Dark Winter: Trilogy

by Hennessy, John

  “It’s simple, Beth. You just have to mean what you say, say what you mean, then act on it. Just saying it is like you trying to deal with Dana Cullen on your own.”

  Tori-Suzanne paused before hitting Beth with another salvo. “Utterly pointless.”

  “I’m not a witch like Toril, and I don’t have that Mirror of Romilly’s. I don’t really know what use I can be to them as a friend, and I-”

  Beth jolted back into her seat as Tori-Suzanne thrust a wand towards Beth’s throat.

  “Oh spare me your tiresome self-pity!” Tori-Suzanne’s huge chocolate button eyes burned into Beth. It was something she had passed onto her daughter, though in this moment, Beth could remember Toril’s kindness and compassion in her eyes. She tried to see the same in her mother, but could not. Tori-Suzanne was absolutely fuming.

  “You should be ashamed of yourself! My daughter faces down the ghost of Dana Cullen, in a cemetery, the very name of which she hates. She faces her down, and Romilly fights demon after demon and just gets on with it – fulfilling her destiny, and doing her Nan proud. What the hell did you ever do? Go to pieces just because you have a few nightmares? And you call yourself a friend to my daughter and that great girl Romilly, who, by the way, has more guts in her little finger than you ever will have. I’m not surprised Toril ordered you out, because I’m going to do the same. Now get the hell out of my house!”

  “W-what?” Beth couldn’t believe what was happening.

  “I haven’t killed anyone in twenty-three years, Beth. Don’t make me break that record for your worthless soul. You disgust me.”

  Beth stood up. She had no doubt that Tori-Suzanne would carry out her threat. On balance, it looked like a great decision not to give Toril her wand. She wanted to prove she could be a good friend, someone who could be relied upon. Taking a deep breath, knowing it could be her last, Beth brushed the point of the wand away from her neck, and uttered possibly her last words on this Earth.

  “You hug me and then you want to kill me? You go to Hell, you slevine bitch.”

  For a moment, it was like they were frozen in time. Beth closed her eyes and smiled. Dana’s malice and hatred was affecting them both.

  “Alright Beth. Alright. You can sit down now. It’s not a real wand, anyway. I haven’t practised the craft in a long time. Haha! I am just messing with you! Just to see if you would fold under real questioning!”

  Beth breathed a huge sigh of relief, She had calculated, like Toril, that her mother was bluffing, but until Tori-Suzanne relaxed her arm, Beth wasn’t certain of anything.

  “I’ll help you, Beth, but you should know that you brought a great evil here.”

  “I have the doll, yes. It must be destroyed.”

  “Is that what you think? You really think the essence of Dana is in that doll? You really think it’s that simple? There are thirteen of those things, Beth, and I do not know where they are.”

  “Mrs Withers-”

  “I thought we’d agreed on Susie.”

  “I was telling the truth,” said Beth simply, who gulped down some coffee, which by now had gone cold, and gave her a sharp reminder of her Mrs Danvers type character who had also appeared in her dreams. Nightmares. Whatever.

  “I came here because I don’t know what the hell else to do. If I am doing something, I feel I can be useful. Helpful. I may not have any guts, like you say. I’m pretty sure I couldn’t have faced down Dana as Toril did, and no matter how scared Romilly was, she dealt with the demons. But as a result of those events, I find I can heal people. Just not myself.”

  Tori-Suzanne listened intently and accepted Beth’s words. Also, it took great courage to face off against a wand, whether it was Tori-Suzanne’s real one or not. Beth wasn’t to know the difference. So now, even harder questions would have to be asked.

  “You told me you wanted to be a good friend to Toril, and to Romilly, isn’t that so?”

  “Yes it is,” Beth affirmed.

  “You read the Bible, don’t you Beth?” asked Tori-Suzanne.

  “Sure, of course.”

  “Do you act on it? Or just read it?”

  “Well,” said Beth, concerned that Tori-Suzanne was about to go all freaky killer witch on her again, “I try to. I try to live the way the Lord would want me to.”

  “So, tell me, Beth-Who-Tries….what does John, Chapter 15, Verse 13 say about friends?”

  Beth paused a little before replying. “I know what it says.”

  “So tell me what it says, Beth.”

  “Greater love has no one than this, that one lay down his life for his friends.”

  “Hmmph!” Tori-Suzanne stood up and kicked her chair back so hard it almost flew. “You aren’t in Religion Studies class now, Beth. Two years out of school and you haven’t grown up at all. Make. Me. Feel. It. You’re just saying the words! God! It’s pointless! I wasn’t wrong about you!”

  Beth shook uncontrollably, and tears flowed freely from her eyes. Maybe they were all right about her. She should just accept her fate. Either Dana was going to terrorise her to death, draining blood from her at each visit but leaving enough to keep Beth alive. Or the nightmares were going to cause her to kill herself because she would be driven to the edge of insanity.

  “Don’t quote the Book, Beth. Tell me what you feel when you read those words, and make me feel it. You come here saying you want to be a good friend to my daughter and Romilly, but the truth is – and you know it Beth - you are a flake, a fair weather friend, a good-timer. When things are going down, you’re nowhere to be found. You can’t feel anything for anyone else, because you only love yourself.”

