Friday, October 14th, 2016

Davy’s POV

Annika and I are staring at mom in shock, while Angie seems impressed by her. As soon as mom confronted us by overhearing our conversation, she called school to call us in sick, telling the reuniting with Sid caused us both a lot of stress. Both Annika and I kept thinking hard, trying to call Angie over, in the hopes of reaching her while she was keeping Cory company.

She came almost instantly, panicky because the both of us had been summoning her, and she thought we got into some trouble. She then went back to tell Cory we were safe, returning again to find out what was going on and why we needed her to come over.

As soon as she lowered herself onto a chair – even though she doesn’t need one, it makes her feel alive – mom said four words that shocked both Annika and me to the core.

“She’s here isn’t she?”

“Mom…” Annika frowns, sitting up straighter after shortly looking towards Angie. “How do you know… don’t you think we’re crazy?”

“I most certainly do not. Olivia and I knew something unexplainable happened when the boys went into those woods. We were most of all relieved the three of you made it out alive…” She looks at me with a worried expression. “But then the three of you suffered from nightmares, and Sid was increasingly getting more aggressive at home, angry, moody… your little group of friends seemed to fall apart, Cory suddenly became a close friend…” She sums up while counting on her fingers to visibly show how many reasons they had to believe something was going on. “And mostly, Sid started to talk to himself, or, we think, to something we couldn’t see. He didn’t notice we noticed, but his mother heard him talk to someone in his room. Then you started, and lately Annika and you seem to have conversations that I didn’t catch big parts of.”

“So, you’ve been spying on us?”

“More watching over you.” She sighs again, a pained expression on her face. “As soon as Sid ended up in hospital, we knew we had to do something. Things are rapidly getting out of hand and we don’t want any of you to pay for what happened years ago.”

“But… if you guys know something paranormal is going on, then why did they lock Cory away instead of helping him?”

“Because authorities don’t know. They’re too stubborn to realise it’s real. Besides, Cory’s parents didn’t believe him either. And we had nothing to say.”

“Mom? Are they going to lock Sid away too?”

Mom seems thoughtful over her answer. “Well, honestly, we’re not sure if they’re going to let Sid go… If he acts off, they will probably take him to the psychiatric ward… Davy, Anni… is Sid possessed?”

“Ehm…” I mutter, and suddenly Annika starts to cry, answering her question without a word.

“I need to make some calls, we’ll need to get Amber and Cory here, Olivia, Maya…” Mom is now more talking to herself then to us, giving us time to exchange a weird look.

Angie suddenly perks up, smiling widely. “I knew it!” she calls out, bouncing around the dinning room and kitchen while waving her arms. “I knew that this was all being swept under the rug! Those stupid adults know way more then they let out for people to believe.” She leans forwards, really close to me. “They’re going to help! We get more help to save Sid, find my body, end all of this for good!”

“Wait, did she say Amber? What has Amber got to do with this?” Annika looks confused and now that she brought up Amber, I feel confused too.

“This is getting weirder by the minute.”

“Yes, it does.” Annika frowns, grabbing the shoulder bag to pull it in her direction. “It really does.”

“We’re in over our heads…”

“And we’re going to help you out again.” Mom reappears in the dining room with the phone in her hand. “They’re coming over. Maya is picking up Amber, but I need one of you to call Cory.”

“I’ll get him!” Angie perks up. “That way I’ll get to him before school starts.”

I nod in response, and mom pulls up an eyebrow, awaiting action. “Well…?” She asks, gesturing towards my phone.

“Oh, right…” I scratch my head. “Ehm… Angie went to get him.”

“Angie? The girl of which you want to find her body?”

“Yes… we… ehm…” I share a look with Annika, who’s wiping away a lost tear. “We can see a ghost?”

Mom swallows, but nods without exclaiming that we’re crazy. How we lost our mind and how we need help, because ghosts do not exist.

“Mom, how come you believe us? Did you… experience something yourself too?”

Mom sighs in deeply, grabbing hold of her head. “We’ll explain everything once we’re all here.”

* * * * *

Annika browses through a way to big book, while Cory and I stare at aunt Maya, my mom and Sid’s mother in shock.

“So, you’re wiccan?” I manage to press out, while Amber nervously shifts in her seat. “Amber, did you know?”

“I had a hunch…” She shortly looks at me. “And it’s why I didn’t want to believe you guys. I was trying to pretend it wasn’t real. That what I thought was a joke, was real.”

