 |
| Matthew’s ship hits a storm |
The storm swirling above Welshport grew and grew. The wind howled in the trees. The ocean seemed angry; it bashed up against the rocky shoreline with a force that felt it would dislodge the ancient stones that held the island together.
The ships at sea rocked over giant mountains of waves. Up high over valleys of water then down deep into the flowing and cascading waves that pushed the ships up again. Over and over like in a repetitive motion.
This was no ordinary storm. This was Caspian's doing. The was the fruition of his promise to Rebecca to remove Matthew from Evie's life...one way or another. He sought to do this too as Matthew was a clear sign of the good in the world. Caspian saw it, Caspian felt it, and Caspian feared it. The demon new if Matthew lived, the good in him, the love from his heart, the innocence and light he held in his body would thwart Caspian's control not only over Evie and those that she cared for but the rest of the Lord family and perhaps the world that Caspian so wanted to rule.
A storm, with winds of so strong they could rip the paint off buildings, the barks off of trees, and the skin from human bone was brewing. A hurricane of devilish and monstrous proportions was the only way to sink Matthew's influence.
Literally.
In his room, lit by candles that glowed of yellow and orange light, the demon Caspian sat on a Persian rug with images of lions and tigers devouring their prey. The drapes were not drawn despite the growing storm outside. His window was open allowing the powerful winds to bluster in lifted the heavy drapes into the air.
Caspian's eyes were closed, his mind locked on the dwelling violent sea outside. His fury, evil and malevolent called for all of his powers to swirl out of his body and into the atmosphere to brew the storm. It rained like never before, gushing water onto every surface on the island.
Villagers scrambled to hide. They covered themselves in their windowless rooms hoping for the storm to pass quickly. Window shutters locked tight. Doors too.
Caspian's powers were overwhelming, and the fishing trawler Matthew was on the in the bullseye.
On the trawler Matthew and the rest of the crew frantically tried to pull in the sails. They scattered around the deck of their ship ripping at cords and ropes. The sails whipped in the wind unbound.
"Rip'em off! RIP'EM OFF!!" one sailor yelled out to another instructing him to release the sails towards the bow of the ship.
"THEY AINT MOVIN!" Another sailor screamed back, as the latch holding the ropes was stuck.
Matthew, hearing this too, quickly ran over to help. Then another man came.
Three men pulled and pulled on the latch holding down the ropes that held the bow's sails up. Then suddenly the metal latch released lifted into the hair and smashing one man in the face.
He groaned a sound so inhuman as his teeth burst from his mouth. The pain was intense. He couldn't see with all the blood in his face. With the ship bashing in the wild storm, the sailor was unsteady on his feet. Covering his face in pain, and unable to hold his step, he fell overboard and into the wild ocean that took him under.
Matthew and the other sailors looked into the dark water in horror as the rain poured down over them.
"He's gone mate! GONE!!" One sailor shouted.
Matthew, his eyes wide with fear, looked back towards the mainland and towards Welshport Island, his heart sank worried for Evie and the baby she was carrying while the storm, Caspian's storm, raged in their direction.
****
 |
| Mary’s nightmare of fire |
Flames, dark flames burned all around Mary Goode. Her legs seemed to be trapped, tied to something. She could not move. She screamed for Filipe but the sound of the fire overpowered her voice and he did not come for her. She tried to reach her trapped legs and her arms were tied behind her back to a large wooden stake.
Her lungs filled with smoke black as tar.
Then, in the heat and smoke of all the fire burning around her Mary saw a face. The face laughed at her as she suffered in the pyre. As the smoke and sulfur continued to choke Mary, she was able to make out who the face belonged to.
Caspian.
She screamed at him, she cursed at him and begged for him to untie her, but he laughed a laugh so deep and menacing that it shook Mary to her core.
As the face of Caspian taunted her in the fire, it began to grow larger and lager and his mouth came closer and closer to Mary and in a split second Caspian looked at her and said “Cook witch!” and opened his devilish mouth and swallowed Mary whole.
“Caspian! Stop this! Stop all of those!” Mary shouted over the sound of enraged flames below.
Caspian only laughed at her.
Mary screamed again, the fire continued to fill her lungs and the air around her with thick black smoke that swelled in the sky and clouded over Mary’s burning body.
