Under the barrow, in or out? Diary of an Occult resolution assistant, the Journeyman
22:35
"You've got to wake up." I barely heard it but the sharp pain that flashed across my cheek was more immediate in my attention.
"Come on you haven't got much time." The words made it through to my mind and thoughts of my lovely daughter and my oh so precious grandchildren being in danger and slipping away from me filled my every thought, I wanted to get to my phone and call them again. Must get to the phone.
I was in my garden, how did I get here? Must have wandered out for some fresh air. Its getting late so I must get on, baking to do and something about the kids........but they have only just left. Getting old is a curse sometimes.
"WAKE UP, you really have to open your eyes."
My old bones ached and pain shot up my arm and I clutched it to my chest and my ears ached. I was so tired but I had something to do. What was it.
I was brought to my knees by a pain in my shoulder and as I looked through squinting eyes I could see a ring of small blood stained welts appearing and then right by my ear I heard the words coming out of the thin air.
"Ouw the what the hell, my teeth." followed by a quiet whimper that hung in the evening air.
I've been a witch for decades and voices in the air didn't worry me, but normally there is a root cause or reason so I thought. Thinking is a dying art and the gloss of the world tricks people into seeing what they want to see but there are things at the edge of sight or information so blatant and apparent and sitting so obviously its so easy to over look. So I looked and I thought.
I am me, Valentine, mother and grandmother and useful member of the community and a Witch. This I know. My house is mine, the garden tendered by my loving husband until his time was called and he is buried under the apple orchard he cared for so much with a stone always surrounded by flowers to mark the spot. My eyes were drawn to the stone and there it was standing like an anchor holding me to this spot and my memories. No wait, the orchard, it looks how it always looks, exactly how it always looks. How long have I been here? 35, 40 years and it was like this when we moved in with babe in arms, it looks like it now after years of care and cultivation. I looked closer the trees looked normal, but the branches seemed to all.....no wait, the trees seem to.....I got to my feet and did my best to run to the headstone of my beloved and much missed partner. I was there, almost instantly right beside the stone, all the flowers bright and scented much like they always were.
"He's coming, wake up NOW!"
Mother, grandmother and wife I maybe but Witch is in my bones and I opened my eyes. The trees this close were identical, the flowers were always fresh, the house always just the way I wanted it. When did I last lay flowers? When did I last need a plumber or builder to come to the house for repairs? In a building this big problems will arise.
The pain, the voice, the .............. A sinking feeling came over me like a weight pulling my insides to my knees. None of this was real, my poor babies are not mine, my life with my husband and all the good moments never happened and I mourned them, I even mourned the passing of my love, holding him in my arms as his last moments came and went and the last breath left his body were a part of me and as precious to me as the birth of my Clara and then her births to the boys, each one I was there holding her hand.
The scent of the flowers was still strong in my nose but they weren't as fresh as I thought, not stale but earthy.
I thought of my actions recently, How did I get so old? I wanted to go to my memory box kept by the side of my chair in the sitting room and.......I was in my sitting room, sat in my chair with the open fire roaring keeping chills, draughts and anything short of an artic blast at bay. I had a mug of tea in my Nanna mug and my memory box open upon my lap; old love letters tied up in ribbon and photos of my parents at my wedding and pieces of scribble from Clara's first day at school and a conker from when I beat Xanthic in a match when I won the deeds to Fernum and moved in with my family and a handful of other meaning full knick-knacks and keepsakes small enough to fit into a silver edged oak box the size of a box of tissues.
The warmth of the fire relaxed me and drove the cold out of my body and the crackle and spitting of behind the grate was hypnotic dragging my eye lids down and the sounds of my snuffling snores soon began to merge with them and sleep slowly enveloped. A pain in my chest made me gasp. I had never had a heart attack but I remember everyone saying it was a crushing pain in the chest and arm; well this was a sudden and insistent pain covering my chest and although I was sure I had not screamed out there was a scream ringing around my bedroom where I was led in my bed. I fumbled for the light switch and the single bulb failed to fully illuminate the room.
The pain began to subside; but the thing with a worrying and possibly fatal condition is it focuses the brain onto important things. How did I get into bed when I fell asleep in the chair? How could I be a grandmother? I feel like a teenager but then I feel like a very old woman.
Pain gripped me again, ripping through my chest and this time I thought I had broken a rib and I called out, a pain orated mirrored by the disembodied voice; not an echo the voice was male, thin and formless as if the language was new to him or once native but forgotten with lack of use over a vast time.
