Rune Witch Mysteries- The Complete Series Read online

  Platt stood and placed his glass on the cabinet before picking up the file he’d been reading earlier and handing it to Thomas.

  “Rescue Rachel and bring her back to me.”

  Thomas opened the file and showed me the contents, the top sheet was a ransom note demanding five million. Platt had twenty-four hours to come up with the money or Rachel would be killed.

  “Do you have any idea who took her?” I asked.

  “None. If you’ll keep looking, you will see a number of stills taken from the CCTV.”

  We flicked through the file and found picture after picture of a dark shadow creeping into the grounds, each image had a date and time stamp attached.

  “These images go back months,” I said.

  “Indeed. It seems my daughter was having a frequent... guest to the house.”

  If Rachel’s guest was a frequent visitor, would the bwbach have become accustomed to his presence? Would she have trusted him enough to become off guard?

  “They left the body for you to find,” Thomas said. “A sign they meant business.”

  Platt nodded.

  “Have you considered paying the ransom?”

  “Mr Heart, I’m sure you understand, I love my daughter, but that love has its limits. I’ll pay you half a million to find Rachel. If you fail, then I’m afraid the matter is out of my hands.”

  Thomas gritted his teeth. “Fine,” he said, as I nodded my consent. “We’ll find your daughter.”

  “There’s one other thing,” I said. “You clearly didn’t want our involvement from the beginning, so why alert the Council to the murder?”

  “That’s simple,” Platt said. “I did not.”

  Chapter Four

  Using magic to find a missing person is never easy. Sure, it would be nice to cast a spell, have a few images flash before my eyes, and hey! Presto! I find who I’m looking for. But that’s only the way it works in the movies. In reality, after a long day of mixing potions, performing rituals, and spouting incantations, I’m pulled along the M4 motorway by a wrench in my gut.

  A normal missing object spell takes a few days to work. Through intricate twists and turns, the object experiences a number of mishaps and winds up practically jumping into your lap. But people, people are complicated. People have this little thing called free will. Sure, you can plant an idea in their head, give them a nudge in certain directions. But at the end of the day, there’s no guarantee they’ll act on those suggestions. They do what they want, when they want. And if that person is being held somewhere against their will, like Rachel Platt, then there’s no hope in drawing them to you.

  To find a missing person in a very short space of time, you have to invert the magic. Instead of drawing Rachel to me, I had to draw me to Rachel. Hence, the gut-wrenching feeling. Imagine someone grasping your stomach firmly in both hands and then twisting them in opposite directions, wringing it tighter and tighter, and then trying to force it through your belly-button. That’s kind of how it feels. Muted at first, but the closer I get to my target, the tighter the wringing gets. It’s not pleasant, trust me, but magic always comes with a price.

  The River Severn stretched out beneath us. A silver sliver in the moonlight, Thomas drove our reliable Ford Focus over the new Severn Bridge, bobbing his head to the music coming through the car radio. It had been a long day for both of us.

  I tried to push down the growing sense of unease that built in my chest. Instead, I concentrated on my gut, which pulled me out of Wales and into the unfamiliar territory of Bristol and the South West of England.

  “Any idea how far we have to go?” Thomas asked.

  I shook my head in answer. Up ahead, the junction that connected to the M5 loomed, and I knew we had to take it. We were getting closer, but specifics... well, there were none.

  “You think she’s in Bristol?” Thomas turned the radio off.

  “Could be,” I said. “Or Western, maybe.”

  Thomas glanced in the rear view mirror, checked the lights of the car behind him, and signalled to change lanes. “I still can’t believe Platt won’t pay the ransom,” he said.

  “I can.”

  Like all goblins, Platt was greedy and manipulative, more concerned with bringing home the bacon than spending time with his family. He had more than enough money to pay the ransom for his half-human, half-goblin daughter, but he loved that money too much to part with it.

  “We’re almost there.” The agony in my stomach increased tenfold and I had to breathe deeply to keep from throwing up.

