Chapter 14

Malachi was seated at a table well away from the room’s few other patrons. The common room of the inn was not spacious, but quaint in an old world way. The walls were made of stone and wood, their surfaces dotted with old paintings in tarnished gilded frames. Wooden chairs and tables were splayed out in front of a massive stone hearth. The check in desk was carved of a deep cherry wood. Wood racks for holding glasses stood empty above the desk giving a hint of the building’s former use. The bedchambers up stairs all held the same timeless and charming quality of the common room. But Malachi appreciated none of it.

Each time the door opened Malachi glanced up, and each time he became more irritable. He despised having to rely on humans. They were hapless, pathetic creatures. But unfortunately they were a necessity.  There were certain tasks that had to be performed during daylight hours, and that of course was not a possibility for his kind.

The bell over the door chimed as a young man stepped through. His eyes met Malachi’s and he quickly joined him at his table.

“I hope your news is good?” Malachi glared at the kid, he thought his name was Jack, or Jake. He did not remember or care.

Jake was around eighteen, and had been on the streets since he was sixteen. His shoulder length dark hair hung in greasy clumps. The lifeless tresses framed a face that was pasty and riddled with pock marks. He wore faded jeans, a black t-shirt, and an army green jacket. All of his clothing was worse for wear and smelled of sweat and stale cigarettes. Jake sighed and swallowed hard. “There is something out there for sure man.” Another customer looked their way. Malachi cringed and uttered a hiss. Jake lowered his voice before going on. “There are powerful wards on that place man; we’re talking old fuckin’ magick.”

Malachi sneered, “Tell me something I do not know.” Since following the girl to the “haunted forest” neither he nor any other of his kind had been able to get even close enough to touch the stone gate. They could get as far as the edge of the road and then it was like an invisible wall blocked their path. They had no better luck trying to access the forest from above. “Is there a way to break through?”

“Yeah … hell yeah” Jake nodded, “All spells can be broken. You just have to know how.  I am on it man.”

Jake rambled on but Malachi was no longer listening. He had heard all the human had to offer at the moment. Malachi was instead watching a man who had just entered the inn. The man approached the check in desk, shifting from foot to foot in discomfort and impatience.

The man looked anxiously around the room then focused his attention on a painting hanging behind the check in desk. He had no interest in the painting but it was something to focus on as he forced his mind to calm. The painting was yellowed with age. It was apparently a family portrait; a father and mother and two young boys were posed in a perfectly manicured garden, a castle loomed behind them in the distance. The family wore a style of dress he was too uneducated to recognize as the sixteenth century. The mother was seated, her husband stood behind her. The two boys stood on either side of their mother. The boys could not have looked more different. One, presumably the eldest was already well built for his age. His skinned was tanned from the sun. His head was crowned by a shock of red hair, matching his mother’s. The other boy was slight of build and much too pale. His hair was raven black, his eyes a deep green.

“That is the Rochester family.”  Reginald, the inn’s proprietor, had arrived at the desk. They founded this village; all of this land and much more was once a part of their summer estate. The Lady Rochester and her younger son in particular spent a great deal of time here. Their castle has long been lost but … “

“I care about this shit why?” The man scowled. Malachi who was listening perfectly from across the room took note the man was American.

“Forgive me” Reginald’s English dignity kept him from showing his distaste for the man’s rudeness.  “Are you being served Sir?”

“This girl …” the man shoved a worn photo in Reginald’s face. “Have you seen her?”

Reginald looked at the photo, remembering the woman immediately. “I am afraid not Sir.” He lied.

The man locked Reginald in a scrutinizing gaze for a few moments then slammed a credit card on the counter. “I need a room.”

Malachi watched as the proprietor checked the man in and slipped him a room key. Malachi had no need to see the photo to know he and the stranger had been following the same woman. Malachi’s interest in the woman was only a means to an end, to help him discover what lay beyond that stone gate. Malachi wondered what this man’s connection to the woman was and how Malachi could use it to further his own interests.