Skinned (13 page)

‘Yes.' Callum answered for both of them.

Gran turned and looked her grandson in the eye.

‘OK,' she said. ‘Then I'll help you.'

Her words hung in the air for a moment, and Callum heard Melissa desperately trying to suppress a squeal of excitement. He remained quiet though – he knew there would be a catch.

‘On one condition,' Gran said. ‘You have to tell me exactly what's going on.'

Callum sighed. He wasn't even sure if triggering a vision would give them anything useful. And was it worth the risk of getting Gran involved, or having her interfere in whatever they decided to do to try and stop Black Annis and the Coven? He looked at his Gran, whose eyebrows were raised expectantly, and then over at Melissa. They were both waiting for an answer.

‘OK, OK,' he said finally. ‘But, Gran, if we tell you what it is, you have to promise not to try and interfere, or keep
me
from getting involved?'

Gran considered it for a long moment.

‘Fine,' she said at last.

Melissa's face burst into a grin, but Callum knew that he would have to be economical with the truth – maybe even bend it a little. As they all sat down at the table in the living room, Callum quickly explained that from some recent visions, he and Melissa had established that a demon witch, Black Annis, had crossed over from the Netherworld at the start of the Shadowing, and that there might be a plot by a human coven to involve the crone in a ritual sacrifice.
He studiously left out any mention of Jacob or Doom, remembering the Born Dead's warnings. Callum was certain, in any case, that now was definitely
not
the time to reveal that he'd been having chime child lessons from a ghost.

‘What exactly do you think these magicians plan to achieve by sacrificing Black Annis? Did your vision give any indication about that?' Gran asked, her brows knitted together with concern.

Callum and Melissa exchanged looks.

‘We, uh . . . we think that they're planning to widen one of the gaps in the Boundary,' Callum said grudgingly. He wasn't sure if revealing the gravity of the situation would help or hinder their case in getting Gran to assist them.

‘Widen it?' Gran said incredulously.

‘Yes,' Callum said grimly. ‘We think they might be planning to bring more – or bigger – demons across, and sooner than we were expecting. So we've got even less time to prepare than we thought.'

‘Oh my goodness,' Gran breathed.

‘Exactly,' Callum said wryly. ‘Melissa just thought
that, as things have gone quiet, if she could help me have one of my premonitions it might give us some clues about how to stop it.'

Callum waited, letting the idea sink in. He braced himself for Gran to freak out and tell him they were packing up and moving to Timbuktu, but she just sat for a moment, thinking.

‘Right,' Gran said at last. ‘Give me your hands.'

‘What?' Melissa replied, but Gran reached out and clasped her own hands around one of Melissa's and one of Callum's. She indicated that they should link hands too.

‘Doing something of this nature with magic will require a Three in any case,' Gran said. ‘You'd never have been able to do it properly on your own, Melissa. Such a thing requires control and focus.'

With nothing more than that, Gran closed her eyes and began to chant. Both Callum and Melissa stared at her dumbfounded for a moment before Callum saw Melissa follow suit and close her eyes as well. Soon Melissa began to repeat the strange phrase that his grandmother was saying over and over again.
They gripped Callum's hands tightly and after a moment, to his shock, Callum's palms began to tingle uncontrollably.

He stared at Melissa and Gran as their lips moved faster and faster, their voices becoming almost indistinguishable, their heads bowed in complete concentration.

And then everything went black . . .

Callum suddenly felt still, almost peaceful.

He could see nothing but blackness, but as he took a deep breath in and out, he realised that the darkness was not
surrounding
him. He was inside a vision – and his eyes were closed. Was he asleep? Yes, for some reason, he felt small and safe, in bed asleep. He felt warm and comfortable, and nothing was wrong at all.

Then Callum heard it.

A voice. A whisper, low in his ear. There was no breath against his cheek, no indication that there was someone in the bedroom with him. And yet he could hear words, so close. They seemed to float into
the room through the air, straight towards him, like . . . magic.

