Jake’s eyebrows lifted. ‘Handsome?’
‘Shut up, Jake. I don’t know why you chose me, what you even wanted from me, but you can forget it. Find someone more gullible next time.’
Jake was nodding. Again, he seemed impressed. ‘Very clever.’
‘I said shut up.’ Sadie pulled her handbag up to her shoulder in a gesture of self-righteousness, then left them standing there as if struggling to remember their lines.
She stomped down the stairs, then came to a halt on the scorched pavement. Even after the stifling air of the lawyer’s office, the heat outside was a cruel surprise. She reached into her handbag for her sunglasses and her anger caught up with her.
She had been so stupid, she could see that now. How easily she had allowed herself to forget being sensible and hope that life might somehow have secrets, that it might excite her.
Sadie turned south and collided with a man in a long military coat.
Even before she saw him properly, she knew it was the man she had seen outside the Army Surplus shop. A foul stench rose off him and choked the dry air from the back of her throat. Base and sulphurous, it was the same rotten-egg stink the sea breeze chased in from the dog beach, from a thick reef of rotting seaweed.
The smell was the first thing Sadie noticed. The next thing was the man’s skin—his flesh was puckered and blue, in parts translucent, with dark twitching veins. At that point, she might have whimpered. She saw his salt-knotted hair, his scratched, grubby sunglasses, his stained, ill-fitting clothes. Then, most frightening of all, she saw his shoes.
The man took a step closer and his soles squelched.
Sadie thought of Mr Freeman’s final words.
Watch out for men with wet shoes.
She tried to turn and run, but found herself going nowhere. She watched, transfixed, as the man opened his mouth and began to sing.
7
WET SHOES
It was music, Sadie was sure, but she’d never heard such sweet sounds before. There were voices working as all the instruments of an orchestra, summoned up from this greasy man’s throat. At times, he might have been serenading softly in her ear, at other times singing from some immeasurable distance.
He was heading for the harbour and she was following. She could feel the searing sun, but she couldn’t move into the shade. People passed and she could do nothing more than smile. Her voice was trapped somewhere behind her heart, somewhere she couldn’t reach it. Her feet lifted and fell, moved by someone else, listening to the song that called from everywhere and nowhere, calling her to the sea.
They crossed the railway tracks. The toe of Sadie’s left boot snagged on a rail and twisted her ankle, but that wasn’t enough to stop her. She wanted to stop and she didn’t want to stop. Wanted to scream and wanted only to walk on towards the water.
There were few people around. The markets in the old wharf sheds were closed and the harbour workers were busy elsewhere. Across the deep green water, cranes lifted containers from ship to crowded dockyard.
The man in the overcoat walked a metre ahead of her. His head was bent forward and his shoulders hunched, as if he was attempting to hide from the sun. Sadie didn’t ever see him move; he was simply somewhere else whenever she blinked.
Soon they would be at the wharf’s edge and she knew what would happen then. She would follow the man into the water. Part of her wanted it, knew that it was right. Whenever she doubted it, the music was there to reassure her. Everything is as it should be. A wonderful place awaits.
Sadie held her breath. It was all she could do to stop herself from being drawn onwards. If she could hold her breath long enough, maybe she would just drop where she was, unconscious but safe. Yet each time she tried, her lungs would panic at the last instant and pull her back.
Four more steps. Three. Two. The toes of her boots were on the raised wooden edge of the pier. The man stood by, watching, as she teetered. She stared down at the dark green water. Low waves washed against the barnacled timber posts. Sun glittered irresistibly.
And then she was leaning over the edge. She wanted to scream and to flail, but her arms stayed by her sides, and her tongue was still behind tight lips. Welcome home, the music told her. She could smell the fresh salt, feel the cool salve of the water on her skin. She fell, almost gladly.
A strong hand snatched at her dress and pulled her back, swinging her around onto the pier. It was Jake, shining with sweat, breathless and snarling. He wasn’t looking at her, even as he let go. He glared at the man who had lured her to a drowning, the man with wet shoes. The man who was no longer singing.
