Spirits

Chapter Twelve

Ghostly trees banked either side of the road as they drove through the night. White lines flicked past in a blur as the speedometer needled flirted with the speed limit. A single headlight appeared in the rear vision mirror, gaining on them quickly. Farrell gripped the wheel tightly, but the motorcycle just sped past them, its engine obnoxiously loud.

He adjusted the rear vision mirror so he could see the others in the back. Rose scrawled intently in her sketchbook, Farrell could only imagine what might be going through her mind. Alex on the other hand sat with his arms folded across his chest, his eyes burning a hole through the seat in front of him where Chris sat. Even with everything else that had gone on Alex couldn't ignore what Chris had done. Chris sat with the duffel bag across his lap, still wide eyed and sweating.  At least Nanna seemed calm, completely unaware of what was going on.

"Take me to my father," said Chris forcefully. Farrell ignored Chris and kept on driving, keen to put as much distance between them and Ardea as possible.  Chris became visibly agitated.

"Turn around, you have to take me to my father."

"We're not turning around," said Farrell, "and unless you want to take your chances with whatever is out there, I suggest you stay with us." Chris's turned suddenly silent as he recalled what had happened and he returned to looking out the window into the darkness. The car returned to a silence that brought with it an unmistakable air of tension.  He was sure Alex and Rose had a million questions, but there were so many things he couldn't answer, how was he supposed to explain?  Alex eventually broke the long silence.

"You said you'd meet Marvin at the lighthouse.  What lighthouse?" his voice was flat and emotionless, still angry at Chris.  Chris turned at the sound of Alex's voice, registering for the first time that there were other people in the car.

"Who is Marvin?" said Chris. Farrell ignored him.

"There's an old lighthouse about an hour south of Havensport," said Farrell, "that's where we are headed."

"I'm not going all the way to Havensport!" said Chris impudently.

"We can't stop now," said Farrell, looking in the rear vision mirror, still half expecting to see the possession spirit chasing after them. "You can have your father come get you from the first town we pass."

Chris paused, looking at Farrell and Alex who were covered in just as much dirt and blood as he was.

"What's going on?" asked Chris. Farrell looked in the rear vision mirror at Alex and Rose. "You know something about what happened to Dale, don't you?" Farrell was silent again.  "Please, you have to tell me what happened," said Chris. He paused, looking out the window. "One moment he was my friend, the next he was someone... something else." Chris went silent.  Farrell took a deep breath

"Alex and I were attacked by a possession spirit earlier tonight," said Farrell, "maybe it was the same one, maybe it was another but-"

"Possession spirit?!" said Chris, cutting Farrell off.  There was an incredulous sarcasm in his voice that annoyed Farrell. 

"You can believe whatever you want.  I'm just telling you what I know," said Farrell.

"You knew her," said Rose, "you called her Marietta." It took Farrell a moment to realise she was no longer talking about the possession spirits. He looked into the rear vision mirror at her.

"My family has come across her in the past."  Farrell tried to think of a way to describe Marietta.  As far as spirits went, she was far older and far more powerful than anything his family had ever come across.  But it was not just that, where other spirits seemed to prey on the weak, she targeted hunters, toying with them before killing them.  Words couldn't do justice to the type of evil that Marietta was.  "Marietta is after me, she'd had a vendetta against my family for centuries. I'm sorry you've all been dragged into this," said Farrell. Everyone in the car was completely silent. He'd expected more questions, the difficult ones that he had no answers for, like how were they going to defeat Marietta and how were they going to get Ingrid back. Just because they hadn't asked him didn't stop them from swirling endlessly inside his head.