‘And ask her about where she’s been. How she got here. One of Harry’s people, they were talking about chasing a girl, they were after her for her abilities. Something about teleporting.’
Karina blinked.
‘Could it be her? That would explain how she got here.’
‘That’s powerful magic. It’s dangerous to even attempt it.’
‘But could she do it?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Then you need to ask her.’
It made sense, Amanda thought. Was that where Steph had been the past year? Running and hiding from Harry and his crew, with no one to turn to? Being afraid and alone all this time could take its toll.
Karina was staring out through the trees in the direction that Steph had gone, her mind most likely travelling the same path.
‘So what now?’ asked Amanda.
The woman gave her a look, not understanding.
‘I get the impression you’re not going to kill me,’ Amanda hazarded. ‘And you can’t just keep me hostage. Believe me, that’ll be way too much effort for you.’
‘Are you still going to try to kill me?’
That was the question, wasn’t it? Amanda had resolved to do whatever it took to keep her daughter safe, but until now she’d only had one option. Now, having seen Steph again, it felt like she’d been given a second choice, a second chance. With two people who knew magic on her side, maybe she could find a different way. A better way. The Amanda Fucking Coleman way.
‘Feels like things have moved on a bit from there, doesn’t it? I never wanted to kill you. I just want my daughter safe.’
‘So you won’t kill me if we help you escape too.’
‘I’m saying maybe we can help each other.’
‘Why should I trust you?’
‘You can’t really, but what else have you got? I really didn’t want to kill you. But sometimes you don’t have much of a choice. Especially in a place like this. Now, you must have a plan. What is it?’
Karina sighed, her head sagging between her hands. ‘I want to get a message out. There are people on the mainland, private people, they wouldn’t trust Steph if she just showed up. But if I sent them a letter to warn them, I think they’d take her in. Give her somewhere safe to stay.’
‘I thought she said there was no going back? That she was stuck here with us. You think she’s lying.’
‘I used to think I could tell. But now… but she won’t say where she’s been or how she got here. I have a feeling she can go back, whenever she wants, but she can’t take me with her and she has nowhere else to go. So it’s up to me to work that out for her. Give her somewhere to feel safe. You’ll notice the difference, I saw it last night. She has this air about her, always looking over her shoulder, like she’s being chased.’
‘You need to find out how she did it. Maybe we can figure something out. We could all be out of here.’
‘You don’t think I’ve asked?’ Karina sighed, staring out into the trees, back in the direction of the prison. ‘And I can’t leave here. I’ve done enough damage to the pro-magic cause. If I was to escape and word got out, this place would be done. I can’t leave these people to that.’
‘OK. So I help you get a message out. How do we do that?’
‘It might be best if I showed you.’
Getting to her feet, Karina urged Amanda to do the same, leading her off through the trees towards the beach.
Out of the hollow, Amanda grew nervous, looking in every direction for a patrol. But Karina seemed unperturbed, striding through the woods like she owned them. Amanda tried to follow her example, wondering what made these two women so confident that they wouldn’t be caught. They had survived this long, she supposed, which was no mean feat in itself.
It didn’t take them long to reach their destination.
Jutting out from the sand was a jet-black tooth of rock, inscribed with runes. The power from it made the very air throb.
‘This is one of the curse wards,’ explained Karina. ‘There are hundreds on the island, keeping the storm from coming in and sweeping the place clean again. This one’s one of the more obvious. They come in all shapes and sizes. But this is one of the keystones to the whole,’ she waved a hand like she was polishing the island, ‘net. Get me the right tools and I think I can… let’s call it hack… the runes. I can tap into where the curse and anti-curse clash, make a message out of it at a frequency I know my people will hear. It won’t be perfect, far from it, but it should do the trick.’
‘You really think that’ll work?’
‘If you have any better ideas, I’m open to them.’
‘And where would I find these tools?’
‘Your new friend, Bohdan. Everyone knows he’s into cursed items. He’ll have some.’
