Wings of Sorrow (A horror fantasy novel) (4 page)

The screeching demon woke Scarlet and made her moan in pain. She rolled onto her side and smashed her palm against the top of the alarm clock and begged it to stop. 8.00AM: Time to go to work.

Her head felt heavy—a mixture of tiredness and bad food. It led to her stumbling into the ensuite like a zombie, never lifting her feet higher than a shuffle. The plush carpet felt good against her bare feet, but that was her only pleasure, and when she looked into the bathroom mirror, her hair was tangled up like a bunch of weeds.

“Wow,” she said to herself. “The boys are going to be lining up to date you, sugar.” She sighed.
I suppose there’s always Indy.

Before getting dressed, she dragged a brush through her hair and put on a little makeup. Five minutes later she felt almost human again. From her wardrobe, she went to get her peach cardigan, but realised it was in the kitchen—muddy and probably ruined. The memory of Sorrow wearing it made her titter. It all seemed like a loopy dream now, and she was no longer sure it had even happened.

In the kitchen, she met her dad. He was leaning over an impressive tower of buttery toast and seemed particularly perky this morning. Scarlet had not inherited her father’s love of early starts.

“Hey, Scarlet. Get some breakfast down you before work.”

“Thanks. Any Marmite?”

“No, sorry. I’ll go the supermarket when I get chance, promise.”

“Okay.”

Instead of looking away, he stared at her for a moment. Eventually, she had to ask him what was wrong.

“Nothing’s wrong,” he said. “I just can’t believe you’re so grown; up and ready for a day at work. Seems like only yesterday I was carrying you around on my shoulders at Alton Towers. You remember that?”

She nodded. “Yeah, it was the year mum left.”

His face fell and he stared into his coffee. “Yes, well, I suppose things really were different back then. We’ve come a long way, though, don’t you think?”

Scarlet hated seeing him brood over her mum—sometimes he could do it for days—so she changed the subject. “How’s the new job coming? They appreciate the long hours you’ve been doing?”

“I hope so; otherwise it’s all for nothing. To be honest, it took me a while to get to grips with the new role after so long in my old one. I’ve just started to find my feet, but things seem to be coming along.”

“Maybe you won’t be away so much then,” she added.

“Scarlet, you know I would be home more often if I could.”

“Would you?”

“Yes! I’m just so afraid of things falling apart again. I’m doing all I can to keep a hold of my job. Things aren’t so bad, are they? I mean, we have this nice little house, and you have your part time job. Have you made any friends yet?”

“If you’d spoken to me in the last month you would know the answer to that question is: Not so much.”

With a sigh, he headed over to the sink and placed his empty coffee mug inside. Then he stood for a moment with his back to her. When he turned around, he looked sympathetic. “I was going to work this Saturday, but I’ll see about getting it off. Maybe we can go ice skating. There’s a rink in town, isn’t there?”

Scarlet loved to skate, so it was a hard offer for her to refuse. “There’s a rink next to the cinema. I suppose it could be fun.”

“Great, then it’s a date.” He came and gave her a kiss on the cheek. “Have a good day at work, hun.”

“You too.”

He left and she finished her toast, enjoying the warm butter in her mouth, but missing the tartness of the Marmite. She’d woken up fully now, and decided that it did feel pretty darn good to start the day early. So often she would lie in bed all morning, but she had to admit that her mood felt better than it usually did when waking up at 11AM.

Once she was full on toast, she rinsed her plate beneath the hot tap and headed for the door. Before leaving, she spotted her peach cardigan hanging on a hook. It was stretched and muddy—proof that what happened last night was real. Sorrow had been real.

She locked the door on her way out and headed down the front path. When she passed the bus stop, she considered waiting, but then looked up at the shimmering sun and decided that she was not going to be deterred from taking her morning walk around the lake. The chances of bumping into Sorrow again were surely next to nothing, yet part of her was willing to take the risk.

Or was it more that she
wanted
to see him again?

She felt embarrassed at the notion of trying to bump into the weirdo, but it was possibly very true that she wanted to see him—if only to see that he was alright. Last night had excited her—a departure from the humdrum, lonely existence of her life. It had almost been an adventure.

Scarlet and the Naked Stranger beside the Lake.

“God, this is like something out of a crappy romance,” she muttered to herself. “If he turns out to be a vampire, then I’m grabbing a stake and shoving it in my eye.”

The lake was often quiet early in the morning, but when she got there she spotted a couple of people walking their dogs and a pensioner feeding the ducks. It made her feel safe, having people around, but she was also disappointed. Nobody had seen Sorrow except for her, and it felt like the only chance of seeing him again would be if she were alone.

She passed an old man walking a beagle.

“Morning,” he said with a smile.

“Morning,” she said back.

She sighed and thought herself silly. What on earth was she doing? Hoping to run into Sorrow again was so immature. Why was she acting like a kid?

