by Helen Harper
I drummed my fingers on the table. ‘We need to come up with a way to monitor the magic in the atmosphere. If we can be sure that we’re not expelling too much, we could use more to help us grow more. I know our farmland is limited but we’re still not using magic to the best effect for our continued survival. Every person in Manchester has their own magic and we could do more with it. Yes, it’s a worry that we’ll use too much and trigger another apocalypse but it’s also a worry that we’re going to run out of supplies. We need to come up with some kind of plan before we reach breaking point.’
Julian looked at me. ‘What are you suggesting?’
I shrugged. ‘Some sort of magic-monitoring task force that will show how much magic can be used in a confined area before disaster occurs.’
Julian frowned. ‘You’d need to be very sure such an experiment won’t affect the rest of the city.’
‘We’ll come up with something,’ I said firmly. ‘We won’t take any unnecessary risks.’
‘Such as bringing monsters into our very own neighbourhood?’ he asked.
Monroe smirked. He knew the truth – we were all monsters in our own ways.
‘I’ll take care of Lucy,’ I promised. ‘By the end of the week, she’ll be gone.’
Julian clearly didn’t believe me. He glanced at Monroe, who gave a brief nod. ‘The baby beast will be gone,’ he said. ‘Without a doubt.’
Chapter Three
The next morning, Monroe was up before me. I woke to find his side of the bed empty and cold, with only the indentation on the pillow to suggest he’d been there at all.
I rolled off the mattress and stretched, before pulling on a dressing gown and padding into the next room in search of a coffee. Our resident engineering boffins had managed to get some electricity pumping through our homes – a feat that had been made easier by the fact that we now all lived in the same place. Despite their best efforts, however, it rarely remained on for more than a couple of hours. Magic and technology didn’t tend to mix well but a few hours were better than nothing.
I didn’t see Monroe at first. I went straight to the kettle to turn it on; when the light didn’t appear, I frowned. Maybe I’d already missed today’s burst of electrical power. I was unwilling to waste our rationed gas cylinder on boiling some water – not these days. Murky cold tea it was, then.
I turned on the tap and waited for some water to gurgle out, then mixed it with a small teaspoon of leaves. Yes, tea was rationed too but I had enough for now. I wasn’t about to forego every pleasure in life.
‘I’ve been thinking,’ Monroe said, from the high-backed chair by the window, ‘about the magic-monitoring situation. I might have a few ideas.’
‘Bloody hell! You almost gave me a heart attack!’
‘Sorry,’ he said, sounding anything but.
I was about to tell him off for being so sneaky but my mouth dropped open when I saw what he was doing. A shaft of sunlight came through the window and gave a golden glint to his dark-red curls. Normally that would be enough to give me pause, let alone his bare-chested, relaxed posture. But that wasn’t what stopped me in my tracks.
Monroe had Lucy cradled in the nook of one arm and was holding a bottle with his free hand. She was suckling on the rubber teat with her eyes half closed in utter pleasure.
‘What?’ Monroe asked. ‘The hell monster was hungry. You needed to sleep. The Wilkos next door swapped me some milk for some baked beans. It seemed like a reasonable trade.’
I put down my mug of cold tea and smiled. ‘You,’ I said, ‘are adorable.’
‘Piss off.’
‘I mean it,’ I told him. ‘I think my ovaries just exploded.’
Monroe snorted. ‘Don’t get any ideas,’ he said. ‘She’s still going by the end of the week.’
‘Of course.’ I walked slowly towards him, licking my lips in an obvious fashion. It might have been melodramatic but it still got my point across.
Monroe watched my every move. ‘Let me get this bottle finished first,’ he said huskily.
‘Sure thing, Daddy.’ I wandered round to the back of the chair and dropped my hand, trailing it lightly across Monroe’s collar bone. He sucked in a breath.
‘I’m not this little beast’s father,’ he said in a strained voice. ‘I feel no protective urge towards it whatsoever.’
I let my fingers brush his nipples. ‘Mmhmm.’
‘I still don’t find Lucy cute in the slightest.’
I bent over and blew gently onto his bare neck. ‘Of course you don’t.’
