Uncanny Kingdom: An Eleven Book Urban Fantasy Collection (Uncanny Kingdom Omnibus 1)

by David Bussell

  ‘It’s me,’ said the boyfriend, laughing and turning to his girlfriend. ‘Sorry to tell you like this, but I just get these bloodthirsty urges. D’you think your dad will mind?’

  The girlfriend laughed.

  ‘This isn’t a joke!’ I spat.

  ‘No,’ replied the gent, ‘A joke usually elicits laughter.’

  The train carriage’s lights spluttered, flickering off and on.

  A crackle on my tongue.

  Something was about to happen.

  ‘Everyone, grab hold of me! Quickly!’

  ‘I most certainly will not,’ said the mother.

  I looked to the passed out man, expecting to see him twitch into monstrous life as the lights continued to splutter. There was no time to find out for sure; unless I went on the offensive soon, something terrible was going to happen. I had to go with my gut and end this.

  I drew the magic in the carriage towards me and felt my hands begin to warm with power. I clenched my fists and lifted a hand to—

  —blackness. The lights cut out completely, leaving us in impenetrable dark in the tube tunnel. Someone cried out in surprise. Was it just surprise?

  It only lasted a second or two, then the lights flashed back on again, causing me to shield my eyes for a moment at the sudden brightness. I squinted at the seating. The passed out man was still in place. It didn’t look as though he’d moved an inch.

  ‘Oh my good God…’

  The city gent’s voice.

  I turned to see his mouth slack, eyes wide, looking over to the young couple.

  I knew I wasn’t about to see anything good.

  The boyfriend was staring ahead, his face white, streaked red.

  Blood.

  But not his own.

  His girlfriend was lying there, her intestines torn out and coiled around his feet.

  That’s when the screaming started.

  5

  I pressed my back to the carriage doors, keeping all of the passengers in my vision. Maybe the monster was the passed out man, maybe it wasn’t, but since boarding this train I’d discovered it had magic beyond its concealment tricks. At any moment it might plunge us into darkness again and take out another victim. I had to finish this soon or we’d all end up like that woman. Twisted on the floor with our guts hanging out.

  A train of the dead.

  The passengers wavered in mute shock, the boyfriend now seated, staring at his dead girlfriend’s mutilated corpse.

  Or…

  I thought back to the dead body I’d found outside. To the police officer. I’d been sloppy then, and the officer had paid the price. I had to make sure I wasn’t being tricked the same way.

  I stepped swiftly towards the body and crouched beside it, sticking my fingers into the still-warm, open wound of her stomach.

  ‘Holy Mother Mary!’ gasped the mother.

  ‘What in God’s name do you think you’re doing!’ pleaded the city gent.

  ‘Checking,’ I replied. I closed my eyes and extended my senses, probing the corpse for any trace of the Uncanny. There was none. She wasn’t the creature in disguise.

  I felt hands on my shoulders, shoving me backwards, sending me sprawling to the floor. I looked up to find the boyfriend stood over me, his features tight with anger.

  ‘Take your bloody hands off her!’ he demanded.

  I stood, hands out, placating. ‘I had to check, I’m sorry.’

  ‘Check what?’

  He was staring at my hands, coated in his girlfriend’s blood.

  ‘I was telling the truth before,’ I said. ‘There is a killer on this train. In this carriage. But it’s not a killer from an Agatha Christie novel. This is something unlike any killer you’ve seen, beyond anything you’ve even heard of.’

  ‘I feel sick,’ said the mother, her hand at her mouth.

  ‘That’s it, I’m getting the blasted doors open!’ boomed the city gent. ‘We can’t be far from the next station.’ He tried to wrench the doors open, grunting.

  ‘It’s no use,’ I said.

  ‘Well, then somebody help me!’

  The boyfriend stumbled over and the pair attempted to lever the doors open. They didn’t give an inch.

  ‘It’s stopping you. The creature doesn’t want any of us to escape.’

  The city gent whirled on me, a vein in his temple throbbing. ‘Stop it, will you! There is no creature! Such things do not exist!’

