by M. V. Stott
Ben nodded and Rita wondered if she’d just lied to him.
17
Derek Nolan—the low-level wizard, ex-teacher, and current assistant manager of a local supermarket—arrived home from work at a little after two in the afternoon.
‘Here puss-puss,’ he cooed, as he closed the front door behind him and shrugged off his coat, hanging it on the hook on the wall and depositing his keys into the bowl that sat on the table beside it.
‘Alfie. Daddy’s home,’ said Derek, making little kissy noises to try and rouse the fat cat from wherever it was dozing. Derek had never thought of himself as a pet person, but for the last year or so an old stray had started turning up in his back garden, and Derek had found himself growing attached to the thing. Eventually he had let the cat, now christened Alfie, into his house, and the cat hadn’t taken a step outside since. It knew when it was on to a good thing.
Derek went through to the kitchen and lifted Alfie’s empty food bowl from the floor and placed it on the table before heading over to the buzzing fridge to grab some of the leftover cold cuts he’d put on a covered plate the previous evening.
‘Alfie, got some tasty meat for you, boy,’ said Derek, pulling off the shrink wrap and depositing the meat into Alfie’s bowl. With no sign of the lazy cat coming to feast, or even just to greet its master, Derek grabbed a bottle of beer from the fridge and headed for the door under the staircase.
All wizards have a sanctum of some sort. A secret place wherein they can study, practice, and generally do wizard-y things safe from the curious eyes. Derek’s was under the stairs. Quite a long way under the stairs. He opened the small wooden door and stooped slightly as he shuffled into the space beyond. Stone steps led into the gloom.
Derek sipped from his bottle and began to make his way down to the impossibly large room that lay at the bottom. His sanctum. A library far too large to actually be hidden beneath his modest-sized house. The walls were lined with towering bookcases that seemed to stretch up and up until you lost sight of the top. A large wooden desk and green leather chair were the only other items in the sanctum. Apart from the mini-fridge, but the mini-fridge was currently empty as Derek had yet to do his big shop for the week.
That was twice now that Detective Rita Hobbes had come to him recently, looking for answers. Neither time had he had the answers she was looking for. Derek slumped in his chair and threw his legs up on the desk. Why was she always coming to him, anyway? He was nobody. Not really. A minor-wizard at best. It wasn’t fair, being hounded. What had he ever done to deserve that?
Well, yes, there was the groping incident that had lead to his dismissal as a teacher several years back, but he’d not groped anyone since. Not unless he’d paid them first. He was an honest groper these days. A regular pillar of society.
It took several more minutes of self-pity before Derek Nolan, honest-groping minor-wizard, noticed the splatter of blood on the floor to the right of his desk. Derek frowned and sat up, placing his bottle down on the desk. Was it blood? It looked like blood. Derek leaned to the side to investigate, and discovered the reason why Alfie had failed to appear. Even after he’d put out food for him.
It was Alfie the fat cat.
His small, plump body lay on the floor of Derek’s secret sanctum, poking out slightly from under the desk.
‘Alfie?’
Derek went down on his hands and knees to peer under the desk and get a good look at Alfie. Maybe he was just injured. Been in a fight with another cat, or that noisy dog from two doors down. Always barking and gnashing its teeth at any passing mog, that one. Had he sunk his teeth into poor Alfie, only for Alfie to wriggle free and make his way down here to keep safe until Derek’s return?
‘Alfie, you okay, mate?’
Alfie was not okay. As Derek peered closer, he saw that his adopted cat was not just dead, but torn into four different pieces. His guts were wrapped around his neck.
‘Oh, Christ! Oh shit in my mouth!’ said Derek, scrambling away from the gruesome find. What could have happened, and how did Alfie get down into his sanctum after it had? He couldn’t have done, not in that state. Which meant…
‘Oh…’
Which meant it had happened within the sanctum itself.
Derek stood slowly, noticing the second figure for the first time.
