~*~
All the strands came together in Remy's head at once and he was absolutely sure when he met the hidden gaze.
"You and Swanson met at Felix's funeral, didn't you?" he revealed some of his hand. "Did you intend to go this far, or did you just want to know what happened at first?"
He paused, trying to hide any disquiet he felt at the ropes around his body and waited for a response. Slowly, Chloe reached up and pulled off the mask, wild red hair falling around an expression that was far darker than the mask.
"Very good, Detective, you get a gold star, but being a smart arse won't save you," the young woman sneered, her eyes blazing. "You will all pay for failing my poor Felix."
Remy knew better than to challenge his captor's logic right out, instead, he kept a steady eye on her and asked, "Felix was your boyfriend, you met at university?"
Chloe nodded and, as Remy had hoped, she began to talk.
"He was the best guy I ever met, shy, kind and happy, we were so happy. Then you idiots let that Ouija get into him and he just started to fade away right in front of us. When he finally killed himself, there was nothing of him left, just a shell, and all he could talk about was that bloody board. All he could think of was that night, he was even wearing this," she pulled at the costume, "when he killed himself."
"Why did you come to the shop?" Swanson joined the conversation, his tone gentle and measured.
"I wanted to find out about the board, I wanted to know why my lover had committed suicide," Chloe snarled, showing her teeth and her eyes blazing. "When I finally got you drunk enough to tell me what had happened, that you'd let that board start on him, that's when I decided that you'd pay the same way he had."
The doll cackled at that and observed, "Quite something, isn't she? I despaired of ever getting out of that damnable vault and then, one day, my dear Chloe rescued me."
Remy really wanted to kick the doll and board into orbit, but he held onto his desire just as the ropes held onto him.
"Chloe, you killed three innocent people last night," Theo's tone was flat as he made the observation.
The look of hatred flickered out at that and the girl glanced down at the little demon that was looking up at her.
"I," she began, confusion flashing across her features.
"You what?" Remy pushed and regretted it as soon as he saw the anger flare again.
"I had to see if it worked," the girl growled, but it was obvious to Remy from the look in her eyes that she was no more in control than he was.
Remy could feel magic now, it was coming from the board and it felt nasty. He hadn't seen the thing in real life, only in pictures, but he knew how it had earned its name. The black lettering was old, broken where the leather surface had worn over the years and he could feel the evil in them. The board had control of Chloe just as it had obsessed Holiday.
"Surely you'd learnt enough not to have to try it out?" he tried to reason with whatever sanity was left to the young woman.
"Oh, I'd learnt so much," Chloe snapped back, grinning uncontrollably. "You know that board is four hundred years old? He told me that," she pointed sharply at Swanson, "but what he didn't tell me, what he wouldn't tell anyone, I had to sneak through his books to find it out myself, is that it was made by Jules Van Der Hoff, a necromancer. He wound it with magic that can tear a man's soul from his body and that is what is going to happen to you all."
Swanson sighed, shaking his head and drawing everyone's attention.
"It was me who failed Felix, not these two," he appealed to Chloe. "Why hurt them?"
"There have to be three," Chloe started to pace, agitation in her manner, and she continued to waggle her finger at Swanson. "You know that. Any two would have done, but I improvised when these two came into the shop tonight. I knew I could get some of your old team here if I hacked their system."
"You changed Felix's record to show he was still alive and living here," Theo revealed he'd reached the same conclusion as Remy.
Chloe laughed then, a sound that was a world away from the flirty giggle she had used on him in the shop.
"It was so easy, much easier than breaking into that vault," she crowed. "And I researched you two, the great Haward twins, just in case it was you who came here, I was hoping it would be. Don't you think the taser was inspired – no magic, no mystic alarm call?"
It was never good when criminals did their homework, but keeping Chloe talking was the only plan Remy had and he was hoping Theo was coming up with something.
"Oh, and, please don't try using your magic, gentlemen," Chloe grinned at them again and swung Swanson's amulet that was around her neck: "I've learned quite a lot about magic too and there are protections in place."
