Here Be Witches

by Sarah Mussi

  ‘No closer,’ warns George, axe in hand.

  I can’t help it, but I look into his eyes.

  Deep, serious, serene, like looking into …

  George shakes me. ‘Ellie,’ he warns, ‘STOP!’

  I shake my head, try to clear my mind. I find myself looking down on to a dark sea of frosty bracken, and at this weird young man. I tremble oddly. I lean down, put out my hands to him. I send up a silent prayer to the mountain and say, ‘Would you please help me down?’

  He stretches up and places his palms on my palms.

  A sensation, like a surge of electricity, jolts through me.

  George tugs me back.

  But I’m mesmerised. He’s sort of strangely beautiful. I just can’t explain. And he’s wearing something very odd: a sort of robe, all loose fitting, brilliant. It flutters behind him, giving the appearance of wings.

  The clouds roll back, the moon shines through, I blink.

  The trance ends.

  He’s not emitting any kind of light, stupid! It was just moonbeams in the mist. He’s not wearing a flowing robe either; he’s just wrapped a space blanket around himself that’s reflecting light back.

  And he’s not weirdly beautiful. OMG. He’s really hairy. I am such a loony. And, yep, he definitely has pimples.

  Phew. I breathe a sigh of relief. Thought I was going a bit bonkers there!

  Shock. Must be.

  Being chased by wolves and all that.

  ‘Where did you come from?’ I ask, hoping he can’t read my mind.

  ‘I don’t really know,’ he says. ‘I think I must’ve fallen and bumped my head, because the first thing I remember was standing on the hillside. It felt like I’d been standing there a very long time, too.’

  Since yesterday? No. Not possible.

  Can’t possibly be the same figure I saw when Mum and me were getting in the newborns.

  ‘What’s your name?’ I say. I look at him closely. He is V strange. A fresh crop of down blooms on his upper lip. And he’s got a fair-haired, wispy beard thing going on. Very wispy. Loads of straggly hair at the front, frames his face, right down to his shoulders, and at the back, it looks like he’s tied it in a long ponytail. But on top he’s going a bit bald. He’s got the look of some sort of Indian monk or Guru about him. But with a space blanket, obvs.

  ‘Davey,’ he says. ‘My name is Davey.’

  ‘Can’t you remember anything?’ asks Rhiannon.

  ‘Well that’s the spookiest thing – I don’t know why I’m here. I don’t know what happened. I don’t even know where I am. All I know is that I’m Davey and I’m extremely cold.’

  ‘OK,’ I say. I look at him. Suddenly, I remember all my mountain search and rescue volunteer support member training … hypothermia, a fall, sudden trauma … I switch into reassuring mode.

  ‘You’re going to be just fine,’ I say.

  He’s obviously in some kind of shock. But he has a space blanket … I squint, trying to get a good look at him, to see if perhaps he’s already going a bit blue.

  ‘How come those wolves were scared of you?’ asks George.

  I notice George’s still got his hand on his axe.

  Rhiannon struggles down off the stone. ‘Let’s go,’ she wails. ‘Let’s get back to yours, Ellie, before those things come back.’ She hops up and down, trying not to let her one bootless foot touch anything.

  ‘How did you know they were the hounds of Cŵn Annwn?’ asks George.

  I refocus. Yes, how did he?

  ‘C’mon! C’mon!’ insists Rhiannon. ‘Who cares whose dogs they are? They’ve gone right now – but they might come back.’

  ‘Not before we’ve retrieved the heart,’ I say.

  ‘Oh My God! Hurry, then!’ screeches Rhiannon.

  Davey mutters something about some last memory that he’s held on to, before the Great Blank happened, and he found himself up on the Devil’s Bridge. ‘I was on some sort of a mission … ’ he says. ‘I definitely had to do something … ’

  ‘Can’t we just get it and go?’ wails Rhiannon.

  The silhouette of Yr Wyddfa looms darkly against a blue-black sky. A chill wind blasts down the slopes, scuffing the snow and whirling it up at us. I shiver and flap my arms around, stamp my feet. I try not to think of all the spells and curses laid around the stone. ‘Obviously,’ I say. ‘Pass Ceri down.’

