I crawled out and grabbed his arm. ‘Freddie, what’s going on?’
‘Katie didn’t come in to work today. I phoned her mum, and she said Katie’d gone out with a friend last night, and rung to say she was staying over and not to worry.’
Dread twisted in my gut. ‘What’s Katie got to do with him?’
He took a deep breath and threw a disgusted look at Gazza by the fridge. ‘This piece of shite here came strolling in with a message.’ The muscles in Freddie’s arm bunched under my hand. ‘For you.’
‘What’s the message?’ I shouted over the pulse thundering in my ears.
‘He wouldn’t tell me, said he had to tell you and only you.’ Freddie’s face crunched up with disgust. ‘The little shite told me I could make him lunch while he waited!’ He kicked Gazza on his ankle and a muffled squeal of rage came from behind the gag. ‘Well, I made him lunch, just as he wanted.’
Freddie swung down and ripped the cloth from Gazza’s mouth. ‘Go on then, arsehole, give her the goddamned message. ’
‘Fuckinfaeriefreakansstupidbastoldman—’
Freddie slapped Gazza across the face. ‘Tell her, you piece of shite.’ He pointed to the carver on the floor. ‘Or I’ll start slicing bits off you.’
‘You don’t frighten me, you stupid old man! Nothing hurts any more—he told me it wouldn’t. Said he’d make it all better too, whatever you did,’ he sniggered. ‘So you can go fuck yourself.’ He stared up at me. ‘And you, faerie freak, he’s got big plans for you, and he said—’
I smacked my hand onto his forehead and slid into the tangled net of his thoughts. A rope of black twisted snake-like through them. Snagging it in a tendril of gold, I yanked on it and ordered, ‘Just give me the fucking message!’
‘The count sends his regards.’ I got a brief image of Red Poet on the stage at the Blue Heart. ‘He wants to offer you the staring role in his play.’ Gazza’s voice came out fast, excited. ‘Only this time it won’t be staged in the graveyard, but in the watering hole of the heart. If you’re not there by midnight, he says he’ll use your understudy. And it’s a private audience only, so don’t think about issuing any invitations.’
Shitshitshit.
Freddie thumped his hands on the counter. ‘He means Katie, doesn’t he? For God’s sake, Genny, what does the bastard want?’
Gazza spewed another stream of abuse and Freddie shoved the cloth back in his mouth.
Katie.
The count, aka Red Poet—the leader of the fang-gang—had got her at the Leech & Lettuce, and I had to get her out. My heart squeezed in my chest and for a moment I couldn’t think, didn’t know what to do.
Then I remembered Finn and the spell. I had to find him. Can’t do two things at once. I grabbed Freddie’s arm. ‘You have to phone Old Scotland Yard. You need to speak to Detective Sergeant Hugh Munro.’
He snatched up an order pad. ‘He’s the big red troll, isn’t he?’
‘Yeah, make sure you speak to him, or one of the other trolls. Lamber or Taegrin. They’ll know what to do!’ I shook Freddie. ‘Tell them that Katie is being held at the Leech & Lettuce in Sucker Town. It’s a blood house, they’ll know the one.’ I watched, impatient, as he started writing it down. ‘I have to find Finn first, he’s in trouble too, but tell Hugh I’ll meet him down there as soon as I can.’
Freddie glanced up from his careful writing. ‘I saw Finn go into the office about an hour ago. Don’t think he’s come out yet.’
‘Great! Thanks, Freddie,’ I shouted as I ran out into the empty café. I pushed the closed sign to one side to turn the lock, then raced across the street to Spellcrackers.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
The door to Spellcrackers was locked. I pressed my finger to the intercom, tapping my foot with impatience.
‘Spellcrack—’ came a voice.
‘Toni, it’s me,’ I called, cutting her off.
‘Oh hi, Genny, hold on. I’ll buzz you in.’
There was a click and I shoved open the door and dashed in. Toni stared down at me from the top of the stairs. She was eye-catchingly bright in a slim cerise sundress and purple bolero jacket, her pink and purple hair extensions curling like they belonged on the Medusa. I ran up, taking the treads two at a time.
‘Hold on, Honeybee,’ Toni laughed, ‘what’s all the rush for? You’re not supposed to be at work until tomorrow.’
