Page 1 of Fallen Thorns
Prologue
Cobbles, poetry and bells. A stone paradise buried in history and birch. Buildings buzz with smoking fools while larger-than-life bodies float in a drowned haze, stamping their feet out of time with the muffled songs everybody knows but no one knows the name of. The heavy influx of students, all chasing impossible dreams, dominate the streets at dusk. Two shots of whiskey and they’re invincible.
In a city so alive, mortality is quickly forgotten. Yet death lives in hidden places, corrupting the shadows and feeding from the light. It’s the whispers through dusty cracks; the movements behind every blackened window, and the silhouettes cast under flickering streetlights. Blink, and you’ll miss it — but oh, how it thrives.
They gather at night — they always do. Swarming from city to city, they emerge from the arches and light-pooled passageways and hit when black has long cloaked the sky — when lone travellers know all too well not to be out beneath the stare of the all-seeing moon. But some never learn. By some power, they think themselves immune to what they cannot see. And it always starts the same. The one left behind.
This evening it’s a man of wise years: a coated shadow underneath the alder branches. Hands placed firmly in each trench pocket, his head angles towards the mossy path ahead with his eyes focusing on each calculated step. He grumbles to himself and clears his throat, breaking the silence. At the crack of a branch from a foreign foot, his pace quickens but not in fear of the impending danger. This was simple human instinct. The body’s response to the unknown. This man had walked many a dim passageway after dark and his lengthened stride was merely second nature.
The distant, golden haze of the cathedral seeps through the partings of the leaf-arched path below. The steady stream of the river drowns out the second and third cracks of the shrubbery. He mumbles again, with greater urgency this time. Adjusting his tie as the path behind him closes, and the ancient, watchful light dies.
It’s funny how quickly humans react to their own shift in senses; driven by adrenaline and possessing no control over how they choose to fight back.
They know when to strike, enabled by a second nature of their own. Too early and the elation could trigger vital mistakes. Too late and they run the risk of sacrificing flavour.
It took seconds. The man felt nothing but a prick. They flocked around each other like birds, pushing and shoving for a drop of ecstasy. Monstrous growls defied the river gushing below, joined by cackling laughter and the whine of animal chants. They had starved too long to let this go to waste.
They drag his body like a rag-doll; the man’s shoes scrape and scuff against the concrete, muddying his ankles while crimson soaks into his collar. The terror bleeding from his eyes is a privilege to witness, and not many have the honour. Frantically, he grasps for something — anything — though his brain no longer understands what. And right before his body finally slackens, the eldest withdraws a knife, no bigger than a hand, but sharp like the devil’s tongue. It draws a perfect downward arch from ear to ear, erasing any sign they had ever been there at all.
So as the evening entertainment of the city draws to a close, high on red bliss, they toss the body down into the river, and, unnoticed, they retreat into the abyss.
Too far away to raise any alarm, the oil painted city watches on as the man in the trench coat silently floats away.
ChapterOne
Imust have drifted off. One moment, I was in the lecture hall, focusing on the clock rather than the ongoing speech on 19thcentury romanticism, and the next, I was blinking awake in a mild and slightly annoyed panic.
My name is Arlo Everett and I daydream my way through life. Attending events in body but not always mind, coasting through school with commendable but not quite stand-out grades, and miraculously landing myself a place on a course I was only half interested in. Yet the degree was one I believed necessary to create the life I had chosen for myself.
At the age of four, when my mother read me stories before bed, I had already planned my life. I would be an author, and no one would stop me. An author of what, I could never decide, but writing was about the only thing that brought me real enjoyment. I tried sports and music and art, and all the extracurriculars parents encourage you to attend for ‘character building’, even though all I wanted to do was write.
Growing up in a village in the northwest of England — surrounded by forests, lakes, and an abundance of sheep — fuelled my passion for inventing fictional scenarios: a world to escape to.
I believed I was on the right path. Everything was going according to plan and I was… satisfied. It did not take long before I realised how much of an idiot I must have looked, trying too hard to be someone I was never cut out to be: the picturesque location and poetic lifestyle, precariously parted hair and charity shop camel coats; thick golfer vests and over polished boots, striding the narrow streets of Durham as if I were written by Donna Tartt. You’d think this was deliberate, writing myself into a narrative too cliché to ever exist in the real world. In actuality, I more just fell into it. I didn’t want to stand out, nor blend in; I was content on just existing. One thing I did not expect upon arrival, was being instantly judged for being northern in a city that was even further north, and thus I had no option but to assimilate. I thought I was doing a pretty good job at it, though. In the month since I’d arrived, I had made enough acquaintances to be remembered in hallways and greeted in cafés, while maintaining enough privacy to avoid activities that would admittedly peak my ever-present anxious thoughts.
The last halfhour of the lecture dragged, but I made a reasonable number of notes, and even asked a question, but only to prove to myself that I was paying attention. My severe lack of sleep recently was certainly catching up with me.
As per my Wednesday routine since the start of term, with no other commitments for the day, I headed to the quaint coffee shop in town to read and wait for my friend Rani to finish her respective morning events. We studied the same course, but Rani had other business to attend to that morning. It had become standard procedure by this point, the constant in our messily scheduled lives. We’d always be there, without fail. Our preferred method of keeping ourselves awake for the remainder of the day.
It rained heavily that afternoon, and I cursed myself for still having not purchased an umbrella since my last one blew away. And with my brain stuck in the mode of over-analysing, I couldn’t help but mentally point out the pathetic fallacy of it all — everything so wet and miserable.
I ordered my drink then sat in the last remaining two-seater. The chair was positioned beside a small window overlooking the alleyway, yet the dripping condensation clouded the view.
I pulled out my book while waiting for the tea to cool, discretely glancing around before pulling out my biro to annotate. No one saw, or even cared — but in my head they did.
I shifted momentarily, before switching seats to better observe my surroundings. An old habit. But a page into my book, I realised my brain wasn’t processing the words, so with a sigh, I tucked the book away and waited.
Rani spotted me the second she came through the door, shuffling herself past the tight queue to reach me.
“So, the vending machine broke. I am now seventy pence poorer and significantly sadder than I was this morning because I didn’t get my mints.” Rani threw her bag down dramatically to emphasise her displeasure. I rubbed my brow, disturbed at the sudden rise in volume, then handed over a tin of mints from my pocket and smiled as her face lit up.
“Wow you really are my knight in shining armour,” she teased.
I shrugged then took a sip of my drink, now luke-warm. “Morning any good?” I asked whilst she arranged herself on the chair opposite. The cogs whirred in her head as she debated whether to open up her umbrella to let it dry or to keep it retracted — after all, everyone knows opening up a brolly indoors is bad luck. I let her take her time, grinning inwardly.
“I suppose good is one word to describe it, although the word ‘good’ doesn’t really have enoughoomfnow I’ve studied literature for this long,” she joked. She removed her black trench coat and pushed up the sleeves to her cream turtleneck jumper. “I finished my essay and tidied my room, though I regret washing my hair this morning because the rain did it anyway, but overall, yeah… ‘good’. You?”
I loved the way Rani started interactions so easily. I always felt more comfortable being myself around people who took charge of conversations and kept the topic flowing without any awkwardness. I was the person who had to assess the company I was in before opening up. Most people who met me presumed I was shy, reserved, and all those other patronising terms. I was shy, until I got to know someone. If talking with them was as easy as it was with Rani, I became a whole different person.
