Then came back.
It quested around, as if sniffing.
It located the blood, coiled around it eagerly and withdrew into the darkness.
Deep amongst the kelp holdfasts under Stray, and as far from the painful light of the upper shallows as it could get, the araka awoke.
It was emaciated and starving, as close to death as it was possible for a deathless thing to be, but something had roused it. Some taste. It had not been aware of feeding; its tentacles responded to smell and movement out of instinct alone, like a drowsing man swatting sleepily at a buzzing insect, except in this instance it had chanced on something edible. Utterly unlike the pain that was its normal diet, this was heavy, rich, solid, and fleshily corporeal. It trickled through the araka’s wizened veins like hair-thin threads of lava, jerking it into wakefulness, and with that the awareness of how appallingly hungry it still was. It had never tasted anything physical before – it had never been physical before. As far as it knew, it was the only one of its kind which had been forced into existence in either world. There were no precedents for this sort of thing.
It only knew one thing for certain: it wanted more.
Slowly, painfully, the araka began to explore the limits of its confinement.
Chapter 9
The Night the Rains Came
1
‘Steve,’ said Vessa, as they lay together in bed at her place. ‘I’ve been thinking.’
‘Always a bad idea,’ he murmured. ‘I try to avoid it, myself.’ He was staring at the pages of a book on the Civil War without really taking any of it in; just marking time until her Cinderella curfew kicked in and he could sleep knowing that she was safe.
‘I want to try and stay awake after midnight.’
That got his attention. ‘But I thought you said you’d tried everything and nothing had ever worked.’
‘Well, almost everything,’ she smiled and snuggled closer. Under the covers her hand reached out to curl around his cock. ‘I’m thinking that it might not be so easy for me to drop off if you’re keeping me busy.’
He’d been involved in enough short-lived relationships to know that in the first flush it was possible to ignore all manner of peculiar personality quirks, and so the issue of her curfew didn’t bother him overmuch. He’d gone out with snorers, vegetarians, smokers, and even one girl who had a thing about seagulls – which had, incidentally, made his spontaneous romantic surprise of a weekend in Great Yarmouth a bit of a disaster – and as long as he remained on day shifts at the gallery, the curfew wasn’t a problem. True, she was spending more and more time at his flat rather than her bedsit, if for no other reason that he had more space, but it wasn’t as if they were moving in together. Not yet, anyway. And here was the funny thing: getting used to whatever baggage your new girlfriend brought with her on the journey was nothing compared to the awkward undercurrent of the fact that ultimately he was looking for someone to settle down with, and in his not entirely limited experience women were just as commitment-phobic as men.
But still, if the lady insisted; and her hand was so very insistent. After their earlier lovemaking, he’d thought himself done, but apparently not.
‘Sounds like a reasonable theory,’ he said. ‘I say we give it a shot.’
With the simple, urgent certainty of him inside her, his mouth on her breasts and her thighs gripping him tightly, Vessa watched the minutes on his bedside clock mount inexorably towards midnight, wondering what would happen if it wasn’t enough – if she went away again. She’d thought that the way to be rid of Sophie was to paper over the cracks with new certificates and qualifications in her own name, but here and now, with her man loving her (her man, she told herself again in delight), it was Vessa’s body and skin and nerves which were coming alight, not Sophie’s. Hers now, regardless of who had been born in it, and Sophie was going to have a fight on her hands if she wanted to reclaim it.
She urged Steve on harder and faster with her teeth on his neck and her nails on the muscles of his back, and whether it was his increasing heat or her fear and anger fuelling it, she climaxed suddenly in a great formless iridescent explosion as if the entire world had turned to mother-of-pearl and spiralled back down into itself like the depths of a gigantic conch shell.
As the waves of it washed away, Vessa looked at the clock again.
It was 00:01.
Fierce pride filled her then, and love for the man who had helped her, and she turned her attention outward to him; kissing him, biting him, feeling his urgency mount.
