Dark Confluence by Rosemary Fryth, Frankie Sutton Page A

barbed wire of the fence. Walking over, she discovered a bloody mess of feathers adhered to it. Removing the feathers from the wire, her fingers were stained red with fresh blood. Her face creased in worry. She reasoned that whatever had taken the rooster had only done so recently, as the blood had not yet congealed and dried. As Amelia stood pondering what had happened, she felt some heavy drips of rain upon her head. Puzzled, she looked up the sky was brilliantly blue. Lifting her hand she felt her hair which had been tied back in a tight grey bun, her fingers came away sticky. Appalled, she examined her hand; it was covered with fresh blood. Gasping with horror, she stumbled back, her eyes scanning the branches of the trees above her. Immediately, she spotted the ghastly remains of the rooster and then in the upper branches of the tree she glimpsed a shadowy movement. For a split-second, she saw an inhuman shape that seemed comprised of fur, scale and teeth, before it too scuttled away deeper into the trees. For Amelia Crane that one brief glimpse was enough to send her limping back into the house, her egg basket fallen and forgotten on the grass.
     
    With trembling fingers, she picked up the phone, dialled a number and waited anxiously for someone to answer.
     
    “Lynn Black speaking.”
     
    “Lynn, Amelia here. We need to urgently contact the other ladies.” Miss Crane’s voice was trembling.
     
    “Amelia, whatever is the matter?”
     
    “It’s started again, Lynn...I saw one of them... in my trees! Took my rooster...oh my God, it disembowelled it. I swear upon my Mother’s grave, Lynn,” Amelia was almost stuttering with reaction.
     
    “What has returned Amelia? You’re not making any sense.”
     
    “Them...the creatures,” Amelia took an unsteady breath. “Fifty years ago...remember what happened.”
     
    “Fifty...oh my heavens!” the voice on the other end of the phone faded away in shock.
     
    “We need to ring the others. Supplies need to be bought and distributed...salt, horseshoes, herb bags...do you remember what the CLS did last time to protect our families.”
     
    “Not really, it’s been such a long time,” Lynn fretted.
     
    “Check the minutes of the meetings,” Amelia said, “We’ve got record books going back decades.”
     
    “I’ll go fetch them,” Lynn stated.
     
    “Not yet, we have to keep this quiet and close,” Amelia advised in a whisper. “Only members should know, otherwise we’ll be laughed out of town, not to mention what the State Committee would say!”
     
    “What about the newcomers, the outsiders?” Lynn asked. “There are many new families that have come into the area.”
     
    “I don’t know” Amelia said. “Perhaps once we have sorted out our own, we can get in touch with neighbours, but our own families are our primary responsibility now. We need to get moving, there is no knowing how long this will last.”
     
    *
     
    Senior Sergeant Maxwell was baffled, three mysterious deaths in as many weeks and two unsolved child abductions. He drew his hand through his close-cropped, dark hair in some frustration. Fellow police divers had finally located the body of their colleague who had gone missing two weeks before in the local dam. They had dredged the waters and brought up all manner of flood debris. However, the diver’s body had not been located until much later. It was odd, all his dive gear had gone missing and he was discovered naked, his body wedged in the branches of a submerged tree.
     
    Then police Senior Sergeant shuddered; it was not as if he was unused to death. He was originally from Melbourne and had dealt with numerous dead bodies over the course of his policing career. He had seen bodies as the end-result of accidents, of misadventure, of murder, of suicide, or simply the body giving up due to extreme old age. He had dealt with complete bodies, body parts and bodies so old that they were bloated, rotten or simply bones. He did