Chapter 4 Arwyn #2
Once again, at the mention of my father, it was like any control Hector had over himself dissipated. His eyes flicked towards the closed door, the cogs turning in his mind as he conjured a plan.
I didn’t have long to warn him before he did something we would all regret.
I reached out and grasped his trousers, my fingers fixing into the material and anchoring myself to him.
“Tomorrow my… Father Tomin has planned an attack against the prime minister. He seeks to pin the attack on witch-kind, and out you to the public. I can only guess he is doing this to spread a plague of fear against you, so he can come in and save the day. You need to do something to stop him, otherwise I fear that a real witch hunt will begin, and spread with ease. If this attack is successful, he will turn every witch into the very demons they have been thought to be, and the world will turn against you. Witch Hunters will not be the only people to hunt you. The time for stakes and burning will return. Hector…” I stood again, my hands holding his arms without thought.
I kept my touch gentle. If he wanted to pull free, he could have, but Hector didn’t fight me.
Instead, he looked up through a veil of dark lashes, drinking in every word of my warning.
“You must utilise the trust of the Coven, warn them and either stop Tomin, or run. Run and hide. Every last one of you.”
For a moment, it was like all the deception between us was gone, and we were back in the Witch Trials, working together to keep each other alive.
I believed it, for a second, before Hector replied.
“The Coven does not trust me,” he said.
I shook my head. “What do you mean…”
Hector snatched himself away from me, repulsed by me. “Unlike you, I’m not a good liar.”
I blanched, working out what was not spoken. “You never told them, did you?”
“There was no point. At first, I thought me returning alive was enough, but then the witches started losing their connection to their Gifts. Fingers were pointed, and in Jonathan Bailey’s… absence, they started accusing me.”
Ah, Jonathan Bailey. The man who sold out Hector’s parents to my father. The witch who worked against witch-kind for his own gain. Just the thought of him inspired the darkness inside of me to swell.
“What… happened to him?” I asked.
Hector didn’t need to ask who I spoke of. “I killed him.”
“Good,” I replied. “Very good.”
I wanted to ask Hector questions, and I would’ve if I had the chance.
“Just like I’m going to kill your father. And you. And every last Witch Hunter that wastes the air they breathe.”
“Not if I beat you to it,” I spat without thinking.
My reply gave Hector pause, but it didn’t last long enough.
He turned back for my bedroom door, swift and unstoppable.
I made a move, but found my legs were frozen to the spot.
Looking down, I saw what kept me immobile.
The wooden panels of my flooring had come alive like serpents, wrapping around my boots and ankles.
My shins ached as I fought against them, but I was too late.
Hector had already dragged the door open, revealing the shocked faces of my two armed guards beyond.
There was so much I wanted to say, so much I wanted to do. For starters, I should’ve dropped to my knees again, and begged Hector to believe in my apology until my throat bled. But our time had run out. He was moments from discovering where exactly this room was and putting himself in danger.
How did I know? Because for the first time, as Hector prepared to reveal himself to an encampment full of Witch Hunters, Bahmet was overjoyed. The demon’s fear turned into hope, proving that Hector was throwing himself into a pit of vipers he would not survive.
Bahmet wanted Hector dead because he was scared of him.
Why, why, why?
Hector lifted a hand and waved at the shocked guards. “Hello, boys.”
Gathering the demon’s power, I grappled with the void of shadows from whence he came and cast them out across the room. The darkness clawed at the scene before me, drowning everything before us until we no longer were in my bedroom.
“No!” Hector cried, and for a moment I felt the control over this place slip, as if Hector had a grapple of it too.
“Warn the witches,” I bellowed into the void, hand poised and ready to banish Hector from it, returning him to the place I’d stolen him from.
“Stop my father from turning you into the monsters he always thought you were. If you don’t believe me now, you will.
But I beg you, Hector Briar, don’t ignore me. ”
Just before I forced Hector with the grasp of this darkness, I heard him reply.
“We are all monsters already.”
Then he was gone. As the shadows receded, I was returned to my room with the open door, and Hector was once again hundreds of miles away from me. He couldn’t know where I was or else he’d come back looking for me.
As I opened my eyes it was to come face to face with the barrel of two guns. My guarders were in the room, one of them hissing into the earpiece he wore. I heard him say Hector’s name, followed by what they’d witnessed with him disappearing into shadow.
Between the guns pointed in my face, the threat of their hate towards Hector Briar, and my natural possessive feelings towards that witch, I did something which I would later regret.
I attacked with the full force of Bahmet, unleashing the power that I had kept squandered for so long. Regardless if my father would find out, and know he could once again use me, I had to do this.
Because of the plain look of undiluted hate in the eyes of these men that looked upon Hector. My Hector. Regardless if he listened to my warning or not, I wouldn’t let a hair on his head be touched by another. Anyone who harboured the desire to harm him would face my wrath.
The gargled screams of the two Witch Hunters were devoured in moments, until the only parts of them left in the mess of their death were two sets of bloodied eyes rolling across the bloodstained floor of my room.
Bahmet groaned inside of me, satisfied with the meal he’d been given.
I sat amongst the torn bodies, breathless and full of a darkness that I was losing grip to. And there, I waited for more armed guards to come, as I knew they eventually would.
A clapping sound rose from outside of my room, announcing the arrival of Tomin Hopkin. He stepped into view, looking around at my destruction with the widest of grins, the pride in his eyes so potent it reduced me to a child, because it was the one emotion I’d craved to see in him for years.
“Well done, my son. I see you’ve finally harnessed the power I was hoping for. Now…” He extended a hand, not an ounce of trepidation shown towards me. “Shall we get a move on and begin the next steps of my plan now you are ready?”
I could’ve killed him, but I didn’t. Instead, I took his hand and allowed him to hoist me from the floor. Instead of keeping me locked inside my prison, Father Tomin beckoned me to follow him out of the room.
I did, not because I wanted to, but because my act had finally given Bahmet the grasp over my body that I’d worried he would achieve. By giving in to the darkness, I had made a grave mistake. No matter how hard I tried to claw back control of my limbs, I failed.
Just as I was forever doomed to do, because as soon as I stepped outside of the room into my freedom, my father stood out the way as the guards lifted their guns. I barely had time to raise a hand before they emptied every bullet into my torso.