by M S C Barnes
never noticed them. Never knew! He felt himself calm down and opened his eyes, smiling.
“I get it,” he said quietly. “They’re always here!” He looked at Mr Duir who nodded.
“Who are?” Scarlet looked around.
“Scarlet I can see it all.” He watched a fairy land on Scarlet’s head and begin stroking the strands of her hair. He reached out. The fairy hopped onto his hand. He brought it down and stuck it under Scarlet’s nose. She frowned.
“What, Seb?”
She can’t see it! “You must see it …” He thrust his hand towards her and a dusting of silver sparkles floated through the air. Aiden let out a sigh. “They are always here, Scarlet, all the creatures; we just don’t see them.”
Scarlet and Nat smiled at the little creature sat cross-legged on Seb’s palm. Zach looked around, frowning and raised his eyebrows as he saw many fairies in various locations within the room.
Mr Duir picked up a flamer. It didn’t disappear.
“There are so many things that over the centuries humans have simply learned to ignore. You will all now see them, but only what your gifts require or Seb enables you to.”
“Why Seb?” Zach was put out.
Miss West snapped, “Because he is The Custodian and you are merely The Guardian!”
“Just asking,” Zach said quietly. A fairy dropped onto his hand and his features softened as the little being turned a somersault in mid-air.
“Trudy, the gytrash once more, please,” Mr Duir said.
Miss West raised her staff and tapped the mirror. The black stallion reappeared.
“As Trudy told you, we all have a soul which is bound by the rules of Nature to travel to the physical world at its due time and live a finite span in this reality. That too is true of the souls of fairies and Dryads , though theirs is a slightly different tale. When the soul is not in the physical world it goes to a place at the centre of all realities – Áberan. Here it enters a dormant, resting phase where it reflects on its experiences. This enables the soul to grow, just like your night-time sleep helps you make sense of the events of your day.”
Looking at the gytrash, Seb found that if he focused on something specific the other creatures around him became ghostly, almost invisible forms.
“When Nature dictates, souls travel along the ley lines, the paths between the different realities, to enter a new body – their physical shell. When that host body dies, they return via the ley lines to Áberan.” Seb saw Mr Duir make a quick movement with his left hand. A minute shower of sparkles fluttered around his arm and then vanished and a moment later The Caretaker stepped from behind the mirror and joined Miss West, standing beside Zach, who dropped his head and mumbled something incoherent.
Zach flinched as The Caretaker placed an object on the table in front of him. His head jerked up as he recognised the rowan stick and made a grab for it. “Thanks,” he smiled.
“Caretaker, thank you,” Mr Duir said.
The Caretaker nodded, said nothing and walked around the table. Mr Duir raised his hand and sparkles danced again. Seb leant round to see behind the mirror just in time to watch a door fizzle out of view in the bookcase at the far end of the room. The Caretaker was gone.
“Given that some of you still struggle to accept, we will continue nevertheless.” Mr Duir nodded to Trudy West.
She tapped the mirror again and now she spoke. “The laws of transition must not be broken and it is the purpose of your group to police those laws.
“The sad fact is that some souls are not satisfied with waiting their turn; they crave the physical sensations of this life and become impatient to return.” She pointed to the charging stallion. “What you see here is a trespasser – a soul that has decided to ignore Nature and has sought a return to this world before its time. Trespassers may take other forms, such as the Fiskerton Phantom, the Beast of Bodmin, and the Beast of Exmore,” as she spoke the image changed first to a huge bear, then to a panther-type cat, “or the Barghest or Black Shuck,” and now the image became a massive dog, the same demonic red eyes staring ferociously at Seb. He gasped as he recognised the dog he had seen at Waulud’s Bank and lurched back in his seat. He felt the weight of Mr Duir’s hand on his shoulder calming him.
“These are not fictional beasts,” Miss West said. “These are the husk bodies of animals, overtaken and warped by human souls trespassing against Nature’s law. “Throughout centuries these beasts have been seen by the unwary and some trespassers have achieved their aims with devastating consequences.”
Aiden asked nervously, “What aims?”
