He choked back a sob. His voice cracked.
“…on the steps of the church itself. Mr Lotson, it was like a butcher’s shop. And…and oh, so familiar…”
Phil frowned, but remained silent.
“They haven’t caught the murderer, and they never will. I am responsible for my mother’s death, Mr Lotson. No one else but me. I ran away from All Souls, to forget what I’ve seen, what I’ve done. And she died because of it.
“They killed her to show they can reach me, with impunity, any time they want. They could’ve killed me, left her out of the equation. But this is how they operate. To punish me for abandoning the Fellowship, killing me isn’t enough. They prefer to destroy your spirit, your reason for living, to leave you in the pits of despair and self-hatred. They learned too much from Her.” His voice was a snarl, and Phil almost physically recoiled from the hatred now unleashed.
“I want to die, Mr Lotson. Seeking a kind of redemption? Absolution for my sins? Maybe I am. These are evil people, Mr Lotson. And to think I believed them, trusted them…” Tears ran down his cheeks, tears of anger as well as self-pity. He sniffed loudly. “On the third day after it happened, it came home to me. I knew then. Not just how wrong I’d been, but how wrong they were - because this was an act of desperation as well as evil. They think it will shut me up, that if I talk I’ll be branded as loopy as Jason Franklin. ‘Poor fucker, lost his mum to a junkie’s blade…now look at the paranoid shit he’s coming out with.’” He wiped his nose on the sleeve of his shirt. “They can pull strings, Mr Lotson. Get me sectioned…put me in the same unit as young Jason. And then they can take their time over me.”
Phil remained silent, waiting for Freeland’s outburst to finish, waiting for the room to stop spinning, waiting for the similarity to his interview with Jason Franklin to fade.
“One thing before I tell you what is happening at All Souls, Mr Lotson. That everything Jason Franklin told you is true. Are you ready to die?”
Phil was on his feet, the sherry spilling down his trouser leg. “What?”
Freeland wiped the tears from his eyes. “A new development. The minute I saw this, I almost hoped you wouldn’t come.” He turned to the PC and moved the mouse. The screensaver disappeared, to be replaced by a webpage.
“BBC news website,” Freeland said quietly. “Did you wonder why the traffic on the A14 was so bad tonight? There’s your answer.”
The picture was a twisted nightmare. What looked like a Ford Focus enveloped within the gaping maw of an articulated truck’s engine housing. The heat from the fire had been intense. The metal on both vehicles was twisted, black and smouldering, the barrier the Focus had crashed through curling and enveloping them both like some mechanical python. Thankfully, he couldn’t make out any human remains.
“The driver of the Ford was a woman called Judith Cox,” Freeland said with a tremor. “She was on her way to see me…and she was killed before she had a chance to see what’s brought you here now.”
“An accident,” Phil said in a low voice. He was aware of the sherry soaking through his trouser leg now, and considered asking Freeland for a top up. “A terrible tragedy, but with the road conditions, these things happen - ‘
“No,” Freeland said emphatically. “No accident. Murder. But no way to prove it. The Accident Investigators will reveal that the vehicle was in a poor state of repair - faulty brakes, leaking steering fluid - and the driver had a history of mental health problems, was coming off her medication too rapidly…”
“You know all this? How?”
“I just know.” Freeland stared unblinkingly into Phil’s eyes. And for a moment, when he looked beyond the moistness of tears shed from the reddened eyes, Phil Lotson had the unsettling sensation that he was back in the Phoenix Unit under the mocking scrutiny of Jason Franklin. He blinked, shook his head, and the sensation passed - but only when Freeland looked away.
“This is why I know they’re getting desperate. Innocent people died on that road, purely to prevent one woman getting here and discovering the truth.”
“And yet I made it here. Alive.” God, but for how long?
“Yes.” Freeland nodded stiffly. “Alive. That’s why there’s hope. But I have to tell you now: once you have this information, this proof, you are going to be in terrible danger. You can walk away if you wish, I wouldn’t blame you. I know you’re a family man,” he added wistfully.