‘Sorry, Toni,’ I gasped, ‘can’t stop. Have to see Finn.’
She caught my arm, a sly grin on her face. ‘You found out about his tail yet?’
‘Later, okay?’ I shook her hand off, tried to squeeze past her.
‘Hey, no problem.’ She winked and moved to let me through. ‘You’ll find the horny sex god in his office. ‘I’m just going to double-check the entrance, those kids are driving—’
I raced to the end of the corridor and flung the door wide open. Finn was leaning back in his chair, his feet propped on a couple of box files.
‘There’s a spell,’ I gasped, slapping my hands on his desk, ‘a real nasty one, and someone’s tagged you with it!’
‘Hello, Gen.’ He swivelled his chair round to face me.
‘It’s to do with the vampires, lets them steal power from us—’ I could hardly get the words out fast enough.
He ran a hand through his hair and scratched behind his left horn. ‘Why are you here, Gen? I left a message on your phone to stay away.’
‘Dammit, Finn, didn’t you hear what I just said?’
‘Yes, I heard.’ Sweat beaded on his forehead.
Fuck. He so didn’t look so good. I looked. The mist clung to him like a thick second skin. ‘Shit, it’s all over you!’
He pushed himself out of his chair and stood up. ‘I know all about the spell, Gen,’ he said, sounding tired.
I blinked. ‘You do?’
He came up to me and tucked a strand of hair behind my ear. ‘I felt it earlier, when I tried to pull that stunt on Helen: something draining at me, sucking me dry. I didn’t realise what it was then.’
My heart thudded against my ribs. Mick said the spell only killed faelings. Finn was fae. What if Mick was wrong? Swallowing back my fear, I wrapped my hand round Finn’s wrist. His skin was hot and clammy. I slid gold tendrils of magic into him, searching.
‘Finn, I think I can call the spell, take it from—’
He gave me a sad smile. ‘It’s too late Gen.’ He lifted my chin with his forefinger and touched his mouth gently to mine. ‘Way too late.’
Jagged thorns ripped through my heart, bled grief like acid juice. In the far reaches of his mind, a desolate wind scoured all before it.
Damn. What was he doing—why was he fighting me? Didn’t he know I was trying to help?
I built a hedge of golden hope to keep the wind out.
Sliding my hand round Finn’s neck, I pulled him down. ‘Don’t fight me, Finn.’ I pressed my lips to his, spilling my Glamour into his mouth. ‘I know how to—’
Something stung my upper arm.
Yelping, I jerked away. A pinprick of blood spotted my skin. Eyes wide, I looked at him.
‘What the—?’
‘I’m sorry, Gen.’
‘Sorry?’ I frowned, bemused, glanced at the blood again. Then back at him.
He held up something that looked like a short pen. ‘I wasn’t fighting you.’ His voice was dull.
I couldn’t feel my arm, couldn’t move it. There was no pain, just spreading numbness. And then I knew what it was. He’d injected me with iron filings. They’d slip through my body, numbing me as they went, until they reached my brain ... and I’d be unconscious—or maybe worse ...
I stared at him, speechless, and lost my hold on the magic.
The wind screamed against the golden hedge, turned it brittle with despair. The mist escaped like grey smoke swirling into the sky.
Horror sliced through me. He’d been containing the spell, and now he’d let it go. Finn’s face wavered, then doubled. I gazed at the tw
o of him disappearing into the mist as the greyness filled the room.
He touched my cheek. ‘You really shouldn’t have come looking for me. You should’ve gone to Hugh. You’d have been safe there.’
Safe? My lips tried to form the question. The room tilted as I felt his arms wrap around me, then he lowered me to the floor.
‘I didn’t want to hurt you, my Lady.’ His eyes swam through the grey. Only they weren’t the moss-green I knew; there was something wrong with them. They were like algae-covered pools, waiting to suck me down. Then his tears splashed emerald chips into the greyness.
I tried to catch them with my fingers.
Green stems pushed their way into the fog, seeking for something to hold onto.
‘Oh good, hon, you’ve done it.’ The voice was female, brisk.
The fog closed over the stems, hid them from my Sight.
‘Did you inject her over the heart?’ the voice said.
‘You should’ve let me stun her.’ Finn’s voice was harsh. ‘This is too dangerous.’
