Marcii (The Dreadhunt Trilogy Book 1) (6 page)

Chapter Ten

“We could run away?” Kaylm suggested most seriously.

Marcii looked at him through the dim light behind the vines with a yearning in her eyes that desperately wanted to say yes.

They had talked of such things before, jokingly, most of the time.

But the look on Kaylm’s face today, Marcii could tell, even with what little light that remained beneath the fading sunset, was one that was nothing if not serious.

“We can’t…” Marcii breathed. “Can we…?”

“Of course we can!” Kaylm exclaimed, only just managing to hush his own excitement in time, for else they might have been discovered.

“Oh Kaylm…” Marcii sighed, not entirely convinced, but not wholly sceptical at the same time.

“We can go to Ravenhead!” He continued. “Like we’ve always talked about! It’s only three days ride west, towards the sunset!”

He glanced out through the vines towards the fading like as if he was judging whether they still had time to leave or not.

If she’d asked him to, Marcii knew Kaylm would have stolen her away that very night.

He would have gone to the end of the world and back for her.

“Kaylm…” Marcii breathed again, but he was relentless.

He’d had enough of this place, and he knew she had too.

“By dusk on the third day we can watch the sun set from the top of Raven’s Keep. We should just go! It’s our chance for a new start! We can build a new life there!”

“What about our families?” Marcii questioned, but he just laughed and took her cheeks gently into his hands, pressing his nose to hers.

“My family don’t care.” He stated. “They’ve bought into every word Tyran has said. They would follow him anywhere now. The whole thing is crazy!” He swallowed nervously. “And wherever he leads them, it won’t be good…”

Marcii knew he was right, and she knew her family had not a care for her either, save perhaps her father. They might not have followed Tyran’s rule quite as religiously as Kaylm’s kin did, but they certainly wouldn’t oppose it.

“Look, Marcii…” Kaylm said warningly, taking her hands in his. “Things are bad, and they’re only getting worse…”

Marcii sighed yet again, torn, knowing his words were filled with nothing but truth.

“Don’t you remember how we used to talk about running away?” He pleaded with her. “The rumours…” He continued. “Witches, these hangings, there are only going to be more of them. More and more people are being accused of witchcraft every day!”

“I know…” Marcii breathed. She looked up at him through the dim light that still just about remained. “And yes, of course I remember. I think about it still…”

“Then let’s do it!” Kaylm urged for the final time.

Marcii drew breath to speak again, all but ready to accept, filled with joy at the idea of leaving with him.

But then something appeared in the darkness beside them, startling the wits from them both.

With her drawn breath Marcii went to scream, and Kaylm to shout, but a small hand covered each of their mouths, and a firm, young voice cut through the early night, silencing them both.

“Hush.” Vixen instructed, and instantly they were quieted.

“What are you…?” Marcii started, still in shock, but Vixen’s tiny hand went to her mouth once more.

“Quiet!” The little orphan hissed under her breath. “There are men coming.” She told them. “They will find us. We must leave.”

Marcii went to speak again, but didn’t get the chance. Sure enough, after only a few moments, they heard the sound of urgent voices approaching.

Vixen dove out from the inlet behind the vines without hesitation and Marcii and Kaylm followed instinctively, confused and afraid.

Driving through the meagre dusk Vixen led them immediately down the side of the enormous, stone church wall, around the corner and out of sight. She moved silently and with a certain grace and assuredness that quite simply forced Marcii and Kaylm to follow her, leaving them helpless to her every whim.

It was as if she was much more than just a simple orphan girl.

Barely moments later, right where they’d just come from, a dozen or so figures appeared, skulking through the eerie dusk.

Amazed, Marcii looked back to Vixen.

But, unsurprisingly, she was gone.

With no time to think on that as she usually would have done, Marcii turned her eyes, and her ears, back to the figures Vixen had gone to such lengths to protect them from.

She couldn’t make out their faces for they were too far away and the light was fading too fast. She could only tell that about half of them were priests, and the other half were enforcers.

That much at least, by their opposed attire, was obvious.

Their voices at first were quiet, subdued, and Marcii couldn’t make out their hasty words, spoken on harsh, hushed whispers.

