Witch-Finder Page 3

  The five men with suits that Dunkley had seen watching the football match from a wagon in the forbidden field came running. Each one of them yanked a twist of string from a post and climbed over the fence.

  As Dunkley watched them, the earth split around him. The elementals separated and escaped. The earth shook more frantically as the ones still trapped tried to get out before the would-be heroes got into place. Another huge surge of earth knocked out a whole section of the fence.

  Dunkley turned and ran. More waves of earth poured out of the field.

  'Earthquake!’ one of the football players yelled.

  The mob panicked. Screams sounded as the first wave of earth tipped the front ranks.

  The tarmacked road cracked and buckled as the elementals fled their confinement. The dammed beck flooded in all directions.

  From inside the stone circle, the college watched the show. Dunkley hurdled the bank. He landed and rolled down into the internal ditch of the henge. Flat on his stomach, he peered over the top of the bank.

  As one, the students and professors joined Dunkley in his place of relative safety. He looked over the edge of the bank watching the events below.

  'Knowing when you're out-matched,’ he said to the nearest student, ‘and when to run is one of the finer parts of our job.'

  The student nodded at this wisdom. Trewithick, who had run at the first suggestion, skidded to the ground next to Dunkley.

  'What the hell is that little fool of yours doing?'

  'I have no idea,’ said Dunkley. ‘He has never shown any hints of bravery before this.'

  Trewithick jumped up. ‘NO!’ he shouted, desperately. ‘Not the third knot!'

  The skies darkened as he shouted. He ducked back down. The waves of earth elementals stopped, then started flowing back.

  'Released the air elementals bound in the strings, have they?’ Dunkley asked.

  Two different types of elementals, mortal enemies, met.

  Dunkley got to his feet as the six freed air elementals and the mountains of earth elementals churned into a tornado in their fight for supremacy.

  Trewithick caught hold of Dunkley's arm. Dunkley crouched to hear him as the howling gale increased crescendo.

  'Where are you going?'

  'I'd better get them out of there.'

  Trewithick shook his head. ‘I thought you said that anyone who gets himself into a situation had better be able to get himself out?'

  Dunkley grimaced. ‘I'm not trying to save the idiot boy. It's the young earth elementals. There may be sixty or so of them, but they'll never last against six mature air elementals.'

  A hailstone hit the ground near Trewithick. Then another. A mass of ice pounded the ground as if the sky was falling. The cricket teams charged into the pavilion. Trewithick rolled underneath the front steps, followed by Dunkley.

  'Can you activate the circle?’ Trewithick shouted over the drumbeat.

  Dunkley lifted an eyebrow.

  'God, man! This isn't the time to work to rule, can you bloody activate the bloody circle?’ he shouted.

  'I know the theory,’ Dunkley hedged.

  'I thought you might,’ Trewithick said.

  'Why do you want the circle activated?'

  'You said this is an earth circle, it would hold the earth elements safe while we chase off the air ones.'

  'I'd need a few things. The kitchen might have them.'

  He ducked out from under the steps and dashed out.

  A hailstone the size of a cricket ball caught him in the shoulder as he charged up the steps and in the front door. Slamming the door behind him, he grimaced.

  'Mr. Dunkley,’ a voice shrilled.

  He wiped his face clear again before turning to face Daphne Green. He nodded at her. ‘Mrs. Green, I'm afraid I'm a bit busy right now.'

  'Oh Mr. Dunkley,’ she clung to his arm. ‘You've got to save us.'

  'I'd be working on that quicker if I didn't trip over you every time I turn round,’ he muttered. Dodging around the crowd in the pavilion entrance hall, he pulled Daphne Green into the kitchen and firmly shut the door.

  'Right, Daphne.’ Dunkley forced a smile. ‘You need to sit down for a while. Here, I'll make you a cup of coffee.'

  He turned, knowing that she watched his every move through rosy-glasses. He would never understand this obsession that women felt for him.

  He boiled the kettle and made a cup of coffee for her. Checking his watch, he stirred it anti-clockwise.

  'Here, Daphne, drink this,’ he said.