“Why me? Why can’t you deliver this…this evidence? Why are you relying on an outsider? And more importantly, why the hell did you sit on it for so long?”
“I’ve been silent for too long, I accept that. A part of me still believed that what they are doing is right, is just…is necessary. And…God forgive me, Mr Lotson, I was wallowing in self-pity, self-hatred. Thinking of my loss and how it paled into nothingness compared to those families whose bereavements and suffering I helped to cause. I’m an Eastender, someone who’s proud of their roots…but, no macho bollocks, no illusions. I’m a weak man and I know it. And I hate myself for it. Fuckin’ mummy’s boy…”
Phil looked away, back to the webpage. The tarmac had melted in certain places, reformed around pieces of metal into twisted, horrifying shapes that resembled outstretched human arms, clawing the road in agony.
“And that changed tonight, when she phoned me.” The Estuary accent retreated. Self control was resumed. “In one phone call I learned about the strength and courage of one woman, and it put me to shame. What she saw tonight was a very personal thing, an event she’d tried to keep hidden - even from herself. She saw a vision of herself, undergoing a shattering and agonising miscarriage, years ago.”
Phil turned back to Freeland. “A flashback?”
“No, not a flashback. She saw herself, her younger self, carried through the grounds of All Souls College - in the third person, you might say. She saw her younger self go through the miscarriage all over again.”
Phil didn’t say anything.
“She thought she was going mad, she didn’t suspect that an outside force was responsible for showing her this. I had to talk to her, to tell her what was going on. But then, as you spoke to Jason Franklin earlier, you know why this happened.”
“I know why he thinks it happened.”
Freeland narrowed his eyes. He closed them, took a deep breath and then opened them again.
“Okay. Let’s back track a little. What exactly did he tell you inside Phoenix?”
“He told me about the whispers, the voices he heard at night. The dreams of going back in time…and his relationship with someone he calls The Elder.”
“The Elder. Yes. And he told you why he tried to burn the college buildings down?”
“To free the trapped souls he was convinced had been imprisoned…that fire could not only cleanse and purge the evil, it could force it to release the ones it had…enthralled, was the rather melodramatic word he used.”
Freeland smiled grimly. “Enthralled souls…All Souls. Melodramatic, but also ironic.”
“He’s convinced that his ‘task’ must be completed before December the twenty first ends…before the final stage of the Founder’s Feast. And he said I’d beg to help him.” That still made him shudder, the gleeful way Jason Franklin had said it. As though he knew Phil was going to suffer, would be on his knees in agony before starting to beg. But who is it that’ll force me? Is it Franklin…or Andy Hughes?
Freeland reached over and took Phil’s empty glass. He refilled it and passed it back before continuing.
“Mr Lotson, last year I was relieved that young Franklin was stopped. Now I wish he’d succeeded.”
Phil frowned and sipped the sherry thoughtfully. My God, it’s as bad as that. Freeland wants other people’s lives put at risk…
But then, Freeland believed that members of the college were responsible for the murder of his mother. Not some junkie smack-head in one of the least salubrious parts of London, no that was too far-fetched. Had to be the members of a Cambridge college,
didn’t it? Jason Franklin’s paranoia was contagious.
And yet…Jason he could understand to a point. The head porter’s son had been tormented by inner demons since childhood, fair asylum fodder. James Freeland, on the other hand, was a respected academic with a PhD in anthropology and a string of academic books to his name. And he’d seemed such a well-balanced individual, according to all the accounts Phil had heard.
Guess this is what happens if you keep too-open a mind. Get too immersed in your work, let reality slip by…Phil swallowed thickly. The sherry tasted extra sour. He had the horrible feeling he was sharing a room and a conversation with his future self.
“Professor Freeland - ‘
“James, please.”
“James - I want you to know that I’m very sceptical about Franklin’s claims. It’s just too fantastical, and…”
Freeland nodded. “Of course. No one can really believe, or understand. It wasn’t until I took part in the ritual, consumed the flesh of the boar, that I truly believed.”
