Nastya was watching the darkening sky from her office window, an objectively gorgeous purple and orange sunset doing nothing to lift her souring mood. She was pondering how it was possible for one single day to derail the entirety of her life and that of five other people. Triple Tower card indeed.
When the prophecy was uttered in the rickety metal halls of the school equipment shed, of all places, she had no idea how she kept her confident facade. The feeling of cold dread that followed her through the entire day spiked through her body at the words of that boy, Dylan. Or more accurately, the entity that was using him as a mouthpiece.
She had seen this before. Seances performed by actual psychics, not the theatrical swindlings of spiritualists you find on TV. A person with such a rare gift of suppressing their consciousness and soul could become a physical vessel for whatever incorporeal creature was around. Souls of the departed were most common, but sometimes an entity from beyond the veil of death slipped through the crowd and then things got really interesting.
Either way, she had yet to see a friendly spirit to date, and this particular one was horrifying. It felt like icy still water with an oily film lingering on the edges of her mind from contact with it. She shuddered and pulled her coat tighter, trying to retain any remaining body heat she managed to generate after a much-needed scalding bath when she came back from the city archives.
It was rare that she had to go somewhere in person to dig up information. Most files, even from decades ago, were digitised and uploaded to a repository of some sort these days. But the particular files she was looking for, such as the colonial timber surveys, original historical land grants and local historical society conservation records, were exclusively on paper. So, she had to get Anatoly to call them in advance and pull a lot of strings to get the files ready by the time she ditched the last period and legged it over. An hour and a half later, having found what she was looking for through an almost inhuman effort of cartography, she was on the way back to the mansion to await the others.
She saw the black SUV pull into the driveway, the rear door opening before it came to a full stop and Nikolai stumbling out in a hurry. The look on his face made her stiffen and rush down to the foyer to meet him. As she cleared the last set of stairs, she heard loud footsteps on the hardwood floors and almost ran into her brother. He caught her, a manic look in his eyes. Equal parts fear and anger. She tapped him gently on the shoulder and looked behind him at the unexpected guest.
Ian was standing in the middle of the foyer, calmly holding his duffel bag over one shoulder, those dark, unsettling eyes fixated on her and Nikolai. He appeared uninterested in the old manor house, or the mess of moving boxes still scattered around from their hasty occupation of the premises. Nikolai was almost vibrating with some sort of odd energy in her arms, but she was a good hostess above all else.
“Welcome to our house, Ian.” She nodded in his direction and released her brother. Ian calmly shook her hand and nodded. “I suppose my brother decided to give you a ride?”
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Alexei in full alert mode, glaring at this boy with obvious malice. Whatever happened in that car, this kid is clearly not to be underestimated.
“Yep. And I really appreciate it.” He said it to her, but something in the tone was directed at Nikolai, who skittered away into the kitchens. She filed it under the “to deal with later” pile of ever-growing things in the back of her mind.
“Alexei, would you be so kind as to escort the other three back here as well? They are probably waiting at Adam Penhalyn’s house.”
After a curt nod, the driver went to do her bidding. She smiled down at Ian, one of the very few people shorter than she was, but no less intimidating, and escorted him into the dining room for tea. They chatted amicably for a little while before descending into companionable silence. He was a little awkward at first, not used to the polite chitchat commonplace for such an occasion, but she liked that. It reminded her of home, in a way. So much unnecessary politeness and wishy-washiness in this country, with people one didn’t even know.
Nikolai was avoiding them like the plague. She could read his nervous mood from the aggressive pacing footsteps carrying from his room on the floor above them. Shoddy American wooden houses. Ian either did not notice or was acting oblivious on purpose.
Almost an hour later, when the sun almost completely set over the horizon, Alexei was finally back with the other unfortunate members of their party. She watched them awkwardly get out of the car and stumble towards the entrance, where she was waiting.
“You are late.”
“Yeah, well, that’s on you, love,” Jesse replied almost immediately, clearly welcoming the distraction of a fight. “Are you fucking mad, or what?”
“Jesse!” both Adam and Dylan hissed at her in unison.
“Care to elaborate?” Nastya sighed as she gestured for the staff to take their bags and directed the new group to the dining room.
“Well, it was a brilliant plan to call my social worker in advance. Would have worked wonders if you didn’t follow it up with a totally not suspicious black SUV with a totally not secret Russian Mafia bodyguard telling us that ‘Miss Anastasia wished me to escort you to the manor’. Daniel had follow-up questions. So did Mrs Penhalyn! Took us twenty more minutes of convincing that you weren’t going to kidnap us and sell our organs on the black market.”
Nastya threw her a raised-eyebrow look at that banal stereotype.
“Still not convinced that’s not happening.” Jesse finished with a huff as she headed for the chair opposite Ian and plopped into it, pointedly ignoring the boy. Adam and Dylan shared a look, conversing through near telepathy as she and Nikolai often did, and headed for the two chairs next to Jesse. They sat next to each other, rather than across the table. Interesting.
She grabbed Anita and instructed her to bring out the dinner. She was going to drag Nikolai back from wearing a hole in the carpet. Nastya told the group to get comfortable, pointedly ignoring the tense atmosphere between them, and headed upstairs.
Nikolai was predictably a ball of anxiety when she let herself into his room. No locks between them since childhood, and probably never will be. She looked with exhaustion at the expensive Persian weave under his shoes, suffering from whatever hysterics were plaguing him now. She noted down to take it to a carpet restorer when she had the chance.
“What’s wrong?” She asked calmly, crossing her arms across her chest and leaning against the door.