‘No. This way is better. If you’d stunned her, she might have cracked it before you’d hit her—much too risky. She’s been iffy with magic lately. Too much salt in her diet.’
I had to banish the fog. I had to find the stems.
Gold light flared, formed trembling tendrils that curled into the greyness. One green shoot crept its way up through the fog.
‘I told you, she’s too strong. Even half out of it, she’s trying to use her Glamour. It has to be the heart. Lift up her top.’
‘No, I won’t.’ But it was more a plea than a determined denial.
‘Finn, there’s no way you can gainsay me, not with the spells I’ve tagged you with, so stop fighting and just get on with it.’
Pink and purple streamers slithered through the grey, twisting over and along the fragile green stem. The stem shivered and struggled and writhed in pain, trying to be free. But the streamers wrapped around and around, until there was nothing but a thrashing nest of brightly coloured snakes.
Feverish fingers traced over my skin.
‘That’s it, do it there. I’ll hold her down.’ Weight pressed against my ribs. ‘Sorry, Honeybee, but this is going to hurt like the Nine Circles of Hell.’
The sting was a tiny, distant pain. She’d been wrong. Somewhere I laughed.
The fog bloomed with golden flowers.
Then cold iron filled my chest.
And the flowers withered.
Chapter Forty
My inner vamp sense told me sunset had long gone and night was here. My eyeballs felt like they’d been rubbed with sandpaper and my lids stuck together with Super Glue. Fear made my pulse jump in my throat. It jagged with pain. I lay frozen and listened.
I could hear a faint noise: shallow, fast breaths.
My heart pounded as my eyes snapped open. I stared, fearful, at the fuzzy greyness. Mouth dry, I blinked and the greyness resolved itself into a carved rock ceiling. Wincing, I slowly turned my head towards the light. There was a door about five feet away, steel, like the ones at the Bloody Shamrock. I sniffed, and caught a whiff of earthy dampness. I was in a cave, somewhere underground.
Why couldn’t I remember what had happened?
I tried to sieve the confusion from my mind.
Venom fizzed through my veins, but its usual lust-hyped high was muted; my body felt like one big bruise. And I could smell blood. Had I been caught feeding? Was that why I felt like I’d been in a slugfest with a horde of Beater goblins? My stomach clenched in hunger and I ran my tongue over my fangs in anticipation—only I didn’t have fangs, just teeth. Confusion slipped back into fear. Had I become so melded with the Alter Vamp spell that I no longer knew which body I wore? The blood snagged at my senses again. It smelled of sour blackberries.
And memory rushed back like a charging troll, smashing my fears into insignificant pieces.
Finn was somewhere nearby.
Toni the bitch witch had tagged Finn with the spell, and tied it with some sort of compulsion magic—no way would he poison me with cold iron. I visualised Toni’s face, compared it with the photo Psycho Louis had shown me. Now I knew what I was looking for I could see the similarities. Toni might have lost a lot of weight, but her eyebrows and nose were still the same.
‘Gen?’ Finn’s voice was quiet, hardly more than a whisper.
I slowly turned towards his voice. The cave room went back almost thirty feet, the ceiling sloping down to meet the floor at the end. In the gloom I could make out a body. Finn.
‘Gen?’ The anxious whisper came again.
I tried to say his name, but all I managed was a croak. I touched my sore throat. There was a swollen lump the size of a golf ball. Shit. Whichever sucker Toni had palled up with, they’d sunk their fangs into me.
I checked out my arms. I had three other bite marks: one on my right wrist and the others at the pulse points inside my elbows. I wrinkled my nose at the map of blue veins wriggling under my skin. The suckers had almost bled me dry.
No wonder I felt so depleted.
At least I still had my clothes on. I’d only been venomfucked, nothing else.
‘Are you okay?’ Finn’s voice was louder.
‘Yeah,’ I whispered. ‘Give me a sec.’
I rolled onto my front, got my hands flat underneath me.
‘Gen, I want you to come here to me.’
The words hit me like a hard promise, raised shivers over my skin. I got up onto my elbows and rested my head on my forearms for a moment, then dragged my legs up until I was on my knees. Panting, I peered down towards Finn. I caught the emerald gleam of his eyes.