  The magic drew me to an industrial estate not far from the shopping plaza at Cribbs Causeway. The streets were deserted. A faint drizzle of rain seeped from the night time ceiling of black cloud and flickered in the street lights. Thomas pulled over and cut the engine and lights, then unclipped his seatbelt and sighed. Dread built inside me, causing my heart to thump in my chest and my stomach to churn like a tumbling wave. I hated missing person cases, you never know what you might find, and this one had me rattled. Only a fool tries to get money from a goblin, and fools act rashly, make mistakes.

  I winced as the Benedict case flashed through my mind. It must have been six years ago when Philip Benedict a rich businessman, much like Darren Platt, went missing. Unlike Mr Platt, however, Philip Benedict was human, and from outward appearances, his family had meant the world to him. So much so, his wife hadn’t hesitated in enlisting my services when he’d gone missing for a few days. The police were useless, insisting there was nothing to suggest Mr Benedict hadn’t left of his own free will. Mrs Benedict was a mess, and her poor kid, just a boy of twelve, was having to hold his mother together whilst dealing with the worry his father may be dead. Her concern for her husband was so great, she’d insisted on coming with me to find him, and like a fool, I’d agreed.

  The search pulled us along a forest track in Wentwood and toward a quiet clearing. A hazy mist curled through the trees, twisting out of the ground and covering the red paintwork on Mr Benedict’s Audi in a sense of calm.

  I held back with the kid. It was my first visit to the forest since Nana died, and my conflicting emotions along with the intense pain in my stomach held me back from continuing. Thomas and Mrs Benedict approached the car and looked it over. I’ll never forget the look on Mrs Benedict’s face as she opened the door and found her husband butt naked inside with his secretary astride him.

  Needless to say, Mrs Benedict and her son were not terribly impressed. And me? I learned that family has no place in an investigation.

  “This definitely the place?” Thomas asked, bringing me out of my memories.

  “Feels like it.” I nodded at the warehouse in front of us.

  The rain covered the car in a fine spray, distorting the view of the street and cocooning us in the protective bubble of the car. Outside, the buildings loomed like tombstones, grey, and silent.

  Thomas took a deep breath and looked at me with pity in his eyes. “Look,” he said. “I can check it out alone. No need for the both of us to get wet.”

  Thomas was my partner in everything, and the best friend I could ever hope for. We'd been through a lot together. If anyone knew how hard a toll the magic took on me, it was Thomas.

  I smiled and squeezed his hand. “I'm good,” I said. “Need to see it through.”

  I was here by choice. No one coerced me or forced me to take the case, at least not in any real sense. God knew, Platt would never pay the ransom and someone had to look out for his poor kid, and today that someone was me and Thomas.

  I unclipped my seatbelt and got out of the car. The chilly October rain seeped into my clothes as I moved through the shadows towards the warehouse. Thomas shivered beside me and pulled the collar of his jacket up to gain a modicum of protection from the rain.

  I scanned the surrounding streets for any sign of movement. There was nothing but a beat up black transit van parked in a side alleyway. Out of habit, Thomas pulled his mobile out and snapped a pic of the license plate, then email
ed it to himself.

  We skirted the outside of the warehouse, looking for a way in. Behind the transit, we found a rusty old fire escape that creaked as Thomas pulled it down. We hid in the shadows for what seemed an eternity, waiting for someone to come and investigate the noise, but no-one did.

  “You sure this is the right place?” Thomas asked again.

  I nodded. The bile rising in my throat and nausea in my stomach said it was. Yet, something seemed off.

  Rachel Platt had been snatched from her family estate in Llanvaches on the outskirts of Newport. Whether her frequent guest had something to do with her kidnapping, or was simply an example of how lax Mr Platt’s security was remained to be seen. For all the guards and cameras the home possessed, Rachel’s visitor had no trouble getting in. Did a gang of kidnappers experience the same ease? The poor household fairy had been slain without a second thought. Whoever took Rachel was cold, ruthless, and organised. Somehow, the beat up old van and the abandoned warehouse didn’t fit what I expected to find.

