The Making of Gabriel Davenport

by Beverley Lee

  The slope levelled out then began to climb again. Her legs refused to carry her further than halfway up the incline. She collapsed into herself like a crumpled origami bird, the cold, wet earth strong in her nostrils. Her eyelids fluttered. Somewhere, the tinny lilt of music filtered through—The Animals Went in Two by Two—and behind her eyes, little orange lions marched in a line with their tails in the air.

  Her husband’s voice called, as though coming from another room.

  Beth smiled. He was telling her it was time to come home.

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  Inside the house, the mood was grim.

  Carver and Ollie had made Noah as comfortable as they could, cleaning his burn and gashes and changing him out of his soaking clothes. He lay, fitfully asleep, on the sofa in the White Room, his limbs jerking under the wool blanket.

  Any hopes Carver and Ollie had about Noah’s faith being their trump card lay dashed. And even though Carver wasn’t a religious man, the knowledge that God had deserted Noah right at his hour of need weighed on his already troubled mind. He tried not to think about Gabe and where he could be.

  ‘I can’t just sit here and do nothing. I feel like we’re waiting to be picked off, too.’ Ollie paced along the length of the room, his hair sticking up in clumps.

  Carver barely heard him. He was sifting through the events of the day, trying to see if he had missed something vital, some small, inconsequential fact that might be the key to ending this mayhem. Suddenly, something hit him. His head jerked up.

  ‘There were two people in this house whom I didn’t ask about the disappearance of the box. Ella and Beth.’

  Ollie stopped in his tracks. ‘It can’t have been Ella; she was too ill to move.’

  As one they raced to the door, running down the hallway like two schoolboys, taking the stairs two at a time. Beth’s room was eerily silent now that the storm had eased. Moonlight pooled in, dappling the floor with milky light and casting an ethereal glow around the bed. The covers lay muddled, one pillow still bearing the imprint of her head. The room bore an incredible sense of loss.

  He opened the door of the wardrobe and pulled things aside.

  ‘Oh, my God.’ Ollie’s voice came from behind. ‘It’s here, in Beth’s bed.’

  They stood, inspecting the thing that had caused so much upset as Ollie voiced what they both were thinking. ‘Why would she take it? How did she know it was even there?’

  ‘I don’t know. But it was clearly important that she be made a part of all this. I could be running blind here, but locking this away might have been the worst thing I could have done.’

  Ollie wiped his fingers down the front of his jeans and Carver understood. The box resonated with evil. To find it here, in a place of such innocence, made his throat tighten. Quickly, he stripped off one of the pillow cases and scooped it up from the bed, the weight of it like a corpse in his hands. ‘Let’s get back to Noah. He’s been by himself too long.’

  Ollie closed the door quietly, as though Beth was still sleeping inside.

  Gabe stood waiting for them at the bottom of the stairs.

  ***

  Gabe had left Clove and his dysfunctional children outside. Clove had told him that it was up to him whether he told the rest of the house where he had been. Gabe imagined telling Carver and Noah he had befriended—if that was the right word—a small coven of vampires. Not that Moth and Teal were friendly. They had spent the whole journey back to the house scrutinizing him like he was something under a microscope.

  ‘Gabriel!’ Carver nearly dropped what he was carrying down the stairs. ‘Where the hell have you been?’

  Here we go, decision time. ‘I had to try and look for Beth.’ The lie, and the irony of it, tripped off Gabe’s tongue like a song.

  Carver thrust what he was carrying at Ollie. The young student grimaced.

  Gabe found himself enveloped in a bear hug that nearly broke his spine as he became the focus of Carver’s full attention.

  ‘Just what part of ‘stay together’ didn’t you get, Gabe? We thought...’ Carver shook his head. ‘Never mind what we thought. Noah went out too, but at least he was prepared for the weather. Why doesn’t anybody listen to me anymore? Come through.’ He led the way to the back of the house, but Gabe didn’t miss the long look he got. Maybe his lie didn’t sound all that convincing after all.