I looked out the window and say my husbands grave covered in flowers, my first view in the morning and last before I retire to bed every night; but the orchard lies in the rear of the property heading towards the woodland and my room, the master bedroom over look the long drive and the gardens leading to Annie and Clive's cottage who manage the estate for me as they did for Xanthic before.
My inner Witch was screaming. This is not right, Clive was ancient when I met him, how could he be head gardener still? And Annie was still there by his side, surely even with healthy living, country air and fresh food they couldn't have well over a century and a quarter in them? The orchard, how can that be in front of me? The trees....what was it I knew about the trees?
"Who's there?" I called out loudly, if there were voices trying to talk to me then it would be rude not to talk back, after all they may talk a lot of sense.
"He's coming!"
"Who's coming?" I called back in the direction I thought the voice came from.
"The ugly one, he's coming, you must wake up."
I was asleep, or somewhere other than complete consciousness; I could see it now, the identical trees, Annie and Clive still going strong, the memories so prominent in my mind of my loved ones but the linking memories, the small things were not, when was I last ill? Did Clara ever fall over and hurt herself? When was I last on the loo?
The room I was in was always the same, everyday it was identical, chairs, the bed, even the spiders I evict with great care when I dust are always in the same crannies in the fire place when I do the task a week later. Too many errors, or perfections? Either way it wasn't the real world I knew that now.
My memories box was in my hand and I pulled out the letters, my letters written to me by hand in ink from a time when email and text ruled supreme, I started to read and remembered those first tender days of a blossoming romance that grew into a deep love and trust that lasted a life time; and here, a ring given to me on my wedding day by my mother who walked me down the isle because Dad had broke his leg, it meant everything to me. How did Dad break his leg? I should know this, he was in plaster, always in plaster right up till he......but he didn't die in my middle age he died before I was born and I never knew what he looked like but here he is, in a wheel chair at my wedding.
The box fell from my fingers, I was being pulled back into......into what? I kicked the box, it was a wicked lie, evil beyond belief giving me so much but taking as much in return. I felt the kick was not enough and I stooped to pick it up and I threw it against the stone outer wall as hard as I could through the pain in my chest and it smashed into fragments with papers, trinkets and a conker falling in all directions but not with the speed of gravity but in a reduced time, then the stones in the wall started to fall out, spooling out but instead of the dark outside within the expanding hole but a brighter warm brown with shapes forming as the stones fall and more and more 'outside' become visible.
"Ha, you're doing it, you're doing it. Wake up please, please, please, please." The voice turned from words into cries and I could now see him, a young man chained to a stone, bare because of rotten and worn rags falling from his body; once fine clothing reduced to nothing with time and wear but the body beneath had no mark or abrasion upon it. Now, the house had dissolved to nothing and I was laying on stinking furs in a grotto dug out of the earth. I was groggy, as if waking after a long sleep and more than a couple of beers the night before and it was hard to think in a straight line but I knew this was wrong.
"You did it." Cried the man, "You actually did it, I knew you would be better than the others, I knew you had strength, I knew, I saw you, I knew." And he lapsed into laughing quietly to himself muttering as he did so. "I knew, I did, I knew."
Where was I and what did I need to do? No time to feel sorry for myself, although I did have a pain still like a cracked rib and what's this? I lifted my collar and saw a bruise in the shape of teeth across my shoulder.
"Did you do this?" I asked looking at the man and as I did I looked to see if I could free him. It never crossed my mind whether I should free him or what he might do, I guess that showed my inexperience in these things or highlights my humanity.
"Yes," said the man. "I need to wake you up and you looked like you could hear me but it wasn't enough. I bit you, scratched you and kicked you. I am very sorry for that, mostly because whatever you have protecting you bites back, I lost a tooth when I bit you and you bit back!"
"Did you have to kick me so hard?" I enquired feeling what I was sure was a broken rib under very tender and swollen skin.
"I had to, but if it makes you forgive me quicker I think you broke my toe when I did; but after I slapped you, you moved out of my reach and I had to wake you. He's coming."
"I don't know, I have a spell on me for protection but I don't know how it works, but please tell me whoo's coming? What's going on?" I pleaded, I needed more information and it felt like I had dropped into this nightmare from such a sweet dream and it was taking me time to catch up.
"He is, the ugly one. He keeps us here, I don't know why, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know."
