Olivia Stone and the Trouble with Trixies

by Jeffery E Doherty

  Brother Westerman gently touches part of a broken wing.

  “He’s more worried about that ugly gargoyle than Olivia,” says one of the girls. Yip can’t see which one.

  “It was more use than you silly girls.” Brother Westerman whirls his head, scowling. His eyes are dark with anger or pain. He picks up Cygnet’s demonic head and holds it to his chest.

  The girls scatter.

  ~~~

  By midday, Yip’s vision is completely gone—burnt away by the bright sunlight—but he knows something is very wrong. The rhythm of the day is off, even considering the events of the morning. There is too much commotion in the school yard. Vehicles have been arriving constantly, more than he has ever heard before. Something slow and heavy that sounds like a troll snoring is trundling closer. There are noises he has never heard before, and then heavy booted footsteps start thudding across the roof.

  What’s happening? Fear grips Yip’s chest.

  “They look secure enough,” a deep voice states.

  “Doesn’t matter,” replies a second voice. “The school board’s not taking any chances. They all have to come down.”

  “Just seems a pity.”

  “Their lawyers are terrified about being sued.”

  “I suppose if one can fall,” the first voice says. “But we’re going to need a hammer and chisel to get these monsters loose, especially that big beast of a thing.”

  They have to be talking about Tank, Yip thinks. Tank is carved in the likeness of a boulder troll.

  “How can you call this beauty a monster?” The second man laughs.

  Yip hears rough hands slapping stone. They are talking about Angel, Yip realises. They are touching Angel!

  Leave her alone. Yip fumes in helpless silence. Guilt wracks him. This is his fault.

  ”Look at her teeth and fingernails.”

  ”Oh!” The second man’s laughter stops.

  For several hours, Yip tries to block out the hammering and the chink of a chisel on stone.

  Finally, the footsteps come toward him.

  “What about this ugly little beast?” the deep voice asks.

  “The Dean said all of them.”

  “Ok.”

  Clink.

  A sharp pain stabs Yip’s right foot.

  Clink-clink-crack.

  The world lurches sideways. There is a pressure under his arms and he feels himself wobble and spin. He can feel the heat of the sun touch his face, his back, until…

  His feet touch gravel.

  “That’s the last of them,” a voice calls from high above.

  Yip is picked up and bustled away. When he finally comes to rest, a door slams shut, a key clicks in a lock and the world turns deathly silent.

  Statue-trapped.

  Yip feels sick.

  They are all statue-trapped and there is no one to protect the city.

  Trixies are on the loose. As bad as that is, the Trixies are a mere inconvenience compared to other creatures that cross over from the shadow realms. It won’t take long for the monsters to realise the Guardians are just stone.

  There is going to be trouble in Haven. Big trouble.

  Every bad thing that happens from now rests on Yip’s shoulders and he doesn’t think he is strong enough to stand it.

  The guilt will drive him mad.

  Part 2

  Stone

  Chapter 9

  Prank Night

  Derrick Sidle walks out of Spinners Café at five past eleven and turns left toward the night clubs of Central. Neon signs flash along both sides of the street lighting up the night so brightly that the stars are lost in the glare. He glances at his watch and picks up the pace. He is supposed to meet Neil and Briny at the front of Devon’s and he is running late.

  A noise coming from the sleek black sports car parked out front of the nightclub causes him to hesitate. He edges closer and peers in through the darkened windows. Derrick’s fists clench in fury. A little girl in a thin pink night dress is sobbing in the back seat. Tears streak her cheeks in hot red lines.

  Derrick tries the door handle but the car is locked. He points to the button and mimes to the child to lift it up to unlock the door. The distraught child continues to sob and shake. Derrick’s anger grows. He doesn’t have kids but everyone knows you shouldn’t lock a little girl in a car alone. Certainly not after eleven o’clock at night. What sort of low-life monster would do something like that?

  The poor little kid.

  There is no one on security out the front of Devon’s. Derrick pulls out his mobile phone but the battery is dead. He stuffs it back into his pocket.

  “I have to do something,” he mutters to himself.

  Derrick looks around frantically.

  There is a small metal bar laying in the gutter, right by his feet.

  How lucky is that? he thinks to himself as he picks it up. The metal is cold against his palm.

  I have to get the child out.

  Then he can find someone to call the police. Maybe they’ll lock up whoever is responsible. Derrick can’t think of a better punishment. He moves to the window farthest from the child and raises the bar above his head. He brings it down hard and the window shatters into a million sparkling shards. The car’s alarm wails and Derrick covers his ears.

  “What the hell are you doing to my car?” Sully Garrod says as he steps out of the nightclub’s doorway. The buttons of his size 5XL shirt bulge around his bulky chest. He strides out onto the footpath.

  Derrick spins to face the massive owner of the car with the metal bar still raised.

  Sully smacks a ham sized fist into his palm. “Well?”

  “I’m trying to get the little girl out of the car.” Derrick’s anger gives him courage. He has never stood up to anyone like this before and definitely not someone as big and angry as Sully Garrod. “And I’m calling the police too.”

  “You’re calling the police?” Sully grins and it isn’t a friendly grin. “Flaming vandal.”

  “Even a stupid oaf like you should know better than to lock a child in a car.” Derrick spits the words out and waves the metal bar like an accusing finger.

  “I don’t have any kids,” Sully yells.

  Derrick glances into the car. The back seat is empty.

  Sully grabs the back of Derrick’s neck and rams his face into the car door.

  “Hey!”

  Sully turns and a tall thin young man shoves him in the chest. He stumbles against the car and trips over Derrick, falling and cracking his knee on the concrete path.

  “Leave my friend alone.” Neil Jannic bends down to help Derrick out of the gutter. Derrick’s nose is broken and blood stains his shirt.

  Sully’s meaty fingers curl around the metal bar. He stands up swinging.