  Gabe got his first look at Noah from behind Ollie. A gasp of shock rose in his throat and he had to put his hand over his mouth. Noah stirred at their voices and raised himself up onto one elbow. He was the colour of bleached bone, which made the raw mark on his brow and the gashes on his cheeks stand out even more.

  Gabe threw himself down in front of the couch and clasped the hand that was attempting to wave. ‘What happened?’

  Noah pointed at Carver then grasped Gabe’s hand in both of his. A sheen of sweat glistened on his skin and his eyes looked sunken.

  Ollie and Carver both filled Gabe in on what had happened since his departure. Although they didn’t say that Noah might have been hunting for him explicitly, he caught an underlying edge to their words. He remembered what Ollie had said to him about secrets and knew that he, too, was guilty of keeping them—now more than ever. How could he tell them about the vampires? Carver had spent his whole life delving amongst the supernatural, the macabre, explaining it as something that you didn’t play around with. And now here was Gabe, a fifteen-year-old kid who had bargained with the devil. Yet something about that didn’t ring true. Gabe didn’t think Clove was truly evil; otherwise, surely he would have attacked Gabe by now—though how could something dead be alive and good? It was a riddle his mind couldn’t digest. The confusion was heavy, pulsing, as if it had a life of its own.

  ‘So it was the bird that attacked Noah too?’ He had almost forgotten the incident this morning. It seemed so long ago.

  ‘It appears so,’ said Carver. ‘But it was no ordinary bird.’

  Gabe’s eyes were drawn to the window, but there was nothing there but the darkness, tightly pressed against the panes as if it wanted to invade and swallow all the light.

  Ollie slipped out briefly, and then reappeared with an armful of old books, dropping them onto the low, square table. ‘If the Internet is down, we’ll have to do this the old fashioned way. This is what I found on possession—and there’s a couple of passages that are animal specific. I know we’ve probably gone through these books before, but now that we know what we’re fighting, that should make it easier to find what we need, right?’ He pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose impatiently, looking from face to face.

  Gabe was the first to pick up a book, a heavy leather-bound text called The Christian’s Guide to Demon Possession. He flicked through the first few pages. The words were as dry as the paper. This was going to be a long night, but at least it would keep his mind occupied. Still, he found that his gaze kept wandering to the windows.

  A slow hour passed, all of them edgy. Noah dozed, occasionally waking to answer a question on theology. Ollie had one eye on his phone. Outside, the wind picked up and the rain began to hammer the roof once again.

  Gabe couldn’t focus on the words. His eyelids drooped. Sleep sounded delicious. A few hours without having to think—it was nearly impossible to imagine the last time he’d felt that sort of weightlessness. He stretched, pulling his shoulders back and wincing. His muscles reminded him that he had fallen down stone steps just that morning.

  Gabe’s gaze was drawn to the object Carver had carried down the stairs, still wrapped up. Ollie had put it by the door. ‘What’s that?’ He nodded towards it, one finger keeping his place in the book.

  No one said anything. Noah opened his eyes at the heavy silence.

  ‘It’s what I was keeping in the vault, Gabe.’ Carver’s words were slow and measured as though he was choosing each one with great precision. ‘The box we found at the farmhouse after you and Beth were attacked.’

  The bottom of Gabe’s world seemed to
collapse and fall away. It had been here all along, then, the object he was told didn’t exist. Carver’s lips were still moving, but in Gabe’s ears, a high-pitched ringing blocked out any sound. He looked out the window. Clove stood outside, the wind lifting his dark hair across his pale face.

  Gabe put his head in his hands.

  Noah struggled into a sitting position. He put his hand on Gabe’s arm but Gabe couldn’t look at him.

  ‘Where did you find it?’ asked Noah quietly.

  ‘It was in Beth’s room. I have no idea how she even knew we still had it.’

  Gabe raised his head. His cheeks were flushed.

  ‘Why did you keep it? Considering that’s what fucked up my family in the first place.’ His words came out razor-sharp, surprising even him. He was so tired—tired of second-guessing and wondering.

  Carver paused. ‘Professionally, I couldn’t destroy something that may become of value to us in the future. Just because we didn’t find a definite link to what terrorised you and Beth all those years ago, that didn’t mean that we wouldn’t eventually. And because—’

  ‘You know something? I don’t care anymore.’ Gabe interrupted the man who had taken care of him his whole life.

