The Four Realms (20 page)

The snow on the ground seemed to intensify as they left the city, buildings and roads giving way to fields and trees, all Christmas card perfect.
 
The blue skies would ensure that it didn't stay around, long wet icicles hanging around the stations, a sign of the snow's retreat.

The train journey seemed to take forever, Darwin growing increasingly impatient with each stop.

"Why do we need to stop here?" he'd ask Cassidy.
 
"It's not like anyone is getting on or off."

Cassidy just told him to calm down.
 
"They're not following us.
 
And besides if they are, they'll have to stop at all the same stations as well."

She was right, he was on edge and didn't feel safe.
 
Each time the door to the next carriage opened, he felt his heart jump, as if one of Mr East's colleagues might step through.
 
Cassidy, on the other hand, seemed largely unaffected by this.
 
How did she manage to stay so calm?
 
She was glued to the window for most of the journey, watching the world shoot past, and even found time for a quick nap.
 
How she could sleep after all that had happened was beyond him.

"So who is this Nanny Voodoo then?"
 
Cassidy asked as they arrived in Clacton and made their way down toward the seafront.
 

"She used to look after me whilst I was a child," he said.
 
"Well, bringing me away here on holidays."

"Is she a vampire?"

Darwin laughed.
 
"Nanny Voodoo?
 
No, she's something a lot more dangerous."

He saw Cassidy's face turn to one of worry and he almost felt glad.
 
She'd been so calm on the train journey he almost wanted her to suffer.
 
But he stopped himself from taking out his angst on Cassidy.

"She's...
 
well she's Nanny Voodoo.
 
They say she's the only person who can do magic in this realm."

Cassidy raised an eyebrow.
 
"Darwin, you know that's not possible, right?
 
I mean, even if there was any mana in this realm, the fact that she's female…"

"If I'd said that, you'd have accused me of being sexist."

"But still..."

"Look, all I know is she got a lot of respect from the vampires.
 
There were few people who Metzger considered untouchable, and she was one."

"So much so, that he'd let her take you away on holiday?"

"Yeah, right.
 
Nanny Voodoo said it was no good a child being cooped up with vampires all the time.
 
Said I deserved a break once in a while."

"So how come you ran away rather than come live with her?"

Darwin scratched the back of his head nervously.
 
"Because she always said she needed a break for the other eleven months of the year."

Cassidy smiled.
 
"I could see that," she said.

In truth, Darwin had some of his fondest memories in Clacton.
 
Going off and playing in the sea, ignoring Nanny Voodoo's calls for him to come back and let her apply sunblock, then spending the rest of the week in a shaded house, while his red skin, blistered and peeled.
 
Oh, how he used to drive her mad.
 
He'd felt the full force of the woman's right arm on more than one occasion.
 
Not that he was particularly naughty, just that as a child without any real upbringing, he had to have some things beaten into him.
 
Even so, the month he spent with Nanny Voodoo each summer were the best times he could remember, which was why he was nervous now.

When he'd run away, he'd run away from everything, the vampire council, the vampire way of life, everything.
 
Heck, he'd near starved himself to death and not worried how burnt he got.
 
He was raging against the system, a system that Nanny Voodoo was part of.
 
He felt ashamed of that now.
 
He should have at least phoned her, told her he was OK, even if in those early days it was far from the truth.
 
But it never seemed like the right time, so he'd put it off and off and off, waiting for that time when he could call her up and tell her he was doing fine.

And in truth, he was worried he might turn up on her doorstep and she'd reject him.
 
She'd have every right to do so, he was only now turning up because he was in trouble.
 
That and to check she was OK.
 
Mortality had been brought to the forefront of his mind in recent days.
 
Never before had the thought that someone might not be there any more ever really crossed his mind.
 
He'd be surrounded by immortals for most of his life, why would it?

That was what had been really bothering him on the train.
 
If they'd managed to get to Metzger and the Vampire Council, had they got to her as well?
 

"You're very quiet today," Cassidy observed.
 
"Is everything OK?"

Is everything OK?
 
How he could have laughed.
 
Of course it wasn't.
 
Things were fucked up royally, it was all his fault and he had to put them right.
 
That started with Nanny Voodoo.
 
A new chapter, Darwin
, he told himself.
 
No more hiding from yourself.
 
It's time to man up, protect your friends and the remains of your race.

"I'm OK," he said sullenly.
 
"This place holds a lot of memories."

"Well are we going to get there soon, cos I'm freezing."

He looked down at her, hands wrapped round her body, head retracted as much as it could into the warmth of her coat.

"Not much further now, Cassidy."

#

Nanny Voodoo lived in a bungalow on the outskirts of town, not much more than a stone's throw from the beach.
 
Darwin used to be able to run out of her front door and get nearly all the way there before she'd scream for him to wait.

He hesitated before knocking, then knocked before all the doubts and angst could take hold.
 
No going back now.

"Whatever it is, I ain't buying," came her unmistakably voice, her accent a bizarre hybrid of Essex and the Caribbean. Relief washed over Darwin.
 
However she might react to him, at least he knew she was still alive.

There was the sound of the door being unbolted, and the turn of a key in the lock, before the door was flung open.

She'd got older, Darwin thought.
 
Her hair was now dusted with grey and her face was more lined than he remembered, but still it was unmistakably Nanny Voodoo.
 
Those buck teeth, those eyes that could narrow and bore right through you.

Darwin held out his arms as she eyed him suspiciously.

"Nanny Voodoo," he boomed, nervously hoping that she would recognise him.

The clout came from nowhere, struck him on the side of the head.

