Superficially, the man reading his paper had similar characteristics to Phillip, enough to set her heart racing. Long dark hair and beard, dark eyes. But this man’s eyes were not wet and mysterious like the night’s belly and his aura was of different colours. Pink and green, fringed with darker green. A healer? Phillip’s had been gold and mauve. Dea noticed a lot of things other people might have missed in the cafe. It never failed to surprise her how little people seemed to observe details in their normal environment. Most people seemed to sleepwalk their way through life.
Many years ago, too many for Dea to want to look back on — she had reinvented her age so many times — she hail come to the Cross as an eighteen-year-old runaway from Queensland. Like many young people back then, and now, she had made her living by prostitution. Men didn’t ignore her on the street those days, Dea thought, touching the crucifix around her neck to excuse the vain thought. She had long blonde hair to her waist, a face like an angel and a body built for sin. It had been the needle that had taken her looks. Nothing had prepared her for that overwhelming relief the needle brought. The freedom of oblivion, no more pain.
One day a local priest had found her slumped against a wall in the main street, the syringe lying next to her. That was the day she had met Phillip, who was doing voluntary work with the priest, rounding up street children, making sure they had beds for the night, food to eat. She had believed back then that she owed her life to both Phillip and the young priest who was now dead. Father Brian, Brian Jones, caught in the crossfire between two street gangs one night. Dea had always remembered his name because it was the same as poor doomed Brian Jones from the Stones. Father Brian Jones had been a good man, idealistic, unafraid and filled with genuine faith. Phillip had followed him like a shadow. She had been so naive back then she hadn’t realised that was how evil worked. Evil masqueraded as good and befriended purity to creep into your heart. Dea Dreamer tried very hard these days not to see auras.
There were a lot of things she now resisted as traps of the Devil. This was how Lucifer sucked his victims in, giving them gifts such as seeing auras and reading minds. By making a person believe they had divine gifts, he ensured their egos would take them over. Inevitably, such people began to assume they were divine themselves, allowing Satan to move in and work his dark magic through them. There was no doubt in Dea’s mind that psychic gifts were from the Devil. All the power Cael and Johanna had boasted of hadn’t done them much good in the long run. When Lucifer had decided they had served their purpose, he had wasted no time in chewing them up. Now, with more wisdom and age she had lost her naivety that had made her trust — no adore — Phillip.
They had all adored him. Dea swallowed his lies and became an unquestioning member of his little meeting group, as he dubbed the coven. She had never met or read about people like them. They seemed to have unlimited money. Phillip had been forever buying his followers expensive gifts. Dea had been too overjoyed with some of the beautiful items he bought her to question his generosity. She had willingly allowed the Devil to buy her for the sake of trinkets and designer clothes. She had been in love with him of course, all the women had. He had bedded her now and again, but she sensed his appetites were not carnal. His intensity, his passions were conserved for seeking spiritual truths.
Leonora, who had also been picked up off the streets, and was a similar age, had told Dea that Phillip was the youngest son of a wealthy Melbourne family. He was a black sheep, expelled from his exclusive private Catholic school under mysterious circumstances. His parents had died in a housefire in their Toorak mansion and there were rumours Phillip had been responsible. Of course Leonora could have been lying. She often did in those days, trying to ingratiate herself further with Phillip, to raise her crushed self-esteem after years of sexual abuse by both her parents. Phillip loved to surround himself with broken people to make himself feel more powerful. He probably still did, Dea thought — that is, if they were insane enough to believe in him after what they had seen when he had opened the portal with Johanna. When they had revealed its mystery. Now, after all these years, he wanted to reassemble the original coven, who had survived, to close it. No way.
Dea Dreamer got to her feet. She would be late for her shift at the White Tiger Inn, if she didn’t get a shake along. She had held a receptionist position for the small hotel in the Cross for seven years. It was boring but undemanding work, where she could sit and study her Bible as the clients came and went. There was an awful lot of praying to do tonight, Dea thought as she shuffled up to the hotel on Princess Street. She had witnessed hell once before in her life when it had rushed past her as they opened the portal. She would never put herself in that position again, where she was close enough to touch darkness. Near enough to smell evil’s stench, to feel its breath.
