The Grimm Dossier

Chapter 44 - The Well

England, West Coast
Devonshire, Dartmoor
Unknown place - Somewhere in the woods
5 November 1898, 10:18 pm

Kyle Crowford stood alone amidst darkness and wisps of mist. Dr Archer had dropped off the face of the earth and panic gripped him so violently that his legs went weak for a moment. He felt as if the ground had been pulled out from under his feet.

"Be brave." He said to himself. He had to pull himself together. He had always managed on his own. He would manage this time too. Though he told himself that with all his might, the words felt stale and insubstantial even in his own mind.

"BEN!" His voice literally barked into the fog. Kyle staggered a step forward. His footwear, however, to his own amazement, did not bump into piles of feathered fowl. His gaze dropped and clung to the forest floor. Brown leaves with jagged edges next to yellowish foliage. Grass bent beneath his shoes, where mud stains hung scattered and speckled his trousers. But there were no carcasses at his feet. Not even a single feather. If it weren't for the warmth of his blood mingling with the cold sweat on his forehead and skin, he could almost have believed it was just a terrible nightmare. The shattered lantern was gone, not a shard of glass gleaming in the dull moonlight, and Kyle stared stunned for a moment at the image at his feet. His arm sank down and the mage's gaze flew around as if he were a startled sparrow.

Stumbling wildly, his heart raced and he breathed deeply in and out. "Think," he said to himself in his mind, again and again. "Stay calm." His gaze flew around. Expecting a new attack, a new spell at any moment. His mind just didn't want to realise or accept that now, suddenly, it was all going to be over. It seemed impossible for him to fix his gaze on one spot. The rushed pounding of his heart thudded all the way into his head, beating a different beat in its own pulse in the wounds and causing the adrenaline to bubble in his veins.

"BEN!" he repeated aloud, but his voice alone echoed between the trunks of the conifers and was lost there in watery haze and shadow. The ring of mist was now so incredibly dense after only a few metres of the copse that he could see nothing beyond it.

"Bloody hell!" he groaned, digging his fingers into his hair, which was already rumpled by the ravens. All over his skin were bloody scratches and the holes of sharp beaks. The wounds were not deep, but they burned like hell - as such cursed little injuries always did. The cold, which was still chilling in the air and, unlike everything else, had not dissipated, plucked spitefully at the torn open areas. Through the deeper scratch on his cheek, he smelled the metallic tang of his blood with every breath. Kyle ran his sleeve over his eye again to wipe away the blood that flowed from his temple into the corner of his eye. It caked the strands of black hair around his temple and even now he managed to wrinkle his nose unconsciously in disapproval because of it.

Clearly, he was no longer in the same place. Everything here seemed silent. Any trace of the struggle had simply disappeared. The typical forest scent of moss, resin and damp earth were in the air. Residual wetness from the rain covered the leaves lying on the ground at his feet with small drops that shone like little pearls in the dappled light that fell through the tree canopies. Was it an illusion or perhaps even really a travelling spell? Such magic existed, but it was extremely rare and very powerful. They far outstripped his abilities and those of most magicians. If this black magician had mastered such magic...

Kyle felt sick at the thought. Dr Archer never stood a chance alone! He might be a soldier and certainly anything but defenceless with two revolvers, but against a black magician with such abilities...? The thought turned his stomach. For some reason, he couldn't bear the image of finding Dr Archer in his own blood.