The Raven Saga Box Set

Chapter 45

However, people still had to make a living, and so Lilly spent the day helping out the local vet, and close family friend, Ben. He had spent hours talking about what kind of animal could be capable of so much brutality. The sadness he was feeling was not lost on Lilly. She was well aware that Ben's thoughts were firmly fixed on the fact that his own parents had been killed by a wild mountain lion when he was just a boy, leaving him and his baby brother, Oliver, to be raised by a close family friend, Gabriel.

But Lilly chose not to talk about it. Her family had to keep their secret from Ben and Oliver, especially knowing how devastating it would be for them to discover that she was part mountain lion herself.

She had been right about the devastation. Some months before, Lilly and Oliver's feelings for each other were becoming apparent. Even though she was barely fourteen at the time, and he was seventeen, they had a connection. Well, they did until her very first transformation had happened right in front of him. It had been the shock of a lifetime for them both. The look on Oliver's face when she changed would haunt her forever. Unable to cope with the reality, Oliver had decided to leave Powell River without another word to Lilly. Although he told his brother he'd had a massive falling out with Lilly, he chose not to reveal the truth to him. His one, final promise to Gabriel.

Although Oliver had kept in contact with his brother, he had asked him not to tell Lilly where he had gone. He had made it painfully clear that he wanted nothing more to do with her.

She was devastated, heartbroken. But she'd had no choice but to accept his decision and move on.

While she worked at her part-time job with Ben, she no longer asked questions about his younger brother. All she knew was that he was alive and well, and that had to be good enough for her.

She would have loved to have been able to confide in Ben about all this supernatural stuff... it would've certainly helped his work, but she had to keep her mouth shut. It was her biggest secret, and she hated not being able to share it with her friends.

Later that day as Ben closed up shop, his girlfriend Crystal arrived. She'd had to close up her hairdressing salon early.

"No-one is in the mood to get their hair done," she said, "everyone's scared to death of this wild animal. People are trying to stay indoors."

"Which is exactly what you should be doing," he scolded her as he planted a loving kiss on her lips, "I couldn't bear anything happening to you. Come on, get in the pick-up. We'll drop Lilly off before we head home," he said as he turned the key and locked the door to the practice.

"No, there's no need, Ben. Tabitha is coming to pick me up. She'll be here any minute," lied Lilly.

"We'll wait until she arrives then."

"No... there really is no need. I'll be fine. I can't imagine that beast will be hanging around here. She'll be here any second. You two go. I'll be fine."

Although Ben didn't want to leave her alone, he knew how stubborn she could be, and so they said goodbye and he and Crystal drove off down the road towards his house at the other side of town.

Ten minutes later, after Lilly decided it was safe to start walking, she hoisted her bag onto her back and began a slow jaunt home. She preferred to walk whenever she could. She loved the fresh air and the smell of the autumn leaves.

Choosing a different route than usual, she headed towards the plot of land where she had broken her leg the year before. It belonged to her father. He had bought it intending to build a family home for his wife Serena and daughters Neleh and Lilly before they had been murdered. But now the land had been left to become overgrown, the wood left to rot. To be forgotten until her father was hopefully found.

It had been over a year since his disappearance. And Lilly had still not given up hope. She vowed she would never give up. She would find him.

As she walked down that dirt track, she thought about the last time she had been there. She had inadvertently caused a large log to fall on top of her, trapping her beneath it while a storm brewed overhead. Falling unconscious, she had eventually woken up at the hospital. It was only later that she discovered she had been rescued by Sammy. He had risked his own skin to fly down and pick her up, carefully leaving her to be found by Ben outside his practice.

She shuddered at the thought. Without his help, Lilly could easily have died. She owed him her life, yet he looked upon her as though she'd saved his. If it wasn't for Lilly, he would still be trapped in the forest, thought of as a murderer. When that couldn't have been further from the truth.

Life had certainly changed for them both since then.

Lilly eyed the rotting logs and stared up at the fluffy white clouds in the blue sky, oblivious to the fact that she wasn't alone. There were eyes upon her.

She turned away from the logs and walked across the concrete base that had been created in preparation for the house. Kneeling down, she stroked the dirty floor and wished that things could have been different.

A chill ran across her back, and so she fastened her jacket and stood up. She decided to walk home along the water's edge, so she headed in the same direction she had come – crossing the main road and down towards the shore of the Pacific Ocean. And still, she did not sense that she was being followed.

It was one of her favourite spots. A handful of little beaches, scattered with huge pieces of driftwood. She climbed over one on to another and continued climbing until she reached the far side, where the narrow, well-worn pathway led towards her aunt's house. She turned at a noise from the water, a plop, as a fish hopped out and back again. Turning back inland, she decided she would pop in to see if Rose had arrived back home yet.

