Burned

7

The gate closed behind me, leaving us in darkness. Anne and I were alone.

I crossed the carpet and kicked open the door to Anne’s bedroom, scanning the futures for danger. The inside of Anne’s flat was warm, and the night outside was quiet and still. We were in Honor Oak, south of the river, and the fire and our enemies were far away. I entered the bedroom, letting my divination guide me, then set Anne down as gently as I could on the bed at the centre. I could hear her breath in the silence, raspy and quick. Carefully I took my arms away from under her, then walked to the door, flicked on the light and turned around.

Even though I’d been braced for the sight, my first reaction to Anne’s injuries was to close my eyes. I took a breath, then forced them open again. Anne’s skin was mottled with a mix of colours – white, red, tan and coal – and the front of her clothes had burned away to reveal cherry-red burns across her stomach and breasts, spreading up to her neck and face. The burned skin looked moist and weepy, and already angry-looking blisters were forming. Although her body looked bad, her left arm was worse. The skin there wasn’t red but black, cracked and charred, and across the forearm it had peeled away entirely, revealing red muscle and white bone. I moved closer and the smell hit my nostrils again, putrid and rich. Bile rose in my throat and I swallowed, fighting back nausea.

Anne opened her lips and spoke, keeping her eyes closed. ‘If you’re—’ She stopped, took a breath, and tried again. Her voice was raspy. ‘If you’re going to throw up, don’t do it on me.’

I took a breath and regained control. ‘Sorry.’ I started to say, Are you all right? and stopped myself. ‘What can I do to help?’

Anne’s breath rasped. ‘Water.’

I hurried to the kitchen and filled a glass, letting my mind focus on the mundane task. Big glass … she wouldn’t be able to drink from the edge. Needed a straw. I went through the drawers. Anne’s kitchen is small and tidy. I found a packet of drinking straws and tore it open before hurrying back.

Anne hadn’t moved, but I could sense magic working inside her body, complex spells layered on top of one another. She didn’t open her eyes as I leaned in and fed the straw through her cracked lips. Anne’s face wasn’t as badly hurt as the rest of her body, but it still wasn’t pretty. Red streaks ran up her cheek and past her eye, and a patch of her hair had been scorched away, the scent of burned hair mixing with burned flesh. Anne drank slowly and steadily until she’d emptied the glass. I set it down on the bedside table.

Anne licked her lips and spoke again. She still didn’t open her eyes, but already her voice was stronger. ‘Are we safe?’

‘I don’t think they tracked us,’ I said. ‘How bad is it?’

‘Third-degree burns,’ Anne said. The rasp in her voice had gone. ‘Fourth on the arm. I’ll manage.’

‘Do you need anything?’

‘Time.’ Anne was quiet. ‘What happened to the shop?’

‘Screw the shop,’ I said. ‘Do whatever it takes to make sure you’re better. Okay?’

‘Okay.’ Anne paused. ‘Alex? There’s … one thing.’

‘Name it.’

‘I can repair this. Most of it.’ Anne drew in a breath. ‘But … it would help if I had more.’

I knew what Anne was asking. Healing magic takes energy. Major healing takes a lot of energy. One way for Anne to do that is to take the energy from her own body, but she can also take it from others. That had been what she’d done to the fire sprites, draining their life force and using it to repair her own injuries. But Anne has limited capacity: she can’t ‘store up’ energy beyond a certain point. Repairing this would take more than she had to spend.

I touched Anne’s unburned right hand. ‘Take what you need.’

‘Thank you,’ Anne said quietly, then paused. ‘You should sit down.’

‘Oh.’ The last time Anne had done this to me, I’d gone out like a light. ‘Right.’ There was a small armchair back in the living room. I went back, carried it into the bedroom, then set it down next to the bed. ‘Okay,’ I said, sitting and taking Anne’s hand in both of mine. ‘Do it.’

The last time Anne had life-drained me, it had been like having the energy and strength pulled from every part of my body at once. It had been horrible, and as I took Anne’s hand my muscles were tense, my mind dreading going through the same experience again.

But this time was different. I saw the spell take shape, reaching out to touch me, but there wasn’t the same draining sensation. Instead it was more of a drift, a flow. I felt myself growing tired, my eyes becoming heavy, but it was the sleepiness of being curled up in a warm bed. I fell into a drowsy state, the world floating away.

