Urban Witch Read online

  “You’d start blowing bubbles,” she said before changing the subject. “Doing anything nice for the weekend?”

  I laughed when I realised what she was talking about. “Yes, I’m getting the keys to my new flat this afternoon.”

  “That’s wonderful news. Got some big strong man to give you a hand?”

  “No, just my weedy flat-mate,” I said. “And she’s useless because she never goes to the gym. No core strength.”

  “Well,” she said tetchily. “Once I’m living in London and not commuting for three hours a day I might just find the time to join a gym. Are you all packed?”

  “I boxed the rest of my stuff up last night. My dad’s hired a van. He’s coming over later. Should be interesting to see how it all fits into my new room. What about you?”

  “My parents are dropping everything off Saturday morning.”

  “Third floor,” the elevator announced as the doors opened.

  Chapter 2

  I was starting to feel anxious and squeezed Millie’s hand as we stepped out onto the third floor. The décor upstairs didn’t match the grandeur of the entrance hall but, like most Whitehall offices, they hadn’t scrimped on the furnishings. The alcove was lined with lots of dark wood which gave the place a rather gloomy atmosphere.

  I was aware of my pulse quickening as we moved away from the lift. Rounding the corner, Millie went over on her heel prompting a string of expletives.

  She waved me away when I went back to help her. “Go and see if Stahl’s still there. I don’t want you to miss her.”

  Unfortunately, the large crowd of people blocking my path seemed to have other ideas.

  Sunlight flooded in through the large picture windows on the right, to the extent that I had to squint just to make out what was going on. The corridor was filled with office workers, all facing away from me. Word of Stahl’s visit must have gotten out. I’d be lucky to get a glimpse of her at this rate.

  While I waited for Millie, I went and looked out into the central quad - the site of the original Bear Garden. It had all been tastefully paved over in warm sandstone with a lower central section set out in approximation of a bear pit with a box-tree at its centre. There’s a blue plaque on the front of the building commemorating the fact that this was where Elizabeth I came to watch bear baiting tournaments in Tudor times. I’ve always thought that it would have been cool to prune the tree into the shape of a grizzly bear – but that’s just me.

  I turned back to the crowd and considered the likelihood of pushing my way through to the front. I wouldn’t have minded giving it a go but I doubted that Millie would be quite so keen. It was at that moment that I became aware of some guy who kept looking over in my direction. He was wearing a pin stripe open necked shirt which would have looked a little too formal if he hadn’t spiked his blonde hair.

  I made a note to ask Millie his name.

  I tried to push my way along the left hand side of the crowd. There was a recessed doorway a little way along which, I figured, would give access to the main office area but, when I got there, the door was locked. I had to make do with looking through the window.

  I rested my forehead against the cool glass and took in the vast, open plan lay-out. By twisting my head round at an angle I hoped to catch sight of someone, hopefully Kinsella. Normally, as head of department, he’d be cooped up in his office but they’d have flushed him out for a visit like this. Whilst this side of the room was deserted I could just make out, over on the far side, a group of people standing in front of a blue display board. I had no problem picking out Kinsella, his dark hair swept back off his forehead revealing the face of a fallen angel. I imagined that this was how Lord Byron might have looked, if Byron had been a wizard with an office job.

  He would, doubtless, be hating every minute of this. Public relations aren’t his thing. I know from Millie that he likes to keep the day-to-day workings of the office as mundane as possible in an effort to shield us from the bizarre nature of the work we’re involved in.

  “You look like you’re on the run from someone.”

  I turned to see that the guy with blonde hair was standing there holding a mug.

  “Haven’t stopped all morning,” I said. “Where did you get your coffee?”

  “It’s tea.”

  I examined the contents, curling my lip. “Looks a bit strong.”

  “Just how I like it. Builder’s tea. Not that I’ve been anywhere near a building site in my life, you understand.”

  By the look of his hands I could see that he was telling the truth. He was standing just a little bit too close but then there wasn’t much room in the doorway.

  “You a fan of the good doctor then?” he said.

  “Is she in there? Stahl?”

  “The great lady herself. They’ve moved us drones out to give her a clearer idea of how the office works when we’re all standing in the corridor. So, you a fan?”

  “I’m a fan of her work. How many world leaders would have had the balls to take on the Vatican?”

  He laughed at that. A self-satisfied kind of laugh. “Oh, come on. The Pope’s a pragmatist. The days of the Inquisition are long gone.”

  “Still, nice to have it in black and white that they don’t intend to burn you at the stake. And what about you? Are you a fan?”

  “I’m sceptical about politicians in general,” he demurred.

  “Mainstream politicians, granted,” I could hear myself starting to rant. I just couldn’t help myself. “But she’s not part of the mainstream. She’s got that all important cross-over appeal.”

  “May I point out that the newsfeeds on the net all like to portray her as some kind of New-Age nutter.”

  “And that’s how you set your moral compass is it: by reading the newsfeeds?”

  “Voice of the nation.”

  “If anyone else had confronted the Pope like that, and won, they’d be a national hero. But for a woman to do it…”

  “Are you this passionate about everything?”

