by Sue Tingey
The windows were all boarded up, so it was dark and gloomy inside – I did try the light switch, hoping for a miracle, but we were all out of those.
I left Jinx sitting on the bottom step of the staircase while I went up to investigate. I found a living room with a kitchenette; the sink was still there, but the water was turned off. There were two bedrooms, both stripped to bare floorboards, but there was an old mattress and sleeping bag in one, so someone had obviously been using it, sleeping rough, maybe, or getting down and dirty … the phrase ‘beggars can’t be choosers’ came to mind and vanished just as quickly: there was no way on earth I was going to sleep there! The very thought made my skin crawl.
By the makeshift bed was an old shoebox, an empty water bottle and a flame-blackened jam jar with a stub of a candle in it, which I appropriated.
Then I found the bathroom. I took one look and turned away, gagging. Some people were just plain disgusting.
I trudged back down the stairs: we had shelter from the rain and that was the sum of it – but there was nowhere else available, so it would have to do. I doubted Jinx would care; he didn’t care about anything very much any more – me included.
But Jinx was no longer on the bottom step where I’d left him. He wasn’t in the bar, either – then I noticed the trapdoor to the beer cellar was open, and shuddered. I really didn’t want to have to go down there into the pitch-black. I hesitated at the top and called, ‘Jinx, are you down there?’
Silence.
I crouched down and peered into the blackness. ‘Jinx? Hello?’
More silence.
‘Bloody man,’ I muttered. I stood up and looked at my candle in its jar. Without matches it was as useless as the disconnected electricity. There was nothing around me, but I remembered the shoebox next to the mattress – maybe I’d get lucky.
I hurried back upstairs to the bedroom and examined the box. I took a deep breath and slowly exhaled. I really didn’t want to go poking around in someone else’s stuff … I gritted my teeth and lifted the lid.
The good news: it was doubtful the recent occupant was a druggie – underneath an unopened packet of condoms were four candles and a Swiss Army penknife, all of which I pocketed, and – praise be to Jesus Christ and all his apostles! – a box of matches. I was almost too scared to pick it up, just in case it was empty, but when I shook it, it rattled. Then that little voice in my head suggested, I bet he was one of those arseholes who put the dead ones back in the box. I slid the box open: half full, and even in the dim light I could see every single one was unused.
I hurried back downstairs and paused at the top of the cellar steps to light a candle, then carefully made my way down, flinching as the wood beneath my feet creaked. I made it down to the bottom with no mishaps and held up the candle to take a look around. The flickering light revealed a stack of crates in one corner, and a few sagging cardboard boxes. I slowly swung around, lifting the candle so the light could penetrate the furthest recesses. Jinx was sitting wedged into the corner at the far end, legs pulled up in front of him, his forehead resting on his knees and his arms wrapped around them, like he was trying to make himself as small as possible.
‘Jinx?’
His arms pulled his legs in even closer.
‘Jinx, what’s wrong?’ I hurried over and dropped down beside him. I reached out to touch his shoulder – it must have been a reflection of the candle’s flame, because the green stone in my mother’s ring appeared to glow for a moment.
Jinx groaned and slowly raised his head. ‘She’s calling to me,’ he said, and I didn’t have to ask who ‘she’ was.
‘Can she find us here?’
‘She—’ He grimaced and pressed a hand against his temple. ‘She won’t let me go. She hurts—’ He groaned through gritted teeth.
‘There must be something we can do.’ I remembered the terrible pains I’d felt in my head before – I had assumed Amaliel had been torturing him, but perhaps it had been her?
He cried out again and stumbled to his feet.
I hurried back to the stairs, dripped some wax on a step halfway up and stuck the candle to it so I had my hands free. I wanted to help him, but how? He jerked upright, his head pulled back, arms dead straight and extended behind him, and the air grew thick – my ears felt like they were full of cotton wool. I reached a hand out towards him – and the stone in my ring glowed with some sort of inner light as blue flames sprang from the cellar floor and began to creep up my Deathbringer’s body.