  ~~~

  The little girl in the thin pink nighty skips into the darkened alley listening happily to the chaotic sounds. The car alarm still wails, a woman is screaming and the metal keeps hitting into something soft and wet. The Trixie steeples its too long fingers together and its eyes glow faintly red when it hears the distant police siren.

  “Tricked you,” it says, then skips off looking for more trouble.

  ~~~

  A dark-haired girl slips out of the hospital’s children’s ward and looks at the clock near the nurse’s station. She has five minutes to wait. She hides crouching in the shadows, watching the two nurses sorting the medications into little white plastic cups. They check the chart, check the names on the cups and double check the pills before signing for them and placing the cups on the trolley for delivery.

  “All done,” the first nurse says.

  The dark-haired girl waves to a second child at the far end of the corridor. She creeps into a room and starts disconnecting the wires on the monitor attached to old Mrs Blassic.

  The machine makes a long high pitched beeeeeeeeep and warning lights flash in the nurses’ station. The two nurses leave the medication trolley and rush down the hall.
>
  The first girl steps out of the shadows and into the nurses’ station. She stands on tip-e-toes and starts mixing up the medications. The girl ducks out when she hears the squeak of footsteps returning.

  “She must have rolled over and pulled the wires loose,” the first nurse says.

  “Well I hope she doesn’t keep doing it. Her room’s right at the far end of the ward,” the second nurse replies.

  They collect the trolley and start on their rounds.

  Twenty minutes later, the alarms start sounding—for real.

  The two Trixies giggle as they skip out into the darkened streets. “We tricked them,” the dark haired one says, delighted in herself.

  ~~~

  Tobias Lansdowne drives his eighteen-wheeler toward the docks with a load of chemicals bound for the Majestic. This has to be the most stupid name possible for the old tanker. There isn’t one majestic thing about the ugly ship. Traffic had been bumper to bumper coming into Haven. Some idiot had jack-knifed his caravan. The highway was cut back to one lane for over an hour.

  Tobias looks at his watch.