Remy just had to try: there weren't many protections that could hold against his fire power. However, as soon as he tried to gather his magic, he felt his skin prickling and then a lance of pain shot down his spine. He gasped and let go of his intent. Theo was staring at him with an angry-worried frown as he tried to relax and his stomach turned when Holiday's voice cut the air.
"Child, we must begin!"
Chloe walked forward, hands held out, and she intoned, "Diablo, vien."
The magic in the room spiked and Remy sunk into his seat as slowly, the devil doll stood up out of its cradle. It was a very impressive piece of magic, animating the doll so precisely, but Remy had the same childish and slightly scared instinct to kick out at it. He could only watch as the doll bent down and placed the planchette on the board and then Holiday's voice was back.
"Diablo, will these three die this night?"
For a moment, there was nothing, and then Remy thought he saw an almost imperceptible wobble of the wooden pointer. Remy really did not want to watch, but he couldn't take his eyes off the thing as it gave another wiggle, bigger this time, making the hairs stand up on the back of his neck once more. Then he gritted his teeth as the planchette slid effortlessly across the board, landing, unsurprisingly on the 'Yes'. It was too much, Remy let out just a little of the panic that was rising in his belly and with it came magic. Pain came swiftly after it as Chloe's protections hit him and Remy cried out. The dagger of agony was so sharp it stifled Remy's wits for a moment, and when he came back to himself, his magic was gone.
Theo growled and pulled at his bonds, the anger in his eyes showing Remy that he was losing it.
"Chloe, stop this," Theo demanded. "The only person responsible for Felix's death is Raymond Holiday and he's dead. You don't want to kill, the board does."
Reason wasn't going to work, Remy could see that in the girl's eyes and she said nothing, just watching and holding Swanson's amulet as blue-white smoke began to rise from the board. However, his skin still prickling from the attack, Remy remembered the encounter that had given him goosebumps for a whole different reason.
"Felix!" he yelled, any thought of logic having drowned in the face of desperation when the board had begun to do its work. "Felix, please, help us!"
Remy tried to look away from the smoke and he broke free for a second, his gaze dancing around the room, but the effort made him gasp. Still, it was worth it, because, on the edge of his vision, he recognised the green glow from earlier. Struggling, he looked to Chloe and told her, "Felix."
The young woman looked the way he directed and Remy was able to see her expression change to one of shock, but then he felt the pull of the board. It was a cold sensation soaking into his bones. He could not resist it, and, reluctantly, he looked back at the board.
"Remy, I can't look away," Theo told him through gritted teeth.
"Me neither," Remy agreed, a pull developing in the bottom of his stomach.
"Remember who you are," Swanson cut in, "don't let it have you."
"Felix?" Chloe's voice was small and uncertain and it gave Remy hope.
The smoke did not rise like natural vapour, instead it twisted its way out in three ribbons, one to each of them and Remy's helping spread out in front of his face. H
e held his breath for as long as he could, but eventually, he had to gasp in air and with it the smoke. Then Remy groaned as something took hold of the deepest part of him and tugged.
"No," Theo snarled, sounding as desperate as Remy was feeling.
"Felix, I did it for you," Chloe stammered, "I love you."
Remy had no idea what was going on between glow and girlfriend, but he could feel the hold getting tighter, so there was nothing left for it. Balling up his magic, he fought back. With relief, there was no retaliation and he looked up at Theo, sending out a stab of magic. Theo's head shot up to meet his gaze and he grimaced as his twin's magic rose up to join his. There was no need to talk, Remy could see the need to destroy the horror he felt reflected back at him and without hesitation, he gave control to Theo.
