[Heya Dudes! Sorry I took so damn long on this, it took a few drafts, if you know what I mean.
Anyway, it's my half term holiday for the next week so hopefully I'll update a bit more. And so, here goes chapter 4, and who could this mysterious blonde, emerald-eyed Englishman be, hmmm?!?]
I am rested and about to go up to this mysterious house on the moors. Sky wanted to come, but I told her I would only be performing a routine search of the outside tonight, so she should go take
in the delights of a quaint Scottish village. Last I saw of her she was heading towards the pub.
As for the house, I can't help but feel apprehensive. I have an odd feeling about this place, though I can't put my finger on it. I may have stumbled onto something big.
-Giomanach
"Time, Gentleman please!" Came the cry from the Landlord of the 'Golden Goose' pub, though Killian and I hardly heard it. We were too busy singing along with the pianist.
"What shall we do with a drunken sailor?
What shall we do with a drunken sailor?
What shall we do with a drunken sailor,
Early in the morning!"
Killian laughed drunkenly into his beer glass while I called for another round. "Aaron, my good man!" I slurred to the old landlord, who wasn't surprised by our behaviour. He was a Brightendale and well
accustomed to my brother and I wasted. "Two more Guinness's, extra strong!"
"I canne', lass," he replied, reluctantly, "Closing time."
What? I looked over at the old clock in the corner. It took me a few seconds to realise that a long hand on 12 and a shorter hand on 11, meant 11 O' clock, and closing time.
"And not even the courtesy of a lock-in for your favourite customer's!" Shouted Killian, his arms around my shoulders and rocking me with him as he swayed, perching on the side of the piano. A
lock-in is a technically illegal thing where landlords lock their doors and pretend like they were closed, because you couldn't stay open after 11, but they kept on serving trusted customers inside. Aaron
gave him a jolly smile and nothing else.
Aaron turned and began talking to a witch I didn't know just on his right, at the other side of the bar. A pretty girl, blonde and tall, not what a little village like this was used too. But I
didn't like her. She had been eying my brother and I superiorly all evening and I got had gotten big vibes of distrust from her. Well, before I started seeing double and ceased being able to walk in a
straight line. Instead, I'd drank and sung more loudly just to spite the moody snob.
While in conversation with Aaron, she glanced over at us. Killian met her gaze with a wink and I saw a spark of surprise in her eyes. She turned back to Aaron, to, I figured say goodbye, and
gracefully glided through the pubs wooden doors. Ignoring us both.
"I think your in there!" I joked.
"You may laugh, but you underestimate my persuasive powers," he said, wiggling his eyebrows.
"Please, she looked at us like we were shit on her Prada boots," I said, picking up my jacket and walking to the exit with the few our singing hadn't driven away.
Killian said nothing just kept staring in the direction that I could see her stalking off into. He started staggering after her.
"And where do you think your going?" I asked, trying to maintain my dignity by leaning against the crooked stone wall that lead into the hills and eventually to our house.
"After my destiny, my dear, my destiny!" He yelled and walking gracelessly away from me, "Don't wait up, and with any luck, I'll be back in the morning!" And he turned around and skipped after the
mysterious blonde.
Cursing my brother, I began the 20 minute freezing hike home. The moon was full and clear, making the heather of the moors and mountains silver lined and beautiful. I looked up at her. Why had I
wanted to drink tonight? It must have been something big, for me to order six pints of Extra strong was once upon a blue moon. Or a full one.
Almost half an hour later, I heard the familiar crunch of gravel under my boots as I climbed the steep drive to my home. I would have took so damn long if I hadn't staggered and landed in one of the ditches
intended to stop the sheep from getting up onto the mountain roads. In my frozen and drunken state, it had taken ages to haul my arse out of it. I was bloody glad no one had been there to see it.
I used my mage sight to locate the front door. One of the few senses available while off my face. Quite useful really.
I saw a big grey car just a few feet up the drive. Between Mum's Toyota and Selene's mean green machine. Was that there when I left? I thought suspiciously.
Still wondering about that car, I staggered further up the drive. I got to my front door. Keys, keys, I thought. Searching my pockets. Shit. I gave them to Killian. Ugh.
Cursing myself and my brother, I stalked round the back of the house, hoping I could still wake up Mum or Dad.