Karina thought back to the amulet he’d made, the one he’d strung around Duncan’s neck.
‘Stealing from him’s going to be a tall order.’
‘And killing me wasn’t?’
‘Fair point.’
They began to head back to the hollow.
‘So what do I get?’
‘This scryball, you have.’ Karina slipped it out of her pocket, rolling it to the crease of her palm. ‘Do you need it right now?’
‘I need to contact him at sundown tonight.’
‘Maybe there’s a way me and Steph can look at it, try to see who is on the other end. Once we know that, maybe there’s a way to stop him.’
Amanda’s chest twisted at the first feeling of hope she’d had in a long time. ‘That would be good.’
There was still no sign of Steph in the hollow, ahead. But the moment they were through the ring of warded trees, there she was, looking agitated.
Some kind of hidey-hole, Amanda realised. That’s what those wards did, hid them from view, maybe from magic as well. She thought of how the search had been pulled to the opposite side of the island, how they didn’t know they were chasing two women rather than one. This was how they’d avoided the search parties so far; a system of boltholes with Steph pulling the guards in all the wrong directions. Pretty smart. But how long could it last?
The young woman seemed agitated. Her eyes were filled with urgency.
‘Where have you been?’ she demanded. ‘I was about to come looking for you.’
‘We were making a plan,’ said Karina. ‘And I’ll remind you that you stormed off first. But we’ve decided to help each other.’
Steph’s eyes bugged in her head. ‘She tries to kill you and now you’re going to help her?’
‘I can get you stuff you need,’ said Amanda. ‘Like I said, none of it was personal. I’ve got no problem turning in the direction of a better offer.’
‘You can’t do this,’ Steph talked as though Amanda hadn’t even spoken. ‘She’ll say anything to get out of this. I just saw the prison. They’re getting ready to hunt for us again, I think I heard the dogs.’
‘They’ll know I’m missing by now,’ said Amanda. ‘I’m going to have some explaining to do.’
‘And what’s to stop her just telling them about this place? What if they make a better offer? They’ll find us in minutes.’
‘Then move,’ Amanda shrugged. ‘Far from here. Make a new place to hide. We can arrange somewhere else to meet. I get that you can’t trust me. But you don’t have much of a choice. They’ll catch you, eventually. Or you’ll starve.’
‘I’ve been stealing us food,’ said Steph. ‘We’re fine.’
‘If your plan is just to hide out here for ever, then you’re going to get caught. Sooner or later, you’re going to have to take a risk. Better the devil you know, right?’
Steph scowled.
Chapter Fourteen
Amanda walked fast, through the trees, telling herself she was hurrying to get back to the prison and not to flee the women she was leaving behind.
As much as she’d tried to hide it after the initial shock, seeing Steph again rattled her. She had never thought the
ir paths would cross again.
That wasn’t to say she hadn’t thought about her. The time they had spent together, in the moment, had felt like a lifetime. In retrospect, it had been a blur, one hot, tight-packed moment of extreme stress and release that had left deep impressions on the pair of them. She barely remembered their train ride back after the job had been completed. The girl pale, feverish and always shivering, her hands bandaged thickly with whatever they’d found. They’d clung to one another, two women caught in an internal storm, while the drivers had worked in shifts around them.
Amanda had been aware enough to recognise that they had both been in shock at the time, but that knowledge was little help. Leaving the girl had been a dick move.
Now all of that guilt she had carried these past two years had appeared again, made flesh in that angry girl. The look in her eyes had reached right into Amanda’s chest, resonating with something that had long been lodged there.
She didn’t blame Steph for the way she looked at her, part of Amanda almost welcomed it. But she was here now and everything had changed, there was some glimmer of hope, a small light shining in this bleak situation. Amanda wanted so much to find out what that light was.
