Nine:
The commotion brought Markus, Aliyah and the others out into the corridor to investigate.
"What is going on?" Markus asked of the tall blond that Aliyah labelled as one of Charity's friends.
"It's charity, she's been kidnapped." The Blond blurted out. "This man, he grabbed her and dragged her into the back of a van. Pleas you have to help her!"
"It's ok, we'll try to help, can you remember anything about the van?" Markus asked.
"It had a name on the side. Moomin? Morgan? Something like that?"
"McMorgan. It must be they've been closed for ages, they must be there." Merry exclaimed. "We have to stop them, I hate to say this but we have to save her."
"Can we find a way to stop them without saving Charity?" John put in; they stopped in their dash for the car just long enough for Markus to shoot him a look. "Ok, ok, we save Charity."
They jumped into car and putting his foot down in a very un-British fashion Markus drove off, to the warehouse.
"What do you want with me?" Charity asked of the hooded men.
"We want you to die." One of the men said simply, as he grabbed her top and started dragging her toward the circle that had been laid out on the concrete fool using blood.
"Hey, this is Armani!" She yelled, but he kept dragging her toward the circle.
He threw her into the middle of the circle and the others started chanting. The one who had thrown her down pulled an intercity worked knife from within his cloak. He grabbed her wrist and started lowering the knife inexorably toward it, she struggled but it was like trying to fight steel, completely immobile.
"Doesn't this heap of junk move any faster?" Aliyah asked as the car cruised at a modest speed of forty.
"There it is." Merry said pulling the door open and jumping out.
Markus' words of advice were lost as the other two children jumped out and ran for the warehouse. Sighing he got out and pulled a short thick bladed sabre from the boot before following them.
"Pleas, pleas, don't." Charity muttered. "No, no, pleas, no." The knife descended. There was a sound from across the room. He turned listening his grip, he let her go completely as the door splintered inward, and skidded across the room.
"You really should redecorate." Aliyah's British accent cutting across the room was the last this Charity heard before the man smashed her across the face knocking her unconscious.
"I mean, torch light, its just so passé." The first monk rushed at her, and Aliyah spun kicked him into the wall and was moving on to her next attacker before he had hit the floor.
John and Merry fought one of the monks, Markus moved over to where Charity lay on the floor and scooped her up with one arm under her arms he lifted her and moved fore the door, one of the monks tried to stop him, but Markus slashed at him with the sabre and ran as best as he was able toward the door. "Catch." He called and threw the sabre to John, who grabbed it from the floor, and swung it at the monk who had Merry by the hair, the sword cut deep into the shrouded figure and it collapsed.
The one with the knife jumped Aliyah from behind, and knocked her to the floor. She rolled over and twisted the knife out of his hand.
"Don't!" Markus called out, just to late as she drove the knife into the figures abdomen. The blood gushed down her arm and his chest, into the veve. The statue that was in the centre of veve started to glow.
"What's going on?" Aliyah yelled over the defining rush of wind that had filled the room.
"His blood, it activated the ritual. You'll have to destroy the veve!"
One of the monks ran at her, she grabbed him, and threw him over the veve smearing the blood pattern. It had no affect of the glowing vortex, which was growing in the centre of the room. "It didn't work!" She yelled over the now defining roar of the wind.
"Try breaking the statue!"
She turned to grab the statue from where it had been placed in the centre of the circle. One of the monks dived at her pinning her to the floor whilst another snatched the statue from the floor and dashed out the back door. Aliyah rolled over under her assailant, and bringing both knees up to her chest she kicked out and sent the monk flying across the room. But she was too late to catch the one with the statue. Hitting the floor she cursed.
The following day Aliyah was walking across the quad, the sun beamed down, nothing in the world seemed to have changed much since the begging of the week. But she had, nothing was the same any more. It seemed wearied that she could go through so much, just to everything the same.
"I guess they'll just never know how close it came to stopping." John's voice broke her train of thought. She turned and smiled as her two friends walked up to her, Merry gave her a quick hug and John clapped her on the back.
As they walked away she threw an arm over each of their shoulders.
Not all the changes were bad though. She thought as the sun beat down on her and her new friends.
The End…