Dea shivered as she made her was along Darlinghurst Road. Ever since that alarming phone call from Phillip, she hadn’t been able to shake the feeling she was being watched. She wouldn’t put it past him to be tailing her personally, or even to have gone to the expense of hiring a private investigator. He didn’t like being told no. Darlinghurst Road looked as it always did during the day, a lull before the nightly stream of spruikers outside garish strip clubs, and buskers playing to the coach loads of hens’ parties and sporting teams. She passed the Bourbon & Beefsteak, then a television crew opposite a McDonald’s filming a crowd scene. Dea paused to watch an actor she vaguely recognised play at arguing with a slim blonde woman, while extras pretended to be streetwalkers and looked self-importantly at the onlookers. A couple of real prostitutes, young things in mini skirts and hotpants, begged the director to let them be in the scene as local colour.
Dea kept walking, not liking to be reminded of her own past as she inevitably was every day in the inner city. Countless times over the years she had promised herself she would move away. Sydney was becoming too built up, and she disliked the wild, restless energy. Every day there seemed to be more and more junkies lying on the street. The papers were filled with tales of school kids who carried knives and coordinated pack rapes by mobile phones. Like the world around it, the city was spiralling downwards, out of control. Dea Dreamer sometimes wondered whether Phillip’s coven had something to do with it. When they had opened the Pandora Box of horrors in the Blue Mountains, had they unleashed an energy that had affected the entire world? Was the decline of Sydney a symptom of that energy? But she liked her flat, and the cats were used to it there. While she didn’t feel safe on the streets, she did feel safe at home. Besides, everybody said that crime was just as bad in the suburbs.
She passed a tattoo shop where a group of tourists were examining the display in the window. Glancing behind her to see if the television crew were still filming, Dea saw her. Johanna. But not the woman who Dea Dreamer remembered. Not Johanna with her dark hair and eyes and vintage gypsy clothes. The Johanna that stood looking at her, unnoticed by the film crew, had the body of a woman and the head of an owl. The sharp eyes were gleaming as she coldly surveyed Dea. Dea let out a small scream. People passing by glanced at her curiously, then quickened their pace. At the sound, the owl Johanna seemed to melt into the air and vanish. Where she had stood, dried leaves blew up into the city sky, and the sound of humming filled Dea’s ears.
‘Cut!’ Dea heard the director’s instruction before she turned and fled back down the street. She would have to call in sick at work. Had to. The coven had sniffed her out. She needed sanctuary now, and only the church could save her.
In the afternoon Veronica, drawn by a nagging impulse, found herself outside the tape library door.
Simon, one of the senior librarians looked up when she entered. ‘Ronnie! What can I do for you, baby?’ Veronica looked around making sure none of the Australia Tonight crew were in the room.
‘Could you on do me a favour and check the archives for anything you have on wild dogs, mysterious deaths, disappearances . . . witchcraft in the Blue Mountains?’
Simon was used to all sorts
of odd requests but he hadn’t failed to notice her glance around the room. ‘Some sort of big secret, Ronnie?’
Veronica cursed herself for her indiscretion, Simon was one of the biggest gossips in the building. ‘Just checking up on a kook email. Probably nothing in it, but where there’s smoke, you know.’
‘I guess Girl Wonder reporter is reduced to chasing smoke now with Lisa opening her legs for Stuart 24/7. Did you hear they’re trying to get rid of Maura before her contract expires because Lisa wants the top job? The viewers are going mad for those plastic, big titties.’
Veronica nodded, longing for a cigarette. She too had heard the rumours about the anchor spot for Australia Tonight. Ratings had been steadily slipping, and Maura was bearing the brunt of the blame for it.
‘Yeah, whatever. Anyway, if you get a chance please get the information to me ASAP.’
Simon nodded, his eyes gleaming as she walked off. He relished the chance to needle Veronica Stewart, she was such a cold fish, a tight-arsed little bitch. He called out to another librarian shelving tapes at the back.