She didn’t know how long she had been unconscious and she hadn’t wanted to ask. She was no expert to be guessing by the position of the sun in its overcast sky, but she thought it was early morning now. Her head throbbed and her clothes were still damp from the ocean. She was going to have a hell of a time explaining where she’d been.
She was beginning to put together a suite of lies to offer when she encountered the guards. She was halfway between the pier and the village when the growl of one of the jeeps began to grow. Another few moments and she spotted one speeding up the road towards her. There were two guards in the front, batons at the ready.
She kept her hands where they could be seen, trying not to look guilty or panicked.
The guards were out of the car the moment it screeched to a stop, the pair coming fast and hard.
‘It’s OK,’ she said. ‘I’m co-operating.’
Whether they heard her or not, she couldn’t say. She made sure to repeat herself over and over as they handled her to the ground, first onto her front and then, once they had her sufficiently pinned, one of the guards keeping her down with magical force, they rolled her over to slip on the restraining gloves.
Once they had her secured, they frogmarched her to the car. It was only then that she saw Drummond waiting for her, talking into his radio from the back seat, the door hanging open.
He was looking at her, blind to her damp clothes, the dirt on her trousers and her arms. Right now, she was just another irritant.
‘Bringing her over now,’ he finished, setting the radio back in his lap. ‘Knew you were going to be trouble. From the moment I laid eyes on you. I’ve got an eye for crazy women. Can spot them a mile off.’
The guards pushed her into the seat beside him.
She stared at the road. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see Drummond watching her, waiting for her to respond.
‘You managed to piss everyone off.’ With a sigh, he slapped the car’s roof and the vehicle lurched to life, heading down the slope towards the coast.
‘Where are we going?’ asked Amanda, turning in her seat. They were swinging away from the prison, back on the wind of tarmac down the slope towards the pier.
‘Warden’s orders,’ Drummond shrugged. ‘Boat coming in.’
Which only meant one thing.
‘I’ve been doing everything he asked,’ she insisted. ‘Fuck, I’ve been here barely two days. What was he expecting? I can’t just be expected to—’
‘Sit back and calm down,’ he slapped his baton to her chest, pressing her back in her seat. ‘Let’s not make this harder than it is.’
‘Just let me speak to him. I just want a few minutes. You don’t need to do this.’
‘We’ll see…’
Amanda was fighting tears, fighting the scream in her head that was preventing her from thinking. She clamped her lower lip to stop it from trembling. So close, she’d been so close.
Her breath grew short, fingers trying to close into fists, squeezing at the restricting plastic that encased her hands.
The sound of a boat engine.
She almost threw up when the car squeaked to a stop.
‘Come on.’
Amanda jerked like Drummond’s hands had an electric charge when he tried to take her arm.
‘Get the fuck off me,’ she spat. ‘I’m not going. Get me the warden, get me the fucking warden.’
She started to kick at him, hoping to catch his knee and managing to scrape a heel down his shin.
Drummond tried to bring the baton up to her throat, but she caught it on the brace that held her hands together. Pushing it away, she kicked at him again, trying to push him from the car and managing only to lever herself out onto the road.
The two guards were already closing in, weaving their hexes.
‘Just fucking try it,’ she heard herself shouting, knowing that between the dirt and her fear she must look like a cornered animal. ‘Just fucking try it. I don’t care any more. I’ve had enough. Kill me right here. I’m ready.’
‘What on earth is going on?’
Fitzackley’s voice cut through the air. He was striding towards them from the pier. In his polished shoes, pressed suit and long coat, he looked like he’d just stepped out of a London cab.
‘You don’t need to do this,’ Amanda said. ‘I’m trying. I am. Whatever you…’
‘What are you talking…’ Fitzackley looked back towards the pier, the boat, realisation dawning. ‘The boat is for me, not you.’
‘But…’ She looked to Drummond and saw the mischief in his eyes. He’d been toying with her. ‘You fucking arsehole.’ She moved to barge into him, but the guards held her in place. ‘You absolute fucking arsehole.’
