Demon Shade (The Demons of Oxford Book 2)

by Kara Silver

  “Nice try.” Aeth sat on the low bar of a canal lock next to the towpath while he waited. “Come on. Almost time to start back.”

  Kennedy groaned. That was the problem with having run, jogged, parkoured and swum so far down the canal away from the centre of Oxford: she had to retrace her steps and go back again. Unless… “I’ll pay for a cab?” she tried. “We must be near a road, someone over there?” Shivering, she pointed away from the water and the scenic path along it. And that was another thing.

  “Why am I the only one having to dive in and swim every half mile? How come you get to jog blithely along on the nice grass and…” Her teeth chattered too much for her to go on.

  “Here.” Aeth passed her the towel from around his neck. “And running will warm you up.”

  “Charming.” Kennedy hauled herself to her feet and took her gym shoes and hoodie back from him. “I’m surprised you didn’t bring bikes, make me do triathlon training. I mean, I’m doing the swimming and the running…”

  “I, well, I can’t ride a bike,” Aeth confessed, looking away.

  Kennedy almost dropped her hooded sweatshirt trying to pull it on. “But this is Oxford!” she shouted, laughing that she’d had a genuine reason to use the passphrase. “You know, I could train you. It would mean getting up at an ungodly hour and looking foolish, and me filming you for some YouTube channel or other. There must be one, some Desperate Demons, Exasperated Guardians channel with about three followers…”

  Okay, not that Aeth took photos of her training. He wasn’t that sadistic. She must look a sight, wringing her long plait of hair to get the water out, the bits of her that weren’t pale from the river red from running. “When we said training…” she began.

  “Isn’t it interesting? Fun?”

  “Erm…” It wasn’t boring. Running at full-pelt along the canal, leaping or climbing any obstacle in their paths or that they spied, including wide locks, low boathouses or tall statues. Oh and then she’d learned what the towel Aeth had brought was for.

  “I hadn’t swum for a bit,” she excused herself. “And never outdoors in December. Much less climbed up and over bridges from water level to dive from the other side. Oh, God, that man’s face when I nearly landed in his canoe!” She laughed again. Despite her aching ribs. Or lungs. Something inside anyway. And her sore arms, from hauling herself up said bridges, be they wooden, stone or metal.

  “I didn’t realise you could swim that fast and underwater too,” Aeth commented on her escape. He’d made himself scarce and they’d re-met on the wall of a pub on the water’s edge, a half-mile down.

  “And to get back to what I was saying… Hang on.” Kennedy frowned, recalling all the water she’d swallowed and bathed in. “I should have made sure my tetanus is up to date. Or that I took a course of antibiotics first, or something. What?”

  Aeth finished shaking his head. “You can’t catch anything like that. Anything…human.”

  “That’s not true. I’ve…” She stopped and rested against a litter bin as she thought back. Huh. It was true. She’d never had measles or mumps or chicken pox or even flu or a cough. “Well, I’ve had vaccinations,” she said. “Now, if you’ll allow me to finish what I was trying to say—”

  “Go on.”

  “Thanks. I—”

  “Not at all.”

  Kennedy glared. “Will you belt up? And yeah, a smirk counts as talking, so knock that off too. I was saying that by training I meant…” Her gesture was intended to convey what she could do with her abilities. If it looked like her hand on her forehead was waving tentacles, that wasn’t her fault.

  “We will. Plenty of time.”

  “Thought I had to be ready? Evil never sleeps, and all that?”

  “Physical strength and speed is important too.” As if to prove his point, he sped up, leaving her to force her jelly legs to catch up to him. “I’m definitely stashing my bike somewhere along the route next time,” she warned him, huffing like a steam train.

  “As if you know which route we’ll be taking next time,” he scorned.

  They came off the canal path through Christ Church Meadows. More people were about here, jogging, or dog walking, and so Kennedy’s still-wet appearance attracted stares. “I bet people think I fell in!” she exclaimed. “I’ll have to wear a track suit that says on the back that I’m training.”

