Free Dawn of the Demontide by William Hussey Page A

Didn’t work. But sometimes I still see bits of what happened. The bridge, my mum, somebody waiting in the dark. And something else … It’s crazy, Rachel. Sometimes I see a monkey.’
    ‘A monkey?’
    ‘Or something like a monkey, clambering out of the tree. You know that big old oak by the canal? The one they used as a gallows years ago? They called it Demon’s Dance … Demons … ’
    ‘Jake?’
    ‘The memory of that night, Rachel—somehow it’s not real.’
    ‘I don’t understand.’
    ‘The bits I do remember—my mum asking me what I wanted for tea, even the moonlight on the water—it’s as if it’s a story I read in a book.’
    ‘I guess it must seem like that. A dream, a nightmare.’
    ‘No. I know my mother and Simon died. I know they killed them. But I also know that it was worse, so much worse than I remember it.’
    ‘They? You think there were two of them?’
    ‘A man,’ Jake nodded, ‘and something else. Something that came down out of the tree.’
    The river burbled and grew darker as the sun slipped behind the trees. From the wood came the first stirrings of night creatures. Rachel took Jake’s face in her hands and gazed into his eyes. The river, the forest, and the world fell away from Jake until all that was left was the angelic face before him. His heart throbbed, a deep and joyful beat.
    ‘Do you know what I think?’ she whispered. ‘I think you’re heartbroken. I think you’re picking up the pieces of your life. It’s hard, it hurts, it’s taking a long time, and I think you need a friend to help you.’
    She kissed him gently on the brow. With her touch, he felt the fire again in his veins, only this time it wasn’t the flame of rage.
    Rachel pulled away and the feeling was lost.
    ‘Call me,’ she said.
    ‘Yeah. Yeah, I will … Are we going back to the house?’
    ‘It’s peaceful here. A good place to think; you should stay. We’ll talk later.’
    Jake watched until Rachel disappeared among the trees.
    He took her advice and stayed by the riverbank for a while, thinking over the last six months.
    After the murder, a passerby had found him in the woods that bordered the canal. An ambulance was called and he was taken to hospital. He had been unconscious and, at that time, it was not clear what had happened to his mother. When Jake woke up, and started screaming about a crazed killer, the murder hunt swung into action. Within a few hours, his mum’s body had been found downstream of the canal tunnel. Despite the police not being able to trace Simon Lydgate, Jake continued to insist that his best friend had died trying to save him. He was interviewed many times in the weeks that followed but his memories of what had happened remained vague.
    Weeks turned into months and no clue as to the identity of the killer could be found. Adam had taken time off work and father and son spent every moment together. Jake had always been close to his dad, and now the loss of his mum strengthened that bond. They had shared everything in these last months: their memories of Claire, their plans for the future …
    Raised voices drew Jake out of his memories.
    ‘What you’re suggesting is evil, Saxby. Pure evil.’
    It was his dad—there was an ugliness in his voice that Jake had never heard before.
    ‘We’ve tried your way, Harker, and it hasn’t worked. This is the only thing we can do now,’ Rachel’s father said, equally enraged.
    Dr Holmwood broke in. ‘Gentlemen, please … ’
    Jake crept through the trees, following the sound of the argument.
    ‘I’m sorry, Adam,’ Holmwood said, ‘but I’m afraid Malcolm is right. Time is running out. We must consider other options.’
    ‘Only two weeks remain,’ Dr Saxby hissed. ‘Two weeks before the Demontide. If we don’t act soon then every demon in existence will be set free. They will kill every living thing and then they will claim this world as their own. Do you understand what I’m saying, Harker? We are facing