"Where have you been?"
 
she demanded as if he'd just stayed out late.
 
"Worried myself sick over you.
 
Running off like that."

Darwin rubbed his sore ear.
 
The glittering vial hung around her neck held his attention as he dare not look up.

"I'm sorry," he mumbled.
 
"I thought you'd make me go back."

"Of course I'd make you go back," Nanny Voodoo huffed.
 
"Best place for you, judging from the state of you."

"I couldn't take it anymore, I..."

He was interrupted by another clout.

"You're a vampire, Darwin.
 
If you think that's the greatest challenge you got coming, you think again.
 
I didn't spend my summers taking care of you, just so you could go running off."

She sniffed him, her nose visibly wrinkling from the smell.

"At least you're eating."

Darwin stood there, cowered and waiting, although if he was honest, he wasn't sure for what.
 

"Hmmm," mulled Nanny Voodoo.
 
"Suppose you'd better come in."

Relief washed over Darwin.
 
He broke into the broadest smile, threw his arms around the woman and kissed her on the cheek.

"Thank you," he said, realising what he'd been waiting for - her forgiveness.
 
She was his one remaining link with his old life, and to have been rejected by her would have broken his heart.

Nanny Voodoo pushed him away.
 
"Be off with you," she said, before breaking into a slight smirk.
 
"You smell like a sewer."

She nodded toward Cassidy, waiting at the top of the path.
 
"Who be your friend?" she asked.

"Oh, this is Cassidy," Darwin replied beckoning her to come forward.
 
"Cassidy, this is Nanny Voodoo."

Nanny Voodoo eyed her carefully, but then she eyed everyone carefully thought Darwin.

"Fallen angel?" she mused.
 
"Some interesting company you be keeping these days."

"Hello," said Cassidy with a little side-to-side wave.
 
"I've heard a lot about you."

"Whatever he's told you, it's all lies," Nanny replied completely deadpan.

"Even the good stuff?"

"Especially the good stuff," she said with a smile.

#

Nanny Voodoo's house was as Darwin remembered it, all flowery patterns and lace doilies.

"Don't you be bringing any mud in," she warned him. "Shoes off!
 
Shoes off!"

Darwin wasn't sure how long he'd been wearing this pair of socks but he wasn't sure taking his shoes off was a good idea.

"What are you waiting for?
 
Christmas?" Nanny Voodoo said, grabbing the free paper from the floor, rolling it into a cylinder and beating him with it.
 
"Off I said."

Darwin did as he was told, only becoming aware of how dirty he was as he did so.

Nanny Voodoo grabbed her nose.

"To the shower with you.
 
Go on, you know where it is.
 
Throw those clothes outside the door."

"Thank you," Darwin said earnestly.
 
"For what it's worth
 
I'm..."

But he never got time to finish.
 
There was the thwack of rolled up paper round his head and Nanny Voodoo shouting.
 
"Go, I told you!"

He smiled at her, and hurried to the bathroom.

The shower felt good.
 
It was little more than a shower head above the bath that gurgled and spluttered but he wanted to submerge under the jet and never come up.
 
Yet still, he didn't feel clean.
 
The grime felt thick on his skin as he took Nanny Voodoo's loofah and scrubbed at his skin until it felt raw.
 
His hair too was long and knotted, and even Nanny Voodoo's luxury shampoo, poured on thick until it generated a beehive of suds, could not get it feeling clean.

His skin was starting to wrinkle by the time he stepped out, the air cold against his wet skin.
 
He looked around for a towel, but other than the small hand towel beside the sink, there wasn't one.

He opened the door and stepped, dripping and naked into the lounge.
 
The humid air seemed to rush out behind him, and he felt the comparative chill of the lounge give him goose bumps.

Nanny Voodoo was sitting on the sofa with Cassidy chatting over tea.
 
Both turned to look at him.

"Erm?
 
Is there a towel," he asked.

"Good Lord," said Nanny Voodoo.
 
"Cover yourself up."

Darwin looked down and shrugged. He'd never been particularly shy about being naked.
 
It was just flesh and skin, not some deformity.

"Airing cupboard, top shelf," Nanny Voodoo yelled.
 
"And don't drip on my carpet."

She turned to Cassidy.
 
"It's surprising he's able to catch any prey with something so small."
 
The two of them giggled.

She still had some of his clothes from when he was a boy, some tracksuit bottoms and a T-shirt.
 
They were tight, but they were wearable, although Darwin didn't think he'd ever be able to get the T-shirt off, which now seemed glued to him like some sort of second skin.

Nanny Voodoo sent him off to the Fish and Chip shop for dinner, whilst Cassidy had her shower.
 
He returned to find her wrapped in one of Nanny's flowery dresses, whilst her own clothes were washed and tumble dried.

"You OK?" he asked handing over her order.

She nodded.
 
"I was telling Nanny Voodoo about the Vampire Council."

He sat at the floor by her feet - there wasn't room on the sofa for all three - and began unwrapping his order.
 
"Oh," he said.
 
He'd wanted to flush the memory of the events of yesterday out of his mind.
 
This was supposed to be a happy time.

"Are they all gone?"
 
Nanny Voodoo asked, returning from the kitchen with vinegar and ketchup.

Darwin nodded.
 
"Pretty much.
 
Honest Tom and a few others made it..."

"And what did this?"

"Tentacles," Cassidy said through a mouthful of chips, waving an arm in the air symbolically.

Darwin reached over and picked up the notebook from the coffee table and handed it to Nanny.

"It was after this."

Nanny Voodoo flicked through the pages.

"Old elvish?" she said with surprise.