  Ollie looked away as the air between them became charged with tension.

  Out of the corner of his eye, Gabe noticed something moving and his next words dried up in his throat. In the doorway stood Clove. Silence descended upon the room. Gabe wanted to stand, but his legs were suddenly boneless.

  Finally, Clove broke the deadlock.

  ‘Forgive my interruption, gentlemen—but I cannot stand by and watch you all tear yourself to shreds.’ Clove clasped his hands together. ‘If you’re concerned, don’t be. Gabriel can vouch for my conduct.’

  ‘Who—what are you?’ Carver’s voice didn’t waver.

  ‘For now, know that I bear you no ill will. I am not human, which should not come as much of a surprise for learned men such as yourselves.’ He smiled and opened his hands.

  Ollie’s eyes widened, owl-like, behind his glasses.

  ‘It’s okay.’ Gabe finally found his voice. ‘This is Clove. I was with him earlier. If he wanted to harm me, I’d already be dead.’ The intake of breath around the room was audible.

  ‘May I?’ Clove bent and removed the pillow case from around the box. He examined the outside of it, running his fingers over the etchings. He lifted the lid, then brought it to his face, inhaling the dank mustiness.

  No one moved. No one was able to.

  Tucking it under his arm, he approached Gabe and placed the box on his lap. ‘This is a skin. Think of it like a snake. The reptile sheds its skin. It was once a part of the entity, but now it is not.’

  Gabe stared at the thing on his lap, the weight of it pressing against his jeans. It looked so inconspicuous. A frown creased his brow.

  ‘This box is wooden; it came from a living source. This was its host, which it needed to survive, as the bird is now its host.’

  ‘Was its host.’ Moth hovered in the doorway like his namesake. His gaze flickered over the room before alighting on Gabe. In his hands was the lifeless body of the bird.

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  Olivia sat in the 4x4 beside Tom as it ploughed through the water-logged, narrow lanes.

  ‘Lines down over there.’ Tom nodded his head to the right.

  ‘How do you know?’ She spun round in her seat and peered into the gloom.

  ‘Headlights when we pulled out onto the road.’

  She was beginning to realise that Tom was far more than the old farmer she had pinned him with. He hadn’t asked any more questions at the farmhouse, only insisted that they have a hot drink and wait for her clothes to dry. But he saw things—like the downed wires—and she wondered how much he had seen the day Noah rescued Beth and Gabe.

  The vicarage was in darkness as the headlights arced past it. Tom stopped by the wooden lichgate at the entrance to the churchyard of St Jude’s. He handed her an old, heavy torch as she climbed down.

  ‘How do you know what you need is in the church?’

  She paused, holding back her hair as the wind whipped it around her face. ‘I was told.’ It sounded pretty feeble. He deserved more. ‘Do you want to come with me?’

  His dark grey eyebrows knitted together for a moment. ‘No, I reckon I’ll just sit here and make sure no one bothers you.’

  ‘Will I have to break in?’ She hadn’t thought about a key. Basic stuff. But she wasn’t in the habit of taking things from churches.

  ‘No, it should be open. Noah rarely locks it, but if he did, there’s a key under the mat.’

  Olivia nodded and set off into the wind, her head down. She still couldn’t get over how trusting people were out here.

  A small cenotaph stood on her left as she walked quickly under the lichgate. Her torch spotlighted a small burst of weathered red—last year’s poppy wreath. The church was old; it was recorded in the Domesday Book and had been here since Norman times. The moss-covered gravestones looked like they had been here almost as long. They leaned at odd angles, their bases choked by weeds. Olivia’s imagination spiked as she wondered who was buried there and how they had died. Something banged hard behind her and she wheeled around, holding her torch in front like a weapon. The lights on Tom’s 4x4 pierced the darkness. He had left them on for her.

  The shingle pathway gave way to flagstones as she drew nearer to the church door. A single automatic spotlight flickered feebly on. It wasn’t much, but right now she didn’t need much to feel grateful.