As I rested, I saw something strange. Out of the grey mist a glowing form took shape: it felt as though I was seeing it with my eyes, and yet I wasn’t. It was a human body, luminous, its skin and flesh formed from glowing green light. As I looked closer I saw that the light wasn’t solid, but woven, tendrils and vines laced into a tight-knit whole. Parts were reddened and blackened, the vines warped and fraying at their ends, but as I watched I saw that they were regrowing, new shoots stretching out from the damaged ends to interweave with the others. It was both slow and incredibly intricate, like watching someone repair a ripped tapestry with a needle and thread, one strand at a time. There was something fascinating about the deftness of the work. There were no missteps, no mistakes, every new thread of glowing green weaving into the greater pattern. I kept watching until the image faded away and I drifted off to sleep.

At some point during the night I came half-awake to see that Anne was leaning over my chair, her face close to mine. Her body was glowing with soft green light, and she was whispering to me. I tried to make out the words but they blurred together and Anne turned into Arachne and I was curled up on one of the armchairs in Arachne’s cave, surrounded by bolts of silk. Arachne was somewhere in the back, working away on some creation of hers, and I turned over and went to sleep.

I woke up slowly and gradually. I could hear voices around me, and the light seemed brighter. From outside, a bird was singing. It was morning.

‘… you’re okay?’ It was a girl’s voice, and it took me a moment to realise that it was Luna. ‘I mean, you don’t look as though…’

‘I’m fine.’ It was Anne, and she was speaking from right in front of me. I could feel her hand on mine. ‘The dangerous time was last night.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘I’ve had worse, you know.’

‘I still wish I’d been there.’ Luna paused. ‘What about Alex?’

‘Well, he’s awake. Why don’t you ask him?’

I opened my eyes. Morning sunlight was streaming through the window, illuminating the pale green walls of Anne’s room. Variam was sitting by the desk, bent forward with his elbows on his knees, and Luna was hovering nearby. She still looked worried, but she perked up as she met my gaze. ‘You’re okay?’

‘Kind of tired.’ I yawned. I felt sleepy, and my limbs were heavy, but I wasn’t hurt. Actually, I felt very comfortable, which was weird given that I’d just slept in my armour. Must have been Anne’s work. ‘When did you guys get here?’

‘Not long. I was talking to Anne and— Crap, kitchen! I forgot!’ Luna turned and ran out into the living room. ‘I’ll be back!’ she called over her shoulder.

I looked at Anne. ‘What was that about?’

‘Oh, Luna was offering to make some food,’ Anne said with a smile. She was lying on her bed, covered with a blanket, and she looked better – actually, much better. I couldn’t see her left arm or her body, but the skin on her face was smooth and unmarked. Only the clumps burned out of her hair betrayed how recently she’d been hurt. It made her look like a sea urchin with pattern baldness, but her eyes were peaceful. ‘I was hungry, and she said she’d take care of it.’

Variam shifted position on his chair and glanced down. I realised that Anne was still holding my hand. Anne seemed to realise it at the same instant, and let go. ‘How are you feeling?’

‘Good. A lot better than last time.’

‘I was trying not to take so much this time,’ Anne said. ‘More like sharing.’

‘Well, whatever you did, it worked.’

Anne smiled. ‘Oh.’ She carefully reached out with her right arm to pick something off the table, then dropped it into my hand. ‘Here.’

I looked at it curiously. It was a spent bullet, slightly deformed. ‘Where did …?’

‘From that last run around the forcewall,’ Anne said. ‘I took it out last night. They can do tests on bullets to figure out where they came from, can’t they?’

‘You were shot as well? Why didn’t you tell me?’

‘I didn’t want you to worry.’

I gave Anne a disbelieving look, then shook my head and turned to Variam. ‘Any news?’

Variam snorted. ‘From us? No. Who did this?’

‘They didn’t exactly announce themselves, but if I had to guess, I’d say Light mages,’ I said. ‘Whatever’s going on, some people really don’t want me involved.’

Luna came bustling in with a tray. ‘Here.’ She set it down on Anne’s bed. ‘Uh, it might have got a bit burned.’

The tray held muesli, toast, fruit, bacon and eggs. The muesli and fruit looked fine, the toast and bacon were blackish and I had no idea what had happened to the eggs. I played it safe and took an apple. ‘Hey!’ Luna said. ‘That’s for Anne.’

‘It’s all right,’ Anne said. ‘He needs it too.’ She pushed herself further up against the headboard, then reached for the bowl with her right hand. She didn’t seem to be in pain, but I noticed she kept her left arm beneath the covers and out of Luna and Variam’s sight.

‘So what happened last night?’ I asked.

Both Luna and Variam looked away. ‘We screwed up,’ Luna said. Her voice was strained, unhappy.

‘You had your phones off?’

Luna nodded. ‘And before you say it, I know we weren’t supposed to. You told me back when we set this up, keep it on all the time. I just forgot.’