  She sipped the coffee. ‘This is very kind of you Mr. Dunkley.'

  'That's all right, Daphne.'

  'Gosh that's very odd coffee.’ She yawned.

  'That's because it was anti-coffee.'

  Daphne Green frowned, then yawned again. ‘What's anti-coffee?'

  'It happens when you stir coffee widdershins. Coffee makes you wide awake, and more able to concentrate; anti-coffee makes you more pliable and sleepy.'

  He pulled a penknife from his pocket. The handle was worn. Then he changed his mind and plundered the buffet. Picking up a plastic knife he held it out, handle first.

  'Take this knife, with no return of gift, to cut the love. Now, you will sleep,’ he said, his voice echoing from the ceiling of the kitchen block. ‘When you awake this will all be a ridiculous dream. Why would any woman chase after a man like Alasdair Dunkley?'

  With her hand fisted around the knife handle, she laid her head on the table. ‘I have to get Dunkley in love with me, so he doesn't suspect. We have to keep the elementals contained,’ she mumbled, ‘for the money.'

  'Stay in a trance, but answer questions,’ he ordered. ‘Tell me about making money from elementals.'

  Daphne sat up straight, her eyes glazed from the sleep charm. ‘We sell them to the computer industry.'

  'What use does a computer company have for elementals?'

  'They tell me that a suspension of iron alloys makes good memory storage.'

  'So you are battery breeding the elementals for slavery? Have I got that right?'

  'We need the money.’ Daphne shrugged. ‘It's not like they are people. It's not slavery.'

  'Go to sleep,’ Dunkley spat. ‘Forget this business with earth elementals.'

  Obediently, her head dropped to the table.

  Clenching his fists, Dunkley returned to the buffet table and grabbed activators for the circle: some bread and cheese, and a box of wine. Above him, he heard the hailstones cracking the wooden tiles on the roof of the pavilion. He added two metal trays to his haul.

  Re-entering the corridor, he saw the students and staff gathered to cheer him on.

  'Going to sort it out now, Dunkley?’ Kilbride asked.

  'I'll have a go,’ he said. Lifting the tray over his head, he ducked out into the storm and back to where Trewithick waited under the steps. He shoved the trays ahead of him.

  'Right,’ Trewithick said. ‘Can you really do this?'

  'The application of gifted and inherent Cræft is very similar. It's just that using inherent power exhausts us.'

  'I haven't followed a word of that,’ Trewithick said. ‘Save it for your Advanced Theory class.'

  'The Council would have me up for heresy if I taught our gentlemen that sort of thing,’ Dunkley said. ‘Here's your shield.'

  'I can do anything that's needed from under here, thank you.'

  'You will banish the air elementals, while I hold the earth safe.’ Dunkley grinned. ‘And you can't contact air elementals with your belly hugging the ground.'

  Trewithick snarled. He tugged the tray over to him and wriggled out from under the pavilion.

  'Oh yes,’ Dunkley added. ‘And what I was trying to say was, be prepared to pick up the pieces of me when I keel over with a heart attack from attempting the impossible.'

  Trewithick continued out into the storm.

  Moments later, Dunkley followed. With the tray over his head, he sprinted to the stone altar that stood at th
e north end of the stone circle.

  Behind him, dirt gray clouds tumbled out of the sky as the tornado spun in ever more furious circles. Huge hailstones pounded the ground, tearing divots of grass from the pitch. The ground twisted up in a vast dust devil. Over the roar of the unnatural storm he heard the screams of the erstwhile footballers.

  Dunkley crouched on the lea of the rock, balancing the tray over his head. The hail tinged the metal tray was distracting, but it was that or be knocked out.

  As he turned the tap on the box of wine, filling an indentation in the rock, he hoped that Trewithick would not feel it necessary to inform on him to the Council. He laid out the bread and the cheese as offerings. Looking around he snatched a handful of daisies, scattered them around the bread and cheese then ducked back under his tray.

  Taking a deep breath, he pricked his finger with the old penknife. His blood dripped into the wine.

