Winter’s Light

by M. J. Hearle

  It took Elena a few seconds longer before the fog finally left her eyes. ‘Yes – yes, of course. We must keep going.’

  ‘What’s the matter, Win?’ Sam asked, worry creeping into his tone.

  ‘We saw . . .’ she began to answer him but trailed off when his face paled.

  ‘Sam? What’s going —’

  Her blood ran cold as a shadow skittered across his face. Whirling around, Winter saw a cat on the bonnet of the station wagon. Not just one – two. Now three. Four! More cats joined the group, a steady stream, materialising out of the long grass.

  ‘Start the car,’ Winter said too loudly. Why hadn’t they driven away by now? In her periphery, she noticed Elena fumbling around.

  ‘The keys!’ she cried out in frustration. ‘They fell to the floor. I can’t —!’

  ‘Find them quickly!’ Winter impulsively moved back in her seat away from the windshield. The entire bonnet now groaned beneath the weight of a dozen or so cats, with still more heaped on top, crawling over their brothers and sisters in an effort to get closer to the glass.

  Above them the ceiling thumped – a small depression forming. They were on top of the car! Glancing fearfully out the window she saw more cats circling past the front wheels. The air rang with their whining, broken voices, rising in pitch as the cats grew more agitated. They wanted to get inside.

  ‘Got them!’ Elena said triumphantly, raising her head from the car floor. Her face fell when she saw the cats squashed up against the glass, a seething mass of fur and claws and shining eyes. There was a cracking sound as the windshield began to yield to the weight of the animals. Jagged lines etched their way down from the corners.

  ‘Just drive already!’ Sam shouted. Winter heard him scrabbling around in his duffle bag, followed by the sound of the crossbow clicking as he loaded.

  ‘I’ll hurt them,’ Elena protested, the note of genuine concern in her voice baffling. The idea of running over a bunch of cats made Winter’s stomach turn, but the situation was dangerous and they needed to escape.

  ‘I don’t care! Squash ’em!’ Sam clearly shared her self-preservation instinct.

  ‘There is another way,’ Elena said with quiet confidence. Confused, Winter watched Elena close her eyes. After a few seconds she opened them again, staring at the cats through the windshield with a startling new intensity.

  What was especially odd, the cats – the ones whose heads were visible amidst the tangled limbs and swishing tails – stared back. Held in Elena’s gaze, the twitching mass grew still. Multiple pairs of glinting eyes rolled towards Elena in unison. She began to murmur in Russian, words Winter didn’t understand but they affected her all the same. The words twisted inside her mind like snakes, making her feel dizzy.

  Sam cried out, ‘Whatever you’re doing, do it faster!’

  Tearing her gaze away from Elena, Winter looked back and gasped.

  Benedict had arrived. He was standing further down the road, staring at them through the rear window’s dust-covered glass. A slow smile spread across his face as he watched Sam frantically try to manoeuvre himself into a firing position. The Demori’s shining emerald eyes darted from Sam to Winter, and his smile faded. Benedict’s expression became animated with a frightening, animalistic hunger. Trapped in his gaze, Winter heard his voice in her head, whispering the promise, You will be mine.

  Slowly, Benedict began to approach the car, taking his time, savouring the kill. Winter turned to Elena in a panic, ready to rip the keys from her hand and take the wheel. But she froze in shock – something astonishing was happening. The cats were leaving. The heaving pile of fur and claws dissolved before her eyes as the cats leapt and scurried away from the windshield and off the bonnet. Elena started the car as the last cat jumped free.

  ‘Go! Go!’ Sam urged.

  Her heart in her mouth, Winter looked back and saw Benedict almost at the car. A deep frown marred his features now he saw they were about to escape. He launched into a run, his body splashed with a red glow as the brake lights flicked on. The engine roared into life and the car lurched forward, tyres kicking up dirt.

  Elena frantically spun the steering wheel, driving them back onto the road. There was no sign of the cats as they tore off into the dark.