How did she get here? How did Caspian tie her up and she had no memory of it?
With the confusion suddenly lifting from Mary’s mind she realized it had to be a nightmare, a nightmare controlled by the demon who infected the island of Welshport.
With this realization Mary screamed in horror as Caspian’s growing face began to come down over her body and his mouth devoured her and suddenly the sound of her own scream awoke Mary in bed at the Inn in the Village safe and sound and not surrounded by Caspian's flames of hell, burning like a witch from Salem.
But oddly, the stench of sulfur remained.
"Are you alright?" Filipe aske, his big arms pulling her close to him. She could feel the warmth of his bare chest.
She felt safe.
She reached down to where her baby bump was growing, the child she and Filipe created when they first made love locked in the turret room at Tirymor, she breathed a sigh of relief— it was still there.
"There was fire! I was burning, the heat! I can still feel it Filipe, I was dying I was dying!!” Mary explained of her dream.
“You’re ok now. You’re safe. The baby is safe. If Edd just a dream.” Filipe answered back.
“No, it was more than that. It was him….Caspian knows we're here. He can sense us. He's incredibly powerful." concerned for her growing child.
"Mary, listen to me," Filipe replied, looking her dead in the eyes "we won't let him hurt our baby, or Evie's baby or anyone. Whatever happens from here on, it will be the beginning of the end of Caspian Casador."
Mary stared deep into Filipe's eyes "Do you really think so?"
"I do. I have to, we have to. We don't have a choice." Filipe said speaking over falling rain outside.
Then, another strange sensation came to Mary as she sat up in bed. It was almost like the reverse of what she felt in her dream. It wasn't fear. It was calm. She looked towards the window and slowly got out of bed. She tip-toed to the window that was open slightly allowing the sound of pouring rain to fall and drops to splatter over the windowsill.
She pulled back the lace curtain and from her view of their room at the Inn she saw a large ship pulling into the shadowy docks down at the Village marina.
"Sebastian." She whispered.
Filipe got out of bed and covered himself in a blanket from the bed as he walked over to her.
"Sebastian?" He asked confused.
"He's come back. That's him! I can sense him! HE'S BACK!!!" Mary replied in excitement as she quickly reached for her clothes that were carefully flung over a chair in the room.
"Hurry, we have to meet him down there. He could have her, he could have the last sister!" Mary said quickly putting on her dress.
Filipe nodded and followed suit.
**
 |
| Sebastian & Jacqueline aboard the USS IGNIS |
The terrible storm raged on in the night. Somehow the ship from Boston found the swinging light of Welshport Island's lighthouse and docked safely.
Sebastian, Jacqueline and the rest of the passengers from the ship named IGNIS scurried down the long ramp on to the dock-side. Jacqueline looked up into the sky as the rain fell on to her face. She touched the water. It was warm. She then turned to the sea and saw it thrashing up against the docks and the shoreline and couldn't imagine how they even made it to Maine from Massachusetts alive.
"This is his doing." Jacqueline said as Sebastian interlocked his arm with hers.
Sebastian, seeing the storm too as something he had never seen before in all his life on the island nodded his head in agreement.
"Otherworldly." He replied of the strangeness of the strength of the storm. "We don't have a lot of time, we have to take cover. He'll know we'll here."
As the smattering of gathers parted and scooped up the small number of passengers that came to Welshport Island, two familiar faces stood out in the darkness like two bright candles under the shadow of their umbrellas.
Filipe and Mary.
Mary rushed to Sebastian, her vampire cousin, and in the pouring rain grabbed hold of him and hugged him tight. She had feared he gave up on and would not return or worse. She thought perhaps something awful had happened and he was dead.
"I'm so happy to see you, So So happy! Thank goodness you've returned!" She said to him as Filipe caught up.
"As you can see," Filipe replied "things have gotten very strange."
"It's him." Sebastian said of Caspian.
Mary nodded. "And this.... this must be her." Mary added noticing the woman next to Sebastian. "We've been waiting for you."
Mary and Jacqueline's eyes locked. They began to tear up as they realized just how connected they were almost like sisters, real blood sisters and not just fragments of a diminishing coven of witches. Jacqueline grabbed both of Mary's extended arms and interlocked her hands with Mary's. There was an instant latching of powers together. They felt it, like a surge of energy rushing from one body to the other. The powerful energy even made Mary's baby bounce in her belly.