It felt natural to lend Theo his power, but with the smoke twisting inside him, trying to pull him apart, Remy had to fight down his own defensive instincts. He willed Theo on, and was relieved when he felt their joined magic rising. The smoke twisted wildly above the board as if convulsing and then Remy's senses descended away from him without his consent. Sight and sound sunk into blackness, but he was still wrapped close to his brother, so he let Theo lead down into the cold place where the smoke had come from. Remy didn't like the emptiness, he wanted to throw his magic out and fill the space and Theo was on the same page, because, suddenly, Remy's power ripped outwards. The pressure was intense as magic hit magic and Remy recognised the bars of a cage. Angry, he threw all he had behind Theo's attack.
It felt like forever that they were pushing at the magical cell, but finally, Remy exploded back into himself, his body hurting and his mind reeling, but in the sure knowledge that the cage had been broken. He sunk into his seat, disoriented and exhausted and could do nothing but watch as where the smoke had been, white light erupted out of the board.
"No!" Holiday's hollow voice screamed and the doll convulsed in the stream of brilliance.
Remy felt strangely numb and he sensed no magic, but the bright fountain shot upwards, hitting the ceiling and dispersing into the darkness with a violence that made Remy think of a desperate escape. He watched it for what seemed like minutes, but could not have been more than a few heartbeats and, as suddenly as it had begun, the explosion was gone.
Bone tired and dazed, Remy blinked across what was now a blackened board and broken doll at where Theo seemed to be in a similar state. He hadn't realised it, but there had been a rushing in his ears and as the sound cleared, all that Remy heard was a quiet, feminine crying.
"Blunt, but effective," Swanson observed dryly, his voice somewhat unsteady, "no-one is using that thing again and the souls have been released."
"Next time, Professor Casanova" Theo lolled his head to one side and glared at Swanson, "don't sleep with mysterious women from funerals."
Swanson raised his eyebrows and tried to look indigent, but along with the messed hair and half-off glasses, it came off more old duffer than authoritarian DCI and Remy snorted at him.
"You two can argue later, right now, someone get me out of this," he decided, rather too tired to muster any magic of his own.
~*~
Theo shut down the computer window and leant back in his chair. His second report on the Diablo Ouija had been just as difficult to write as the first one he had written with DCI Swanson. Yet, there had been rational magical explanations for everything that happened and, in the cold light of day, it had all made much more sense. Theo still had a strange feeling when he thought back to the events in the warehouse, a nagging feeling he couldn't shake that maybe not everything could be explained through magic, but he had to accept that Remy's trickery with Chloe had caused the girl to have a breakdown just in time to free their magic. They had destroyed the board forever, released all its magic back into the atmosphere and he had been studiously ignoring the way Bill Swanson had referred to it as a release of souls.
"Finished?" Remy asked, as usual turning up just after the paperwork was complete.
However, there was an edge to his voice that spoke to the discomfort in Theo, and he turned to look up at his twin.
"I've just been chatting with the SCSI's," Remy lowered his volume as he sat down in the chair next to Theo. "You know that damn doll, the one that we concluded was being controlled by Chloe."
Theo nodded: he wouldn't forget that evil little magical marionette for a long time. Remy grimaced at him.
"Well, our technical friends ran a barrage of tests on that bloody doll, checked it at every magical level they could," Remy continued and Theo thought he could see what was coming next in the faint disquiet in his twin's eyes: "not a dickie bird, nada, nothing, the thing was completely free from magic."
"That's impossible," Theo defended everything that he knew to be logical and true as ice sliced up and down his spine none-the-less.
"Yes, I know," Remy did not look happy at what he was saying. "So, if magic was not controlling that demon doll, what was?"
####
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Also, you might like other stories in The Haward Mysteries Collection: https://www.wittegenpress.com/hawardmysteries
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Afterword
About Wittegen Press:
Wittegen Press is a small independent publisher of eBooks based in the UK. We publish on many eBook sites. To see our whole catalogue please visit our website.
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About Sophie
Sophie was born with the writing bug in her blood, boring her primary school teachers with pages of creative writing and killing her first typewriter from over use when she was thirteen. She began publishing her work on line while at university where she discovered the internet and fanfiction. It took another decade for Sophie to realise her long-time dream of releasing her own original fiction.
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The Diablo Ouija Page 8