allow the painful memory to resurface. He looked at the bed, then at the trees swaying outside. Dust motes surfed the block of yellow light that poured through the open window.

  He picked up the brush again. As the pink disappeared under the magnolia, he turned his thoughts to the memory.

  He was trudging through a white landscape. The world was full of snow, but he wasn't cold. He didn't need to open his eyes because he could see without them. There were stars above him. Darker shapes sometimes loomed into view as he walked, but faded before he got close.

  He heard his mother's voice. She was arguing with someone. Not just one person. There were other voices. One was female.

  "You are wrong. It is not your choice to make, Mae. It is far too important for that. We must all agree and I, for one, do not." The voice softened a little. "At least wait until we gather the Three. In a few days, we can—"

  "In a few days, he'll be dead. I will not wait." John had never heard such passion from his mother.

  "He's stronger than anyone anticipated, Mae." This was the male voice. "He should have died. He has talent, this boy. If he had been allowed some training, he would have known what he was up against."

  "Your time in this realm has turned your mind soft, Warden." The female voice was honey-toned, measured, and authoritative. "The Accord still holds because of the Three. Would you have us try something new? Do you have no regard for the laws that have protected billions of lives?"

  "I would not have us crippled by blind adherence to the law. There is no heir to the line. Astarte follows no rules, and she will exploit our weaknesses."

  The unknown female again. "He is male. What possible motive can Astarte have for cursing a male?"

  That male voice was thoughtful. "Her relationship with time is unpredictable inside the cage. Perhaps she has discovered something we have not foreseen."

  "Explain why she would waste her time on a man."

  "Species change over millennia. In my opinion, it may be possible—"

  "Your opinion is of no interest, Warden. We have seen what has happened here. There is nothing we can do." The voice softened for the first time. "I am sorry, Mae."

  His mother spoke again. Her voice was shaking, and her words were so charged with passionate intent that John drifted closer to the surface.

  "You're wrong. There is something we can do. Something I can do."

  John knew he was still in Bristol; that he had been moved from the local hospital. He didn't know exactly where he was, only that it was quieter than the first hospital although he sometimes heard crying from other rooms.

  "Mae, you cannot. An Adept cannot put her family before her respons—"

  "Don't you dare lecture me about responsibilities. You have no idea what the word means. He is my son. My son!"

  Silence then, that stretched for half a minute. When his mother spoke again, she was calm, but resolute. "I will do this with, or without, your consent. I will not lose him. I am strong enough to contain it."

  "You do not know that. You cannot know that. And if you are wrong, you weaken us all. It may have been Astarte's intention all along, using him to get to you. You will let your son go, Mae, and your line will end with you. We will begin the search for the next Adept."

  "No," said his mother. "John will not survive another day. He may be able to repair the damage, but only if I remove it now. I will not wait."

  "You will do what is right for—" the voice vanished mid-sentence, as if someone had flicked a switch. His mother spoke to the man and came closer, but John was already sinking deeper into the whiteness. He listened to his heartbeat, slow and solemn, like the chime of a distant church clock.

  As if from a great distance, the male voice spoke again. "I suspected it the first time his father brought him to me. The boy could have wielded power, Mae. The old law should not blind us to the facts. Do what you can for him. I will stand by you."

  John stared at the wall of the cottage bedroom. He had finished the first coat.

  The memory, now that he had allowed himself to experience it, had revealed a surprising detail. He had recognised the male voice. There could be no mistake. He'd never known the owner of that voice was so close to his mother. As far as John knew, they had only met on a couple of social occasions. And yet he had come all the way to Bristol when John had suffered his breakdown.

  The male voice had belonged to Augustus Bonneville.

  Seventeen

  Evie,

  If you did as I asked, I imagine I have your undivided attention now. I have opened your eyes, and you cannot unsee what has been revealed. For centuries, the concept of a hidden world has been bandied about by occult gurus. Some even published books claiming to have visited new dimensions. Ninety-nine percent of it was appalling tosh. They had no more visited the Blurred Lands than I have been to Belgium. Nothing against Belgium, I'm sure it's delightful.

  There was one author whom, I suspect, had glimpsed a noone. She wrote a series of articles detailing sightings of fairies in the New Forest over the centuries. She never finished her work. The report I read said she spent a night alone in the forest. When she came out, she didn't write—or speak—another word for the rest of her life. The impact on a twenty-first century human of an encounter with a being from another realm cannot be overestimated. Here, there be dragons. Possibly real dragons if the rumours are true.

  One day, you will be an Adept. You will assume my role as one of the Three. Not immediately after my death, as you are not yet mature, but soon enough. The Wardens will get twitchy while our realm relies on only two protectors.

  Back to your pre-history lesson. Now, that's a lazy phrase. How can anything be pre-history?

  Magic was once commonplace in our realm. All women can draw upon it to some degree, but there were always those who had a talent for it, and that talent ran in the family. As you now know.

  I'm afraid I can offer you no detailed description of what, precisely, magic is. I suppose if we got the best scientific minds on the case, we would know more, and understand why so few can harness its power. But as magic use in our own realm has, since the Accord, been kept secret, it's unlikely it will ever be properly studied.

  What I can do, is explain
the little I know.

  The language of magic, and humans' fascination with it, goes back as far as the beginning of recorded history. Why do we talk about a spell of weather? Because, in ancient times, spells often influenced the weather. A hurricane might be diverted from a town, a landslide held back until those in its path could get to safety. Unfortunately, over time, the deployment of magic led to conflict.

  All use of power has consequences. Conjuring a rain storm for thirsty crops might save a village from a hungry winter, but nothing can arise from nothing. For the rain to fall on those particular fields, it had not to fall elsewhere. Perhaps a nearby village went hungry that year. What if they saw the rain-fat clouds ignore the wind and answer another call? It may have made them angry enough to decide the theft of their rain was an act of war. Such a conclusion gave them justification to take up arms against the rain-thieves, to burn their village, and take their harvest.

  Whether the magical creatures and gods came before the conflicts that ravaged our realm, no one can say. But come they did, from the other six realms, the powerful, and the power-hungry. They whispered hate into the ears of those who were ready to listen. Skirmishes escalated into battles and battles turned into wars. The pattern of violence and death suffered by those who have the most to lose on behalf of those with all the power was set. And we humans still follow it.

  We called them gods because that was how they were perceived, but they are not gods. Does incredible power turn a lusting, petty, vengeful, mad creature into a god? No. But they were feared and worshipped as such. The seven realms, particularly where they overlapped Earth, became a giant board game for these creatures, and the ordinary inhabitants of the realms their pieces. Millions died.

  It was a human woman who stopped it. Her name, heavy with connotations in many traditions, was Eve. I was pleased when I heard what they called you, Evie. Such an auspicious name.

  When you become an Adept, you will learn more of this history. I will stick to that which is most important. The practical instructions I need to give you are crucial, but I cannot leave you ignorant of what you might have to face.