  But for what? While athletes wore the name of their club, or people training for a specific event had their cause emblazoned on their clothes, she could hardly go about with DEMON MAGE IN TRAINING, PLEASE PASS written on her.

  “Didn’t realise you were so vain,” Aeth observed. “I doubt anyone’s stopping to stare—”

  Kennedy followed his eyeline to see what had cut him off. Aeth was staring at a man walking past the gate to Christ Church. A man familiar to Kennedy from yesterday. Her kin. “Giacobbe!” she cried.

  “Kennedy!” he called back, waving. “What good fortune! Now, I can take you to breakfast. If you’re free?”

  “I am!” She grinned. “And I’m starving.”

  “You’ve been swimming?” He took her elbow to guide her out of the way of the morning pedestrians and even tourists beginning to fill the street. “In your clothes?”

  “Training.”

  “And she hasn’t finished,” Aeth cut in.

  “Oh, this is Aethelstan. He—” Kennedy cut herself off. She suddenly remembered that it wasn’t wise to give out names freely. Oh, well, too late.

  “Can’t you finish early for once? Not every day you spend time with your kinfolk,” said Giacobbe.

  “I don’t think—”

  “And I think Kennedy should make decisions on her own.” Giacobbe didn’t shout, didn’t even raise his voice to cut Aeth off, but it carried. Carried weight and years and authority.

  “I’ll have breakfast with you. Aeth, I’ll see you later. It’s fine.”

  “Fine.” He didn’t seem to be in agreement with her, instead just touched a hand to the stone post of the gate, and was gone. Kennedy stared. It was always disconcerting to see him merge or integrate or whatever with stone and in this case, she hoped him doing so didn’t make the enormous ornamental ball on top of the pillar wobble or worse, come loose. She sneaked her hand to it, just to check. Warmth met her skin, surprising her, but soon cooled.

  “Let’s go,” she urged Giacobbe, shaking out her hand. “Where were you going?”

  He told her he always visited the same café when in the town. “Very old and traditional. Never changes.”

  “In a museum?” They turned into the gateway of a walled-off set of buildings, displaying the sign for some collection or other. While she had no doubt there was a café, in her experience ones in museums or institutes didn’t tend to be unchanging. Plus, a lot were concessions or franchises.

  They went under an arch into a courtyard and a building at the back.

  “I wouldn’t have known this was a…pub?” Kennedy ventured, the dim, woodsy interior making her think it was a public house rather than a restaurant. The place gave the impression of being underground, like a cellar bar, due to its lighting, or like a barn, with its wooden beams for walls and ceilings.

  “Are you really hungry?” Giacobbe asked. “If so, you’ll need a proper breakfast.”

  “So starving I’d settle for an improper one.” Kennedy went to look around, marvelling at the old posters and playbills displayed on the walls and ceilings. There were old costumes and props too, and a lot of instruments. Oh yes, the museum was one of musical instruments. Another place she’d been meaning to see, and it was probably less…scary than this one. Okay, so the costumes weren’t displayed on full-size dummies, like at the museum, but the way these ones hung from or were positioned on walls was…scary, she didn’t mind admitting. And that entire panel of black and white and gold and silver comedy and tragedy masks was creepy.

  The aroma of strong coffee and tea and the smells and sizzles of bacon frying made her stomach groan in anticip
ation and she started in on her plate as soon as it was set before her. That was, when Giacobbe could tear himself away from the counter. He seemed to know the staff and some patrons.

  “So,” Giacobbe said, after his plate was mostly empty too. “Tristano made you an invitation yesterday, yes? Come and help us out, and spend time with us, get to know your folks?”

  Kennedy nodded, her mouth full of fried bread. She’d saved it for last to mop the plate with.

  “What’s your answer? We need to know now, because we have a show tonight, and so we should practice this morning.”

  Trying to answer, Kennedy half-choked.

  “Kennedy?” A familiar voice sounded alarmed and a strong hand patted her on the back. “Hang on, lass. I’ll get thee some water.”

  And within a few seconds, PC Chris Collier was back with a glass he held out to her.

  “What are you doing here?” they asked the other together.

  Chris laughed. “Station’s just down the road.” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder

  “Oh.” Of course, it was. On this road, down from Christ Church.