She was greeted by Rose's cat, Scully. Purring at first, the cat's back soon arched and a low snarl escaped its mouth. Sensing danger, Lilly turned to look. Although she could see nothing, that meant little. Her senses were suddenly on full alert, and that's when she noticed a faint metallic odour, the smell of blood. She dodged out of sight as quickly as possible, before running as fast as she could into the relative safety of Rose's cottage.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

December gripped her mother's hand tightly as the two carefully descended the steep steps that led into the basement. As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she shivered as goosebumps suddenly appeared on her arms and the back of her neck. She sensed that they weren't alone. Moira tightened her grip on her daughter in a gentle squeeze of reassurance and December relaxed.

When they reached the bottom, Moira reached out and flicked a switch. The glow of an old fashioned lamp flickered on, revealing something rather unexpected.

The room was painted entirely in purple - floors, ceiling and walls. There was a small single bed, also painted purple with purple sheets and pillows. An ornate wooden wardrobe stood to the side of the bed and guess what? It had also been painted purple. But in the middle of the room stood a tall thin white table, and on top of it sat a large old book surrounded by white candles. Although the book was open, every few seconds, the pages would turn as if someone was flipping them over. Just as December had felt when they first walked down those stairs, she sensed that they were not alone. It was a sensation that would ordinarily frighten the life out of her, but somehow, in the comfort of her mother's home, it felt all right.

Just as she was about to ask Moira about it, her mother turned to her and held a finger to her lips with a smile. December closed her mouth and waited. After a couple of seconds, she could hear whispers, they slowly became louder until she could understand the voices. The voices called out her name.

"December... December

Welcome home

Daughter of Moira

Grand-daughter of Ruby

A descendant of Constance, Fidelia, Genevieve, Theodosia, Millicent...."

And as quickly as the voices could be heard, they faded out to nothing.

Wide-eyed, December turned in wonder, speechless.

"They are the spirits of your ancestors. I can call upon them whenever I need them. But this time, they just wanted to welcome you home."

Still speechless, December was in shock. Since the weird events in the gym, she hadn't experienced anything quite like it. The mysterious voice in Battersea Park aside, that is.

Finally, her vocal cords returned, and December simply said, "thank you" to the empty room.

Moira smiled and encouraged December to sit down while she recounted the tale of her mother, Ruby.

"Born to a great witch, my grandmother Constance, in 1949, Ruby was adored from day one. Her mother taught her everything she knew about the art from a very early age and then when she was older, she was also encouraged to fit in with normal society. She went to college, studied to become a doctor and later got a job at a Massachusetts hospital, but she never stopped practising the art. Whenever she wasn't healing people, she was saving others from evil. In 1970, she met and married another doctor called Henry, a union that resulted in the birth of their beloved daughter - me - five years later. My father sadly developed cancer and died in 1981, leaving Ruby a single working mother. Not that it was a problem, of course. She was fiercely independent and very, very smart. The problem arose when she was offered a better position on the other side of America in Seattle. She took it, more money and fewer hours was a no brainer at the time. But Seattle had something dark and foreboding lurking in its midst. Unbeknown to Ruby..."

"Oh, get to the point, will you," said a woman's impatient voice from the shadows.

December jumped so far that she fell off the bed.

"Oh my dear, I'm so sorry, I certainly didn't mean to startle you, but your mother... honestly, she should have been an author the way she rattles off these long and rather boring stories. The whole point of the story was to tell young December here about who killed me. Are you going to get to the point, or shall I?"

Moira stooped down and helped pull December up off the floor.

"Mother... must you scare your granddaughter like that?"

"Well, I did apologise. I am sorry, my dear," said the voice out of nowhere.

"Mother... show yourself. December can hear you now, she may as well see you too."

The blurry image of a woman began to appear from behind the tall white table, slowly becoming a slender and glamorous looking figure with fiery red hair. A family trait.

Although the image remained somewhat translucent, December could easily make out the hazel green eyes and a cheeky smile that was etched on her thin pale face.

"Here I am. Is that better, dear? Let me introduce myself. My name is Ruby, and I'm your grandmother. I'd shake your hand and give you a hug, but it's not really possible," and she demonstrated as her slender hand trailed through the air, straight through December's own.

Speechless yet again, she felt a cold chill and shivered.

"Mother, please don't do that, it's actually really very cold when you try to touch us. December I'm sorry about my mother. I thought she was going to wait until you were more prepared until she revealed herself to you. Are you all right?"