Spellweaver (11 page)

He raised his eyebrows
impassively. “Untie me,” he ordered.

The three friends
exchanged nervous glances; none of them knew what to say. Felicity
was surprised by his voice, as she was certain that she had heard
him talk before but it didn’t sound quite as deep as she had
expected it to be.

Oliver’s tone became
more sinister. “I said... untie me.”

“No way!” Hollie
exclaimed, suddenly unable to control herself. “You like, totally
tried to kill me!”

“Hollie...” Jamie said warningly.

“I wasn’t trying to
kill you,” Oliver said patronisingly. “I was trying to scare you.”
He snorted. “Seems like it worked better than I
thought.”

Hollie averted her
eyes.

“Look,” Oliver said
calmly. “This is crazy. Just untie me.”

“Not until you tell us
what’s going on,” Jamie said a little more bravely than he
felt.

Oliver laughed and
shook his head innocently. “It was just a Christmas Day prank is
all,” he said. “Can’t you guys take a joke?”

Hollie and Jamie
exchanged glances as if they were considering Oliver’s words. What
they had seen that night was so unbelievable that they were
beginning to question their own memories, just as Felicity had.
There was no way to be certain that they had truly seen what they
thought they had seen, and Oliver’s new explanation seemed just as
plausible as anything else.

But Felicity was not
fooled, for she had seen things before. “That was no joke,” she
said darkly, hanging back behind the twins. She was eager to put
distance between herself and Oliver.

Oliver’s feigned
playfulness faded instantly, and he regarded Felicity with an
expression of contempt that was impossible for Hollie and Jamie to
miss.

Jamie backed away from
him. “What’s going on?” he asked warily. “Who are you? And why did
you come here and attack my sister?”

“Forget that,” Hollie
piped up. “Just what was that flamey-fist thing all
about?”

Oliver smirked.
“You’re all so stupid,” he said, and then he sighed. “I can’t
believe I got caught by the likes of you.”

“Hey,” Hollie
protested.

“That ‘flamey-fist
thing’ was a spell, a spell designed to burn the flesh from your
bones - not that you two would have any idea about that kind of
power. You’re just children, so ignorant and blind that you can’t
see what’s going on around you. Now, you are going to untie me, and
if you don’t then I promise you’ll see exactly what I’m capable
of.”

He spoke so calmly and
confidently that each of the friends half expected one another to
do exactly as he asked, but none of them moved. They simply stared,
lost and unsure, until after a few moments Oliver emitted another
sigh and leaned back in the chair. It was then that the others
realised he was completely helpless, and his bluffs lost all their
power.

Jamie turned to the
girls. “He’s harmless. Why don’t you go and get some sleep?” he
suggested. “It’s really late. I’ll stay down here and keep an eye
on him.”

“Are you sure that’s a
good idea?” Felicity ventured.

“I don’t think he can
hurt me,” Jamie said, glancing back at Oliver, who was watching
them intently. “Go on. It’s alright.”

Felicity and Hollie exchanged glances, and then Felicity
nodded and the two girls left the cellar. Oliver kept his eyes on
them the entire time. It was then and only then that Felicity
realised something curious about one of the things that Oliver had
said:
not that the two of you
would have any idea about that kind of power...

The two of you, he had
said. Not three.

Felicity and Hollie
agreed in silence that they did not want to be on their own that
night. Too much had happened. Hollie kept on stroking her face as
if trying to erase the memory of the attack, and her entire
demeanour seemed to have changed; though her bubbly, feisty nature
did still make an appearance, such as when she had been questioning
Oliver, for the most part she had become quiet and withdrawn. She
walked up the stairs and along the landing in small, anxious steps,
hunching her shoulders and keeping her eyes to the
floor.

Felicity was also
troubled. She couldn’t stop thinking about what Oliver had said,
and even though he appeared to be unable to do any magic whilst his
hands were tied behind his back, she couldn’t feel safe and she was
concerned about leaving Jamie down in the cellar with
him.

Magic. It seemed both
ridiculous and crazy to be considering that such a thing existed,
but then Felicity had twice seen Oliver do things that she could
not explain. The thought of it made her stomach turn. She kept
expecting to wake up and find that everything that had happened had
been a dream.

“Fliss?”

Hollie’s voice
penetrated the dark of the bedroom, catching Felicity by surprise.
The two of them had been tucked up side by side in Hollie’s
father’s bed for a while, and Felicity had thought her friend had
fallen asleep.

“Yeah?” she answered
her.

“Did you mean what you
said before?” Hollie asked. “You know... about not having any
friends at boarding school?”

For a moment Felicity
was confused, and then she suddenly remembered everything she had
said earlier that night and was overcome with embarrassment, which
was a stark change to the fear that had flooded her mind and heart.
She wasn’t sure which was worse.

She squirmed
uncomfortably beneath the sheets. “Um... yeah,” she admitted. There
was no point in lying; she had already admitted everything, much to
her eternal shame. She swore she would never drink alcohol
again.

“It must have been
really lonely,” Hollie said.

Felicity didn’t
reply.

“Fliss?”

“Yeah?”

“You do know you’ve
got friends now, don’t you?”

A warm feeling surged
through Felicity’s body like gentle waves brushing a sandy beach,
starting in her stomach and drifting upwards until they reached her
eyes. She could almost feel a happy tear emerge.

Almost.

“Yeah,” she whispered.
“Yeah, I know.”

8
.

Felicity awoke early
the next morning. She hadn't slept well. Her wandering mind had far
too much to think about, so every time she did manage to drift off,
her eyes snapped open not long after. Hollie, on the other hand,
appeared to have slept soundly, which seemed strange to Felicity
when she considered all that her friend had been
through.