  “That’s not true!” cried Beth. “I do love Romilly, and I would die so that she could live. I adore Toril. There isn’t a day goes by that I don’t want to be like her. Yes, I would lay down my life for them, and not because I want my pain to stop, but because I want their pain to stop. I want them to have peace in their life, I do. I really do. This is my truth.”

  “Now, I believe you have made me feel it, Beth. No need to cry anymore, alright?”

  Tori-Suzanne had put Beth through enough. She felt the girl did have some guts, loyalty and courage after all. She was going to need it for what lay ahead. But neither of them could do this, fatigued as they were. When Tori-Suzanne ushered Beth to one of the upstairs bedrooms, Beth said that she did not want to sleep in case she had another nightmare.

  Tori-Suzanne said a short rest would be all that could be afforded. Tori-Suzanne needed time to consult her own book, her own copy of the Circle’s Book of Prophecies. Tori-Suzanne had been truthful for the most part about the dolls, but the main reason she would not take action, such as destroying the doll, was because it would attract the attention of both the Circle and also Dana herself.

  No. There was no escaping destiny. Tori-Suzanne had one time the opportunity to destroy Dana once and for all, and she had balked at it. There was a reason Beth O’Neill had come here today, and why Toril wasn’t here right now.

  Tori-Suzanne flicked the pages of the old book until she saw a passage that thrilled and scared her in equal measure.

  To the East of Gorswood Forest

  Lies a place of notorious fame

  It was created by the Devil

  Diabhal Takh is its name.

  To find it you must go

  On foot, not as one, but two

  It is the fate of the red haired girl

  No other blood will do.

  So take the Twisted Path,

  Follow the road Down,

  Until you come to the place

  Of the man once dressed as a Clown.

  She wanted him to kill

  Thirteen so she could be freed

  But he failed in his task

  But still she comes to Feed.

  Her body lies there,

  Of the coffins there are Two,

  One of them has been opened,

  With the Other, you’ll know what to do.

  Fail in the ta
sk

  And for sure many will die

  But what else can the Red-Hair do

  She only wants to Try

  Those who try can’t win

  Those who try just fail

  Their bones will clutter Gorswood Forest

  Do you still dare take this Trail?

  Tori-Suzanne closed the Book. “Well. I’ll just have to make sure Beth tries a lot harder then.”

  Tori-Suzanne’s feelings on the matter at hand were in great conflict. She knew that she would have to leave her wand and her pentacle at home. To bring them with her would attract the attention of the Circle, and with Toril currently ensnared by Denzel Tanner and the others, she could not risk putting her daughter in any more danger than she already found herself.

  She had to believe Toril would come out of this unscathed. Maybe there isn’t a way to avoid destiny, but maybe the rules could be bent a little. The last line of the script concerned her greatly. She hoped that Red Hair would do more than try. What was Bethany’s word worth, anyway?

  Her thoughts were broken by Beth’s dulcet tone. “I’m ready to go.”

  Tori-Suzanne turned around and shrugged her shoulders. “I really doubt that you are, but we will go nonetheless.”

  “It would help if some of you started to have more faith in me,” said Beth sharply, before adding more gently, “because I gave you my truth, Susie.”

  “That you did, Beth, and I won’t forget that,” said Tori-Suzanne.

  “Make sure when it all kicks off you don’t forget either.”

  The two women left the old house, and as Tori-Suzanne and Beth stepped out, the snow seemed to fall from all directions.

  Tori-Suzanne had locked the door securely, but checked the lock several times, before putting a gloved hand on the wooden panels and patting it reassuringly. Turning to Beth, who was already shivering from the cold, Tori-Suzanne said, “Despite all I said in there, you took it, Beth. I would be proud to have you as my daughter.”

  Beth chattered a Thank You through her teeth and felt just how easy Troy felt for the famed Withers’ charm. Toril and her mother really were one and the same. Tori-Suzanne knew all too well that the journey through Gorswood Forest would be anything but a walk in the park.

  There was no way to avoid passing by Rosewinter and the ruins of Saint Margaret’s Mental Hospital. They would have to pass by the cursed Silver Birch tree, from which Tori-Suzanne’s wand had been made from all those years ago.

  They would have to journey through the Forest without the aid of that most powerful wand, and Tori-Suzanne felt naked without her pentacle around her neck. She could see a glimmer of Beth’s white cross and wondered if belief in the Christ would get them through this. The witch’s effects would simply have to stay out of sight.

  Tori-Suzanne had conflicting issues on faith, after all. Before leaving the Circle, she would never have dreamed about going into a Catholic church, yet she would now go on occasion. Often the priest’s sermons would peak her interest and she would read the Good Book, though there were things in the Bible that seemed darker than anything her Wiccan texts had prophesied.

  Assuming they could pass by the ghosts undetected, the road to the Eastern part of Gorswood Forest would no doubt give up all its treachery, and with no way to transfer in the Wiccan way of speaking, the mission could end before it had even began.

