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  And so the four of them disappeared through the door, first Sol, closely followed by Fen, Jedd and Elisabeth, all engulfed by the thick, non-transparent material.

  As soon as the four Cerbereans had departed, Kaden offered his condolences to Cecily.

  “I’m so sorry about Purdey, Cec. I know you two had your problems but she was still your mum.”

  Cecily dared not speak. She did not want to reveal her true feelings towards her mother. Problems? That was definitely an understatement. So she simply smiled at Kaden instead. Even in this bleak place between realms, Kaden could still make her smile. She remembered why they were friends. The white substance through the doorway began to move and shift, revealing Sol.

  “Let’s go!” he said, before disappearing once more.

  “Hold my hand and don’t let go,” Kaden told Cecily.

  “OK,” she replied, full of trepidation as to where this portal was going to lead her. As Kaden pulled her through the gateway, she took one last look at the foreboding rocky landscape and in her heart, wished for the beauty of Bramblegate.

  Chapter 23

  Cecily did not know what to think as she passed through the portal. She had to push hard through a thick, white, opaque, gel-like substance which appeared to stick in between every orifice. She held on tight to Kaden’s hand, fearing that if she lost it, she would be congealed in this gelatinous substance forever. It seemed to take them quite a while to push their way through, although in reality, it was probably only a minute or two. She was just beginning to feel claustrophobic, like the gel might suffocate her, when she felt fresh air on her face and immense relief. However, this feeling did not last as then she was falling. Before she knew what had happened, she had hit the ground in a crumpled heap. She looked around and saw that Kaden had landed skilfully on his feet in the same crouching position as that of a big cat ready to pounce. All eyes were now on Cecily as she was patting herself down, not only to check if she was alright, but also to see if the sticky substance she had just passed through had left its mark. Miraculously, she was bone dry and when she looked up, so seemed her friends. Unfortunately, they could not disguise their amusement.

  “What happened?” questioned Cecily, who had not yet managed to pick herself up off the floor.

  “The portal exit is there,” laughed Sol pointing upwards.

  However, when Cecily looked up, she could see nothing. Fen must have seen by the look on Cecily’s face that she did not understand, so she kindly explained.

  “The portal exit is just there, Cec, in the air beside that tree.”

  Fen was pointing upwards, just as Sol had done.

  “I can’t see anything!” said a puzzled Cecily.

  “You are not meant to see it. We wouldn’t want just anyone to happen upon it, it would cause too many questions.”

  “But why can’t I see it?” asked Cecily, matter-of-factly, thinking of the door she had just passed through in the other realm.

  “It’s just a tear, a small rip in the fabric of our atmosphere. You will only see it if something pushes out of it,” explained Fen.

  “Ah, OK,” said Cecily, not altogether sure she understood exactly what they were talking about. “And what was that sticky stuff?”

  “The sticky stuff is the gel that holds the realms together. Disgusting, isn’t it?”

  Cecily agreed with Fen as she hauled herself to her feet.

  “I wonder why portal doors come in pairs?” she pondered. “I mean, doors open from both sides. It seems silly to have separate doorways to the same place.”

  Kaden was quick to respond to her musings. “Most people aren’t even aware other realms exist, Cec. We can’t have revolving doors between them, it’s unsafe. Think of the entrances and exits like one-way streets.”

  Cecily said nothing. She was so tired. She wondered if the others were getting sick of having to explain things to her. At least she could supply their entertainment. Kaden quickly reminded them of the situation.

  “We need to go,” he said, soberly.

  “Where are we going?” enquired Elisabeth.

  “Let’s not discuss it here,” replied Kaden. “We don’t know who is listening. Has everyone got their powers back?”

  Cecily watched as Fen, Sol and Elisabeth reached behind them to grab the hilts of their invisible swords, well, invisible until they needed to use them. Then they appeared out of nowhere, big and powerful accompanied by bright, white light. When they all smiled, Cecily took it they were back at full strength. Sol even flexed his muscles for good measure. When she turned to look at Kaden and Jedd, Jedd was sliding his sword back in place and Kaden’s hands were glowing an icy blue. Cecily still found it difficult to accept her childhood friends as they were now.