How was she doing that? She wasn’t even here, but she was enclosing him in Blue Fire? ‘Oh no, you bloody don’t!’ I swore as my inner daemon flexed her muscles and roared, and I roared with her as I changed.
Just as before, golden light flowed from my body and flew out from my fingers, smashing into the blue light encircling his body. As soon as it touched the Blue Fire, it flared up in a great sheet of flame. After a moment it fizzled and died, leaving a black stain on the ground around his feet.
Jinx fell to one knee, but when he looked up his eyes were glowing with life and he managed a bit of a smile. ‘Tell me your name.’
‘I told you, you either know me or you don’t,’ I said, crossing my arms.
‘I think I might like to, very much,’ he said, looking me up and down, taking in my daemonic appearance.
My heart gave a little leap.
‘She won’t give up,’ he said.
‘Nor will I,’ I told him. ‘That’s why I’m here.’
‘We have to leave.’
‘It’s not dark yet.’
‘We can’t be here then; she is so much more powerful during the hours of darkness.’
‘So she’s the real deal?’
He took my hand and led me towards the stairs. ‘She is not of this world.’
I stopped, pulling him to a halt. ‘What do you mean? She’s daemon?’
His forehead creased. ‘I have no words.’
If that was true, we were in deeper trouble than any of us had thought. I stuffed the candles and matches back in my pocket and as we headed for the back door, I heard something hit the floor with a metallic clatter. Then it happened again, and I dropped to my knees and started feeling around for whatever it was. The only thing I could find was a little lump of metal.
I held it out to Jinx – just as he flinched, and I pulled aside his coat to see another bullet pushing out through his skin. The puckered pink hole pulled together and closed, leaving a small wrinkled depression.
‘Better out than in, I suppose,’ I told him.
*
While we’d been in the pub, the bad weather had closed in and the sky was a mass of black clouds. It felt like the gods were conspiring against us – and just to confirm it, the moment we stepped outside, the wind began to howl, thunder rumbled and lightning flashed across the sky.
‘Are you sure this is a good idea?’ I paused at the back door.
‘She knows where we are. We must keep moving.’
‘Will she be able to follow us?’
His expression grew bleak. ‘Probably.’
We walked out of the pub with no idea where we were going, but Jinx said firmly, ‘We go right.’
‘Any reason why?’
‘The left-hand path is always favoured by evil.’
The memory of all those Dennis Wheatley novels resurfaced. ‘Yes, let’s go right.’
This time he put his arm around me as we walked – I’d’ve liked to think it was because he wanted to hold me, but I suspected it had more to do with keeping me close so I couldn’t suddenly bail on him. Not that I would have; it wasn’t his fault he didn’t remember me. It wasn’t his fault we were in this mess.
We trudged along the road as the dingy afternoon darkened to twilight and then to night. The rain was so heavy we could see no more than a few feet ahead; I doubted this would hinder Persephone much in her search for us – I’d never heard of black magic and witchcraft being dependent upon the weather.
Whe
n we came to a hamlet, just one tiny shop-cum-off-licence and two or three farms, I shouted, ‘We can’t keep walking all night!’ The rain was coming down so hard and the wind was so strong I doubted he’d heard me, but I was wrong.
He stopped and put his mouth to my ear so I could hear: ‘This is unnatural weather. She is calling upon the elements.’
I swiped my sopping hair from my face. ‘She’s causing this?’
He looked up at the sky and nodded. ‘She uses darkness.’
I’d grown to understand daemons and their world, but this black magic was something else entirely. That I was using some unknown power of my own which I didn’t really understand wasn’t making me feel any better – but the dark side of me was craving a confrontation with Persephone: she had tried to take Jinx from me and given half a chance, I would take her down.
My kickass bravado lasted about fifteen minutes as I fantasised sending her flying across rooms and into brick walls until she flopped unconscious to the ground – but then my little inner voice pointed out that although it was possible I could do this, I didn’t actually know how. When the moment came I might well be full of fury and revenge, only to find my inner daemon refused to come out to play.
