Mercy (The Guardians Series 1)

by Wendy Saunders

  ‘Helga?’ she muttered in confusion.

  ‘Actually that’s not my name, that was his idea of a joke,’ she threw a sidelong glance at Davis, ‘my name is Danae…Connell.’

  ‘Connell?’ Olivia’s eyes widened.

  She nodded.

  ‘This is my twin brother Davis,’ she introduced him.

  ‘It’s nice to finally have the chance to meet my niece,’ he smiled warmly.

  ‘Niece?’ she repeated looking to her father.

  ‘The twins are my younger half brother and sister, we share the same father,’ he told her.

  ‘I told you before Olivia,’ Danae spoke softly, ‘that I wasn’t watching you because of that deranged idiot Walcott. I was there to protect you from your mother.’

  ‘You knew,’ she looked at all three of them, ‘you all knew she was alive and you said nothing.’

  ‘It was complicated Olivia,’ her father replied.

  ‘So start explaining, I think I deserve that much.’

  ‘The twins found me about eighteen years ago. It was about that time I started getting small hints that Isabel was still alive. Davis and Danae were my link to the outside world, they helped me to keep an eye on you and search for your mother.’

  ‘Why did you send me all those things, the doll, the book, Beau?’ she looked down at the puppy that was snuggled on his cushion in front of the fire.

  ‘Beau?’ he repeated, realising she meant the dog, ‘it suits him.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I never wanted to hurt you Olivia,’ he shook his head, ‘but I needed you to remember that night. You were there you saw everything.’

  ‘I don’t remember,’ she frowned, ‘I’ve tried and I just can’t.’

  He sighed. ‘Then this is going to be hard for you to hear.’

  ‘Just start talking.’

  ‘I loved your mother very much, we shared everything. As such I was privy to a lot of your family’s secrets. I knew about Nathaniel, I knew where and how he had been trapped. When the murders started back in ‘94 we knew someone was trying to raise the Demon. I’d discussed it with both Evie and Alice but we couldn’t figure out who was responsible for the killings. I noticed your mother changing, pulling away from me. Then Jimmy was killed and your mother became quieter and more withdrawn. The night of the fire I came home earlier than expected, I wanted to surprise her. I had brought her favourite flowers to try and cheer her up but when I walked into the kitchen she was in there with Alice. They were fighting, I saw her kill Alice and I couldn’t believe what was happening. It was then I realised your mother was the killer all along; she was trying to raise the Demon. I dropped the flowers and wrestled with her for the knife. In the struggle she was stabbed in the chest. When I looked up the house was on fire. I grabbed you and ran as far and as fast as I could. I just knew I had to get you as far away from Mercy as possible. I was trying to protect you.’

  ‘She was the murderer all along,’ she shook her head blinking back the tears she wouldn’t allow to fall; ‘she did all those terrible things to those men?’

  ‘Yes,’ he replied flatly.

  ‘Why? I don’t understand, I’ve seen the spell Hester used, she didn’t need to kill those men.’

  ‘She did,’ Theo told her. ‘We already know that if you raise a Demon in its true form it can’t be controlled. It will just spread death and destruction, because that is its nature. If your mother hoped to have any control over it she needed to exchange one prison for another, only this time a prison of living flesh. By creating a body for him and forcing him into it, he is bound to her by her magic.’

  Charles looked at Theo, grudgingly impressed.

  ‘He’s right; Isabel isn’t stupid enough to raise a Demon in its true form.’

  ‘Why didn’t you come to me?’ she turned to her father.

  ‘I wanted to Jelly bean,’ his voice softened, ‘I wanted to tell you the truth but you wouldn’t have believed me. You had to find out for yourself.’

  ‘That’s such a cop out,’ she replied bitterly, ‘so it was alright for me to get blindsided again because you didn’t want to take a chance I would reject you? You should have come to me; you should have told me the truth from the beginning. I might not have believed you but then again you’ll never know will you, because you didn’t give me that chance. We could’ve tried to rebuild the trust that was lost between us but now, you’re just another person who’s lied to me my whole life. I can’t trust you now.’

