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Blurb for the novel that follows:
Jason and Wendy Edwards, happily married, are sucked into a nightmarish world where their own professional and private lives mirror the ancient myths and legends surrounding MEDEA, daughter of SELENE and AETES, King and Queen of Colchis.
An old bracelet, possessed by the power of Medea, links Wendy and her husband to the ancient world. Wendy’s aged mother, already crazy, and her husband, Jason, a salesman for an Industrial and Scientific company, who is on his way to Georgia, part of the old USSR, and her half-brother Tim, completely mad and incarcerated, seem destined to relive the horrors of Medea’s life.
Medea was educated by the enchantress CIRCE, fell in love with Jason of the Argonauts and helped him steal the Golden Fleece from Colchis, murdered her half-brother and her twin sons by Jason, when she discovered he was having an affair with Glauce. She brutally murdered Glauce and was finally condemned by the Gods. ALL this becomes a horrifying reality for Wendy and all those surrounding her.
The climax, in Georgia, at the eastern end of the Black Sea, is a bloody and violent testimony that our wrongs, and our evil, can live after us.
“The Daughter of Selene” © SER 1999
Chapter One
Jason Edwards was so drunk he didn’t realise he’d tripped over the carpet, until Wendy tried to pull him to his feet. “Salesman of the Year” he may have been, but Wendy had had enough. Amid the good-natured laughter, she managed, with Gordon B Eales’ help, to get him into a chair by the fireside. What a party!
Wendy wasn’t really upset. Even when Jason had attempted to embrace Sylvia Buckminster, her best friend and swimming partner from the Leisure Centre. It had been her Jason’s night. “Salesman of the Year”, yet again. She didn’t, understand how her softhearted, loving Jason could possibly be ruthless enough to gain the prize for the third year running. Still, selling and contracting computer time, the research facilities and the products of the giant chemical engineering and drugs company, COLCHISTROL, wasn’t like selling double-glazing door-to-door.
It was 2.00 a.m. when Managing Director Gordon Eales had suggested using his chauffeur and car to get Wendy and Jason home. “It’ll may be a taste of what’s to come, Wendy,” Gordon said, as he and a colleague lifted Jason into the car. “We’ve got, something in line for Jason in a few months’ time. I think he’ll like it. Can’t say more, at the moment, you understand, but... well, have a good weekend both of you. I’ll talk to Jason on Monday.”
Wendy felt flushed, yet she’d deliberately stuck to lemonade after a couple of glasses of wine. Must be the pregnancy. Jason was mumbling, “Wennn.dy.. cum here, dar... dar..ling....” She put her arm round him and tried to lift him into a more comfortable position. She couldn’t. He slipped half across her and snuggled against her generous breasts. She felt a flood of desire, but he was in no fit state. Never the less, in his usual gentle and arousing way, he was playing with her right breast. The firming nipple was becoming obvious through the silk of her new and expensive dress. She couldn’t resist. She caressed the dark wave of hair that had fallen across his face and the short, dark beard. Her hand slid down his arm until she reached his inner leg and closed her fingers over the suspicion of his erection. She felt her own response and wriggled closer. Drunk or not, Jason was in the mood. She inclined her head and lifted his chin, placing her lips firmly to his allowing herself to melt into the kiss.
When they arrived home, Jason, staggering, was helped up the garden path by the Chauffeur, Mike. “Will you be okay, Mrs Edwards? He’s a fair weight in no mistake. I can get him upstairs, if you like,” he suggested, grunting under most of Jason’s twelve stones.
“Please, Mike. I don’t think he’s going to make it otherwise. I’m in no fit state to drag him upstairs,” Wendy replied, holding the door open. “I’ll make some coffee. Would you like a cup?”
Mike muttered something that sounded like an affirmative as he awkwardly manoeuvred his way up the stairs.
Jason was trying to sing, tunelessly, a recent pop-song about “Prey for the huntress of love..” and wondering if it meant, “pray” or “prey”. He began to giggle and gurgle stupidly.
“The second room on the left!” shouted Wendy, coming back out of the kitchen to the bottom of the stairs.
