Judgement (The Twelve) (14 page)

A passing male dog walker stopped and gawked at the ghost like figure. Shadow had allowed him to see his form and smirked. Floating across the ground he stopped directly in front of the man. The dog, a small white poodle, growled and tried to nip at his leg. Shadow reached down and pretended to pat the dog.

“Good dog.” His voice sounded like a low whisper echoing through the night sky.

“What are you?” The man
whimpered
.

Shadow smiled, “People used to call me the Candle of Death. Do you know why?” He whispered.

All the petrified
man could do was shake his head as he clutched the dog lead tightly.

“Let me show you.”

A moment later Shadow entered the In Between place and hurried to catch up with his master. Leaving behind a screaming burning figure running wildly down the street, his poodle standing at the kerb, untouched but shaking with fright, the end of its lead blackened and burnt.

C
hapter three

“
T
ell us again what you did to Ghost?”

The Twelve sat around a tri
-
sided electric fire, on various different types and
different
coloured leather settees, and arm chairs,
in the centre of a large warehouse area on the
forth
floor of what
Patch fondly called The Fortress.  The warehouse area was of course far bigger than they needed. A large
thirty
foot square second hand rug lay on the bare concrete floor in the centre of the
two hundred by one hundred and forty multi
pillared
floor
space. The huge industrial electric heater rested on four flag stones,
on top of the rug,
with a cable running
a hundred
feet across the floor to a wall socket over by the lift.
Various different pieces of furniture scattered around the warehouse gave the place an eclectic look. One big area down at the
northern end
of the
floor
, had
a
false plasterboard wall
enclosing a sixty foot
by a one hundred foot rectangle area,
joined
in a line
to
six iron pillars that ran across the
width of the
floor every
twenty feet
or so. The area was subdivided into twelve bedrooms with on suite bathrooms.
Anvils
private security company took care of the
construction many years ago
. This included the kitchen area and drainage.
The
kitchen and bedrooms were all
raised up
on false floors
to allow
for
drainage
pipes and
electric cabling
etc.

“Chris
,
come on tell us again what you did to Ghost?”

The person belonging to the question stood with his head buried inside the open double doors of a very large grey American fridge/freezer, over in the kitchen area at the southern end of the floor. Stepping back with a plate of spicy cold cooked chicken wings and a tin of coke in his hands,
Priest looked expectantly towards Chris who was seated
(as
usual) next to Patch on one of the settees, together with Huntress and Slash.

Chris hadn’t
been paying attention. It had been three weeks since they’d moved here. He’d helped with
un
loading the old battered van
, but only managed to get in Rages way.  He’d never seen someone carry a large double settee on each shoulder before.
He used the big old fas
hioned service lift
, to ride up to the forth floor with strict instructions not to get off at any of the others
.
Bulls Eye had smiled when Chris asked why and had simply mimicked a large explosion.

  Chris had insisted on a television.
A nice forty inch flat screen with Free sat included. It stood
in a corner
near the kitchen area, with a large rug in front of it, surrounded on either side with two large
bookcase
s
, filled with very old hard backed books. It appeared the
rest of
team liked to read instead of watch
ing
TV. But right now he was sitting next to Patch
on a three setter settee in front of the TV watching an old film starring Gary Copper. Patch was
a
d
miring his
new
leather outfit.
Although he was staring at the film, Chris was remembering meeting the tailors who’d supplied his clothes.

Anvil had been
right, the man did, in this case, maketh the clothes. His visit to Alina and Alfredo Fashion Suppliers of fine Leather had been an experience.  The shop was in a fashionable high street full of designer shops. There’s had stood out with its black painted window frames and front door. The front window was filled with hats, belts, boots and jackets, all made from leather and covered in studs.

Anvil
had taken him along and once at the door step, dropped them both back into real time. The front door had an old fashioned brass bell over the door on the inside. It
jingled gently
as they stepped over the threshold. Alina and Alfredo stood behind the counter, side by side
, s
trange middle aged men. Strange because both had black short curly hair,
slightly pointed ears,
huge walrus
moustaches,
bulbous wide noses,
double chins, chubby bellies hidden behind black leather waistcoats
engraved with spun gold
. Strange because upon seeing
Anvil
, both smiled huge wide grins, revealing several gold teeth.

But the real surprise was, as each turned away in the opposite direction to each other and started to walk towards the ends of the counter, they started to get smaller and smaller until only the tops of there heads showed! Finally both appeared from behind the counter, dwarfs!

One had on brown leather trousers and the other black leather trousers.
Both wore red shoes.
It turned out
brown legs
was Alina
and
black legs; was
Alfredo. They greeted
Anvil
warmly and to Chris’s surprise completely ignored his weapon.

“Mister
Anvil
so good to see you again
, y
ou look as young as ever.” Alfredo
stated politely in a deep granite bedrock sort of voice, which startled Chris.

“Young
er
,
” Echoed Alina
,
in an equally deep rock hard voice.

Anvil
leaned down and shook hands warmly, “Nice to see you pair of old rascals again, Hope you haven’t been overcharging your customers.”

Both dwarfs thought this hilarious for some reason. It took a moment for the laughter to die away, finally Afredo turned to Chris.

“Where are my manners
?
Allow me to introduce myself and my brother. I am Alfredo and this is little Alina.”

Chris tried not to laugh at that as both stood no more than four feet high. “Very nice to meet you.”

Alfredo nudged his brother, “Nice manners.”

“Manners.” Alina echoed.

Anvil
didn’t need to tell them why he was here. The two dwarfs started to walk in a slow circle around Chris. There eyes slowly drifting from the top of his head to the tip of his toes.

Afredo fingered the sleeve of Chris’s leather jacket and pulled a face, “Anvil my friend, why he wear old cow on his back!”

Chris was affronted; this was the nicest jacket he’d ever owned. He started to protect, defending Anvil’s generosity but both dwarfs said, “Shush!”  At the same time.

Then
added
Please
a
s an afterthought.

They continued to size up Chris for two to three minutes before moving back
to the counter, heads together they whispered back and forth for several more minutes. Finally both grinned from ear to ear and shook hands with each other.

Alfredo looked solemnly towards at Chris. Bowing once he stated matter of fact, “You are one with Anvil
s people
now. We think the missing link eh? You called
special
name, Judgement we think eh
?

So clothes with fit your name. Preacher man you be and Judgement of all.”

Alina
clapped his hands and smiled, “Call back tomorrow and your clothing shall be ready.”

Chris had to ask, “What clothes will that be?”

Both dwarfs spoke as one. It was like rock rubbing on rock, “Flat wide brimmed preachers hat with leather trim, black cotton, round necked shirts with leather trim around the neck and cuffs. Leather
full
length jacket
,
thin and fine, with studded cuffs. Leather trousers
with denim running down outside seams.” Both grinned, “Because you are young and young humans like denim. Also lace up boots with steel toe caps, nice and shiny, with two inch soles, for extra height, until you finish growing.
Nice calf skin black gloves to finish with
all
made from our finest black grain
leather.”