  ‘Olivia,’ he began.

  ‘Just get out,’ her voice was barely above a whisper now. She could feel the tears rising in her throat burning to get out, but she wouldn’t fall apart in front of everyone. ‘Just all of you, get out.’

  She turned to Theo.

  ‘Get them out of the house,’ she breathed heavily.

  He watched helplessly from the library door as she slowly climbed the stairs, disappearing from view.

  ‘I’ll go clean up the medical supplies,’ Louisa headed back to the kitchen.

  ‘God, I need a cigarette,’ Mac blew out a breath, heading out of the room.

  ‘I’ll come with you,’ Jake followed him.

  Charles turned to Theo and handed him a card. It was a plain white business card with nothing but a phone number on it.

  ‘Take this; if you need me call the number on the card. Let it ring twice and hang up then wait for me to contact you.’

  ‘I don’t think I’ll be calling you.’

  ‘Don’t be so quick to judge Theodore, this is only the beginning. Once the shock has worn off Olivia and I need to talk. There are many things she needs to know.’

  ‘Why did Isabel set Nathaniel free? What is it she wants?’ Theo frowned.

  ‘She wants what she’s always wanted,’ Charles replied, ‘she wants Infernum.’

  ‘Infernum?’ Theo started at the reference, his eyes snapping back from the card in his hand to Charles, his gaze narrowing in suspicion. ‘You know what it is, don’t you?’

  Charles regarded him for a moment, his expression giving nothing away.

  ‘Call me when she’s ready to talk.’

  He turned and walked out of the room, closely followed by the twins.

  Charles stepped out onto the porch and into the cold night air. It had started snowing again. Good, it would cover a lot of the evidence in the clearing. He turned to Mac who was watching him with sharp eyes.

  ‘Thomas’s body?’

  ‘I’ll take care of it,’ Mac replied after a moment, ‘you know I should be arresting you.’

  ‘But you won’t will you,’ Charles’s mouth curved in amusement.

  ‘No.’

  Charles nodded and jogged comfortably down the steps.

  ‘What are you going to do now?’ Mac called after him. He paused and turned back briefly.

  ‘I’m going to find my wife.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘And then,’ his smile was cold and dangerous, ‘then I’m going to kill her.’

  ‘And I thought my family was messed up,’ Mac murmured under his breath as he watched Charles and the twins disappear into the darkness amidst the wild swirling snow.

  ‘So are you going to stick around?’ Jake asked, ‘we need a new Chief.’

  ‘I have a feeling I’ll never be bored,’ Mac took a long drag on his cigarette.

  Louisa opened the door and stepped out, pulling her coat tighter against the cold air.

  ‘I’m going to leave the medical supplies here,’ she sighed, ‘I get the feeling we’ll be needing them again.’

  ‘That’s probably a safe bet,’ Jake replied, ‘you alright driving back in this?’

  ‘Oh please Jake, I took my driving test in the snow,’ she replied indignantly. ‘I’ll be fine.’

  He held his hands up in mock surrender.

  ‘What about you Mac?’ Jake asked.

  ‘I’m parked about half a mile down the
road.’

  ‘Want me to drop you at your car?’

  ‘I’d appreciate it,’ he flicked the butt of his cigarette into the darkness.

  The three of them stepped down the porch and set off companionably into the snow flurry.

  Theo slowly opened the door to the bedroom and found Olivia sitting on the side of the bed. She was watching the rapid waterfall of snowflakes outside the window with a blank expression, while Beau lay curled up at the foot of the bed. He rounded the bed as she looked up at him, everything inside him churned at the absolute devastation in her eyes. He handed her a glass of water and dropped a couple of pills in her hand.

  ‘Louisa says to take these; it will help the pain in your shoulder.’

  She did as she was told, too numb to do anything else. Theo leaned down and unlaced her boots and tugged them off, helping her to lie down without putting too much pressure on her wound. When she was finally settled on her side he kicked his boots off and climbed onto the bed, spooning in behind her and wrapping his arm around her gently.