  Rain lashed her fingers as they closed around the latch. With a helping shove from her shoulder, the door creaked open. Blackness yawned in front of her, together with a smell of cold stone and—what was that? She wrinkled her nose. Beeswax.

  She wished she had thought to ask Tom where the light switch was. St Jude’s wasn’t a large church, but the aisle seemed to stretch for miles down the length of her torch beam.

  Her shoulder hurt. Her hip ached. Her heart didn’t want to feel anymore. Ollie would be frantic. Maybe she had dreamt the whole thing with Stu and this was just a fruitless trip to find nothing?

  Olivia inched down the aisle, past the squat rows of wooden pews with purple and gold hassocks neatly piled at each end. She kept to the aisle, not wanting to creep past the stone sarcophagus that lay against the left hand wall. She had never liked those—not even in broad daylight, with the sun streaming through the high, stained-glass windows. When they’d all come for Christmas and Easter, she had made sure that the boys sat at that side.

  She had no clue where to find what she was looking for. She wasn’t a church-goer; Olivia was more a girl who had faith in herself than anyone—or anything—else. God had always seemed to watch from the side-lines when she and Ollie were growing up. The plaster eyes of St Jude looked down on her coldly. This wasn’t the time to be thinking about what she believed in or not. Then, she remembered who he was—the patron saint of hope and impossible causes. So God, at least, did have a sense of humour.

  The altar loomed, covered in a simple white cloth. Behind it, flashes of faraway lightning illuminated the stained-glass window. She pointed her torch to the right to find the steps to the lectern. Something fluttered right above her and the breath hitched in her throat. She angled the beam of light towards the rafters. Zig-zagging across the ceiling, she found the beady eyes of a confused pigeon looking down on her.

  Olivia mounted the three steps that led to the altar. All of the disagreements she had had with Noah in the past came rushing at her, falling over themselves, making her squirm uncomfortably.

  For God’s sake, focus! She snapped her mind back to the task at hand, trying not to think about blasphemy, or the hand of God, or every time she had ever sneered at Noah’s remarks.

  On the left, in a small alcove invisible from the pews, was a single door. Her feet echoed in the stone stillness as she walked towards it. For the second time, she wished that Tom had come with h
er. That gruff, no-nonsense logic was something she desperately needed right now.

  An old-fashioned latch adorned the door, the kind you depressed. At first, she thought it was locked and she gave a grunt of frustration. The latch clattered down with a noise that made her jump. A rush of camphor rose up to meet her and she was reminded of a time when she had hidden in an old chest when she was playing hide-and-seek with Ollie.

  She cast the beam around the small room. A narrow bookcase stood against one wall next to a coat stand, a single plaid scarf hanging from one arm. Against the other wall was a small desk with an inlaid blotter. Behind that, a heavy curtain hung from a metal pole. With her heart hammering, Olivia pushed the curtain to one side. A row of Noah’s vestments hung from a similar pole that was slightly bowed in the middle. Some were covered in see-through protectors and Olivia recognised those she had seen at Christmas and Easter. Others were packed tightly together, more like the contents of a teenager’s wardrobe than a priest’s.

  She bumped her hip on the edge of the desk and swore. There was nothing on the desk but a small wooden bowl with a cross etched into the base, and the desk drawers were locked. Olivia wanted to scream. She was getting nowhere fast and she had the panicky notion that timing was crucial. She had to get back to the house.

  The door creaked and she spun round, adrenaline white hot in her veins.

  A pair of oval-shaped green eyes regarded her coolly. The laugh that came from her throat sounded vaguely crazy, even to her own ears. Purr Snicketty, the church cat, wound himself around her ankles, his bushy ginger tail wavering. She bent down to stroke his head and he arched his back into her hand. His ears were notched from fights he’d had defending his territory.

  ‘Hey, Purrdy.’ Olivia’s voice was barely more than a whisper, but who—or what—she was hiding from, she didn’t know.

  The beam of her torch cast a glow behind the door. There was an ancient plant stand with bowed legs. On its top was a simple vase.

  And in that vase was what she had come for.