  ‘He’s still coming!’ Sam warned, his attention glued to the rear window. Benedict was chasing after them over the gravel with unnatural speed, his teeth bared in an ugly snarl. Elena pressed down on the accelerator and the station wagon shot forward with renewed vigour. Mercifully, Benedict began to recede into the night, disappearing in a distant explosion of green sparks as he left the periphery of their tail-lights. Despite the fact he was no longer visible, Winter, along with Sam, continued to watch through the rear window. Her heart thudded in her chest and she felt very queasy. Any second she expected to see Benedict come flying out of the darkness and leap atop the car.

  ‘He is gone,’ Elena said, eyes flicking up to the rearview mirror. Her cheeks were flushed pink but apart from that she didn’t look too rattled by the experience. Sam lowered the crossbow, swivelling around to face the front again. Winter felt the car slow as Elena eased off the accelerator.

  ‘That doesn’t mean we should slow down,’ Winter said, growing alarmed again. Benedict moved with terrifying speed.

  ‘Either that or we run out of gas,’ Elena replied with a shrug.

  Sam lent forward through the gap between the front seats, trying to see the dashboard. ‘Is there a chance of that happening?’

  Winter watched Elena check the fuel gauge twice, as though she wasn’t sure she’d read it correctly the first time.

  ‘Probably not.’ It was a less than encouraging response.

  ‘Great! That’s just great.’ Winter slumped backwards in her seat, staring worriedly at the road ahead.

  She could just see it now – the engine spluttering as the fuel tank ran dry and the car rolling to a stop in the middle of nowhere. The wave of cats would descend upon them again followed by Benedict, only this time he wouldn’t waste time gloating over the kill. He would peel the roof off the car like it was a can of tuna and scoop them out one by one. Thinking about the cats, Winter shuddered – all those hairy bodies pressing against the car trying to get in. She shot Elena a curious look. ‘What happened back there? With the cats.’

  Elena hesitated before answering. ‘You asked about the mark on my face. It’s not a tattoo, but a brand. I received it when I was a small child.’ Her voice thickened slightly with an emotion that might have been anger. ‘My father gave it to me. When he discovered I was . . . different.’

  ‘Different how?’

  ‘He caught me one day talking to our cat, Yaga.’

  Winter shrugged. ‘So, what’s weird about that? Kids talk to their pets all the time.’

  ‘True. Except Yaga talked back to me.’ Elena paused, smirking at Winter’s confused frown.

  ‘In my village, behaving in such a way is considered blasphemous. An affront to God. My father was a pious man, he would have killed me if not for my mother. She begged him to let me live. So he branded me instead with the sign of the vyed’ma.’

  ‘Vyed’ma?’ Winter’s frown deepened at the vaguely sinister-sounding Russian word. ‘What does that mean?’

  Elena’s eyes never left the road.

  ‘Witch.’

  The Slave

  There was light on her face. Lamara could feel it rippling across her skin like the reflection of water. For a moment, she told herself that it was all a dream – the portal, the dark towers, Elumen Var. That the light she’d see when she opened her eyes would be warm and golden.

  Her light. Not his.

  Lamara’s eyes flickered open and she let out a small sob. It was no dream. The ghostly radiance spilling in through the tall window was a livid green. The colour of this world. A world of pale monsters that pretended to be gods. The world she couldn’t escape.

  How long had she been here? Days? Weeks? Months? It was impossible to mark
the passing of time in a place where the sun never rose, and there was a permanent emerald-tinged night. Gritting her teeth, Lamara tried to raise herself up from the bed but the effort was too great and she collapsed, defeated. He’d stolen her strength again.

  Her thoughts moved sluggishly, but she remembered Elumen Var coming to her, gliding across the floor like a spirit. She’d tried to fight him but he’d been too strong and once he’d captured her in his eyes all was lost. Her will ebbed away. Lost in those eyes blazing with green fire.

  Feeling a tightness around her throat, she reached up with trembling fingers and was startled to touch metal. A collar. She shifted her weight slightly and there was a chinking sound – steel rubbing against steel. To her right was a long loop of chain running from the collar around her neck to a bolt in the wall. Where had it come from?