  ‘OK, OK,’ says George. He chucks Ceri down and jumps off the stone himself.

  Ceri wags her tail like crazy and seems dead pleased to meet Davey. She runs circles round his legs, pressing herself against him, and she lets out happy little yelps. Davey smiles and stretches out his hands and pats her. I guess if Ceri likes him, he can’t really be from The Dark Side, can he?

  We stand there shivering in spite of our jackets.

  ‘C’mon,’ says Rhiannon.

  ‘Do you know the way to an inn, or somewhere I can lodge for the night?’ asks Davey.

  An inn? Which century does he come from?

  I grab George before he gets right into helpful mode. ‘The heart?’ I remind him.

  ‘We need to get out of here,’ wails Rhiannon.

  ‘It’s just,’ says Davey, ‘I seem to have forgotten where I came from … ’

  ‘You’ve got a hotel,’ I say to Rhiannon. ‘You can take him there after.’

  Rhiannon rolls her eyes at me through the gloom, mouths out, ‘Thh-anks’. Like she is thinking: great, Ellie, why not saddle me with every random who can’t remember where he’s from and obviously won’t be able to afford an en suite.

  I ignore her. Now the danger of the wolves is past, I haven’t forgotten that she stitched me up.

  ‘What is it that you seek here?’ Davey asks.

  I was right. He has come straight out of the Dark Ages. I mean, ‘What is it that you seek here?’ Lol.

  ‘At this old cromlech?’ continues Davey.1

  I suddenly realise that’s what the Black Stone is: a cromlech! I’m a bit shocked. I never guessed that before. The Black Stone of the Darkness must be the capstone of a burial chamber.

  How did Davey know? The guy who doesn’t seem to know what day it is?

  I kick at some disturbed ground around the base. The soil seems to fall away. ‘Is this where you dug?’ I ask Rhiannon.

  She nods and pulls her jacket tighter around her. The earth at the base of the Maen Stone opens up a crack.

  ‘Back off a bit,’ says George. We stand aside as he swings his axe. The turf splits. After a few more super-George swipes, the ground crumbles. Underneath the stone seems to be a space. Bits of grass and sedge fall away. George swings again.

  There it is: the entrance to a burial chamber.

  —

  George makes a hole big enough for us all to squeeze through. One by one we pass down between two damp, half-buried rocks, through the centre of the dolmen, down underneath the great Black Stone of the Darkness.

  In the darkness we huddle together. The stench of damp stone, peat and something putrid, chokes me.

  George flicks his torch app on. The tomb glows in eerie light.

  ‘This is where we buried the heart,’ says Rhiannon. ‘Right here, right in the middle.’

  ‘Then it’s here that we must dig,’ says the stranger. (I wonder if he is usually a bit weird or if the bump on the head has made him talk all ‘olde worlde’.) Davey picks up a piece of stone shaped like slate and hands it to George.

  ‘Great,’ says George, ‘do I look like a grave digger?’

  ‘Oh. Sorry,’ says Davey.

  George smiles. ‘Don’t worry,’ he says. ‘But if I have to be the one who does all the work, then I’ll use my axe.’

  1 Cromlech (from Welsh crom, ‘bent, curved’ and llech ‘slab, flagstone’) is a term used to describe prehistoric megalithic structures. The term is now virtually obsolete in archaeology, but remains in use as a colloquial term for two different types of megalithic monument. In English it usually refers to dolmens, the remains
of prehistoric stone chamber tombs.[back]

  EIGHTEEN

  ELLIE’S PHONE 1 March 18.30

  Status: Worried sick

  Recent updates:

  Sheila

  Ha ha ha! Heard you got into a spot of bovver. Lol.

  Meryl

  Now I am worried. Sheila says that her friend from the rugby club saw you in the POLICE CELLS? Hon, are you OK? What happened? Can I help?

  Sheila

  If you accept that Henry is mine, I’ll give you an alibi. Member: I DID BAGS HIM FIRST.

  Inside the burial chamber it smells.

  And it’s not nice.

  A bit like Sheila’s texts.

  Why, I ask, do I get coverage under a rock, when I don’t get any on top of it? And secondly, why do I not block Sheila? She is a cow A COW.

