Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Find out what happens next in Fia and Alexander’s story…
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
About the author
For the friends who encouraged me
Chapter One
Fia
T he fox cried out again. It was calling to her, Fia was sure of it. It scratched at a rubbish bag propped up against a Japanese restaurant, the rotting contents spilling out onto the pavement. She let out a quiet whistle, the sound barely more than air between her lips. This was not a good place to linger at night. Some tourists posed for a photograph beside the window of a bookshop—a shop she’d much rather avoid, especially after dark.
Congratulations, you’ve officially lost it. It wasn’t the first animal she could understand, far from it, but that this particular fox was talking to Fia made her question her own desperation.
“Occult. Bookshop. Magic,” read the glass above the window. The Atlantis bookshop was a favourite hangout for local witch covens, and the fox had led her right to it.
“I won’t go in,” Fia hissed quietly through her teeth. “Who knows who I’ll meet in there?”
Two glassy black eyes looked up at her from the rubbish, holding her gaze for a moment. A soft glow from the British Museum lit up the street beyond them as the tourists walked away. The fox glanced left and right before trotting over to her.
“The way back is through,” it said, inclining its head back to the bookshop. And then it blinked and scurried away.
“Wait!” Fia thrust herself forward with as much force as she could muster, throwing herself around the street corner after the fox. “Wait.” She bolted down the street and almost ran headfirst into the startled tourists who’d posed outside the bookshop just moments before.
“Don’t just run away!” She almost screamed the words. Up ahead, a bushy tail disappeared through black metal railings into a leafy park.
“It’s okay,” Fia said, counting her breaths. “You’re just casually shouting at a fox, chasing it through the streets of London in the middle of the night. It’s totally fine. No one’s watching you, anyway.”
No one would believe her, either. It was incredible, really, how many animals there were in London. She’d never appreciated just how many until she could hear them. Since returning to Earth from the parallel world of Ohinyan, the chatter of animals seemed to follow her everywhere.
Fia spun the little bird charm on her bracelet between her fingertips. She could chase after the fox. Or she could wait for him. She had a feeling he’d be back. “The way back is through,” she repeated, as she made her way back to her flat, and for the first time in weeks felt her heart flutter with hope.
On too many days, she’d wondered if she’d dreamt it. Had any of it been real? But then there were tangible things, like her strange clothes, the witch knot Noor had tied around her wrist, and the golden cuff Alexander had given her. The talking to animals. It had all happened, every moment of it. And Fia knew, since her first day back on Earth, alone, that she had to get back to Ohinyan. To Alexander, and to her friends—coming back to Earth had been a mistake, despite the darkness that waited for her in Ohinyan.
A roadworks vehicle lumbered noisily down the road, and a worker leaned out of the passenger door to drop cones whilst another up ahead unfolded a diversion sign. A cyclist with a headlamp whizzed by. None of them knew there was a whole other world out there, right alongside this one.
Nobody knew about the witches and the angels and the Makya and the dying sun. Well, except for the witches here, that was. Fia was certain they’d been witches, the first night she’d seen them gathering in Highgate Cemetery, blocking the way to the above-ground catacombs housing the only way she knew back into Ohinyan. Did they know, too? Or were they just gathering in Highgate because covens had gathered there for decades now? It seemed like too much of a coincidence.
A crow had told her to be wary as she’d watched from a distance, hidden behind a crumbling grave the first night after Alexander carried her back from Ohinyan. The crow had met her every night that she went back to the cemetery; each time more witches gathered, but the crow said little else. She’d only been back on Earth for a month—not that she’d been in Ohinyan much longer—but her ability to talk to animals, to understand them had developed to the point that there was little she didn’t comprehend now.
A fire engine rushed past down the residential road, blue lights flashing but no sirens. And then another, followed by a police car. A few moments later an ambulance passed, its wailing sirens echoing long after it was out of sight. The rows of houses ended and Fia walked along the pavement beside a wider, open expanse of road, bridged by a rusty, flaking overpass covered in glow-in-the-dark graffiti.
What if it was a motorbike? Curiosity urged her feet forwards, and she jogged to the top of the overpass for a better view of the emergency vehicles. The shadow of flames flickered against a concrete junction, thick black smoke, nothing but a shadow in the night sky. She could hear the firefighters shouting instructions to each other. Another London traffic accident. She considered going to look, just for a moment, to see if there had been a motorbike involved, one like her sister’s. But Fia thought better of it.
And then she saw it in the glow of streetlamps—wings outstretched as it prepared itself for a perfect landing, dropping itself neatly down near the chaos and out of sight. An angel. Of course it was. Fia ran back to the road, barely looking left and right before crossing to a small patch of grass separating four lanes of traffic. A few cars began to back up, and beyond the overpass a group of drunken football fans sang, “England!” over and over.