  Of course, he’d placed it on her as punishment for trying to resist him. The memory returned now – Elumen Var smiling cruelly as he clasped the collar around her throat, locking it with a small silver key, which he wore on a black cord against his bare chest. She had been such a fool to think he was a god! The gods could be cruel but also compassionate. There was no compassion in Elumen Var. He was no god. Nor were the other creatures she’d glimpsed – the hooded servants that brought her strange-tasting food and drink and wouldn’t meet her gaze. They were something else. Something wicked.

  Drawing in deeply of the sweet air – air which no longer possessed magic enough to calm her fears, she had grown inured to that power – Lamara felt a tingling spread through her limbs. Strength and vitality returning.

  She tentatively sat up, her head spinning, making her feel ill. Once the dizzy spell passed, she began uncoiling the chain. Letting it out, Lamara found she could move easily around the room, but not much further. Even if she somehow could escape past the locked door, she wouldn’t make it far.

  A breeze blew in through the window, prompting her to tighten the robe she was wearing. Briefly she thought of her furs, wondering what he had done with them. She missed their comforting warmth. She missed what they represented. Home. Stumbling towards the open window, Lamara rested one hand for support against the frame and gazed out at the city. Her vision swam, eyes readjusting to the dazzling brilliance after the dimness of the bedchamber. Once this view had thrilled her, filled her with awe, now it made her feel alone. Trapped.

  The black towers sparkled with a thousand emerald lights, their crowns lost in the endlessly churning clouds. She could see small figures gliding between these towers, moving as if they were passing along invisible bridges. Some trailed the ghost light in their wake like fire, or water or tendrils of mist. More false gods.

  Where was this place if it was not the realm of the gods? How far away was she from her mother? From Teodore? It was hard to hold their images in her mind – something about the air here made it difficult for memories to take shape, but even though she couldn’t recall their faces in detail, her heart ached at their absence. The foul magic of this place couldn’t reach deep enough inside to steal that pain.

  Could she do it?

  Lamara lent forward through the window, staring down at the ground which was obscured in a hazy mist. An idea had been forming ever since the realisation had sunk in that she was a prisoner. That she was a slave. The Grey Wolves had never been slaves and Lamara would not be the first.

  Could she do it?

  If she jumped would the chain break her neck, freeing her from this world of emerald fire and loveless demons, or would she be left dangling against the side of the tower? What would her captor do to her when he found her? Would it be any worse than what he did to her now? While she contemplated the unthinkable, a shadow passed across her face.

  He was here.

  Tripping backwards, Lamara fell painfully to the floor as Elumen Var floated in through the window. Her eyes widened in fear as the false god filled her vision. He was magnificent. He was terrible. The flowing black material swimming around his tall, muscular frame seemed woven from the night itself, glittering as his eyes did, reflecting a light that didn’t exist.

  Worship me, his cold voice echoed through her mind as he stooped to gather her effortlessly into his arms.

  I will not! she replied, but was too weak and too afraid to protest with anything but her thoughts.

  Yes . . . you will. A cruel smile played at the corner of Elumen Var’s blue lips. She tried not to look into his eyes, turning her head away, burying it in the sheets. His fingers took hold of her chin, firmly tilting her face towards his.

  Look at me, he commanded, and while she fought the compulsion, eventually it was too strong for Lamara to resist.

  Gazing into those infinite black depths, Lamara felt utter despair. She recoiled, retreating within herself. It was here, in the secret hiding place at the back of her thoughts, that Lamara discovered something startling: a series of potent images and words. Images and words that were not her own. Coursing through her mind beneath the layers of upper consciousness.

  Malfaerie. Dead Lands. Krypthia. Light. Hunger. Occuluma. Skivers. Kei.

  The more she concentrated on these thoughts, the less garbled and nonsensical they became. With dawning recognition, Lamara realised she was reading Elumen Var’s mind.