  “And they do black and white pudding cobs here. Spread wi’ dripping.”

  Kennedy had no idea what those were and hoped never to find out.

  “I didn’t know tha’ was back.” Chris’s Yorkshire tones sounded less full today. Guarded, even.

  “Sit down.” Kennedy hated looking up. Not that Chris was so tall. Not as tall as Aeth, whose remoteness made him seem taller, if that was possible. “I came back just the other day. Late-ish,” she added, hoping to mitigate the situation. The situation being that she hadn’t called him. Hadn’t spared him a thought. And he was supposed to be her— “I decided at the last minute, the day after I came to have lunch with you. Because…”

  She dropped her gaze. There was no way to describe events, her role, her feelings.

  “I see.” He sounded happier and she risked a peep at him. Smiling, he was looking at her companion.

  “Oh, sorry. Chris, Giacobbe. He’s a player with the travelling fair and you’ll never guess, but they’re my kin!”

  “Kin?”

  “Family!” Giacobbe explained. “As in uncle, aunt, cousin, more clan…”

  Chris exclaimed at this, but Kennedy didn’t join in. It had just occurred to her that ‘aunt’ was used as an honorary title by children to address older female friends of their parents, rather than use their given names. ‘Uncle’ was probably used the same way. So, were Giacobbe and Emilia her actual—

  “So are you going to?” Chris was doing the loud tone that signalled something being asked for at least the second time.

  “To…?”

  “Help out at the fair! That’ll be fun! So when I come round to try my luck, you’ll see to it I win a goldfish? Or get an extra-big cuddly toy?” He winked, pushing his flip of soft brown hair back from his forehead, his caramel-brown eyes twinkling.

  “I don’t… Well…”

  “And tha’ can write about it! Did you know she writes articles for newspapers, and even writes books?” Chris addressed her uncle.

  Kennedy hid behind her mug and slurped the last of her coffee. She should correct those rumours, but research for writing was such a useful cover.

  “With a win-win like that, you can’t say no,” Chris finished.

  “So, what do you say?” Giacobbe asked.

  “I suppose…” Kennedy spoke slowly, hoping something would happen to stop her finishing the sentence. But nothing did. Damn. “Yes.” The word came out like a hiss, and the moment she spoke it, she wanted to take it back.

  She jumped in her seat as if electrocuted when her gaze landed on the long of row of theatre masks across from her. Before, they’d hung in standard happy-sad pairs, one representing the muse of comedy and its match the muse of tragedy, but now, each and every one bore a tortured, anguished expression of pain. But when she blinked, they righted themselves in a nothing to see here manner. Except, she had seen it, as she’d perhaps been supposed to. But why? And what did it mean? Her heart sank. She’d be finding out and—she was prepared to bet—the hard way.

  10

  Kennedy needed to get out of there. She hit the wall behind her with her chair when she shoved it back. “Can I walk you to the station, Chris? It’s a sort of tradition we have,” she explained to her uncle. Or kinsman. Giacobbe. Stick to given names. Easier.

  “Oh! You’re…” Giacobbe waved an expressive hand. His movements were controlled like that, she’d noted, only now trying to put a name to it. Dancer-like, perhaps?

  “Well…” Chris gave a shy duck of his head. “We… Kennedy?”

  “Yes, we should get going.” She indicated the waitress approaching, a paper bag for Chris in her hand. “I’ll come over to the ground after that.” If I can. For all she knew, she had instructions waiting for her at the Porter’s Lodge. She’d checked first thing, but that would have been too early to have received any. Just as well. The longer she got through the day without learning she was on toilet-cleaning duty later, the better.

  “Thanks for breakfast,” she called as she left. The small courtyard housing the café building proved to have twists and turns, and Chris took her arm to guide her to the archway. Kennedy walked under it gladly, feeling something like the pop she got in her ears when she dived into the deep end of the pool, only this time as she walked among the few buildings making up the place and emerge via the gate in the wall into the Oxford morning.

