Hubble Bubble - 1. Chapter 1

The boy with blue eyes is looking at me. No, not looking, staring. He is staring at me across the circle and it makes me feel a little uncomfortable, not least because at this distance, in the darkness I should not be able to see that his eyes are blue. I blink and they are just dark shadows in a pale oval face.

“May they sleep in the arms of the goddess until their time comes again or they join with the Great Eternal. So mote it be.”

“So mote it be.” I join with the general chorus of the age old incantation. The elderly man next to me turns and hands me a slim wand, its crystal tip glowing red with the light of the fire.

“I remember my father and my mother.” The boy is still watching me. He did not speak the incantation, I was watching and his lips didn’t move. His gaze is cool and steady and... somehow... familiar. “And I remember James Lucas, who died in service to his country. And I remember... I remember...”

And I remember a pair of ice blue eyes that seemed to have the ability to look into my soul, lips so full and perfect they must have been made to be kissed, skin so flawlessly milky pale it was almost translucent. I remember the body, perfect in every way, writhing beneath me and then... and then I remember the eyes closed, dark lashes still on the grey cheeks, the lips too cold to kiss, too blue, and the body, stiff and cold, motionless in my arms. I remember... I remember.

“And I remember Nicholas Rayner, who was stolen from this life too soon... far too soon. May they sleep in the arms of the goddess until their time comes again or they join with the Great Eternal. So mote it be.”

“So mote it be.”

This time his lips move but he is not saying what the rest of us are saying. I can’t tell what he is saying because it is too dark, the flickering firelight too distorting. I turn to hand the wand to the person on my left... and when I turn back he is gone. Startled I scan the crowd. The ritual is a public one and there must be a hundred people here, not all actually participating in the circle. Many are nothing but dark blurs outside the circle of firelight, moving about, wandering among the looming stones, dipping in and out of the ritual as they pleased.

I don’t like public rituals. They are too loose, to open, too distracting. I much prefer the private rituals I perform with my coven, safe within our sacred space; protected and powerful. Although I have to admit there is a certain kind of power that is only and always generated by a crowd. I can feel it now, eddying around us, blending with the subtle energies of stone, fire, rain and incense scented air.

Annoyed by my distracted state I try to concentrate on the ritual, to show the proper respect for the words being spoken by the members of the circle, sometimes defiantly, sometimes hesitantly and sometimes so choked with tears they are hardly discernable at all. Every one of us is remembering someone; someone close to us who has passed. Samhuinn is, after all the time for remembering, the time when the veil between this world and the other world, the world of spirit, is thinnest, when spirits walk among us and we pay homage to those who have gone before, showing them by our words and deeds that we remember.

I will never forget, not until I live to be a thousand years old. I will never forget the day my High Priestess received the telephone call that led us to Nick. We had known that Nick was special. We had always known it. It was impossible not to know it. He raised energy with a word, a glance, a touch, even when he was not trying to. In every ritual or meditation in which he was involved something always happened, something special.

Oh yes, Nick Rayner was special, and to me even more so. To me he was... everything. Every breath, every sigh, every touch, every word, every moment, every heartbeat. He was mine. And then he was gone.

We had known there was something strange going on. We had known there was someone in our small town polluting the energies, spoiling everything we did. We had known that they were dark, that they were powerful and that they were interested in Nick. There had been two messages. The first one warned us to disband, to walk away from the coven, from the power, from the path. It stated that if we did not our heart would be torn out. The message had come through Nick, although he had not been aware of it, being unconscious at the time.

It had been in the middle of a small private ritual and Nick was High Priest. He had raised the cup and just keeled over. We all, with one mind, broke the circle and it was that which had let the power in. We had all felt it... like a greasy, dark smog, creeping over our defences and wrapping Nick in an impenetrable shroud. It poured into him and flowed out of his mouth when he spoke in a voice that was not his own, to deliver the message. It was just that. Disband, walk away, or lose your heart.

When it was over the smoke simply dissipated and Nick woke, shaken and strangely withdrawn but apparently none the worst for it and having no memory of what he had said. Some of the younger members of the coven were completely freaked out by what had happened and they did precisely what the message had asked... they walked away and have never come back.

Those of us who remained were under a shadow. We tightened up on our defences, threw a little more salt, drew our pentacles with greater care but the second message did not come through magical means, it came in the post, in an ordinary white envelope neatly addressed in a strange curling script, to The Coven of the Moon, c/o Mr Nicholas Rayner.

