The Inner Circle: The Knowing

The Inner Circle

The Knowing

Cael McIntosh

Copyright © 2015 Cael
McIntosh

All rights
reserved.

ISBN-13:
978-0-646-93735-9

DEDICATION

For the shunned.

CONTENTS

Prologue

Unfortunately

Bright streaks of lightning revealed a
sky filled with dark clouds that rumbled malevolently. Baen Geld
turned away from the fearsome sight and determinedly pulled down
the latch on the barn doors. The horses would be safe enough in
there. The cattle would have to fend for themselves in the
fields.

‘
Urelie,’ Baen called
as he hurried toward the small farmhouse he shared with his wife
and son. He didn’t want to leave them alone too long. Baen was well
aware of Ilgrin’s fear of storms and knew just how great a handful
his son could be when frightened.

The boy was not truly theirs . . . not
by birth. And at the tender age of six, he harboured the strength
of a full grown man.

‘
Daddy!’ Ilgrin’s
voice cried shrilly from the doorway.

After that everything
passed by in a blur. Lightning struck a tree
just strides from the door and a deafeningly loud crack tore
through the night. With his eyes locked on Baen, Ilgrin shrieked in
terror and fled toward the closest safe haven he knew: his
father.

‘
Ilgrin, no!’ Urelie
cried as the boy thrust himself into the night. She leapt after him
to snatch at his wrist, but Urelie’s strength was futile against
his. The tree that’d been struck just moments earlier moaned, its
tortured trunk beginning to fold. Urelie threw her weight into the
middle of Ilgrin’s back and sent him stumbling out of the way as
the great tree completed its journey to the sodden
earth.

‘
Ilgrin!’ Baen called
into the darkness, the once steady stream of lightning having
momentarily ceased. ‘Ilgrin,’ he beckoned again, moving unsteadily
with outstretched arms.

‘
Daddy?’ the boy
whimpered, wrapping his arms around Baen’s legs from his place in
the mud.

‘
Get into the house,’
Baen ordered weakly.

‘
I’m scared,’ Ilgrin
moaned, the sound bearing a more similar likeness to an animal than
that of a human.

‘
Get back inside!’
Baen projected firmly and doubled his efforts in escaping the boy’s
iron grip. At last, Ilgrin did as he was told.

‘
Urelie?’ Baen asked
tentatively. He didn’t need to wait long for an answer, but it did
not come from his wife. A bright flash of lightning revealed
Urelie’s form crushed beneath the fallen tree. ‘No!’ Baen’s breath
caught as he hurried to her side, the image of her mangled corpse
ingrained on his memory forever. He pleaded the Ways that he’d been
mistaken. Surely he hadn’t seen what he’d thought.

‘
Urelie?’ Baen
dropped to his knees and cupped her face in his hands. But there
was no mistake. The tree had pinned Urelie’s torso to the earth.
Her eyes were open, glassy in death.

A deep moan rumbled free of Baen’s
chest as the realisation struck that his wife was beyond help. He
howled, both enraged and destroyed. Baen leapt to his feet, wrapped
his arms around the tree and used all his strength to free her
body.

‘
Daddy,’ Ilgrin’s
voice echoed fearfully, as Baen huddled over his wife. He ignored
the boy, instead closing his eyes and caressing her
face.

‘
Don’t be gone,’ he
wept regretfully. ‘Don’t leave me alone with him.’

‘
Daddy?’ Ilgrin
squeaked. ‘What’s Mummy doing?’

‘
This is your
fault!’ Baen shouted. Overcome by pain, he lost all restraint. ‘You
killed her!’ He glared at the boy, hating him. And why shouldn’t
he? Baen gritted his teeth. The boy was not theirs. They’d pitied
the creature. That was all. He glared at Ilgrin, remembering not
for the first time what he
really
was.

The demon child stood silhouetted in
the doorway, the light behind him blacking out his features and
exacerbating his outline. Although his stature was small, his
leathery wings arched wide from his shoulders and even the darkness
of night failed to diminish the obscenity of his pasty white flesh.
Ilgrin clamped his hands over his cheeks, bent his knees and
screamed piercingly. It was a sound no human child could produce, a
sound that chilled Baen to his core.

‘
Mummy?’ The boy
leapt through the doorway, his wings quivering, occasionally
causing his toes to lift away from the earth. ‘No, no!’ he howled,
gripping his mother’s hand. ‘Not my mummy!’

‘
I’m sorry.’ Baen
swallowed heavily, his heart softening. ‘I’m so sorry.’ He wrapped
the boy in his arms, only to be hurled backward into the
mud.

‘
There’s no time,’
Ilgrin whimpered. ‘She’ll be gone soon.’

‘
What’re you doing?’
Baen’s eyes were wide with alarm as he squirmed through the sludge
to reach his son.

‘
There’s no time,’
Ilgrin wailed, evading Baen’s grip. ‘I won’t let her go. I won’t!
She’s not really dead,’ the boy mumbled, resting one pallid hand on
his mother’s cheek before placing the other atop her
stomach.

A flash of lightning brought Baen’s
surroundings to the brightness of day. He gasped and recoiled at
the sight before him as the world plunged back into darkness, a
fearsome rumble vibrating the air. Had her hand twitched? Just for
a moment? Did he dare hope?

‘
Get away,’ Baen
called, but the voice he heard was weak and noncommittal. ‘Please,’
he hissed, but the sound was barely audible.

‘
Don’t go,’ Ilgrin
whispered as he rocked back and forth over his mother. ‘You can’t
go.’

‘
Don’t do this,’ Baen
croaked. ‘Oh, Maker, forgive him,’ he pleaded as he listened to
Urelie’s bones snapping back into place and rearranging themselves
into order.

Another flash of lightning revealed
Urelie’s chest as it began to swell, the gash on her face likewise
melting away. Baen’s throat felt as though it were filled with
sand. He needed to stop the boy, but wasn’t it too late? Urelie was
on the brink of being returned to life. Surely he’d waited too
long. Shouldn’t he just let the demon finish his work?

‘
Stop,’ Baen rasped,
a waste of breath amongst ferocious wind. He was simultaneously
paralysed by fear, hope, and repulsion. Baen was weak and for that
he loathed himself. But, Maker forsake him, this was his
wife.

How could Ilgrin have known? Baen and
Urelie had done everything in their power to prevent him learning
of such repulsive evils. They’d long ago destroyed every bit of
literature on silts they could find, refusing to risk the chance of
Ilgrin discovering his powers of resurrection. But clearly . . .
somehow . . . they’d failed.

Urelie’s body jerked violently and she
moaned loudly. Her arm twisted sideways and snapped into place. Her
shoulder crunched forward and her head snapped back. She cried out
and sat up glancing about herself in confusion. Baen knew what was
coming. The cost of resurrection would not take long to reveal
itself.

Ilgrin pulled his hands away and fell
back, head hanging with exhaustion.

‘
What--?’ Urelie
began to ask, but her eyes widened in a display of discomfort and
she began scratching her arms feverishly. The dim glow from the
lanterns inside the house revealed panic rippling across her
features. ‘In Maker’s name, what have you done?’ she choked out
before the sound was cut off by a fit of coughing and
wheezing.