  During the day, Platt had received further contact from the kidnappers: a photo of Rachel, gagged and bound to a chair, tears streaking black mascara down her cheeks, and a letter reiterating the kidnappers’ demands. Not that they would do any good. All we had on our side was time: a few hours for me to work some magic.

  We waited a few more minutes in the shadows. When it became clear no one was coming to investigate the creaky ladder, we left our hiding place and climbed. At the top, Thomas picked the lock on the fire escape door and we edged inside.

  I stumbled along the blackened corridor, clutching my stomach as though someone had blindsided me with a kick to the abdomen. It was the cost of the spell I’d worked. The closer I got to Rachel, the more pain I was in.

  Patches of moonlight reflected on the broken glass in the windows and highlighted the dancing dust motes disturbed by our passing, before disappearing behind the thickening cloud. From all appearances and the damp smell of mould, the building had been unused for some time.

  I dug my fingernail into the palm of my hand to distract me from the pain building in my stomach. “I’m not sure how much further I can go,” I said to Thomas. “She’s close. Behind that door is my guess.” I nodded to the windowed door at the end of the passageway. The one that opened on a stairwell, leading down toward the main space of the warehouse.

  “Alright,” Thomas said. “This is as far as you go.” He pulled me into the nearest room and shut the door. A hum of voices carried from the work-floor below, so we kept low to avoid being seen through the line of windows on the far wall.

  As I huddled in a ball on the floor, Thomas lifted his head and peered over the lip of the sill. “I can’t see anything,” he said, ducking beneath the ledge. After a moment, he edged back towards the window to take another look. “Nope. No-one. I’m going to have to leave you here and see if I can get a better view.”

  “Be careful,” I said as he moved back to the door.

  “Aren’t I always?” Thomas winked at me and put his hand on the doorknob. His shoulders slumped before he turned to me and said, “I know you won’t listen, but I really think you should end the spell, turn the magic off. We’ve found Rachel. There’s no need for you to keep suffering.”

  With those parting words, he left the room. He was right. I wouldn’t listen. We’d come too far. If I completed the spell and they moved Rachel, there’s no way I’d be able to perform another one to find her again. She’d be lost to me.

  Chapter Five

  I sat shivering in pain for countless seconds. The dark, empty office space was illuminated only by the fluorescent light strips that flickered through the window from the vast warehouse beyond.

  I hated being in this situation, waiting for Thomas to return, not knowing where he was or what he was seeing.

  I clutched my stomach and tried to take reassurance in the pain that Rachel was still close. I pictured her face. At first, the image from the photograph came to mind, but that soon distorted into a vision of a distraught young woman with tears streaming black mascara down her cheeks.

  Damn it! Worrying like this would get me nowhere. I needed to focus on something else. I breathed in and out to steady my mind and focus my energy. Pulling myself onto my knees, I grasped the small window ledge with knuckles as white from the cold as they were the grip they exerted, pulling me from the ground. I needed to see what was happening.

  Thomas had to have some idea if Rachel was alive by now, as well as a count of the bad guys keeping her captive.

  He’d better keep safe.

  Not that Thomas couldn’t handle anything thrown at him. Thomas was six feet tall, late-twenties, and slim and athletic. His eyes, bluer than a summer sky, were often obscured by his dark brown hair that flopped over them when it wasn’t held in check by the simple black cap he always wore when working. Thomas had said it was my old eyes that first caught his attention, but, stand out features that they were, it wasn’t Thomas’ eyes or hair that first caught mine. That would be his muscular chest and arms, and a body lithe from a lifetime of Krav Maga. His insanely good looks only distracted from how deadly he could be. Platt’s men had been surprised when he’d tossed them about. Given their bulk, I doubt anyone had knocked them off their feet before. Yet, I felt uneasy taking this case. Platt was a dangerous goblin. Thomas and I had caught him unprepared at the house, but he didn’t strike me as the type to forgive and forget, even if we did manage to bring his daughter home.

