Blackthorn - Revenge of The Dragon Rider

Chapter Three - Willow

Drake had handed Pyro into the Enforcerer’s Department, coming away with a small wad of cash for his trouble, enough to keep him going for a good few days anyway.  He’d spent the rest of the night holed up just outside the City, a few miles north of the reservoir that supplied Devilsgate with all of its water, under the wings of Falkor, as he had done every night since he had rescued him from the clutches of the Dwarves.

At nine o’clock in the morning, Falkor had dropped him just outside the City walls and had disappeared into the thick cloud cover that strangled Devilsgate like a noose.  Drake had continued on foot to the warehouse that was home to the orphans, or the Lost Souls as they were now known.  The old orphanage, Drake’s home for six years before he had fled its walls, was now a burnt out shell, just another victim in the wars between humans and Faeries.  Not that Drake was sorry to hear of its demise; it held too many painful memories which he’d hidden at the back of his mind, locked up so tight that he wouldn’t be able to unlock them again.  Or so he hoped.

The warehouse was a relic from the human era, a four-storied Victorian red-bricked building which was rumoured to have once housed mental patients.  Most of the windows were boarded up from the inside; the glass smashed by the bullet fire that rained down on Devilsgate during the Appropriation Riots, the shrapnel still embedded in the holes peppering the front wall.  As if those human weapons would have held back the tide!

The air was thick with the smell of congealed blood from the adjacent meat factory where fresh animal carcasses hung from great steel hooks, waiting to be transported around the City, and the clogged up drains that were full of the detritus of life.

Drake didn’t really know why he was here; when he’d got the note from Willow asking him to come to the warehouse to discuss a proposition, he knew instinctively it was a bad idea, but even so, he found himself stood at the front steps of the crumbling building wondering.  Wondering how the years had treated her since he had left, whether she was the same person or if she had changed like he had.  He really hoped not; she had been the only thing in Devilsgate that had been good in his life.

He meandered through the corridors of the once magnificent warehouse, its walls now covered in graffiti and posters of missing people, the floorboards bare and crumbling.  Every corner seemed to be crammed full of kids, battered sofas, mattresses or books and the air sang with the shouts and laughter of the kids that now called this place home.

A small boy with fuzzy blonde hair and an oversized grey t-shirt had reluctantly showed him up to the top floor where Willow hung out.  His small blue eyes only moving from the tattoo, the Devil’s Mark, on Drake’s right cheek when Drake had placed a green note in the palm of his hand.  Even so, the kid did a runner as soon as he’d shown him upstairs, not wanting to be alone with Drake for any longer than he had to, not even if Drake had offered him another crisp green note.

Drake stood at the doorway.  He could hear the rise and fall of voices from inside.

‘What time is it?’ asked a male voice, full of exasperation.

‘Don’t worry Giz, he’ll be here,’ came the reply.

‘Nine-thirty,’ said Drake stepping into the room, ‘just like we’d agreed.’

Willow threw the book she had been reading onto the floor and leapt over to Drake.  ‘Drake-‘

‘It’s been a long time, trouble,’ he said, as she flung her arms around him.  ‘Wow, there!  I need to breathe, you know, it’ll help keep me alive.’

‘Sorry,’ she replied, relinquishing her grip on him, a huge smile lighting up her face, ‘it just seems like it’s been-’

‘Forever,’ finished Drake.  He looked at her and his heart felt heavy.  She looked exactly the same as when he had left, except that now she was a young woman with several piercings and bright pink hair.  For a second he could still see the sadness, the reality of life, etched in her almond shaped eyes, then it was gone, replaced by a hardness which was unfamiliar.