‘C’mon, Gen. I’m waiting.’
Lust twisted sharp thorns in my belly, venom fizzed in my veins and both drew a painful gasp from my mouth. I started crawling, my hands and denim-clad knees scraping the stone, muscles protesting with aching soreness.
‘My Lady, I need you.’
‘I hear you,’ I whispered. The soreness in my body dissipated, pushed aside by a more urgent craving. I crawled faster.
‘Genny,’ he crooned.
I stopped, shaking, my skin flushing with heat. The throb between my legs and at my throat was hard, insistent, almost too painful to bear. My head buzzed and the cave swam and swayed into greyness.
‘Gen—’
‘Dammit, Finn,’ I croaked past another wave of lust, ‘keep your Glamour to yourself. My body can’t deal with it. I’ve lost too much blood.’
Silence. Then, ‘I’m sorry.’ His voice was soothing. ‘I thought it would help.’
The desperate need inside me blunted and the aching my body had ignored returned with a gleeful vengeance. Crap. I gritted my teeth and started crawling again: slow but steady, that was the way.
Hand ... knee ... swallow ... pant.
‘I don’t know when she gave me the spell.’ Finn’s voice washed with anger. ‘You know, the spell you came to tell me about? It sucks the magic out of you.’
Hand ... knee ...
‘Psychic vampirism, the bitch called it. She’s worked it so a sucker can bind a fae’s power and use it as their own.’ Fear flowed beneath the anger. ‘You don’t even have to know about it. No need for negotiations and bargains, just a cocktail of blood and spell and that’s you.’
Swallow ... pant ...
Damn. It all fitted with what Mick had told me—and I’d a good idea that Toni had tagged me with the spell too, but for some reason it hadn’t worked so well on me.
I reached Finn, my lungs gasping for air
‘You need to get out, Gen,’ he said quietly, staring at the ceiling.
Of course, the ‘getting out’ involved steel doors and solid rock, and I doubted I could blast through them with magic, even if I knew how.
‘There’s some sort of fight going on,’ he added. ‘The sucker’s siphoning off my power to win.’
I tried to catch my breath as I peered through the half-darkness at him. They’d stripped him na
ked and staked him out, stretching his limbs to the four points. The Glamour he’d been wearing to appear more human had gone, dispersed by the gem-studded silver shackles on his wrists and ankles, or maybe he just hadn’t the energy left to hold it. His body was broader, muscles heavier, his skin more darkly tanned than before. Sleek sable hair covered his stomach and his flanks, then smoothed like silk down his legs until it feathered over his hard cloven hooves.
Lifting my head, I crawled closer. His horns were small stubs almost hidden in his matted hair and he was covered in blood—his blood. I briefly closed my eyes as the scent of blackberries made my stomach twist with need. Hanging my head, I willed the hunger away. Deep wounds scored down Finn’s chest and stomach, and bite marks punctured his skin. The familiar-looking injuries told me which sucker Toni had palled up with, which sucker was using him: Rio.
He turned to look at me. His face was pinched, almost feral, the bones sharp under his skin. But it was his eyes I stared at. They were dull, grey, desolate with the spell.
‘You need to get undressed, Gen,’ he said wearily.
‘What?’ My mouth fell open. That was the last thing I’d expected.
‘I’ve been waiting for you to wake up. There’s a chance you can escape using a blood door.’ His gaze held mine, then he looked away again, as if it hurt him for me to see him like this. ‘Only you have to go naked, in supplication. It won’t work otherwise.’
I knew of blood doors. I’d even been through one once, taken by another fae. Once you activated the spell, it took you straight to the person who’d shared the ritual with you.
I frowned, slumping back on my heels. ‘Don’t they have to be pre-arranged?’
‘You need to go to Helen.’ His voice caught as he said her name. ‘Ask her for aid.’
Oh right, Helen, as in Inspector Crane.
‘Helen and I have performed the blood exchange. We did it when we jumped the broom before—’ A spasm of pain cut him off.
They’d jumped the broom? When did that happen? And before what? Before they split up? They couldn’t be still together, could they? An odd feeling slipped from beneath my heart, as though I’d lost something I never had to begin with. I shrugged it off. No wonder the inspector didn’t like me. Still, priorities: escape first, pity-party later.
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