  The circle was old. The last activation had been an age ago. Now it lay sleeping. Dunkley called to the latent power trapped here, hoping that this wasn't one of the circles used to hold a demon so strong that it was unkillable. At least this was a single circle—not a double, or even the triple ring use for such creatures.

  He felt no presence, but an elemental that powerful could mask its location from him.

  The circle's power flowed sluggishly, the working pulling strength from him.

  The little elementals fought the summons. There were too many of them. But he called them until the sun and sky spun into darkness.

  A warm spirit filled his mind. You have returned.

  'I beg your pardon?’ That was not what Dunkley was expecting. ‘What are you doing here? You're not bound.'

  I chose to hide, in this welcoming place, from the little people who want their red paint from our corpses for their pictures in the heart of the Earth.

  This made sense to Dunkley. ‘Am I like someone you knew from before? Is that why you think I am returned?'

  He felt a rough hand brushing his brow.

  Ah! I am mistaken. This is your first visit. Why do you bind the young?

  'I'm trying to save them from air,’ Dunkley said.

  I can gift you with the strength to call the young.

  'No! I take no elemental gifts. I am your enemy.'

  Not yet, but I am not bound by your illusion, Time; I see the future, the warm spirit said. You could be the enemy of all sentient beings should you unwisely accept a gift from my kind.

  'That will be never.'

  Never is too uncertain at this point—there are always good reasons for accepting a gift. Rest. I will give the young safety.

  The warmth left him. The chill hail stung his back, waking him from the dark. Lifting his head, he looked out on Hell.

  The earth in the circle exploded in a mud volcano, engulfing the twirling, twisting tornado that was six air elementals. Dunkley curled into a ball, trying to hide behind the altar stone.

  The wind howling through the stones.

  The earth thundered, as quake after quake ripped through the rock that lay under the fertile soil.

  Then he was the soil, hard rock broken by the wind and water.

  He called on the sun to bring the tree roots that stopped the wind and the water from washing him into the sea.

  No! He clung to Dunkley. He would not be possessed by any part of the elemental experience.

  From his pocket the air elemental begged to be freed. It could stamp on the earth that threatened his life and sanity.

  Dunkley snatched away the hand that was already acting to draw the string from his pocket.

  'NO!’ He shouted into the turmoil. ‘I want calm now.'

  Pushing up on the altar stone he stood and spread his arms to the sky.

  'There will be calm now!’ he shouted into the wind. His face as still as a god carved from marble.

  The raging world paused for a moment. In that instant, the six air elementals fled.

  Remember that I obey, Master of Demons, said the earth spirit. For when you visit again.

  The spirit of the circle slowly subsided back into its chosen containment. The young earth elementals sank into the land.

  Dunkley lowered his arms. He saw Dave curled around a fence pole and people from the football game coming up to see if anyone had survived at the center of the maelstrom.

  He sat on the altar. It was empty of the offerings. The storm striking from a clear sky had blown away the evidence of his awakening the circle—or the earth spirit had taken his gift.

  In his pocket the trapped air elemental snarled. Dunkley crouched at the base of the altar, and scratched out a hole. He dropped in the knotted string and covered it with soil.

  'Guard this for me, please,’ he said.

  The earth gave one last shudder as everything settled back to how it had been. The pounding hail turned into rain.

  With a shaky hand, Dunkley tugged out his hip flask and took a sip of whisky. Trewithick, accompanied by a villager, charged over, his cricket whites spattered in dirt and debris. Dunkley looked down at his own mud and grass-stained clothes.

  All things considered, it had not been a good day.

  'Alasdair?’ Trewithick said. ‘Are you in there?'

  Dunkley nodded; he took another sip from his flask. The ice-cold rain soaked him, but everything was calm.

  'At least with the rain,’ he said. ‘We can call it a draw and stop getting trounced by the students.'

  'What happened here?’ the villager interrupted.

  'The weather can get a bit odd around an earthquake, I understand,’ said Dunkley. He forced a smile onto his face. ‘Perhaps the countryside took exception to your changing the day of your annual football match.'

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  The Camera Just Piles on the Pounds

  'Just act like a star-struck, stage-struck teenager,’ Mr. Trewithick said.