Mike, who was quite an elderly man with swept-back greying hair, looked flustered as he came into the kitchen a few minutes later. “He’s well away, Mrs Edwards. I’ve sort of positioned him on his side, on the bed, but I wouldn’t leave him too long. He’s certainly enjoyed himself tonight.”
Wendy chatted for a few minutes over the coffee before suggesting Mike let himself out when he was ready. She wanted to make sure Jason was all right.
Their bedroom was warm and inviting. Jason was curled up on the very edge of the bed, facing the door, still muttering about “Prey for the huntress of love...” She smiled and couldn’t stop her musical laughter. Mike had obviously tried to make Jason more comfortable by undoing his tie, shirt and belt. His fly was undone. Green underpants! A shockingly bright green. She couldn’t help laughing; wondering when he’d bought them. They looked so incongruous against the pastel autumn-orange duvet cover and his dark suit.
Jason looked heavy-eyed at his wife. She was so beautiful. “What…er you laughing at? I’ve hurt my ankle,” he said thickly, “..hurt my ankle... look..” He rolled back on the bed and lifted his right foot. It was indeed swollen.
Wendy walked slowly to the bed, a gentle smile on her lips. She slid down onto Jason and kissed him lingeringly and lovingly, soft tongue tip to tongue tip. “Rest... I’ll cover you over for now... bring you a coffee later,” she whispered, kissing him again.
Jason sighed and he let himself relax totally in the sensuousness of the kiss.
She stood and loosely turned her half of the duvet over him. She switched off all the lights, leaving the moon-shaped clock light glowing.
Immediately, he found himself falling into a dream. A beautiful woman, Wendy? No - dark, like Wendy and yet not Wendy. The hair was longer, thick and dark down to her waist, yet the eyes were the same.... longing for love. Wendy’s face had that curious quality where the eyes, cheeks, lips and ears were separately imperfect, but together melded into a deliciously perfect whole. It was a face that could give you an imperious glance and a sidelong, sexy stare, all in the space of a couple of seconds. And the figure, so slight in height, yet full in all the right places, moved like Wendy’s, as if with a latent awareness of the wild, animal passion she could conjure up, and give. He felt her inviting look in the dream, heat suffusing his skin, a glow communicating itself to the very centre of his being until, engorged and firm, he felt himself ready for that moment...
The face again, the eyes changing, a wildness in the whites, a curling sneer of the mouth that destroyed the loveliness instantly and emphasised an ugliness he’d never seen before; certainly not in his wife, his dear Wendy. This couldn’t be Wendy! He was outside. It was cold in the night breeze. He was running. His ankle hurt. There was a scream. He knew it was the woman, who was uncannily like Wendy. It was a scream of hatred. He ran faster, until his breathing hurt. He heard a name - John Loveless. He was John Loveless.
Jason felt he’d had enough of this dream. He wanted out! He couldn’t. He felt trapped; hunted, haunted. He had to run and run. How could you be in a dream and know it? Prey for the huntress! Prey, that’s what he was. He knew in some subtle and unproven way that she could take him, devour him, and eat up his essence, his very being. He had to get away.
John Loveless felt his heart pounding as never before. The sweat had soaked through to his leather jerkin. He tripped, but ignored the pain, as brambles tore at his flesh. He tried desperately to hold his breath and listen for sounds of pursuit, but the pounding in his chest and ears swamped his consciousness. Even though the moon had risen, he realised his crazy dash across the fields towards the wood had affected his vision. He tried to wipe his eyes. He heard what he feared most, her voice calling him to meet with Selene, her precious mother. He sensed a rasping noise and with shock realised it was his own breathing. “J..ohn! John? Where are you? I want you to meet Selene. She’s been a wonderful mother to me.”