We were relieved at the time that it had been sent to Nick... everyone knew Nick was strange, that he was special. No one was afraid of Nick, no one batted an eyelid when he walked around with pagan symbolism bright on his chest, or wearing a top hat and cloak, or when his black cat, Lucifer followed him everywhere. For anyone else there would have been questions asked, reputations destroyed, maybe even bricks through the window.

The note had been simple. “You have been warned. There will be no more. On the night of the full moon, if you are still together your heart will be stilled forever.” No one had noticed at the time that it said ‘heart’ and not ‘hearts’... the threat was never directed at us... but we were all afraid, all except Nick. Nick was never afraid of anything. He was calm and gentle and sweet and reassuring, as always. He was also confident that he could protect us from any supernatural threat that assailed us. And he was right. He could have... but the threat was not supernatural, it was physical, very physical... and he probably could still have protected us... but he had never been so good at protecting himself.

We had gathered for the Sabbat as usual, as we had for every full moon since I had joined the coven as a sweet sixteen year old neophyte, six years ago. By then I was a full third level witch and sometimes even stood in for the High Priest. I was strong, I was powerful, I was confident. But by the end of the night I was none of them.

We waited until long past midnight but, when Nick didn’t show we decided to start the ritual without him. I think that everyone but me was thinking he had chickened out. Not me. I knew that Nick would never do that. I knew that if he was not there then there would be a good reason why not. I was right, there was.

Right in the middle of the ritual all of our cell phones began to ring. This, in itself was strange enough, but stranger still when you think that every one of them had been switched off before we began. We broke the ritual but the phones were all dead, deactivated and silent. As we were standing around wondering what was going on the High Priestess’ phone began to ring, telling her she had received a text message.

The message read. “Nick Rayner. Unit 7, St George. You are already too late.” And then the phone was dead again and when she switched it on the message wasn’t there. Without a word we all disrobed, threw on our clothes and headed for the cars. There were only seven of us left and we had two cars, one of which was mine. I broke every speed limit on the way to the St George Industrial Park. Unit 7 was a warehouse. The doors stood open, wrenched off their hinges. It looked deserted, had probably been this way for some time. It was down the shabby end where most of the units were deserted and beginning to become derelict.

Inside the smell of urine and animal droppings was overpowering. The floor was littered with debris and it was as dark as the pits of hell. Alex had been the only one with the presence of mind to bring a flashlight and he switched it on and swept it around. We did not have to search far. The girls screamed and one of them, Helen I think, fell to the floor, whether she fainted or not I don’t know because I was already moving.

He was naked and hanging from a beam by a rope wound around his wrists, his feet only inches off the ground. His head was low on his chest and the glorious tangle of his raven black hair brushed his knees. As I moved I grasped the hilt of my ceremonial dagger which I had brought... just in case. Circling him with my arm I reached up and cut the rope. But even then, from the moment I touched him I knew.

I staggered back as his weight hit me, and fell to my knees, holding him on my lap. He was stiff, and cold, so very, very cold. I cradled his head in the crook of my arm and brushed the hair out of his face. Alex, at my shoulder shone the torch downwards and it reflected off the glassy blue eyes which stared upwards from a face that was serene and calm, if anything holding a look of slight surprise.

“Oh my god. Oh no... no..nononononono.”

Officially he died of an overdose, although given the circumstances no one suggested he had administered it himself. They never found who did it and now, two years later it is unlikely they ever will. Just as promised our heart had been torn from us, and we would never be the same again.

We stumbled on for a while but our hearts weren’t in it and, one by one we went our separate ways. I moved away from the town altogether and made a new home, a new start and was eventually welcomed into a new coven who knew nothing about Nick, nothing about what had happened. As far as I am aware none of us has heard anything more from our mysterious nemesis.

“So mote it be.”

I am shocked out of my reverie by the realisation that there is someone standing in front of me. I jump when I look up into a blank veiled face. Shaking myself slightly I take a slip of paper from my pocket and drop it into the silver bowl held by the veiled figure who moved on. The representation of the Goddess Cailleach, bringer of death and of new growth, taking from us, via the slips of paper, all of the things we wish to rid ourselves of in the year to come. As I watch she moves gracefully to the centre of the circle and begins to drop the slips, one by one into the fire.

My vision blurs and I blink impatiently. Now is not the time for tears, not for me. As Cailleach drops the last slip into the flames the High Priest raises his arms and words spill from his lips like a stream of liquid gold. He is a good showman, and it is he who insists that it is good for the coven and for paganism generally if we raise awareness by holding public rituals. Personally I think he is only in it for the drama, the attention, but I am only one voice, and a small one at that.

