The Cold Kiss of Death

‘Yes!’ she cried, clapping her hands together, a big beam of a smile on her face, then, just as I was congratulating myself on an easy success, she dashed past me back into Witch Wilcox’s flat.

I sighed and followed her through the jagged opening into a short, windowless corridor. The metallic scent of old blood hit me, pricking goosebumps over my skin, and I hurried past two closed doors and stumbled into a living room.

Except the ‘living’ part was now a misnomer.

Daylight filtered around the half-drawn curtains. All the furniture was pushed back against the walls and a multitude of dirty-white candles had burnt down to misshapen blobs of wax. The air in the room was thick and heavy, as if something unseen lurked there. A shudder crawled down my spine. In the centre of the room was a large expanse of blue plastic with a circle marked out in red sand. Inside the circle lay a naked body, diminished by old age.

I took a careful step forward and then another until the toes of my trainers were just short of the red sand. The stench of blood mixed with the sour smell of sulphur and death-expelled bodily excretions hit the back of my throat, making me gag. A gaping wound ran from just under the breastbone to the crotch. I wasn’t going to check, but I was betting the heart and other internal organs had been removed.

Witch Wilcox wasn’t going to be campaigning to get me evicted any more.

I clenched my fists; the silver pebble buzzed anxiously against my palm. I might not have liked the old woman or her obsessive paranoia, but all of me wished she was still around to complain. At least then she wouldn’t be dead.

‘Can we go and see Cecily now?’ Angel appeared from a door on the other side of the room and skipped around the outside of the circle. Her dress pulled itself in and away, even though she didn’t seem to notice anything odd—but then, she’d seen it before. She stopped in front of me and smiled happily. ‘I want to show her my new books.’ She held up half-a-dozen children’s comics: Cinderella smiled merrily at me from the cover of her Christmas Spectacular, complete with rainbow twinkling lights, meringue bride’s dress, and silver halo. Now I knew where Angel’s outfit came from.

I opened my mouth to ask something, but stopped as Angel looked over my shoulder, her pale-gold eyes widening, her pupils dilating in fear, her bottom lip quivering.

‘Genevieve.’ The woman’s dulcet voice made me flinch as I recognised it. ‘I had hoped you two wouldn’t meet until much later, but que sera, sera.’

Fuck, she was just who I didn’t need right now!

I grabbed Angel’s hand, dropped Gria

Typical Gria

And no doubt Angel was safely back in the Fair Lands before I’d even had time to blink.

I turned, still a little blinded by the dazzle, and said calmly, ‘Hello, Ha

‘Figured you’d turn up sooner or later after seeing your sorcerer’s handiwork here,’ I said drily.

‘I’m impressed, Genevieve.’ Her perfectly outlined lips smiled, but the expression in her coffee-brown eyes was more about smiting me on the spot. ‘I wasn’t aware you were capable of Transportation spells.’

I shrugged. ‘You learn something new every day.’

‘Ah. Well, it must be time for your next lesson then.’ She stepped aside. ‘Joseph?’

Malik’s doctor friend stepped into the room, his owl-like eyes blinking rapidly. He lifted his arm and aimed a gun straight at me...

Oh shit.

... and a sharp pain pricked my chest. I looked down to see a steel dart embedded in the swell of my left breast, then there were three darts, then too many to count as the world fractured around me into tiny unrecognisable pieces and I felt myself falling ...

Chapter Twenty-Eight

‘Is she dead, Doctor?’ I heard Ha

I frowned as I recognised the place from Ha

How lucky could I get?

Of course, I’d be even luckier if I could figure a way off the table, preferably before the sacrifice bit happened.

I slowly winked at the doctor.

He ignored me.

I stuck my tongue out at him.

Still nothing.

I realised he really couldn’t see me; I was having some out-of-body experience. Panic started bubbling and I pushed it down. Panicking wasn’t going to help.

‘Doctor?’ Ha

‘No, not quite.’ He adjusted his mask and looked at something next to him. ‘There’s still some brain activity.’

I followed his gaze. He’d got me hooked up to his machines again. One showed a faint green line winging across its screen, the other, the heart monitor maybe—I checked; yep, more electrodes stuck to my chest—wasn’t flashing up any numbers.

Damn. My heart wasn’t beating. And nothing hurt any more.

Not a good sign.

It was begi

‘Hurry it along, Doctor, we’re on a tight schedule here,’ Ha

I turned towards her and she didn’t notice; apparently seeing ghosts or spirits wasn’t one of her sorcerous powers. She stood almost within touching distance, dressed in a floor-sweeping black velvet robe, heavily embroidered in red with symbols I didn’t recognise and tied at the throat with matching red cord that ended in foot-long tassels. The outfit had to be her sorcerer’s robe, but it looked more like she’d dressed herself up in a pair of swanky curtains.

‘I’m going as quickly as I can,’ Joseph said, his voice filled with nervous tension. ‘Her metabolism is faster and more resistant than a human’s. And I have to balance out the morphine with the tranquilliser, they’re working against—’

‘Oh, do shut up and get on with it,’ she snapped. ‘Time is of the essence here.’

‘Why don’t you just stab the sidhe? It would be quicker,’ said another voice from somewhere near my feet.

Stab me?Wasn’t the doctor trying to save me?

I sat bolt upright, staring at the plump, curly-haired woman who was standing there. She popped a liquorice torpedo into her mouth from the white bag she was holding. Her robe was identical to Ha