  “Damn.” He’s almost at the docks but it’s time for a mandatory rest break. “Ten minutes more driving isn’t going to hurt,” he tells himself, as he changes back a gear, heading into the sweeping bend leading down to the harbour.

  A small child stands in the middle of the road, shielding her eyes from the bright headlights.

  Tobias jams his foot down. The air brakes hiss and the tyres lock up. Blue-black smoke billows out from the screaming tyres. The truck hits the gravel edge of the roadway and starts to skid sideways. It topples down the embankment, shattering trees and tumbling onto the jagged rocks below.

  The huge tank buckles and splits. A rank smelling chemical bubbles out and floods into the harbour.

  The Trixie frowns as it watches the driver clamber out of the crushed cab. He staggers away from the wreck as fast as he can manage.

  Tobias holds a cloth up to his face to protect himself from the toxic fumes but his lungs and throat have already started to burn.

  ~~~

  All across Haven, the Trixies play their nasty little pranks and slip away into the shadows to enjoy their work. Sirens from police cars, ambulances and fire trucks sound across the city.

  The leader of the Trixies sits on the roof of St. Giles Old Priory School in the place where the Grotesques used to stand. She quietly waves her hands like she is conducting an orchestra.

  The Guardians are gone and this is just the first night of chaos. There are going to be many more to come. Haven is her play thing now and she means to have some fun.

  Chapter 10

  Awakening

  Olivia’s left arm burns. The pain lances into her elbow and wrist. Her left knee and shin are almost as bad. She tries to sit up and swoons back onto the pillow, starting a whole new wave of pain through the left side of her face and ear. Thick bandages wrap her entire left arm and there is a tube sticking out from the back of her right hand.

  “Ow,” she says.

  Looking around the room is hard. The light is so bright and Olivia doesn’t want to move her aching head. There is a curtain pulled back to the wall and an empty bed across from her. The blanket is pale blue and heavy, the knitted type with all the little holes in it. There’s a television on a wall-mounted stand and a nurse in a very old-fashioned uniform standing by the door.

  My brain must be running slow today, Olivia tells herself.

  “Hospital,” Olivia says.

  The nurse stops and gives her an odd look.

  “Could I please have a sip of water?”

  The nurse looks even odder, her face is lined with concentration as she helps Olivia take a small sip from a glass on the bedside table.

  “Thank you.” Olivia smiles at the nurse.

  The nurse nods seriously and glances at the chart at the foot of the bed. She frowns and looks sadly at Olivia before turning and gliding out of the room. She looks back once from the doorway before disappearing.

  Now, Olivia is getting scared. What did the nurse read in those notes to cause such a reaction?

  “Jade, she’s awake,” a familiar voice calls, interrupting Olivia’s thoughts.

  Olivia sees her dad in the doorway. He hurries forward and Mum is close behind.

  “We were so worried,” Mum says.

  Dad leans over the bed and kisses her hair. “You certainly gave us a fright.”

  “It hurts.” Olivia winces as she tries to sit up.

  Mum presses a little red button on the side of the bed to call a nurse.

  The nurse that arrives looks nothing like the first one. Her dress is hemmed well above her knees and she isn’t wearing any hat.

  “My daughter’s in pain,” Mum says.

  The nurse checks the IV bag and looks at the notes. “I’m sorry Mrs Stone, but there is an emergency in the next ward. I’m here alone at the moment.” She makes some adjustments on the pump.

  Almost immediately, Olivia feels better and a little dozy.

  “Mum, the other nurse looked worried when she read my notes.” Olivia squeezes her mum’s hand.

  “You must have been dreaming, dear,” the new nurse says, “I’m the only one on this ward at the moment.” Her smile doesn’t reach her eyes. “She should feel better now. I’ll let the doctor know she’s awake.”

  “She’s lying,” Olivia says, when the nurse leaves the room.

  “You got a nasty bump on the head,” Dad explains. “I know they are worried about that. We all are.”

  “You’ve been unconscious for over thirteen hours.” Mum wipes tears from her eyes.

  Olivia yawns. “Can you turn the lights off, it’s very bright.” Her eyes drift closed.

  Mum frowns. There is only one light on and the room is almost dark.

  Olivia is asleep.

