How I Found You (10 page)

“Oh good. You know I have a weak stomach for heroic gestures. It was upsetting to see you being so…” he grimaced, “considerate.”

“Sorry about that. Minor error in judgement. Happens to us all from time to time.”

Caicus puffed out his chest. “Not me. You’ll never catch
me
being considerate. Not out of choice, at any rate.”

“Okay, okay.” I rolled my eyes. “I get it. You’re faultless and can do no wrong.” He was so smug it made me want to clock him. “Anyway, if I hadn’t taken her up to her room, we never would have had a chance to clear out my pockets before she showed the contents to Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary.”

“True,” Caicus agreed. “How did you explain it?”

“I told her she’d imagined it.”

Caicus doubled over with laughter. “Don’t tell me she actually bought that?”

“Maybe. A knock on the head can make you go all kinds of crazy. But she also mentioned something else. Something about eyes. Crow eyes.”

“Crow eyes?” Caicus repeated, his eyebrows pulling together. “What’s that about?”

“I think it’s Lathiaus.”

He tensed. “She’s seen him?”

I contemplated it for a moment. “Only in her sleep. In her dreams she must be close enough to see his eyes now.” The thought made my heart wrench.

“Then it’s almost time.”

“Yes,” I said quietly.

“We’re nowhere near prepared,” Caicus grumbled. “It could have been today, you know. Right there, in the bathroom. And we’d have missed the whole thing.”

“It’s not today,” I told him.

“It could be today,” he argued. “We’re not ready. We need to prepare the brew, we need to get the others out of the house—”

“It’s not today,” I snapped.

“What makes you so sure?” he challenged.

“It’s just not, okay? There have been no signs. The weather’s glorious, no tremors or storms, nothing.”

“What about your visions? Are they getting any clearer?”

I felt my shoulders tauten at the mention of my visions. Or my dreams, if you will. Well, not
my
dreams exactly. Rose’s dreams.

For the past few months, our dreams had somehow fused together. Almost as though I had slipped through a crack in between dimensions and ended up in her unconscious mind. I was a spectator, watching her nightmares play out like a Hitchcock horror. And that was how I was able to track her to Millwood.

It was strange, but I’d developed a bond with her through our subconscious meetings. Every time she had a nightmare, I was there too. Yes, I always stood out of sight, skulking through the shadows like a creature of darkness, but I saw it all. I saw Rose walk mechanically towards the demon Lathiaus, and each time I wanted to call out to her—to stop her. At first he was just a mound, hunched beneath a black cloak. But with every dream he grew a little stronger, forewarning of his imminent awakening. Now he stood tall before her, gigantic and intimidating.

The nightmares were terrifying—even for me, who kept to the sidelines. But I saw her, and I learnt so much about her from those unearthly encounters. I felt as though I knew her better than I knew myself. It was because of this connection that I was able to find her. That was my power—I could find anything I wanted, as long as it had a place in my heart. And she did.

“It’s not time yet,” I said to Caicus. That was all he needed to know. 

“I wonder if she knows,” Caicus muttered to himself. “Maybe she knows about Lathiaus.”

“No. She doesn’t know. She blames everything inexplicable on me.” I looked over at the former contents of my jeans, which were sprawled on Caicus’s bed. My cluster of cleansing sage, tied together with a piece of red string, and my ceremonial dagger, the handle engraved with our coven symbol—basically just an elaborate ‘V’ for Valero. How imaginative.

“Great,” Caicus grumbled. “If she’s suspicious, then it’s only a matter of time before she finds us out.”

“So what? What’s the worst that can happen? She exposes us and your powers of persuasion no longer work on her? Guess what, numbskull, your powers already don’t work on her.”

“No,
numbskull
,” he echoed back. “The worst that can happen is that she blabs to Mary and we’re booted out of the family home. Things will be a little less straightforward if we’re exiled. You know full well we can’t stick around if we’re not invited. Not to mention the fact that the prophecy girl’s not going to be so willing to guzzle down a potion brew handed to her by two witches.”

“She doesn’t know anything,” I repeated. “And you’ve got Mary eating out of the palm of your hand, so you’ve got nothing to worry about there.”

Caicus grinned and cast his pale blue eyes upon me. Fooling around, he blinked his irises into an icy white. Of course, it had no bearing on me because I was a witch. But to a human it was mesmerising, like a blinding flash dazzling them into believing and agreeing with everything Caicus said. That was Caicus’s power. The one loophole to this was that if the victim exposed him to be a witch, then his power would be weightless. All bets would be off.

