Banshee Angel Of Judgement (14 page)

His
body fell back, down to the damp
cellar. He didn’t shout out, there was no time for she had ripped
his life force from its shell. Though he had felt the pain as she
took his life it was too quick for his physical form to cry out in
protest. His spirit screams but only seemed to add to the screech
the grotesque creature filled the air with as the thing held his
soul firmly in her grasp.

He tried to
get out of the grip that held him but to no avail. She
carried him into the cellar through
to her secret place.

“
In you go
with the others,” she said as she pushed him through the lid of the
jar, imprisoning him as she had done to her other trophies her mark
glowing faintly on the cork stopper as he was deposited into the
glass vessel.

She watched
him for a while as he pleaded to be released as had the others when
she had added them to her collection. She felt her darkness ease as
she gloatingly ran one of her talons down the glass.

After a
short
time of this she tired
of it, turned leaving the jar on its plinth. Into the basement she
passed and took her solid form to gather the corpse that lay at the
foot of the old wooden stairway.

She lifted it with little
effort onto her shoulder. Up to her kitchen then out to where Andy
still lay bleeding, gasping for air as his life ebbed away. She
dumped Micky’s lifeless form near to his friend.

“
Please,”
Andy whispered, almost inaudibly. She ignored him leaving him to
die with Micky’s cold form near by, alone.

Andy watched
her go, shuddering as he heard the door close with a creak then a
loud thu
d. He no longer
noticed the chill as he inhaled the cold foggy night air for the
last time. His hand slid away from his upper body; leaving his
crucifix lying, gleaming in the strange misty light of the night,
on his chest as his sightless eyes watched his spirit rise from the
container that had house it in life.

He looked
around unsure where he should go till he saw the bright light
shining from the woods. He slowly at first moved towards the warmth
the white light offered
then
he heard his grandfather’s voice calling to him from the
brightness. He picked up his pace and began to race to the loved
ones waiting for him.

She saw the light from the
kitchen yet knew it was not for her and never could be for she was
the vengeance, the judge; there was no place in the light for her,
only the wonder of the night.

C
hapter 19

The unmarked
police car came to a halt
, as
the sun burned away the last of the mist from the previous night,
behind the large blue plain transit van used by forensics on the
narrow farm track. Detective John Munroe climbed out as his younger
colleague turned off the engine then joined him as he walked
towards the police tape around the old derelict cottage. A
uniformed officer nodded as he lifted the tape to allow access to
the site for the senior ranking officers.

“
It’s round
the back, sir,” the uniformed figure said pointing down a path
already cleared to make it easier to get to the scene of
crime.

John gave a
quick nod of his head then with his partner following close behind
made his way round the small ramshackle structure to the rear
overgrown garden. As he turned the corner of the building he heard
the sound of the photographer clicking away so none of the evidence
would be lost
and so they
could build a time frame of the events.

He carefully
approached a figure, he recognized as his good friend Dr Winters,
leaning over something he took to be a body. As he got closer he
could make out that what his friend was examining was the corpse of
a man in his late twenties. He could see no visible signs of
injury, not far from this he speedily took in the very different
corpse of a younger man clearly lying in a pool of his own blood
with something spear like extending from his lower
abdomen.

“
So what
have we got
Winters?” John asked less from curiosity than for something to
say.

“
Two male
caucasains, the younger one over there seems to have died due to
exsanguination but this one I’ll not really be able to tell you
much about till the autopsy as there are no visible marks to
suggest cause of death,” Winters state in his usual factual
manner.

“
So we’
ve got one
murder and one possible?” John put it as a question though was
already in his own mind summing it up.

“
It’s a bit
early to say that. No at the moment it looks like the younger one
fell or possibly was pushed onto that fence impaling himself. We’ll
need to gather the evidence first before making any conclusions,”
Winters knew John though just wanted some quick answers as he
always did yet seldom got to his chagrin.

“
So some sort
of weird accident then?” John’s younger associate asked from behind
him.

“
Well that’s
still to be determined we’ll not know for sure till all the facts
of the case are looked over,” the doctor looked at the other
officer then back at his old friend, “but on what I can determine
so far it could be but don’t hold me to that just yet.”

“
No surprises
there then,” John smiled knowing this was the normal way thing went
with Winters, always making things more difficult than they needed
to be for him.

“
Do we know
who they are?” John wanted to get on with the
investigation.

“
Yes, I’d
like you to meet Micky Chambers and his friend over there is Andy
McArthur,” Winters said theatrically.

“
Who found
them?” John looked around to see if he could spot the subject of
his question.

“
Some guy
walking his dog. They had to take him home though as he was really
shook up,” the doctor had been ready for this enquiry.

“
Is there
anything else we know about them so far?”

“
Well
, I thought that
was you’re job to tell me,” the doctor answered eyebrows raised in
an inquiring manner.

“
Okay, I’ll
leave you to it then,” John had seen enough and knew that he
wouldn’t get anything more from Winters so made his way to have a
closer look at the other body.

“
You know the
local myth about this place don’t you?” John’s subordinate
queried.

“
You mean the
witches ghost? Yeah, I’ve heard it before,” John nodded, “Got told
about it back in the seventies when I first got assigned around
these parts. The old sergeant was one of the officers called out to
this place back in sixty eight when a bunch of druggies tried to
make this into their commune and overdose here or something. It was
never really solved so the locals put it down to this place being
haunted. A load of shit, if you ask me though.”

“
So what do
you think happened to the druggies then?”

“
Probably
overdosed as I said but you know what locals are like,” John said
dismissively as he glanced down at Andy’s still form.

“
Didn’t one of
them survive?”

“
Yeah, a girl
but apparently she had amnesia or so she claimed when she came to
in the hospital,” John had been interested in the story when he
first arrived but now it all seemed to far fetched to him. He never
could work out why the girl hadn’t been question more thoroughly at
the time.

“
What happened
to her?”

“
She moved
away.”

The
End