Fia could see the wreckage clearly now. Two burning cars surrounded by firefighters and loaded ambulances racing off to the nearest hospital. Under the harsh glow of the streetlamps, they looked awkwardly animated, the lighting exaggerating their movements. The smell of petrol and melted tarmac carried to her on the breeze. Police officers in bright yellow jackets taped off the area so no vehicles or pedestrians could pass through. One spoke quietly into her radio as she watched firefighters tackling the car fire. Someone hadn’t made it out.
Fia tried to push away the memory of her sister lying still on a road not too different to this one, the sound of the ambulance sirens too far away to reach her in time.
The angel remained a few metres away from one of the cars. Fia knew he couldn’t get too close, but even from where she stood, she could see how the flames turned his umber skin iridescent.
“Stay back,” Fia called out, panic rising in her chest. Fire and angels did not mix well in her experience. The angel look
ed up and caught her gaze—golden eyes locked with hers. But Fia didn’t move. He turned his attention back to the burning car. His lips moved quickly; his arms outstretched. He pointed to the horizon, away from the wreckage.
Minutes passed. The firefighters extinguished the flames, and still the angel stood calmly beside the cars. Fia made her way closer to the police tape, slowly, so as not to draw any attention to herself after she’d just called out like a crazy person moments before. She didn’t look at the ambulances—she couldn’t bring herself to do it.
The angel had stopped whispering. He stood, arms folded, watching the firefighters. Fia looked on, and only now she was closer, could she make out the twisted mass of the two cars. There was no discernible beginning of one car or end of the other—they had simply melted into each other. And in the front seat of the car closest to her, the rescuers worked together to recover a body.
The angel stepped away from the wreckage and sat on a wall nearby, watching the firefighters as Fia approached. Her heart thundered in her chest with anticipation—this was the first angel she’d seen since returning to Earth.
“He didn’t want to come with me,” the angel said, his gaze fixed on the rescue attempt.
“I’m so sorry.” Fia brushed a hair from her face, her voice gentle. “Were there any others?”
Golden eyes met hers. He sighed, his tawny wings moving together with the rising and falling of his chest. “They were taken for healing, but I fear they will not make it. A mother and her two children.”
“Is that why he didn’t want to go with you?”
The angel nodded. “You can see me. There are few who can.”
“On Earth, maybe. You remind me of someone.” There was no doubting it. Even the shape of his face was the same. “General Jarl.”
“My father,” the angel scoffed. “How is it that an Earth girl knows the angels’ general and, stranger yet, is here to tell me so? Halvar.” He extended a hand.
“Fia. Fia Aldridge. I’m… a friend of Alexander’s. It’s a long story.”
“Is he here with you?” Halvar jumped down from the wall, searching left and right.
“No… no he isn’t.” Fia noticed two police officers pointing at her and quickly realised they couldn’t see Halvar. Of course they couldn’t. “Can we, um, can we walk and talk, maybe?” she asked, darting her eyes at the police officers.
Halvar flexed his wings as if he were considering her question. “A walk might lighten this heavy night. But,” he looked Fia up and down, “That’s a witch knot on your wrist, is it not?”
Fia held out both her hands. “From a friend. The Lady Noor.” She held out her other wrist. “And a cuff from Alexander, if that helps you to trust me.”
“More than a friend, then.” Halvar raised an eyebrow, a polite smile breaking across his face.
More than a friend. Much more than friend. Fia led the way to her flat. She kept her eyes to the pavement and tried not to move her hands as she spoke, so as not to draw further attention to herself, not that anyone was around at this hour. Halvar listened quietly to everything she had to say. To how she had fallen into the world of Ohinyan, how she’d been rescued by Alexander—leader of angels—and all that had followed.
A man in a dark hoodie turned the corner just ahead of them, his face concealed in shadows. Fia paused in her story, hoping the man hadn’t heard her. His hands were thrust deep into his pockets and he didn’t look up as they walked past. Halvar simply raised an eyebrow for Fia to continue.
She told him about Erebus, even though she was sure Halvar already knew about the ancient darkness and his attempts to return to Ohinyan. Fia left out the part about being able to hear the darkness, though. How she couldn’t help but wonder why she had been able to hear him, when her friends were unaffected by his whispers.
She was out of breath by the time she’d finished, and she’d still left out so much. How Ohinyan felt like home. How she’d left her friends behind because Erebus had got inside her head somehow. How being away from Alexander felt as if her heart had been ripped from her chest. How it ached.
Even in the middle of the night, Halvar looked every bit a magical being beside the looming shadows of her apartment block. He was brighter, somehow, and his wings pressed close to his back as he walked. Fia had almost forgotten what angel wings looked like. This close, she could make out flecks of orange amongst his pale brown feathers.
“You’ll come inside for a while, won’t you?” She grabbed Halvar by the wrist before he had a chance to refuse, tugging him towards her as she leapt up the steps to her flat.
He laughed. “For a short while. Much has happened to you, Fia.” He tucked his wings tightly behind himself as they entered the flat—it was small and Halvar was not. “But I fear neither Earth nor Ohinyan are safe anymore. We are all in danger.” He stood beside the kitchen island, careful not to knock anything over with his wings.
