Hope & Fury (Heroes & Demons Book 2)

It was a perfect morning. The kind of lazy days summer was made for, endless hours of sunshine all too rare in the UK. The morning started warm and promised casually to become hot as it matured into a day. For now, it was just pleasant, the sky above dusted with only the faintest icing sugar streaks of cloud between large patches of azure blue.

In fact, it was starting to get a little too warm, she was glad of the shade afforded by the oak tree above. She was dappled in the slight pools of sunlight, a shimmering shifting demarcation of shade undulating nearby on the grass. She liked sunshine but relished the shade – and not just to be skincare conscious.

It had been her idea to venture to the city that morning. Her husband away early with work, somewhere in the messes of office buildings doing something she vaguely knew about but never asked about – mainly because the dull way in which he described it to her was the easiest way to fall asleep of an evening. He would be late that evening with a very special visit they were having at work. He worked for the government so would always seem to have a very special visit from the minister for something or other. Perhaps this time would be different but she doubted it.

She was left as so often these days with their young children. The eldest, a bouncing baby boy who was quickly growing into a toddler. The youngest only a few months, she lay in the carrier beside her.

They sat in tower gardens, her favourite spot in her home city of York. A small oasis of fresh green in the middle of the densely populated city. In the distance bushes chugged, sirens wailed, tourists clicked their cameras and life went on. There in the small park, a garden really, she could forget somewhat about that and simply be.

She glanced up at Clifford Tower before her, all that remained of York Castle. It stood upon a little mound, overlooking the city. She’d heard the views were fantastic. Given she had lived her entire life in York she was surprised to realise she had never been up. Perhaps she would go that day, the kids were young enough to go in free. Then she reminded herself that the baby’s pram would be a bugger to get up the steps and sighed, realising it would probably be another one of the things she wanted to do which she would never get to. It would go in the someday box – nestled between the trip to the Maldives and learning the guitar.

Her little boy jiggered past again, apparently finding running back and forth to be one of the most interesting things he could have imagined. His entertained babbling giggles made her smile – as she longed to be that free of burden and amused by something as simple as the feel of the wind on your face.

The River Ouse bubbled away behind her, the soft lapping sound of running water a gentle noise, non-invasive as it trickled through her ears. She wondered how many of the people in the city that day would stop to hear the simple sound of the river.

A harsh shrieking wail began nearby, a type of siren she hadn’t heard before. A slick black car, the kind a Bond villain would drive undoubtedly with cream leather seats, blazed past – the source of the siren. It sounded terribly urgent. Then again everything was urgent to the people outside of the oasis. Every little problem was the end of the world.

The baby gurgled urgently so she slowly began to rock the pram. Gently back and forth. It was soothing and she soon settled down. She felt her own eyes began to go, then snap suddenly awake when she heard the dull thud of flesh on mud. Her boy came to her crying, he had bumped his knee (it wouldn’t even bruise) and so she comforted him.

A duck quaked nearby in solitary solidarity with her son’s pain. He managed to giggle through his tears but his pudgy form remained clung to her. He was impossibly warm from all his intent running around. Maybe someday he would be a runner, a little Usain Bolt in the making.

She noticed some people pointing – no doubt tourists from their garish pink tracksuits and those weird sun visors she thought only stereotypical poker players wore. They were pointing in the sky. She found it strange and so looked herself.

She blinked twice, sure she had fallen asleep and that it was some kind of dream. A bizarre dream because they appeared to be pointing at a floating tampon applicator streaking through the crystal clear blue sky. Only it wasn’t a tampon, the thick flames shooting from behind it was not some stupid string. She knew what it was, only she didn’t want to believe it.

When she finally did allow herself to believe it – split seconds later – her entire body grew cold. She froze, clutching her two children so tight they squirmed. Horror bloomed and spread in growing helplessness.

So she’d never get to go up the tower after all.

The sky erupted in holy light.