"Oh my." Jacqueline said, feeling the baby in her own body as the two witches slowly melded into each other as one telepathically.
"We have a lot to catch you up on. We met with Gregory. He let it slip that people at Tirymor are on to Caspian too. We're not alone in this." Filipe said.
"Jacob too?" Sebastian asked of his uncle.
"Especially Jacob. There have been incidents at the house causing Jacob concern especially around your grandmother. She's not been herself they say. They know Caspian's game. They even called Donovan Ryan to help." Filipe added.
"The priest." Jacqueline said surprising the three.
Filipe confirmed. "How did you know that?"
Mary turned to Filipe and smiled "She's my sister. She can feel it. Can't you?"
Jacqueline smiled back almost shyly as the rain continued to pour over their umbrellas. "We have to take cover. We have to get somewhere safe, if he's as powerful as I can sense, we're not safe here. He knows more than he leads on and he's probably already sensing me here. Sebastian too." Jacqueline replied as three yellow-eyed owls landing off in a close by tree watching the group.
"Agreed." Filipe replied.
"If Father Ryan is helping--what does that mean? Can Jacqueline and Mary still join together and fight whatever Caspian is plotting to do with my child?" Sebastian wondered as they walked over to a side, smaller dockside where a small boat was tied up and awaiting then.
"Father Ryann is going to need all the help he can get from us. I have a feeling their planning to vanquish Caspian as soon as they can. They know the darkness he's brought to Tirymor and the family. We have to get back to Goode Island and be safe." Mary said.
"But look!" Sebastian said pointing to the wild ocean. "Is it safe?"
"Sebastian's right. It's not safe to travel on this boat to Goode Island. We have to go back to the Inn. That's our best bet." Filipe replied.
They group agreed and rushed off in the rain back towards the Inn where'd they'd hunker down for a very long and painful night. Mary held Jacqueline's hand the whole way.
****
 |
| Father Ryan’s arrival at Tirymôr |
The rain fall slightly subsided but continued to pour down as the hours went on through the night.
In the strangely warm rain and mist, a small car pulled out of the circle driveway at Tirymour house and drove off quickly passed the tall iron gated entrance to the estate leaving Father Donavon Ryan on the front steps; cold, wet and trembling.
He turned from the car as it drove off into the distance and vanished and walked towards the front door. As he lifted his gloved hand to pull on the door knocker the door opened revealing Jacob Lord how put his pointer finger up to his lips motioning for Donavon to stay silent.
Then Jacob handed the priest a note.
"This monster knows all. He probably knows you're here. I have Constable Reigns standing watch in the room across from him. We must go up as quiet as possible and surprise him."
Father Ryan nodded his head after reading the note.
The two slowly walked passed the foyer that was glowing with candles. The electricity had yet to reach this part of the mansion. Only the bedrooms and two of the drawing rooms had been lined with electrical wire in the old house walls.
As they ascended the large red carpeted circular staircase together, a flash of light from the sky brightened the 6 rectangular windows that went around the staircase. Jacob, who was leading Father Ryan, turned and looked down at him and again put his finger to his lips to remind him to stay quiet.
**
 |
| Aurora confides in Evie |
Thunder rolled; lightening came again then more thunder.
Evie sat in her room watching from a high window as the rain crashed down over the entire estate. Her stomach felt strange. Uneasy. She took a breath and patted her baby belly that was bigger than ever.
"There, there." She told her little baby.
A knock came at her door. "Honey. Are you alright?" Aurora said, her stomach too uneasy in the night.
Evie smiled sweetly. "I've never seen a storm like this."
Aurora walked in and closed the door behind her. "Neither have I. Not since I left England."
"I'm a little nervous. Matthew is out there. The sea is...I don't know. It's unruly." Evie replied.
"Maybe they turned back once they saw how dangerous it was. He could be on his way back right now." Aurora replied holding her daughter's nervous hand.
"I hope so." Evie said as she turned again and looked out of the window into the distance where on a clear night, she could see all the way to the ocean, but on this night, she saw only darkness. "Since Sebastian died in the fire I have had this sinking feeling that something worse was coming. I haven't told anyone. I never would put that pressure on someone. After all, everything that's happened to me in the last 2 years is because of me."
