The Tens, Vanessa Jones [i like reading books .TXT] 📗

the paper, just knowing they had something to tell her. Skimming her eyes over the page, the quaint symbol stood out directly in the middle. It was a more complex symbol than any she had seen in the book or dotted around the camp's items. Noticing now that symbols were what she was seeing all along: on the ceramic canisters in the shed, marked on several trees, on the sides of saucepans held over the fire… made to look like innocuous squiggles, Sophie thought they were anything but seeing as they formed part of a caustic ideology. She looked at one of the ceramic urns again. It had an “X” engraved in it. The roman numeral for ten. It was hard to unsee now. Alex’s keyring, the jumpers, Carla’s number plate… all of it was staring her in the face. A week ago, Sophie would have convinced herself that she was descending into lunacy if she kept seeing symbols. But all it took was one person, Abigail in all her innocence, to show her that she wasn’t going insane.

The symbol in the book comprised of strokes and bubbles and half circles and had indentations like rivets that suggested the lines had been drawn over and over.

Sophie leant over Abigail's face to see if she was awake and noticed her eyes were already open. There was a soft greyness to them, like a lake had been draining away and there was nothing left to see but the lake bed. 'Sweetheart, what does this symbol mean?'

Abigail half-heartedly shifted her body to sit upright and traced her finger along the symbol. She was about to say that she had no idea when it made sense. 'Follow the birds,' she said nonchalantly.

'What does that mean? Does that make any sense to you?'

'It just means... I don't know... follow the birds.' Abigail shrugged and laid her head back down in defeat.

So, Sophie searched the birds' flight path, looking for clues, looking for anything out of the ordinary that might give her insight into what Clive and Carla were planning to do next. What they had in store for her. But the birds went around and around in a circle on the page and just ended up frustrating Sophie more than ever. Her mind drifted back to the dead birds that kept accumulating at her house. The ones that met their match with the clear windows. The sparrow that flew into her tent. The tiny birds that adorned the copper cases she spied on the shelf earlier. The cases!

She leapt up and Abigail bounced off her. 'Abigail, what are these?' Grabbing the horned shaped ornaments in both hands she shoved them in her friend's face.

'Careful!' Abigail shrieked. 'They are canisters of gunpowder. The ancients believed they were a key ingredient to immortality. We use it in spells.' And as Abigail let out the last syllable, they both shared an idea at the same time, eyes and mouths agape.

'Let's blow the door off!'

'Do you really think we can?'

'We need some matches or something to light them. And if there's any fertiliser in here, that would be even better!'

Abigail nodded and starting searching as Sophie inspected the door. Where could she place them to have the most effect, without injuring themselves?

'Sophie, what does fertiliser look like?'

'I really don't know actually. Maybe we can try any kind of liquid you find?'

'We have this diesel here for the vehicle we used to have. Will that work?'

'We're going to have to try. Be careful with it! Move it gently near the door but not the exact spot until we are ready to go. When do you think the best time to do this is?'

Abigail contemplated. 'Now?'

'What about if we wait a bit. Lull them into a false sense of security. Maybe dinner time before it gets dark? Surely they'll be busier?'

'Okay but we must do it today. I don't want to wake up tomorrow and be subject to their wickedness tomorrow. I know what they're capable of.'

'I'm sure you do.'

'If they come back and feed us, they will give us the paralysing potion again. Or the memory loss thing.'

'Memory loss thing?'

'Yeah, you know...' Abigail realised her mistake and busied herself careful shifting the plastic jerry can of fuel.

'Abigail. I do not know. Tell me about this memory loss thing.' Sophie folded her arms.

Abigail chewed her lip and squished her face up, like a jellyfish about to jettison forward.

'Have you noticed strange things since your thirtieth birthday?'

'Well, my husband left me not long after, so yeah. You could say that.'

'Right. But even before then, did your nightmares increase? Did you hear voices? Did you always feel a little bit like you were going crazy?'

'Not just a little bit. I went full-blown crazy. I thought I could fly! I tried to jump off a fucking balcony Abigail. Hence why I started the sessions with Carla. What are you telling me, Abigail?'

'It was all orchestrated. When you were little, very little, you were fed the memory loss supplement. It's like a strong version of the copper water we use. You were probably no more than four or five. So lore has it.'

'I'm sorry, what? How do you know all this? Did Alex tell you this?'

'Sophie…’ Abigail’s face crumpled with earnest and she fiddled with her hair. ‘You were born here. You were fed this potent potion to repress your memories of this place as an experiment and keep you somewhat obscured from this world. Then released into the wild, as it were. The Seniors wanted to see how effective the memory potion really was. It was always designed to wear off on your thirtieth birthday. And it sounds like your inherent magical abilities that were dormant, aided by complete amnesia, started to sprout to life. To someone who is not of the alchemical persuasion this looks, unequivocally, like madness. We were so excited when Alex reported that you had started to regain some of your mystical abilities, although you had