Gallows at Twilight (14 page)

Jake stood up. Blue light—darker this time—crackled once more in his hand …

‘JAKE! Are you down there?’

The magic vanished. Jake blinked, as if coming out of a dream.

‘Brag? Is that you?’

The troll’s head craned over the pit.

‘Your dad sent me to find you!’ Brag shouted. ‘Something’s happened. Something bad.’

By the time they had lifted him out of the pit, Simon had changed back to his human form. Jake’s magical blast had burned the flesh around his ribs, but he was otherwise unharmed. Both he and Rachel were still unconscious and so had to be carried back to the Grimoire Club. With Simon slung over his shoulder, Brag held the door open for Jake.

The club seemed unnaturally quiet. Usually there was laughter, the babble of conversation, even the odd scream echoing down the corridors.

‘Where is everyone?’

‘In the bar watching the TV,’ Brag grunted, kicking the door shut.

‘
All
of them? What’s going on?’

‘You’ll see for yourself soon enough.’

With Rachel in his arms, Jake hurried along the hall. Her soft breath sighed against his neck and he felt the prickle of tears. If he had lost her …

‘Found ’em!’ Brag bellowed.

Pandora opened the apartment door. Her gaze passed from Simon to Jake before coming to rest on Rachel’s wounded face. Concern flashed in those intelligent eyes.

‘He changed?’

Jake nodded, and Pandora lifted Rachel out of his arms.

‘We’ll have to talk about this later,’ she said. ‘Your father’s waiting.’

Jake found his dad hobbling back and forth across the lounge. Adam’s eyes darted between the television and the phone. He gnawed at a hangnail and ran fingers through his thin grey hair. Jake’s breath caught in his chest—was this old man really his father?

Adam caught sight of Jake and a mixture of relief and anger muddled his features. Brag and Pandora carried Simon and Rachel into the lounge and laid them on the sofa.

‘What’s happened? Where have you been?’ Adam demanded. He shuffled over to his son and caught Jake in a rough hug. ‘Are you all right?’

Jake explained what had happened in a few short sentences. The only thing he kept back was his reason for visiting the Oracle. If he spoke about the cure then he would have to break his promise to Pandora.

‘Prophecies,’ Adam muttered. ‘Tonight they’re coming true. Remember what Simon told us during his hypnosis? “Dark powers are gathering, drawn together by the Demon Father.” Now we know the meaning of those words. He has assembled a universal coven.’

‘A what?’

‘A brotherhood of witches drawn from across the globe. I believe that’s what the symbol meant. After he had visited them, the coven would display his trident as a mark of allegiance. Tonight this universal coven had their first meeting.’

Adam gestured towards the TV. It showed a grainy picture of a huge cloud gathered over Wembley Stadium.

‘That was where they received their first orders.’

Jake’s mouth ran dry.

‘What orders?’

Adam switched to another news channel.

‘Orders to kill.’

Flashing blue lights. Ambulance sirens. A reporter standing in front of a police cordon, her voice jittery with excitement and horror. Paramedics raced through mountains of rubble, the dead and dying in their arms. Great plumes of fire billowed against the night sky. And there, in the background of the shot, an inferno raging in the shattered heart of Hobarron Tower. It was like a vision of hell.

Rachel stirred. She glanced between frightened faces before focusing on the TV.

‘My dad … ’

The reporter handed back to the studio. The anchorman shuffled his papers.

‘Horrific scenes of what is believed to have been a terrorist assault on the headquarters of the Hobarron Institute. Staggering news is reaching us that another site has also been attacked. The birthplace of Dr Gordon Holmwood has been devastated by a separate but equally lethal onslaught. The little village of Hobarron’s Hollow … ’

Pictures flashed onscreen: burning cottages, the old church on the hillside smashed to rubble, Holmwood Manor ablaze.

Jake went to the phone.

‘Eddie,’ he croaked.

Adam took the receiver from his hand.

‘I can’t get through to anyone. Not Dr Holmwood nor Malcolm Saxby.’ His gaze flitted to a distraught Rachel. ‘Mildred Rice isn’t picking up either. None of the Elders are.’

The anchorman was back onscreen.