I stopped dead. I could hear the husky hiss of whispering from the shadows. Not just whispering. I felt a tiny pulse of energy coming from the whispering. Whoever was saying it, this was a spell.
I took a step back silently, snapping a twig. Shit. The whispering stopped. I stared into the darkness beneath the pine trees, metres away from me. Something was there...
Suddenly I saw something shift in the blackness. A turn of the head to look at me. Whatever was there began to slowly creep backwards. "Hold it!" I shouted, trying to sound a tiny bit challenging in my
nervous and frozen state.
The something stepped forward, into my vision. Not a something, a man. Not just a man, a witch. Tall, almost lanky if his shoulders weren't as broud. His hair was messy, in a rugid way, and fair
from what I could gather at 11:30 at night. He looked casual if not for his face. Everything there from his interogating eyes to his angular, sculpted face progected someone who would not stand to be messed
around.
I held his stubborn green gaze as I mentally examined him. I resented this. Here he was, in my garden, trespassing on my families property and he had the nerve to give me a look as if I was the guilty one.
Still, he stared at me, challenging me. If he expected me to back down, he had come glaring at the wrong witch.
Finally, he spoke, "And who might you be?" An Englishman.
"I could ask you the same question," I replied, prickly. The nerve of him to question me.
He continued to stare at me. Fine. "Sian, Sian Murphy", I lied outright.
"Surely you shouldn't be out this late, Scottish moors are never the most accommodating places to take a stroll over this close to midnight."
And now he mocks my home and my ability to protect myself. "Why, in case a marauding sheep mistakes me for grass and eats me?" Ha, take that, "I'm collecting heather, you know, for Samhain?"
"At near midnight?"
"Yes..." I hesitated. why would I be out this late on some Highland moors? "You know the purifying properties of the moon?"
"You obviously have a very particular coven."
"We like to do things right, traditionally, you know?" I said sinisterly.
He paused, studying me. I could tell he felt my power, witches pupils always seem to expand a little when they first cast their senses over me, then they make special efforts to make conversation with me and
make sure I was comfortable. Though not many every challenged me outright, as this person was.
"How about I walk with you then," He said, "I could use the exersize, and a midnight stroll never hurt anyone."
Now this I wasn't expecting. "What?"
"With that heather, surely you could use two pairs of hands."
"Oh," I hesitated. Damn my lager-soaked brain. "Sure."
We walked in silence back around the house, him walking quickly and purposefully and me, trying my hardest not to stagger. Okay, I had to figure a way of ditching him and keep him from finding out my
real name or that I'm pissed or that I live where he was snooping around, and still get back home before anybody gets up and finds that I've been out on the moors all night. I sighed. This is gonna be a long
night.
We stepped off my drive. I glanced at his face and caught my breath. The moonlight had shaded his pointed face in silver, taking away the hard, determined look he had in the shadows and making him
look like he was made of marble, ethereal and magickal, annd I didn't like to admit it, kinda beautiful.
He looked back at me. He held my gaze again. Though not like before. I felt no challenge from him. No barriers. I just saw his eyes, and the endless green of them, mysterious in the moonlight. And I
knew he saw me too. All of me, like I felt I was seeing all of him, as deep as...
I snapped my head away. He is a stranger. A trespasser. Just another witch sticking their nose where it wasn't wanted. Someone to be eliminated. He just stood there, dumbfounded.
15 minutes later my hands were raw from wrenching heather out of the ground and both our arms were full of the useless stuff. I turned to him, avoiding his eyes, "It's late, surely your tired? I know
I am."
He looked at me, trying to challenge me, but not finding the effort, said, "I am actually," he started walking back, "well?"
"What?" I asked.
"Are you not walking back to the village?" He questioned me again.
"Oh, ermm..." I hesitated again. "I've just remebered, I have something else I need to get, you go on."
He glanced suspiciously into my eyes. I looked away. I didn't want to repeat what happened last time he did that.
I waited until I saw his tall outline disappearing along the old stone road I had walked up half an hour before. Though right now, it felt like a lifetime.
As I walked back, drunk and confused, two realisations hit me. One, that was the guy I had seen in the candle flame, hours ago. And two, I hadn't even gotten his name.
[ok so there we have it, girl meets boy, girl is suspicious of boy, girl looks longingly into boys eyes, girl wishes to eliminate boy and boy walks off into the moonlight. So now please review, and I will
try and get chap. 5 to you as soon a poss.]