And suddenly she couldn’t breathe.
2
Sophie was screaming.
Its banshee sound cut through entire worlds of sleep – even the araka on the sea-bed beneath Stray shifted uneasily – and brought everyone running.
When Bobby got into her chamber he found Marjorie attempting to console the girl, who was deeply distressed, but every time the older woman came near, she lashed out, the chain around her wrist thrashing, and screaming a confused babble with a single hysterical phrase repeated: ‘She’s not here! She’s left me! She’s not here! She’s left me! She’s…’
Lachlan strode in. ‘What in God’s name is happening?’ he demanded.
‘Your guess is as good as mine,’ Bobby replied.
‘P’raps she is having some sort of grand mal,’ suggested Seb, who appeared behind them, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.
Far from calming, Sophie was becoming more agitated. She started pounding her head against one of the wooden beams, shrieking ‘Vessa’s gone! Vessa’s gone!’
‘Bugger this.’ Bobby edged forward. He wasn’t sure what you did when someone had a screaming fit like this, but he was pretty certain you didn’t let them bash their own brains out. He grabbed for one of her flailing arms, the one with the chain, catching it on the third attempt. Seb caught the other – and she bent and sank her teeth into his hand. He yowled and dropped her. That’s it, Bobby thought. Crazy girl or not.
‘Sorry, love,’ he said, and punched her in the face. She collapsed, senseless.
3
Steve was close, so close, with Vessa’s nails raking his shoulders in that animal way which drove him absolutely crazy for her. Except now she wasn’t just scratching but pushing, shoving him away, twisting her body out from underneath him and shouting ‘GetoffmegetoffmeGETOUTOFME!’
He fell to the edge of the bed, staring at her in shock. ‘What…? he panted. ‘Vessa, what the…?’
‘Vessa?’ she spat. ‘Oh of course there’d have to be a man involved, wouldn’t there? Does she really think it’s that easy?’ She drew her knees up to her chin and dragged the bedclothes over them, glaring at him over the top with undisguised contempt. ‘You tell that faithless bitch next time you’re fucking her that we had an agreement, and if she ever tries this shit again I’ll make her wish she’d never been born.’ Something about this seemed to strike her as funny, because she began to laugh: a thin, hitching sound so completely unlike Vessa’s that it raised gooseflesh all over his naked, unprotected skin.
Somehow – he couldn’t imagine how – this wasn’t his girlfriend. Someone else was here.
‘Sophie?’ he whispered.
‘I was here first,’ she said sulkily, like a petulant child. ‘Don’t either of you forget that.’ She was nodding now, suddenly drowsy.
‘Where’s Vessa?’ he demanded. ‘What have you done with her?’
‘If she won’t do her job,’ she muttered, head on her knees, ‘then she’ll have to do mine, won’t she? Can’t let it go, Steven. Sorry. So tired.’ She yawned hugely.
‘Let me speak to her!’
‘…so…’
Then she was gone, and her body slumped into the bedclothes, too deeply asleep to rouse.
4
Bobby and Seb were lowering Sophie’s unconscious body gently onto her cot
when she started to come around. Marjorie ran forward with a damp cloth to wipe the blood from her battered and swollen forehead while the rest of the Strays watched from a cautious distance.
‘Oh my dear,’ the older woman shushed. ‘My poor, poor dear. What’s happening to you, hen? What’s happening?’
‘I’m getting rid of this stupid bloody chain for a start,’ Bobby declared and reached for the key which hung from a piece of string around her neck. Woozily, her free hand swatted his away.
‘No,’ she slurred. ‘Can’t let it go. My job now.’
‘What’s your job, Sophie hen?’ asked Marjorie gently.
‘Not Sophie. Sophie’s not here any more. She’s asleep. I’m Vanessa.’
5
Steve threw some clothes on and paced her bedsit in a panic of indecision. No hospitals under any circumstances, she’d said. Not unless she was actually injured or suffering a serious medical emergency.
