by Rebecca Hall
SYMPHONY OF THE CURSED
BOOK III
THE ANGELS ARE BACK
The long hidden heart of the Twisted Curse had been found, concealed in a realm that no angel can enter, where magic runs wild and time is just another direction. The Twisted Curse is the key to ending the Eternity War and it can only be broken by someone willing to traverse the depths of Faerie.
Unfortunately, Mitch has other things on his mind. For reasons that currently escape him he’s going to university, making regular trips to the Netherworld and hunting down a demon. The Academy might have prepared him for university but Netherworlds and demons were inexplicably left off the curriculum, not to mention curse breaking.
Then the Angels return, and this time they’re hunting his best friend.
Instrument of Chaos is the conclusion of the Symphony of the Cursed trilogy, as Mitch, Amelie and Nikola arrive at university in Dunedin.
Cover artwork by Alison Buck based on feather photo by KPG_Payless/shutterstock.com
Review comments for Book I, Instrument of Peace:
“a refreshingly modern yet old-fashioned fantasy novel with an emphasis on entertainment … [that] has clearly been written out of love for storytelling” –Risingshadow
“engrossing”, “atmospheric”, “a really good read”, “engaging characters and storyline” – Reader comments
Book II, Instrument of War:
“A clever update to a magical school story with a twist.”
Christopher Nuttall, bestselling author of Schooled in Magic
Visit bit.ly/InstrumentOfChaos
Elsewhen Press
Also by Rebecca Hall
Symphony of the Cursed
Book I: Instrument of Peace
Book II: Instrument of War
Instrument of Chaos
First published in Great Britain by Elsewhen Press, 2018
An imprint of Alnpete Limited
Copyright © Rebecca Hall, 2017. All rights reserved
The right of Rebecca Hall to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, telepathic, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the copyright owner.
Use of the Ringbearer font by kind permission of the designer, Peter Klassen.
Elsewhen Press, PO Box 757, Dartford, Kent DA2 7TQ
www.elsewhen.co.uk
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 978-1-911409-27-4 Print edition
ISBN 978-1-911409-37-3 eBook edition
Condition of Sale
This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
This book is copyright under the Berne Convention.
Elsewhen Press & Planet-Clock Design are trademarks of Alnpete Limited
Converted to eBook format by Elsewhen Press
This book is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places, educational institutions and corporations are either a product of the author’s fertile imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual organisations, universities, places or people (living, dead, fae, teratos or angelic) is purely coincidental.
Google is a trademark of Google Inc.; L&P and Lemon and Paeroa are trademarks of Coca-Cola Amatil (N.Z.) Limited; Macca/McDonalds are trademarks of McDonald’s International Property Company, Ltd.; New World is a trademark of New World Supermarkets Limited; One Square Meal is a trademark of Sapporo Holdings Ltd.; The Two Dollar Shop is a trademark of The $2 Shop Limited; The Warehouse is a trademark of The Warehouse Limited. Use of trademarks has not been authorised, sponsored, or otherwise approved by the trademark owners.
To Nic
Contents
PART ONE
New Beginnings
The Netherworld
Eighteen
The Morning After
A Drop to Drink
Blackmail
Demons
Improvisation
Cullum
PART TWO
Toast and Custard
Demonic Secrets
Awakening
Guests
Something Like Normality
Sibling Rivalry
PART THREE
Questions and Confusion
Aroha
Birthday Surprises
Goodbye
When the World Comes Crashing Down
Shaken
PART FOUR
Deep Faerie
Unspoken Words
Hidden Paths
The Heart of Faerie
To Make an End
I Love You
PART ONE
New Beginnings
“You’re going to wear a hole in the carpet,” Nikola said from the doorway.
“Would it kill you to knock?” Mitch asked, spinning to face his best friend and continuing to pace. The door was wide open and he’d had a clear view of the hallway but that was beside the point. No one could move as silently as Nikola.
“It could happen,” Nikola replied with a shrug. “I’ve seen doors made out of Whipwood before.”
Mitch shuddered; he’d gone through a maze made of Whipwood once and the experience was not one that he cared to repeat. One shouldn’t have to worry about been eaten by trees. Especially not trees that had been cut down.
“I swear that carpet is about to fray,” Nikola said. He picked his way through the clothes strewn across the floor and sat on the desk chair.
“Like you’re any better,” Mitch retorted, “you wore a path around a freaking lake.” He finally stopped pacing and glared at Nikola who just shrugged.
“You liked that path,” he grinned and Mitch smiled back, remembering the tiny glade it had led to. “And the lake didn’t cost two thousand dollars.”
“Are you packed yet?”
“Err…” Mitch looked guiltily at his half-packed suitcase.
“Mitchell.”