‘She has nothing to do with this,’ Jake spat.
The man smiled. His teeth were jagged shards, his voice a salty gargle. ‘She brought you to the water.’
Then three figures shot up, one after another from the harbour depths. They rose ten metres in the air, trailing saltwater, and then dropped onto the wharf. Their hair was knotted and foul and their faces warped and discoloured. They wore tight-fitting, tarnished armour: chain-mail vests stained with verdigris, and heavy bracelets on bony wrists. Helmets sculpted into sinister scowls masked their eyes, exaggerating their brows into curled horns. One carried a double-bladed axe, one had a sword strung from his rotting leather belt, and the third gripped a trident.
Sadie sat on the pier, dazed and squinting at the figures. Jake’s body was rigid. He held a fist to his chest, and his other hand stretched towards the figure that was shrugging off his overcoat.
‘This is a warning,’ Jake said. ‘I’m not looking for a fight. Leave now and I won’t hurt you.’
One of the new arrivals stepped forward and pulled his sword from his belt. The blade was dull and mottled. He took a swing at Jake.
Sadie tried to cry out a warning, but it snagged at the back of her throat. Her body was slowly waking up and returning to her, but she felt heavy and sluggish.
Jake barely moved. The sword sliced towards his left arm and he stepped aside. It swung again and he caught the blade neatly between his palms.
‘I don’t want to fight you,’ he said.
The man bared ragged teeth and howled, spraying Jake with salt water and spittle. Still gripping the blade, Jake pulled the sword and its wielder forward in a sharp movement. The figure stumbled and fell. Jake raised his left arm and brought his elbow down twice, hard, on the man’s spine. There was a swift, almost casual, violence to the movement. Sadie flinched at the crack of breaking bone. The man’s limp body fell heavily to the ground.
Another of the men was already on Jake’s back. Jake was thrown to his knees. He yelped in pain, then grabbed the wrists that were either side of his neck and lifted his attacker up and over his head, bringing him down headfirst with another horrible crack. The man writhed a moment, then his tense frame slackened and the trident clattered on the tarmac.
The last man was taller than the others, and broader. A thick, dark beard obscured much of his square face. He paced around Jake, blue fingers tight around the handle of his axe.
Then the bearded man stopped. He let his axe fall and his shoulders relax. For a moment, Sadie thought the fight was over. The man’s head went back, as if to laugh, then his chin dropped forwards sharply and he vomited a fierce jet of water that blasted Jake three metres back. Instantly, the man was over him, lifting his axe high while Jake spluttered.
The weapon swung down, sparking on bitumen, as Jake slid through the man’s legs and leapt to his feet. His foot lashed out at his attacker’s legs and the man went down. Then Jake was on the man’s back, a bloodied knee in his spine and a hand holding his hair. Almost gleefully, he cracked the man’s forehead against the edge of the pier. Once, twice, three times. There was blood. Four times.
‘Stop! Please, stop!’
Sadie had found her voice. She was on her feet, directly behind
Jake.
‘Stop. Seriously, stop. You’ll kill him.’
Jake’s eyes were wild, hungry. But Sadie’s protest stalled him. He looked up and across at the man in the overcoat and sunglasses. ‘Consider this just retaliation,’ he said.
‘Just?’ The man lifted his sunglasses, revealing a pair of soft-boiled eyes. ‘What would we know of justice?’
Jake stood up, leaving the large man unconscious on the wharf. His chin fell and he stared, suddenly appalled. Any argument went out of him. ‘There’s nothing I can do about that. I’m sorry.’
‘She is waiting for you. In the water. Always, she waits for you. For you to bring her what is hers. How much longer must she wait?’
‘Lysandra knows I can never give it to her. Open that box and she’ll bring down the sky. This world will burn.’
‘If that is the price of life, then let the sky fall.’ His bile-coloured lips peeled back on glassy teeth. And then the man and his unconscious compatriots were gone, leaving nothing on the pier but bloody water, a crumpled overcoat and a pair of scratched sunglasses.