And then he announces in his beautifully theatrical way that the ritual is now open for celebration. I sigh and sink to the ground along with everyone else. The rain is light but insidious and it is beginning to soak through my clothes. I hope that this section of the ritual will not take long but you can never tell. This is where anyone who wants, a member of the coven or of the public, can participate by singing, playing music, telling a story. Sometimes it is very entertaining, sometimes moving and sometimes hilarious. Tonight it is tedious.

My mind wanders, eventually turning to the nearby hall where a feast awaits us in a warm, dry room with a roaring fire and a bar well stocked with alcohol. Oh to be warm and dry... oh for the sweet taste of cider, the traditional Samhuinn drink on my lips and the numbing veil of alcohol over my senses.

I am suddenly and forcefully jolted out of my reverie by a voice. It is a sweet voice, beautiful even, rich in tone and full of life and passion. However it is not the voice that startles me, it is not the voice but the song. It is His song.

For a moment I am transported back to another time, another ritual, another fire and another voice, so different to this one, so familiar, so....pure. Looking up with tears in my eyes, tears of pride and love as Nick sings for everyone, but to me. His song.

Blinking back tears I peer at the singer and am startled to realise it is the boy who was looking at me earlier. His face is lit by the fire besides which he is standing and it is... strange. He is not unattractive, in fact some may call him beautiful but it is not the physical beauty that startles me it is the intensely introverted look on his face, the thoughtfulness with which he sings, the sense of familiarity about him, although I know I have never set eyes on him before.

The music soars around me. Drummers are joining in, and somewhere a flute. No one speaks, they are all entranced, as am I. The boy has power. I can feel it in the words as he sings them. The night closes in around the circle, thick with spirits, straining towards the fire, towards... him. Who is he? Who the hell is he? And why does he feel... familiar? No, not familiar. He is not familiar. I know I have never seen him before, by the goddess I would have remembered. Not familiar as such but... something.

The boy’s voice soars towards the song’s climax and he turns slowly, his eyes meeting mine. His face is filled with the same intensity that his sweet voice instils in the song and it seems to ripple across the distance between us, practically visible in throbbing waves of clear, blue energy. Everything fades into the background and there are only the two of us. He is singing just to me and the power of his music flows through me, entrancing, bewitching.

I smile, recognising the tug of magic at the edges of my mind. Bewitching indeed, but it takes more than that to ensnare me. Beware of attempting to bewitch a witch, it might just rebound on you. Gathering my energy, my power I murmur words of an ancient incantation and the energy flares out, golden to his electric blue. He takes a step back, staggering and the music dies on his lips.

The world crashes back in waves and there is some uncertain applause. The boy’s eyes are still locked with mine and they are wide, shocked. I smile and stalk around the edge of the circle, intending to intercept him. Something soft brushes against my legs and I look down automatically, just in time to see a sleek black shape slink back into the shadows. A cat. Lucifer? I shake my head, annoyed that I should immediately think of him. When I look up again the boy has gone.

I find that I am strangely unsettled. It is not surprising that I am thinking of Nicholas at this time of year, at this place, in this setting. In fact it is not surprising that I am thinking of Nicholas at all, rarely a week goes past when something does not remind me of him. Some little thing, some word, some touch, some glimpse of a dark head in a crowd... the colour of the sky, the smell of lilac... No it is not surprising at all that I would find something here to remind me of him. But this time, this time there is more. It is almost as thought he is here, with me, as if I can turn at any moment and see his eyes watching me from the crowd, that half smile he always wore lifting the corner of his lips, the faithful shadow at his feet.

I shiver as a cold breeze lifts my hair. It loose about my shoulders tonight, falling in a shower of gold to halfway down my back. The dampness is making it crimp into waves and it feels heavy. I remember how it feels to have his hands in my hair, his lips on my throat, his body pressed against mine. I remember his voice, always excited, always half breathless, always so full of life. I remember...

I look up startled as the rich voice of the High Priest calls us back to the closing of the ritual. I am genuinely shocked. How long have I been lost in my remembrances? How long have I stood here while others have come and gone, spoken their words, sung their songs, blended their energies with the Great Eternal?

“Now is the time of our departure. As the fire at our centre dies may its light be rekindled in our hearts....”

The voice drones on, speaking the words that are so familiar and yet so alien, a blend of traditions so ancient their practitioners were here when all that stood on the windswept plain were trees and plants, before the circle was conceived let alone built. I close my eyes and they wash over me as the ancient ones parade across the circle in solemn procession, marching down the years, their magic as ancient as the hills.