‘Took you long enough, wizard,’ said the woman perched nine shelves up on one of Derek’s over-stuffed bookcases, full as they were with all manner of magical texts.
Derek’s eyes darted to the door, to the stone steps that led up to the house. The woman clicked her fingers and the door slammed shut, the desk in front of Derek scraping across the floor and stopping in front of the door to block his escape.
‘I don’t think so,’ said the woman, her piercing blue eyes glowing sharp through the gloom of the sanctum.
‘Who are you?’ asked Derek, shaking from head to toe.
The woman frowned and considered the question. ‘Well, to you, I am death.’ She hopped down from the high shelf, landing soundlessly upon the ground. ‘You can also call me Magda.’
‘This… this is my sanctum! You’ve breached my sanctum!’ said Derek, trying not to sound as scared as he felt.
‘Yes. I also killed your cat.’
Magda approached, slowly, playfully, and as she moved closer. Derek could see dark blood smeared across her mouth.
‘Did you…? You killed him with your teeth?’
The woman smiled. ‘Yes. He did not taste good. Try him, if you don’t believe me.’
Derek decided it best to take to his heels. With the way blocked, the easiest way out was a little simple transportation magic. One of the spells he was, for some reason, most adept at. Not bothering to say goodbye, Derek willed the magic in the sanctum into himself and demanded it obey his command. Demanded it take him from this place and deposit him somewhere safe.
The air around him swirled with colour and Derek readied himself to depart. Only it didn’t happen. The colours crackled and fizzed and then puttered out.
‘Problem?’ asked Magda, smiling.
Derek tried again, and again, a sweat breaking out across his brow with the effort, until he finally fell to his knees, defeated.
‘Not… not possible…’ said Derek, gasping for air.
‘I am not stupid, wizard,’ said Magda. She wandered over to one corner of the sanctum and crouched, running her finger across the floor and holding it up for Derek to see.
Chalk.
Magda had cast a holding spell, so that no one was able to magic their way out of the place. Derek had walked into a cage.
‘You were the one who killed the wizard,’ said Derek.
‘Yes. And I feasted upon his flesh, and upon his magic. I enjoyed both.’
Derek staggered up to his feet, his heart racing. No way to jump out, he was going to have to fight for his life. He already feared he knew how that was going to turn out. He looked down at dead Alfie.
‘You’re a werewolf,’ he said.
‘Not so stupid, are you? But I’m not just any werewolf, I’m a master werewolf.’
Derek thought about what he’d witnessed. The door, the desk; that was magic. The spell keeping him contained, the chalk symbols would need magic fed into them to bring them to life. But a werewolf, master or not, wasn’t able to use magic. It was beyond them. They didn’t have it naturally, and could not be taught. Could not master it. The only magic in them was that of their own curse. What Derek was seeing was impossible.
‘You can’t do this. Any of it. You’re not magic, not properly, not like me. How are you doing it?’ asked Derek, curiosity vying with his fear for pole position.
‘Viciously,’ replied Magda, and in the blink of an eye, her face turned monstrous, her mouth full of large, sharp teeth, her eyes yellow and bulging, her features a hungry snarl.
Magda tore into Derek, who barely had time to scream before he expired. Magda then feasted upon some of his flesh until her stomach was satisfi
ed. After that, she suckled upon his magic, drinking it all down, feeling her own connection to the Uncanny growing stronger with each mouthful, her grip on magic ever surer. She was strong enough now. She was sure of it. She was ready.
Magda took what was left of Derek Nolan—small-time wizard, ex-teacher, and former supermarket assistant manager—and laid it out on the beach for all to see.
18
February 14th, 2012, Somewhere in Wales
Hell is not just one place, it is many places.
Think of Hell like a fungus, buried deep under the Earth. Though, of course, it is not below the Earth at all, just as Heaven is not above. Such terms are meaningless when it comes to such places, but they serve as handy tags to those with a flat understanding of the universe.
So think of Hell like a fungus.
