by Lee Isserow
Rafe leaped over to the casting agent, and tapped him on the forehead before he could seal his sigil.
A torrent of fire tore across the churchyard with an ungodly roar, Rafe dropped and rolled across the ground, casting as he whipped back up to his feet. The fire-flinging operative found his legs taken from under him, and a crack rang out as his jaw hit the ground.
“They're coming for you, all of them!”
Light swirled around him as the operatives began to descend upon Rafe, their barely visible fingers danced through the air as they cast to take him down. A blast of solid light screamed across the church grounds, Rafe turned on his heel to dodge it as the beam tore a tree from its roots and knocked it into the road. Car horns blared, along with the crunch of metal on wood, and then metal on metal, as a pile up filled the adjacent street.
Rafe tried to move, to run, but found his feet firmly stuck to the grass beneath him. Whilst he had avoided the blast of light, another casting had been placed on the lawn, and great vines had wrapped their way around his legs, and held him tight.
He dropped to his knees as a great fist of water materialised from condensed moisture in the air, intent on knocking him for six. His fingers tried to tear at the plants that held him in place, but for every one he tore off another three seemed to grow, and they reached not only for his feet, but for his hands too.
“They're in a holding pattern. . .” Jules whispered in his periphery. “Castings ready to be sealed, just waiting to see what you'll do.”
“It's not him they should be worried about. . .” Ana grunted, as she jumped the fence behind the mass of operatives and threw her hands out.
The sound rang out, like a thousand mirrors being smashed all at once, and the operatives found themselves no longer able to see Rafe. Each was staring at their own distorted reflections.
A further crack almost took his foot off, as it severed the vines that bound him to the lawn.
“Watch it!” he squealed, as he leaped from the grass back to the stone pavement, and proceeded to kick the dying vines from his legs and shoes.
“I'll take that as a thank you. . .”
“That's not going to hold them for long. . .” he muttered, as he knelt down and ran his fingers along the paving. They picked up blood that had been dripping from the nose of the first operative he took down.
He traced the fingers of his clean hand through the air, then circled them back on themselves before he opened his palm up flat in front of him. The fingers painted with blood met the ones that were clean, and he spread them wide.
“Get ready to open a hole,” he told her.
“Sure you want to do this?”
He nodded, but wasn't anything close to sure. He'd probably blow out all the magick he had at his disposal taking them down. . . but they wouldn't remain trapped in the mirrored prison for long.
The fingers all came together as he brought his hands upright, held them in front of his chest, and nodded to Ana to open a hole. He lined up his thumbs to seal the sigil, and threw his fingers apart. A miniature sun burst to life in between the palms of his hands, then contracted in an instant, as it became an intense black void. Ana knew what was coming, and opened up a hole in the glassy prison directly ahead of him.
From the darkness, an explosion of microscopic fireworks butterflied out, they funnelled through the slim gap she had made. Each of the operatives it hit was flung from their feet, slammed into the walls of the reflective cage.
The casting was powerful, so powerful that it was forcing his hands apart, but Rafe would not let it. He locked his thumbs together, grit his teeth, and put everything he had into it to keep it firing. He swung his hands to the left, Ana moved the hole in the same direction, and they knocked yet more of the operatives about, then to the right, where it hit a solid barrier that it could not penetrate.
Rafe unhooked his thumbs and fell to the ground, a thick sweat dripped from his forehead, and a quiver rocketed across his body.
“My turn,” Jules huffed, as he stepped past him and walked right up to the hole in the mirror prison. He stared at the glimmers of men and women that hid behind the barrier. “Sorry about this,” he said, as he took command of the shadows in their bodies and pulled them out of their mouths and noses. They changed consistency, turned solid, and began to stop the airflow to the agents' lungs.
The barrier fell.
Then the men and women fell.
Ana waited to confirm that all were alive, but none still conscious enough to cast, and repaired the cracks she had made in reality.
Jules glanced down to the shaking, sweaty mess of Rafe, who was crouched on the floor, and held his head in agony. “What's his deal?”
She ran over to him and took hold of Rafe's arm, as she had done so many times before. As her skin met his, he felt his limited supply of magick begin to replenish, their connection healing him once again.
“He was poisoned a while back, some big sea monster's venom, left him. . .” she gave Rafe's arm a squeeze, trying to offer support, whilst apologizing for telling a story that wasn't hers to tell, and one that he didn't like to be reminded of. “Left him with a magick deficit. . .”
“Is that true?” Jules asked.
Rafe nodded as he wiped the sweat from his brow.
“Then why the hell did you offer to go in and take on all the operatives? I could have dealt with them, me and Ana could have done it alone, you didn't have to―”
“Yes I did,” Rafe sighed, as he picked himself back up to his feet. “You're not alone any more. Whatever happens here, whatever we have to do to get your son back, we're doing it together. . . no matter the cost, or how much it hurts.”
Jules stared at him, the man that had been so quick to judge him when they first met just hours earlier, now seemed as though he was willing to risk his health―perhaps his life―to save his son.