Jake stood on the edge of the wharf. He was fighting for breath. His knuckles were torn, his knees gashed and his shirt ripped. One of his shoes had been lost over the edge of the pier. He looked to the water, as if wondering where it had gone. Sadie could see the scattered sunlight reflected in his eyes. But there was something else there too, something dark.
‘Who were they?’ She barely got the words out. She had seen fights before, outside beachfront pubs. Drunken idiots shoving each other about until friend or bouncer pulled them apart. But this was different.
‘We call them the Drowners,’ said Jake, ‘although it’s a name I never liked. They were like you once, but they dreamed of being Gods. Now they’re damned to spend eternity in the depths.’
‘Like you?’
‘I’m sorry?’
Sadie was feeling woozy, but she held onto the conversation. ‘You said like you, like me. As if you’re something else.’
Turning back from the water, Jake straightened his shoulders, bracing himself. ‘You asked what was so special about me.’ His firm gaze met Sadie’s. ‘I’m an envoy, from the Gods.’
‘Yeah right.’
‘The Gods were never that good at dealing with mortals. We bridge the gap. I live in a human body, but I’m immortal.’
‘Shut up.’
‘It’s the truth.’
‘But you’ve got a whole new body. Where did that come from?’
‘Immortality is the Gods’ gift to their servants.’
‘Don’t be stupid. There are no Gods.’
‘Yes there are. They once walked among you. If the relic is opened, they’ll come back. And they’ll be angry.’
‘The relic.’ Sadie felt her sarcasm fade. She remembered holding the box in the attic that first evening at Ocean Street and hearing her name called from nowhere. ‘You said there was something inside it. Something dangerous.’
Jake nodded. ‘A demon,’ he said simply. ‘One with the power to bring any dream to life. A power humanity was never supposed to have. And the Gods will do anything to keep it from you.’
‘Okay. You had a demon, in a box, in your house.’
‘For safekeeping. The demon is a weapon, its power a threat to the Gods’ sovereignty. If any human dare use it again, the Gods won’t take any risks. They’ll destroy you. All seven billion of you.’
He was so earnest, so insistent, it was hard for Sadie to keep him at a sane distance. She shook her head, as if to shake off his words. ‘No. This isn’t true. None of it.’
‘It’s why I’ve been hiding away here. The relic has to stay hidden. For all our sakes.’
‘No, no. This is crazy. You’re crazy.’
‘It’s a lot to take in, I understand. We’ll take a cab back to Ocean Street.’
That was the last thing she wanted. She found herself staring at the blood on the pier, and then on Jake’s knuckles. There was blood on her dress, she realised. She didn’t know whose it was. Wiping at the stain, she saw her hands were shaking. She wanted to go home, to apologise to Grandpa and have Nan put the kettle on. She wanted to wrap herself up and forget the last few days.
‘No, no. No no no. You can have the house back. Everything.’
Jake raised an eyebrow. ‘I was under the impression you thought we were trying to con you.’
‘I don’t care,’ Sadie said, trying to hold her voice firm. ‘I’ll sign whatever you want me to. I don’t want anything to do with this.’
‘As you wish.’
They walked together back to Frobisher’s office. Jake was lopsided with his one bare foot. Every few steps he would look across at Sadie and frown. Occasionally, he touched her elbow or shoulder, but she shrugged him off. She wanted to push him out of her life and to be glad he was gone.
The door at the top of the office stairs was open. Maybe she knew then that something was wrong, that her old life was gone forever.
Frobisher was face down on the carpet with one hand outstretched, as if trying to drag himself to safety. There was a ragged, bloodied hole in the right shoulder of his jacket and another, tidier one, in the back of his head. Dark blood pooled around him.
Jake ran into the back room, but found it empty. Hurrying back, he said something, but Sadie wasn’t listening. She was trying not to look at the lawyer’s face.
He was dead. Really dead. Half an hour ago she had been arguing with him, now there was a hole in his head. A hole in his head. Dead.