  ‘I’m sorry, but they do, and it’s hiding among us.’

  ‘Where?’ asked the mother. ‘Come on, then! Where is this thing if it’s in here!’

  ‘Oh, don’t entertain her demented fantasies.’

  ‘No, I want to know. If there is a monster, where exactly is it hiding? Because I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but there aren’t a wealth of hide-and-seek options in here!’

  ‘Yes,’ said the city gent, ‘good point. Go on then. If there’s really an ooga-booga monster in here, where is it hiding?’

  There was a moment of silence as they all stared at me.

  ‘I told you, this is no ordinary killer. It’s not a person, it’s a thing. A thing that can change form at will. It moves around unnoticed, changing mid-step if it needs to, disguising itself from anyone who might have a fix on it.’

  The city gent hooted and clapped his hands. ‘She’s out of her bloody mind!’ he roared.

  The boyfriend was stood over his dead girlfriend again. ‘We’d been seeing each other for a year, you know. I’ve never been in love before. I liked it. I was going to ask her to marry me. I was going to buy the ring next week, I’ve been saving for months. And my dad, he gave me a bit extra, too, you know? Just so I could get something special. Something special like her.’

  ‘I’ll find out who did this,’ I told him. ‘I promise.’

  He turned towards me, pulling something small and gleaming from his pocket.

  A flick knife.

  ‘No, I’ll find out,’ he said, brandished the blade at us, a tear rolling down his cheek.

  ‘Careful with that thing, lad,’ said the city gent, taking steps back so he was behind myself and the mother.

  ‘One of you did this. Did this without getting a spot of blood on you. Now you’re going to own up to it, or none of you is getting off this train alive. I don’t care what happens to me. I don’t care anymore.’

  I could see he meant it. There was nothing behind his eyes now. No spark like there had been earlier. He’d become a husk, an empty person. That told me something else: that he wasn’t the monster. That was three people scratched off my list now. It couldn’t be the sleeping man, the girlfriend or the boyfriend.

  I stepped slowly towards him, hands out in supplication.

  ‘Please, put the knife away and trust me. This is what I do. This is my job. I’ll find out who did this to her and I’ll make them pay. Not by taking them to prison. There’s something worse waiting for them.’

  He jabbed the knife at us. ‘Tell me who killed her!’ Spittle flew, his face snarling, a wounded animal.

  ‘It was her!’ cried the city gent.

  I turned to him to see he was backed up several metres now, pointing at me.

  ‘You sure?’ asked the mother.

  Things were spinning out of control. I pulled the magic towards me, ready to defend myself, to dampen whatever might be coming.

  ‘Don’t listen to him,’ I said. ‘He’s just a coward, and a coward always points the finger.’

  ‘Go on,’ said the boyfriend, gesturing to the city gent. ‘Tell me!’

  ‘Just think it through! Which one of us boarded the train blathering about monsters? Monsters that are—apparently—hiding among us? Well, I’m not a monster, and d’you know why? Because monsters don’t exist! But crazy women do.’

  ‘What are you saying?’ asked the mother.

  ‘It’s her!’ he replied. ‘She’s the one who killed the girl!’

  They were buying into it, I could feel it. My hands began to grow hot wit
h power.

  ‘No, listen to me, I didn’t kill her, it wasn’t—’

  ‘Blood! She had blood on her shoes. Look over there by the door, she walked it in here. I saw it when she ran on. That was before… before her,’ he pointed to the gutted woman on the floor of the carriage.

  ‘Well?’ asked the mother.

  ‘Listen to me. Just stop. There is a monster on this train, and if you don’t trust me it’s going to kill every last one of us!’

  ‘No,’ said the city gent. ‘You’re not going to hurt anyone else, you mad cow!’

  The boyfriend made his move. Quick as a flash, I pulled the magic into me and swept my hand at him, yanking the blade from his hand and sending it shooting down the carriage, where it embedded in a seat cushion.

  He looked at his empty hand, then up at me, ‘How did...?’

  ‘I told you, magic. I’m telling you all the—‘

  Something cracked along the back of my head. I stumbled forward, the carriage tilting. The city gent lowered his umbrella, its handle snapped in half.