“All of us?” Fia kicked off her boots and ran them both some water from the tap. “Even you? I mean, I know Alexander asked some angels to stay here, but I thought it was safe, as long as you stayed?”
“Not all witches are like your friend, Noor. There are many here on Earth. Some good, some bad.” He drank the water Fia passed him, eyeing the coloured glass with a flicker of curiosity. “Angels have been disappearing, and I believe that witches are responsible.”
“Highgate!” Fia almost broke her glass, she slammed it on the counter so hard. “I knew they were at the window to Ohinyan for a reason.”
Halvar raised his eyebrows. “They’ve been congregating at all the windows accessible to them, as far as I can tell. But for what, I do not know. Our instructions were clear: to remain here and not to return to Ohinyan until we hear word from Alexander that it is safe to travel through the windows again. When the third sun shines brightly. Angels have been going missing almost daily, and with the witches waiting near the windows, I can only conclude that they are the cause.”
Fia paced the tiny living area of her flat. This was not how she’d wanted this meeting to go. Of course, she couldn’t just ask Halvar to take her back, to risk his life for her. But angels disappearing? Alexander had to know. He’d want to know, to do something.
“Halvar, I need to get back to Ohinyan. I can tell Alexander. I can get help.”
His wings flexed, and he marched over to the window, pushing it open into the cold night air. “Someone is dying not far from here.” He looked out, searching the street below.
It was his duty—the reason angels came to Earth—to help the dying, and Fia wouldn’t keep him from it. “Can you come back at dawn?”
“I can.” He was already half out the window. “See you then, Fia.” He glanced back over his shoulder before he took off, and she ran to the window just in time to see him flex his wings wide as he leapt into the air.
What if the witches get to Halvar, too? She should have considered it before letting him go. She huffed a quiet laugh. As if she’d have been able to convince him to stay.
Fia was too full of adrenaline to sleep. She tidied the flat as a few drops of rain fell outside, ready to leave it for a while. Forever, maybe. She looked around. There wasn’t anything she’d miss. She changed into black, fitted hiking trousers and a plain grey T-shirt. Over that she wore a dark green, loose-knit jumper, a very thin yarn, one that she hoped would help her to blend in more in Ohinyan. She fastened her heavy boots from Ohinyan and tucked her dagger neatly down the side. A blind man had gifted it to her before she’d returned to Earth. She hid her little pouch of witch stones in her clothes and finished it all off with a waterproof jacket that could be squashed into her backpack. If Halvar was coming, she was ready.
The thought of seeing Alexander again had her stomach in knots. He’d want to know what was happening to the angels on Earth. That was reason enough to go back, wasn’t it? Fia looked at the cuff on her wrist and shoved away the memory of their goodbye.
She pulled on her backpack, her bow and ar
rows slotted neatly across the back. It had been packed and ready since she’d returned to Earth. And there was something else that had her stomach turning over itself, too—she wasn’t sure how she was going to keep Erebus out, but she’d deal with that when she came to it.
Something screeched out in the car park but Fia saw no sign of the fox. He’d said the way back was through. Through the Atlantis bookshop? Was there really a window to Ohinyan in there, one that was still open? Halvar might know of an unguarded window, even if he couldn’t take her through—that was her decision.
If this was it, then it was time to pen a note to Jo, her only real friend on Earth. Jo had a key, so Fia knew whatever she left behind her friend would find come morning. She squashed the pang of guilt threatening to escape in the form of a written confession, a full and complete admission of everything that had happened—of why she’d disappeared without warning the day after her eighteenth birthday and reappeared just as randomly weeks later. She swallowed the lump rising in her throat. She’d told Jo she’d been on a Kenyan retreat and Jo had bought it—had even asked if Fia had brought her back a gift. A sorry excuse, but it at least accounted for the strange clothing and the odd weapons lying around her flat.
Fia scooped her hair up into a bun, puffing at an auburn strand that was too short to tie in. Jo would probably let herself in first thing in the morning, just as she had every morning since Fia had returned from Ohinyan. You’re a terrible friend to do this to her, Fia told herself. She’s been practically maternal since you’ve been back. She let out a quiet whistle. She deserves better.
Fia had lost her phone falling into Ohinyan and hadn’t bothered buying a new one. She’d had no need for one, except for now, with her hand resting over a blank page, she wished she had.
Hey, you, she scribbled on the notepad. Tears stung at the corners of her eyes and Fia pressed her palms into them. She was going to miss Jo. She’s all you’ve got left now. On Earth. She sucked in a breath at the thought and continued her note. I never thanked you properly, for teaching me how to fight. A skill that had gotten Fia out of trouble a few times and no doubt would again. My first day at Flow I saw you take out those guys twice your size and knew I wanted to be able to do that. Men always wanted to prove themselves when they found out a woman owned the gym, but Jo’s uncle had taught her everything she knew—a mix of martial arts—and Fia was confident she’d learnt from the best.
The Eternal Dusk (Daughter of the Phoenix Book Two) Page 1