“To take over a human host. Watch!” She touched the screen with her staff. It panned back, the hound now became a silhouette in the distance, its glowing eyes barely visible. A man wandered into view in the foreground.
Dressed in fancy hillwalking gear, he was reading a map by the light of a small head torch. It was dusk and a slight mist wove its way between gorse bushes and clumps of heather, hovering just above the surface of the soggy ground, obscuring the path. He trod carefully as he struggled to see the track and keep within its bounds.
The squelch of the man’s footsteps and his laboured breathing could be heard. Then he glimpsed the red eyes, which gleamed like a welcoming light in a cottage window. He turned and took a tentative step from the track, then another. The red points of light grew and the man seemed to become determined. He stepped firmly towards the lights.
He was now a good twenty feet from the path and darkness swallowed the scenery around him as dense clouds scudded across the sky, obscuring what little moonlight there was.
Suddenly the red lights disappeared. The man stopped abruptly. He turned in a circle, disoriented. He glanced at the map then seemed to realise how futile that was since he now couldn’t tell which direction he had come from.
Seb was transfixed and then he noticed Mr Duir lower his head and close his eyes as if the image was too painful for him to watch.
Seb looked back at the screen. The man, his face contorted with uncertainty and fear, jumped in response to a faint sound – drumming footfalls.
From his left a dark shadow loomed and for a split second the torch beam illuminated the hound as it pounced. The man fell to his knees and gave a horrified, fearful cry as the weight of the beast knocked him to a prone position, his face pressed into the cloying mud.
The great dog stood astride the man and lifted its face skyward. Then the beast jerked and, as if being jettisoned, a wisp of white swirling mist poured out of its chest, curling around the back and shoulders of the poor man who lay motionless. The white mist dissolved into his torso and the hound’s body crumpled as though the moisture and essence of it were draining away. In seconds the mist had entirely disappeared into the man’s body and the large dog’s carcass fell to the side, lifeless.
Another second passed and then the man stood up. He made half-hearted efforts to brush the mud from his clothing and then strode towards the track, confident of his direction now. The only sign that anything had happened was the mud still clinging to his face and the front of his jacket.
Seb heard Mr Duir exhale and, as if to distract Seb, Miss West planted herself in front of him. “The aim of these souls, Seb, is to come to this reality when they choose … and they need a host body!” She snapped the point of her staff onto the wooden floor.
Drawing a deep breath, Mr Duir stood. Dierne launched into the air to hover beside him. Accompanied by his own reflection and the fluttering Dryad he walked around the table.
“They need a host body,” he repeated the words. “That is just the beginning.” He sounded downhearted, defeated. “Once that aim is achieved all manner of suffering will follow.
“Seb,” he turned to look at Seb, his face sad. “What you saw at Waulud’s Bank was a trespassing soul that had been unable to find a human host. The aim of these errant souls is to trespass at the point of birth, at the start of a human life if possible, but if they cannot then they must take whatever form they
can. Temporarily some take over an animal host.”
Miss West tapped the mirror and the image disappeared.
Mr Duir continued, “For a trespassing soul to inhabit the body of an animal is a cursed existence. The soul suffers exposure to the puerile, unimaginative outlook of the animal, twinned with it for sometimes months, years even. The animal’s body will live for many more years than its natural lifespan, the energy force of the human soul extending its physical capabilities. So effectively the soul has brought about its own entrapment.
“But taking on an animal host now enables the soul to travel beyond the limitations of the ley lines and it can then hunt for a suitable human host and, as you have just seen, it will wait for a chance to leave the animal host and take over a human one.
“However it is unusual for a trespassing soul to enter an adult host. If they embed themselves within the body of a baby or a young child they are stronger and can completely dominate the soul within. Sometimes they are even strong enough to force out that soul. But to take over an adult host means vying with a soul that has reached an awareness of their own being, their own identity, in this life. Often the result is such a conflict that the behaviour of the individual, with two occupant and battling souls, becomes so strange that either society rejects them – and institutionalises them – or the life of the host is brought to a premature end.” Mr