‘Well what the fuck do you call this?!’ he protested to the empty flat. Once again her breathing and pulse were completely normal; she hadn’t banged her head or cut herself. ‘Oh no, nothing major. Just, you know, completely switched fucking personalities!’ He desperately needed to talk to Jackie but couldn’t bring himself to call at this hour. The only alternative was the phone number Vessa had given him on their first date – the one with the single name: Ennias. He still had the battered slip of paper in his wallet, but no better idea who that was after all this time. Vessa had never spoken of him since. Steve had absolutely no reason to trust that this Ennias person could be any more use to him than a qualified doctor. Except that she trusted him, said Jackie’s voice in his head. That should be enough for you, if you really want to help her.
‘Oh bloody hell,’ he moaned, and with great reluctance dialled the number. If it rings out, he told himself, that’s it. I’m dialling 999.
It was picked up on the first ring.
‘This better be good, whoever you are. It’s late.’ A man’s voice, inflected with a European accent he couldn’t place.
‘I’m a friend of Vanessa Gail’s. She gave me this number in case of an emergency. Are you Ennias?’
There was a long pause, during which he could hear the other man breathing and what sounded like traffic noises in the background.
‘Where are you?’ Ennias asked eventually.
‘Who exactly are you, and why would she…?’
‘Shut up and listen to me. If you don’t know who I am, then she’s told you sod all about anything, so you’re not setting the terms here. Tell me where you are, and I’ll come and make sure she’s alright. Or not. Whatever. Has Sophie spoken to you yet?’
‘How do you know about her?’
Ennias sighed heavily. ‘Listen, boyfriend. It’s been a long night, and I don’t have the energy for this. The fact that you have called me indicates that, from your perspective, some fairly weird shit has just happened, and you have no clue what to do about it. The fact that you are still alive and breathing indicates to me that so far you have been very sensible and not done anything idiotic like taking her to the authorities. Your instincts so far have been correct. Listen to them. Tell me where you are.’
It all sounded a little bit too much like a threat for Steve’s liking. He’d wait until Vessa – or Sophie, or whoever was asleep in there – woke up, and ask her for himself.
‘I don’t think so.’
‘You stupid …’
But Steve had already hung up.
6
‘Vanessa?’ Bobby crouched beside her nest. Seb had been whisked away by Marjorie to tend his bitten hand, and Joe along with them despite his complaints; Stuart and Allie hovered in the background, watching warily. ‘Is that your name?’
He wasn’t sure that she could hear him properly. She seemed to be semi-conscious, twisting in her blankets like a child fretting in its sleep. ‘Off!’ she cried out. ‘All of you… have to get off… kill you all…’
For a brief moment, she opened her eyes and looked at him. ‘I know you from somewhere,’ she said.
‘Yes, just the other day. You looked at my hand.’
‘No,’ she frowned. ‘No, somewhere else. I can’t remember. There were paintings. Why can’t I… Neil, that’s your name. You were rude to me.’
Bobby felt like someone had just tipped a jugful of ice-water down his spine. He leapt up and away from her, his skin crawling, mind reeling. The crossed timbers of her chamber were suddenly pressing in on him like a coffin; there was no space. Fragmented memories – barely even that; not much more than vague impressions – of falling, drowning, surfacing. His vision blurred; the woman below him looked like she was bursting out of a golden cloud of leaves and birds and someone close by was saying Crash and burn, my friend. Crash and burn. Who had that been? He couldn’t breathe. He had to get out. Most especially he had to get away from her.
He barged past the others and out into the open air.
‘Bobby?’ Allie ran after him, concerned. ‘Bobby, are you okay?’
Lachlan was left with Vanessa, but he hovered by the doorway, unwilling to get any closer than he absolutely had to. ‘What do you want with us?’ he pleaded.
She smiled grimly. ‘Me? Nothing. Nothing at all. I just work here. She warned you, though, didn’t she? About what would happen if you stayed?’
He followed Bobby’s example and fled.