“And yes, to answer your question,” Mom tells me, while looking shortly towards Aunt Maya. “We are Wiccan.”

“But… why haven’t you ever told us?” Annika asks casually, still curiously browsing through the book that mom gave to her. All it contains is spells, rituals, anything that has to do with the Wiccan belief.

“Because we usually not tell anyone who isn’t an adult, and only to those who have the same powers.”

“Does Annika have the powers?” I ask curiously, knowing if the answer is yes, it could be the reason she acted as a shield, and can’t come near Sid right now.

“Yes.” Mom nods, now deciding on looking towards Annika. “But she’s… different. Different from us.”

“Angie says I’m some sort of Angel.”

“Well, first of all, you’re my angel.” Mom chuckles over her own joke. “But secondly, that is true.”

“What, she’s an actual Angel?” Cory calls out in disbelief, his face a bit pale.

“As is Davy…” Mom smiles at me. “Though boys usually develop their powers later on in life. Mostly around adulthood. You’re just a late bloomer, like your father.”

Cory chokes on his breath and I stare at her with my mouth slightly agape.

“Like dad?” I repeat the casual drop of information. “An angel? What the hell mom? What is all of this?”

“Well, there’s regular human beings,” she gestures towards Cory, “There’s Wiccans,” she gestures to all the females in the room, “there’s Angels, like you and Annika,” she points towards the two of us, “And in Annika’s case, she’s both Wicca and an Angel.”

I shake my head, trying to process the load of information about supernatural beings that I suddenly got presented.

“And there’s malicious entities…”

“Like Baywick.” I finish Aunt Maya’s sentence.

“And ghosts, like me!” Angie perks up with a smile, while she kept silent, reading along with Annika curiously until now.

“And ghosts, like Angie.” Annika repeats her words with a chuckle.

Mom, aunt Maya and Mrs. Hayes all smile at Annika shortly.

“So, you three know about Baywick. Did the history paper cause you to find out, or the fact you guys went into the Miller Woods and Sid is now possessed?” Mrs. Hayes sounds calm, but I know the fact her son is possessed causes a great distress.

“The latter…” I mutter sadly. “Is Sid going to die?”

Mrs. Hayes swallows hard, and her eyes water at the thought.

“Can you help him?”

“We can… give him time,” aunt Maya sounds unsure of her case. “Time to find a way to help. But nobody ever succeeded in helping any of them in history…”

“We will.” Annika snaps at her angrily. “Wewillfind a way to help him. I love him, and I’m not going to lose him.”

“He’s our friend and it’s my fault he’s in this situation. We haveto help him.”

“Right. Besides…” Cory shortly looks at Angie. “We owe it to all who died to solve all of tis for once and for all.”

“We agree, but we need to buy ourselves some time to help Sid first.” Mom sits down next to Annika, pulling the book towards her. “And for that, we need Sid to get fired from hospital first.”

“He’s doing good, and they want to keep him for another day, but if he’s doing good tomorrow, they’ll let him go.” Mrs. Hayes smiles weakly.

“This won’t be easy, you know that, right Olivia?” Mom sends her a sad look. “You know it’ll fight back. The kids can’t be there. They might end up hurt.”

“What? What are you going to do?” Annika sounds panicky, probably because they’re talking about ‘it’ fighting back, and us possibly getting hurt if we’re present.

“We will have to use a bit of our powers, to seal the entity away.”

“Seal it away? What does that mean?” I get up from my seat to walk closer to mom, wanting to know what she’s looking for in the book.

“It will lock the entity away inside of Sid. But it will break out slowly. Sid will be himself at first, but sooner or later, the entity will break the seal and reveal itself again.”

“And how long before that happens?”

“It depends on all sorts of factors, including Sid’s ability to fight it once the seal will start to break.”

“Sid will be able to resist the darkness for a while…” Mrs. Hayes takes in a deep breath. “As a half-blood he at least has the blood to fight…”

“Half blood?”

“While you and Davy got Angelic genes from your father and me, Sid is a half-blood Angel as Harold is an Angel instead and Olivia is not.”

“I’m so confused…” I frown, feeling more confused every second. “I have multiple questions that I need to be answered.” I hold up my hand, pinching the bridge of my nose.

“Same goes for me…” Cory mumbles, slumping down in the couch.