Phil blinked.
“All will be clear when you read the files. Jason Franklin didn’t lie to you.” He indicated the large storage box underneath the PC desk. “Everything you need is in here.” He eyed it with a shamed expression. “The proof Jason promised you…the guilt of the Fellows of All Souls. My guilt, my shame…the cross I bear.” his voice trailed off.
Phil stared at it. It was a standard archive storage box, a foot long, in cardboard with a fake wood grain effect.
“It’s heavy, about twenty kilos,” Freeland said with a shudder. “A lot of history in there. A lot of suffering. Most of it was compiled by Jason Franklin. He’s spent years on it.”
Phil shook his head. Now he was being offered proof…and he wasn’t sure he wanted it any more. But he’d come this far, he had to know…
“To fully understand it, you’ll need some historical context. Your specialist period is the Early Modern period, is it not? Specifically, England in the seventeenth century…so I’m guessing you don’t have much expertise in pre-medieval history.”
Phil shook his head.
“Thought not.” Freeland sighed and pointed to the hardback books on the shelf. “Most of those I’ve written. I’ve made a name for myself in the field of pre-Christian beliefs and societies. And it was the Celtic world that fascinated me the most. My books were serious works, focussing on the legacy the Celtic tradition left to the world, rather than the New Age self-help rubbish…” he laughed mirthlessly. “Ironic really. Even I had no idea of the true legacy left to us. But I must have come close, because it was my last book that attracted the attention of the Fellows of All Souls.
“An exploration of human sacrifice. An attempt to link the phenomenon from different societies, all over the world: to try to ask the question why humans create gods that demand killing.”
“I remember it well, Professor. Fear and Gods…the title taken from the Satyricon by Petronius. ‘It was fear that first brought Gods into the world.’”
“Very good, Mr Lotson. Not a very successful work, nothing new on the subject…or so I thought. But it was my section on Andraste and the Iceni that caught their attention.”
“Boudicca’s goddess, if I recall,” Phil vaguely remembered the book. Again, he’d been too busy with his own research when Fear and Gods had come out. “Called upon to help defeat the Romans at Colchester.”
“Yes,” Freeland nodded grimly. “And the violence of her uprising is well recorded. She delighted in the savage killing of her defeated prisoners…because Andraste demanded it.”
“I thought it was because the Romans raped her and her daughters? A personal violation as well as a smack in the face of the ruling power of the Iceni?”
“Yes, Boudicca knew this could not go unavenged…but it also had to be successful. The odds were stacked against her: despite the popular support she had it would not be enough. She needed help from beyond the world of men.
“You won’t find much detail of Andraste in studies of Celtic mythology, because very little is known about her. To some historians she was similar to the goddess Badbh, or The Morrigan, the ‘Phantom Queen’ of battle who delighted in death and mutilation. Hence her appellation as a goddess of victory. But that’s where the similarity ends.” Freeland’s face was grim. “What Boudicca invoked on the woods of Durolipons - the old, Roman name for what was to become Grantabridge, then Cambridge - was far more ferocious, more deadly than she could have expected. Andraste accompanied her, helped her destroy Colchester and Londinium…but Boudicca was defeated at Watling Street by the Roman Governor, Seuetonius Paulinus.
“Seventy thousand Britons lay dead for the loss of only four hundred Romans. Why was that, do you think?”
“That part’s well known,” Phil said. “She had a large following, but a lack of manoeuvrability and open field tactics…against the most ruthless, disciplined fighting machine the ancient world had ever seen. It was only a matter of time before the revolt was crushed.”
“But she had Andraste on her side. Why did she not help Boudicca at Watling Street? It is rumoured that Andraste went back to the woods in Durolipons. What happened after that is anyone’s guess - but it is certain she wasn’t at the battle. Andraste lied to Boudicca, promised her a victory she had no hope of achieving…just as she lied to everyone who followed.”