“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Mitch asked. “I mean, it’s only been a few months and…”
“Worried you’re moving too fast?” Nikola asked when he trailed off. There were so many ands that he didn’t know where to begin. “You’ve only been dating Amelie for what? Nine months now. I hear that moving in together is a pretty big step.”
Mitch growled and threw a pair of socks at Nikola who snatched them out of the air.
“Good idea,” he said, “I hear it gets pretty cold in Dunedin in winter.”
Mitch groaned, Nikola could be utterly impossible at times and Mitch had never found a good way of dealing with him. The only consolation was that Nikola’s family seemed to have the same problem and they’d known him for eighteen years.
“You know that’s not what I meant,” Mitch said. Things with Amelie were great despite his sudden vampirification and she’d taken that remarkably well once he’d actually worked up the courage to tell her.
“Relax,” Nikola said. He tossed the socks into the suitcase and got up to hug Mitch, “we won’t let you eat anyone.” Mitch hugged him back tightly, once again relieved to find that Nikola wasn’t the slightest bit scared of him.
“Promise?”
“We worked it all out remember,” Nikola said, taking a half step back to look him in the eye. “You’re with me for half your papers a
nd Amelie for the other half. Everything will be fine.”
“You can’t always be there,” Mitch said. He gave it a week before Nikola was bedridden with a cold, “what if something happens?”
“Nothing will happen,” Nikola said firmly. He smiled and squeezed Mitch’s shoulder reassuringly.
“But… Sieg told me how things work if I hurt someone…”
“You won’t,” Nikola said, “you could never hurt anyone.”
“I might,” Mitch replied, “I killed Ms Saris.” He shuddered; his memories of that night were mercifully hazy and Ms Saris had been a kidnapper and angel, but she’d still been dead when he pulled his fangs out of her throat.
“I have faith in you,” Nikola said. Mitch felt himself relax a little; Amelie probably would have tried to tell him that she’d deserved it, or that it was only a natural consequence of Halloween. She might even have said that it was what the Dance with the Dead, and the subsequent feast, were for. Nikola just had faith in him and disappointing Nikola was almost as unthinkable as hurting him.
“Are you ready to finish packing now?” Nikola asked.
“I guess,” Mitch sighed. It wasn’t too late. He could still go to Sieg and beg to be allowed to stay here another six months, or even a year. He wasn’t ready to be around people yet, he wasn’t sure he would ever be ready. Sieg would probably just say that was all the more reason to go through with it. He had helped Mitch enrol.
“I still think this is a bad idea,” he added, opening a drawer and tossing its contents in the general direction of the suitcase.
“Trusting you to pack is a bad idea,” Nikola replied, turfing everything out and neatly folding his clothes before packing them properly. “This is a dreadful one but you don’t see me whining about it.”
“Sorry,” Mitch mumbled. Unlike him Nikola didn’t want to attend university at all but Amelie had wanted him to come with her, and his aunt and uncle had encouraged him to do the same. I want him there as well, whispered a small, guilty voice at the back of Mitch’s mind. Even knowing that his best friend would be happier in Faerie, Mitch still wanted Nikola to come to university with him.
“It’s fine,” Nikola said, he had an exceedingly flexible definition of fine that didn’t seem to have any correspondence with the one found in the dictionary. “It shouldn’t be as hard on me as school was, even Gawain thinks that I’ll be able to cope.”
Mitch rifled through the rest of his drawers and then scoured the floordrobe for stray clothing, tossing everything at the suitcase though the few things that were in danger of actually going in veered to the side and joined the pile Nikola was steadily packing rather more neatly.
“Haven’t you ever heard of folding your washing?” Nikola asked.
“That’s what you’re for Dobby,” Mitch tossed him a pair of socks, confident that Nikola wouldn’t just take them and vanish.
“Whatever you say Harry.”
Mitch groaned, he hated his middle name, and Nikola grinned at him.
“Alright, alright,” Mitch sat opposite him and started folding clothes and between the two of them it wasn’t long before the pile was gone and the suitcase overflowing.
“Do you want to take anything else?” Nikola asked.
“Just my books,” Mitch said. They were sitting on the desk, neatly wrapped in silken coverings. Mitch had no intention of putting them in his suitcase.
“Alarm clock?” Nikola asked.
“I thought you couldn’t do moving objects,” Mitch said, retrieving it from the bedside table. On the other hand it was indestructible. He’d been throwing it at walls for years and it still woke him up with ear splitting screeching every morning just fine and he knew from personal experience that walls were hard.
“I can’t do them reliably,” Nikola said, taking the clock from him, “and in this case there’s a simple solution.” He removed the battery and dropped the clock into the suitcase.
“Are you sure I’m ready for university?” Mitch asked.
“No,” Nikola smirked. Together they wrestled the suitcase closed and then it vanished, whisked away to their new home by Nikola’s spacial manipulation magic.