He looked distressed and the collar around his throat kept him in place and heavy chains linked to his arms and legs tethered him to the stone against one wall; I could see past him to a small nest made from disgusting rags where fleas jumped and scraps of food and bone festered in a dark corner.
There was a tunnel off to the side, a rope tied to pegs stuck into the walls held a tartan rug acting as a curtain separating the room from whatever else lies beyond. It wasn't big enough to cover the entrance in it entirety and I could see a small creature ambling its way along the tunnel carrying a wooden bowl; it looked like a small child in its gait, moving with small steps but at a pace. I didn't know what to do, there was no place to hide in here and no weapons to hand to defend myself from what could turnout to be anything. I led back down hoping to ape my previous pose and buy me time to think; oh I envy those that can act in an instant and always make that critical but correct decision.
The thing pushed through the curtain and threw the bowl onto the floor in front of my fellow captive and half its foul smelling grey watery soup sloshed over the side; it didn't put off the man from filling his mouth and swallowing it down in great gulps. The thing then kicked him and laughed. I knew this thing was evil, You can never tell by looks because no-one can help how they were created but everyone can behave how they want and this thing took great pleasure in the pain it caused. Now it was closer I could see its small head, large ears and a protruding nose gave it a comical appearance, but the black eyes sharp over hanging teeth and long fingers that ended in talon-like claws off thin grey skinned bony arms gave it a nightmare visage. It went to kick the man again and I leapt from my prone position and pushed the thing to one side sending it tumbling to the side; it was like touching a snake, thin and delicate looking but packed with muscle and sinew and you knew it could do more harm to you than you could to it.
The man cried in despair as if all hope was gone and the creature hissed and leapt agilely to its feet and raked the air with its claws.
"No no no no no, " cried the man, "its all over, he'll kill us now for this."
"Shutty face Hoo-man," Rasped the thing. "I bitey you girly now, taste you flesh in my belly ha, Master will not beat me if you fight yes yes." Then it came at me, a jump propelled it at waist height through the air and it coved the short distance without effort.
I reacted without thought, there was no time for thinking, and rounded my shoulder to pull myself into the smallest space I could. The creature was on me and I could feel its clawed fingers grab onto me and its ugly wrinkled face pull towards mine as its foul hot breath engulfed the air around me as it laughed uncontrollable with glee over what it was going to do.
"You've got to wake up." I barely heard it but the sharp pain that flashed across my cheek was more immediate in my attention.
"Come on you haven't got much time." The words made it through to my mind and thoughts of my lovely daughter and my oh so precious grandchildren being in danger and slipping away from me filled my every thought, I wanted to get to my phone and call them again. Must get to the phone.
I was in my garden, how did I get here? Must have wandered out for some fresh air. Its getting late so I must get on, baking to do and something about the kids........but they have only just left. Getting old is a curse sometimes.
"WAKE UP, you really have to open your eyes."
My old bones ached and pain shot up my arm and I clutched it to my chest and my ears ached. I was so tired but I had something to do. What was it.
I was brought to my knees by a pain in my shoulder and as I looked through squinting eyes I could see a ring of small blood stained welts appearing and then right by my ear I heard the words coming out of the thin air.
"Ouw the what the hell, my teeth." followed by a quiet whimper that hung in the evening air.
I've been a witch for decades and voices in the air didn't worry me, but normally there is a root cause or reason so I thought. Thinking is a dying art and the gloss of the world tricks people into seeing what they want to see but there are things at the edge of sight or information so blatant and apparent and sitting so obviously its so easy to over look. So I looked and I thought.
I am me, Valentine, mother and grandmother and useful member of the community and a Witch. This I know. My house is mine, the garden tendered by my loving husband until his time was called and he is buried under the apple orchard he cared for so much with a stone always surrounded by flowers to mark the spot. My eyes were drawn to the stone and there it was standing like an anchor holding me to this spot and my memories. No wait, the orchard, it looks how it always looks, exactly how it always looks. How long have I been here? 35, 40 years and it was like this when we moved in with babe in arms, it looks like it now after years of care and cultivation. I looked closer the trees looked normal, but the branches seemed to all.....no wait, the trees seem to.....I got to my feet and did my best to run to the headstone of my beloved and much missed partner. I was there, almost instantly right beside the stone, all the flowers bright and scented much like they always were.
"He's coming, wake up NOW!"
Mother, grandmother and wife I maybe but Witch is in my bones and I opened my eyes. The trees this close were identical, the flowers were always fresh, the house always just the way I wanted it. When did I last lay flowers? When did I last need a plumber or builder to come to the house for repairs? In a building this big problems will arise.