  I am trying not to let her text upset me.

  And the smell is really disgusting. Really foul. It’s not like the normal kind of earthy smell. Normal soil smells nice and loamy and fresh.

  This doesn’t.

  It’s kind of creepy and evil.

  Just like Sheila’s texts.

  (OK, maybe the text wasn’t exactly creepy and evil, but she did not bag him first.)

  Rhiannon feels it as well. ‘I hate this place,’ she moans. ‘I wish I’d never come here. I don’t want to be a witch any more.’

  ‘Bit late for that now, isn’t it?’ I hiss. (I know that’s mean, but sometimes I just am.)

  I take a few deep breaths (poo!) then I relent and give Rhi’s arm a little reassuring thump. She’s way out of her depth. We all are. I hate Sheila.

  George digs. A bead of sweat rolls down the side of his face. Davey stands there looking serene. I am never going to go out of my way to be nice to Sheila ever again not going to let Sheila upset me.

  We clear the foul-smelling soil from inside the centre of the cavern. I get out my mobile, and shine the torch down. It’s so cold down here my fingers are going numb. George finally makes headway. His axe hits metal. We hear a sharp clang as steel bounces off something.

  ‘Tis no doubt the iron box,’ says Davey. Like he knows all about this thing.

  I force myself to stop thinking about how hateful Sheila is, because now I am officially wary. Who is this guy? He knew the Black Stone was a dolmen. He knows there’s an iron box … he uses words like ‘seek’ and ‘tis’ … the wolves were frightened of him …

  Perhaps we should be too.

  ‘How do you know?’ I challenge. I swing the torch up at him and shine it in his face.

  ‘Tis often told,’ he says, ‘that the Coraniaid cannot touch iron. No fairy folk can. They cannot hear through copper and they detest metal. But iron especially burns them.’

  Ooooh kay. Right. But like, what kind of an answer is that?

  I give him a really, really weird look. Now, he knows all about the Coraniaid. What a little mine of information he’s turning out to be.

  Rhiannon moans. ‘I hate it here, I want to go home … ’

  ‘Did you actually come here willingly and do all this, or did the Supreme One have to drag you here in chains?’ I am getting fed up with her now. I should be a bit more understanding. But right now I’m finding it pretty hard to understand how Rhiannon got into all this stuff.

  I mean, number one: she’s a big wuss.

  Number two: she cares more about cute outfits than shapeless robes.

  And why would she want to be a witch in the first place? Plus the ‘Supreme One’ is a really annoying name.

  ‘Just hurry,’ she says.

  Like we’re not.

  OK, more deep breaths. Now, I really really really am not going to let Sheila’s texts get to me.

  I exhale.

  George clears the earth from around the top of a shape. It’s about the size of a lunchbox. He drags it out of the ground and brushes dirt off it with his sleeve, then fumbles at the catch. I shine my torch on it, trying to get a better look.

  Davey’s right: it’s an iron box. Spidery engravings glint in the mobile’s light.

  My hand trembles. The beam wavers. Henry’s heart may be in that box.

  I wonder if it will look anything like the heart I remember; that beautiful, sparkling heart caught in the crystal – held there by the High Magick of Merlin.

  ‘George,’ I say, my voice shaking. ‘Can I open the box?’ I try to keep the torchlight steady. I hold out my hand to take the small metal container off George. ‘Please?’

  ‘Whatever you want, Elles,’ says George. ‘Just be careful. It’s really heavy and really cold.’

  He hands me the box and it is heavy. I squat down, knees weak. I put the box on the floor. Something dark and sticky is wrapped around it. Where George’s axe hit home, the sticky layer is torn, showing the metal beneath. It feels like black silk soaked in something like engine oil. It’s revolting and smells totally rank.

  I don’t care. With trembling fingers I tear off the oily cloth. I unwrap every shred of the foul stuff that I can and rip the rest away.

  I ease the catches of the container back and flick open the case.

  George takes my phone off me and shines the light into the box.

  Rhiannon moans, ‘Pleeeease hurry’.

  There, balanced on something reflective, is a dark object. Tentatively I touch it. It’s hard and smooth, like a piece of obsidian, about the size of my fist.