  I was about to take a peek over the edge of the window when a frosty shiver ran through me. The world stopped. Time stopped. Dust hung motionless in the air. The hum of voices stilled. Something was happening. Coming...

  A whirlwind gathered at the edge of my consciousness. A rush of unnatural air pushed against me, bringing with it the scent of rust and mildew. Then, as suddenly as it appeared, it was gone, sucking all the air out of my lungs as it disappeared.

  Closing my eyes, I counted to ten and prayed that Thomas was okay. I knew too well he’d been attacked. His wards had activated in defence and caused a magical backlash.

  A sense of movement came from below as I listened to the faint susurrus of the air around me. “You can do this,” I said and took a final deep breath before peering through the window. My vision blurred from the pain in my stomach. I forced myself to focus and willed my vision to clear.

  Then I saw Thomas, motionless on the ground. My stomach began to heave as my mind screamed that this was all my fault. I’d had a bad feeling about this case from the start. We should have been curled up in bed after a night of watching movies and eating pizza.

  Instead, Thomas was lying prostrate on the ground, and I felt like a pane of safety glass that had been shattered into a billion shards and was only being held together by the laminated outside.

  Memories of how we met surfaced in my mind. The cheesy nightclub, filled with the putrid smell of stale sweat, alcohol, and cigarette smoke. At sixteen, I was underage, but had been dragged out by a well-meaning, if slightly mischievous, friend. Lisa and I had completed our exams. We were on top of the world, not afraid to talk to anyone, especially not the model-sexy boy who stood next to us at the bar. Thomas Heart lived up to his name and stole mine.

  There was a stillness to him. Something that focused my energies and made me feel like it was okay to be me. The soft, steady tone of his voice. The way he woke every morning and went through his martial arts stances and movements. The smile on his face, as he left the shower afterwards.

  I’d lost Nana and Mam, and Dad had never been in the picture, but I had Thomas. Thomas was my life.

  I forced the tears to stop and sat down on the floor with my back leaning on the wall beneath the window. Reaching into my jean’s pocket, I pulled out the hazel branch entwined with strands of Rachel’s hair as well as my own. The pain in my stomach told me Rachel was still close, but it also stopped me from functioning at my full capacity. I gulped down a deep breath and opened my sight to the mag
ic. The world around me erupted in a violet glow, as the Ogham tattoos on my arm ignited. The symbol of Coll blazed like indigo fire on my wrist, as my location spell drew on the ancient runic power. My fingers unwound the hair, and my mind unwound the spell. The magic in Coll faded to a soft glow. Within moments, the spell was broken and the pain in my stomach gone.

  I pulled myself to my feet and stared at Thomas. Through my magical vision, I could see that he was still alive. I almost screamed in relief. He’d been knocked unconscious by the backlash from his wards, but his heart beat thunderously in his chest, and he was beginning to stir.

  Reprieve washed over me and a tightness I hadn’t realised I was holding in my muscles diminished. But he wasn’t out of the woods yet. Someone had attacked him, and whoever it was used powerful magic.

  I released the energy locked within Luis, Fern, and Duir, bringing forth their power of protection, endurance, and strength. Their magic roared through my veins as their runes, tattooed on my arms, blazed to life. Lightning danced at the edge of my fingertips. I was a bubbling volcano waiting to explode. Rachel’s kidnappers had made a big mistake messing with Thomas.

  My legs, fuelled with more energy than a nuclear power plant, raced from the room and down the steps toward Thomas.

  Kneeling by his side in the dusty warehouse, I stroked his cheeks and brushed the hair from his eyes. Thomas stirred.

  “Hey, you okay?” I asked.

  Thomas blinked at me, then moaned as he tried to lift himself off the floor. I held him down.

  “Any damage?”

  “You mean besides feeling like I’ve been rugby tackled by an elephant?”

  “Yep. Besides that.” I scanned the room, but there was no sign of Thomas’ attackers. “If you’re okay, I’m going to take a quick look around.”

  I moved to leave, but Thomas grabbed my arm.