  Chapter 32

  The amber petrol light had been on for nearly twenty minutes when they passed into the outer city limits of Newbury. Elena hadn’t alerted her to this fact, Winter had seen it for herself. She’d been keeping an eye on the gauge throughout the journey, noting with increasing dread the thin red arrow as it dipped lower and lower towards ‘empty’. It reminded her of sand sifting through an hourglass; time running out.

  The three-lane arterial road leading into the city was practically empty at this early hour. A few big trucks rumbled past them but generally the green station wagon was left to putter through the darkness alone. She didn’t know how long a car could run on an empty tank. Probably not much longer than half an hour. Sooner or later the tank would run dry. When that happened she wondered how long they’d have before Benedict revealed himself. Winter could almost feel the Demori as an invisible presence hovering in the ether around them, waiting to pounce.

  Elena hadn’t spoken since revealing the origin of the tattoo – the brand as she called it. Winter was desperately curious to find out more but was too intimidated by the Russian’s brooding silence to inquire. She’d hoped Sam might be the one to question her but either he already knew about Elena’s history or was less intrigued than Winter. Somehow he’d managed to fall back asleep and was still snoring softly.

  Sleep was not an option for her. It didn’t matter that she’d been awake for nearly twenty-four hours; her body wouldn’t let her rest. It wasn’t just the residual adrenaline periodically zapping her frayed nerves like earthquake aftershocks, it was the horror show that lurked behind her closed eyelids. Every time Winter shut them all she could see was Benedict’s gaping mouth looming out of the blackness. So she watched the fuel light and thought about that word Elena used – vyed’ma. Witch.

  For her, the word ‘witch’ conjured two alternate images – the first Dorothy’s aggressor in The Wizard of Oz, a green-skinned monster with a black pointy hat and a fetish for ruby slippers; the second, a teenage girl with white pancake make-up, heavy mascara and questionable personal hygiene. Elena didn’t resemble either of these images.

  She was cool, beautiful – nothing like a practitioner of the dark arts. But Elena had wrested control of the cats away from Benedict, bending them to her will. She’d heard those strange, slithery words reverberating in her head. The idea of Elena possessing supernatural powers was incredible, but Winter didn’t find it too difficult to accept. After all, was speaking to cats any stranger than seeing the Occuluma or having the ability to open doorways to other worlds? She and Elena were sisters in freakdom.

  Hearing the loud droning of a plane’s engine overhead, Winter’s anxious gaze flicked away from the fuel gauge. She had only been
to Newbury a couple of times, but remembered the airport wasn’t too far from the freeway. Looking out the window, Winter was heartened to see a plane coming in to land. Its outline was clear and distinct against a dark blue haze. She could even spot the carrier’s red and white logo on the fin.

  The sun was rising!

  Anxiously, Winter’s eyes returned to the fuel gauge and the tiny amber light, so similar to the Occuluma, a sickly glow signalling the end. Winter turned the full force of her will into keeping the engine running. Just a little bit further, she urged the station wagon. In five – ten minutes at the most – the sun would be higher and the threat of Benedict would pass. At least until nightfall.

  The seat springs in the back groaned as Sam shifted his weight. She heard him yawn loudly, the sound striking her as completely incongruous given the tense circumstances.

  ‘We there yet?’ he asked, words blending into another yawn.

  ‘Nearly. Ten more minutes,’ Elena answered, the slight trace of tension in her voice the only hint that she shared Winter’s concern.

  ‘Did you get any sleep?’

  ‘No,’ Winter replied tersely.

  ‘What’s your problem?’

  Elena glanced over at Winter, the brief instant of eye contact confirming that she was well aware of just how perilous the situation was.

  ‘Well . . .’ Winter hesitated, trying to figure out the best wording to let Sam know they were about to run out of petrol and that maybe he should get his crossbow ready.

  ‘Would you look at that,’ he said before she could continue.

  Winter turned and was immediately blinded by a searing golden light. Holding her hand up to shield her eyes, she saw the crown of the sun glinting through the warehouses and factories. The sky above it had blossomed to a deep burgundy colour, light rippling along the underside of a scrim of violet clouds. Looking at the fingers of dawn stretch out across the sky, Winter allowed herself a moment of relief. They were going to make it!