“I don't deserve this. . . your help. . .” he said, as he met Rafe's eye. For the briefest of moments, he saw something that burned away behind those eyes. An unspoken understanding of his situation that he couldn't find the words to question.
Rafe turned on his heel to escape the prying gaze, and led the way towards the doors of the church. But as they approached, Jules could swear he heard something under his breath, that sounded like “No father deserves to lose a child.”
Chapter 26
Too late
The entrance to the apothecary was the same set of doors that led into the church itself. The key to enter the domain or magick rather than mundane was a sigil cast before one laid their hand upon the door. With his magick returned, Rafe drew it out and pushed on the old door, which swung open to reveal a dimly lit room that looked as though every element of it was made from wood.
As Ana entered, her feet rocked on the uneven floor, that on closer inspection appeared as though it was formed from thick, old roots that wound and weaved around one another. It was a lattice of organic properties, the likes of which she had never seen before.
“Is the floor part of a tree?” she asked.
“It's all 'a tree',” Jules replied, as he gestured to the walls, which had a myriad alcoves that appeared to be natural hollows, the only evidence that there was anything magickal about them was how uniformly they were lined up. Each of them was being used as shelves, and above them, branches full of dark green leaves arched across to form a canopy above. At the ground level, the room was encircled by roots that were thick and bulbous, they grew up to four feet in height and were flat at the top, as if nature had provided a natural counter for commerce to occur.
A number of apothecary staff milled around behind the counters, and Jules found himself reach to his face, an automatic impulse that made him shroud his features, in fear of being recognised, or having questions fired at him, no matter how well-wishing they might be.
“They tell you where it is?” Rafe asked.
Jules nodded and led them across the grand expanse of the wooden room. He stared dead ahead
at the far side of the room, where a small archway behind the counter led deeper into the hollow of the apothecary.
“So, why is the outside a church, but the inside is a tree?” Ana whispered.
“This is one of the oldest trees in the country,” Rafe explained. “Chopped down to make way for the church. . . But Hawksmoor only had it chopped down in the Natural World.
“So, this is the realm. . . of. . . nature?”
“The Mother Realm, and it's not the actual realm, just a facet of it that was fused to the Natural World―”
“Right. . . well the name, Mother Realm, is stupid,” she grumbled. “You people need to be better at naming things.”
“Is this the point where I remind you that you're one of 'us people'?”
“Shut up,” she grunted.
“Both of you shut up,” Jules commanded. He was not enjoying being a third wheel to their conversation, and it certainly wasn't helping him focus on the matter at hand.
As they approached the counter at the far end, one of the apothecary staff circled around to them. He did not seem perturbed by their shrouds, but Ana figured that it was just like any pharmacy, where sometimes people were embarrassed when they had to come in to clear up some awful ailment.
“What can I help you with today?” he asked.
Jules glanced back at the others, then met the man's eye. “We have an appointment with Doctor Shime.”
Ana raised an eyebrow, but decided it was best to quell the myriad questions that rocketed through her head.
“One moment,” the apothecarian sidled off to the far side of the room, and picked up a large leather-bound book.
“You booked an appointment?” Rafe whispered.
“Only way I was going to get on the other side of the counter. . . tree doesn't like uninvited guests.”
“'Doesn't like'?” Ana found herself repeating.
Jules gestured subtly to the roots wound around the archway beyond the counter that led deeper into the apothecary.
“Tend to get a little grabby. . .”
The man returned with the book and settled it on the counter. Jules tapped his finger on the cover, and it flipped through the pages until it came to his appointment.
“Ah yes,” the man said, as he read the page. “Mister Smith. Don't have you down for company though,” he glanced to Ana, then Rafe.
“Forgot to mention that when I booked in, shouldn't be a problem though, should it?”
“Of course not, we are more than used to multiple donors.” He had a smile on his lips and glint in his eye that seemed to suggest that he was genuinely excited at the prospect.
He closed up the book, pulled it away, and ran his hand over the old wood. The counter seemed to breathe, rose ever so slightly, then contracted into the ground, which opened up a slim path that allowed them to walk through to the archway ahead.
Jules took the lead, followed by Ana and Rafe.
“Second door on the left,” the apothecarian added cheerily as they walked under the arch and made their way down the hallway.
“Donor?” Ana inquired, as soon as they were out of earshot.
“He thinks we're making a baby,” Rafe explained.
“Oh. . . Oh!”
“Yeah, best not to think about it.”
“How does a three-person baby work?”
“Same as a two-person baby, but without the messy sex, pregnancy and birth aspects.”
“But the sex is the fun part. . . “ she muttered, as they arrived at the door.
Jules glanced over his shoulder, to confirm that the apothecarian was not monitoring their movement down the root-laden corridor, and he continued onwards, straight past the second door on the left.
The wood beneath their feet seemed to react to their onward journey, murmured and moved of its own volition, as if it objected to them continuing past the door they were expected to knock upon. It snaked back and forth, the entire floor became bumpier, until the lattice tore from the ground, and looped back on itself in an attempt to wrap around their feet and impede any further movement.
Jules picked up pace, pulled the shadows from under the roots, and tried to hold them in place. They fought back, attempted to break free of the dark restraints.