Rose was the exception. It was odd. We couldn’t be sure how exactly she was immune to Caicus. She certainly didn’t seem to know that we were witches. Our only explanation was that she herself was a witch—or part
witch, anyway. After all, the prophecy did refer to her as ‘the girl with the heart of a witch’. 

I clasped my hands together and rested them in my lap. “I don’t sense her to be a witch,” I said absentmindedly.

“Neither do I.”

“I wonder why the prophecy forecasts her? Her, and only her.” It was a question I’d asked myself often.

Caicus shrugged. “Perhaps she’s the only one of her kind—the only known entity with the heart of a witch but the body of a human. Like a rare jewel.”

“What do you think will happen…you know, when we hand her over?”

Caicus let out a heavy sigh. “I don’t know, Oscar. But I imagine it’ll be quick.”

My chest tightened. I nodded my head.

“Then it’ll all be over,” he added. “And things can go back to normal.”

“Yeah.”

“Anyway,” said Caicus, his tone lightening, “you should put these away.” He tossed the contents of my pockets over to me. “And find a better hiding place this time, dimwit.”

My sage, my dagger…

Wait.

Something was missing.

“Oh hell!” I shouted.

Caicus jumped at my outburst. “What? What is it?”

I leapt to my feet and began flinging up his bed sheets. He shuffled back until he was sitting on his pillow.

“What?” he demanded.

“My talisman. Did you get it from my pocket?”

Caicus’s eyes widened a fraction, but he said nothing.

“Have you seen it?” I barked.

“No!” he yelled back. “It wasn’t in your pocket.”

“It’s
always
in my pocket.”

“Well, obviously it’s not, because I emptied your pockets and it wasn’t there,” he fired back. “So don’t blame me.”

“Argh!” I pounded my foot on the floor. “
She’s
got it.”

“Damn it, Oscar! The talismans are inscribed. If she finds out we’re witches, we can kiss the plan goodbye. It’s over. We’re out of here, and Lathiaus will kill us all.”

I kicked my bed in temper. I must have kicked it a little too hard, though, because it skidded across the room and crashed against the wall.

“Oscar!” Caicus hissed. He threw a pillow at me.

I took a deep breath. Okay. This wasn’t irrevocable yet.

“I’ll get it back,” I told Caicus. Before he could reply, I was out of the room.

Slow down
, I reminded myself.

I inhaled deeply, tasting the air. Rose wasn’t in her bedroom. That was handy.

I closed my eyes.
Talisman
, I willed. That was how my power worked. I pictured what I wanted to the finest detail: the thin, cold brass, the faded tawny colour, the words imprinted on the surface… I felt it in my heart and envisioned it with the deepest love.

Got it.

I was able to see it clearly in my mind’s eye, tucked safely into a secret compartment of Rose’s jewellery box.

Nice try
. I smirked.

In a heartbeat I was in her room and rummaging through her jewellery box. Bracelets, rings, blah blah blah… talisman!

“Hello, love,” I said, kissing the brass coin.

And then I heard the attic door open.

Busted. 

Words

I SAT ON MY BED
with the covers bunched around me.

Maybe Oscar had been right. Maybe I really was imagining things. Perhaps that was a symptom of concussion? Come to think of it, I was feeling a little light headed. Although I presumed that was fairly common after being bombarded with a serious overload of unexplained events.

I touched the bump on my temple. It was sore. Of course it was—I’d clipped it on the porcelain sink. Ouch. Even the memory hurt.

I leaned back against my pillow, gazing out of the window at the cloudless blue sky. It was nice to see a clear day for a change. I’d spent the past week watching the rain fall, working my way through Mary and Roger’s literature collection, and playing chess with Oscar. Conveniently, Oscar always seemed to show up whenever I was alone. It was strange. I still didn’t exactly trust him, but I hadn’t come any closer to uncovering his agenda. If there was even an agenda to uncover.

Of course, I still had reason to be suspicious. The Valero boys seemed to be magnets for baffling things. One good example was their weightless footsteps. It was virtually impossible to hear them cross the corridor, even with the extremely creaky floorboards hindering their path. In fact, compared to the rest of the occupants of the house, Caicus and Oscar’s footing was beyond light—it was almost illusory.