We came to a huge sign announcing Farm for Sale by Auction, and I pulled Jinx’s sleeve to get his attention. Moving in close so I could make him hear me over the storm, I cried, ‘It’s worth a try.’
He didn’t respond but let me lead him down the lane. I hoped there’d be at least an empty barn; somehow we had to get out of the torrential rain.
Muddy rivers gushed down the gullies on either side of the narrow road, and in a couple of places we had to wade through rainwater surging up past our ankles. The sky above us crashed and banged, zigzags of white light flashing bright enough to illuminate the countryside. Jinx was right: this wasn’t natural weather. Who on earth was Persephone?
*
The farm was in complete darkness and as soon as we stepped through the gate and into the yard I could see the place was derelict: the farmhouse windows were smashed and the door kicked in, and I had a moment of anger at people who could so willingly destroy the property of others for no real reason other than just because they could.
I had a quick look inside, but the floor above had collapsed into the hallway and water was running in a steady stream down the walls. I led Jinx towards the cowshed looming out of the darkness instead, but that had fared no better: someone had tried to burn it down and it stank of wet bonfire. The concrete floor was littered with half-burned wood and straw. I was beginning to think we had wasted our time, and the thought of the return trudge along the lane – when a moment ago I’d had hopes of finding shelter – had my spirits dropping again. But we were free, and I wasn’t about to give up. We would find somewhere.
We plodded past a couple more ruined buildings and I was wondering whether I should go back and investigate the rest of the ruined farmhouse when Jinx suddenly picked up his pace and took the lead, moving through a gap in a broken fence into yet another open field.
He kept walking, and I squinted past him through the driving rain to see what had piqued his interest, but nothing was obvious. Then ahead, I saw a grey shadow taking shape: a stable block. We weren’t walking through a field but a paddock, and I could just about make out the remains of a couple of jumps and other paraphernalia surrounding us like the skeletons of long-dead beasts.
The local yobs apparently hadn’t made it this far. I hurried to catch up with Jinx and was by his side when he pushed open the door.
I lit one of my precious candles so we could look around. The people who’d lived here had taken their horses seriously: backing onto the stable block was a tack room and an inside exercise arena. The aromas of hay and horse manure still tainted the air, but it was dry and several degrees warmer than outside. Even so, I was shivering with cold. Bugger the risk of burning the place down; I was going to try and make a fire.
I scraped together a pile of straw and when I went in search of something I could use for firewood I found a stack of painted wooden poles and some broken fencing panels that had once been used for jumps. After Jinx’s short burst of enthusiasm, he had shut down again. He slumped back against the tack-room wall and stared into space as I lit the fire and then looked around for anything that might be useful. Horse blankets would have been good – though I realised that was probably too much to ask – because we really needed to get out of our wet clothes so they could dry out a bit.
I made a rough and ready clothes horse out of some of the poles and stripped off my jacket and jumper and hung them up in front of the fire. I even managed to persuade Jinx to give me his coat, and when I turned back after hanging it up to dry I found he had pulled off his boots and was taking down his trousers.
‘Okayyy,’ I said, taking them from him, then thought, What the hell! and took off my own boots and jeans, although I did keep my underwear on.
Without his coat I could see other scars marking his body that hadn’t been there before. Like the bullet wounds, they were fast disappearing, but the evidence of his torture was clearly visible. I clenched my teeth and went to gather some hay from the stalls. I would make Amaliel pay, but now was not the time to let my anger get the better of me. I focused instead on piling up the hay for us to sit on. It was a bit prickly, and it stuck to our wet skin, but it was far better than sitting on cold concrete. I dropped down next to Jinx – close but not too close. We should probably be sharing body heat, but given the circumstances, I wasn’t at all sure that would be a good idea. My Jinx wouldn’t have been able to let this opportunity pass us by; he would have had me wrapped within his arms in moments and be kissing me senseless.
I sat there staring into the flames and wondered where Jamie and the others were, and why Kayla hadn’t found me yet. Now I had the time to think about it, I realised that was weird: where was she?