  “Actually, I’d better say goodbye here.” Kennedy tilted her head to one side then the other to clear out any residue from the canal. Must be that causing the pressure-pop thing. “I have a thing at the Ashmolean.”

  “Oh?” Chris looked confused, his smooth forehead creasing into a line.

  “Yeah. The official reason I came up early is to make up work, grades, hand in extra, that sort of thing.” They’d cleared up over the course of their dates where Kennedy actually studied and which subject. She’d initially let Chris think she was at the other university in Oxford and connected to journalism. Kennedy had tried to explain what social and cultural anthropology, or ethnography and ethnology was, and Chris had tried to understand, and called her “the clever clogs of the relationship”. Relationship.

  “I’ll see thee later, then,” Chris promised. “What, you don’t think I’d miss your first night? Debut, no, premiere, isn’t that what they call it? Shall I bring you a bouquet of roses? Box of choccies? What’s best?” He rubbed his arm where she punched it, pretending to be wounded, and Kennedy twisted when he went to kiss her goodbye, so it landed on her cheek instead.

  Of course, he would come and see her…making a fool of herself, she didn’t doubt. Caught between smiling at his words and behaviour and sinking under the weight of her stupid agreement, she arrived at the Ashmolean Museum. And yeah, that had been another half-truth. The ‘thing’ she had to do there was buy postcards to send to people back in Wyebury, trying to share a piece of this life with that one. She hadn’t had many photos to show them, when she’d been back. This was at least something.

  “Oh, sorry!” Head bent as she left the gift shop, studying the cards she’d bought and deciding who should get which, she’d bumped into someone. “Oh.” She cut short her apology. She’d bashed into Emma, another Heylel College first year, also reading Social and Cultural Anthropology and a member of Dr Crane’s tutorial group, along with Kennedy. Tough. Kennedy eyed her. While she still didn’t know exactly what had gone on last term and who was involved, Emma had been a bitch to her.

  “Did I hurt you?” she enquired, her voice and expression hopeful.

  Emma backed away a little, narrow-eyed and wary. “I’m fine. What are you doing here?”

  “What are you?” Kennedy countered. She hadn’t seen Emma in the sparsely populated college and, it seemed, Emma hadn’t seen her.

  “I’m here for a week or two to work with Dr Crane!” Emma fizzed with excitement. “A special project, part research
, part organising… I shouldn’t say anything, but you know how we have to do a month’s field work during the first year?”

  Kennedy nodded. She’d been wondering about fitting it in—and funding it.

  Not so for Emma, whose godfather or father’s godfather—Kennedy couldn’t keep up with the flow—was someone at or connected to someone working in the recent Draa Abul Naga necropolis discoveries in Egypt, so Emma could go and study the objects of the funerary equipment found! Oh, and Dr Crane could go, too, as her supervisor, and write a paper on the funerary masks, and Emma would co-author and the Head of School was…

  “If you shouldn’t say anything, you’d better shut up,” Kennedy suggested.

  Emma tilted her head, her strawberry-blonde hair falling over one eye. “Didn’t mean to make you jealous.” She snorted. “Like you thought I was jealous of you, when all those guys were in competition for you!”

  “And it was just some stupid bet that you were in on, one that ended in what I believe was technically sexual assault?” When Kennedy hadn’t gone for any of the moneyed idiots, Ed had grabbed her and kissed her. She never had worked out who’d smacked her on the ass. “Yeah, I’ve been meaning to speak to a police constable friend of mine about it, find out what the sitch is.”

  “Oh, for God’s sake,” Emma scorned, but paled and stumbled back another step. “Get over it. Get over yourself. Swanning about like you own the place when you’re a scholarship case who can barely manage the work. I bet that’s why you’re here in the vac—pull your finger out or get the boot? Ever thought this isn’t the right place for you?”

  “Ever thought how difficult an anthropological dig would be with ten broken fingers?” Kennedy stepped forward, her chin jutted out. “And you know what? You’d never see it coming.”

  “You fucking psycho!” Emma shrieked, twirling around and banging into a custodian, despatched, no doubt, to see what was going on with two young women facing off, a crowd backing away to form a makeshift ring around them. “I’m going to report you!”