But the incident that stood out above all was what had happened in Hutton Ridge. Despite the amount of time Oscar and I had spent together, we had never spoken of our encounter that day—mostly because Oscar refused to. Having had over a week to dissect it, I somehow convinced myself that Oscar’s perilous jump was not entirely unfeasible. After all, I’d never jumped off a cliff, so how could I be sure if it was possible or not?

On more than one occasion I had contemplated talking to my aunt about it, but something held me back. It was as though I felt a loyalty towards Oscar that I simply couldn’t betray. 

I sighed. 

Gazing out at the distant tree tops, I watched the leaves sway gently in the breeze. And then, in front of the window, something else caught my eye. The candle on my dressing table.

Something was different.

I hopped up from my bed and walked over to the table. Carefully I picked up the candle and examined it, trailing my index finger along the smooth wax surface.

Now, that candle had sat in the same spot for the past God-only-knew-how-many years. Subsequently, I could practically picture every detail just from memory alone. Most noticeably, there was a distinctive stripe of ochre trailing from the wick to the base. From my bed I’d always been able to see that marking, and yet that day, somehow, the stripe was facing out to the window.

The candle had been moved.          

What
? Why would someone come into my room and move my candle? Mary and Roger never
went up there, and baby Zack couldn’t walk, let alone climb two flights of stairs and rearrange my room. I knew I hadn’t moved it. That left two people…

So much for giving the Valeros the benefit of the doubt. They’d been in my room! But
why
?

My mind was jumbled. I needed to think clearly.

Okay, retrace my steps
,
I decided.

After bumping into Oscar post-shower, I’d gone up to my room. When I came back down I passed the bathroom and noticed Oscar’s clothes dumped on the floor. I wasn’t usually one for snooping, but I counted that to be extenuating circumstances. I ducked into the bathroom and locked the door behind me. Before I could stop myself, I was rummaging through his pockets. I wasn’t sure what I expected to find. In fact, I didn’t really expect to find anything.

But that had been wishful thinking.

In actual fact, I found a whole lot more than I bargained for.

There were three objects in total: a small dagger with some kind of marking engraved on the handle; a cluster of sage bound together by a worn piece of string; and a brass coin inscribed with unfamiliar words.

I didn’t imagine it.  The memory was too vivid.

I felt sick just thinking about it. Suddenly everything started to feel a little too real. Why would he carry those things around in his pocket? I mean, a dagger, for crying out loud! Obviously, to me, a non-dagger-carrying citizen, that stuff seemed psychotic. 

But it’s Oscar
. I found myself saying that phrase an awful lot these days.

In all honesty, when my fingers first touched the cold blade of the dagger, I wanted so badly for it to be the final straw. And it should have been. I wanted to hate him, but instead I began making excuses.
Maybe he’s been using it for gardening.
Yes, that was fairly believable.
Maybe it’s for opening boxes.
Shaky, but still not completely unreasonable.

And then my rational side kicked in.
He carries a dagger
.  

That was enough. I didn’t want to see it any more. Any of it. I just wanted to get out of that bathroom. Moving hastily, I returned the items to his pocket and made my getaway.

There was one slight catch, though. I must have slipped on the wet floor tiles, because I remembered falling forward towards the sink. I must have knocked myself out cold, because the next thing I knew, Oscar was sitting at my bedside, dabbing my head with a tissue. Then, of course, we argued, and I stormed off to show him what I had found in his pockets. But when I looked through his jeans again, the contents had vanished.

Or had they?

Wait. Backtrack. Before I’d left the bathroom, I’d put everything back…hadn’t I?

My hands began to tremble. Maybe I hadn’t put
everything
back. Even in my state of avoidance, I hadn’t been able to let go of the one thing that might have given me some answers.
Genuine
answers.

I quickly dug through my own pocket and drew out the brass coin.

There. Whatever it was, whatever it meant, it was real. I saw it, plain as day, before my very eyes. I had been right all along. And Oscar had lied to me—again.

There was an inscription on the coin. The print was minute and written in an unfamiliar language.

I grabbed a notebook from my dressing table and jotted down the words onto a blank page.

Bellator Tenebris. Mortifer Veneficus

I tore out the sheet of paper and folded it into a small square. Something about those words sent chills down my spine. This was my chance to finally piece together a part of the Valero jigsaw, and I wasn’t going to waste it. For the good or the bad, I needed to know the truth.

I scanned the table for a safe place to keep the coin—somewhere Oscar wouldn’t look. My eyes fell on my white leather jewellery box. Inside it there were a couple of secret compartments which would go unnoticed by anyone who didn’t know much about jewellery boxes—which I was guessing Oscar didn’t. Anyway, it seemed as good a hiding place as any, so I tucked the brass coin into one of the compartments, beneath a heap of assorted rings and bracelets.