‘
When, lo, as they reached the mountain's side
,

A wondrous portal opened wide . . .
'

At the sound of the words, Callum's eyes sprang open, almost against his will. He could see a child's bedroom around him, but he hardly registered his surroundings. It was as though he was in a trance. The words echoed around his mind, again and again.

Callum could feel soft, plush carpet beneath his bare feet as he swung over the edge of the bed. He began to walk, zombie-like, towards the bedroom door, and then he felt himself moving through the darkened corridor of the house and straight to the front door, like a puppet controlled by some unseen force.

Callum realised he had to stand on tiptoes to reach the front door latch. But with eerie precision, he opened the locks and strode out into the street. Yellow light pooled in circles on the cold concrete beneath his bare feet, but Callum knew this wouldn't stop him. He was being called, and he was coming . . .

*

Callum came to, shaking his head slightly but otherwise feeling less like he'd had an anvil dropped on his head than he usually did after a vision. Gran and Melissa, on the other hand, were looking far more the worse for wear. They both dropped his hands and sat back, panting. Melissa looked very pale, and her eyes remained unfocused for several moments.

‘Did it work?' Gran said between breaths.

‘Yeah, sort of,' Callum replied, ‘but are you guys OK?'

He looked at Melissa anxiously, who was still breathing heavily, but she nodded and gave him a shaky smile. Gran's expression was grim as she looked over at Melissa's trembling frame.

‘We won't be doing that again in a hurry,' she muttered.

‘Yeah, that was pretty hectic,' Melissa agreed, colour only just returning to her face. ‘But what did you see? Anything useful?'

Callum was almost sorry to tell them after all the
effort they'd clearly gone to, but he really didn't know what to make of the vision he'd had. It certainly didn't seem to give them any solid clues as to how to get to Black Annis or stop the coven.

‘Well, it was weird – it definitely wasn't as intense as my normal visions, but there was something pretty strange happening. I felt like I was young, really young . . .'

‘Perhaps we triggered some sort of memory instead?' Gran asked.

‘No,' Callum said, ‘it was definitely a vision. It was as if I was seeing it from someone else's perspective – a kid, and he was under some kind of trance. He was asleep in bed, then there was this weird whisper, and suddenly he got up and walked out of his house into the street, totally . . . zombified.'

Melissa frowned. ‘Definitely weird.'

‘Can you remember what was whispered?' Gran said.

Callum racked his brain, trying to remember it exactly. ‘Yeah, it was, “
When, lo, as they reached the mountain's side; a wondrous portal opened wide . . .
”
That's all I can remember. I don't know what it means though.'

‘It doesn't sound good, whatever it is,' Melissa said. ‘Maybe the chime child books have some reference to it?'

Callum looked over at Gran. Her brow was furrowed.

‘What is it, Gran?'

‘I don't know, there's something so familiar about those words, but I just can't quite place them,' she said.

Melissa got up and began rifling through the chime child books, passing volumes to Callum and Gran to look through too. But it was no use – they couldn't find the phrase anywhere.

‘We can keep looking tomorrow,' Melissa said. ‘It sounds like it must have something to do with Annis or the coven – I mean, “a portal opened wide?”'

Callum nodded. He felt even more baffled and uneasy than he had before. What was happening to the boy in his vision? Where was he, and where was he
going
? More and more questions were piling up in Callum's mind, and he had no idea how to deal with it
all. He snapped one of the chime child books shut with a grunt.

‘It's getting late,' Gran said, looking over at Callum. ‘I think you ought to be getting home, Melissa. Perhaps you should ring your parents to come and collect you?'

‘I'll be fine,' Melissa began, but Gran's stern look told her that she wouldn't be allowed to walk home alone tonight, not after everything the older woman had heard that evening. As Melissa pulled out her mobile phone to call home, Callum sighed and turned to his grandmother.

‘Thanks for all this, Gran,' he said in a low voice. ‘I know it's been a bit of a strain, but we really did need all the help we could get. I just hope we can find out what's going on before it's too late.'