Suddenly one voice cut over all the rest. The sound of it sent chills crawling menacingly up and down Marcii’s spine. She felt Kaylm shudder at her side too, though he hid it well.

“Do it!” Tyran ordered sharply. “Do it now!”

Feeling her trembling and hearing her quiet breaths shaking, Kaylm took Marcii’s hand gently in his, interlocking his fingers with hers reassuringly.

A soft mewing began and though she couldn’t see them, Marcii could hear at least three cats amongst the group, if not four or five.

All of a sudden the mewing turned to hissing and spitting and then shrieking, as the steely ring of metal against bone grated out through the night.

Marcii only just about caught her breath on her tongue, holding back a faltering cry.

There came a gruesome, gurgling, choking sound, followed the desperate whimpers of futile, helpless struggle, as the felines were heartlessly slaughtered.

“On the wall!” Tyran’s barbaric voice pierced the courtyard again, now almost fully cloaked in darkness.

But, unfortunately, Marcii and Kaylm could still just about make out what came next, as the priests one by one dipped their hands into the still quivering carcasses of the cats and set about drawing strange symbols upon the side of the church.

The patterns and designs they painted on the stone face were ones that Marcii did not recognise. They seemed to be some kind of language that neither she nor Kaylm knew, perhaps long lost and forgotten, or perhaps made up entirely.

Undoubtedly, whatever they meant, they couldn’t have been anything good.

It didn’t take long and before Marcii knew it Tyran was issuing out yet more orders, sending priests and enforcers alike scurrying to and fro. She didn’t hear the words he spoke however, for she was more concerned about being seen than anything else.

It was too dangerous for them to stay, for they would surely have been found as Tyran’s underlings spread out.

And so, most reluctantly, Marcii and Kaylm hastened away, parting ways yet again. They headed off in separate directions into the night, each of them all alone in the dark of fear and uncertainty.

Chapter Eleven

              Marcii was running. Her heart was racing. She panicked as she tore through the narrow confines of Newmarket’s streets.

              The air was cold in her lungs and against her face and her jacket whipped about her body wildly. By now, after all that she’d seen in such a short space of time, she was absolutely terrified.

              She didn’t know where to turn.

              Kaylm had been her last hope, and now even he had been torn away from her. She’d been so close: on the verge even of running away with him forever.

              And Vixen?

              What part was she playing in all of this, for she seemed to know much more than she should.

              Or, at least, much more than Marcii would have hoped for a girl so young.

              In her haste, her thoughts tumbling somehow even faster than her legs were carrying her, Marcii was barely paying attention as she tore through the streets and alleyways. She careered round corners almost blindly in the black of the night, tears streaming from her eyes.

              There were no streetlamps and most of the light by which she could just about see came from the flickering of candles in the windows of houses that lined either side of the streets.

              When she hit him, she hit him hard, for she was still running full speed. The collision threw the young Dougherty to the ground with force to be reckoned with.

              The man grunted heavily, doubling forward as Marcii crashed straight into his front.

              It took them both more than a few moments to recover, equally from the shock as from the pain of the impact.

              Marcii looked up fearfully as the man finally straightened himself up above her, looking down by the light from his nearby window.

              “Marcii?” He asked, confusion lacing his tone.

              It was Alexander.

              She sighed with heavy relief.

              “I’m so sorry.” She apologised immediately.

              “No, no, don’t worry…” He struggled at first, still catching his breath. “What are you doing here?” He asked her. “It’s late. Shouldn’t you be at home?”

              As he spoke he held out his hand and helped Marcii to her feet. But even in the poor light she could see that he looked flustered, and that his concern for her was merely a convenient cover.

              He glanced around for a moment, as if to confirm her very thoughts, and threw his gaze briefly back towards the house behind him. When he looked back to Marcii, only a second or so later, his eyes looked nervous, guilty even.

              What was he hiding?

              Had he been one of the priests she’d seen at the church?

              Had he slaughtered one of those cats and drawn upon his place of worship in the poor creature’s blood?

              She prayed not.

              Alexander had sounded so firmly against Tyran’s cruel rule only the other day; Marcii hoped to God that hadn’t changed.

              Or, perhaps, was it something worse than that?

