Witch Clans

Part 36

The wind was even stronger in Lancashire than it had been in London. Katie wrapped her coat more tightly around her as she took in her surroundings. Desolate was an accurate word to describe it. The entrance booth windows were covered in dust and grime. The gates hung half open, creaking in the wind and rusty. Katie couldn't even see any crows or rats. She could only hear the howling of the wind and the creaking of the rusty metal. Camelot theme park that had long since fallen into abandonment following a steady drop in the number of visitors. People didn't go there any more, or so few, Katie reckoned, which made it a good spot to hide. It was cold out here, the wind whistling and biting their skin.

"The Council sensed magic here?" Luke asked.

He was casting a sceptical eye over the area.

"That's what my parents said. What did yours tell you?"

"When I asked them, they didn't want to discuss it with me," Luke said. "They said I should focus on my school work."

Katie suddenly realised she hadn't even considered that, and felt guilty.

"Oh... then maybe I shouldn't have called you..." she said uncertainly. "You'll be in trouble if they hear you've been out here..."

Luke shook his head.

"I'll deal with that. And anyway, we're here now."

So, carefully, they made their way inside. Every building and attraction was falling to pieces. Katie had sometimes seen pictures of dilapidated amusement parks on the Internet, but she'd never seen one in real life. The result was too disturbing for words. And yet, when she tried, she could just picture the laughter of children running around exploring, their parents calling after them between the screams of the people riding the roller coasters.

"It's sad... I used to love this place. My parents, Gideon, Hazel and I would come one weekend every summer to visit my grandmother before she moved in with us in London," Katie said, looking around the crumbling edifices.

"Yes, my parents took us here a couple of times, too," Luke said.

Just then, there was a loud creak and a crash as a piece of metal crashed to the floor. Startled, Katie grasped Luke's arm without thinking.

"Whoa!"

They stood very still, eyeing the large piece that had fallen just a few feet from them. It had fallen from the Knightmare roller coaster, one of the few rides left on site.

"This place is falling to pieces..." Luke said.

"Well, it's been abandoned for the past few years, so I suppose it was inevitable."

She then noticed she was still holding his arm.

"Oh... sorry."

She immediately pulled away, but stayed close to him.

"Don't worry about it. You okay?"

"Yeah, yeah... fine."

Luke glanced ahead.

"Come on, let's keep looking."

They searched the park for about an hour, but found nothing helpful. Eventually, Luke found the storage units, which looked like large hangars.

"Hey, they look like a pretty good place to hide something, don't you reckon?" he asked, pointing.

Katie followed his gaze and spotted them.

"Or someone," she agreed. "Let's go have a look."

They moved closer, and were within a few feet when Luke held out an arm.

"Look," he said.

On one of the storage unit doors, the padlock had been broken.

"Couldn't it have dropped from the rust?" Katie suggested.

"It could have done, yes," Luke allowed, crouching down. "Except that last time I checked, rust doesn't leave burn marks, does it?"

Katie looked too, and sure enough, there were black traces where the padlock had broken.

"Come on, let's have a look inside, we've come this far..." Luke said.

Katie nodded, and followed him in. The door creaked loudly as Luke pushed it open. It was large and mostly empty.

"It's empty. Whatever was stored in here must have been taken out ages ago," Katie noted, her voice echoing slightly.

"Yes," Luke agreed.

All that was left were a few odd shelves and wooden chairs. And beneath the chairs...

"Luke, look!" Katie said, pointing.

Moving closer, they spotted dark circles of what looked like soot or scorch marks.

"What could have caused this?" Luke wondered aloud, bending down to look.

Katie was about to say she had no idea, when she realized she did.

"Luke, I think these are what the Council detected!"

"You mean the spells they sensed were what left these marks?" Luke asked.

"Yes. It makes sense, doesn't it? Usually, it takes a strong spell to do something like this, right? And they noticed it twice. So maybe these were when Georgia and Victor were being drained..."

"... But why would the killer take them all the way out here?"

"Well, a lot of our magical history's connected to Merlin, Camelot and King Arthur. Maybe it was some weird symbol, or something."

Katie was about to ask if it would have made more sense to do this in an actual medieval castle, but then realised they were most likely open to tourists, and not very practical for evil deeds.

"D'you think the Council even saw this? That it even registered with them?"

Luke frowned at the circles on the floor.

"Hard to tell... they could have noted it but not made the knowledge public. And even if they did, this doesn't exactly help zone in on a culprit."

They looked through the storage unit, and even the ones next to it, though they didn't expect to find much because neither of the padlocks had been touched. Katie took a few pictures to look at from home. They examined the room once more but found nothing.

"Clearly, they weren't completely stupid," Luke commented.

"If they were, the Council would have caught them, by now," Katie pointed out.

Luke opened his mouth to answer, when he froze.

"Luke, wh-"

He raised a finger to his lips to silence her. Katie, beginning to feel nervous, mouthed:

"What's going on?"

Luke glanced at her.

"Someone's coming."