And then it is over. The circle is uncast, the gateways closed and people are beginning to drift away, back towards the town, towards the hall and the welcoming heat of the open fire, the lure of food and alcohol. All around me conversations are struck with friends and strangers and the mystic becomes the mundane.

I follow the general flow, part of it but apart from it, still half in another world, another time. The moon is high and, despite the persistent rain, finds gaps in the clouds to bathe the scene in pale moonlight, just enough to allow me to scan the crowd, searching for a slender figure, dark haired and blue eyed. I see nothing but damp tired people trudging through a muddy field as the magic leaks from them and reality settles like an old familiar cloak around their shoulders.

As we get closer to the hall the babble of voices grow louder. I can see the light spilling out, the carved pumpkins either side of the large double doors making little pools of flickering firelight through which people trump in their eagerness to reach the goodies inside. I sigh. It took me hours to carve those pumpkins, they are the size of dogs, and hardly anyone gives them more than a passing glance.

Suddenly the thought of the warmth and sustenance becomes too much for me and I increase my speed, half jogging across the muddy grass.

Inside the hall is bright with candlelight and conversation. A makeshift bar is set up at one end and long trestle tables groaning with food at the other. There are more people here than there were at the ritual and those who did not brave the weather are evident as much by their smug smiles as their steaming hair. All over there are groups and couples, chatting about the ritual, the weather and enough pretentious new age crap to fertilise fields.

I hesitate a moment torn between the bar to my left and the food to my right. Ahead of me there is an enormous fire pit with a blazing fire warming the chilled revellers over which the remains of half a pig is slowly rotating. I feel almost envious of it. I had not realised how cold I was until I came inside.

Unconsciously my eyes are scanning the crowds but, although I see many familiar faces, some of whom smile and wave, I do not see what I am looking for.

I hear someone close by comment to a companion how ‘sacred’ the hall is, filled with the light of many candles, some in lanterns hanging from the beams, other in glass jars on the tables. I sigh. On my other side someone mentions that they knew someone who had spoken to someone who had once met someone who knew Alex Saunders. Sigh.

Left it is then. Weaving through the crowd I am not deliberately looking but my eyes are constantly scanning the crowd nevertheless and I am unconsciously disappointed when I reach the bar without catching the slightest glimpse of anyone who could have been...

“Hello there Sam, nice ritual. Shame about the weather. Good turn out though.”

“Yeah. What you got there? Any mead?”

“You should be so lucky. We have crate loads of tins of various sorts, jugs of cider, red, white and pink wine and a rather dodgy bottle of Scotch.”

“Ooookay. I’ll take a polystyrene cup of red wine and a stiff chaser of the dodgy Scotch.”

“If I didn’t know you better I would think you were trying to drown some sorrows there.”

“I’m trying to drown something.... thanks.”

I hand over my money, down the Scotch in one go and, clutching my plastic cup prepare to head back into the party as someone squeezes into a gap next to me and I almost drop my drink as I turn my head and find myself looking into a familiar pair of liquid blue eyes.

To say I am shocked is an understatement. Close up the boy is... somehow less and somehow so much more. Those eyes are amazing, huge in a delicate pale face, and the most incredible shifting blue. His head is tilted to one side slightly and there is a half smile on the full sensuous lips. I had thought he was dark but now I see that he had been wearing a hood which is now thrown back to reveal a wild tumble of hair so pale it is almost translucent with a strange blueish tinge.

Close up I am suddenly not so sure that it is a boy at all. There is something very feminine about the soft, full lips and the thick lashes that are surprisingly dark considering how pale the hair is. He is indescribably, ephemerally beautiful and the sight of him completely takes my breath away.

The lips curl gently upwards and part slightly to show small even white teeth. He is almost too perfect. There is something about this kind of perfection that is jarring to the senses.

“Hello.” The voice is soft and as androgynous as the rest of him. He reaches out a delicately pale hand and takes a cup from the bar tender. I had not even heard him order a drink. He must have paid for it too because she turns and walks away smiling in a slightly dazed way.

“Er... Hi.”

“It’s very crowded in here.”

“Um... yes.”

“I think I will go outside. It is sweeter there.”

The words are soft, slightly accented and I am almost sure they contain a hint of invitation as do the glittering blue eyes which spark mischief. I have absolutely no intention of taking up the invitation, none at all. I lean back against the bar and watch the slender figure weave between the packed bodies with gentle grace, the crowd seems to part to let him through and then begin to close again behind him.

I have absolutely no intention of following him but... something tugs at me, something nagging at the back of my mind. For a moment I almost feel that it is an alien presence but then it manifests and another form seems to superimpose itself over the slim form, an altogether taller, broader and darker figure. A memory of the times, many of them when I have smiled and watched another back disappear into the crowd, one that is very different in many ways but which moved in much the same way, with the same easy grace, the same unconscious artistry the same... the same...