There is the main body of it. A fist of dank despair. And squirming from this central, rotten mass are millions of rancid tendrils. Roots winding through rock and dirt and sea and reality, until they hit fresh air.
A little piece of Hell in the open.
A fissure. A rift. A crack.
An exit, an entrance, a meeting place.
Most of these seams to Hell are beyond reach for anyone who walks upon the planet’s surface, Uncanny or not. They simply do not exist in a way they could be found, seen, or understood.
But still, enough of them do.
In a cave perhaps, high on the side of a mountain. At the bottom of an unused, dry well by a family home in the English countryside. And then there is the one Magda found, under the arching roots of an ancient oak tree known as the Creeping Oak. The Creeping Oak stands somewhere in a desolate, beautiful area of Wales. It is best if the location is kept vague.
The tree itself has stood for many centuries, and its roots jut high from the dirt, as though arching their backs like a cat. Locals said it was because the tree used them to creep across the countryside, using its roots like a spider would its legs, but that of course is impossible.
Of course.
Magda had been searching for some years for a place like the Creeping Oak. Most who claimed to know the location of such a place, of a direct line to Hell, were more often than not lying, or at the very least ill-informed. Many of those that did actually know were unwilling to give up the information for any price, for such a place could be as precious as it was dangerous.
So Magda had searched. As she had kept her head down, attempting to keep off the radar of any wizard with a taste for her blood, to keep off the radar of that one wizard in particular, Magda had visited numerous Uncanny gatherings late at night and made her desires known.
Eventually, she had met an eaves who claimed to know the location of what she was after. In return for a taste of magic, he would tell her where it was hidden, and she agreed. The eaves told her, and Magda tore his throat out with her teeth and ate his heart.
The Creeping Oak stood alone upon a small hill, overlooking a barren valley. Winds tore at it as though trying to rip the tree from the land and deposit it far, far away, but the Creeping Oak stood strong against the winds, barely shaking a branch.
The wind bit into Magda, but she did not feel it as she crested the top of the hill and walked towards the giant tree. Its trunk was at least three metres wide, which was much wider than any oak Magda had come across in her long life. She took in its gnarled roots, thrusting out of the ground, reaching high above her then shooting back beneath the soil. Each root was as thick as her arm.
Magda reached out and touched one of the roots. She could feel the life in it. It throbbed, it twitched, it writhed. She walked towards the trunk, where several roots could be seen feeding into the tree. Magda placed her hand flat against the tree trunk and closed her eyes.
‘Ahka Hyula Fa’Lach.’
The wind dropped in an instant, and the world held its breath.
For several seconds, nothing happened.
Magda began to suspect she had been fed false information, before she had fed on the information’s source.
Then the tree beneath her hand cracked.
Magda opened her eyes and stepped back, afraid about what might happen next. Afraid, but determined.
A jagged crack appeared up the tree trunk and the tree opened.
Magda took a breath or two to calm her jumping heart, and then she walked into the tree. Rather than smack straight into the tree’s interior—or at the very least the other side of the trunk—Magda instead began walking up an iron staircase. She looked past her feet to see it twisting down and down for eternity, but she knew she was meant to go up. Each step she took, the ancient staircase swayed and shook, and it felt to Magda that at any moment, with any footstep, the brittle staircase might collapse and send her falling down forever.
She found the creature at the top. Found the demon.
A little old lady, white of hair, plump of cheek, rotten of teeth, wiping her fat hands upon the stained gingham apron she wore.
It was not how she had expected a demon to look, but then demons have no set form. They can and do look like all manner of things.
‘Hello, hello, do come in, I get so little company,’ said the Demon. The top of the Creeping Oak—if that’s where they were, and Magda was not sure how they could be—looked like the kitchen of a cosy old cottage.
‘Milk in your tea, dear?’ asked the Demon.
‘Yes. Thank you.’
Magda, wary, made her way to the large wooden table and took a seat. Something that might have been a dog opened an eye from its sleeping place by the open fire, grunted, then closed it again.