Sadie thought of another scene. A scene she was sure she didn’t even remember: lights flashing red and blue in bitumen puddles, someone she didn’t know whispering reassurance, a blue blanket around her shoulders, consciousness coming in fits and starts. And there, in the front seat, with the broken glass, then on a stretcher, then being zipped forever into nothingness—
Sadie’s throat tightened. She thought she was going to faint.
Jake slapped her. She blinked and slapped him back. That flash of anger felt good.
‘Listen,’ he said, not even wincing. ‘You need to be sensible.’
From the street outside, the sounds of a siren and car doors slamming.
‘Who did this?’ Sadie hardly recognised her own voice.
‘It’s not important. Sadie—’
‘He was your lawyer. Your friend. He’s dead and you’re not even surprised.’
‘Sadie—’
A terrible thought occurred to her. ‘I left you alone with him. You did this.’
‘Don’t be absurd. Why would I kill the one man who can help me?’ There were footsteps on the stairs. Two, maybe three, pairs of heavy boots. Jake spoke quickly. ‘That’ll be the police. Tell them you just walked in. They can’t find me here. Not now.’ He leaned in, without warning, and kissed the cheek he had just slapped. ‘You’ll be fine. I’ll find you.’
Then he was at the window, pulling it open and kicking away the flywire.
‘You can’t just leave,’ Sadie hissed. ‘He’s dead.’
Without another word, Jake followed the flyscreen down to the car park. It was at least a four-metre drop, but he hit the ground and was gone.
8
BLOOD
First through the door was the same policeman Sadie had seen the night the old man died. He strode in, ignoring her, and went straight to the body. His lips were pursed and he looked tired, as if he was thinking about having to tidy up.
‘You make the call?’ he asked.
‘I’m sorry?’
‘Did you phone the police?’ A young constable had appeared at the top of the stairs. She had sandy hair, chafed cheeks and thick, rimless glasses. ‘I’m Constable Williams, this is Sergeant Bradbury. Did you call us?’
‘No. I
only just got here,’ Sadie said, a little too quickly. She was trying not to look at the lawyer’s body, but felt her eyes pulled to his wounds. She wondered if that made her look guilty. She wondered if she felt guilty. ‘Is he dead?’
Bradbury snorted. ‘Big hole in the back of his head. Yeah, I’d say he’s dead.’
Sadie nodded, too dazed to respond to the snark in his voice. Trying to look anywhere but the body, she noticed a photograph on the lawyer’s desk. He probably had a wife, she thought. Maybe a family. Soon, someone would receive a phone call, not knowing someone had pulled a thread that would unravel their world.
Williams put her hand on Sadie’s shoulder. ‘It must have been a shock,’ she said. ‘What were you doing here?’
‘Oh.’ Sadie couldn’t tell them, not really. She saw her explanations play out and backed away from them, embarrassed. ‘It was a family thing. Nothing important.’
Bradbury glared at her. ‘Is that blood on your dress?’
Sadie had forgotten the blood and had to fight the urge to clap a hand down over it. She wondered if she should tell them about Jake, about the fight at the harbour. And how she had been hypnotised by a man with wet shoes. No, she would only sound crazy.
‘Maybe it’s sauce,’ she mumbled. It sounded like a terrible excuse.
‘Seen you before, haven’t I?’
‘She was at the hospital,’ Williams put in. ‘A couple of nights back. That’s right, isn’t it?’
Sadie nodded. Was that enough to incriminate her? Two dead men inside a week?
‘Right.’ Bradbury nodded. ‘The old man had been mugged. You said they swam out to sea.’
‘They did.’
‘You make a habit of hanging around crime scenes?’
‘No, I just—’ No matter what Sadie said, she sounded guilty. She would need to give them the truth, or some of it, at least. ‘Actually, that’s why I’m here. Mr Freeman left me something in his will. Frobisher,’ she pointed to the man on the floor, ‘was his lawyer.’
Fire in the Sea Page 5