It was his wife’s voice. Selene wasn’t even her mother’s real name. It wafted on the slight breeze, which was beginning to sigh softly through the undergrowth at the edge of the wood. John moved and felt an agonisingly sharp pain in his left ankle. He had to get away, deeper into the dark shadows, find somewhere to crawl and hide. He knew he couldn’t remain sane if.. if she… He gripped the soft earth like an animal and prepared to leap for the gap he could just make out between the trees at the fringe of Manton Wood. A bird of some kind suddenly, noisily, took upward flight through the leaves. He forced himself to one last effort and shot forward as quickly as his limping would allow. Dragging his bad foot was as bad as trying to walk on it. His whole body ached. He tried to settle himself to a steady, halting, pace, that would put some distance between him and his wife’s distant calling. The pathway he found became firmer the deeper he limped into the safety of the trees.
He knew exactly where he was now. The path would lead him to the meeting of the three roads, a crossing of roads, which would be bound to confuse her. The western route wound vaguely into the valley towards Nottingham. The north eastern track ran towards even higher ground and the southern left the meeting-place on the mound in a straight line, indicated by a solitary post arm bearing the legend “London”.
He decided to head uphill and make his way towards the coast. Perhaps he’d be able to get work, find a ship, and get right away from Joanna, forever.
Or was it Wendy’s voice calling so grotesquely, tauntingly? Jason turned his head this way and that. Was he John Loveless or was he Jason Edwards? He was both, and couldn’t escape, couldn’t run, couldn’t wake up! The echoing voice behind urged him to even greater effort. He was sure it was becoming fainter, losing itself in the creaking and rustling of the branches and leaves above.
At last, clutching his chest and throat, gasping, he saw, outlined by the moonlight ahead, the shape of the mound on which the post at the crossroads leaned precariously. The trees thinned to bushes and scrub and he was out! Crossing the wood must have taken more than thirty minutes. He could no longer hear even a suspicion of Joanna’s voice. He had to stop. He sagged back against a lone tree, sliding down the rough bark, ignoring the pain.
How could she have behaved like that? In spite of his agony, he remembered the many nights, early in their marriage, when her sensuous and erotic caresses so gently aroused him. He’d watched her deep, limpid eyes become ecstatic with that peculiarly self-possessed, yet faraway look, just before her climax. She’d always been able to twist him round her little finger. He would have died for her. He thought guiltily of her long dark hair, that aristocratic and haughty look she often assumed for their acquaintances, the sweet way she could curl up like a young child in his arms, and that curiously sensuous way she had of parting her lips to show the slight gap in her bottom teeth before she kissed him, so that he was tempted to touch and feel for it with his tongue as their lips pressed wetly together.
Jason sweated in shock. It was Wendy’s mouth, the small gap in her teeth.... Jason, John? Who was he? , John was trembling uncontrollably before he heard the unmistakeable howl of the wolf. That had not been heard around Manton Wood for many years, certainly not since the success of Oliver Cromwell’s forces, with all those bodies left for days after the battle. Now, with the Restoration, John had been looking forward to better times. He didn’t really know what a wolf howl was like, he’d been too young to remember, but whatever it was, it made his spine run cold. He tried to make out the point where the three tracks met. He couldn’t be sure, but there seemed to be a tall figure moving towards the leaning post. It was certainly not Joanna. It spite of her perfect figure, Joanna was no more that five feet four inches in height and this person must have been at least six feet tall. The silhouette stopped by the post and appeared to be looking over into the valley. John decided to break his cover and ask, in his desperation, for help.
As he made to stand up, he felt another crack in his ankle, winced with the pain and looked at his foot. It was horribly swollen. With slow, hopping movements, he made his way towards the waiting figure. The wolf howl cut into his pained consciousness as clouds began to shade the moonlight. John knew his foot was virtually useless. His only hope was in help from the person with its raised arm holding the post as if to prevent its falling. Whoever it was must have been aware of him before he reached the levelled top of the mound. He could hear, but couldn’t stop, the loud asthmatic gasps issuing harshly from his lips and the scraping of his limping through the gravel over the final yards.
As the howling from the westward valley chilled his blood, and the moonlight almost failed, the figure turned slowly to face him. The cowl of its cloak fell back and revealed the suggestion of an elegant, aquiline nose and a mass of greying hair, which reflected highlights of silver. From the side view, John realised the cloak hardly concealed the full-breasted shape of a woman. She stood as if used to giving commands and having them obeyed. He became still as her gaze fell on his anguished body.