Once the coin was hidden, I left the attic and snuck downstairs, all the while with my fingers crossed. If ever there was a good time
not
to bump into the boys, it was then.

I made it to the ground floor undetected and found Mary in the conservatory.

“Hi,” I said, hovering in the doorway. Uh oh. I’d almost forgotten about the huge bump on my head. If Mary saw it, she’d probably insist on my going to hospital to get it checked out. I was not loving that idea. Quick thinking time. I shook my hair forward to conceal the shiner.
If she asks, I’m experimenting with the grunge look
, I decided.

But she didn’t ask. She was lounging in one of the pink armchairs, reading a romance novel and sipping tea from a dainty china cup.

“Hello, dear,” she said, peering up over her reading glasses. “Everything okay?”

“Yep,” I smiled. “Everything’s fine.” 

In the far corner of the room, Zack played with a plastic train, making an occasional choo-choo noise.

“Are you bored, honey?” Mary asked, placing her book down on the coffee table. “Where are the boys?”

“The boys are upstairs,” I said, struggling to keep my tone indifferent. “I’m not bored. I was wondering—”

Mary cut me off. “Why don’t the three of you go on a day trip or something? You can borrow the minivan. I’m sure Caicus would be able to drive it.”

The thought of getting into a car with Caicus Valero was positively nauseating. 

“No, thanks,” I replied. “Actually, I was wondering, do you have an internet connection here?”

“Umm…” Mary mulled it over. I knew technology wasn’t her forte. “Yes, I believe Roger has the interweb.”

The interweb
? Okay, technology
really
wasn’t her forte.

              She went on, “It’s on his laptop, though. Is that any good?”

“Yes,” I nodded my head eagerly, now using my palm to conceal the bump in an I’m-so-laid-back-I-can’t-even-hold-my-own-head-up kind of way. “Could I use it for a minute?”

“Sure, honey. It’s in the study. I could show you where, but don’t ask me how it works. I’m hopeless with computers!”

“No problem,” I smiled. “I should be able to figure it out.”

Mary picked up her book from the coffee table. “I’ll leave you to it then, shall I?”

“Yes. Enjoy your book.” I gave her a quick wave and then closed the conservatory door.

Right then. I was off to Roger’s study. It was a room at the back of the house—one of the ones I rarely went into; I’d never had much reason to in the past.

Rather tentatively, I twisted the door handle and peeked inside. The walls were mahogany panelled and the carpet was a rich brown. There was only one small window, which didn’t appear to allow much light in, so the room seemed drab. In fact, I suspected that the study was pretty much a forgotten room. Roger was inclined to do the majority of his work at the office of his accountancy firm, and the chunky black laptop sitting atop the desk was coated with a fine layer of dust. One potted dracaena plant stood tall in the corner, its leaves drooping ever so slightly. I made a mental note to come back and water it when I had more time.

Pushing the thought aside for the time being, I approached the desk and brushed the dust from the laptop. The internet connection cable was already hooked into the port, so all I needed to do was switch it on at the mains. After that, things were relatively straightforward. There was a fast connection, too, which almost seemed wasted on people who didn’t use it—especially since my connection at home was so poor that it was hardly worth the bother.

While the search engine loaded, I took a seat in Roger’s office chair.

It was only when I started typing that I noticed my palms were clammy. Apparently, what I was about to do was affecting me far more than I cared to admit. The truth was that whatever secret I unearthed, it would change things forever. Would change
Oscar
forever. There would be no turning back.

Swallowing nervously, I tapped my index finger on the keys.

Translations.

I clicked ‘Search’ and watched as a long list of results appeared on the screen. I scrolled down until I found what looked like a good link and clicked on it. As the webpage materialised before me, I unfolded the notebook paper and re-read the scrawled words.

“Bellator Tenebris. Mortifer Veneficus,” I spoke them quietly before typing them into the translation box.

Below the text box were the final two steps required for the translation process.

‘Choose language to translate from’ and ‘Choose language to translate to’.

The latter option was simple, so I began with that first. I highlighted ‘English’ on the selection of language choices.

The top option, ‘Choose language to translate from,’ was much trickier to complete.

I wasn’t familiar with any of the words on the coin, so that narrowed my search down to
not English
.

What language is it likely to be?
my brain churned. Well, Valero sounded Italian. I started with that.