Winter Rising: an Urban Fantasy Novel (Coldharbour Chronicles Book 1)

by Richard Amos

I walked the line of machines, all gleaming glass and chrome, playing their little instrumental tunes of joy and fun, really selling the name of this establishment, hiding their true nature of longing to drain every single coin from your pocket and generate a sense of failure among their willing victims.

  “This one,” I said.

  Inside the machine was a blue teddy bear with pretty blue eyes. It stood out amongst the other brown and green ones, and I took it as a sign that tonight was the night. The blue teddy bear would be mine after so many years of failure. I could never win at these things, and it seriously got on my nerves. Years of heartache at the ridiculous waste of money, the frustration at never being able to land a single bloody thing had made me declare a war I could never win.

  But now was the time to flippin’ well triumph!

  I would take that blue teddy bear back to the mansion and display it proudly in my room, a symbol of man triumphing over machine, an emblem of success.

  Yeah, I had issues.

  “The blue one?” Dean wondered.

  “Yeah,” I replied.

  “It’s ugly.”

  “Ugly it may be, but also unique among the others. It’s the one.”

  “Your voice sounded creepy then.”

  “A result of years of defeat.”

  “Battle worn?”

  “Yep. But now I’m battle born, ready to smite my enemy.”

  “Who knew a hideous blue teddy bear could make you sound like a character from a dodgy fantasy movie.”

  I turned to face him. “Do I?”

  “A little bit.”

  Whatever. He didn’t understand. I returned my attention to the machine. This was it. There was some shit about to go down. I took a deep breath and retrieved a pound coin from my pocket. It was thirty pence a go, so I fished for a twenty pence coin. Four attempts. I rubbed the coins together, shook them in my hands as if there were dice, and then inserted them into the slot.

  Yellow buttons on the control panel lit up and a tiny screen flashed a red digital number four at me.

  “I can do this.”

  “Good luck,” Dean said.

  Seven pounds down, I was still without the blue teddy bear.

  “Fuck it!”

  “Maybe you should try another machine,” Dean suggested.

  “No. It has to be that bastard blue bear.” Sweat was running down my face, a bubble of rage forming in my chest. I didn’t need more money, I needed a big friggin’ hammer to smash the glass and retrieve the prize. Then I’d rip that poxy claw out and have a burning ceremony on the beach, condemning it to the hottest corners of Hell!

  “Would you like me to try?”

  I rubbed the back of my neck. “No. I have to do this.”

  “You’re crap at it.”

  “I will triumph,” I said through clenched teeth.

  “You’ll implode if you don’t take a break. Come on, let me have a go.”

  “Ha!” I heard it, so did half the rest of the building, making me look like a complete nutter. I really wasn’t of sound mind. “Fine, have a go. You’ll be in my boat soon enough. Get ready to be defeated by this bloody thing.”

  I stepped aside for Dean.

  Dean got the blue bear on his first attempt.

  What the fuck?

  “This ain’t happening,” I said. “How the hell did you do that?”

  Dean shrugged. “I don’t know. Never used one before.”

  “What? Bollocks! No way was that rookie’s luck!”

  “I guess it was.” Dean winked. “Here you go.” He held out the teddy bear.

  Rather than ride the indignant train and spit in the face of a gift, I accepted the bear. “Thank you.” Man, was I confused. This was supposed to be my night to succeed. Instead, I was the one who’d had the gift won for them. Again. Michael always won at these things and handed over the prize at me waiting all helpless on the sidelines. No, it wasn’t romantic, as my sister liked to say, it was bloody annoying.

  “You’re way too competitive sometimes …”

  Michael’s voice came from nowhere, filling my head with its beautiful baritone. I looked at the smiling Dean and then down at the teddy bear. Dean had won me a teddy bear. Dean, not Michael. That was Dean standing there, not my husband.

  My legs were suddenly unsteady. “I need some air.”

  “Okay,” Dean said. He put a hand on my back, and I stumbled at his touch. “Whoa! You all right?”