The pain, the voice, the .............. A sinking feeling came over me like a weight pulling my insides to my knees. None of this was real, my poor babies are not mine, my life with my husband and all the good moments never happened and I mourned them, I even mourned the passing of my love, holding him in my arms as his last moments came and went and the last breath left his body were a part of me and as precious to me as the birth of my Clara and then her births to the boys, each one I was there holding her hand.
The scent of the flowers was still strong in my nose but they weren't as fresh as I thought, not stale but earthy.
I thought of my actions recently, How did I get so old? I wanted to go to my memory box kept by the side of my chair in the sitting room and.......I was in my sitting room, sat in my chair with the open fire roaring keeping chills, draughts and anything short of an artic blast at bay. I had a mug of tea in my Nanna mug and my memory box open upon my lap; old love letters tied up in ribbon and photos of my parents at my wedding and pieces of scribble from Clara's first day at school and a conker from when I beat Xanthic in a match when I won the deeds to Fernum and moved in with my family and a handful of other meaning full knick-knacks and keepsakes small enough to fit into a silver edged oak box the size of a box of tissues.
The warmth of the fire relaxed me and drove the cold out of my body and the crackle and spitting of behind the grate was hypnotic dragging my eye lids down and the sounds of my snuffling snores soon began to merge with them and sleep slowly enveloped. A pain in my chest made me gasp. I had never had a heart attack but I remember everyone saying it was a crushing pain in the chest and arm; well this was a sudden and insistent pain covering my chest and although I was sure I had not screamed out there was a scream ringing around my bedroom where I was led in my bed. I fumbled for the light switch and the single bulb failed to fully illuminate the room.
The pain began to subside; but the thing with a worrying and possibly fatal condition is it focuses the brain onto important things. How did I get into bed when I fell asleep in the chair? How could I be a grandmother? I feel like a teenager but then I feel like a very old woman.
Pain gripped me again, ripping through my chest and this time I thought I had broken a rib and I called out, a pain orated mirrored by the disembodied voice; not an echo the voice was male, thin and formless as if the language was new to him or once native but forgotten with lack of use over a vast time.
I looked out the window and say my husbands grave covered in flowers, my first view in the morning and last before I retire to bed every night; but the orchard lies in the rear of the property heading towards the woodland and my room, the master bedroom over look the long drive and the gardens leading to Annie and Clive's cottage who manage the estate for me as they did for Xanthic before.
My inner Witch was screaming. This is not right, Clive was ancient when I met him, how could he be head gardener still? And Annie was still there by his side, surely even with healthy living, country air and fresh food they couldn't have well over a century and a quarter in them? The orchard, how can that be in front of me? The trees....what was it I knew about the trees?
"Who's there?" I called out loudly, if there were voices trying to talk to me then it would be rude not to talk back, after all they may talk a lot of sense.
"He's coming!"
"Who's coming?" I called back in the direction I thought the voice came from.
"The ugly one, he's coming, you must wake up."
I was asleep, or somewhere other than complete consciousness; I could see it now, the identical trees, Annie and Clive still going strong, the memories so prominent in my mind of my loved ones but the linking memories, the small things were not, when was I last ill? Did Clara ever fall over and hurt herself? When was I last on the loo?
The room I was in was always the same, everyday it was identical, chairs, the bed, even the spiders I evict with great care when I dust are always in the same crannies in the fire place when I do the task a week later. Too many errors, or perfections? Either way it wasn't the real world I knew that now.
My memories box was in my hand and I pulled out the letters, my letters written to me by hand in ink from a time when email and text ruled supreme, I started to read and remembered those first tender days of a blossoming romance that grew into a deep love and trust that lasted a life time; and here, a ring given to me on my wedding day by my mother who walked me down the isle because Dad had broke his leg, it meant everything to me. How did Dad break his leg? I should know this, he was in plaster, always in plaster right up till he......but he didn't die in my middle age he died before I was born and I never knew what he looked like but here he is, in a wheel chair at my wedding.
The box fell from my fingers, I was being pulled back into......into what? I kicked the box, it was a wicked lie, evil beyond belief giving me so much but taking as much in return. I felt the kick was not enough and I stooped to pick it up and I threw it against the stone outer wall as hard as I could through the pain in my chest and it smashed into fragments with papers, trinkets and a conker falling in all directions but not with the speed of gravity but in a reduced time, then the stones in the wall started to fall out, spooling out but instead of the dark outside within the expanding hole but a brighter warm brown with shapes forming as the stones fall and more and more 'outside' become visible.