  “Right, let’s go,” said Kaden, leading the way through the trees.

  Cecily knew they were in Bramblegate Woods. She would have recognised them anywhere, although at the moment, she was a bit disorientated and she wondered in which direction they were heading. The others were light and nimble, dancing over exposed tree roots and shrubbery. It was a beautiful warm, sunny day and Cecily felt she would rather be enjoying the woods; however, she had to make a real effort with her footing and watch it carefully. She thought that just by herself, she sounded like a herd of elephants. As well as trying to be light on her feet, she was also attempting to look from side to side for any imminent signs of danger in the form of those dreadful shadow beasts she so despised, but she was sure the others had undertaken that task as once again, she was sandwiched between her friends just in case they were ambushed.

  They must have come through the portal in the north of the woods, as now they had arrived at the gravel track that led from Bramblegate down into the dell. Instead of taking the path, they crossed it carefully back into the protection of the woods again. Cecily knew they were heading down into the dell, only she did not want to ask why. The thought of seeing her childhood home made her sick to the stomach. It was the location of so much pain in recent years that she now knew was caused by Purdey and the cottage was also the scene of her horrific downfall. She tried to put it to the back of her mind and concentrate on her footing as they continued the walk down into the dell. She was again very aware of how much she must be slowing the others down.

  When they got to the dell, they entered behind Kaden’s cottage. Cecily’s thoughts wandered to Kaden’s stepfather and she wondered if he was OK. Kaden, however, did not even give his childhood home a second glance and he carried on walking in the direction of the Fanes’ cottage. Both Cecily and Kaden knew the Fanes well as they had all shared the dell over the years. No one else tended to go down there unless it was purposely to visit one of its residents.

  Cecily was surprised when the group made their way around the back of the Fanes’, through the picket fence and into the small, well-kept garden. Kaden strode up to the back door and knocked. After a minute or two, the door creaked open, seemingly of its own accord, revealing no one to be stood there. Suddenly, Mr Fane appeared from above, dropping to the floor whilst coming out of a very spritely back flip, making Cecily jump out of her skin. She was so surprised at what she had just witnessed, she could not speak. She was thinking where he could have come from and the only answer she could come up with was that he had been clinging to the top of the door frame.

  Before she had more time to consider Mr Fane, she heard a click behind her and a voice saying, “Don’t move an inch.” The group slowly turned their heads to see who was threatening them and Cecily could hardly believe her eyes. There stood Mrs Fane, holding a crossbow poised with a very sharp arrow, pointing directly at them. Mrs Fane must have gone out of the front door and around the back to surprise them. As Cecily turned back to look at Mr Fane, she realised that he too was holding a crossbow and arrow that had them marked. Cecily automatically raised her hands to show she posed no threat and looking at the others, she saw that they had done the same.

  “Identify yourselves!” said Mr Fane,
sharply. “Careful now,” he added as Kaden stepped forward.

  “My name is Stellan.”

  Cecily was puzzled as to why Kaden was using this strange name.

  “Show me!” said Mr Fane in the same sharp tone.

  Although Kaden’s back was facing Cecily, she could see the ice blue glow emanating from his person.

  Mr Fane maintained his emotionless face and simply said, “Next!” One by one her friends stepped forward, introducing themselves by names Cecily had not heard before. Fen introduced herself as Amira, while Elisabeth said she was Toril. Sol said his name was Breccan and Jedd, Inigo. But this peculiar system of identification did not stop there. After they had said their names, each of her warrior friends reached behind their heads to the top of their backs, where the hilts of their swords could be found and Cecily heard the unmistakable sound of sizzling flesh. Cecily managed to peer over Fen’s shoulder as she was standing close to her. What she saw was that the sword had made a brand on the palm of her hand which disappeared as quickly as it had made its mark. Cecily tried to see what the brand was, but it disappeared in an instant.

  When all of her friends had undergone the same process and identified themselves satisfactorily, it was Cecily’s turn. She looked helplessly at Kaden, who simply nodded his head in suggestion that she should step forward. Cecily found herself stood in front of Mr Fane, looking down the arrow of his cross bow.