‘Here we go then, can’t beat a nice cup of tea, eh?’
The old woman—the Demon—handed Magda a fine china cup full of tea, then took a seat opposite to her.
Magda eyed the cup with suspicion.
‘Oh, it’s just tea and milk and hot water, dear, on my honour!’ and the Demon laughed at the idea of it having any honour. ‘I heard you was on your way, you know. The soul of a very disgruntled eaves passed this way and I cocked an ear to hear what it was making such a fuss about.’
‘He would have told others about me,’ Magda replied. ‘Sooner or later, people would have found out and come after me.’
‘Oh, no need to explain to me, dear, I’m a demon, after all. Rotten shits all of us, you know. I’d sell my own granny out for ten bob. If I had a granny, which I don’t. I’m a demon. Demons don’t have grannies.’
Magda nodded and sipped her tea. It was good.
‘Told you,’ said the Demon. ‘Just normal tea.’
‘Tastes better than normal tea.’
The Demon grinned and shook her head, coyly.
‘Okay then, so what’s it to be? Selling your soul, is it? The usual?’
Magda nodded.
‘Yep, yep, people always selling their souls. Seems like they can’t wait to get rid of the things. A soul for me and a wish for you, that’s how it goes. You’re sure you’re willing to pay the price?’
Magda was sure.
‘What you after then?’
Magda sipped her tea again, then looked the Demon in her watery, red eyes. ‘Magic. I want magic.’
‘I see.’
‘I want to be able to access it. Take it. Use it. Master it. Then I will never have to run in fear from those who wield it ever again. I will never cower before a wizard. They will cower before me. Cower and beg and scream and die.’
‘I see,’ said the Demon. ‘Well, it’s good to have a hobby.’
‘Can you do it? Can you give me magic? Can you give me what they have?’
The Demon nodded, finished her tea, and stood, taking Magda’s cup from her hands.
‘I haven’t finished,’ said Magda.
‘You have. And it’s done. The deal is fair.’
‘It’s…’ Magda looked at her hands, looked at the air around her. ‘I don’t feel anything.’
‘You will. Now you have what your heart desires, and when your number is up, I’ll be the
re to take mine, understood? No getting out of it. We’ve made a trade, fair and square.’
‘Yes.’
‘Good.’
Magda said goodbye and made her way back down the swaying iron staircase, and stepped out of the Creeping Oak. She turned to see the entrance into the tree no long existed.
Magda buttoned her coat and walked down the hill.
19
Manchester is an English city well known for two things. There is the sporting heritage, home as it is to two giants of the footballing world: bitter rivals, Manchester United and Manchester City. Then there is the music. Manchester is a city of music. Many famous bands and musicians plied their trade in that northern city, from the aching, lyrical sadness of The Smiths, to the swaggering, fist in-the-air confidence of Oasis.
But these are just the everyday things the city is known for. In the Uncanny world, it is known for much more...
It is the birthplace of Ivner the Mighty, the first Wizard in recorded history, who perished laying low the eternal dragon, and whose bones are said to rest still somewhere within the boundary of Manchester, awaiting resurrection.
There is the invisible river that runs like a great, winding snake half a mile above Manchester. It is, as the name suggests, invisible, but its waters are said to contain healing properties. If you were able to actually find it.
And then there was the reason Carlisle found himself in Manchester, purple coat flapping in the bitter northern breeze. He was here to find the City of the Dead.
Carlisle had, of course, heard of the place, and knew something of what it was. The City of the Dead, lurking somewhere beneath Manchester itself. A place where things that could not be killed ended up when they died. Which did not seem to make any sense. How could that which could not be killed possibly die? But this was the Uncanny world, and sense did not always count there.
According to Giles L’Merrier, the key to killing the Angel of Blackpool could be found in the City of the Dead. A man, or a thing that looked like a man, that might be persuaded to kill an Angel of the first order.