Cataindar

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Luisa woke in her Grandmother’s with one thing on her mind. She put on her running shoes on and set off with her cash card firmly in her pocket.  Pounding down the hill in a light morning rain she found she could run the three miles to Llangollen easily now. She pushed open the green door of Rowland’s Pharmacy and strode purposely to the shop attendant.

“So… what would you need for like a really big cut in the stomach?”

The attendant looked at her strangely.

“Well for cuts, bites and scrapes we have…”

A few minutes later Luisa slammed down a huge pile of sterile dressing and antiseptic stock on the counter to the bemused look of the cashier.  Jogging back the loaded bags banged against her legs.  The thought of Thorne lying in pain kept her going.     

That evening, with her medical supplies safely stowed under her bed, she sat with her brother and grandmother.  They spoke to her Mum on the phone, passing the heavy phone to one another, trying to not tangle the cord.  Her Mum’s voice felt so far away, 

“Are you OK Mum?”

“Darling I am OK, I’ll be much better when I am out of here. Are you alright at your grandmother’s?”

“I’m fine Mum.”

They ate dinner silently, even Max was unusually quiet.  Luisa said she was going to bed early and excused herself while carrying the plates into the kitchen.

Going into the store cupboard she filled a bag with potatoes and apples and quickly tip-toed past the dining room and carried them up into her room. 

This time I’m not going back to Cataindar empty-handed.

In her bed she sat with her amassed provisions loaded into her rucksack.  She had decided not to wear pyjamas tonight.  She was sick of wearing that silly red dress in Cataindar, she was going to wear her own clothes.  She pulled on a blue hoodie and in her jeans and trainers climbed on top of her bed.  She laid down and clasped her pendant, she thought she felt it pulse in an affirmation.

I’m doing the right thing.

She put her other hand through the loop of her rucksack and tried to meditate herself to sleep.  She heard her grandmother’s footsteps tread up the stairs to bed, but suddenly heard them turn, she was heading towards Luisa’s room.  Luisa sat up in shock, but it was too late. Her grandmother pushed open the door to see Luisa sat fully clothed on the bed with a heavily packed bag. 

Her grandmother’s face filled with a look of pure horror. Her hands flew up to her mouth. She came towards her quickly and snatched at the rucksack, pulling out a bag of apples. She dropped them in disbelief, the colour drained from her face.  She pointed at Luisa, breathing so hard she was almost hyperventilating.

“Why are you doing this? Running away too? How did you… who told you? Who told you!”

Luisa was almost too frightened to speak, but before she could even answer her grandmother was upon her slapping her hard around the face repeatedly, screaming over and over hysterically,

“Who told you! Who told you! Who told you!” 

Luisa cowered under the blows. The first few slaps stung and surprised her equally. Her grandmother had begun to cry, and her body totally overcome with emotion she turned and stumbled from the room. Luisa kicked up from the bed and followed, pulled along by an invisible string of dread. Her grandmother staggered down the corridor to her bedroom. She watched as her grandmother desperately pulled open her bedside draw, and with a wail, she pulled out an rectangular object and sat on her bed. Clutching it to her chest she rocked back and forth, crying.

Luisa’s face burned. She approached her grandmother silently.  Passing into her grandmother’s room she watched the white head bobbing as her Grandmother cried.  Her grandmother turned and threw herself onto the bed sobbing. The object fell next to her.

A photo frame.

It was lying facedown.

Luisa’s hands shakily extended and picked up the photo.  Her stomach churned as she slowly turned it in her hands.

It was a photo of her Mum and Hugh aged nine or ten with another girl a few years older. The girl was wearing a red corduroy dress and dolly shoes. But what struck Luisa’s heart like a catain dart was the ghostly smiling face; it was horrifyingly identical to Luisa’s own.

“Who is this?”  Luisa croaked to her grandmother, her skin crawling.

Her grandmother didn’t answer but continued to sob.

“Gran, please. Who is this girl with Hugh and my Mum?”

Her grandmother composed herself for a moment, but with each word she subsequently uttered the emotional pain grew inside to engulf her in shuddering sobs.

“My daughter, Anne, oh my beautiful daughter…. she…hnn.. she… hnn… was stolen from me, she… she was… taken!”

It took everything for her to say the last word. Her body shook with grief.  Luisa put the photo facedown on the bed.  She felt sick as she turned out the room and quickly walked back to her room, reeling from the shock she closed the door and lay on her bed staring at the ceiling.

In Luisa’s mind the pieces of the jigsaw came together.  She thought back to the look of horror her grandmother had when she first saw her, her own sickening similarity to the girl in the photo.  She thought back to Hugh in the ruins of the Abbey talking about the how strict her grandmother had been when he was a boy.  She thought about what Clearwater had said, about the last princess dying. The nauseating resemblance between her and the girl.

In the same red dress that she had been wearing in Cataindar. 

Her aunt had been a princess too.

Like Luisa She took things back with her.

Her aunt had been killed in Cataindar, but for everyone at home she had… just vanished?

 Luisa turned over, looking at the bed stand, she traced the small carved name ‘Anne’ with her finger and shuddered. 

What the hell had happened to her aunt in Cataindar?  

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