“Faster,” he grunted, as he launched into a run.
The roots grew in mass and strength, and began to overpower the shadows.
The three continued down the hallway, desperately trying to outrun it. They turned a corner, and discovered it blocked off by a mass of vines. Jules growled, grabbed hold of the shadows between the plexus of greenery, and coalesced them to form what looked like a massive fan blade. On his command it spun to life, and whipped around in a frenzied black blur. He turned it on the horizontal axis then the vertical until he had cleared a path through the angry living weeds, and covered the sap spewing wounds where they had been cut with darkness to stop them from growing anew.
“Almost there,” he gasped, as he leaped through the gateway cut in the tangle of massacred creepers.
There was a door at the end of the hallway, it was almost within reach. But as Jules shot his arm out to grab hold of the handle, a root lashed around his foot, tripped him up, and sent him head-first into the door. His nose exploded in a fountain of blood, and he fell to the floor. Ana's jaw dropped as the sanguine fluids appeared to be absorbed into the wood. The thin green veins that laced the bark seemed to get plump and fat, and sprouted buds on long spindly stems that bloomed into bright red flowers.
“Does this tree eat. . . people?” she found herself asking.
“Eat implies it as a digestive tract. . .” Rafe sighed, “Think of it more as using us as fertiliser.”
“Oh, yeah, I much prefer that image, thanks for that.”
Roots wrapped around their legs and held them in place before they had a chance to react. The tree's tentacles thrashed around their arms and torsos. Jules began to disappear beneath a throng of angry vines, that looked as though they were lapping up the blood that gushed from his nose, and as a result, became bigger and stronger with every passing moment.
“Slice these bitches up!” Rafe grunted, as the roots began to crawl up his neck.
“I'm not sure if I could kill a tree―”
“Can you breathe wood?” The tree's tendrils latched on to his lips, and began to contort his words as they slid down his throat.
“No. . .”
“Then be quick about it!”
Anna took a breath, set her intent as she muttered a “sorry,” and stretched her fingers out wide. Cracks formed in the air between them, forked out across the hallway, snaked under their feet and around the walls. Wherever a vine or root seemed to be coming from, she sent her fractures between the realms. As the plants came for her mouth, and tried to crawl up her nose, she closed her eyes, and apologised once more as a crash rang out in the hallway. The vines and roots died in an instant, as they were separated from the tree that had given birth to them. She grabbed fistfuls of the desiccated plant matter that covered her, ripped it from her body, as Rafe did the same until he too was free. Then the two of them helped uncover Jules, and lifted him back up to its feet.
“Thanks,” he muttered, as Ana glyphed him, and his nose put itself back together.
She gave him a small smile in response, but her eyes betrayed how she truly felt at having to hurt the tree, that was older than all three of them put together, perhaps older than London itself.
Jules reached again for the handle, turned it, and pushed the door open. The room was thick with a crosshatch of vines, the wellspring visible beyond it, at the centre of the room. And above it hung an organic looking object, a cross between a plant's bud and a human heart. It glowed a soft green that illuminated the room, and beat to a slow and steady rhythm.
“What is it?” Ana asked, but somehow she already knew the answer. The mesh of vines around the room, that blocked them getting to the wellspring, was the tree's pulmonary system.
“It's the
heart.” Jules said. “Keeps the whole thing living. . .”
“Since when do trees need hearts to live? Don't they just use photosynthesis?”
“These days, sure. But trees weren't always so. . . benign. Roots weren't always just for absorbing water, as you've just seen. . . They were born of the same matter we were, children of the same gods.”
“Roots. . . are tentacles?“
“Were tentacles. Just like with magickians, there's aren't so many of the older generation left.”
“Are. . . we going to have to kill this thing to get to the wellspring?”
“No.” Rafe grunted. “But if we get to the wellspring, we are going to kill this thing.”
“You don't know that,” Jules barked.
Rafe pointed to the heart. A thin reticulation of white web-like veins gathered at its base, and dropped down, spread across the surface of the wellspring. “Been keeping it alive all this time, what do you think happens if that wellspring goes into stasis?”
“It won't be for long,” Jules said,as he tried to hide the quiver on his voice. “Only one more church after this and then it's over.”
“No way to tell how that will impact this place. . .” Ana muttered. “We could go to the library, or ask Tali, might be the kind of thing she knows, how long this place can last without the wellspring.”
“You know Tali?” Jules asked, thoughts knocked off track by their mutual connection.
“Rafe thinks she's his secretary,” Ana scoffed, enjoying the chance at a brief moment of levity.
“I do not,” he grumbled back.
“We can't involve her, can't involve anyone―the fact that I've already got you two helping is. . . they told me not to tell anyone.”
There was a desperation on his tone, and as much as neither Rafe nor Ana wanted to harm the tree that had survived aeons in this realm just one step away from the world they lived in, they had promised him that they would do whatever it took. With a tear in her eye, Ana tore through the veins of the plant, and cleared a path for them to access the wellspring.
She watched from the doorway, unwilling to step deeper inside as Jules pulled out the coin and whispered the words it needed to hear.