He turned towards her, face flushed, breathing heavily. “That little shit!”
“You mean Ian? What’s wrong with him?”
“He is…” Nikolai hesitated, searching for the right words to describe the feeling. “I just… I don’t trust him. Neither should you.”
“Oh, honey. You know I don’t trust any of them. That’s why they are here. On our territory, on our terms.” She shrugged and took his cold, clammy hands in hers.
“We have to get to the bottom of this. All of them are involved, and to figure out what really is going on, we have to interrogate them one by one. We’ll ply them with food and drink, make them let their guard down. Then, leave everything to me.”
Nikolai nodded reluctantly, still holding back the details of this mistrust he had particularly gained for Ian. As usual, her dear brother was bottling all his anxiety inside, but Nastya knew he would overflow and crack open eventually. All she had to do was wait. And besides, with the motley crew gathered downstairs, it was showtime.
***
An hour later, after the group was sufficiently stuffed with a variety of Russian delicacies and Anita was pouring tea and a slice of cake for everyone, Nastya spoke.
“I think it’s time to talk about what happened earlier today.”
The small talk that began to bubble up during the dinner died out, Jesse still chewing on a second portion of meatloaf, glaring at her for interrupting her food. Nastya stood up and pulled up her notes on the tablet.
“To summarise, we have been led to the same location at the same time, by a stroke of fate rather than coincidence, to witness a prophecy from an otherworldly entity inhabiting Dylan’s body. All that cryptic hyperbole concludes that if each of us, being referred to as a symbolic archetype in said prophecy, fulfils the predicted course of events, the final result would be this ‘HIM’ opening the door to our world. One does not need to be a genius to assume that that is bad.”
“Yeah, no shit, Sherlock.” Jesse huffed, reaching for the second slice of cake. Nikolai sat perfectly still, having said nothing during dinner and trying his hardest to avoid meeting Ian’s eyes. His extreme discomfort at the situation was evident in the white-knuckle grip he was holding the teacup with. Ian, meanwhile, looked absolutely unbothered. She didn’t know if she liked that about him or was equally unsettled by it.
“The easiest course of action would be to not fall into the trap of trying to prevent the prophecy and simply go about our lives, keeping an eye out for the particulars of our assigned roles. However, that all depends.”
“On what?” Dylan asked, his half-eaten plates at last taken away by disappointed Anita.
“On you, actually.” Nastya shrugged and looked him over with an assessing gaze. He looked even more ragged than before, his bruises now turning bluish-purple rather than red, with bags under his eyes. He was even paler than this afternoon. She pretended not to notice Adam’s protective hand reach to cover Dylan’s under the table, causing the latter to startle.
“What do you mean?” Adam asked, confrontation evident in his blue eyes. The unnecessary aggression was not unfamiliar to her, but this was her house. And she would let this slide just this once. She glanced towards Dylan, ignoring his guard dog.
“I mean, you are the final bulwark. The Gatekeeper. If we assume that the entity wanting to ‘come through’ is the same entity that possessed you earlier, or they are a subordinate, ally or some such of that entity, regardless of whether we fulfil our prophetic purpose, it is up to you to keep the door closed, yes?” She paused, letting the boy keep up with her train of thought.
“Are you capable of doing that?”
“I…” he hesitated, looking away. That did not bode well. “I think so.”
“I’m afraid ‘I think so’ is not good enough. We need to figure out how you are susceptible to the entity’s influence and prevent whatever happened at the shed from happening ever again. I need you to tell me exactly what you felt, saw and thought before the incident.”
“Is this an interrogation?” Adam, the obstinate brick, barged in again, interposing himself between her and Dylan. This was going to be an issue.
“No. I need to assess the situation to be able to help.” She did not let him provoke her and glared right back at him. They stood there in a stalemate for a few seconds until Jesse broke the ice.
“Well, it’s the sleepwalking, innit?”
Everyone whipped their heads to look at her, mid-enormous bite of the Napoleon cake, her third serving.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean…” She took her time, sipping the tea with obvious delight, before continuing. “…he sleepwalks. Or used to. Isn’t that just the weird thing that whatever ‘entity’ from this beyond would latch on to? If it wanted someone magical already, it would latch onto you or Adam. Shut up, Adam, you are magical. As it stands, it went after Dylan.”
Surprised by the impeccable logic from the most unusual host, Nastya began to think aloud. “That is true. Sleepwalking and lucid dreaming had long been associated with powerful psychic abilities, especially those of summoning spirits from beyond the veil. Maybe you are just inherently more capable of bridging the two worlds together. That’s why the entity chose you to be the mouthpiece and have you pave the way for it…”
“Ok, guys. Let’s be real for a second.” Dylan raised his hand, slipping it out of Adam’s grip and glaring at Jesse. “I used to sleepwalk when I was a child and haven’t had an incident until today. I have also had a…let’s just say difficult… day, meaning my mental state was not at its best. Have we considered that it was just a fluke? That maybe if I don’t get… oh, I don’t know… thrashed and emotionally ragdolled all the time, the sleepwalking wouldn’t happen again?”
“Perhaps,” Nastya answered, getting more sceptical by the minute of this entire excuse. “Easy way to check.”
“What do you mean?” Dylan looked back hopefully.
“I mean tonight. We sleep in here, together, and watch out for anything weird. If it was a fluke, as you say, we all go back to school tomorrow as if nothing had happened. If not…well, at least we’ll know how bad it is.”
Dylan’s pale, distraught face spoke for the rest of the room. It was going to be a long, uncomfortable night.
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