  “I’m okay.” I steadied myself. “It’s just so hot in here.”

  “Come on, let’s patrol some more. Be good to be out in the air.”

  It felt better to be outside, walking the path alongside the beach. I liked the sea air, the coolness, the being away from walls. Air was good. I didn’t really understand the episode I’d just had in the arcade and just wanted to let it slide away.

  “Thanks for the teddy bear,” I said.

  “No worries,” Dean said. “I felt like I needed to step in.”

  “Sorry, I get a little carried away.”

  “Don’t apologize. Nothing wrong with being competitive.”

  “There is when you act like a crazy person.”

  “Well, yeah, there is that.”

  I chuckled and then stopped walking. The cold was suddenly invasive. “Blimey! It’s freezing. Should’ve brought my hat.” I wrapped my coat tighter around me.

  “You haven’t even got a scarf on,” Dean said.

  “Observant.”

  Dean unwrapped his thick black scarf. “Have mine.”

  His gesture surprised me. “No, that’s yours.”

  “Really, I insist.” Dean put the scarf over my head and carefully wrapped it around me. “There. Snug as a bug in a rug.”

  Dean smiled that unnerving smile of his, his face and his body just that little bit too close to me. There it was, that push and pull of unease. I wanted to step away from him, but couldn’t move, didn’t want to move. I needed to bloody move! He placed a hand on my right shoulder. There were no words, just a smiling Dean and a very uncomfortable me with his hot breath on my cheek.

  Just step away and carry on walking. Talk about the weather, burgers … Anything!

  “Claire loves the beach,” Dean said. With the name of his girlfriend back in Brighton, the strange spell was broken.

  I stepped away.

  “She does?” My head was heavy.

  “Yep, a real sun worshipper. She hates the beach in winter, prefers the blazing hot variety. She wants to go on holiday to Australia. Probably been now.”

  Girlfriend … Forgotten all about him …

  Did you used to win blue teddy bears for your girlfriend and offer up your scarf?

  Shut the fuck up, inner voice! So what if he does?

  Damn this bollocks!

  “I wanted to go there,” I said. “With Michael. We were planning on it, but it was never meant to be, I guess.”

  He didn’t say anything.

  Confusion, that’s all it was—stupid confusion over a stupid blue teddy bear and a scarf.

  Needaline …

  Silence fell between us once more as we continued on with our patrol. A gathering of people were laughing outside Silver Chalice Bingo, smoking cigarettes. I checked the time on my phone, opening a text from Greg. I replied, letting him know all was good.

  It was 20:12 according to the clock on my screen.

  “It’s been nice,” Dean said out of nowhere. “Hanging out like this.”

  Okay then. “Yeah, it was.”

  “You got to have a fish finger sandwich, which is still weird.”

  I was relieved everything had moved on so suddenly. Doing this patrol in silence would’ve driven me crazy. I didn’t want to feel all this crap around Dean, just to have things be as easy as it was with Greg and Naomi. Hopefully we were on the road to being cool. Was that too much to ask? It wasn’t even him. All of this was on me for making things uncomfortable. This wasn’t me. I was the cool model. Michael had flustered me, s
ure, but that was him. Dean wasn’t him, would never be him, and I didn’t want him to be him. Dean Tseng was a friend, my guardian. It was his hotness, that was all. I was only human.

  “Jake?” His voice pulled me back from my inner-rambling.

  “Er, yeah? Sorry. What’s up?”

  “Just checking you were still with us.” He smiled, and I couldn’t help mirroring it with one of my own.

  “Zoned out a bit.”

  “Wanna check some of the alleyways?”

  We did, finding nothing. For such a busy night, things sure were quiet. I was expecting at least one attack by now. In fact, I was craving one. Anything, really, even another hyena. My power was thrumming, making the hairs on my arms stand up as if static energy was making them dance. I was … hungry. Did that make me some sort of sicko? Part of me didn’t actually give a fuck and that was a little alarming. Back and forth went the tennis ball, never landing, stuck in the constant to and throw that was my brain.

