Chosen (The Chosen Few Trilogy #1) (10 page)

My story is simple.
One day m
y wife disappeared
,
taking nothing with her but a platinum ring inscribed with the legend: ‘To Dean, all my love forever, Raychel’.
At first I was a suspect, n
ow they believed my wife had just run away. Happened all the time, apparently. I’d spent a year clicking away on the in
ternet, searching
for sightings of missing persons. There are websites for that, you know. I guess you have to be in my unique and desperate position to find out about them.

And
sometimes
I still clicked away after Lucy had gone to bed when she wouldn’t hear me. I entered Raychel’s name in all its guises, her old mobile number, her old addresses. I checked Google and more recently Facebook, MySpace, Twitter.

Imagine the torture of a ringing phone. A knock on the door.

Back then, I’d hit the bottle hard. I’d ceased to care about my life and the lives of those closest to me. I blamed myself for Raychel’s vanishing act. I had fail
ed her, and I had failed Lucy
, and I had thrown away my career.
Why the Hell would anyone make me one of the Chosen?

I swallowed a lump of pure guilt as Belinda finally came over, a glass half full of clear liquid in her left hand, my cup of
c
amomile
tea in her right.

“Shall we toast?” she said.

I stared questioningly at her.

“To doing the right thing,” she gave an easy smile.

“You always drink that much?”

Belinda grinned in that carefree way of hers. “It’s a ‘Belinda-shot’, sugarcake. Just enough to take you
there.
”

I stared into her eyes, shining with health and
wit
and
wisdom
.
It was a wisdom she concealed
well, and purposely, behind a
light exterior.

I briefly wondered why.

Then I raised my cup. “To friends,” I said simply, knowing she would understand. “Both old and new.”

1
5

YORK, ENGLAND

I slept poorly for a few hours, my dreams haunted by a beast I could neither name nor remember.
I climbed out of bed,
then pulled on yesterday
’
s clothes and headed down to the kitchen, following the smell of freshly
-
brewed coffee

Belinda was already at the table, a steaming cup in front of her. She looked the opposite of me, fresh, bright-eyed and perky.
T
oday’s t-shirt read
:
‘Innocent’.
I almost smiled.

“Just brewed,” she said, indicating the expensive
-
looking coffee machine. “It’s Komodo Dragon blend. Myleene brought it back from the States a few weeks ago.”

I poured a cup
,
then n
early dropp
ed it
when I noticed
a short girl with masses of bouncy hair and a wide, wicked smile stood behind the door.

“Meet Felicia,” Belinda waved at her. “This here is Dean Logan. One of the Eight. Go easy,
poodle,
you’re his first Lycan.”

I stared, feeling rude but unable to stop. Felic
ia looked soft and
sweet and all things cute. A silver ring sparkled at her navel and two more at her earlobes.

Felicia gave a pretend growl, showing sharp canines. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I’ve already eaten.”

I closed my mouth with a clack of teeth and turned my attention back to my coffee.
I wasn’t about to poke fun
at a werewolf
no matter how light-hearted she seemed.

The coffee
was dark and smooth, with a hint of liquorice. Belinda said, “
Like
it? I’m a coffee connoisseur. Don’t laugh.”

“She’s a
geek,” Felicia breezed past,
heading unerringly for the coffee pot.

I said nothing, feeling intimidated. It soon became obvious the kitchen was a kind of sounding st
age
where views were aired and reactions evaluated. More decisions were ground out here, I
wagered
, than in any
official
meeting room.

Felicia seated herself beside me. I noticed her send a wicked grin in response to Belinda’s warning look. “We Lycans are a loose affiliation,
Mr.
Logan. We like our freedom, so tend n
ot to linger in once place for
long. We move in groups of three or four,
but
rarely more. I am the only Lycan
within a hundred miles of here,
”
she winked.
             
“
At least
, the only one worth knowing.”

Felicia was about to continue when someone else entered the kitchen. I
recognized
Myleene, dressed in a black, well-cut business suit.

“Now there-” Ceriden said approvingly. “Is a woman who knows how to dress.” he turned to me. “What does
that
look say to you, Logan? Power? Dominance?
Some Vivienne Westwood m
ixed with a little S and M?”

Felicia giggled.

“The meeting,” Myleene cut across us. “Is about to start. Everyone must assemble in the meeting room within five minutes.”

I heard
the
tensio
n in her voice. It reminded me that these discussions would affect the futu
re of our planet. I glanced
at the apprehensive faces of all the fantastical
beings
arrayed around me in the kitchen. It was their expressions that, above all else, drove home the indisputable fact that we were facing the severest situation in our history.