‘She probably doesn’t even like milk,’ he said. ‘For all we know, shadow beasts are lactose intolerant and any second now I’ll be dealing with the very unsexy issue of projectile diarrhoea.’
‘Well,’ I murmured, ‘we do have a shower. The water might be cold but, if I join you and soap you down, I can help you to stay warm.’ I planted a brief kiss on the edge of his lips.
Monroe groaned. Then he sprang up, so fast that Lucy let out a squeak of protest. He tossed the now-empty bottle to one side and carefully placed her inside her cage before turning back to me. I let my eyes drift down his naked torso. He was wearing loose fitting boxers. He looked unbearably sexy.
‘Monroe,’ I whispered.
He growled again. In a heartbeat, he was next to me, pushing me against the wall, his hands in my hair. His mouth pressed against mine and I could feel his heart hammering. His fingers twisted my hair. ‘Did I ever tell you,’ he murmured, ‘that I love your blue hair?’
I smiled. Once upon a time, he had despised my aquamarine locks.
‘Or that the way your earlobe curves into your neck is quite possibly the most seductive thing I’ve ever seen?’
‘The most seductive?’ I purred.
From the cage, Lucy started to moan and squeak. We both ignored her.
‘Well,’ Monroe demurred, ‘there is the birthmark right here.’ His fingers caressed the top of my thigh. He knelt down and kissed it. ‘This is pretty damned seductive.’
Lucy was getting louder.
‘I’ve always thought,’ I said, ‘that actions are the sexiest. Like,’ I paused, ‘this.’ I pulled Monroe gently to his feet and turned him round before tracing the nubs of his spine. My fingers travelled lower and lower and lower…
Lucy screamed.
Both Monroe and I stopped ignoring her and pulled apart. I turned and glared at her. ‘What?’ I asked. ‘What is it?’
She flung herself against the bars of her cage; I couldn’t tell whether she was trying to escape or simply drawing attention to herself.
At that moment there was the loud clanging of a bell. I froze. Monroe reached for his tracksuits bottoms and hauled them on. That sound meant only one thing: danger was approaching.
I glanced at Lucy. ‘You were warning us,’ I whispered. ‘Good girl.’ Then I was running out of the door with Monroe hot on my heels.
We weren’t the only ones sprinting out. Although a good number of people darted back into their homes and firmly closed their doors, more than enough of us sped towards the main entrance to our enclosure. Whatever the problem was, we’d deal with it face on.
How bad could this be? I calculated the odds. Okay. Pretty bad.
As we rounded the corner onto the main thoroughfare, I saw the cluster of people by the barricade. There wasn’t much action; there was no sign of a terrifying beast or a crazy onslaught of magic-induced hell. Everyone was simply standing around.
I careened to a halt. ‘What’s the problem?’
Julie turned towards me, her eyes glowing red. Her right hand gripped her lace-fringed parasol, shielding her vampire skin from the sun’s damaging rays. ‘See for yourself,’ she said. She pointed beyond the gates.
I sucked in a breath, wary of what was about to greet my eyes. I had to steel myself, however; I had to cope.
I squinted. At first I couldn’t see anything. The road beyond the barricade was empty. There were the usual old pockmarks in the tarmac a
nd the potholes that had been left after the various magical shenanigans that had rained down from the skies above, but there wasn’t much else to be seen.
‘I don’t get it,’ I said finally. ‘There’s nothing there. In fact…’ I frowned and looked more closely. Hang on a darned apocalyptic second. ‘Wait. We’ve not been hauled here at some ungodly hour because of a pigeon, have we?’
The pigeon in question was sitting on top of a long-defunct postbox. The red paint had peeled off and there was a lot of mossy lichen snaking round the bottom half of it. The bird cooed, enjoying the attention, then ducked down to peck at some invisible insect.
Felicity edged over to me. ‘It wasn’t just one pigeon,’ she said. ‘There were dozens of them. They flew overhead and that one decided to stop. Luckily for us.’
There was only one reason I could think of that would make the border guards ring the alarm after seeing dozens of flying grey rats. I craned my neck to get a better look. Ah-ha.