Friend. It still
seemed strange to Felicity that she had friends. Although the three
of them had been going to lessons together and seeing one another
outside of school for the past three months, it was only Hollie’s
words last night that confirmed it. It may have had something to do
with their recently shared strange experiences - or perhaps it had
been the alcohol.

Felicity glanced at
the bedside clock, which was blinking 6am in harsh, red lights. For
a few minutes she just lay there, listening to the silence, but it
wasn’t long before she could do so no longer. She had to get down
to the cellar and make sure that Jamie was still alright. She
hadn’t been keen on the idea of leaving him down there, but they
seemed to have precious little options since they had ruled out
involving anyone else. The whole experience had shaken the three of
them and the last thing they wanted was to be labelled as
insane.

The cellar was quiet.
Felicity descended the stone steps as quietly and gently as she
could, and was relieved to see Oliver still tied with his hands
behind his back; she had half expected him to have escaped, which
she was certain would have posed some kind of danger to them. Jamie
was resting on the cellar floor. He had his eyes closed, but as
soon as Felicity came in he opened them and jolted suddenly into a
sitting position.

"I wasn't asleep," he
said quickly.

"He was
asleep."

The two of them turned
to face Oliver, who was wide awake and watching them with a
thoroughly unimpressed expression.

Jamie pulled a face.
"I wasn't," he said defensively. He turned back to Felicity and
gave her an apologetic look. "I was resting my eyes."

"I just came down to
tell you that I need to go back to the flat quickly," Felicity
said. "My dad will kill me if he knows I didn't come in last
night."

Jamie nodded. "Where's
Hollie?"

"Still asleep. She's
fine." Felicity glanced at Oliver, whose persistent stare was
beginning to unnerve her. "I won't be long."

She began to make her
way back upstairs, but Oliver's voice made her stop.

"I'll be waiting," he
said darkly.

Outside, the sky was
black and clear, yet it was impossible to see the stars in the
constant orange glow of the city; that was one of the only things
that Felicity missed about her previous residence. The light coming
from the tall, iron street lamps made the snow glisten like the
surface of a lake in the sunshine. The entire road was so still and
silent that it seemed as though the rest of the world somehow knew
that something was wrong and was holding its breath, awaiting the
storm that would follow this uneasy calm. Felicity hugged her big
coat around her and hurried back to the flat, eager to be out of
the cold.

Her father was asleep
on the sofa when she got there. She could hear him before she saw
him; his distinguishable snores indicated that he had drank a
significant amount of alcohol the previous night. The television
was still on and a number of empty beer bottles stood on the coffee
table. With a shudder, Felicity was reminded of her own drinking
antics and pictured herself lying sprawled on the sofa in her
father's place, with her mouth wide open and her hair dishevelled
and messy. She swore that would never be her and was reminded of
her vow of sobriety.

She crept past him to
her bedroom and changed her clothes. She still felt tired and a bit
unclean but it was refreshing to pull a cool, clean jumper over her
head. Whilst she was running a brush through her long, red hair,
she caught sight of her mother’s journal underneath her pillow.
Without thinking, she grabbed it and shoved it in her
bag.

She left her father a
note to let him know she had gone out and returned as quickly as
she could to Jamie's house. When she opened the door, her nostrils
filled with the delicious scent of frying bacon and she realised
how hungry she was; the only thing the three friends had eaten the
previous night was crisps. She found both Hollie and Jamie in the
kitchen.

Hollie smiled brightly
at Felicity when she came in. "Happy Boxing Day!" she chirped. She
was wearing an apron and stood beside the large cooker, happily
turning over the sizzling bacon with a pair of kitchen
tongs.

Felicity frowned and
sat next to Jamie at the kitchen table. “Aren’t you watching
Oliver?” she said to him.

“I came up to get some
water,” he groaned.

Felicity noticed that
Jamie’s eyes looked red and were barely open. He sat slumped over
the table, one hand wrapped loosely around a large glass of water.
“Are you okay?” she asked.

“He’s hungover,”
Hollie declared jovially as she cracked an egg into the saucepan.
It hissed loudly as it met the steaming surface of the
metal.

Jamie winced. “Ugh,
tell her to keep the noise down, will you?” he moaned.

“But what about
Oliver?”

“He hasn’t said one
word since you left,” Jamie said. “Anyway, he can’t go anywhere.
I’ll go back down there in a minute. Just... give me a
second...”

Hollie came over to
the kitchen table and began dishing out the breakfast she had
cooked, humming to herself as she did so.

“Why is she so...
happy?” Felicity whispered to Jamie.

Hollie overheard. “Why
shouldn’t I be happy?” she asked.

The answer was so
obvious that Felicity found herself unable to reply. Instead, she
flicked a glance towards the cellar door.

“Oh, right,” Hollie
said with a slight titter. “Well at first I was scared, I’ll admit,
since we have this crazy person who thinks he can do magic tied up
in the cellar, and of course I was worried that since he tried to
kill me once he might try again, but then I thought: hey!” She
whirled the spatula in her hands. “What’s the point in worrying
about it? I could’ve been murdered yesterday, but I wasn’t. I’m
still here, I’m still alive, the two of you are alive, the birds
are singing - and I’ve made a fry up.”

Jamie shook his head.
“She’s gone insane.”

He cried out and
grimaced when his sister hit him over the head with the
spatula.

“Uh, Hollie?” Felicity
queried as her friend continued to dish up breakfast.

“Yeah?”

“Why have you done
four plates?”

Hollie stopped, looked
down at the plates on the kitchen table, and then she put one hand
on her hip. “He might be our prisoner but he still has to eat,” she
said defensively.