Crappy reason to get yourself killed. I looked at Luna for a second. She didn’t meet my eyes, and I decided not to push it. ‘I guess it could have been worse.’

‘It nearly was worse!’ Luna said. ‘You both nearly died!’

‘Yeah, well, it might have been better this way,’ I said. ‘If you’d gated in while the ground floor was on fire…’

‘But I’m not her,’ Variam said. He was quieter than usual. Vari and Anne have a complicated relationship and in a lot of ways they don’t actually have much in common, but Vari’s deeply loyal to his friends. Failing to protect Anne must have stung his pride.

I shook my head. ‘What’s done is done. I’m guessing you were busy training or something.’

Luna hesitated. ‘Yeah.’

Something was nagging at the back of my mind. There was something I was supposed to be doing. ‘What time is it?’

‘Ten-thirty.’

Suddenly I remembered. Caldera. ‘Crap.’ I stood up, feeling my armour adjust to my movements, and nearly fell over. My head was spinning.

‘Alex!’ Anne caught my arm, steadying me. Her grip was surprisingly strong. ‘Careful.’

‘Have you got a phone I can borrow?’

‘You can use mine.’

Anne had an old model iPhone in a black case. I took it and dialled the call-block prefix followed by a number, then put the phone to my ear and let it ring. My legs were still a little shaky and I walked out through the living room and into Anne’s kitchen. Pans were on the stove, there was a tinge of smoke in the air and there was something in the sink that looked like a failed prototype. You can always tell when Luna’s been using the kitchen.

There was a click as the number picked up. ‘Caldera.’

‘It’s Alex.’

‘Alex?’ Caldera’s voice sharpened. ‘Where the hell are you?’

‘Long story.’ There was a knock at Anne’s door. I heard Luna say something, then there were footsteps as someone went to answer it. I checked quickly for danger and found nothing. ‘There was a bit of a hold-up.’

‘No shit you had a hold-up. I told you the briefing was this morning at nine. I’ve left three messages already. What were you doing, getting a lie-in?’

‘You’re in front of your computer, right?’

‘Yes. Why?’

‘Log in to the Met Police database and check their incident reports for my street in Camden Town. I think this’ll go faster if you see for yourself.’

There was a pause, and I could faintly hear the click of keys. Voices sounded from Anne’s bedroom. I could tell the instant Caldera pulled up the report. ‘What the hell?’

‘I had a spot of trouble.’

‘You’re okay?’

‘Yeah.’ I didn’t mention Anne. Caldera’s basically one of the good guys and I’ve come to trust her, but she and Anne don’t get on. ‘I’m guessing there’s a bit of activity there.’

‘Yeah, you could say that.’ I heard keys click and Caldera’s voice rose half an octave. ‘Five bodies? Alex, what the hell?’

‘I woke up with a bunch of guys about to shoot me in the head,’ I said testily. ‘I was kind of working from limited options.’

‘I want to know everything that happened. Get your arse over here right now.’

‘I need to do one thing first,’ I said. ‘I’ve got a bunch of items still onsite. Some are the kind that you guys don’t want the normals getting hold of, if you know what I mean. Can you clear me for access?’

‘So you can do what?’

‘Take stuff away,’ I said. ‘Look, I have a lot of personal belongings still there. I don’t want them all going into police impound. Please?’

Keys clicked in the background. ‘This says the place is gutted. I don’t think there’s going to be much left.’

‘The protected stuff will be.’

There was a pause. ‘All right,’ Caldera said after a moment. ‘But you are coming in straight afterwards. No sidetracks. And you’re not leaving until you’ve put in a full report. Clear?’

‘Okay. Are they looking for me?’

‘There’s no arrest warrant, but they’ve made the connection with the explosion two years back. Make sure you steer clear of MI5 until Rain’s had a chance to talk to the liaisons.’

‘I will.’ I paused. ‘Caldera? Thanks.’

‘Just get here in one piece, all right? I don’t want to spend my afternoon picking you off the pavement.’

‘I’ll be there in a couple of hours.’

I returned to the bedroom to discover that the new visitor was Sonder. He and Variam were facing each other, with Luna and Anne watching from the sides. As I entered, Luna and Sonder turned to me.

I looked between everyone. ‘Something wrong?’

There was a slightly longer pause than there should have been. ‘No,’ Luna said. ‘We’re fine.’

I looked at Anne questioningly. ‘Everything’s okay,’ Anne said in her soft voice. ‘Sonder, do you want to sit down?’

‘Uh,’ Sonder said. ‘Sure.’ Variam scowled.

I set Anne’s phone back on the table. ‘I need to go back to my shop.’

