Messenger (Mary Hades) Page 9

  After I left the hospital, I had to see the farmhouse one more time. I had to see that it was empty, that there wasn’t anyone lying to me. Katherine and a social worker came with me. Jack didn’t want to. He’d been struggling to come to terms with losing his mother, but for him it was so much worse, because he’d wanted to save her and now he couldn’t.

  I walked around the empty rooms, trailing a finger over the abandoned furniture.

  Starting over would be difficult for the Congregation this time. They didn’t have an unending source of money, and they had spent much of it moving to the farm.

  I didn’t know what I’d expected, but I didn’t find it in the farmhouse. The place was a mess. They’d left dirty dishes in the sink. The place smelled of old food and sour milk. The bedroom was already dusty, and the beds had been pulled askew, as though the bedding had been ripped from them in a rush. I went outside to the barn and stared at the white wall I’d painted with Jack and Bram. Had I known what he was capable of when I painted that wall? No, I don’t think I had.

  The stage was still there, standing empty without Father Merciful delivering his sermons. Was any of what he’d said true? Part of me wanted to believe that it was, so I didn’t have to admit that the first twelve years of my life had been wasted. It was something that I would never know, not really. I would never have an answer.

  Before I left the barn, I noticed the paint can in the corner. It was in the same place I’d left it only days ago. But there were fresh paint splatters on the ground, and the canister was open, with the handle of the paintbrush sticking out. I went over to investigate.

  There, on the wall, painted as small as possible given the width of the brush, was one word.

  Sorry.

  I backed up and clapped my hand over my mouth. Tears flooded into my eyes, ready to wash down my cheeks.

  Sorry. Who had written it, and why? I wanted to believe it was Mother Ariel. I imagined her running here with her sandals slapping against the flagstones. I imagined her holding her dress up with one hand as she ran and her strawberry blonde hair floating out behind her. I wanted to believe that she had prised open the paint can with shaking hands, dunked the paintbrush into the paint and looked around to see that no one was watching. Then, as her tears fell into the paint, she painted the one word she couldn’t say to me, with splatters of paint hitting her dress.

  I wanted to believe it when I pressed my hand against the word. I’ll never know for sure. Not unless she comes to her senses and returns to me. But when I left the farmhouse, I realised that I could never get what I wanted from this empty old farm, and that was a sense of the end. Because I knew now what I was—a girl who could see the dead. I closed my eyes, let the wind hit my face, and thought of Bram’s last words to me. I will come for you.

  There was a whisper of breath on my neck. I opened my eyes and my pulse raced. Judgement Day might have been Father Merciful’s fabrication, but I knew something else was waiting for me now.

  “Is everything all right?” Katherine asked.

  I smiled. “It’s fine.” But I knew there was something watching me on the wind.

  ~ A Note from the Author ~

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  About the Author

  Sarah grew up in the middle of nowhere in the countryside of Derbyshire and as a result has an over-active imagination. She has been an avid reader for most of her life, taking inspiration from the stories she read as a child, and the novels she devoured as an adult.

  Sarah mainly writes speculative fiction for a Young Adult audience and has had pieces of short fiction published in the Medulla Literary Review, Apex Magazine, PANK magazine and the British Fantasy Society publication Dark Horizons. Her short story ‘Vampires Wear Chanel’ is featured in the Wyvern Publication Fangtales,.

  There are books aplenty, from YA fantasy to YA horror, so keep in touch for more information!

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