Witch Clan: Matriarchs, John Stormm [great reads txt] 📗

"Before you open your insulting trap, sister," she warned through gritted teeth. "You will address me as though I just might possess the intelligence that befits a witch and a matriarch. You will not only tell me what I want to know, but as best as you are able, you will tell me why. The children and I have been suffering from vague threats and ominous warnings for weeks now with no indication of what it is we need to be watching for. Your nonsense has disrupted my house to no avail and in rescuing your haughty bustle from this side show funhouse of yours, I have lost my grandson to your nameless threat. If you thought you were in danger before, it's doubled now. The good news is that I won't lock you in your house, and the bad news is that I won't lock you in your house." She shook her hand with the witch blade in Elvyra's direction for emphasis as she spoke.

"Please, put that thing away," Elvyra said, recoiling is as though from a living serpent. "It's not necessary. I too wish to stop the madness before it brings destruction upon us all. I will answer all the questions I am able. But please put the Sidhe blade away."

"For someone who has your affinity for rifts and crossovers," Emma puzzled. "I would have assumed you would have a strong fae connection. Perhaps even as strong as Johnny's."

"It's true," Elvyra said. "But there are fae and then there are fae."

"Quit being so cryptic," she warned. "I'm fast running out of patience."

"Johnny's father was Sidhe," Elvyra explained. "Though of a darker nature than most, he was still a Sidhe of the ancient Tuatha De Danaans. My father was Formorian of the ancient Corca-Oidce. Before the coming of mankind, these races were mortal enemies. The Formor, also called Fir Bolgs were driven out by the Tuatha De Danaan, and they in turn were driven out by the Milesians, or humans. My dual nature allows me as a child of both worlds access to the gateways that is denied to the full bloods by ancient decree."

"That decree wasn't so strong when Johnny's father was made to crossover," she observed.

"There are times and circumstances where being in the right place at the right time," Elvyra explained. "a single individual can crossover from their plane of existence to this one. That is how my father crossed also and why part of this house is inaccessible. He left a hole in place, and yet another fearsome creature of the People of Darkness, called Behir awaits to grow strong enough to make the crossing in those locked rooms."

"Will it be able to get out through the window I cut?" Emma asked with a start.

"No," Elvyra said. "I was sealing Behir into a single room from the front when the Vough locked me inside because I wouldn't help."

"Behir is the beast you spoke of," Emma concluded. "But who is this Vough?"

"The Vough is my great grandmother," Elvyra admitted. "She is a mad woman with a hatred for the Sidhe folk and humankind that transcends the ages. She can't call the black lightning to make Behir stronger. She has been awaiting the day when I could. But I understood her madness and made it a point to never learn. Your Sidhe child will give her exactly what she wants, because by his very nature the black lightning will be attracted to him here. All three planes, of Gwynvyd, the Sidhe plane, Abred, the Earthly plane and Annwn, this dark plane are adjacent on this hill. Your grandson represents Abred and Gwynvyd here and if the Vough gets her hands on him she'll have the perfect key to send murder and mayhem into the other planes. Who will then have cause to drive the Fir Bolg deeper still. No one will benefit from this madness. Only grief will come of it."

"Where might she be likely to take him to work this evil?" she asked.

"Dun Cruachan is the most likely spot." Elvyra pointed out beyond the dark twisted woods. "A tower built on the edge of a chasm said to be bottomless."

"A black, obsidian tower?" Emma asked.

"Why, yes," Elvyra said in surprise. "Have you seen it?"

"In my dreams," she said. "I've seen a lot in dreams. Like the creatures you turned loose on some teenaged boys out there one night. How can I trust you?"

"Don't be silly, woman," Elvyra huffed. "I love that forest every bit as much as you do and for the very same reasons. I don't want it to become like this place. I'm half human too, you know. I belong as much there as here, and I happen to like there much better. Those boys would have been in danger of far worse harm than the simple wraiths I sent to discourage them had they stayed in those woods for the night. The hill opens easily to Gwynvyd during the day, but Annwn reigns in the night. It is not a safe place then."

"That's what I thought," she said. "I needed to hear it from you and you've vanquished more of my doubts than I expected with it. Welcome, sister. Let's see if we can stop this sinister thing."

"Easier said than done, sister," Elvyra said pointing over the dark wood.

The overcast was growing considerably thicker, and a jagged streak of black could be seen like an afterimage in the eye, descending from the sky to the west to some unknown landmark that Emma could only guess.

"I take it that this is the way to the black tower?" she asked, nodding in the direction she had seen the lightning.

“It will take a few days to reach it on foot from here,“ Elvyra nodded solemnly. “For every time the black lightning strikes the tower, Behir grows larger and stronger trapped in that room. Eventually, he will be strong enough to burst out on his own.”

“Then we need to be after my grandson,” Emma surmised. “Before he can reach the tower.”

“You’ll need provisions for the journey,” Elvyra said. “The Vough will use every means to get him there well before you. He has no faery friends here. Piskies are not pixies and he may not understand the difference. A couple stout staves for the hard journey are best picked of the oaks of Abred in my backyard as opposed to the twisted, sickly things of this world. Some additional food from my pantry will see you a lot farther as you can trust nothing here. But I must stay here to redouble the spells to keep Behir locked behind these doors. You don’t want him sneaking up behind you on the trail.”

Taking the advice, Emma and Leona pushed through the gate to the backyard and cut a pair of oak staves from the saplings in the forest. Leona stripped the bark off the walking sticks with the folding camp knife while Emma stocked Leona’s daypack and her canvas shopping bag with a box of kitchen matches, some acorn breads, dried fruits and nuts from Elvyra’s pantry. A pair of skin water bags was given them to take on the journey. One was filled with a heady sassafras tonic as a fortifier, and the other was filled with pure water from the park reservoir.

It was a little past noon when Emma and Leona said their good byes and crossed the road to the dark trail through the twisted woods. She could only wonder what would happen should they find Johnny too late.

The Haunted Woods

Crossing the road into a field, a little over a hundred feet wide that bordered the haunted forest, the dark, twisted trees loomed ahead and were still not recognizable as any species that Emma had hitherto encountered. Leona stayed close at her side as she contemplated the arthritic limbs bearing dark, waxy, almost holly-like leaves that reached in every direction in frozen agonized silence. She was almost relieved that the yawning maw of the trail entrance was wide enough not to have to come into close contact with the unhealthy looking trees. It was disturbing that in looking into the forest gloom that specters of baleful blue, gruesome green and sickly salmon could be barely discerned in places between the twisted boles throughout the woods. Holding her staff in a white knuckled grip, Emma pushed on into the darkened woods with her granddaughter.

Eyes adjusting to the woodland twilight, she scanned the details of a path wide enough for three men to walk abreast plunging deep into the woods ahead. Growing on the rocks and tree trunks, several varieties of phosphorescent lichen and fungi accounted for the pale spectral shapes seen through the trees. Mushrooms, toadstools and puffballs the size of hassocks thrived in the decay found in the forest loam. Looking about, Emma found a large stick and drew her witch blade to sharpen one end and placed it on a rock with it pointing into the forest ahead. Then she scratched the horizontal, V-shaped rune Kano into the top of the rock in a way so the V pointed to the trail entrance.

“Are you working a spell?” Leona asked.

“In the strictest manner of speaking, yes,” she replied. “This is a spell of orientation. The sharpened stick leans against the rock and points in the direction we are heading, as opposed to any of the side trails