Chapter 3

Trust as a Rare Commodity

"So, no memories huh?" Ronald scratched his blond head. "There were a couple on our list too. Beats me what it could mean."

"This is strange indeed, Knox. We should inform the higher ups immediately." William seemed to be completely unconcerned by the fact we both almost died less than ten minutes ago. "Something is stealing memories, and it's not demons or angels for that matter. Don't you find that a little bit strange, Ms. Bates?" William held his death scythe to my neck, hands steady, finger on trigger. I felt the blades of his death scythe brushing against my neck, my death mere millimeters away. "After all, it seems you're the only one who matches this criteria."

"I just saved your life, and you're accusing me of murder?"

"Saved my life?" He scoffed. "A wound like that wouldn't have stopped our weakest trainees!" I bit my lip. He was right, there was no doubt about it, and the look on his stupid face said he knew it. I never thought I would want to punch someone so badly. "However, the blow aimed at you should have been fatal to a human such as yourself."

"Listen to me." I said, backing myself against the damp stone wall, cornered once again. "I know about as much as you do."

"Sir," Ronald apprehensively put a hand on his superior's shoulder, "I suggest we see what the higher ups make of this before jumping to any conclusions." I felt my body un-stiffen as William lowered his weapon.

"You're right Knox." His glasses flashed. "There would be no telling how much paper work we'd have to file if she were wrongly killed." I snorted.

"Nice to know you value a clean inbox more than my life." William ignored my sarcastic retort and continued speaking to Ronald.

"I need you to escort her back to your apartment for the night. I've got more business to attend to."

"Alright, sir."

"And you." William finally acknowledged my existence. "Don't think I have let my guard down. I have my eyes on you."

"Anything you say, sir" I whispered mockingly under my breath, as Ronald and I melted into the crowd once more.

The street lamps all around us glowed like many little moons against the darkened sky. A silence hung around us like a thick mist as we walked back to the housing block. Too much happened today, too much to even think about, so instead I counted the fireflies. However, it became difficult to keep track of them as the flicked their little lights on and off, so resigned to content silence.

I realized with a gut twisting feeling, that not once since I came here, had I thought of home. Home, with the familiar rush of traffic, and the voices of the few people close to me. I wondered if anyone looked for me, or missed me at all. I had been gone more than a day, which is usually around the time when people start worrying, that is if they cared enough. However, I knew that there would always be at least one person who cared, whose world would be empty without me. Perhaps she was waiting at home for the police to call back, and tell her I was gone for good, that she lost the only person she had left.

The night air was chilly, and I automatically shoved my hands into my coat pockets, where they bushed against the cold metal of the silver necklace.

"Ronald?" My breath formed curls of mist that tumbled through the air until they faded away.

"Hm." I saw the smile disappear from his face as the necklace unraveled itself in my hand. "Oh… That." His voice was unusually subdued, and his somewhat cocky attitude had all but vanished.

"Are you alright?"

"No, no I'm fine." He insisted, flashing a weak smile.

"Oh… okay then." There was a long pause in which neither of us talked. We just walked listening to the birds of the night make their calls.

"Hey," Ronald spoke once again. "There's something I want to tell you."

"What is it?"

"The story of the life and death of Ronald Knox."

"Is it a sad story?" Ronald smiled slightly at my question.

"You could say that, I guess." He said. "He was seventeen, engaged to the girl of his dreams. Her name was Caroline Martin, and he thought the world of her. There were a few days left until their wedding, and he decided he would surprise her. So he bought her the most finely made silver necklace he could afford. But on his way there, he was struck by a carriage and died instantly. And that's the end, I guess."

"What about Caroline, what became of her?"

"She moved on, had a family and everything." Ronald seemed older in that moment. He must have known that eventually she would move on, grow to love someone else. But perhaps a sliver of him had hoped she wouldn't, that she would commit suicide in despair, and they would be able to see each other again.

"What a horrible ending." I said, tilting my head towards the sky as I thought.

"What do you mean?"

"There's no resolution. I mean, what happens to this Ronald Knox? Clearly death wasn't the end for him. " I replied. "There is still something he can do."

"I don't follow."

"The necklace, I say we go give it to her, put things to rest. That sounds like a better ending to me."

"You have got to be joking. This was over a hundred years ago. She's been dead for a very long time now."

"I know." I said, a slight smile spreading across my lips.

When we arrived, the graveyard was empty. A fog swirled in the air, and a raven croaked somewhere in the distance. There was nobody there except us and tombstones of the long dead, covered in various mosses, and almost unreadable. A vase of fresh red roses was carefully placed by a weathered tombstone. Long gone, but never forgotten. The graveyard was peaceful, and the moonlight gave it subtle beauty. There was a graveyard like this one in my hometown, where children always gathered at night, daring one another to slip under the gate, but each would chicken out and they would run away giggling. The backyard of my childhood home touched the edge of it, with only a fence to separate them. So I would watch them leave from my bedroom window, and when they were gone, I would hop the fence and explore. Then when my father died, it was somehow soothing to walk the stone path through it. It was one of the many things that doomed me to be alone. At school, in public, it didn't matter, nobody ever went near me, they didn't want to be.

"Here." Ronald's voice cut into the silence. The tombstone was the oldest one of the lot, cracked in places, lichen grew in patches on its surface. I stood behind him watching as he laid the necklace in a tiny dirt hole and smoothed it over with dirt. A cold night breeze wandered through my hair making it dance against the murky, tar black sky. I pulled my jacket tighter.

A feeling of uneasiness settled upon me. I glanced over at Ronald, who was sitting in silence, staring deeply at the name etched into the mossy stone. He looked older again, in a way I could not explain. Perhaps he was simply looking back, remembering things he thought he had long forgotten. But there were no signs he felt the same uneasiness I did, and that troubled me. What could I have been sensing that he could not? Unfortunately, I did not need to wait long to find out.

Out of nowhere, I was punched in the gut by an overwhelming sense of fear. My eyes instinctively shifted towards the alleyway just beyond the fence. The outline of terrible and spider-like figures stirred within it, their blood red eyes piercing right through me. The voice in my head was screaming, run, run, but my body wouldn't move.

"Ronald?" I barely managed to speak, feeling as though I was being suffocated by its gaze.

"Can it wait? I'm having a-" He stopped short, noticing the eyes peering at us from the alleyway. They moved quickly, giving us no time to react. Ronald yelled something, but his voice was nothing more than a drum pounding vaguely in my head. My face was gripped by a frozen hand, and with a bright flash of light my world dissolved into nothing but fear and pain.