Blue Moon (Book One in The Blue Crystal Trilogy) (31 page)

If I thought it was over with
Theo, I was wrong. He found me at break time, when I was putting
some books into my locker.

“Emily,” he said, standing
behind me and I froze. I’d forgotten the effect his voice and his
presence had on me.

“What?” I said, afraid to turn
round and look into his eyes. If I gazed into those deep pools of
blue, I wasn't sure I could control my emotions. Mentally, I put a
force field around my body, trying to ward his energy away from
me.

“Emily, don’t close me out,” he
begged. “We need to talk. Please turn round.”

He sounded so sad and forlorn,
I wavered. “Turn around,” he pleaded again.

I strengthened my resolve and
spoke without turning. “I’ve got nothing to say to you, Theo. You
told me an elaborate story and expected me to believe it, then when
the chance came for you to prove it, you wouldn’t do it. So what am
I supposed to believe? I don’t want to look at you and I don’t want
to see you any more.”

“Emily, I tried to tell you…’
he began, but I interrupted him.

“Theo, my Granddad is dead. If
you and your family have the powers you say you do, you could have
saved him. But you didn’t.”

“Couldn’t, Emily, couldn’t. I
tried to explain.”

“So you couldn’t help my
Granddad, but you could help all those old folk at the Blue Moon
Ball?” I turned suddenly, my anger getting too much.

If anything, he looked more
beautiful than ever. I yearned to touch his smooth, perfect skin,
gaze into his troubled blue eyes and feel his soft, sensuous lips
on mine. The attraction between us was almost too great. I steeled
myself and resisted the temptation to fall into his arms.

“The Blue Moon Ball was
different,” he said. “Look, we can’t discuss this here. There are
too many people. And it’s all too complicated. Meet me later? Give
me a chance to explain properly?”

I stared at him, trying
desperately to control my emotions.

“You’re not listening to me,
Theo. It’s over. I don’t want to see you any more. Please leave me
alone.” I turned back to my locker and continued taking out my
books.

I felt his face close to the
back of my head and heard him say, “For now, Emily, but it’s not
over. You know it.”

At lunchtime, he found me
again. Seth was at rugby practice and Tash had a dental
appointment, so I sat in the far corner of the cafeteria feeling
alone and vulnerable. It was inevitable he would seek me out. As I
sat, pushing the food around my plate, without any appetite, he
slid on to the chair opposite me before I realised it.

“Theo, I’ve told you…..” I
started to say, but he interrupted.

“Emily, listen to me. You have
to let me explain properly. You owe me that at least.”

“You’re not going to let this
go, are you?” I said wearily.

“No, I’m not, so you might as
well let me have my say.”

“Okay, go on then.”

“Not here, it’s too
public.”

“I’m not going anywhere, Theo.
It’s here or nowhere, take your pick.”

He grinned at me. “You can be
very forceful when you want, Emily, your energy is very
strong.”

“I thought you were going to
give me an explanation,” I said coldly.

“I am.” He looked at me
earnestly. “Emily, what were the last words your Granddad said to
you? Think clearly.”

His words took me by surprise
and I faltered. “That’s none of your business.”

“Did he say he wanted to live
forever?” persisted Theo.

“No,” I had to admit, “he
didn’t.”

“What did he say? Emily, this
is important.”

I remembered back to that
afternoon in the hospital. “He said he’d had a good, long life and
although he hated to leave us behind, he didn't want to go on for
eternity. He said there was a time for birth and a time for death.
The natural order. That’s how things were meant to be.” The tears
were starting to stream down my cheeks. “He said he was going to
see my Grandma.” My voice was little more than a whisper. “He told
me to remember that.”

“You see, Emily, your Granddad
didn’t want saving. He understood the natural order. He knew it was
his time to go.” Theo spoke kindly.

“No,” I said, through my tears,
“it was too soon. I didn't want him to go.”

“I know,” said Theo. “Death is
never easy to accept, but sometimes we have to.”

“What do you know about death?”
I asked him angrily. “Haven’t you and your family managed to cheat
it for thousands of years? How could you possibly know what I’m
going through?”