‘We pass now to Downing Street where the Prime Minister is due to make a statement.’

The picture flipped to show that famous front door. A podium had been set up outside Number 10 and the Prime Minister had taken her place behind it. She looked tired but very serious. Miss Cynthia Croft stared directly into the camera while flash bulbs went off all around her. Perhaps frightened by the late-night hubbub, Miss Croft’s cat, Chequers, mewled at her feet.

‘Good evening, ladies and gentlemen,’ she began. ‘I want to begin by telling you that this outrage perpetrated against the Hobarron Institute and the people of Hobarron’s Hollow will
not
stand.’

A low growl rumbled in Simon’s throat. Without a second’s hesitation, Rachel went to him and cradled his head in her lap. The eyes of the others never left the TV screen.

‘As yet, we have no intelligence about who might have committed these hideous crimes, but rest assured, people of Britain, we
will
find them.’ Cynthia Croft’s tone hardened. ‘We will hunt them down. We will punish them. To that, I have sworn.’

A reporter called out from the crowd:

‘Prime Minister, there has been talk of
creatures
falling from the sky. Eyewitnesses have reported seeing, well, witches. Witches and demons.’

Nervous laughter from the press, followed by a long pause.

Miss Croft did not smile.

‘We live in a grown-up world, ladies and gentlemen. A grown-up world with grown-up terrors. Fictitious monsters need not concern us.’

Adam switched off the TV. As soon as the screen blipped to black, the phone rang.

‘Adam Harker speaking … Yes. Yes, I understand. Of course, we will be there as soon as possible. Goodnight.’

Adam replaced the receiver. He shook his head and glanced back at the others.

‘We’ve been summoned home.’

Chapter 12

Evil Unleashed

The sun’s first rays had just yawned over the horizon when Dr Harker’s Volkswagen left the outskirts of New Town. The car trundled along the road and kicked up the soft ash that had settled on the tarmac. Blown out half a mile from Hobarron Tower, pebbles of glass crunched under the car’s tyres. Jake stared ahead, unable to believe what his eyes showed him. The once majestic tower was gone. In its place, a confusion of jagged glass and twisted metal stabbed at the bleeding sky.

Jake reached onto the back seat and shook the sleeping girl. Rachel blinked swollen eyes.

‘We’re here.’

There were holes in the security fence large enough to drive a bus through. The cameras had been smashed to smithereens and the cabin at the gate was now a burned out shell.

‘My God,’ Rachel whispered.

A man in military uniform waved them to the gate. Adam wound down his window and handed over three passports.

‘Dr Adam Harker, Jacob Harker, and Miss Rachel Saxby. We’re expected.’

The soldier scrutinized their faces and checked the names against the paperwork on his clipboard.

‘Please drive on through to the plaza, Dr Harker,’ he said, handing back the ID documents.

‘Just a minute.’ Jake couldn’t take his eyes off the black-walled security hut. ‘Brett Enfield—he was a friend of mine. Was he hurt?’

The soldier ran his finger down a long list. He found the name and tapped the clipboard.

‘Brett Patrick Enfield. I’m sorry, your friend died in the assault. He fell right where I’m standing.’

All those silly jokes and games he and Brett had enjoyed over the years came back to Jake. The open, honest-faced guard had been a fixture of his childhood. A good man. In his mind, Jake saw him again, slumped in his seat in the cabin, head in a newspaper.

Afternoon, fella! How was school?

Steam from burst water pipes covered the plaza in a white fog. Somewhere inside the fog, lights strobed on and off — blue-black, blue-black, blue-black—a shivery, nightmarish flicker. Adam parked and they got out of the car. Colossal shadows cast by slabs of masonry and melted girders loomed through the mist. Giant cracks splintered the ground.

Something caught Jake’s eye and he raced across the plaza. Adam and Rachel followed. They found him standing over crumbs of white stone, some so tiny they were little bigger than baby teeth. He picked up one of the larger pieces and showed it to them—

‘Olivia Brown’s memorial,’ he said. ‘They destroyed it.’

A voice called out:

‘A little girl who was murdered by a witch and a demon. I wonder how many more must die?’