“Nick.”

Without ever having made the conscious decision I am moving. The crowd seems thicker and I am pushing through bodies which press in on all sides. Everything is damp and slightly steaming and smells of ozone and woodsmoke, overlaid with the tantalising scent of roasting meat. Yet, as I follow his path there is something else, something so subtle I could not swear it was real but all pervading nevertheless... the sweet scent of lilac.

The boy has vanished and my movements become more determined, more desperate. It seems to be a very long way to the door and I am almost on the verge of panic from the press. Voices call out my name but I ignore them and then suddenly I am outside. It has stopped raining but there is still the smell of it in the air and, now more than ever the heady fragrance of lilacs.

There are almost as many people out here as there were inside. Where are they all coming from? The candlelight from the hall and the pumpkins make a patio of light and beyond it there is only darkness. There is no sign of the boy and I pause, wondering what to do, where to go... and then I see him. Out in the darkness, highlighted in a patch of moonlight, near the tree line, his hands raised over his head, dancing.

I watch in awestruck wonder as he whirls and leaps, lighter than a feather, oblivious, enraptured. Without realising it I am moving towards him and all the people fall away, the voices fade, the darkness enfolds me.

I walk until I am barely feet away. He is unbelievable. So beautiful in face and form. I am awestruck by the grace of his movements, the flying hair the long slender limbs, the sheer unselfconscious abandon of the dance.

I barely have time to register all this before he suddenly twirls, his hair flying out like a cloak around him and he is in my arms. He is so delicate, insubstantial, his bones brittle as a bird, pressed against me. He is panting, lit up like a candle, his pale skin and hair seeming to glow faintly in the moonlight, his chest heaving against mine.

He is a fair bit shorter than I am and has to tilt his head back to look up into my face. I am starstruck by his beauty. The sweet lips curve upwards and I get the feeling that somehow he is mocking me.

“Do you dance Sam?”

“Not like that.” It doesn’t occur to me to wonder how he knows my name, not then, not yet.

“Will you dance with me?”

“I... there’s no music.” Smiling he begins to hum, closing his eyes and swaying in my arms. Before I know it I am swaying with him and then we are dancing, close together, his arms around my waist and mine on his shoulders. The song he is humming is vaguely familiar.

“What’s that you’re humming?”

Opening his eyes he smiles up at me and starts to sing softly.

‘Deep in December it's nice to remember
altho you know the snow will follow.
Deep in December it's nice to remember
without the hurt the heart is hollow.
Deep in December it's nice to remember
the fire of September that made us mellow.
Deep in December our hearts should remember and follow. (Try to Remember: Tom Jones)’

From the first word I am frozen. Someone else had sung that song to me, sweetly, softly and intimately. Someone else had looked up into my eyes in just this way before he kissed me. Someone else.

As I stand, immobile, my heart beating so hard and fast it hurts, he stretches up and the final word ‘follow’ is whispered against my lips as he kisses me... gently, lightly, briefly and then he spins out of my arms and is dancing on light feet into the trees.

“Wait.... Please wait...”

“Will you follow Sam? Will you follow me?”

“Follow you where?”

“Into the darkness.”

“Wait... how do you know my name?”

“A friend told me.”

“A friend? What friend?” The boy glances over his shoulder, one pale hand resting on the trunk of an oak tree, and a small dark shadow separates from the deeper shadow of the woods. It pads on soft paws through the moonlight and rubs himself against the boy’s legs then sits close to his feet in a very familiar pose. “Lucifer?”

The boy turns and he and the cat slip into the shadow of the trees.

“No! Wait. Please wait.” Suddenly terrified that I will lose him, that I will never see him again, I run headlong into the trees. Within a few yards I break into a small clearing, bathed in moonlight and he is waiting... they are waiting. I stop.

“Who are you?”

“Who do you want me to be?”

“Don’t play games with me. Who are you? What do you know about Nick?”

“Nick?”

“Don’t play games with me. You know who I mean, I know you do. Cut the crap. Who are you?”

Slowly, deliberately he walks back across the clearing, only a few steps but it seems to take forever. When he is so close I can feel his breath he raises one hand and lays it against my face. His eyes are cool and faintly puzzled.

“I am Ariel.”

“Ariel? That’s a strange name for... for...”

“For a boy?”

I nod wordlessly and he smiles, a strange, almost feral smile. “Ah... but I am not.. a boy.”