              If he hadn’t been a part of that group, if he was resisting Tyran, had he made himself a target?

              Suddenly, before either of them could speak again, a rushing flurry of movement answered all of Marcii’s questions as once.

              The narrow, wooden door to Alexander’s home, the door that he had been so nervously glancing at, flung suddenly wide open. Within but a moment out bustled the figure of a woman who clearly looked as though she had no business being there.

              Actually, quite on the contrary, her being there was in fact her only business that night, but that was beside the point.

              She was skimpily dressed, wearing nothing but a short red dress and sharp high heeled shoes. It was clear even in the meagre light that her lashings of makeup had been hastily applied beneath her bleached hair. She clutched a few belongings to her almost bare chest, as if someone might at any moment rip them away from her. And her eyes, filled with the certainty of much experience, surveyed the sight of Alexander and Marcii before her with a level, calculating gaze.

              Alexander’s face dropped merely at the sight of her.

Though Marcii did not know his wife all that well, Alexander knew that the young Dougherty would recognise for certain that the skimpily dressed woman on his doorstep was most certainly not Mrs Freeman.

Without a word, seeing them and freezing for barely a moment, the blonde haired, underdressed whore barged past Marcii and took off down the street. All but fleeing from her night’s work, discretion was at least half the nature of her business and she feared being caught out by an angry wife more than most things.

Whilst her business was perhaps unsavoury, Marcii decided, it was not with the woman that the blame rested.

Her hard, reproachful eyes turned back to Alexander, her father’s dear friend, whom still had not moved. His gaze dropped to the floor beneath his feet in shame and he wore an expression that is more commonly seen on the faces of guilty children.

Now, it seemed, things were falling into place.

Alexander had had nothing to do with what she and Kaylm had seen at all, Marcii now realised.

He had been somewhat preoccupied with other matters…

Alexander saw the realisation in her eyes and panicked, not knowing what to say or do.

“Marcii…” He attempted, but faltered.

All words were futile.

He wasn’t a target.

He didn’t care about those who were.

He was more concerned about his affair.

Yet again though, Marcii was not granted the opportunity to reply. Another figure appeared from the night, though this time, fortunately for Alexander, from the opposite direction down the street to which the whore had fled.

“Alexander…?” A soft voice sounded from behind him, carrying her tone off through the cold night.

His wife appeared at his side and her expression changed from surprise to shock as she set her eyes upon Marcii, for she suspected, as most did nowadays, that terrible things happened in the dark of the night.

She didn’t know the half of it, clearly, and Alexander looked impossibly racked with guilt.

“Oh! Marcii!” His wife exclaimed slightly. “What are you doing out so late?”

For a moment Marcii didn’t answer, and instead she glanced between Alexander and his wife with eyes hard and piercing. For the life of her Marcii could not remember his wife’s name, but in that particular moment, that wasn’t really what was really troubling her.

Eventually though, sighing deeply, the young Dougherty relented, for just the same as anybody, she was not perfect herself.

It was not her place to condemn others, she decided.

“I’ve been running errands for my mother…I’m very late…I was just on my way home…” She half lied.

Fortunately, Alexander’s wife, whose name even still Marcii could not remember, did not see through her hastily constructed guise. Alexander looked on at her with grateful eyes filled with silent thanks.

Marcii’s returning gaze to him was not forgiving, for it was not her place to do that either, but she did not speak of what she’d seen.

“Well you should be getting home.” Alexander’s blissfully oblivious wife continued. She turned to her dear husband. “Why don’t you walk her home, Alexander?” She suggested.

But before he could reply, Marcii swiftly intervened, for the notion turned her stomach somewhat violently.

“No, no…” She declined hastily, smiling falsely. “Not to worry. I’ll be home in no time…”

“Well run along then dear.” Alexander’s wife ushered her, uncertainty evident in her voice. “This is no time to be walking the streets…”

And though her warning was of course genuine, she couldn’t possibly have known the full extent of the danger that lurked down the dark, dank alleyways.

None of them did.

How could they?

Marcii bade them both goodnight and took off at a dead run through the dark streets. Fear filled her every breath and a hundred and more thoughts tumbled through her mind.

This was all getting very out of hand.