"Ha, you're doing it, you're doing it. Wake up please, please, please, please." The voice turned from words into cries and I could now see him, a young man chained to a stone, bare because of rotten and worn rags falling from his body; once fine clothing reduced to nothing with time and wear but the body beneath had no mark or abrasion upon it. Now, the house had dissolved to nothing and I was laying on stinking furs in a grotto dug out of the earth. I was groggy, as if waking after a long sleep and more than a couple of beers the night before and it was hard to think in a straight line but I knew this was wrong.
"You did it." Cried the man, "You actually did it, I knew you would be better than the others, I knew you had strength, I knew, I saw you, I knew." And he lapsed into laughing quietly to himself muttering as he did so. "I knew, I did, I knew."
Where was I and what did I need to do? No time to feel sorry for myself, although I did have a pain still like a cracked rib and what's this? I lifted my collar and saw a bruise in the shape of teeth across my shoulder.
"Did you do this?" I asked looking at the man and as I did I looked to see if I could free him. It never crossed my mind whether I should free him or what he might do, I guess that showed my inexperience in these things or highlights my humanity.
"Yes," said the man. "I need to wake you up and you looked like you could hear me but it wasn't enough. I bit you, scratched you and kicked you. I am very sorry for that, mostly because whatever you have protecting you bites back, I lost a tooth when I bit you and you bit back!"
"Did you have to kick me so hard?" I enquired feeling what I was sure was a broken rib under very tender and swollen skin.
"I had to, but if it makes you forgive me quicker I think you broke my toe when I did; but after I slapped you, you moved out of my reach and I had to wake you. He's coming."
"I don't know, I have a spell on me for protection but I don't know how it works, but please tell me whoo's coming? What's going on?" I pleaded, I needed more information and it felt like I had dropped into this nightmare from such a sweet dream and it was taking me time to catch up.
"He is, the ugly one. He keeps us here, I don't know why, I don't know, I don't know, I don't know."
He looked distressed and the collar around his throat kept him in place and heavy chains linked to his arms and legs tethered him to the stone against one wall; I could see past him to a small nest made from disgusting rags where fleas jumped and scraps of food and bone festered in a dark corner.
There was a tunnel off to the side, a rope tied to pegs stuck into the walls held a tartan rug acting as a curtain separating the room from whatever else lies beyond. It wasn't big enough to cover the entrance in it entirety and I could see a small creature ambling its way along the tunnel carrying a wooden bowl; it looked like a small child in its gait, moving with small steps but at a pace. I didn't know what to do, there was no place to hide in here and no weapons to hand to defend myself from what could turnout to be anything. I led back down hoping to ape my previous pose and buy me time to think; oh I envy those that can act in an instant and always make that critical but correct decision.
The thing pushed through the curtain and threw the bowl onto the floor in front of my fellow captive and half its foul smelling grey watery soup sloshed over the side; it didn't put off the man from filling his mouth and swallowing it down in great gulps. The thing then kicked him and laughed. I knew this thing was evil, You can never tell by looks because no-one can help how they were created but everyone can behave how they want and this thing took great pleasure in the pain it caused. Now it was closer I could see its small head, large ears and a protruding nose gave it a comical appearance, but the black eyes sharp over hanging teeth and long fingers that ended in talon-like claws off thin grey skinned bony arms gave it a nightmare visage. It went to kick the man again and I leapt from my prone position and pushed the thing to one side sending it tumbling to the side; it was like touching a snake, thin and delicate looking but packed with muscle and sinew and you knew it could do more harm to you than you could to it.
The man cried in despair as if all hope was gone and the creature hissed and leapt agilely to its feet and raked the air with its claws.
"No no no no no, " cried the man, "its all over, he'll kill us now for this."
"Shutty face Hoo-man," Rasped the thing. "I bitey you girly now, taste you flesh in my belly ha, Master will not beat me if you fight yes yes." Then it came at me, a jump propelled it at waist height through the air and it coved the short distance without effort.
I reacted without thought, there was no time for thinking, and rounded my shoulder to pull myself into the smallest space I could. The creature was on me and I could feel its clawed fingers grab onto me and its ugly wrinkled face pull towards mine as its foul hot breath engulfed the air around me as it laughed uncontrollable with glee over what it was going to do.
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