Exhaustion finally took its toll and I slipped into the dark.
*
I woke from a nightmare, my eyes heavy. Judging by the fire, I must have been asleep for only a few minutes; even so, a maroon arm was around my shoulders and my cheek was resting against his chest. I don’t know if he realised I was awake, but he pulled me closer, and the warmth of his skin against mine felt so good I didn’t try to pull away. I closed my eyes again and drifted off.
In my dream I was being buried alive. I could feel the weight of the earth crushing down on my chest as I struggled against it – then my head hit concrete and I was awake, and a pair of maroon hands were clamped around my throat.
Jinx lifted himself up so he was astride my waist, his fingers pressing harder and harder. My lungs screamed for breath – my windpipe was being crushed and darkness was rapidly enveloping me. I pummelled his chest with my fists, fast losing any strength I once had. My head hit the ground again in an explosion of stars and it dawned on me that I really was about to die. Jinx was going to kill me.
No! I screamed inside my head. No! It was not going to end like this! I made a fist and for the second time in as many days, punched him as hard as I could in the groin – he didn’t have the protection of his leather trousers this time, which made my pathetic blow effective enough to make him gasp and let go – unfortunately, it also reminded him that he was naked, and I was pinned beneath him.
He took hold of my chin with one hand and forced my head back so I was looking up at him as he snarled down at me. His other hand grabbed the front of my bra.
‘No,’ I gasped at him, ‘Jinx, don’t do this! Don’t do this—’ My throat felt like it was red-raw, but if I didn’t speak, he wouldn’t hear me. ‘Jinx!’ And I slapped him as hard as I could across the side of his face.
I don’t think he even felt it. He glared down at me as he lowered his head towards mine until his hair was cocooning both our faces in a veil of black. I closed my eyes. I didn’t want to see him when he was like this. His lips crushed against mine, and I knew if I survived the night, I would have bruises on
my chin where he was holding it so tight.
I lay still, saving my strength for when it mattered. I’d let him have his kiss, but I’d fight him for the rest. He lifted his head slightly, but I kept my eyes screwed shut. His lips touched mine again, but this time they were soft and gentle. The fingers gripping my chin relaxed and his thumb swept up to caress my cheek. Then his arms were around me, pulling me up against him and holding me tightly to his chest. He was still astride me, but he’d dropped back so he was straddling my legs.
He caressed my hair, he kissed my cheek. He pressed his face into the crook of my neck and his shoulders began to heave.
‘Jinx?’ I whispered.
‘Forgive,’ he said against my neck, his voice a harsh whisper, ‘forgive me. I thought you were her. I thought …’
I stroked his hair and cupped the back of his head. ‘Do you remember my name?’
‘I will. Promise, I will.’
I let my head rest against his. ‘What happened?’
‘She … she tries to fill my head—’ And he shuddered and pressed a palm against his temple. ‘Hurts … hurts.’
I wrapped my arms around him and cradled him to me as he began to rock back and forth. ‘Hurts so much.’
His head slipped down to rest against my breasts as I held him. He groaned again, but there was nothing I could do to help, just hold him tight. My hand slipped down from his hair to stroke his skin and my fingertips found raised ridges of puckered flesh across his shoulders and running in lines down his back; his beautiful, finely sculpted back. I could have cried. The daemon inside me added her anger and outrage to mine.
In my mind I heard a voice that sounded remarkably like mine say, ‘She’s going to die.’
I took Jinx’s damp coat down and wrapped it around the pair of us and eventually he slept. I didn’t – I couldn’t. I needed to be awake, in case she tried any more of her freaky mind games on him.
His sleep wasn’t peaceful; he twitched and groaned for hours, but when I stroked his back or hair it calmed him. Why didn’t she come? Jinx had told me she could find us, but maybe it was just his mind or his soul she could find … Jamie had told me the Blue Fire would bind Jinx to this world, and the ritual had bound him to either Persephone or Amaliel – or even both of the twisted psychos – but maybe they couldn’t find his physical body.