Mitch shook his head, he didn’t know anyone else who could do that; it wouldn’t even be an officially recognised speciality until someone could replicate it, but Nikola made it look as easy as lighting a candle.
“I guess I’m really doing this then,” Mitch said, gazing around the now empty room.
“Don’t worry,” Nikola said, “I’ll look after you.”
“You’re usually the one who needs looking after,” Mitch said. Nikola needed his brain rewired on a regular basis and his immune system was lousy. “You look good,” he added. Mitch wasn’t sure when he’d last seen Nikola look this good. His skin was lightly tanned from the summer sun instead of flushed or red and irritated, he wasn’t trembling or flinching away from the sunlight; he didn’t even look tired.
“It’s all Gawain’s doing,” Nikola said. “Having a few months to do everything properly helped.”
Nikola smiled at him. “Are you ready to go or do you still need to say goodbye to Sieg?”
“We have to find him first,” Mitch said, picking up his small bundle of books and hugging them to his chest. They were the most valuable things he owned and not just because each of the rare first editions cost thousands of dollars.
“He’s fishing in the pond,” Nikola said, trailing him down the hall.
“I’m still not convinced there are fish in that thing,” Mitch said, blinking in the bright sunlight. He should have kept his sunglasses with him instead of letting Nikola pack them.
“You could just ask,” Nikola said. “I’ll wait for you by the gates.” He waved lazily and set off down the drive while Mitch veered towards a pond that was so large it didn’t really deserve the title of ornamental anymore. It even had a little bridge across it upon which Sieg was sitting, his stout legs dangling just above the water’s surface.
“Ready to go then?” Sieg asked when Mitch’s shadow fell across the water.
“I guess,” Mitch said. “Are you–”
“Yes,” Sieg said before he could finish, “I am sure this is a good idea. Waiting will not make this any easier and your friends will keep you out of trouble.”
Well, Nikola would but… “You have met Amelie,” Mitch said.
Sieg chuckled, “You’re starting university, a certain amount of trouble is expected.”
“I don’t think anyone is expecting a drunken vampire at a keg party,” Mitch said, himself included. Nikola reacted badly to alcohol and would probably break out in a rash if Mitch breathed it all over him. He couldn’t even tolerate alcohol-based soaps and perfumes.
“I doubt they’ll get you into that kind of trouble,” Sieg said, “Changelings are very good at keeping the magical hidden.”
“I guess they would be,” Mitch said. The Unseelie Court killed any it found. There was an arrangement in place to protect Amelie and Nikola during the winter months but they still insisted that it was safer not to attract attention.
“Thank you for everything.”
“Thank you for not breaking anymore of my furniture,” Sieg replied, reeling in his line and casting it out again, the bait apparently untouched.
“Sorry,” Mitch stared at his feet. Sieg had given him a home and he’d responded by breaking a coffee table and denting the wall.
Sieg shrugged, “It was ugly. Anyway walls can be repaired and tables replaced, doing the same for your parents would have been a great deal more difficult.”
“Yeah, but the coffee table was useful.”
Sieg laughed. “Come visit when you get some time off and stop scaring away my fish, I’ll never catch anything with you looming over the pond like that.”
“Are there actually any fish to catch?” Mitch asked, he hadn’t seen even a hint of movement in the water.
“We’ll never know if you keep looming,” Sieg replied.
“Bye,” Mitch said, “and thanks for everything.” They waved to each other and Sieg went back to his fishing while Mitch returned to Nikola.
“Ready to go?” Nikola asked, not raising his head from the grass he was lying on.
“Ready when you are,” Mitch said, offering him a hand up. “You really shouldn’t be lying there you know.”
“Worried that I’ll muss my clothes?”
“Worried that you’ll set off your allergies,” Mitch said, hauling him to his feet.
“I swear, you’re as bad as Gawain sometimes.” Nikola didn’t let go, instead he tightened his grip and abruptly they were somewhere else.
“You could have warned me,” Mitch said, disoriented by the transition from brightly lit, deserted countryside to dim, cramped hallway. He leaned against the wall, blinking rapidly as he tried to adjust to the decreased light.
“You said you were ready,” Nikola grinned at him.
“Why the hallway?”
“No external windows,” Nikola replied. “The backyard is fenced in but you never know when someone might decide to take a peek.”
“Right,” Mitch said, shaking his head slightly. That was not a mental image he needed. He was definitely making sure the curtains were closed when he got ready for bed tonight.
“Amelie’s at the end of the hall,” Nikola pointed, “I’m on the left and you’re on the right.”
“So I have to go past you to get to her?” Mitch asked.
Nikola shrugged, “I have the ensuite.”
“What did you do? Flip a coin?”
“It’s easier this way,” Nikola shrugged, “you don’t have to be as careful about which products you use and I can spend the night throwing up without having to worry about whether someone else needs to use the bathroom.”