  “This ain’t right.” I watched the shadows, waiting for something to pull an unsuspecting victim into the dark. Nothing. On the beach, there was nothing, not even a hint of my sparks going off. “Maybe this is too obvious. We’re probably being watched, beasts ready for us to give up and go home.”

  “That could be the case.”

  “So, then what’s the point of this if we’re just wasting our time?”

  “This isn’t a waste of time.”

  “I feel like I’m letting every one of these people down, leaving them like deer to starving lions.”

  “I hate nature programs, so depressing.”

  “Hate seeing Bambi get mangled.” I folded my arms. “We’re hypocrites. We just ate animals.”

  “I know, but watching them is like a movie, because you start rooting for the little herbivore running from the big nasty. Edge of your seat stuff. You so want the little guy to win. I shout at the damned screen more than I do movies because this is real life. That deer or whatever is really gonna get it if he doesn’t get away. Sometimes he does by the skin of his … fur. But often it doesn’t and it all ends in blood or watching his body get swallowed up into the dislocated jaws of a snake.”

  That one took me a moment to respond to. “And I thought I had issues.”

  “Come on, you don’t agree?”

  “The little guy could be a she.”

  “Don’t get all technical about it. Bambi’s in my head, I was going with him.”

  “Not a good reference point when thinking about death by scary predator.”

  His stare was intense. “You don’t feel any of that stuff when you watch them?”

  “I don’t really watch them.”

  His brow furrowed. “What? How could you not?”

  “I’m not big on that stuff.”

  “Really? Everyone loves a good old David Attenborough series.”

  “I do like his work.”

  “See.”

  “But I only catch it now and then.”

  “I have a goal for you,” he said. “When all this is over, you need to spend a week with every single David Attenborough series you can get your hands on. Trust me, it’ll change your life. In fact, I’ll be right there with you.”

  With me? “My goal is to go somewhere that isn’t in the UK. Sorry, don’t think I’ll have time to be glued to a screen.”

  “Ah, you’re no fun. Go traveling after.”

  I chuckled at his tone, all husky with a hint of mischief. “Hmmm, the big wide world or a sofa with you watching nature documentaries …”

  He winked. “There’s only one sweet choice there, mate.”

  “I’ll get back to you on that one.”

  He laughed, clapping me on the back. “Let’s go back to the car, drive up and down a bit. My balls are shriveling up.”

  “Mine too. Good plan.”

  I was about to rub my hands together to keep warm when they started to buzz, and I was suddenly on high alert. Out of the corner of my eye, motion on the sand halted my trek toward the car. I turned toward the movement.

  “You see something, Jake?”

  “I don’t …” Sparks came to life as the small shape approached. “Is that a—”

  “Cat,” Dean finished.

  The cat came closer, striding into the light of the street. It was pure black with huge, green eyes. It meowed at me, and the sparks spat.

  A beast cat. “It looks so normal.”

  “Don’t let that deceive you,” Dean said. “Get ready for the pounce.”

  But the cat meowed again and ran off into the darkness. The sparks petered out.

  What the hell?

  Chapter 25

  It was 04:00 when I woke up with the ease of turning on a light switch. It was dark, maybe even a little too dark, and the central heating did little to stop the bite of the cold permeating my room, running down my naked chest as icy fingers.

  I slid out of bed and went to the bathroom, taking a piss and splashing some water on my face. Every part of me was alert. My bones thrummed.

  Meowing? Was that meowing I heard?

  I quickly got dressed and went downstairs. The dining room was hollow, empty of life, a dream dining room. Was I dreaming?

  Meowing again, so faint, yet detectable.

  Outside …

  I was coming to the conclusion that my power was sort of a tour guide for me, giving me little hints as to what to do. A pawn on a chess board came to mind, at the command of a player, me the piece to do the dirty work.

  There it was again, that keening of a cat.

  “Beast cat,” I said aloud, making my way across the dining room. If it was outside, I needed to be as well. Outside I would go.