For the rest of her walk, she kept her head down and concentrated only on getting to work. If she wanted attention, then she could get it from Indy easily enough. He had made no secret of the fact that he fancied her, but she always felt queasy at the thought. He wasn’t bad looking, but he was such a…
doof
. She didn’t want to call him anything worse because he didn’t deserve it, but she could only imagine what a date with him would look like: McDonald's followed by paint-balling, most likely. She wanted a grown-up boyfriend—someone with a car who could take her places.

Why was she even thinking about boyfriends right now? Was it because she’d been thinking about Sorrow? Did she fancy him? He was so much older…

And crazy. Don’t forget the crazy.

She started to dawdle and, when she checked her watch, saw that she was running late. With a muffled curse, she picked up her pace. With the way Mr Chester had been eyeballing her from his office yesterday, the last thing she could afford was tardiness.

A jogger dodged around her, and then the path ahead was all clear, right up to the visitor’s centre where she could take the path into town. She considered changing from a walk to a jog, but when she passed the spot where Sorrow had been lying, she lingered. The tracks in the mud were still there, and seeing such evidence made everything surreal again. What on earth had happened to that strange man she had found at the edge of the lake?

A gust of cold air came across the lake and made her shiver. The sun retreated behind the clouds, taking all colour with it. A noise made her spin around, but when she looked, she saw nothing but an empty path.

The breeze coming off the surface of the lake picked up, and she shivered again. Summer had left and the trees on the other side of the path rustled. The back of her neck felt like someone had pinched it. The oddest feeling, but something in her blood cried out for her to get away from there. Earlier there had been people about, but now the lake was deserted, aside from the birds which sat perfectly still on the water.

She embarrassed herself by acting like a frightened little girl. “Hello? Is anybody there?”

No answer. Of course there was no answer. Either she was being paranoid, or some psychopath was about to kill her—in both situations, nobody was going to answer her calls.

God, Scarlet. You’re such a wet mess. Why would anybody want to hurt you?

She decided the only thing to shake off the willies would be to get to work, so she picked up her pace until she was almost jogging. She probably looked stupid, but right now no one was around to laugh at her. She wished she had taken the bus, but the longer she walked, the more she told herself she was being stupid. Eventually, the sun reappeared from behind the clouds and the foreboding greys were once again replaced by colour. The breeze from the lake fell away too, and she felt foolish. Why had she been so worried?

A man appeared up ahead, strolling down the path in her direction.

Scarlet laughed, and was glad nobody had seen her freak out.

The man walking towards her was tall—even from twenty metres away that much was clear. His hair was golden-blond and he wore a bright white shirt. A knight, come to rescue her from her childish fears. Whoever he was, she was glad to see him. This might be the last time she ever took a morning walk beside the lake.

Now close enough to see the man’s handsome face, Scarlet gave a bright smile.

The man did not return it.

With an amount of fury Scarlet had never witnessed before, the man leapt at her like a maniac. It was only the fact that she had already been on edge, already jumpy, that allowed her to react quickly enough to dodge out of the way.

The man whirled and snatched out again. This time he caught her by the wrist.

Scarlet screamed as the flesh on her arm burned. The man had something in his hand—something scorching hot.

“You’re hurting me,” she screamed, tears exploding from her eyes.

The man showed no concern, looking at her with nothing but hatred. “You are the Spark. I am here to extinguish you.”

“Get off me! Help! HELP ME!”

“I will help you,” her attacker snarled. “I will help you before it is too late.” He raised his other hand towards her face, fingers open like a sharp clamp. She could feel the heat coming off his fingers against her eyebrows.

“You’re a monster,” she screamed.

“I am not the monster.”

The burning hand was only an inch away from her face now, and her eyes watered under the intense heat, so she closed them.

Something collided into Scarlet and sent her sprawling down the embankment. She came to rest with one leg in the water, and only just managed to keep herself from sliding into the lake. Her wrist burned, and the wind had been knocked out of her. She tried to sob, but was in too much shock.

Somebody had come to her rescue. Another stranger raced down the hill towards her. No, not a stranger. It was Sorrow, still dressed in her father’s jeans and shirt—and still barefoot. Her attacker was still on his feet and marching towards her too, but Sorrow leapt into the air and pummelled him. He drove a knee into the other man’s head and shoved him down to the ground. Then he turned to Scarlet. “You need to get out of here now.”

“Sorrow? W-what are you doing here?”

“I don’t know, but I’m certain it has something to do with you.”

“How did you know I would come back here?”

“I didn’t. I never left you. You slept during the night, but I stayed close. Now get out of here, before he comes for you again.”

“W-who is he?”

“JUST GO!”

The force of Sorrow’s voice made her flinch—like a physical force knocking her back—so she turned and fled up the bank, ignoring the startled lady who was standing on the path with a bicycle by her side. Only once did Scarlet dare to look back, and when she did, she saw that Sorrow had fallen to his knees and was being beaten harshly by the enraged blond man. She considered going back to help him, but went for her phone instead. She cursed when she couldn’t find it. Her jean pocket was ripped open and her phone had been inside. She knew only one safe place to go and get help, so she broke into a run and headed for work.