  I made to respond but then realised that he was smiling, goading me. I watched the way the dimples formed in his cheeks. He had a nice smile. He had a very nice smile. So nice, in fact, that I could already feel myself starting to blush.

  “I’m Marcus by the way,” he switched hands with his tea and offered a hand- shake. “Marcus Rolfe.”

  “Bronte Fellows,” we shook hands like two old gentlemen. I waited for the joke about my name but it never came.

  That, at least, was promising.

  “Do you think the rumours are true?” he asked. “About her visit?”

  “What about it?”

  “Giving us the big kiss-off. Her last visit before they shut us down.”

  “I hope not,” I said, sounding perturbed. “I’ve only been here five minutes.”

  He turned and regarded me, “Course you have. So, what have they got you doing?”

  “Oh, various bits and pieces - but the library mostly.”

  “Ah, an academic. You don’t look the type.”

  “What does an academic look like?”

  “Oh, you know: bookish. Glasses, hair in a bun, meal for one. That kind of thing.”

  “Is that your kind of thing?” I tried to sound dismissive but came off sounding flirtatious.

  “Long afternoon, down the library. Sounds great.” He moved in a little closer and lowered his voice a notch, “A few of us meet up for a drink after work tonight. Nothing too formal – just a bit of fun. What do you think? You can bring your box along if you like.”

  “You’ve met, then,” Millie squeezed in between us. She was holding her shoe. It looked like the strap had gone.

  “Yes. This is Marcus.”

  “Oh, I know all about Marcus,” she said pointedly. “I was hoping to keep you away from him.”

  “Millie wants to keep me all to herself,” Marcus said turning on her.

  “The only way I could do that is if I had you neutered,” she purred. “Sorry, Mar
cus. Am I keeping you from something?”

  He tipped his head in my direction and re-joined the others.

  “He seems quite nice,” I whispered.

  “Yes, he’s a proper little sweetheart, our Marcus. Just so long as you remember never to go for a drink with him.”

  “Why’s that?”

  Millie gave me a pained expression. “Trust me. He’s like this with all the newbies. If you can withstand his charm offensive for the first couple of weeks he’ll get bored and move on.”

  “And if he doesn’t?”

  Millie raised her eyebrows half mockingly.

  I said, “Looks like we’ve missed our chance with Stahl.”

  “Oh, don’t be such a defeatist. We’ll catch her on the way out.”

  I stopped listening then because of the odd way Marcus was acting. He was behaving very oddly indeed, skirting along the row of windows shading his eyes so that he could better focus on something in the distance.

  “Is it me or is Marcus acting a little strangely?”

  Off in the distance - over the city skyline - a cloud was forming. A dark cloud which appeared to be changing shape by the second. It took me a moment to realise what I was seeing.

  Birds. Thousands of them.

  They were flocking over the city, forming a giant mass that was constantly rolling in on itself. I’d never seen anything like it and all the time we were watching you could see other birds from across the city flocking to join them.

  “What sort of birds are they?” Millie asked crossing to the window. “Pigeons? Rooks? What?”

  “I don’t think it’s as simple as that,” I said. “It looks like there’s all different types of bird. Look, this group just about to join the others. They look like starlings.”

  Marcus said, “But different types of birds don’t mass together like that, do they?”

  “Not normally,” I said. “Am I going mad or does it look like they’re coming this way?”

  Like a dark, spreading stain they now totally dominated the skyline to the extent that the light was starting to dim. There was a frantic energy to the flock’s movements as it formed into a swirling whirlwind which rolled endlessly in on itself ending in a long siphon-like tail.

  Other people in the corridor had also noticed that something was going on and had started to gravitate towards the windows.

  “I don’t like this,” Millie was saying. “This isn’t normal. It looks like…”

  “We’re under attack,” Marcus said.

  And with that, a large bird appeared from nowhere and flew straight into the window, breaking its wings. It hit so hard that everyone jumped back. One moment the bird was there and then it was gone leaving nothing but a tattered, bloody imprint.

  Another one hit a few seconds later, over to my right. A much smaller bird this time but the intention was the same. They were attempting to break the glass

  That decided me.

  “Here, take care of this,” I said, pressing my case into Millie’s arms.

  It felt weird entrusting the book with anyone but I trusted Millie to take care of it. If I was going to get anything done I’d need both hands free.

  “We need to clear this corridor – now!” I shouted.

  No one paid any attention. No one moved.

  I tried to reason with people in an attempt to get them to move back down the corridor but no one was listening. All the time, in the background, you could hear the harsh crump of bodies striking glass. It was only a matter of time before they broke through.

  I needed a different approach.

  If there’d been a fire-alarm I would have pressed it, but I couldn’t see one. No sign even of a fire extinguisher but when I looked at the ceiling I understood why.

  Sprinklers.

  It was a government building after all. They couldn’t risk a fire of any description. And that’s what gave me the idea.

  I needed something I could set light to. There would have been plenty of paper inside the office but the door was locked. I looked around for another alternative.