‘Did you check out Lady Muck, Mark? What’s the bet she’ll be the next one to go?’ Sniggering to himself, he noted her request down on a notepad. The Ice Queen can wait a couple of hours for it, he decided.
Blue Mountains, Australia
Kevin had agreed to meet Jackson at the Saloon, their nickname for their secret cave, but his friend was nowhere to be found. It was late afternoon in the mountains, but it already felt much later and Jackson knew his mother would be pissed off with him it he wasn’t home in time for dinner. She didn’t like him meeting up with Kevin after school, preferring him to come straight home and start his homework. She had also begun to check his breath for alcohol and cigarettes ever since she had caught him lighting one of hers in the back garden. Jesus, he hadn’t forgotten how high he had jumped when he had lit the cigarette and then, almost instantly, heard her voice directly behind him. He wouldn’t have thought his mother had it in her to be so sneaky. She had actually laughed at how horrified he was before she had dragged him inside by the ear and grounded him for an entire two weeks.
The incident had forced Kevin, his best friend, and him to find a new smoking hole, and now they had found one farther in the bush towards Govett’s Leap. It was one of several caves located under a large rock just back from a walking track, a perfect place to have a few fags and some stolen plonk. Although he knew his mother couldn’t be following him because she had a hairdressing appointment, he still felt more anxious than usual as he waited, eyes darting impatiently, using his pocketknife to carve his initials into the cave wall. Jesus, where was Kevin? Jackson hated to admit it, but he was beginning to feel uneasy. The bush had taken on a sinister hue since he had last been here. It seemed to be breathing around him.
‘Ugh!’ He jumped back in fright when he saw a large huntsman right near his hand. Quickly he shot out of the cave, paranoid Kevin would make fun of him for being afraid of spiders. Jackson had unhappy memories of the boys at school, who having found out his phobia, chased him with a huntsman and put it on his face. He could still see the faces of them laughing. Bad enough he was labelled ‘Porky’ for his excess fat, but to be found out to be a chicken as well had been the most humiliating experience he had ever endured.
He shivered, the temperature had dropped, and glanced back at the cave. No, he didn’t feel like being in there with that huge spider. Concerned he might have other loathsome creepy-crawlies on his hair or clothing, he began checking himself. If he had any real guts, he would go back inside the cave and stick it with his penknife. Cut all the legs off the fucker. It Kevin didn’t hurry, he would have to leave. His mother’s dye job wouldn’t take long, unless of course, she stayed gossiping to the old biddies in the grocery stores. They were all working themselves up over the wild dog sightings. Jackson thought it was the most exciting thing that had happened to the sleepy town in ages. More exciting even than when that slutty schoolgirl had disappeared. Kevin and he had discussed it endlessly, even hoping they would come across one of the dogs. Now out here in the bush on his own, Jackson had begun to regret those wishes. What if it was true and the dogs were out here, super dogs that could kill a grown man? How was Jackson going to protect himself with his little-bitty pocketknife? What was that noise? His head snapped around. From the dense scrub floated an eerie sound — panpipes.
‘What the . . .?’ he spoke out loud. Pipes in the bush? Who would be playing music near the Saloon? He listened for a moment, but the sound trailed off. He frowned, feeling a fist of fear clench his stomach. Suddenly home seemed a desirable place to be with the television blaring, his little brother playing on the floor, and his mother nagging him as she prepared dinner. A twig broke behind him and he shot around, his hand reaching for his pocketknife. Nothing there. Jesus, what was happening to him? He had never felt so afraid in his life. He was acting like someone from a corny splatter film. Yeah, his mind mocked. Like one of those stupid turkeys who go off by themselves into places they shouldn’t, and the madman comes after them with an axe. He was beginning to shake. He could not explain the tremors of terror pulsating through him.
Jackson looked around the bush. The trees he had scarcely bothered to notice when he first entered this hiding place, now seemed to he enclosing him, imprisoning him from civilisation. At any moment, an ancient force could recharge these trees, and they would come to life, reaching for him with long spindly arms; they would rip his head from his body and throw it to the sky. A sob rose in him.
‘Jackson.’ He jumped a mile in the air.
Kevin was standing behind him looking puzzled. ‘What’s wrong, Jackson? What is it?’