  While of course ecstatic to be asked to help by his teachers, Mike plodded from where they both remained in the car—up to the queue. He hunched his shoulders and jammed the tips of his fingers into his trouser pockets.

  At the front of the queue, people rolled up sleeping bags and sipped from thermos flasks. Mike tried to suppress a sneer—it was amazing that anyone would camp all night just for this.

  A girl ran up to her friend who stood next to Mike. ‘Is my make-up right now? The mirrors in the ladies at the Underground are impossible!'

  Her face looked plastic as she huddled with her friend under an umbrella, raised to protect their hairstyles from the few spots of rain. Noticing Mike, they eyed his tank-tee shirt and painted-on jeans.

  'Want to come under?’ the first one asked. The brolly barely sheltered the two stick-thin girls.

  Mike flushed. ‘I'm fine thanks.'

  They gave his gym-fit body another once-over and giggled. He felt his flush darken, and yet he was wearing what amounted to the uniform for the boys in the line. Though most of them aspired to, rather than had, his physique.

  At 8.30am the doors of the agency opened. A silence spread along the line as everyone craned their necks to see. Those who had arrived later than Mike peered around the corner, from where the queue now extended onto The Strand.

  Two women emerged. They strolled down the line, comparing the candidates with images on their clipboards. Every now and then, they gestured someone indoors. The chosen one scurried down the steps into the basement offices of the Downstairs Modeling Agency. The unfavored ones remaining behind stared with open-mouthed envy. No one left, even after the selectors passed.

  They stopped in front of Mike and scrutinized him. He studied them back. Both cast from the same mould, they exemplified everything these girls tried to copy.

  'How would like to keep that figure without all the exercise?’ Twin 1 said.

  Mike blinked. His teachers were really hot on the subject of ‘unfit people in our line of work don't last long'.

  'Actually, I like working out at the gym,’ he said. Wel
l, learning antique weaponry was fun—the rest was a chore.

  They pursed their lips, almost in unison. ‘You like the discipline of hard work?’ Twin 1 said.

  Mike flashed a bright, insincere smile and said, ‘Yes.'

  'You sound like the sort we're looking for. What's your name?’ Twin 2 asked.

  He straightened. ‘Mike Rider.'

  Twin 2 held out her hand. ‘Could I see your birth certificate, please? While you look about twenty, we are required to check that no one under sixteen slips through our selection process.'

  Mike reached into his back pocket for his battered wallet. He unfolded it and shook out a square of paper.

  'You're nineteen,’ Twin 2 said. ‘Good. I'm sure your attitude for discipline will translate into the maturity needed for this job. Go on in, please.'

  Mike sauntered off.

  An engine revved nearby, and Mike looked up hopefully, but it was a BBC van. The windows were darkened and a camera poked out the side window, trained on the crowd.

  Mike sighed; then a wolfhound stuck its head out of a back window, lolling its tongue happily as it caught the breeze in its wiry fur.

  A doorbell chimed twice in his pocket—the ringer set on his mobile phone—then it went silent. He relaxed.

  A blonde teen-doll look-a-like caught up with him. Mike caught himself wondering if her breasts were implants, no one so thin had real gazongas that big and bouncy.

  'Isn't this so exciting?’ said the girl sucking in her stomach and flashing a toothpaste smile at the camera-car. ‘Though I do wish they had waited until we were ready to be photographed. They say that a camera piles on the pounds. I bet we're on the news tonight. I'm Taylor.'

  'Mike,’ he said.

  'Well, it's not really Taylor, but I looked through the fashion mags and thought I'd better use a modeling sort of name, don't you think?'

  They descended into the basement. A tearful girl ran up the stairs and pushed them aside.

  Mike watched her leave, then turned back to Taylor. ‘I'll worry about names if they actually hire me.'

  'Haven't you dreamt about this day all your life?'

  Mike laughed—it just burst out. ‘No, actually. I need a job to fund me through college.'

  Taylor glanced at him warily. ‘It's just like a reality show on the telly, isn't it?'