‘I do too, Callum,' Gran replied. ‘I do too.'

Daylight glints off the flame-red hair of the woman approaching the school gates. She breathes in the fresh air, relishing the relative ease of the task ahead of her. She hears the children's laughing, squealing voices as they play in the concrete grounds, oblivious. And so they shall remain, she thinks.

The adults posted around the gates – the teachers charged with protecting these youngsters – remain unseeing, a result of Aradia's magic. They know nothing of the fate that will befall the children they are supposed to be watching over. As she strides up to the iron railings of the playground, Aradia reads the
sign attached to them – ST ANTHONY'S SCHOOL. A smile creeps on to her beautiful face. St Anthony, the patron saint of lost things.
How apt
, she thinks to herself.

She whispers an ancient sequence of words, a spell that will lure a child over to her. A girl of ten or so, with short, slick black hair and honey-brown skin freezes in the middle of the playground. Aradia reaches forwards and crooks her finger. Wordlessly, robotically, the girl turns around and begins to walk towards her. The girl's deep brown eyes are glazed, her expression slack. Aradia leans down to the level of the girl's ear and whispers the special rhyme that she has made into an incantation. It seems so appropriate that
these
are the words that will complete her mission.

She draws herself back up to her full height, and gestures once more. The girl turns, but instead of returning to the gaggle of friends she'd been sharing mobile phone games with, she walks swiftly over to two girls sitting on a step, where one is braiding the other's hair. Aradia folds her arms and watches.

The black-haired girl leans close to each of the
others and whispers straight into their ears. Aradia watches her lips move, and nods slowly.

‘Good,' she mutters to herself. She keeps watching as the two girls stop their hair-braiding suddenly. They each move off swiftly and whisper to another two children.

And so it spreads.

Aradia turns on her heel and strides away from the playground.

The dusk air was crisp, and the sky a glowing red as Callum made his way to Gran's cottage. He had barely said two words at school the entire day – all he could think about was the mystery of the vision that Melissa and Gran had helped him generate the previous evening. Even Melissa had seemed subdued in their classes together, with dark circles under her eyes that suggested she'd had just as little sleep as Callum had.

It was almost a relief that Gran had insisted he come home straight from school for once. Part of Callum was annoyed that he wouldn't get the chance to quiz Jacob on the vision, but he was also relieved to have a
night off from practising his powers. He was exhausted, and he needed an opportunity to switch his mind off for a while.

But Callum was still feeling distracted as he made his way up the lane . . . until something moving in the corner of his eye brought his mind sharply into focus. Something intangible and misty grey was floating back and forth on one side of the road. Callum turned slowly, warily, and the movement stopped.

Another ghost. Again, this one was unfamiliar, but even though it wasn't as physically threatening the disfigured phantom that had tried to attack Callum and Melissa not so long ago, it was still unsettling. The ethereal, tall wraith was a woman. Her feet didn't seem to touch the ground, but her long, colourless skirts floated round her ankles, and her pale neck was held at a an unnatural angle. Callum swallowed as he saw the dark rope hanging limply around it. She'd been hanged.

He turned to continue down the path, hoping this disturbing spectre would leave him alone, but as he took another step the woman began to float alongside
him again. The orange-red light of the setting sun illuminated her with a fiery glow.

‘Go away,' Callum said under his breath but, at that, the spirit's black eyes widened.

‘Please, please, I'm sorry,' she said, her voice like the wind moving through dried autumn leaves. Callum shivered and quickened his pace doing his best to ignore her. The ghost continued floating alongside him.

‘Please!' she said again. ‘Please, I did not mean to . . . I did not, it was an accident, I beg of you please, please, help me, I'm stuck here. Help me get away from here, please.'

It was only then that Callum realised she was holding something. He grimaced as she floated in front of him and held the bundle out before her. It was a baby, or the apparition of one – but it did not move. Its eyes were closed and its mouth hung open, slack and motionless.