She turned, with legs astride, to face him. John found his eyes drawn to hers. They could not be real, he felt. They glowed with a cold blue light.
“He’s mine, mother!” The strangled scream came from the edge of the wood. Running madly across the scrub of thistles and thorns, which were tearing at her thin dress, came Joanna. Or was it Wendy? Jason couldn’t be sure.
He was losing his own identity. Surely, he was John Loveless? He was being swallowed, engulfed. John looked wildly from side to side. He couldn’t run. And there was no place to go. Coming up from the valley was another human form, a mirror image of the austere female by the post. It flowed over the ground as far as John was concerned. He felt he could no longer trust his perceptions. Two enormous wolf shapes with glaring red eyes flanked the second figure. The floating form carried a burning torch. Even Joanna stopped her wild rush as she became aware of the approaching trio.
“This isn’t necessary, mother,” Joanna’s voice pleaded. “He’s mine. Mine.... for you! And your other self, Hecate! An offering. He was unfaithful to me. I carry his twins and he’s made himself unclean. He’s lain with that red-haired wench at The Oak tavern!” Joanna’s voice was rising to an ugly, high-pitched scream.
John had never heard such hate. He could almost see her changing into that monstrous, tattooed bitch, as she had done before. He forced himself to close his eyes, but her voice cut into him.
“He’s mine, mother... for you. Bring a pestilence upon this miserable country. Torture them with the black evil, mother, a great plague. Let them know the power of Hecate. Let me have this miserable creature. I’ve hunted him all night, queen of hunters, let me have him....” her voice was nearer and becoming deeper, snarling, animal-like.
John realised her voice was getting lost in the growling of wolfish animals. He opened his eyes. The tall woman at the crossroads waited imperiously. Quite near to John, Joanna was kneeling before the other woman, her teeth bared, slavering like a dog, the spittle shining on her chin and dripping onto her bared breasts.
This woman, with the burning torch, a double of the figure still holding the leaning signpost, held the two wolves on silver leashes, and lowered her gaze. “You are pitiful.” The voice was deep and calm, throbbing with power. “I see nothing of Aetes in you. You disgust me, as you have always disgusted me.” The woman gestured to Joanna as if dismissing her and took two steps towards John.
He looked into her eyes and felt warmth spreading through his body. Suddenly a stinging pain arced through his shoulder and arm. Joanna had pounced on him like a wild cat, thrown her arms round him in a cruel embrace and had bitten into his shoulder with all her strength. He found himself rolling over and back, this way and that, trying to throw her off. She began to tear at him, her nails raking cruelly across his face. His screaming became a gurgle. She bit again, this time into his neck, and then again, down into his shoulder.
Her first onslaught had thrown back his leather jerkin and pinned his arms. As he began to lose consciousness, he heard the tall woman’s voice commanding Joanna to stop. As Joanna slowed in her frenzy, John grabbed a wrist and channelled all his strength into his grasp. Beneath his fingers he felt the silver bracelet Joanna always wore.
“I will... I will...” she was saying in a guttural voice completely unlike her normally melodious speech. “I will give his soul, torn from him, to you, mother dear.” She returned to her cannibalistic biting and scratching.
John knew he couldn’t last much longer. He caught sight of the tall woman bending over him and was aware that she was talking to the wolves. Their snarling grew in intensity and there was wet blood and fetid dog odour everywhere. The unearthly dogs were ripping at Joanna.
She was screaming and changing her form. That horror was the second to last thing John saw. The tall, grey lady bent to him and held out her hand. He took it and felt a fire coursing through his blood. His soul was being sucked entirely and completely into her. His back arched, his other hand closed on the bracelet, and it, and the hand of Joanna, came free as an enormous wolfish jaw with bared and glistening fangs bit through the already blackened and dusty looking flesh.
As he closed his hand fully on the cold metal, Joanna screamed with despairing anguish, which followed him into the fire that seemed to be consuming him too. He was aware of the two, tall female shapes dissolving into one. Jason screamed long and loud, as a flash of lightning sliced down towards him and an instantaneous crash of thunder deafened him.