“Death is a constant fear for
us, Emily, and it doesn’t happen naturally,” he replied. “Ours is
one of rapid ageing and decay, as you saw with our unfortunate
guest. Can you imagine how it feels for your skin, your organs and
your senses to shrivel to nothing within minutes? For your hair to
thin, your teeth to fall out and your body to fail in less time
than it takes to walk across a room? There’s no slowing up, no
gradual descent into old age for us. It hits us full in the face,
like being hurled off a precipice.” He laughed scornfully. “That’s
the threat hanging over us and that’s the price we have to pay for
eternal youth. Which is why I don't want it for you.”

“But what about your guests at
the Blue Moon Ball?” I asked. “They were old and yet you made them
young.”

“I know that’s how it looked,
Emily, but the truth is, they were young when they were first
initiated, and that’s the age they’ll remain, frozen in time for
eternity.”

“But they were old when I saw
them,” I persisted.

“That’s because every three
years, their life force begins to ebb away and the accelerated
ageing process kicks in. The only way to reverse it is to bathe in
the light of the crystal at the time of the Blue Moon. It’s the
only way we can recharge our energy and rejuvenate. If we don’t,”
he faltered, “well, you saw what happens.”

“You say ‘we’, Theo,” my voice
was a whisper. “That means you as well.”

As much as I didn’t want to
hear it, I had to know the truth.

“Yes,” he said reluctantly,
“yes, I had started to age, which was one of the reasons I couldn’t
see you. I couldn’t bear for you to see me looking like that.”

“Oh, Theo,” I said softly.

“Now, perhaps you can see why
I’m so confused about everything,” he said sadly. His eyes were
full of pain and love and emotions I could barely understand. “This
is not the life I want for you. I love you, Emily, and I want to be
with you, but, more than anything, I want you to have an ordinary,
happy, normal life.”

I stared at him, not knowing
what to say.

“And you have to believe me,
Emily, there was truly nothing I could do to save your Granddad.
Sometimes, you just have to let go.”

I looked down. “It hurts, Theo,
more than I ever imagined. I’ve never lost anyone before. Well, my
dad, perhaps, but that’s different. I lost him to another country
and another family, not to death. It’s just so final. And I feel so
alone.”

“But you’re not, Emily, you
have your mum, you have your friends, and you have me.”

“Do I?” I asked, “You come from
a strange world, Theo, one that you don’t want me to belong to.
What future could we possibly have?”

“I don’t know, Emily,” he said
sadly. “I only know that I need to be with you. I don’t want to
lose you. I love you, Emily, so much. If you only knew….”

I put my hand on his and
squeezed it.

“I do,” I said. “My granddad
said we went well together. But can’t you see how much I’ve had to
take in over the past few weeks? I still don’t know if I believe
all you’ve told me, it sounds so far-fetched. And, by the way, I
found my phone. I hadn’t dropped it at Hartswell Hall. It was in
the pocket of the blue cloak you lent me. So, there’s no way The
Lunari can know about me. There’s nothing to link me to the Blue
Moon Ball. That is, supposing The Lunari actually exist. Don’t you
see, Theo?”

“It doesn’t matter, Emily,” he
said slowly. “I’m glad you didn’t drop your phone at the Hall. It
makes life marginally simpler. But don’t you see? Pantera and
Aquila know about you. At the moment, two things stand in your
favour. Firstly, they don’t know that I’ve told you the truth, and,
secondly, for the moment, they’re obeying Viyesha and not telling
The Lunari about you. But that could change at any moment.”

“What do you mean?” I
asked.

“I mean, the hotel opens for
business this weekend, and The Lunari are coming to visit. They’ll
be here in Hartswell-on-the-Hill and The Guardians will have no
option but to tell them about you.”

I looked at him wildly.

“So, I have less than a week,”
I said in horror. “Everything changes in days?”

“Yes,” said Theo sadly. “We
have just days to decide what to do.”

27
. Attack I

Grace Wisterley took her
evening constitutional as usual, walking through the fields where
her sheep stood grazing, then cutting back through Hartswell Hall
grounds, and on to the gravelled driveway that led to the High
Street.

She intended to call in on Tom
Mastock for a nightcap, as she often did, finding a drop of his
Jamieson’s whisky sent her off to sleep a treat when she returned
home. But on this occasion, she never made it beyond Hartswell
Hall’s driveway. She’d been feeling out of sorts for a few days now
and wondered if she was sickening for something. Her head ached
permanently, her mouth was dry and her back was playing up
something rotten. She’d even developed a stoop in the last few
days.

