Chapter 19: 19: She Sells Sanctuary

Seeing Victoria casually sitting at the dining room table was a total surprise. She and Mum looked like they’d been having a good long chat. Mum had laid out some of her latest vintage clothes finds. Victoria had been indulging her in the meantime whilst they waited for me.

“Uh, hi Victoria, what are you...uh, doing here?”

“Well, I said I’d be in touch,” Victoria replied. “I hope you don’t mind me dropping by.”

“No, that’s fine, I guess. I…”

I was at a total loss as to what to say. The last time I’d seen Victoria, we’d been surrounded by her soldiers capturing a supernatural beastie. Now here she was drinking herbal tea with my mum and discussing vintage clothes grading.

“I was telling your mother what a brave young man you are,” Victoria continued.

A rush of fear hit me. What had Victoria told Mum? I didn’t want her to know anything that had happened.

“Yes, and not much else,” Mum said. “I wish you’d tell me more.”

“As do I, Miss Hall. Unfortunately...”

“It’s a matter of national security,” Mum finished the sentence with a roll of her eyes. She adjusted her headscarf.

“I’m afraid so,” Victoria said, pulling shirt cuffs straight.

Relief that Victoria hadn’t been telling tales washed over me. Part of me was actually pleased to see her. On the other hand, coming round to my house felt odd. I remembered she had stopped the creature from killing me, though. Plus, she’d also been the only person I could think of to turn to when I’d been planning my escape from Section 13. I guessed that being odd came with the territory of dealing with the supernatural.

“Right,” I said, “Mum, could Victoria and I have a word in private?”

Mum narrowed her eyes at me. I knew the expression. It was a definite ‘we’ll talk about this later, young man,’ look.

She would only put up with so much of all this cloak and dagger secrecy, and Victoria showing up added another big question mark to the growing list. Mum left us to it. I heard her go upstairs to the spare bedroom that doubled as a storage and sewing room.

“You’re looking well, Ethan.”

“Yeah, I’m fine, thanks,” I replied.

I couldn’t help feeling self-conscious in her company. Victoria had a refined presence, and her accent was upper class. She looked out of place in our small dining room, which was dotted with my mum’s artistic efforts. Everything from wonky pottery to less than brilliant paintings crowded the wall and shelf space. Mum was forever finding some new artistic pursuit to throw herself into when she wasn’t running the shop.

“So, the last time we saw each other...”

“Yeah,” I said.

“I’m sure you have a lot of questions.”

“Only about a billion.”

Victoria smiled at that. She opened the palms of her hands towards me as if to say ‘ask me anything.’

I tried to marshal my thoughts and find a sensible opening question, but I was stumped. Where to begin?

“Why are you here?”

“I want to invite you to visit our sanctuary,” Victoria replied, “In Avebury.”

“Your sanctuary?”

“Yes. For special people and things.”

“Why do you want to invite me there?”

“Because there’s something special about you, Ethan, and I’d like to know more. I’d like to introduce you to some people who might be able to help you.”

“I don’t need any help,” I replied defensively, “And I’m not special.”

A flash of anger crossed Victoria’s face.

“Ethan,” she said, “I’ll make you a deal. Don’t lie to me and I won’t lie to you. That way, we won’t be wasting each other’s time. I saw what you did that night. I saw the way you kicked the creature across the playground. No-one normal has that level of strength, which means you’re a supernatural.”

I started to protest but Victoria held up a silencing finger.

She’d known there was something not right about me from the second we’d met.

“My organisation is built around protecting and aiding people like you,” she continued, “You saw what I did the other night, capturing that creature rather than killing it. That’s what I do. So. I won’t lie to you, you won’t lie to me. Deal?”

I was standing at the far end of the dining room with my arms crossed. Victoria was still seated.

I frowned, then nodded.

“Good, that will save us a lot of time. Now, I’ve told you my side. Now tell me yours. What are you?”

I sighed and sat down at the table opposite Victoria.

I would have to trust someone, eventually.

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I’ve been this way since I was twelve.”

Victoria nodded, pleased that I was being honest. The flash of anger had gone.

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“Been what way?” she asked.

“Strong. When I get angry or scared. Able to do stuff like you saw.”

“Interesting,” Victoria nodded, “but you’ve never changed?”

“Changed?”

“A lot of supernaturals shape-shift. It’s highly unusual to gain abilities without some form of physical change.”

“Brilliant,” I said, “So not only am I a freak, I’m a freak amongst the freaks.”

“Ethan, I will say this once. You are not a freak.”

“I doubt Major Wilson would see it that way.”

“You met him, then?”

“Yeah. Not a fan.”

Victoria broke out her dazzling smile.

And then, without planning to, I told her everything.

Everything that had happened that night, everything I knew about myself and my strength. How I’d been hiding it because I was scared of what the other kids would think of me. How I’d hurt Maxwell. How I’d been hoping it was all a hormonal phase or something. The attack on Section 13, Major Wilson, the cage, Brooks’ execution.

All of it came tumbling out in one long flow.

I took a leap of faith on Victoria that afternoon. Partly it was because I felt there was nowhere else to turn and no-one else I could talk to. Sure, showing up at my home felt a bit off, but apart from that, what had she done? Saved my life and given me some answers, invited me to visit her when she could have just carted me off using her private troops. I didn’t know how much of what she claimed was true.

I did know if I didn’t tell someone everything I’d go nuts.

I kept my voice low, conscious of Mum not overhearing, but the low hum of her sewing machine told me she was busy upstairs.

Victoria sat and listened to my account. When I got to the bit about the assault on Section 13, she looked horrified.

“What an ordeal,” she said, “but that makes sense of a few things.”

“What does?”

“We hack into Section 13’s systems. That’s how we’re able to follow their social media analysis and get ahead of them. At around two on Saturday morning, everything went dark. We thought they’d locked us out of their network. It didn’t occur to us that the network might be down.”

“Major Wilson thought you had a mole there.”

“No,” Victoria said, “Too risky. Moles get caught and then they talk. Their systems aren’t anywhere near as secure as they should be. It’s far easier to monitor what they’re doing remotely and piggyback off it.”

I nodded, continued my story.

I’d spent years hiding things and to get all the secrets out in the open was a huge relief. It took maybe an hour and at the end of it I was light headed. I felt like I’d just taken a good long shower after years of being unwashed.

Secrets are like dirt, I thought. They build up around you, they creep under your fingernails, they darken your soul.

Finally here was someone I could tell all mine to. The sense of relief was overwhelming.

Somewhere in amongst all of that, Victoria and I traded phone numbers. Later I realised that I’d forgotten to mention the murder in Bussage. I’d been too wrapped up in telling my story to throw in a detail I wasn’t sure was connected.

When I was done, Victoria was silent for a while.

“Well, Major Wilson was right about one thing,” she said. “You really are a lucky man.”

“It doesn’t feel like that.”

“I can imagine. Ethan, if you’d shown your strength, he would have...”

“I know. I was terrified.”

“With good reason,” Victoria replied.

“There’s something else,” I said.

I’d completely forgotten to mention my healing abilities. I unbuttoned my shirt. Victoria looked startled, and then she understood.

“The cuts,” she said, “They’re gone.”

She pulled a pair of glasses out of her pocket and put them on to examine where the monster had clawed me.

“Fascinating,” she said. “You can still see the marks of where it cut you if you look closely.”

She lifted a hand to my chest, trying to trace where the cuts had been, squinting.

Which was the exact moment that Mum walked back into the dining room: Me with my shirt unbuttoned and Victoria Pryce running her fingertips across my chest.

To say Mum hit the roof would be an understatement.

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