He was still. He could see dawn breaking. The sun rose, with a hint of pale warmth, to touch the top of the leaning signpost. The storm, the thunder and lightning, had retreated to the southwest. The sky was clearing. It was going to be a sunny day, in this year of our Lord, 1662, of the Restoration, with King Charles II on the throne.
A young gipsy girl, with dark, long hair and beautiful eyelashes emphasising the limpid vacancy of her eyes, was, rather stupidly wandering towards the wood, searching for kindling that might, somehow, have remained fairly dry after the downpour. She found the body of John Loveless. Jason could see it too. Its contorted face and horrified staring eyes shocked the nine-year old child into attentiveness. She looked down at the rain sodden, blood-streaked figure, and a ray of sunlight flashed from something in the creature’s hand. The child knelt, oblivious of the mud and a sulphurous smell, and reached for the shining bracelet.
It levered the white fingers from their death-grasp, took the pretty thing and placed it on its left wrist. In the morning light, as the sun rose, the bronzed skin of her thin arm set off the shining loveliness of the silver trinket and she smiled. She turned to the sun and a smile broke across her normally vacant features as she shook the bracelet on her wrist so that it flashed and glittered. Her eyes became sharper and harder. Her smile broadened and she began to laugh. It was an adult woman’s laugh. The smile turned to a sneering gurgle and then broke out afresh into a screaming, hysterical laugh, which contrasted harshly with the early morning birdsong from the wood, and silenced it, as she looked down at the twisted body of John Loveless. Purposefully, the child turned away from the wood, and the crossroads, and ran playfully down into the shallow valley, where the gipsy encampment had set up above the River Trent in the storm.
“Jason! Wake up! For God’s sake wake up!” He felt a stinging blow across his cheek, which brought the saltiness of blood to the inside of his mouth. It was Wendy. He stared at her. Her neat, dark curls were tangled. Her eyes were staring worriedly. The nightmare returned. For a split second Jason thought it was the face of Joanna. Wendy caught the glance of horror, the temporary dilation of the pupils in his narrowing dark brown eyes. “Jason.... for Heaven’s sake, what’s wrong?”
He realised it had been a nightmare, a terribly realistic dream, but only a dream. He flopped back and felt the back of his head hit the floor. “It was a dream. I’ve had the most terrible dream,” he gasped. “What were they serving at the ‘do’?” He tried to sit up.
The bedroom was a mess. Everything portable had been knocked flying. The drawers in the bedside units were pulled out, their contents scattered all over the floor. The duvet was shredded as though some wild animal had been clawing at it.
Wendy joined him on the floor amidst the mess and cradled his head in her lap. “You’ve had some kind of fit... I think. I daren’t come right in at first. You were hobbling with your bad ankle, swinging your arms about and screaming.” She stroked the sweat from his brow and his cheeks and then cupped his chin and thin, dark beard in her hand as she stroked his forehead. “You worried me. I’ve never seen anything like ... You.... had such a look on your face... you looked terrified!” She didn’t know what to think. It was not her Jason who’d smashed up the room. He couldn’t be like that. “Something you’ve eaten must’ve disagreed with you.” She paused and looked round. “We’ll clear up in the morning. Let’s get some sleep in the guestroom.” She saw a worried frown as she mentioned sleep. “Don’t worry, my darling, I’ll have my arms round you all night. I’ll keep you safe and close,” she forced a laugh, but inside she was thinking that it was very unlike Jason to have a nightmare. It was more like a fit of some kind.
Jason smelt the faint odour of his own sweat and picked up the scent of musk from Wendy’s wrist. He looked at it, close to his chin. It looked like the wrist of.... but no, what’s in a wrist? A wrist was featureless. How on earth could he have a dream like that? It had been so vivid. “Okay,” he mouthed, his throat dry and sore. “As long as you hold me tight, darling.” He tried to smile and realised his cheek inside his mouth was still bleeding, where it had split against his teeth. His tongue felt the unmistakeable saltiness of blood again. He shivered and croaked, “Just hold me tight.”