Northern Fiction - Going Underground
Wizard In Limbo
His eyes moved up to stare into the dark sludge of his Guiness, and he considered the unlikely series of events that had led him to this lowest point in his fortunes. He had always wanted a life full of excitement and danger, but things had really come to a head in the last few months. Here he was, on the run with a crustie and a Goth! He sneered to himself. Who would have thought, when he left his cold, grey Glaswegian home for the sleazy delights of the South, that this would be the result?
'Hamish,' came Eloise's voice, breaking into his thoughts. He scowled up from his drink, and saw the black_clad girl standing before him. She looked at him reprovingly as Nick shuffled about behind her, glancing nervously about him so that his thick brown dreadlocks swayed about his acne_riddled face.
'What the fuck d'you two want?' Hamish growled. 'Can't you leave me to enjoy my pint in a bit o' peace?'
Eloise threw an impatient glance at Nick, who was still looking ineffectual in the background, then slid round the table to sit by the Scot.
'You know it's dangerous, going places like this,' she murmured, gazing coolly into his eyes. That always made him uncomfortable; it was like she was reading his mind. Then again, for all he knew, it was true. She was a self_confessed Witch.
A rogue lock of black_dyed hair fell across her eyes and she tossed her head back. 'When you disappeared from the caravan_site, we both knew where you'd go. Just a case of finding the right pub.'
'You're not ma fuckin' mother, bitch,' Hamish barked. She was giving him a headache, always going on like this. Who was she to run his life? Wasn't as if he even fancied the Gothic tart _ not really. Not that he expected he had much of a chance with her, anyway. 'I'm okay here,' he went on as she stared at him, clearly expecting self_justification. 'I can look after maself,' he added with bitter pride.
'We know you can,' Nick said uncomfortably in his nasal voice, as he parked himself on a barstool on the other side of the table. There was a newspaper under his arm.
'Want me to prove it, do ye?' Hamish snarled, glaring at the Scouser with venom in his eyes.
'No,' said Nick, laughing nervously and glancing away at Eloise, who was still gazing intently at Hamish from his left. 'Eloise, you tell...'
'Oi!' Hamish barked. Nick flinched. 'Do you want me to prove it?' the skinhead demanded again. Nick laughed.
'What, here?'
'No, we'll go outside. Yeah? A fight, now _ outside.'
'Not tonight, Hamish,' Nick said, laughing again.
'You don't think I'm serious, do you?' Hamish demanded. 'I hate people who...'
'Hamish,' Eloise said sternly. 'That's enough. Listen to me. You know the police are still after you _ your description's on the files, isn't it?'
'I don't know what they're bothered about,' Hamish sneered. 'It wasn't that big a deal.'
'Hamish,' Eloise said loudly. 'You mu...' She checked herself, and glanced around. Then, lowering her voice, she went on. 'You murdered someone. You're not going to get away with it if you're so careless.'
A long silence followed. Nick fidgeted on his barstool. Hamish stared down at the floor. The conversation buzzed around them, but it was as if they were cut off from the normal world forever. Finally, Eloise broke the silence.
'Anyway, Nick's found something interesting in the paper. You might find it as intriguing as I did.'
Hamish looked up, and his eyes cleared.
'Interesting in what way?' he asked, taking on a different tone.
'Nick, the paper,' Eloise commanded. The crustie handed it to her. She opened it and flicked through the first few pages. Finding what she was looking for, she folded it back and smoothed out the sheet, placing it on the table. She pointed at an article.
'Read that...' She broke off. 'Oh, sorry.' She'd forgotten he couldn't read. Hamish glowered at her, and she looked briefly contrite. 'I'll read it out,' she said quickly.
She turned to the paper.
'Found dead in his home last night, Samael Anghelides, shipping magnate and noted occultist, of uncertain causes. Indications of a disturbance in the residence (Wroxeter House), but no signs of burglary. Police are baffled. The funeral will be postponed until further notice...'
'So what, Eloise?' Hamish demanded. 'An occultist, this Anghelides bloke? What do you know about him?'
Nick stared at the Scot. 'You mean you've never heard of Samael Anghelides?' he said, grinning. 'He was all over the papers a few years back.'
'I never read the fuckin' papers, do I?' Hamish snarled. 'Who was this fucker?'
'He was known in the City as a big business type,' Eloise said quietly. 'But in occult circles he gained a fair bit of notoriety. Published a number of works on chaos magick that even chaos magickians thought a bit dubious. I read one of them once.'
Hamish frowned. 'What, when you were in your grannie's coven?' he asked.
Eloise nodded. She made a face. 'It wasn't... a pleasant book.'