Jackson shook his head. He was now so petrified he didn’t care about his friend witnessing his dread. He lacked the vocabulary to explain that there was something out there, something he instinctively knew was older than the land itself. It was the stuff from which nightmares were made, and every kid intuitively knew existed.
‘Did I frighten you? Jesus, Jackson, say something! You haven’t seen one of those dogs, have you? Was your mother here?’
Jackson urgently motioned for him to be quiet. There. There it was again. The sound of panpipes coming from the bush. Goose flesh broke out along Jackson’s arms. He looked at his friend, who had gone quiet, a quizzical expression on his face. A part of Jackson’s brain noted the way Kevin also began to turn around and look at the bush — the expression of alarm coming over his friend’s face.
‘God, that’s really creepy,’ Kevin whispered. A twig cracked again behind them. Jackson wasn’t hesitating any longer. His entire body was bathed in sweat and he was shivering. He could hear the sound of bees buzzing near the entrance of the cave.
‘Run for your fucking life!’ he screamed to Kevin, his voice sounding thin and hysterical.
Kevin didn’t need any persuading and the two began to crash together through the bush, back the way they had come along the path. In their panic, they were lurching into each other and Jackson was so afraid he didn’t even recognise the direction to run. As they ran, he felt the thing that had been watching them take chase. Oh God. He began to sob as he ran. Where was the path? Where was the bush track? Kevin, the slimmer and fitter of the two, had run ahead.
‘Wait for me!’ he called. ‘Kevin! Don’t leave me!’ But his friend kept up his frantic pace and Jackson found himself left behind. He had a stitch in his side, which was preventing him from running. He felt as if he was going to have a heart attack. The daylight had disappeared and the bush was filled with an eerie light. Jackson began to whimper, looking around him. The fear he had felt earlier was nothing to the terror that was pumping through his body. He would willingly have handled a dozen huntsman spiders than face whatever was playing with him in the bush at the moment.
He heard the sound of panpipes again, and a soft chuckle. Then he began to run. There were bees flying around his head, and he attempted to swat them away. He had to get out of th
is place! He knew with every part of his being that if he stayed here, he was going to die. Too late. There was something behind him, he could hear the sound it made as it ran through the thick scrub. He fell, and began to sob, trying to pull himself to his feet. Then he saw it, and for a split second the image didn’t compute. For some reason he recognised her despite her disguise. What was she doing here? What was she doing out in the bush with that weird mask? Those feathers? Then he saw what accompanied her, and the weird smile on her face as she urged them to attack him. At first glance he thought they were wild dogs, an entire pack of them circling him. But the size of them! And they had human heads. He began to scream, the last sound he made before they closed in and ripped out his throat.
When Veronica arrived at the studios car park Matt and Anthony were already packing their equipment into the crew car, yawning and complaining at the early hour. Veronica was wide awake the second her producer had rung in the early hours to say a teenage boy’s body had been found in the mountains, and his friend was claiming a supernatural force was responsible. This was the break she had been looking for. She knew it. The words of the email she had discarded came back to her as she raced around her dark, silent flat getting ready: I’ve seen things up here you wouldn’t believe.
The streets were deserted as they pulled out of the car park, the security man barely acknowledging them as he waved them through. Veronica stared out at the streets, wet after a light shower of rain, half-listening to Matt on his mobile as he arranged alternative plans for his small children to be taken to school by his sister. Family, relationships; things that she never had to worry about. She liked it that way. She had nothing in common with her family. Veronica kept her visits to her parents as infrequent as possible. They bored her with their incessant television watching, their uneventful days spent tending their small garden, the highlight being a walk to the local shops. Her married brother lived in the suburbs with four children; a number Veronica considered excessive with modern contraception. Pamela, her sister-in-law, was seemingly content to be a breeder. Veronica found the whole idea of childbirth distasteful. She had been reassured to read statistics that families were on the way out, and childless partnerships would be the norm by 2016. It seemed obscene somehow to have your belly blown up to an abnormal size, and then have a kid drop out of that tiny hole. It baffled her that Pamela and Robert continued to have children.
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