  “Well, what are you waiting for?” said Mr Fane, impatiently.

  “My name is… Cecily Stalks,” ventured Cecily, hesitantly.

  Mr Fane immediately looked to Kaden. “She doesn’t remember?” Kaden simply frowned and shook his head.

  Mr Fane began to fire a series of questions at Cecily, whilst shining an unusually bright torch in her eyes that he had just acquired from the kitchen table.

  “Where did I use to take you in the summer holidays?”

  “You used to take me to work with you if Mum and Dad were busy.”

  “Where?”

  “Well, the gardens at Bramble Hall, of course!” She was looking incredulously at Kaden.

  “What was your father’s middle name?”

  “John.”

  “Named after who?”

  “His Uncle John. He was my dad’s favourite,” she added.

  “What was the last thing your father said to you?”

  This question caught Cecily off guard and she had to think for a moment. She had to return to memories that were painful.

  “To beware of the dark. To beware of the dark and always trust in the light.”

  It was like a penny had dropped and she was sure the realisation was clear on her face.

  “He was trying to warn me! Did he know he was…” she hesitated, “… going to die?”

  “Aye, lass,” replied Mr Fane in his broad Lancashire accent. “He had an idea. I saw him on the afternoon of that terrible day. He told me his fears and what you’d talked about. Of course, I had no idea it would happen so soon…”

  Mr Fane’s voice trailed off and there was sadness in his eyes as he looked at Cecily. He turned to the others and said, “You’d better come in.”

  “Thanks, Abram…” began Kaden.

  “Use some of that magic of yours to ensure we are not being overheard, lad,” he interrupted.

  Kaden obliging began to murmur and wave his hands around, which were glowing their pale, icy blue colour. Cecily presumed he was shielding the cottage.

  When Mr Fane was again satisfied, he made his way into the living room, beckoning everyone to follow him. He shouted back in the direction of the kitchen, “Verena, put the kettle on!”

  “Yes, dear!” called back Mrs Fane obediently.

  Kaden continued, “We need your help, Abram. We need to know what has been happening while we’ve been gone.”

  “Gone? I thought you might have been lying low, but gone?”

  “Yes, gone, Abram. I’ll explain in a moment. What date is it?”

  “The eighth of June, lad,” replied a puzzled Mr Fane.

  Kaden breathed a sigh of relief.

  “Well at least that is one piece of good news,” he said to his companions. “The passage of time seems to be the same between realms as here on the Earth plane. That means we have not lost too much time. We’ve only been gone a day.”

  Cecily was really confused. “What do you mean, the passage of time is the same? Should it be different?”

  “In the Realm of Dark, time goes much slower than here on Earth,” explained Kaden. “I suppose more time to fit in all that torture and pain. That is the point of it.”

  Cecily flinched at the mention of torture and pain as that was what Purdey must now be experiencing. Kaden gave her an apologetic look and carried on.

  “In the Realm of Light, time goes really fast. One human lifetime is but the blink of an eye to those in the Light.”

  Cecily accepted what Kaden said by nodding her head. She found she was now accepting the weird things her friends told her as the everyday norm.

  “Between realms you say, lad? I would like to know more about that!” piped up Mr Fane.

  Kaden explained to Mr and Mrs Fane all that had happened from the balcony at the party, to their defeat and capture and finally about how they escaped. Cecily noticed how kind Kaden was about Jedd’s deception, never blaming or fully implicating him in any way.

  “So that is the story of our adventure,” Kaden concluded. “Now we need to know what is happening here. Have you been watching?”

  “Well that is our job, young Kaden!” said Mrs Fane in consternation, as if Kaden was implying that they were not doing what they were supposed to be doing.

  Cecily felt that she had another question to ask about their job, but she realised that now was not the time.

  “We didn’t go to the party of course,” began Mr Fane. “We are too old for all that now, but like you, we had a feeling something was off. We weren’t surprised when we heard the commotion coming from Bramble Hall, especially on the night of the village party. It reminded me of last time…” Mr Fane’s words again trailed off and he appeared to be somewhere else. Mrs Fane brought him back to the present.