  I tried to put words together in my mind, some sort of spell to try and pull me out of this, but my brain was scrambled. I watched helpless as the solid, handle of the umbrella came at me again.

  Then there was black.

  6

  ‘...Worry… I’ll… tell us the truth…’

  The words smudged in and out as I regained consciousness. The city gent seemed to have put himself in charge, which was no great surprise. My head was throbbing and I could taste blood in my mouth. I moved to get up, but my hands and ankles were secured. I looked down to find they’d used their coats to tie me up.

  ‘She’s awake,’ said the mother.

  ‘Don’t try to escape. You’re stuck until we move, and then we’re going to find the nearest police officer and that is that for you, you reprehensible mad woman.’

  I looked up at the city gent and spat a glob of blood at his feet.

  ‘Disgusting,’ he said, grimacing.

  ‘I don’t feel good about this at all. I just don’t,’ said the mother.

  ‘You’ve made a mistake,’ I said.

  ‘I suppose you’re innocent?’ replied the gent.

  ‘As it happens, yes I am. And you’ve tied up the only person who can help you. Assuming you’re not the killer, that is.’

  ‘Still with this rubbish. She’s quite mad you know,’ he replied.

  The boyfriend was sat on the seats, head in his hands, looking at his knife, rolling it around in his hands. He looked up at me, eyes unblinking. ‘How did you do that? With my knife? It was like you yanked it away from me without using your hands.’

  ‘I told you, magic.’

  ‘Oh, give it a rest, love,’ said the mother.

  ‘I didn’t kill your girlfriend,’ I said. He looked at me, or sort of did. I’m not sure if he really saw me. His whole world had been burned down and all he could see were the ashes.

  I had to try and get through to him. ‘I didn’t kill her. Neither did you, or the passed out man. Which leaves one of the others as the killer.’

  ‘Poppycock. Absolute poppycock.’

  ‘Shut up for one moment!’ I told the city gent.

  The boyfriend sighed and stood, a little unsteady on his feet, passing the knife back and forth between his hands. He was about to do something terrible, I could tell.

  He stepped towards me. ‘I believe you. I think you are magic.’

  ‘I am,’ I said, a little hope sprouting.

  ‘And I think that’s how you killed her. With your magic.’

  ‘No, I didn’t kill her, you’ve got to believe me!’

  ‘You killed her,’ he said. ‘And now, I’ve decided, I’m going to do the same to you. For her.’

  ‘What did he say?’ asked the mother.

  ‘Now, hang on a moment there, you can’t do that,’ said the city gent, stepping towards the boyfriend.

  He rounded on him, blade up, and the city gent backed off quickly. ‘She doesn’t deserve to live. Look what she did.’ He used the blade to point to his girlfriend’s twisted body. ‘Look!’

  ‘This is a matter for the authorities now,’ said the city gent. ‘It is not our place to administer justice.’

  ‘Yes. I know,’ said the boyfriend. ‘But you know what? I don’t care. I’m going to do it anyway.’

  Okay, that was enough. I placed the right words together in my mind and my bonds fell away, allowing me to stand up.

  ‘I tied those knots myself,’ said the city gent. ‘I’m very good at knots, how did you do that?’

  ‘Drop the knife,’ I said, but I could tell he wasn’t going to.

  He screamed and thrust it towards me. I pushed his arm aside and jabbed him in the throat, just hard enough. The knife fell from his grip and clattered to the floor of the carriage as he coughed, eyes bulging. His hands went to his neck as he staggered back into a seat.

  ‘You’ll be fine in a moment,’ I said, turning to the others. ‘Until then I’m going to see which one of you—’

  A magical spark—

  The hairs on the back of my neck stood up—

  Too late—

  ‘Everyone, just—’

  The lights went out. I stumbled into the black. A scream, then the carriage was flooded with light again.

  The boyfriend was dead.

  Slumped in his seat, throat torn out, eyes wide with surprise.

  ‘Oh, Jesus Christ!’ cried the city gent, hands to his mouth, face pale.