  All the same, it was a just mission, and Tori-Suzanne knew that she and Beth would find the answers together.

  Or die together.

  If that happened, it really would be all down to Toril and a forlorn hope, but a hope, nonetheless, that she could survive her time at the Circle.

  Beth hadn’t seen her do it, but Tori-Suzanne had left an unsealed letter for her husband on the table, just before leaving. Just in case.

  “I think we should go to the Swan, Bethany. Dutch courage and all that,” said Tori-Suzanne.

  “I don’t know,” said Beth. “I have a poor relationship with that kind of poison.”

  Pretty Girls Make Good Graves

  “Just one drink,” said Tori-Suzanne. “A Wiccan thing. For good luck. The Irish believe in good luck, don’t they? Don’t you Beth? We’re going to need it.”

  Tori-Suzanne linked arms with Beth in order to steady herself. Beth didn’t say it, but she could feel just how much that Tori-Suzanne missed her daughter, and although Beth didn’t act much like Toril, it was good to have an eighteen-year-old around again.

  Beth really didn’t want to go to the Dying Swan, but it was more to do with the events that led to Jacinta’s death, rather than wanting to avoid a re-connection with the demon drink. If anything Tori-Suzanne had said were to come to pass, perhaps one drink would dull the senses and numb the pain.

  “Just the one drink then,” said Beth. “I need a clear head for all this.”

  At that moment, the bag containing the White Roses for Dana doll fell to the ground, and Beth slipped, taking Tori-Suzanne down with her. The doll rolled out of the bag, and the depression on its stomach turned its white posey of flowers to red, with Dana’s signature mocking laugh ringing out, and passers by gawked at the two women to see what the fuss was about.

  “Away with you,” said Beth, who kept her eyes locked on some of the shadowy men who lived in Gorswood. One of them recognised her, and shouted, “Away with yourself, and back to the loony house with you. Only strange folk carry around something like that.”

  Beth yanked the doll up by the neck and was stopped from launching it at the men by Tori-Suzanne, who pulled Beth’s arm downward.

  “Not now, Beth. Not here. Put that damned thing away, until it’s time. Fools design their own fate, and we’ll have no part of that. Let them be.”

  Beth breathed out heavily, and clutched her chest. Tori-Suzanne feared what that was greatly, and yet, she knew she must walk with Beth into the haunted part of the Forest nonetheless.

  The Dying Swan public house was so named because a promising young ballerina hanged herself in an area where the ladies restroom now stood, the night before she was to perform in her first ballet. When they found her, she was still alive, with her toes almost touching the floor.

  Her last word was “Diabhal,” as she breathed her last.

  “What’ll it be, ladies?”

  “Glenfiddich, by the double, Bren.”

  “Are you sure, Tori?”

  “I’m always sure. Now fill those to the brim, none of your cheating.”

  “Now where did I get that reputation?” said the landlord.

  Beth allowed herself to smile at Tori-Suzanne’s complete self-belief. She could convince others even if she wasn’t so sure herself, just like Toril. With Tori-Suzanne’s help, Beth believed the nightmares would finally stop.

  Tori-Suzanne grabbed the glasses and motioned Beth to a table. “Not that one, Bethany. The one you call the man is said to sit there sometimes.”

  “Maybe they should open another pub,” said Beth.

  “Or bulldoze this one to the ground,” said Tori-Suzanne crisply.

  “Slante,” Tori-Suzanne continued. “Isn’t that what they say, where you come from?”

  Beth laughed. “Not Slan-tee, it’s pronounced Slaan-tuh. But yeah, cheers!”

  The vile liquid wasn’t too bad in Beth’s view, though she hoped each one would be the last. She raised her glass again to Tori-Suzanne.

  “May the Road Rise Up to Meet You,” Beth offered brightly.

  “Oh! I’ve heard of that one,” said Tori-Suzanne. “And May the Wind be Always at your Back.”

  “There’s more to it than that,” said Beth. She recited the Gaelic blessing in full.

  “May the road rise up to meet you.

  May the wind be always at your back.

  May the sunshine be warm upon your face;

  the rains fall soft upon your fields and until we meet again,

  may God hold you in the palm of His hand.”

  Tori-Suzanne smiled, and sat quietly.

 
“I have a warped relationship with God,” continued Beth, “but it at times like these that I truly believe it is powerful to believe in something more, something better than ourselves.”

  Underneath the table, she deliberately kicked the doll in her bag, then thought better of it, put a hand to her lips and kissed it, then placed her hand on the bag, before quickly removing it. Beth would hope such an action would keep evil at bay. Hope can be a powerful thing.

  “So tell me,” said Tori-Suzanne, “do you believe that you will see Toril and Romilly again?”

  “I do,” said Beth. “I know you miss Toril, but she will be back safe. She just has to be.”

  “I hope you’re right, Bethany. Don’t you forget what I said earlier about her. Just in case.”

  Beth nodded, but thought Tori-Suzanne was worrying over nothing. Beth and Toril had argued, had a difference of opinion, that was all. Once the Circle had had enough of Toril, she would be back, and everything would be fine.