‘Seemed like she could do with remembering her place,’ Drummond explained.
‘I do not have time for your games. Make sure that the boat is ready to launch. All of you.’
Drummond slunk away.
‘Where have you been?’ Fitzackley snarled. ‘There were screams last night. I had reports. Then you and Mallory were nowhere to be found.’
Close to, she could see that he was dark around the eyes. Beneath the polish, she recognised a man close to the edge, his cologne not quite succeeding in covering up the scent of his sweat. A slight nick under his jaw told her he’d cut himself shaving.
‘Tell me you found her,’ he demanded. ‘If you have any idea where she is, you will tell me now.’
‘I was out looking. I thought I had an idea—’
Fitzackley cut her off by taking a swing at her. It was slow and clumsy, easy enough for Amanda to lean back and let his hand sail past her.
The man’s face twisted in fury. ‘If you don’t want to end up on that boat, then you had better give me something. One word is all it would take. Is that what you want?’
‘No. Of course not.’
‘Westminster and the shareholders have begun to ask questions. They know something is going on here. If the search for Khurana doesn’t end soon, they’ll start to investigate and this will all come crashing down. Your life and the lives of everyone on this place depend on what I tell them. Give me a reason not to suspect that you’ve done the stupid thing and sided with Harry. He’s up to something, isn’t he? He’s concocted some idiotic plan. Is he in league with her? Or has he just shat where he lives and killed her. Because if she’s dead…’
‘She’s not dead. Mallory was divining. She fought back, but I saw where she was. I went after her, but it was too late. I didn’t want to come back empty-handed.’
‘Yet here you are.’ Fitzackley grabbed her manacles, shaking them roughly. ‘This is all a game to you people. If Harry thinks that he can play me… What’s he been saying?’
‘He wants out,’ said Amanda, lowering her voice as
Drummond returned. ‘Of course he does. He’s trying to get something over you, some kind of leverage so he can walk away clean. Get off the island and guarantee you won’t come after him. I know he’s up to something, but he won’t let me near it. He knows you talk to me. What else was he going to think? I need more time.’
‘What about his men? Do they know? If I were to remove him…’
‘They’d follow him. Kill him and you’ll have to kill them all. Maybe not Zoe, but the men, none of them is a leader and they’re all loyal.’
‘I want them. Split them up. Divide them. Make them yours. Do that and you can take his place. You have until I get back this evening. I’ll wait no longer.’
‘You’re not serious. How the fuck do you expect me to do that?’
‘Like your life depends on it.’
Turning away, Fitzackley headed out onto the pier, to the boat, leaving Amanda to the care of Drummond and the guards. ‘Talk to them too, Daniel,’ he called over his shoulder. ‘Let Church know where I’m going. When I get back, I expect to see Khurana on this deck waiting for me or the whole island will pay the forfeit.’
‘Sir,’ acknowledged the deputy, his face twisting in disgust.
The engine gunned as Fitzackley stepped on board. The boat began to pull away.
‘Fuck,’ growled Drummond, turning to his guards. ‘He shuts the island down that’s all our fucking jobs. Think there’s a lot of opportunities out there for what we do? Get out there and start patrolling. Find that fucking bitch. She’s not here when he gets back, we’re all on the fucking breadline.’
One of the guards pointed up the slope. There was the unmistakable shape of Harry heading towards them, Andre and Zoe in tow. They must have been watching, waiting for the warden to be far enough out to sea that he wouldn’t spot them.
Amanda, forgotten, stood back as Drummond stormed past to meet them. She watched as the deputy hit the trio like a battering ram. Scattering them in all directions, he shoved Harry hard in the chest with the flat of his baton.
The big man fell back, shock turning quickly to anger. The wind stole whatever words Drummond hurled at him.
Zoe and Andre kept their distance, glancing towards the guards as they climbed back into their car. Zoe locked eyes with Amanda and came over.
Strange Ways Page 20