  The lights spluttered again—

  Black—

  They lit up again and the passed out drunk was on the floor, his chest ripped open, his heart sat beside him.

  ‘Stop!’ I said. ‘No more!’

  I pulled the magic towards me, boiling with fury, and thrust both of my hands out. The magic surged from each, taking hold of the mother and the city gent, lifting them off their feet and pinning them to each side of the carriage.

  ‘No more!’

  ‘Oh, God. Oh, Jesus Christ!’ cried the city gent.

  ‘Please don’t hurt me!’

  ‘Which one of you is it? Tell me! Stop hiding, you coward! Face me!’

  I blinked. And again. The blood draining from my face. It was suddenly very obvious ‘Oh…’ I said. ‘Oh.’

  I lowered my hands and the mother and the city gent stumbled forward, released.

  ‘How... how did you do that?’ asked the gent.

  ‘She’s a demon!’ screamed the mother. ‘A demon!’

  The mother…

  How could I have overlooked something so obvious?

  Six of us had entered the carriage.

  ‘Where’s the girl?’ I asked.

  ‘The girl?’ said the city gent. ‘You murdered her earlier, or did you forget already?’ He pointed past me, to the corpse of the girlfriend.

  ‘No,’ I replied. ‘The other girl. The child.’

  ‘Child?’ he asked, absolutely perplexed.

  I turned to the mother. ‘Your daughter. You walked from the platform and onto this carriage with a daughter. Where is she?’

  The mother looked at me, confused… because of course…

  ‘Daughter? I don’t have a daughter.’

  I’d been stupid and I’d been slow. Again.

  There had been no daughter; no little girl trailing at her mother’s side. I’d seen her and dismissed it. Overlooked it. Concentrated on the adults.

  Stupid.

  The hairs on my neck prickled again and then there she was, the little girl, charging at me from where she’d been sat quietly all this time. The thalang’s concealment magic must have been working full-throttle to hide itself from me, telling me to ignore it. Telling us all to ignore the little girl. To not see her over there, quietly watching and waiting.

  She tore into the city gent and the mother, their blood spray painting the carriage as their bodies whirled and collapsed, dead at my feet. The young girl, the monster, turned to me.


  ‘You’re not very good at this, are you?’ she said, and smiled, her mouth a mess of jagged, yellowed teeth.

  She sank them into the passed out drunk’s throat and ripped his windpipe out clean.

  7

  I was running, my feet crunching the loose gravel of the tunnel floor, heart thudding faster and faster.

  Back in the train carriage I’d thrown everything I had at the thalang as it bounded around inside, its body transforming from its disguise into the grey, long-limbed beast it truly was. At the height of the battle I’d tossed a spell that narrowly missed the creature and blew a hole through the side of the carriage. It had used the opening as an escape hatch, leaping out and twitching away into the black.

  I was chasing it now, and I could hear the thing ahead of me. It wouldn’t get away. I wouldn’t allow it. I was leaving behind a carriage full of corpses, their blood criss-crossing my face and body, and their deaths were on my hands. My entire reason for existing was to take down creatures that would harm the innocent — to stop them hurting normals and Uncanny alike. And now six people who had crossed my path were dead. Families, friends, partners would all soon get the news, and their lives would crumble.

  Some might never recover.

  And all because I’d been slow and stupid. Bad at my job. A failure.

  I couldn’t let any more people die. I wouldn’t. This had to end before the thing made it back into the world and left another body on my patch.

  If I made it out of this I knew I would have to remember them. All of them. See their faces in my mind’s eye every time I stepped out of the London Coven with a job to do. Even the passed out drunk, who I never exchanged a single word with. Who fell asleep and never woke up.

  All of them.

  I would remember, and the memory of them would keep me sharp. Remind me that I couldn’t let any more people fall because of my stupidity.

  The tunnel opened up: a station.

  It was dusty and dark; clearly a station that hadn’t been used in some time. One that had been dropped from the route and allowed to fall into disrepair. There were several of these “ghost stations” across London. Vagrants set up home in some of them. Rats in others. I had a feeling that something else altogether had chosen this place as its den.