Anyway, it's my half term holiday for the next week so hopefully I'll update a bit more. And so, here goes chapter 4, and who could this mysterious blonde, emerald-eyed Englishman be, hmmm?!?]
I am rested and about to go up to this mysterious house on the moors. Sky wanted to come, but I told her I would only be performing a routine search of the outside tonight, so she should go take
in the delights of a quaint Scottish village. Last I saw of her she was heading towards the pub.
As for the house, I can't help but feel apprehensive. I have an odd feeling about this place, though I can't put my finger on it. I may have stumbled onto something big.
-Giomanach
"Time, Gentleman please!" Came the cry from the Landlord of the 'Golden Goose' pub, though Killian and I hardly heard it. We were too busy singing along with the pianist.
"What shall we do with a drunken sailor?
What shall we do with a drunken sailor?
What shall we do with a drunken sailor,
Early in the morning!"
Killian laughed drunkenly into his beer glass while I called for another round. "Aaron, my good man!" I slurred to the old landlord, who wasn't surprised by our behaviour. He was a Brightendale and well
accustomed to my brother and I wasted. "Two more Guinness's, extra strong!"
"I canne', lass," he replied, reluctantly, "Closing time."
What? I looked over at the old clock in the corner. It took me a few seconds to realise that a long hand on 12 and a shorter hand on 11, meant 11 O' clock, and closing time.
"And not even the courtesy of a lock-in for your favourite customer's!" Shouted Killian, his arms around my shoulders and rocking me with him as he swayed, perching on the side of the piano. A
lock-in is a technically illegal thing where landlords lock their doors and pretend like they were closed, because you couldn't stay open after 11, but they kept on serving trusted customers inside. Aaron
gave him a jolly smile and nothing else.
Aaron turned and began talking to a witch I didn't know just on his right, at the other side of the bar. A pretty girl, blonde and tall, not what a little village like this was used too. But I
didn't like her. She had been eying my brother and I superiorly all evening and I got had gotten big vibes of distrust from her. Well, before I started seeing double and ceased being able to walk in a
straight line. Instead, I'd drank and sung more loudly just to spite the moody snob.
While in conversation with Aaron, she glanced over at us. Killian met her gaze with a wink and I saw a spark of surprise in her eyes. She turned back to Aaron, to, I figured say goodbye, and
gracefully glided through the pubs wooden doors. Ignoring us both.
"I think your in there!" I joked.
"You may laugh, but you underestimate my persuasive powers," he said, wiggling his eyebrows.
"Please, she looked at us like we were shit on her Prada boots," I said, picking up my jacket and walking to the exit with the few our singing hadn't driven away.
Killian said nothing just kept staring in the direction that I could see her stalking off into. He started staggering after her.
"And where do you think your going?" I asked, trying to maintain my dignity by leaning against the crooked stone wall that lead into the hills and eventually to our house.
"After my destiny, my dear, my destiny!" He yelled and walking gracelessly away from me, "Don't wait up, and with any luck, I'll be back in the morning!" And he turned around and skipped after the
mysterious blonde.
Cursing my brother, I began the 20 minute freezing hike home. The moon was full and clear, making the heather of the moors and mountains silver lined and beautiful. I looked up at her. Why had I
wanted to drink tonight? It must have been something big, for me to order six pints of Extra strong was once upon a blue moon. Or a full one.
Almost half an hour later, I heard the familiar crunch of gravel under my boots as I climbed the steep drive to my home. I would have took so damn long if I hadn't staggered and landed in one of the ditches
intended to stop the sheep from getting up onto the mountain roads. In my frozen and drunken state, it had taken ages to haul my arse out of it. I was bloody glad no one had been there to see it.
I used my mage sight to locate the front door. One of the few senses available while off my face. Quite useful really.
I saw a big grey car just a few feet up the drive. Between Mum's Toyota and Selene's mean green machine. Was that there when I left? I thought suspiciously.
Still wondering about that car, I staggered further up the drive. I got to my front door. Keys, keys, I thought. Searching my pockets. Shit. I gave them to Killian. Ugh.
Cursing myself and my brother, I stalked round the back of the house, hoping I could still wake up Mum or Dad.
I stopped dead. I could hear the husky hiss of whispering from the shadows. Not just whispering. I felt a tiny pulse of energy coming from the whispering. Whoever was saying it, this was a spell.