  “The screams were so loud that we could hear them down here in the dell, a mile away!”

  Mr Fane continued. “We got our things and headed straight up there. We kept to the trees and saw the last of the guests escaping down the driveway to the village. We made our way up to the house and had a look through the windows of the Great Hall. We saw bodies lying everywhere, being devoured by those disgusting shadow beasts. Then we saw him, Dasrus, bold as brass and true to his natural form, coming down the staircase with the two young Cerbereans there (he pointed at Jedd and Elisabeth for good measure). We hid in the grounds of the manor for a long time. After Dasrus had gone, the shadow beasts took their time in feeding on their victims; very upsetting knowing that nothing could be done for them. They were long dead. Let’s just hope their souls passed to the Light.

  Eventually those hell monsters melted into the shadows. Verena and I waited a little while longer to make sure they weren’t coming back. We were severely outnumbered. When we were pretty sure they had gone for good, we entered Bramble Hall through one of the windows in the dining room that had been left open. It was eerily silent. As you’d expect, there were no bodies to be seen. Those bottom feeder cretins eat more than flesh. They guzzle bone too. And clothes don’t seem to bother them either. We poked around the dining room and Great Hall. All we saw was blood spatter on walls and bits of shredded clothing. The furniture was upturned and it was full of broken things, like crockery, glasses, mirrors, ornaments and such. It looked like a burglary gone wrong. However, not a body to be seen, just bloodstains, evidence of a heinous crime.

  The parlour and drawing room were locked. We looked through the windows on our way out and they appeared untouched. We had a look around upstairs but there was no evidence anything had happened there. It looked like most of the guests tried to es
cape out of the front door or windows downstairs, rather than hiding in the building.”

  “I don’t blame them,” said Kaden, interrupting Mr Fane’s account. “I wanted to be as far away as possible from Bramble Hall too. We were among the first to get out and even then, the crowd was bottlenecked at the main entrance. We should have stayed to help.”

  “You’d have stood no chance, lad. The amount of those things in there pitted against three of you, whilst you were trying to protect Cecily? You did the right thing. As it was, Dasrus and his agents caught up with you anyway.”

  Kaden shrugged his shoulders and Mr Fane continued to recount his tale.

  “We had a poke around the kitchen, but there was no one about. As far as we could tell, the place was empty.”

  “What about the chapel?” asked Kaden.

  “The door was unlocked so we had a quick look round, but as Abram said, the place was deserted,” replied Mrs Fane. “Not a soul in sight, so we made our way home. It was coming up dawn before we left.”

  “What about yesterday? Did you go up to the village?” questioned Kaden.

  “No, we didn’t. Thought it best to stay away. We didn’t want people to think we were sticking our noses in. As soon as we got home yesterday morning, we alerted the authorities and they dealt with the fall out.”

  “The authorities?” queried Cecily. “What on earth are they going to do about this? They aren’t a match for Dasrus and his hell beasts and even if they were, who is going to believe what actually happened at Bramble Hall? How can we explain a massacre with a load of missing people, yet no bodies?” She looked round imploringly at her friends in an attempt to rally some support.

  “Not human authorities,” said Kaden, quietly. She got the impression that he was trying not to appear patronising. “Agents of the Light. I suppose the best way to describe them are as angels. That’s who humans think they are.”

  “Angels?” Cecily took a moment. “What can they do? If I were regular Joe Bloggs at that party and I’d witnessed either my mother, wife, sister or daughter cut down and eaten by one of those monsters and I was lucky enough to escape, the first thing I’d have done was call the police. I would have wanted help, back-up, an explanation as to what was happening. The police would never believe what regular Joe Bloggs and the rest of the people said they saw. Sure, they could test DNA from the blood spatter, but they would never find the bodies because they have been eaten by demons. Then the police would think the villagers were conspiring. The murders would be pinned on innocent people!” Cecily was aware that she was running away with herself, but she had thought about this. “And how am I going to explain my mother’s death?”