Phil took a breath. “What are you saying, professor? And what does this have to do with what’s going on at All Souls?”
“Understand this, Mr Lotson. The Celts understood the world they lived in, far better than we do now. They had their own morality which we may consider barbaric - but they recognised that everything has a price. Human survival included…and that cost could sometimes only be paid in blood and pain. Their priests understood this better than anyone. The druids beseeched Boudicca not to invoke Andraste, because they knew the cost would be too great for humanity to bear. They knew that once she’d tasted blood on human soil…she would always hunger for it. She would return, unless appeased. Boudicca’s invocation allowed her to secure a foothold on this plane, and she’s had to be appeased ever since.”
Phil stared at the archive storage box. He was where this was going.
“The ritual of appeasement has not changed, Mr Lotson. A man and a woman, every Midwinter’s Eve…taken apart to sing to Andraste, to feed her and water her. Only this prevents her breaking through.”
Phil was speechless.
“Destroyed in the Nemeton, upon which the chapel has been built. Twice-holy ground, Mr Lotson. Twice-defiled.”
“You’re joking.” Now he remembered what the Master had told him about the college in the ancient woods surrounding what was now All Souls. The name given to it before the present college was founded. Nemeton.
“I wish I was. I wish I’d never written that section of the book, because that was when All Souls came to me. An Honorary Fellowship offered to me after I attended the Foundation Feast. To become a part of the oldest college in Cambridge, and entrusted with the task of writing its history.”
Phil looked up.
“That’s what they offered. But they had no intention of their history ever being recorded. Like the ancient druids, their history is an oral one, passed down from one college member to another, never to be shared with outsiders. Quite literally oral - once I had consumed the flesh of the boar…the secrets were made known to me. And I was trapped.”
“Consumed the boar?” Phil stared hard at Freeland. “I don’t understand. How can eating boar meat give you knowledge?”
“The wild boar was a very important animal to the old religions. To the Celts, it linked this world to the Otherworld…as well as its symbolism in war, the flesh of certain boar was considered magical. Food of the Gods, if you will.” The professor’s eyes were filled with self-loathing, and they moved back to the archive box.
“Supernatural beasts that could be hunted, but never caught. A common theme in ancient sagas. They disappeared into the Otherworl
d, and would only return when the time was right. For the beasts in All Souls, the time is around the winter solstice. That’s when the Children of Andraste will make themselves known. When one will offer itself to be consumed…and its siblings guard the forest.
Phil thought back to the NO ENTRY sign on the West Gate of All Souls. Then he remembered the Master’s reference to the boar and the Founding of the college.
On the day the foundation stone of All Souls was laid - the twenty-first of December, 1299 - a single boar was seen running through the woods. The first seen for hundreds of years. It was hunted, killed and eaten at the feast to mark the founding, and its remains buried in a patch of ground that was to become Old Court.
“Bloody hell,” he whispered.
“Hell, indeed. I - I don’t want you to read through these files here, Mr Lotson. Please take them away with you.”
Phil’s glare returned. “Why? Will I be so furious, so disgusted, that I’ll physically attack you?”
“Maybe, maybe not…but I don’t want to see the hatred and disgust in another’s eyes anymore. I see enough of that when I look in the mirror each morning.
“Please understand me when I say that when I took part in these atrocities I really believed they were necessary. The rest of the Council…they still believe. That’s why it still goes on. They had their doubts, but they listened to their predecessors, and learned to accept their duty.”
“But you woke up!” Phil shouted. “You knew something was wrong, why don’t the others? What changed your mind?”
“Jason Franklin…and The Elder. The Master may have told you that I left due to ill health, on the verge of mental collapse, and that much is true. If I’d stayed, participated in another of those…abominations, it would have destroyed me. What Jason told me, showed me in his artwork…that sealed it for me.
“Remember what I said about everything having a price - a price that includes blood, pain and suffering? This is where The Elder comes in. It’s not just Andraste that demands sacrifice…The Elder is the only one who can stop her. But he requires blood also.”
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