*****

The meeting room was full to bursting. I sat with a bedraggled looking Lucy as
unobtrusively
as possible. A high row of windows marched away to my left, loo
king out onto a
n
ordinary
York street. People walked there- mothers pushed prams, little girls held their fathers
’
hands, a postman delivered letters- completely unaware that
on the other side of those
opaque
windows the fate o
f the world was being decided
. I
recognized
few people
to be honest,
Myleene, Belinda, the lo
vely Lycan, Ceriden the vampire and
the oriental guy,
Kisami, sitting a few rows in front
.

And God how I wished for my trusty old Nikon. The
camera is the
physical
extension of the mind
,
and my mind
captured
grainy studies in tension,
fear and
anticipation.

Myleene br
ought the meeting to order by
indicat
ing
the quad bank of video screens mounted on
the wall, facing us. “
Soon we will see Tristran, Master of Vampires. Cheyne- the Witch Queen. And Eldritch- King of the Elves. Their representatives in the room are Ceriden, whom you all know, and-” Myleene paused as if in awe.

“Eleanor, the wife of Eldritch. Queen of the Elves.”

M
y jaw dropped. I knew enough to be stunned by the presence of a being even vampires said were rare and reverential.

Elves?
I thought.
Am I dreaming?

I saw a diminutive figure give a slight nod from the front row. I craned my neck to get a better view, then noticed Lucy doing a complicated neck-wrenching manoeuvre beside me. I patted her knee. “We’ll catch her later,” I winked.

   Myleene had recovered her poise
. She
flicked a switch and the screens flickered to life.

And so this momentous meeting of the true leaders of the world began.

Giles, the world leader of Aegis
,
said
nothing. Myleene stayed on her feet, taking the spotlight.
They’d p
robably worked out a routine between them where she took the limelight
,
whilst he kept to the background, taking time to think. The idea was sound.

Myleene spoke up. “First the good news. Devon Summers, of Maui, has been successfully extracted.
Our enemy got to her first
but made a mistake,"
she smiled. “
Devon is our healer.”

There were a few positive expletives around the room.

“Devon is on
her
way to York. And Ken Hamilton, another of the Eight, has been found, though he is proving hard to convince.”

“
Just put me in line for
a crack
at that,” Belinda said
.

Ceriden cooed. “
Belinda!”

I guessed they knew something about Ken Hamilton that I didn’t.

“
All
the Eight have been located,” Myleene said with obvious pride. “And
all
are alive. We will do
our best
to
keep
them that way. But
we h
ave not yet made contact with the majority of them.”

“How long do you anticipate?”  Eldritch asked.

“Twenty four hours,” Myleene said. “That’s all we need.”

“Make it quicker, please,” Eldritch said, somehow making his order sound like a reasonable request. “The Eight are all that stand between us and oblivion.”

Tristran spoke up next. For
a master vampire he didn’t sound
good. His voice shook as he spoke. “
Any luck with triggering their latent
. . .
powers
. . .
yet?
” Tristran’s words ended in a
series of
wracking coughs.

“
We haven’t started
yet, Tristran.”

“Then what happened with Devon Summers?”

“We believe her powers surfaced in response to a near-death situation,” Myleene sighed. “Let’s hope it’s not the only way.”

“We can at least start their training,” Eldritch said “
P
erhaps Eleanor could help?
N
one
are
better at training than the elves
.
If anyone can coax their powers out it is Eleanor, our finest.”

A voice answered from the front row
.
“I am grateful for the opportunity, husband.”

I noticed Myleene
relax. I
realized
there was more diplomacy going on here than it seemed
.

“I
’m sure we can still lear
n
more from
this text,” Cheyne said. “This text of Arcadia.
I’m sure I don’t need to mention that nobody has located the
seventh
Destroyer yet
,
Trickste
r
. I would like to continue spelling the text here in the library.”

Cheyne was a true
beauty, with the bearing and
appearance
of a
model
, but nothing could take my attention away from her nose. More like a beak, it was nearly double-jointed and crooked. It was as if God had said
okay, I’ll give you all this power, I’ll make you a true witch, but you’re gonna have to live with
this
in return.
And
bam!
She’d
gained a conk only a shade shorter and slightly less crooked than the Grand Canyon.

I heard Lucy stifle a giggle-cough beside me.

“Don’t say a word,” I lea
ned towards her
. “I don’t want my daughter turned into Shrek.”

Cheyne now folded her tanned legs
beneath her, and sipped
from
a
crystal wine glass at her side. “I want more specifics about this last battle. And I’d bet my ribbed broomstick that we can discover more about Gorgoroth. He is the coming world-ende
r, of whom we know nothing
.”

That made me frown
. We knew
nothing
?
Myleene and the gang had kept that little fact quiet.

Felicia found her voice. “I offer the services of Hugo’s pack. They hunt not an hour’s run from the Library.”