7
Half an hour later – after Steve had made himself a cup of coffee and settled himself in the armchair to watch over her until six, or else call an ambulance and damn the consequences – a heavy thumping sounded on the bedsit door, making him jump. He tiptoed across and peered through the door’s security peephole.
A man of indeterminate Slavic appearance, dressed in dark clothes and a long leather coat, was standing outside. As Steve watched, he took out his phone and dialled. Steve’s phone rang.
‘Shit!’
Ennias stared right into the fish-eye lens and gave a little wave.
Steve opened the door but kept it on the chain. ‘How did you find me?’ he demanded.
Ennias simply shrugged. ‘Oh, the apps one can download these days, if one knows the right people,’ he said cryptically, putting his phone away. ‘Aren’t you going to let me in?’
‘Just answer one question for me. How do you know Vessa?’
‘Do you really want to know?’
‘It’s the only way you’re getting in.’
‘Okay then. She contacted me after escaping from a high-security psychiatric institution acting as a front for a world-wide conspiracy which abducts and imprisons refugees from an alternate reality. I work for an underground organisation which helps those refugees create new lives in this world.’ He said this with an absolutely straight face.
Steve looked at him.
Ennias laughed. ‘No, I’m just messing with you. I’m her ex. Can I come in?’
‘Sure. Why not?’ If the man had said anything remotely normal, he didn’t think he would have believed him. Steve opened the door.
After Ennias had apparently satisfied himself that Vessa was sleeping normally – whatever that meant these days – he began mooching around her bedsit, picking things up, examining them, and putting them back again.
‘I won’t ask how you know her,’ he said to Steve. ‘I think “biblically” is the word, yes? I would say you are a brave man involving yourself with her, but I also think that you have no idea what you’re getting into, so let’s not get carried away.’
Steve didn’t like the way this strange man was rummaging through her things. ‘Do you mind not doing that? Seriously, what’s your connection here? What’s wrong with her?’
‘Oh the size of those questions, and they come out of your mouth as if they’re nothing at all! What are these books for?’ Ennias waved a Biology GCSE textbook at him.
‘She’s, uh, she’s studying.’ He was having trouble keeping up here. ‘When you said psychiatric institution, you were joking, right?’
‘Do I look like I’m joking?’ In truth, he had the eyes of a man who looked like he slept little, if at all. ‘Studying. For examinations? Qualifications?’ He was digging through the rest of the paperwork on her tiny desk, peering at documents and tossing them aside carelessly.
‘Yes. Look, I’m just going to, uh…’ he edged away, digging out his phone, ready to call the police. He found that his phone had no signal, which was odd, but it didn’t make any difference; you could still dial 999 without a network signal. He did so – and heard nothing. No dial tone, no recorded message. Just blank white noise.
‘Apps, remember?’ said Ennias absently, waving his phone at Steve while he continued to dig through Vessa’s things.
‘Hey, I warned you. Leave her stuff alone.’ Steve crossed the room and moved to grab Ennias’ arm, but before he made contact Ennias extended the forefinger of the hand that waved his phone and planted it squarely in the middle of Steve’s chest. Steve stopped dead as if he’d just run into the end of a construction beam and saw the front of his torso ripple in concentric circles where he was touched. He staggered back, gasping for breath.
With his other hand, Ennias waved a piece of paper in his face. ‘This looks like a driving licence application form to me.’
‘So what? What the fuck did you just do to me?’
‘And this appears to be an application for a Marks and Spencer store card.’
‘So?’
‘So it looks like our girl is trying to make herself real without having even the basic sense to use the false ID she was given. Honestly, I’m amazed that the Hegemony hasn’t caught up with her yet. She must have finally gone wampy; how can she think they don’t know about her? You tell her, when she comes back, that when I agreed to help out in an emergency I didn’t think she’d be doing everything in her power to get caught again, the silly bint. I’m off.’ He tossed the papers to the floor in disgust and headed for the door.
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