  ‘Theo.’

  ‘Yes,’

  ‘We let a Demon loose and it’s my fault.’

  ‘It’s not your fault,’

  ‘I hesitated; I should have stopped my mom while I had the chance.’

  ‘Of course you hesitated Livy, it was your mother. Anyone else would have done exactly the same thing.’

  ‘What are we going to do?’

  ‘We’re going to find them both and we’re going to make it right, whatever it takes,’ he replied softly.

  She went quiet again for a while.

  ‘Theo.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘My mom’s a murderer,’ her breath caught on the hot ball of misery burning the back of her throat.

  ‘I know,’ his arms tightened around her, unable to stand her pain, ‘it will be alright.’

  ‘My mom tried to kill me Theo,’ she whispered as the first tears fell, ‘how is that ever going to be alright?’

  He didn’t have an answer.

  ‘Stay with me,’ she whispered into the silence of the room.

  ‘Always,’ he murmured.

  Available Now

  The Guardians Series 1

  Book 2

  The Ferryman

  Olivia has been left reeling from one shock after another. Betrayed by her family and still trying to piece together the broken strands of her life, she and Theo must also figure out how to stop Nathaniel, the Demon from seventeenth century Salem, who has been let loose on the unsuspecting town of Mercy.

  As if that’s not enough the town is suddenly overwhelmed by the spirits of the dead. Not just one or two but hundreds. When the vengeful spirit of a wronged man and the soul of a murdered girl spread chaos through the town, Olivia and Theo have to try and find a way to force all the spirits back to the other side and close the door to the otherworld.

  The problem is the door was opened on purpose. If Olivia and Theo can’t figure out how and why it might just remain open permanently.

  Chapter 1.

  Olivia curled restlessly in the old armchair, with her legs tucked under her. Even staring into the small fireplace in her room watching the strands of red and gold flames didn’t soothe her, she still couldn’t sleep. She glanced over to the bed where Theo lay sprawled naked and tangled up in the sheets, one arm stretched across her side of the bed seeking her out, even in his sleep.

  She sighed and turned back to the fire. It had been a month since that night in the woods and there was still no sign of her mother or the Demon Nathaniel. It had been almost too quiet and that was what worried her. After the last murder life had pretty much returned to normal in Mercy. The case had been conveniently pushed to the back of the shelf and marked unsolved. Thomas Walcott had been laid to rest in Mercy cemetery. He’d had no surviving family and few friends being a very private man, which should have ensured him a pauper’s grave, but at the last minute the funeral had been paid for by an anonymous patron. Olivia had a pretty good idea who that was. She shook her head resolutely, trying to rid herself of unpleasant thoughts. She was still mad at her father and she didn’t want to think of him doing something so kind for a man he’d once called brother, despite what Thomas Walcott had become in the end. Even the Mayor had stepped in at the last minute and pulled some strings to get him buried next to James Talbot, the man he had loved so desperately. She only hoped that he was at peace now and maybe somehow they would find each other in whatever afterlife they believed in.

  Unfortunately, thinking about Thomas Walcott drew her thoughts back to her father. She’d been dodging him for weeks; in fact she’d been dodging everyone. Her agent, Mags, had been calling her almost non-stop after she returned to Boston. She’d only seen Louisa when medically necessary and her shoulder was healing well apart from a little lingering stiffness. After the initial round of statements and the police investigation into Thomas Walcott’s death she’d even managed to avoid Mac and Jake. She’d pretty much holed up in the house licking her wounds and brooding. Theo was the only one whose presence she seemed able to tolerate. He was the calm at the eye of the storm while chaos raged around her. He soothed her in a way she’d never experienced before and wasn’t ready to examine in too much detail just yet.