"Because of you? What are you talking about? Sebastian's death in the fire wasn't your fault." Aurora asked as she cuddled up to her daughter.
"In a way it was. Had I just let him be and never tried to be with him again while he was..." she paused "the way he was, then maybe things would be different."
"Yes they would have been. You would have never gotten to know and love Matthew the way you do now." Aurora reminded her.
Evie smiled but still felt guilty. "I just feel like maybe I'm cursed. Maybe I did something in a different life that's causing so much pain in my life. Why else would have my whole marriage to Sebastian have gone so wrong. It literally crashed and burned all around me. And now I'm staring out of this window and watching a storm ..." Evie paused before saying what she was really thinking and feeling.
"Darling, you didn't cause any of the terrible things that have happened." Aurora replied. Then she realized all of the terrible things she herself was responsible for and the grief it would cause Evie if she revealed it. "Listen, you are going to have a baby soon. All these emotions are just because of the new life growing inside of you. You're not responsible for the horrible things from the past."
Evie turned to Aurora from the window and smiled at her mother and just before she thanked her for her kind words she noticed Aurora's facial expression.
"What is it?" Evie asked.
"What? Nothing." Aurora said, lying.
"Mother, I know you. When you bite your lip like that, I know you have something on your mind. Tell me." Evie said as the lighting flashed.
Both mother and daughter flinched in the bright light.
Aurora couldn't hold back. She had to confess... but not everything.
"I did something that I regret." Aurora began.
Evie's eyes squinted in suspicion. "What have you done?"
Aurora had plenty of skeletons in her closet, one in fact that she would hold on to and not reveal to Evie, that being the death or the truth of the death of Robert, Evie's father and Aurora's late husband. This confession felt much worse to Aurora. Aurora stood up from the chair and tangled the dangling ribbon from her sleeve nervously.
"Last night, I did something that I am embarrassed about and surly you'll hear about soon. Rebecca seems to be the type of woman is incapable of being discreet but you should know, or hear it from me, before anyone else." Aurora said.
Evie got up. Her stomach churning as the storm rolled on.
"What did you do?" She asked her mother.
"In a strange, mistake in identity, which is truly the only way I can honestly explain it, I was intimate with Caspian Casador. Please, darling, don't make me go into details." Aurora confessed.
Evie covered her mouth in shock, but then giggled. "CASPIAN?" She said, not knowing his true evil yet.
"It's not funny. Darling he's not a well man. He's got some hold over Rebecca and sometimes I feel he's trying to do it to me too. It was almost like I was dreaming, and then I woke up and he was in bed with me, and Rebecca was there and there was shouting, and Rebecca was angry. It's all very blurry and confusing. He kept saying that he wanted to make a child with me." Aurora added to Evie's now serious reaction.
"A child???" Evie replied confused and a bit horrified. "How can that even be?"
"You see?” Aurora replied. “It's all very bizarre. In truth, and again this is rather embarrassing for a mother to admit to her child, but I thought I was with Gregory. I thought it was him in bed with me."
“But why would Caspian say you were pregnant?” Evie asked
Aurora again couldn’t reveal all. She knew that Caspian has very much wanted a child, a baby, to empower himself more than anything on earth. He wanted Evie’s baby and had brainwashed Rebecca and Aurora to help take the child once born.
That plan had been changed, thankfully, but the idea Aurora couldn’t bring it upon herself to confess her complacency in the bizarre plot no matter how brainwashed she was at the time. She knew how awful it would be for Evie to know this of her. It was ter one more secret Aurora had to keep from her children.
“I don’t see how Rebecca still keeps him around. Even Jacob is suspicious of him. I just feel so awful about everything. I never meant to go to bed with that man.” Aurora explained.
Evie sighed. She could see her mother Aurora was feeling uncomfortable about the whole situation. The night was wearing long, both women were in the state of a whirlwind of nerves and anxiety. Evie, being the good-natured person she was decided to leave it alone. Let the winds blow and the rains fall and not pursue anything else from the whole sorted event of the night before.
"As much as it is confusing and frankly very strange for me to hear what all of this mother, it must of been awful for you to wake up in a state of confusion in such an intimate affair. Especially with that deranged talk of you carrying his child!” Evie replied.
