Leaf Pickers

We had a cup of tea while we waited for Julie to be ready. I'm not entirely sure why she showered – the land behind the portal looked filthy to me – but then I've never been able to understand women. Give me the honest, unwashed stink of a man any night. There's something vaguely disturbing about soap, I've always thought, as if the removal and masking of bodily odours indicates some sort of skulduggery in the offing.

Julie was ready at last though I was surprised at her light blouse and skirt and large backpack full of spellbooks and empty jars (it isn't often you get to go to Faerie and she intended to make the most of it by gathering specimens and spell components). She spotted my expression. "Harold said it's always mild and sunny in the forests of Faerie."

I nodded. "Mostly," I said, "and you can always use a leaf as an umbrella if it rains."

"Super," she said, picking up a sturdy walking stick. "I expect we'll be in and out of there in no time. What was it we were looking for again? A soul leaf?"

"Soul thief," I said. "A necromancer."

"Oh?" She glared at Harold. "I thought only Wednesdays were a black hole of misunderstanding."


Image: Hillwalker

Spellcraft and Saber-rattling

Harold dressed in his 'lucky' Spiderman boxers and headed down to his studio. not that he was an artist – of any kind – but he had a study / workshop on the first floor in which to conduct magical experiments. (Other than the cellars and the attic, it was the one room in the whole mansion where he could cast a pentacle without it being broken by pipes or wires under the floorboards) Ever since Lucy was born he's preferred to call this space his 'studio' as if he were some bohemian dr. Faustus. It could have been worse – he could have called it 'laboratory'.

He picked up his pocket book of spells and went to drag Julie out of bed. His spell book is very interesting. Every magician I've ever known has followed the traditional path of great tomes of vellum bound in skin (human or otherwise) in which to record their craft – as if the grandness of the book imparts some extra gravitas to their ability with the craft. Not so Harold. Embracing both old and new, he has a pocket-sized tome (bound in goatskin purchased on e-bay) in which he glues sheets printed from his word processor. If he wasn't so possessive of spells it's taken him years to research, I'd suggest he market the idea. He'd make a small fortune.*

"I'm ready," he said, buckling on a sword belt and saber. "Now where's this dratted portal?"


*small being the operative word – mages are few and far between and mages willing to spend money rarer still.

All you Need is L-- er... Leverage

Harold looked perturbed when I finished telling him about the trip to Offley Street.

"Then what?" he said. "Did the hero get the girl or what? You stopped halfway through."

"What hero?" I said. "Have you listened to a single word?"

"Of course." Harold pulled his duvet over is lap and rested his cup there. "This Winston fellow is obviously in love with the Welsh bint so the story should end with a 'happily for weeks'."

"It's not a story, Harold. This is where I was all day yesterday. You know Winston and Meinwen. They've both been to this house in the past. Now I have a Faery portal in the workshop that contains a wanted felon. and I can't winkle him out."

"Wanted by Hell's minions," said Harold. "I can't say I blame him, really. Stay in Faery or go and have a boiling lava bath in Hell for the rest of eternity?"

"He slaughtered his own wife and children, Harold. That would be like you killing Lucy to open a Gate. This is worse than your Grandfather Herbert. He was an evil so-and-so but at least he never got as far as sacrificing his own children – or anyone else's for that matter."

"Well what am I supposed to do about it?" said Harold. "You tried, you failed, you came crying to me. End of story."

"It's not the end of the story at all," I said, wishing for someone else to ask. I could ask Julie, I suppose, but she doesn't have the innate cheery 'luck of the devil'* that Harold has possessed since birth. "I need you to go in and pull Thorburn out of Faery so he can get his just desserts."

"Pudding?" said Harold. "Why didn't you say?"



*quite literally

To Tell a Tale

Monday morning brought all the children dragging themselves back to school and a collective sigh of relief from the shopkeepers in the town. Trade would begin to increase in the run-up to Christmas but for now there was the briefest of lulls to be enjoyed. Harold, in typical fashion, took the day off and left Julie to cope with the shop on her own with just permission to call him in if any of his 'special customers' called.*

This gave me the perfect opportunity to discuss yesterday's jaunt with him and to sweeten the pill, as it were, I took him breakfast on a tray.

"Where's Devious?" he said, sitting up and rubbing his eyes with his fists like they only ever do in cartoons. "I haven't seen him since yesterday morning."