I took a step back silently, snapping a twig. Shit. The whispering stopped. I stared into the darkness beneath the pine trees, metres away from me. Something was there...
Suddenly I saw something shift in the blackness. A turn of the head to look at me. Whatever was there began to slowly creep backwards. "Hold it!" I shouted, trying to sound a tiny bit challenging in my
nervous and frozen state.
The something stepped forward, into my vision. Not a something, a man. Not just a man, a witch. Tall, almost lanky if his shoulders weren't as broud. His hair was messy, in a rugid way, and fair
from what I could gather at 11:30 at night. He looked casual if not for his face. Everything there from his interogating eyes to his angular, sculpted face progected someone who would not stand to be messed
around.
I held his stubborn green gaze as I mentally examined him. I resented this. Here he was, in my garden, trespassing on my families property and he had the nerve to give me a look as if I was the guilty one.
Still, he stared at me, challenging me. If he expected me to back down, he had come glaring at the wrong witch.
Finally, he spoke, "And who might you be?" An Englishman.
"I could ask you the same question," I replied, prickly. The nerve of him to question me.
He continued to stare at me. Fine. "Sian, Sian Murphy", I lied outright.
"Surely you shouldn't be out this late, Scottish moors are never the most accommodating places to take a stroll over this close to midnight."
And now he mocks my home and my ability to protect myself. "Why, in case a marauding sheep mistakes me for grass and eats me?" Ha, take that, "I'm collecting heather, you know, for Samhain?"
"At near midnight?"
"Yes..." I hesitated. why would I be out this late on some Highland moors? "You know the purifying properties of the moon?"
"You obviously have a very particular coven."
"We like to do things right, traditionally, you know?" I said sinisterly.
He paused, studying me. I could tell he felt my power, witches pupils always seem to expand a little when they first cast their senses over me, then they make special efforts to make conversation with me and
make sure I was comfortable. Though not many every challenged me outright, as this person was.
"How about I walk with you then," He said, "I could use the exersize, and a midnight stroll never hurt anyone."
Now this I wasn't expecting. "What?"
"With that heather, surely you could use two pairs of hands."
"Oh," I hesitated. Damn my lager-soaked brain. "Sure."
We walked in silence back around the house, him walking quickly and purposefully and me, trying my hardest not to stagger. Okay, I had to figure a way of ditching him and keep him from finding out my
real name or that I'm pissed or that I live where he was snooping around, and still get back home before anybody gets up and finds that I've been out on the moors all night. I sighed. This is gonna be a long
night.
We stepped off my drive. I glanced at his face and caught my breath. The moonlight had shaded his pointed face in silver, taking away the hard, determined look he had in the shadows and making him
look like he was made of marble, ethereal and magickal, annd I didn't like to admit it, kinda beautiful.
He looked back at me. He held my gaze again. Though not like before. I felt no challenge from him. No barriers. I just saw his eyes, and the endless green of them, mysterious in the moonlight. And I
knew he saw me too. All of me, like I felt I was seeing all of him, as deep as...
I snapped my head away. He is a stranger. A trespasser. Just another witch sticking their nose where it wasn't wanted. Someone to be eliminated. He just stood there, dumbfounded.
15 minutes later my hands were raw from wrenching heather out of the ground and both our arms were full of the useless stuff. I turned to him, avoiding his eyes, "It's late, surely your tired? I know
I am."
He looked at me, trying to challenge me, but not finding the effort, said, "I am actually," he started walking back, "well?"
"What?" I asked.
"Are you not walking back to the village?" He questioned me again.
"Oh, ermm..." I hesitated again. "I've just remebered, I have something else I need to get, you go on."
He glanced suspiciously into my eyes. I looked away. I didn't want to repeat what happened last time he did that.
I waited until I saw his tall outline disappearing along the old stone road I had walked up half an hour before. Though right now, it felt like a lifetime.
As I walked back, drunk and confused, two realisations hit me. One, that was the guy I had seen in the candle flame, hours ago. And two, I hadn't even gotten his name.
[ok so there we have it, girl meets boy, girl is suspicious of boy, girl looks longingly into boys eyes, girl wishes to eliminate boy and boy walks off into the moonlight. So now please review, and I will
try and get chap. 5 to you as soon a poss.]