“Deranged. That’s a good word to use to describe Caspian.” Aurora added.
“I can say however that if Jacob is suspicious of him, you won’t have to worry too long. Jacob has a way of getting rid of people he’s not fond of. Trust me, I know.” Evie replied alluding to the horrors Jacob subjected her to in the past.
“So you’re not ashamed of me?” Aurora worried grabbing her daughter’s hands.
Evie smiled sweetly. She never saw them being as close as friends like this and dispute the cold rainy weather outside their closeness warmer her heart.
“Mother, you're all adults, the discomfort and silliness of it all will pass.” Evie said not knowing how deep Aurora and go that matter Rebecca has fallen prey to Caspian’s predatory plot. “Just like this storm. It'll all pass. But there's a bright side." Evie added perking her mother's attention.
"Bright side? What could that be?"
Evie, worried but confirmed that Matthew would return to her turned back to the window where the rain soaked the glass. She opened the window where on a clear night she could see towards the sea but tonight there was only blackness all around her.
"Matthew will return." Evie said hopefully. "And when he does, we'll all leave Tirymor and let Rebecca have Caspian for whatever she wants, and you and Nikki will move with us and we'll be done with the Lords."
Aurora could see how happy this idea made Evie. She didn't want to stomp on her dreams. She saw her beautiful pregnant daughter staring out into the sea, or where the sea would have been, and waked up to her from behind and held her tight.
She said not a word and let the rain and thunder rumbled again in the sky speaking for her.
The storm, it's strength, was growing and so was the danger for Matthew out at sea.
 |
| Rebecca’s rosary beads |
Rebecca tossed and turned in her bed. She couldn't sleep. There was uneasiness in her house in her heart, in her mind. She sat up in bed. Her eyes wide open, no sleep lingers in the green of her eyes.
Out of bed now, in her white nightgown with her whitening red hair tied in a neat braid she went over to her desk. She opened a drawer and pulled out a small box that when she opened revealed a glistening silver rosary.
The thunder clapped again. She flinched in the flash. Her heart skipping a beat it seemed.
She reached for the rosary and as soon as she touched it, it burned her fingertips.
Rebecca watched as the rosary fell to the floor. She reached for it, and on the second touch she felt the cool of the silver.
"God help us." She said to herself. "God help us all."
And as she spoke, a small crucifix she had on a side wall between her two large windows began to flip upside-down on its own and Rebecca's eyes began to glow yellow.
Caspian’s work was just beginning.
The rain was getting louder and louder as the two men, Jacob and Father Donavon Ryan got closer to the bedroom Caspian was in.
The hallway, dark and clouded with the puffing smoke of several candles seemed like an ominous sign to Donavon that things were about to get very frightening for him and the others in the house.
He tightened his grip around the handle of his bag, the leather of his gloves squeaked as his grip squeezed.
Then, a door opened, and Gregory peaked through. Jacob nodded to him as he entered with Father Ryan.
Whispering, Jacob revealed the plan: "Just outside in the room across the hall is Caspian. He may already be expecting us. I don't know. Gregory and I will enter. We'll do our best to subdue him and tie him down. And then you can begin."
Gregory showed Father Ryan the ropes.
"What if the ropes don't work?" Father Ryan asked.
Jacob lifted a brow "You of all people should have more faith, Father. That's all we have now. That's all we have."
Smoldering heat like the sun hitting earth. She saw her mother Mary's face.
Charlotte was seeing Mary's dream from early on in the night. More fire. More flames.
A thunderclap snapped Charlotte out of her sudden waking dream.
"Something is going to happen." Charlotte said.
Celeste turned to her back lit by a storm flashing in baby Fabian's window.
Charlotte did not respond. She did not have the words. Celeste only took Charlotte's facial expression for her word just as yet another flash of thunder lit the windows.
**
 |
| Caspian’s powers & Matthew’s ship |
Caspian sat in the center of his bed. His legs were crossed, his eyes closed. He was preoccupied in his mind and had no sensed Father Ryan's arraival. He had other fish to fry, in truth, he had other's issues at hand.
Especially that of Matthew Winterborn.
As Caspian's powerful mind continued to rip and tare through the sky in the form of a storm, and he had not sensed the priest enter, things were about to change the the tables turn.