  ‘That’s it!’ cries Rhiannon. ‘That’s the dragon’s heart!’

  I stretch out my hand and put it firmly around the heart; that poor, hard, blackened thing. I’m certain that Henry’s heart can never hurt me, whatever potion has been poured over it or magic cast around it.

  I clutch it tightly. My fingers tingle. For a second I feel an icy numbing touch, and then I lift it up.

  It is much much heavier than it looks. Much heavier than it should be. My whole arm suddenly aches with the weight of it.

  It’s Henry’s heart, I tell myself. You can bear the weight of it. He told you to be strong.

  I breathe out: I am strong.

  Something shines at the bottom of the box.

  What looks like a hand mirror with an ebony handle, and an oval, silvered front glints up from the darkness. It looks like one of those mirrors that Edwardian ladies used, or mermaids maybe.

  I put the stone heart in my inside jacket pocket, next to my heart. Strangely the cloth of my jacket does not sag. I weigh the heart in my hand again: heavy. I let it lie in the pocket: virtually weightless. I don’t understand. It is as if touching it somehow creates its weight. Vaguely I wonder what that means, and then I pick up the mirror.

  Big mistake.

  I hold it up and look into it.

  Even bigger mistake.

  It shines, as if it reflects the distant light from unseen stars, galaxies hidden way above us. I don’t see my face at all. It’s actually quite shocking to be so suddenly and completely erased. I look into the mirror, hardly believing that I am not there. With some relief, I see that it isn’t entirely full of that shining dark. A huge shadowy range of mountains zooms in at me. They’re covered in mist and snow, above them moonlit skies.

  And it’s as if I’m on a plane, flying through time zones. In the distance there are tiny pinpricks of light; far away, dawn is breaking on some distant horizon.

  The little lights pull at me, tug at my eyes.

  George shouts. He sounds very faint. I can’t quite hear him.

  I should have known better. Especially when I didn’t see my own reflection.

  Like, if you find a mirror that has been buried under an ancient, evil tombstone by witches on 29 February, and if you look into it, well, you really should expect anything, shouldn’t you?

  I try to warn myself.

  But it’s too late.

  The heart lodged inside my breast pocket suddenly drags against me, pulls me down – and quite abruptly I’m being sucked towards the centre of those pinpricks of light.

  Dizzy.

&nbs
p; ‘Hey!’ I cry.

  And I fall forward. The mirror seems to widen. Somewhere in the periphery of my vision, I see Rhiannon. Her hands are flung over her face. She’s screaming. I see George standing there with his axe raised as if he is about to smash the mirror.

  I see Davey. He is smiling.

  And then the darkness closes over me.

  NINETEEN

  ELLIE’S PHONE 1 March 19.16

  Status: ………...............................................................

  Recent updates:

  … pending …

  Sheila ………...............................................................

  No reply, eh? So you’re ignoring me now …

  I don’t know where I am. I look around. It’s a hot sunny afternoon. I am lying on springy grass high up on the mountain, somewhere near the Devil’s Bridge. Above me, I can see the peak, smoking pink in the hot afternoon sun; the call of birds sounds high overhead; a fresh breeze cools my face.

  ‘Isn’t it fabulous here?’ says a voice I know and love.

  I turn my head. ‘Henry?’

  There, right beside me, lying on the heather, with his arms thrown out is Henry. He looks as impossibly beautiful as ever. His thick chestnut hair has got bits of bracken stuck in it, and he’s smiling.

  I fling myself at him – give him a massive hug. ‘Is this some kind of dream?’ I ask, my face buried in his neck.

  ‘Yeah,’ he laughs. ‘And no.’

  Typical.

  ‘OK,’ I say. ‘Is this a game?’ I flop back beside him.

  If he’s not bothered by the fact that even though it’s only just March, we are lying on the grass on a hot afternoon, high on the mountainside, why should I be? Why should I wonder that in the brilliant blue sky overhead pipits and meadowlarks are singing?

  ‘I can’t believe it!’ I say.

  ‘I know,’ he says. He reaches out a hand and grabs mine. And we just lie there with our backs on the turf, staring at the clouds, twining our fingers together. So close together.