‘It’s carrying a message,’ I said, spotting the tiny red cartridge strapped to the bird’s leg. For one brief second I forgot to breathe. ‘It’s a homing pigeon.’
Felicity nodded, her expression grave. ‘They all were.’
Homing pigeons are so called because that’s what they do: they fly home. The birds would have been released from a certain point and would flap their way back to wherever they lived with unerring precision. The red cylinder attached to this homing pigeon’s leg looked innocuous enough – but we were living in a strange twilight world where there was a myriad of possibilities as to what the cylinder might contain.
Julie smiled. ‘It’s terribly exciting.’
‘Here,’ Cath said, appearing breathlessly from behind us. She handed Felicity a chunk of bread. ‘It’s a bit stale but it should work.’
The werewolf nodded and tore off a small chunk before sidling up to the edge of the barricade. I watched as she tossed the bread in the direction of the bird.
‘You think it’s for us,’ I said slowly. ‘You think the message is for us.’ If that were the case, it would have come from the outside world, beyond the walls that the British Army had erected. Beyond the magical air of Manchester. This would be the first communication we’d had in almost a year.
Monroe’s gaze was trained on the bird. It cocked its head at the piece of bread but didn’t move from its postbox perch. ‘It could be a coincidence,’ he said. ‘It might not have anything to do with us.’
‘Drones don’t work,’ Theo replied. ‘Planes don’t work. Helicopters don’t work. Anything technological that’s been sent through our atmosphere simply crashes and burns. If someone wanted to get a message to us, they would use a carrier pigeon.’
I considered this before eventually nodding. ‘If you had your own pigeons and you were holding a race for them, or just experimenting, you’d make damn sure they didn’t go anywhere near the exiled city of magic. Unless you wanted them to.’ My shoulders tightened. ‘Theo is right. Whatever that bird is carrying, I’m betting it’s a message for us. Common sense dictates that it has to be.’
Monroe lifted an eyebrow. ‘Common sense was never something I associated with humans,’ he said.
‘We’re lucky that this bird chose to stop here,’ Felicity said. ‘Otherwise we’d never have a chance to see the message. Whoever sent the birds used hundreds of them. He – or she – is clearly hoping that we’ll get hold of one.’
I stared grimly at the bird. ‘So,’ I said, ‘let’s make damned sure we get hold of this one.’
The pigeon had apparently decided that the bread looked tasty. It swung its beady eyes away from us and hopped onto the road. No longer caring that it had a rapt audience, it leaned down and pecked at the crumbs. Felicity threw out some more.
‘Not too much,’ I cautioned. ‘We need to give it enough reason to stick around until we catch it. If we overdo it, we might scare it off.’
‘Kill it, darling,’ Julie said. ‘You have the strongest magic out of anyone here. Send out a bolt of the good stuff and knock it dead.’
I didn’t particularly want to zap the pigeon dead but it might be the smartest move. ‘I don’t want to miss. If I get it wrong and don’t hit it, it’ll fly off and we’ll never see it again. And if I send out too much magic so that I don’t miss it, it might disintegrate and we’ll lose the message as well as the bird.’
‘Are you saying that you can’t do it?’ Felicity asked.
Monroe answered for me, his hand brushing against mine. ‘No,’ he said. ‘She’s saying that she needs to be careful and take her time. We’ve only got one shot at this.’
I breathed in deeply, aware of the expectant eyes swivelling in my direction. There’s nothing like a bit of pressure to focus your mind. The pigeon was still blithely pecking at the bread but I could sense we had only seconds. If that.
I raised my hands and did my best to concentrate. I couldn’t think of any other way get hold of the bird except by killing it; I’d missed the day at school where we were taught how to create magical cages.
I winced and sent out a silent apology to the pigeon for what I was about to do. On a count of three. One. Two… A sudden thought struck me.
‘Wait,’ I said. ‘I can’t kill it.’
‘It’s the only way to be sure we get the message,’ Felicity snapped. ‘This isn’t the time for your saviour sensibilities.’
‘If we’re going to reply to that message,’ I told her evenly, ‘we need the bird. If it’s dead, it won’t be homing anywhere.’