Hamish digested this. Eloise was not weak_stomached; he knew that, so something that made a morbid Goth like her shudder must be pretty sick. He frowned.
'So what's it to do with us?'
Nick broke in. 'Wroxeter House is about ten miles off the Silchester Bypass,' he said quickly. 'We could get there in about an hours, if we walked quickly.'
'So?' said Hamish. 'So what? Is this another of your morbid nights, Eloise? Wanna see a corpse or something?'
Eloise sighed patiently. 'No Hamish. Nick and me were thinking we could maybe break in, look around, retrieve a bit of property... I'm interested in the magical regalia, of course, but you and Nick should find something to interest your grubby little minds.'
'Rich, was he?' Hamish asked.
'He was a shipping magnate, wasn't he?' Nick shrugged. 'Must've been loaded.'
Hamish shrugged. 'Let's do it, then. But one thing. We're not walking to this place.'
'There won't be a bus there this time of night,' Eloise warned.
Hamish shook his head, turned to Nick, and grinned.
'We're gonna get ourselves a car. Aren't we, Nick?'
Half an hour later, they pulled up in a narrow country lane. To their right, a long chainlink fence surrounded an area of thick woodland, and beyond it lay Wroxeter House. The moon shone down on their stolen car.
Eloise sat in the back, staring glumly out of the window. There were things she was happy about doing, and breaking into rich people's houses was one of them. But she wasn't too keen on robbing perfectly innocent people; and the Ford Cortina Nick had hotwired was unlikely to have belonged to any fat capitalist.
She glanced at her two companions, comparing them. She'd met Nick first, not long after she'd run away from home. Only sixteen then, faced with a futile future of A_levels, university, and some boring job at the end of it _ probably in sales and marketing _ she'd gone for the option of many of her contemporaries, to leave behind the material shackles of society and live an alternative lifestyle on the road.
Of course, not all the Travellers were as idealistic as she was; Nick, for example, would have been described as a 'petty crook' in urban society. He was an affable, chatty, cheeky lad of eighteen; a little nervous, and not much good at anything apart from breaking and entering, thieving, and stealing cars. But all petty stuff, by capitalist society's standards.
Hamish was a different matter. He seriously scared Eloise. He had turned up on the campsite a week or two after Eloise had started hanging around with Nick. He had been on the run for days by then, and was as thin and undernourished as a famished dog. The Travellers had taken him in, as they took in all runaways, fed him, hid him when the Pigs came round, and treated him as one of their own. It was only then that they get to know him. To start with, his politics were hardly progressive. Eloise knew a few ageing skins who followed the Convoy, but they were old_style sixties types who'd known the days of ska and reggae, before racist politics took over. Hamish was one of the newer breed; a foul_mouthed lout with a narrow, paranoid outlook and a fanatical hatred for anyone not of his kind. He saw the Travellers as degenerates, Eloise was certain, but he was using them for what he could get, so he kept his resentment to himself. But he'd let a few things slip, carelessly, when he was drunk. One of them really chilled Eloise; the reason he was on the run.
He hadn't explained anything, but what he had said had made Eloise want to avoid him as much as possible, though it was proving extremely difficult in the small community of the campsite.
Hamish had murdered his girlfriend.
Eloise had wanted to stay away from him ever since. Especially when his cold blue eyes turned her way. He would stare at her when he thought she didn't realise, stare constantly. She wanted to stay away from him, but he'd attached himself to her and Nick and they found it almost impossible to shake him off. Nowadays, they just tried to make sure he didn't get himself or the Travellers into too much trouble.
'Well, here we are,' said Nick unnecessarily. 'We getting out, or what?'
Without answering, Hamish threw open the car door and headed for the fence. A look passed between Eloise and Nick, but they followed the moody skinhead, all the same.
They found him staring at the chainlink fence. He turned to face them.
'The house is through the trees?' he asked. Eloise nodded. She'd studied an OS map of the area before setting out, and had a rough idea of the direction they should be heading in. She turned to Nick.
'Just got to get over this fence,' she muttered. 'How's it look to you?'
Nick studied it briefly.
'It's not electrified,' he said in the businesslike tones he adopted on these occasions. Eloise always felt confident when Nick spoke like that. 'There could be security patrols beyond, but I wouldn't expect it.'
'The wood's too thick,' Hamish agreed. 'Come on. I'll give you two a bunk up.'
A couple of minutes of struggling, clambering and jumping, and they were across the fence and crouching silently in the bracken that grew between the gnarled old trees. These were the grounds of Wroxeter House. Nick had his head cocked.
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