  “Jake?”

  I jumped at Greg’s voice.

  “What’re you doing up?” he asked, strolling into the kitchen fully dressed for the day.

  “Could say the same for you.”

  He smiled. “Sleep’s a luxury we can’t always afford, eh? Been going through the paperwork on the lung stealer cases.”

  “How’s it going?”

  “Nowhere, mate.”

  “Can you hear that?”

  “What?”

  “Meowing?”

  His posture straightened, his whole body going into battle mode. “Yeah, I hear it. Cat … wait. Like you saw earlier?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Come on,” he said.

  Stepping outside the front door, my sparks burst to life. The meowing was louder out here.

  “Over there,” I said.

  The black cat was pacing back and forth outside the gates, wards keeping it out. I broke into a run to get closer, Greg hot on my heels.

  When we arrived at the gate, the cat stopped pacing, sat down and continued to meow.

  “I don’t get it,” I said. “Doesn’t look like much of a potential assassin.”

  “Means nothing. If the back leg claws get into you, that’ll hurt like a bastard. Anyway, might be a disguise.”

  Right. Rule number one, don’t be fooled by the cat. Beneath the fur and the purr was probably something more akin to an ogre ready to stomp the hell out of me with hairy feet smeared with the blood of previous victims.

  Yeah, the wards were my best friends.

  “What do you want?” I said.

  It meowed some more and started to change. Here came the ogre. It’s back rippled, its legs swelled. The little cat started to bloat, the fur falling away to reveal human skin. Paws became hands and feet, head a human face. I had to blink several times to comprehend the transformation, like watching CGI in real life.

  When it was over, a human man stood there, naked. His skin was gold, sun-kissed, his hair a long, matted blond—the surfer look. He still had his cat’s eyes, oval and green.

  “You must come,” he said.

  “What just happened?” I said.

  “I have to hide my true form,” he said. His eyes went from cat to human, changing from green to blue. “They have stru
ck with their assassin.”

  “Who?”

  “Come with me and see what they do.” He started to sob. “Please. They killed her.”

  “You’re a beast,” I said.

  He continued to sob.

  I looked at Greg. “Please tell me I’m dreaming.”

  “You’re not dreaming, mate.”

  “Please …” the man said. “Please. They killed her as punishment for not giving them what they want.”

  His sobbing reminded me of moments when I just couldn’t deal. “Killed who?”

  He fell to his knees so hard that I winced. “Please …”

  “You’re a beast,” I said again. “I have to—”

  “Kill me,” he said, looking up at me, tears streaming down his face. “Yes. That is your destiny. But I have not hurt a single human. I’ve never wanted to. I didn’t want this realm, not until I met her.”

  “Who?”

  “My love … my dear love.” His head lowered again. “Please, you have to come, you have to see before it’s too late to stop her.”

  “Her?”

  “Please!”

  “What do we do, Greg?”

  “This is some sort of trap.”

  I waited, but there was no voice giving me a clue. Oh, sure, give the obvious one about a cat meowing outside, but don’t help at this crossroads!

  Beasts were the enemy, pure and simple. Yet here we were, facing one begging for help with what I wasn’t quite sure—only that someone he loved had been killed. I know they’re tricksters, so this was some good acting. Still, there was something raw about his pain.

  “I don’t know what to do.”

  “I’ll wake the others,” Greg said. “We need everyone on this.”

  “Time is running out. They’ll know soon. Be too late to kill her!”

  Instantly, I thought of Purple. “Her?”

  He winced. “The purple one let’s her do her dirty work. She sliced her open and ripped out her lungs. She’ll be waiting for me. We can stop her.”

  A tremor went through me. “Greg …”

  “I know.”

  “We have to go with him. We have to go now.”

  The man was back on his feet, suddenly animated. “Yes! Yes! Now! Before she runs. She’ll kill again, she’ll take away someone else’s love.”

  Just like the white eye guy. “Greg …”

  “I’ll get the car,” Greg said, dashing off.