Realisation hit the group like a Mexican wave. Almost as important as reading the message was the chance to communicate to the outside world, to tell the people out there that we were alright. A bit hungry maybe, but alright.
‘Can you use magic to catch it instead?’ Monroe asked.
I gestured helplessly. ‘I could try, but it’s a crap shoot.’ I pursed my lips. ‘If I’m honest, in this scenario I’d bet against myself.’
‘A net,’ Cath said suddenly. ‘We need a net.’
Monroe looked at her. ‘The fishing group,’ he said. ‘Get one from them. Hurry.’
Cath started running. The rest of us turned back to the pigeon, willing it to stay where it was. There was still plenty of bread for it to peck at. If it had been flying for a long while, it would be tired so it would enjoy the break. We had to be careful not to scare it off.
‘No one make any sudden movements,’ I said in a low voice. I crossed my fingers. Come on, Cath. Get back here quickly.
‘I have fast reflexes,’ Julie said. ‘I could try and catch it.’
‘Or,’ Felicity suggested, ‘we could use your umbrella to throw at the bird, create a temporary cage and watch you burn up in the sun. It would be win-win.’
‘Darling.’ Julie tossed her head. ‘It’s a parasol.’
I shut out their bickering, aware that it was more a result of stress than true antagonism, and kept my attention on the bird. We needed that net. We needed… I stiffened as something else occurred to me. Oh no.
Registering my change in stance, Monroe whispered urgently. ‘What is it? What’s the problem?’
‘Lucy,’ I returned. ‘She warned us that something was coming. Why would she have gone nuts just because a flock of pigeons flew overhead? She wouldn’t have known they were carrier pigeons.’
‘Worry about that later,’ Monroe told me, in a tone that suggested he didn’t give a single shit about what Lucy had been doing.
‘Yeah,’ I said, ‘but…’
From the nearest side street beyond the barricade there was a wheeze. I barely had time to blink before a giant dog-like creature sprang forward with lightning speed. Its jaws snapped as it lunged at the pigeon. There wasn’t so much as a squawk before the bird was swallowed whole.
The dog monster paused, swung its head towards us and stared. It wagged its tail briefly in acknowledgement of our shock, then it bounded away in the direction it had come from. All that was left was a single grey
feather, lying forlornly next to the half-eaten chunk of stale bread.
Well, shit.
The sound of pattering feet came up behind us. Cath was breathless but beaming. ‘I got a net!’ she said. ‘This will do the trick, right?’
I’m sure we all tried to smile at her; alas, I don’t think any of us actually pulled it off.
Chapter Four
We convened in the square. Most of the werewolves who weren’t out on patrol were present, as well as a number of the more magically gifted humans. There were quite a few vampires too, even though the sun was rising high. Admittedly they stayed under the awning that had been erected in recent months for that very purpose, and they were covered from head to toe in reflective white and silver fabric, but the fact that they were there gave testament to how important this could be.
I had to bite my tongue to refrain from giggling. We were all standing around with grim expressions and frowning foreheads simply because of a now-dead pigeon.
‘So it was eaten by a hell hound?’ Julian asked, using the name that the vampires had coined for the dog monsters. ‘Can I assume it was one of the creatures that normally live out by the southern wall?’
It was Felicity who answered. ‘We have no reason to think that a second pack has sprung up.’
‘Other than the fact, darlings,’ Julie said drily, ‘that it was five miles away from its usual territory.’
One hell hound looked much the same as another to me, so I wasn’t prepared to hedge my bets on where it had come from just yet. Normally, the hounds didn’t bother us. We weren’t sure whether they were dogs that had been transformed by the magic when the apocalypse hit or they’d somehow been conjured here by accident, like the shadow beasts, giant rats, mammoth pink elephant and Nimue the mermaid. Either way, they hadn’t been much of a concern until now.
I thought of Lucy’s mother and the discussion I’d had with Monroe the previous day. ‘We’re not the only ones short of food,’ I said aloud. ‘If the hell hounds are finding scavenging and hunting hard in their own territory, it stands to reason that they’ll venture out to other areas. It’s not beyond the realms of possibility that this is another of the southern dogs.’