"Oh.." I gave him a clenched-tooth grin. "I send him on an errand. he'll be back in a day or two."

"A day or two?" Harold frowned. "What takes an imp a day or two? They're the most efficient little workers I've ever seen."

"Shh! I pressed two fingers against his lips. "Don't say things like that! You never know who's listening."

"Who would be?"

"Another imp!"

"Oh." Harold took a sip of Darjeeling and brightened. "So where were you yesterday?"

"Ah," I said. "Let me tell you a little tale..."


*generally this refers to angels, demons and other denizens selling books and any order that required a book from the stacks to be reproduced.**

**i.e. forged

All Souls go to Hell

I have to admit I left the portal alone after that. I'd spent all afternoon on it and needed to catch up on a few things. People don't stop dying just because I'm busy, after all, and I do have quite a large area to take care of. Souls need to be comforted and extracted from their bodies, debated over with my opposite number from Upstairs* and sent to Hell.

Instead I had an evening of normal banter with Harold, Felicia, Frederick, Julie and even Gillian, and took a turn at holding little Lucy and wondering if she'll ever actually play with the doll's house that is causing me so much trouble.



*Technically, all souls have a chance of going to Heaven if they've led a blameless life and repented all sins** In practice, this almost always proves not to be the case, though in rare cares (less than one in ten thousand) the soul is invited to remain with its body until Judgement Day when it can go to Heaven after all.***

**The definition of a sin is subject to revision at any time. What might not have been a sin yesterday may well be relabelled today

***Unless the body is cremated, which is also a no-no, Heavenwise.

Is there any Tea?

Meinwen went home to have her supper and do whatever it is that single people without televisions do on a Sunday Night – listen to their crystal radio, I suppose – and Winston and I walked round to his garage with the portal. I was rather glad he survived the day, if truth be told, since he is a useful chap to have about. Not that that I trust him as far as I can spit; you can never truly trust an elf, I don't think. A leopard never changes his shorts.

I settled up with him (cash in hand to avoid the tax – a sin that counts as theft but doesn't even affect the afterlife of an elf -- Winston is all too aware of the afterlife awaiting him – and we loaded the portal into the van and headed off to the Manor. We detoured past Offley Street to see all the flashing lights. They'd closed off the whole road and had even begun to set up an incident room despite the place being less than a mile from the police station on High Street. They'd probable declare the whole family missing unless the corpse in the cellar had been the mother and I knew Winston and Meinwen would keep the secrets we'd uncovered.

The Manor gates were open so Winston was able to drive me right to the stable yard and help me stash the portal in the same dreary workshop we'd started studying the doll's house in. We set the portal facing the wall and hefted the tool bench against it. No-one was coming in that way. I bid him adieu and went into the kitchen where Harold was sat at the table eating a sandwich and watching the local news.

"Look at this," he said. "An anonymous tip led police to a house with a couple of corpses in."

"Oh?" I said. "How tedious for them. Is there tea in the pot?"

All Souls

We left the way we'd come in, with the simple addition of a small corruption spell in every room to remove any DNA or fingerprint evidence of Winston or Meinwen – or mine, come to that, but they'd be scratching their heads over demon DNA – since it's possible that the British police have discovered modern forensic techniques. CSI might still be science fiction but I've seen all those little index cards they have with people's fingerprints on them.

Once we'd fought our way back through the brambles and out past the back gate (collecting the terracotta pots of bones on the way) we headed to the corner of Offley street where Meinwen called the police to report a dead body at number 34. They were certainly in for a surprise though thankfully no longer a fatal one. There was nothing left in the house that a HASMAT suit couldn't cope with and Inspector White would have a field day with all the blood and bodies. It'd keep him out of our way (hopefully) for weeks.

"Is it still Christmas morning?" Meinwen asked. "It feels like we've been in that house forever."

"What are you on?" said Winston. "Sunday evenin' innit?" And I recon I'm owed a full weeks pay for an afternoons work.

I nodded. "I suppose so," I said. "Just nip us back to the manor in your van, would you? I don't dare carry a Faery portal though an Infernal one."

"Why?" said Meinwen. "What would happen?"

"Did you ever see the episode of Doctor Who where they stack one Tardis inside another?" I said.

"She nodded. "Years ago," she said, "Would it be like that then?"

"No," I said. "Not at all."