“We’ll answer all of them, today. Because tomorrow we need to seal away the darkness in Sid.” Mom sighs deeply, turning to look at me.

“Okay, first question. Annika and I are both Angels, but only she is a Wiccan? Why am I not both?”

“The genes of an Angel are both given to boys and girls, while only girls carry the genes that hold the powers of witchcraft,” mom simply explains. “You are wiccan, you just aren’t capable of using the powers.”

“Right, sounds… logical.” And a bit unfair. Why can’t I be a wizard? “What’s the difference between Sid and us, for him being a half-blood, is it really because Mrs. Hayes isn’t an Angel?”

“Exactly.”

“And you do?”

“Indeed.”

“So, you’re an Angel, dad’s an Angel, and neither ever told us?”

“Not until adulthood.” Mrs. Hayes speaks up. “A child’s mind is too underdeveloped to really do anything with the powers, so it serves no purpose to explain until we get to teach you how to control and use them.”

“Except honesty. Maybe if we would’ve known about this sooner, we wouldn’t have gone into the woods.”

“You would anyway.” It’s aunt Maya’s turn to sigh, shortly looking towards Amber. “The two of you, and I mean Sid and you, have always been drawn to those woods, from when you were little. And that didn’t change. For one reason, or another, you and Sid would’ve gone in there anyway.”

“And you would’ve let us?”

“We did everything to stop it, but we knew Sid’s connection was too big, and you two are too close for you to let him go on his own.”

“But it was me who persuaded him to come along.”

“Which was a bit of a surprise.” Mrs. Hayes smiles shortly. “And for a long period of time, or actually until we found out you already visited the woods, we thought the gates would be enough to keep you out until you two were adults.”

“I’m getting dizzy from all this information.” Cory mutters besides me. “I’m just a regular human being, so why did I have to be here today?”

“Because you’re connected to the Miller Woods in the same way as Sid.”

“Because I’m offspring of those who murdered Baywick?”

Now all three of our mothers smile amused.

“You have to admit, they did their research.” Aunt Maya chuckles.

“Almost.” Mom sends him a reassuring smile. “Because you, just like Sid, are a relative of someone who went missing, while not being offspring.”

“The collateral damage kids.” I mutter, since that’s how we named the ones we identified so far, as not being offspring.

“If that’s what you’d like to call them…” Mom nods. “Yes.”

“So, who is my relative, and who’s is Sid’s?”

“Hannah Hayes and George Hubbert. They went missing on September 3rd, 1975…”

“Along with Rob Laru…” I finish what she started telling. “The younger brother of Evert Laru.”

The adult women share a look, impressed by the knowledge we have about these kids. “And born on October 6th, 1962.” They all send us a knowing look, but that’s where I get confused. Why is that date important?

“That’s…” Angie turns to look at us shortly, but then stares at the women in front of us. “That’s the day I went missing.”

“The day Angie went missing?” I repeat Angie’s words in shock.

Mom nods, supported by aunt Maya and Mrs. Hayes. “Every first child who went missing during a cycle, was born on the day the last child in the cycle went missing.”

“And who’s going to be next?”

“That is yet to be decided, since the last cycle never ended…” Mrs. Hayes sounds… afraid. “It’s why we need to act quick and seal the entity away inside Sid. As a half-blood Angel he has more strength that is needed to keep it inside as long as possible.”

“But the last cycle needs to end?”

“It does, and it will, if we don’t do anything.”

It’s all too much to process right now. Just this morning we were fully focused on the fact there was a dark entity, a ghost girl named Angie, and tons of events revolving around Baywick, the Pits and Hunter’s Lodge.

I got all that, and since we gained that information slowly but steadily, I could process it all.

But now I’m told that I’m an Angel, as is Annika who also happens to be a Wiccan witch. Genes we got from our parents.

Sid is a half-blood Angel, Cory is a human, and I think it’s safe to assume Amber is a Wiccan witch too, which would explain why she is present today while Amara and Edward are not.

Of them I assume they are simply human beings too, but other then them, at least Cory is connected to the cycles, Baywick, and all that happened.

It’s the mere fact they have a connection that draws them to the woods that it is important to us. But it won’t help us solve any of this.

And for that, I think we will get more explanations, lessons and information on a later time.

For now, sealing away the darkness inside Sid seems to be our priority.

Even though I appear to be useless in that part.

I just hope mom knows what she’s doing, and they will be able to succeed in protecting Sid.