  Suddenly she heard a deep chiming somewhere in the house. She listened as the chimes struck three o’clock, before it occurred to her how weird that was. She didn’t have a grandfather clock in the house but that was exactly what it had sounded like. She dropped her legs to the floor, and she stood slowly. The small carriage clock sitting on the mantle above the fireplace also read three a.m. Frowning to herself she headed out the door. Her puppy Beau, sensing her move, stretched and yawned before trotting out of the room behind her.

  She moved down the stairs slowly, barely half way down when she suddenly shuddered uncontrollably. It was freezing and a shiver danced gleefully up her spine, making the tiny little hairs on the back of her neck rise. She kept moving but the further down the stairs she went the colder it was. Her fingers and toes were starting to feel numb and her breath was expelled from her mouth as a vaporous mist.

  She moved warily down the hallway, her bare feet flinching as they touched the floor. She felt a rush of icy air coming from the kitchen, brushing against her face, wafting her hair back. She could still hear the monotonous ticking of the grandfather clock she didn’t own and it seemed to be everywhere. Beau cowered behind her which was unusual for him. She approached the kitchen apprehensively and as she reached the doorway she could see that the back door stood wide open and wet footprints trailed across the floor into the house.

  She stepped into the kitchen and her heart lurched in her chest. She could barely breathe, her breath catching in her throat as every muscle in her body froze.

  A girl stood motionless with her back to her. She wore a thin white muslin shift; wet, torn and streaked with mud. Her black hair hung in thick wet tangles down her back and her skin was chalky white. Olivia blinked and the girl was suddenly facing her, the pupils of her eyes white and lifeless and the shadows under her eyes like dark purple bruises. She looked no more than eighteen years old. Suddenly she stepped towards Olivia, a strange twitchy movement like she was watching a jerky old film reel.

  Olivia couldn’t move, it was like her muscles had been petrified. She could feel her hair standing on end and she just couldn’t make her voice work. The girl was now standing barely a foot in front of her, just staring. She slowly opened her mouth as if to speak but instead dirty water spilled from her lips in a huge gush.

  ‘What the hell?’

  Theo’s voice split the atmosphere and the girl simply turned to water and flooded the floor like someone had just emptied a bucket. Water sloshed across the kitchen floor, butting up against the cupboards like small waves.

  Olivia knelt down and scooped up some of the water, examining it thoughtfully before letting it pour from her palm back to the floor.
>
  ‘It’s lake water,’ she looked up at Theo.

  ‘Was that what I think it was?’

  Olivia nodded. ‘She was a spirit.

  ‘Has this ever happened before?’ Theo was a little wild eyed and she couldn’t really blame him, her heart was still hammering in her chest.

  She shook her head, ‘I’ve never see anything like this before.’

  ‘Shouldn’t the protective wards have kept her out?’

  ‘I guess not,’ Olivia murmured thoughtfully, ‘I wonder what she wanted?’

  ‘What makes you say that?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Olivia frowned, ‘don’t get me wrong she scared the shit out of me but I don’t think she was trying to hurt me. It felt like she was trying to tell me something.’

  Theo looked at the floor, an inch deep in dirty water.

  ‘I’ll go and find the mop,’ he turned and headed out into the laundry room where she kept her cleaning supplies.

  Olivia turned back to the kitchen and shivered. Realising the back door was still open she stepped forwards intending to close it, when Beau suddenly rushed past her barking madly as he disappeared into the darkness.

  ‘BEAU!’ she yelled after him. ‘Damn it!’

  She rushed to the door and yanked on the green rubber boots tucked neatly behind it. Grabbing her coat off the coat hook she pulled it on over her pyjamas and ran out after him.

  Halfway down towards the dock she realised she should’ve brought a torch. Pulling in her magic she flicked her hand irritably and one of her flame dragonflies appeared and hovered over her shoulder, lighting her way. Hearing Beau bark down by the lake she took off, trudging as quickly as she could through the snowdrift and shivering against the cold wind.

  She could see a small form on the jetty. Trying to move quickly but carefully she headed towards him. Her feet started to slip beneath her on the wet wood and she slowed down, the last thing she needed was to fall into the icy waters of the lake.