“
Don’t know what’s up wi’
me,” she’d said to her daughter on the phone. “I’ve no energy to do
‘owt. All I want to do is sleep or eat.”

“
You can’t be feeling too
bad if your appetite is good,” her daughter had pointed
out.

“
It’s better than good, it’s
insatiable,” she’d laughed.

And indeed it was. Whatever she
ate, she simply couldn’t get enough of it. The shepherd’s pie that
would normally last for three days was gone within minutes,
shovelled down as if it were her last meal. She’d eaten a whole
roast chicken, too hungry to wait until she’d carved it, tearing
off great chunks of meat with her teeth and not stopping until it
was all gone, bones and all. Then she’d gone to the butchers’ and
bought as much red meat as she could carry, staggering home with a
variety of steaks, minced meat, cutlets, liver and kidneys, not
even waiting until she arrived home before she started to eat it
raw, the blood dripping down her chin.

But no matter how much she ate
and how much she slept – and she found herself dozing off all the
time – she couldn’t shake this feeling of bone-weary tiredness. Her
limbs felt heavy and cumbersome, her energy levels were at an all
time low, and her back had hunched alarmingly.

“
It’s almost as if I’m
carrying a huge weight on my back,” she’d told Tom Mastock.
“Something’s draining my energy, and no matter how much I eat, I’m
permanently exhausted. I don’t think much o’ this getting old
malarkey.”

“
Pop in for a night cap on
your way back home,” he’d suggested. “That’ll make you feel
better.”

And that’s what she was about
to do, except she never made it.

One minute, she was walking
past Hartswell Hall, her feet crunching on the gravel, the next she
hit the deck, landing flat on her face, dead as a doornail, her
eyes staring straight ahead.

Silently, the black shadow on
her back disengaged itself, sliding on to the pathway, replenished
and recuperated. As it did so, the dead woman’s bent spine slowly
began to straighten as if the cares of the world were finally
leaving her now she was unable to carry them any longer.

The black shadow stretched up
into the air, blacker and more substantial than it had been for a
long time. Quickly, it assessed its bearings, realising it could
not have asked for a more convenient drop-off. Without a sound, it
glided towards Hartswell Hall, aiming for the great oak front door,
and flowing beneath it like a dark, deadly gas.

No one was in reception and it
continued on its way unheeded, flowing quickly and unnoticed up the
main stairway. The object of its desire was getting ever closer and
freedom was at last within its grasp.

28. Martha

Tash and Seth weren’t too
pleased when I told them I was back with Theo.

“I thought you said he was a
fantasist weirdo,” said Seth, “or is that what you’re into
nowadays?”

“Be careful, Emily,” said Tash.
“There’s something strange going on and even if you’re not in
danger, you could get hurt.”

“I’m okay, guys,” I said. “Just
forget all that stuff I told you. I was going through a funny phase
after Granddad died. I wasn’t thinking straight. Theo told me this
story to take my mind off things. I got muddled up and ended up
thinking he was telling me the truth. Turns out he was just trying
to make me feel better.”

“But what about the photos on
your phone?” persisted Tash. “What was all that about?”

“Oh, they were two separate
events,” I lied. “One was a celebrity look alike party and the
other was an old folks reunion, both held at Hartswell Hall. Sorry,
guys. I didn’t have a very good grip on reality after losing
Granddad. I didn’t know what was fantasy and what was fact.”

“Loony toony!” said Seth.
“People go on medication for less than that, Emily.”

“I know. I’m fine now. I’m over
it. Theo and I are good.”

It sounded odd and I knew it. I
could tell they weren’t convinced, but they kept their distance and
were coolly polite whenever they saw Theo. For the moment, an odd
sort of status quo existed. I knew Tash and Seth were watching and
waiting, and in a strange way I welcomed it, like having a safety
net in place. In truth, I was just glad to have Theo back in my
life, to be able to slip my hand into his, see his magical smile
and feel my energy levels rise whenever I was with him. He made me
feel good. Very good. But I also knew it couldn’t stay that way,
that something would have to change and the days were ticking
past.