  ~~~

  The annoying buzz slowly clears into voices. Olivia recognises her dad but not the other male voice.

  “There are no broken bones, but you knew that already. The lacerations on the arm and leg are reasonably minor but we think some kind of fungus was growing on the statue that hit her.” The man pauses for a second and shuffles through some papers. “I believe it was very old and it’s been sitting on that roof for goodness knows how many years—”

  “About one hundred and twenty.” Olivia opens her eyes.

  Everyone looks at her.

  “One of the headmasters at the school carved it in 1894,” she adds.

  How do I know that?

  After a shocked moment, the doctor continues, “There must have been something on the stone because it looks like the wounds are becoming infected.” He holds up his hand. “Not to worry, we are giving Olivia a broad-spectrum antibiotic to help her heal.”

  “What about her head injury?” Dad asks.

  “Quite a large piece of stone struck Olivia’s temple but the x-rays and scans have come back clear. There are no cracks or any sign of internal bleeding. This young lady has a pretty tough skull.” He gives a little laugh. “She is a tough nut to crack.”

  Olivia groans. That is worse than one of her dad’s jokes and his jokes are famous for being lame.

  ~~~

  A new nurse comes in to change Olivia’s bandages.

  Olivia winces at the sight. There are five sets of tiny black stiches in her arm. The edges of the cuts are red and puckered but the skin around the injuries looks grey.

  “Are you sure it’s alright?” Olivia asks.

  “Don’t worry yourself, dear,” the nurse replies, as she begins to wrap the arm.

  Olivia closes her eyes. The light is way too bright.

  ~~~

  When Olivia wakes it’s morning. Dad is in the chair beside the bed reading the newspaper.

  “Do you believe the wild night they had in town last night?” he states rather than asks. “There was a wild brawl outside Devon’s Nightclub and a tanker truck crashed into the harbour. It’s the worst chemical s
pill they have ever had. The harbour is full of floating dead fish. I also heard on the radio about a bunch of shops being looted, a gang fight and some vandalism in the town cemetery.”

  “And I heard two of the nurses talking about a big medication mix up here last night. A bunch of patients in the next ward ended up with the wrong pills,” Mum adds.

  Dad thinks about this for a second. “That must have been the emergency the nurse mentioned last night.”

  “I know the two nurses on duty have been suspended so it must have been serious,” Mum says.

  “I’m just glad they weren’t on this ward.” Dad lowers the paper and notices Olivia is awake. “Good morning, darling.”

  “How are you feeling?” Mum asks.

  Olivia tries to smile but squinting against the brightness makes it look like a grimace. “It’s too bright, Mum.”

  Mum unzips her handbag and searches inside. She pulls out her sunglasses and puts them on Olivia.

  Olivia sighs with relief. This is the first time since waking up that she doesn’t have to squint. “Thanks Mum. The light was hurting my eyes.”

  Mum smiles but her eyes look worried. It’s a dull and overcast day. The light in the room is quite dim.

  “The doctor says you might be able to come home tomorrow,” Dad says brightly.

  “I’d rather go home now.”

  “Soon, Olivia,” he promises.

  Chapter 11

  A Petrified Child

  Yip tries to work out where he is.

  He must be someplace in the school. They hadn’t taken him in a vehicle and they hadn’t moved very far before they set him down. He’d been carried on stairs but he wasn’t sure if it was up or down. He had heard a door thud shut and a latch lock.

  It was either up in one of the empty tower rooms or down in one of the basement storerooms. They wouldn’t leave the Grotesques where the kids could get to them.

  There has to be a way to get out of this mess! he thinks. If he was only locked in the room, things would be different. No, he is in his statue form and unless he can be in contact with a roof at moonrise he will remain a statue forever.