Dr Gordon Holmwood emerged from the mist.

The leader of the Hobarron Elders was very much as Jake remembered him. In fact, despite his spindly legs and rotting yellow teeth, Dr Holmwood didn’t look much older than Adam Harker, a man almost half his age. The doctor held a cigarette between his nicotine-stained fingers. He drew on it with all the hunger of a drowning man sucking down his last lungful of air.

The small, dark-haired boy standing next to Holmwood took one look at Jake and rushed over. Rachel and the Harkers took turns in hugging the kid.

‘It’s good to see you, Eddie,’ Adam said, ruffling his long locks. ‘Growing your hair like Jake, eh?’

The boy blushed.

‘Is your mum OK?’

‘We hid in the cellar,’ Eddie nodded. ‘I remembered reading something in one of my old horror comics—
Crypt of Fear
, I think it was—that if there’s an earthquake you should shelter under an arch or in a doorway. The cellar at the Manor has an arched roof so … ’

‘Horror comics save the day again,’ Jake smiled.

Eddie’s own smile was short-lived. ‘Lots of Hollow people didn’t make it. There were bodies in the streets. People I’d known since I was little.’

Adam glanced at Holmwood. ‘My sister?’

‘Joanna survived.’

Jake hugged Eddie close.

Meanwhile, Rachel was staring at the man on Dr Holmwood’s right. Malcolm Saxby came forward and held out his arms to his daughter.

‘I’m glad you’re alive,’ Rachel said, trying to hide the throb of emotion in her voice. ‘But nothing’s changed. You understand? You are
not
my father.’

Dr Saxby winced, lowered his hands, and slunk off into the mist.

‘Rachel, why don’t you and Eddie get some breakfast,’ Dr Holmwood said. ‘There’s a canteen set up by the gate. The Harkers and I need to talk.’

‘Rachel stays,’ Jake insisted.

‘It’s all right,’ Rachel said. ‘I could do with a breath of fresh air. Come on, Edster.’

They walked away, arm in arm.

Knees cracking, Holmwood sat down heavily on a chunk of cement. Under the shadow of his shattered dream, the doctor sighed.

‘Perhaps I should have listened to you, Jake. When you spoke with the Witchfinder’s voice, perhaps I should have taken heed. Closed down the Institute, disbanded the Elders. If I had, maybe this would never have happened.’

‘You were ancient enemies,’ Jake said. ‘I think the Demon Father would have come after the Elders, Institute or not.’

‘It’s very kind of you to ease an old man’s conscience.’

‘It’s not kindness. You’ll always have your share of blame, Dr Holmwood.’

‘You’re wise beyond your years, Jake. I always said so.’ The doctor drew deeply on his cigarette. ‘The truth is, I kept the Institute running because I thought we could continue the fight against demonkind. I was wrong. The power of this place was always in the connections I made with governments and the wealthy people who funded us. But ever since that woman was elected—’

‘Cynthia Croft?’ Adam asked. ‘The new PM?’

‘I’ve had private meetings with her. She’s a practical woman—studied chemistry at university—the sort who will only believe in something if it can be quantified, measured, analysed. She doesn’t credit all this “demon nonsense”. Her words. Since that meeting, our connections in the police and military have dried up. Our supporters have fallen away. Even before this attack, the Hobarron Institute was a spent force.’

‘But you still had the defences,’ Adam said. ‘The tower, the Hollow, both were protected by magical charms. How did the Demon Father get through?’

‘He had over a hundred witches in his army!’ Holmwood laughed bitterly. ‘A universal coven. He smashed through our defences within seconds. And now … ’

The doctor watched Jake through hooded eyes.

‘Now he has even greater numbers at his command.’

‘Oh God.’ Adam stood up. What little colour he had drained from his face. ‘It never occurred to me … But if that’s true then we’re finished!’

‘What is it?’ Jake asked. His dad’s panic was infectious.

‘Your father told me what the Lydgate boy said under hypnosis.’ Holmwood flicked the stub of his cigarette into the mist. ‘
They will fall like fire from the sky. At their touch, fortresses will burn, prison walls will quake and crumble.
This tower was that fortress. These were those prison walls.’