Matthew's ship was in peril.
The sea washed over the bow of the ship. The water pulled at several sailors and took them overboard. The salty water, controlled by Caspian and the storm heaved and pulled down the ship, the violently pushed it back up in powerful waves. The rain tore through the sky and came down.
Matthew and the remaining men did all they could to control the ship but the storm was more poweful than they could have ever imagined.
"WE'RE GOIN' DOWN SIR!!!!" a sailor yelled to Matthew.
Matthew grabbed his hand and pulled him into the bridge of the ship and closed the door behind him. Another sailor came running and tried to open the door. He banged on the window begging to be let in. Matthew ran to the door and as soon as his hand touched the door knob the boat tilted and everyone fell to one side. The man outside flipped over the bridge and into the sea. Matthew and the sailor with him in the bridge fell over each other and hit the wall. Then the boat again flipped back to the other side. Tossing and turning in the ocean like a toy boat in a child's bath.
The ocean's waves, dark and hungry for more, bashed up against the glass of the bridge.
"I don't know how long the glass will hold. Once it bursts there will be a rush of water, do you understand me? You'll have to try and swim out." Matthew told his last crewman.
"I can't! I can't swim in that!!" The man yelled.
"YOU HAVE TO! You have to!!!" Matthew said grabbing at the man's shoulders and shaking.
Then it happened. The waves, with the power of a storm created a demon hit the glass the two men in the bridge watched as the glass cracked. The crack grew and grew across the entire bridge and the waves burst through washing into the bridge like a giant untamed waterfall.
The sailor grabbed on to Matthew. Death in their eyes. The water filled faster and fater and Matthew too a deep breath and held it then dunked his head. The sailor lifted him back up as the water began to fill up to their chins.
"YOU HAVE TO HOLD YOUR BREATH!!!" Matthew screamed.
"IM SCARED!! I DON'T WANT TO DIE!!" The sailor yelled back.
Matthew slapped the man across the face; an attempt to shake the terror out of him for his mind to clear and focus on survival. Then once again ordered him to hold his breath.
This time the fellow sailor did it and then both dunked their heads and swam through to the burst window of the bridge. But the water was too swift. It pulled them both in an under current pulled them with such a force they went deep into the ocean.
The dark waters swallowed the ship and the sailors.
And Matthew.
Then, in a flash of thunder Jacob, Gregory, and Father Ryan burst into the demon's bedroom in such a fast motion that Caspian had no time to react.
Father Ryan pulled a large wooden cross. "WITH THE LIGHT OF THE LORD I REBUKE YOU!!" Father Ryan yelled.
Caspian's eyes turned yellow, and he hissed at the sight of the crucifix. His handsome human face, carved with wrinkles of time, twisted into a monster's face. Jacob and Gregory were strong, and they yanked each arm of the beast and tied him to the bed. Then they got his legs and tied them each to a post.
The demon inside Caspian’s host body hissed and spit. It tried to bite Gregory & Jacob but his restraints were too tight. The crucifix held high up in air and in Caspian’s face seemed to subdue the monster slightly, giving the men time to think in his weakening state.
Then, a voice from the evil man trickled out in an evil growl. "Clever. Clever. Clever priest. But its too late. The sun has set on the house of Tirymor. It's over."
“SILENCE DEMON!!” Father Ryan screamed. “With the light of the holy mother and the grace of our lord god I command you back to the depths of darkness where you belong. FREE the hold you have on this man’s body!”
The temperature of the room dropped. Ice began to form Caspian’s eyes turned from it’s glowing yellow to black and empty as if they had disappeared completely out of their sockets.
With a deep twisted laugh that chilled them to their bones Caspian shouted “YOURE TOO LATE, YOU FOOL! YOU’RE ALL TOO LATE!!!”
His face transformer to the monster within the body of the man, just long enough for Father Ryan to see.
“DEMON BE GONE!!” The priest screamed as his breath former puffs of white smoke in the air.
Caspian’s laughed again then spit at Ryan who began to pray louder and louder so his voice beamed over the sound of thunder clapping.
**
A body floated in the sea amid debris of Matthew's fishing trawler.
Then another body. Then two more bodies. They floated there, lost in cold waves. Lost in the storm.
Lost at sea forever.