  Which was when I spied the cylindrical bin at the other end of the corridor.

  I ran over to it and thrust my hand inside. A sandwich pack was blocking the top but once I got past that I found what I was looking for very quickly.

  Four sheaves of paper.

  But I still needed to get up as high as possible and there were no desks or chairs to hand. I briefly considered standing on the windowsill but I didn’t think that was a good idea.

  “Marcus,” I shouted. “Over here!”

  He ambled over towards me while I got my lighter out.

  “What is it?”

  “I need to get as close to those sprinklers as possible. Can you get me up on your shoulders?”

  “Really?”

  “Really.”

  It worked perfectly. He knelt down so that I could wrap my legs around his neck. We had a little wobble at first, when he started to stand upright, but other than that it all went very smoothly.

  The piece of paper lit first time and I held it to the sprinkler.

  Someone wandered over and asked me what I was doing. To acknowledge them would have been to weaken my resolve so I ignored them.

  The first piece of paper burned away into a charred fragment so I had to let it go.

  I lit another one.

  Whoever was talking to me clearly didn’t like what I was doing. And with good reason.

  I was just about to drop the flaming remains of the second sheet when the sprinkler burst into life, spraying me straight in the face before shutting off just as quickly.

  “What do you think you’re doing?” someone shouted but it was too late.

  When the sprinklers came on the second time they stayed on, soaking me from head to toe. Marcus stumbled backwards and nearly dropped me.

  Water was suddenly everywhere, spraying the little crowd of people in the corridor. They all stood around shrieking pulling at their clothes and looking at the ceiling in disbelief. A man bustled towards me, wiping water from his face and, for a second, I thought he was going to hit me. Instead, he grabbed his friend and the pair of them jogged past me down the corridor. I felt isolated – self-contained.

  I forced myself not to look out of the window, wanted to give no indication that anything might be wrong. Silently, I was urging them all to move along. Desperate for the crowd to disperse.

  The sprinklers only ever worked in sporadic bursts and eventually stopped all together. It was warm and damp in the corridor and contrails of vapour began to play across people’s shoulders.

  There was no panic. No sudden surge of bodies. They just moved off in small groups, completely unaware of the threat posed by the birds.

  They were massing from all across the city. The flock had swelled to such immense proportions that it was impossible to conceive of how many made up the tempest which was gathering itself before moving towards us.

  “We’d better go,” I said to the few people remaining but they weren’t listening. They were looking out of the windows in rapt fascination.

  London had lost its colour, gone grey, the flock blocking out the feeble sun.

  A flight of birds was headed towards us, racing across the rooftops, coming at us so quickly it was impossible to look away. Everything became a blur.

  The sound of their chattering intensified. I tugged at Millie’s arm, she seemed to have lost all sense of herself, but I managed to pull her back from the window just as the dark shadow grew to fill the sky, obscuring our view of the capitol. The first solid wave hit the glass with a thunderous roar which turned everything to flesh and feathers. The people fell back, buffeted by the roar of bodies hitting the glass as it steadily built to a tumult. The noise quickly became unbearable, driving everything else out of my head.

  Millie still clasped the box in both hands and I guided her back to a narrow doorway where we took shelter.

  Then, with a terrible crack, a hole was punched throug
h the glass and the frenzy fell upon us. Suddenly there were birds everywhere: hawks and crows, sparrows and pigeons, their wings punishing the air. They clawed at the heads of those unfortunates who had stood transfixed at the window. One woman staggered backwards with two birds beating themselves against her face, a falcon caught in her hair.

  When I tried to help her all I managed to do was make myself into another target and found myself spinning round lost in the midst of it all, lashing out open-handed against a flurry of wings, beaks and talons. A bird clawed at my scalp and though I reached up, I found that I couldn’t defend myself, striking blindly yet finding no target. Then, someone crashed into me from behind and I ended up on all fours.

  Marcus was standing over me. He wielded a wooden chair pushing up and away. He gave me a startled look as though seeing me for the first time and then moved on, swinging the chair at a pair of crows.

  The corpses of birds lay thickly under foot, and when I tried to push them aside I found that I couldn’t, they were soaked in the water from the carpet. There were feathers everywhere, thick as the first fall of snow. A discarded shoe lay at the centre.

  When the moment came I managed to push myself to my feet, anticipating another attack but none came. People stood around looking lost. Marcus had put his chair down and braced himself against it. When I ventured to take a breath a lone feather found its way onto my tongue and I nearly gagged.

  It took me a little while to work out what the noise was.

  It was silence.

  The window looked like a Jackson Pollock painting.

  *

  They took us all down to the improvised V.I.P. area, which had been set up for Stahl’s visit, whilst they tended our wounds. There were seven of us in total. It all felt a bit surreal. The tables had been laid out in someone’s approximation of a champagne reception though all I could see were warm bottles of Cava.

  They made me sit down while they cleaned the wound on my scalp.

  Millie brought the box over and laid it over my knees. It was covered with a fine layer of grime but, otherwise, was undamaged. I balanced it on my knees. It was reassuring to have it back in my possession.