‘I’ll come with you,’ Luna said.

‘You’re due for your lesson with Chalice.’

‘It can wait—’

‘No, it can’t,’ I said. ‘It’s Tuesday morning and your test is on Friday. Nothing you could do at the shop is more important than you passing that test.’

Luna made a face but didn’t argue. ‘I’m staying with Anne,’ Variam said.

Which would leave Variam and Sonder glaring at each other over Anne’s bedside. Well, with Anne there, I didn’t think Variam was going to do anything stupid. ‘Okay,’ I said. ‘Luna, let me know how things go. I’ll check in later.’

I own a small farmhouse deep in the country in Wales, at the end of an isolated valley. Over the years I’ve turned it into a bolthole, with a stock of food and emergency equipment. Which was just as well, because right now my equipment list consisted of my armour, the magic items I’d managed to grab last night and not much else. Luckily my wallet had been in the pocket of my trousers, along with my most important gate stones, but my phone and everything else that had been on my bedside table were in all likelihood a smouldering wreck.

I gated to the house in Wales, changed out of my armour, took a shower in near-freezing water that left me shivering (the heating doesn’t work that well), then got a new set of clothes. As I did, I found myself thinking about how long I had left. Four days until my sentence went through. The stress of last night’s attack had driven it out of my head, but now I could feel time pressing again.

The gate stone to my back room in London wasn’t working, which was disappointing but not really a surprise. Gate stones only take you to one location, and the exact layout of that location is attuned to them when they’re created. If the location changes too much, they stop working. I’d been using this gate stone for years, but I wouldn’t be using it any more. I activated one of my few remaining gate stones to travel to a park in Camden, then walked to my house.

You know that whatever’s happened to your home is bad when you see the signs before you even turn down your street. A yellow and blue checked police car was blocking off the end of my road, with a bored-looking police officer standing in front of a line of tape. I’d had some vague ideas of sneaking in, but one look at that made me change my mind. I’d brought along a prepaid phone from my emergency kit and I used it to call Caldera. After a brief delay Caldera told me to wait where I was.

A few minutes later a man appeared from behind the tape, ducked under it, scanned the street until he spotted me, then ambled over in my direction. ‘Morning,’ he said. ‘Who might you be then?’

I took a look at the man. He was in his twenties, with a London accent, and was wearing a POLICE vest with lots of useful-looking gadgets clipped on to it. From a glance through the futures I knew he was who I was waiting for. ‘My name’s Verus.’

The officer nodded. ‘All right.’

‘And how about you?’

‘I’m from SASU.’

‘I thought you guys were called SCD-14 or something.’

‘We got reorganised again.’

For the most part, the police and security services of the United Kingdom are run by normals and for normals, with as little involvement with the magical world as possible. This means that when the two worlds overlap, neither side is particularly well equipped to interact with the other. On these occasions someone has to clean up the mess, and in the London Metropolitan Police, that someone is SCD-14, or SASU, or whatever they’re called at the moment, and their job is to liaise with Light Keepers to keep things orderly. From my perspective, dealing with SASU is a mixed blessing. On the plus side, they’re a lot less likely to panic and call in the armed police to have you shot. On the other hand, they’re considerably harder to fool than normal police, and they have a habit of doing things like not telling you their name.

‘Fair enough,’ I said. ‘Can I ask what your orders are?’

‘Officially, I’m supposed to escort you on to the site so that you can retrieve some personal belongings,’ the man said.

‘And unofficially?’

‘Make sure you don’t cause any trouble,’ the man said. ‘Are you going to?’

‘No.’

The man nodded. ‘Come on then.’ We ducked under the POLICE DO NOT CROSS tape and walked down my street.

My shop was at the centre of a collection of police and other emergency vehicles, along with a crowd of people in police vests and high-vis jackets, most of whom seemed to be standing around waiting. The shop itself was a blackened, burned-out husk. It was still standing, but I got the impression that it wasn’t by much.

‘Are MI5 here yet?’ I asked the officer.

‘They’re stuck in traffic,’ the officer said. ‘Did you want to talk to them?’

‘Not particularly.’

‘Suits me.’

The inside of the shop was worse than the outside. The shop floor was cinders and ash, charred metal skeletons of shelves peeking out from the debris. I took a glance towards what had been the magic item section and saw that it was gone. The forcewall had probably shielded it for a while, but once the wall had dropped, that section must have taken the full brunt of the fire and now there was nothing left but black husks. There had been over a hundred magic items in there. Granted, none had been particularly valuable, but they’d been familiar to me and I’d developed an odd sort of affection for them. All gone now. ‘How many rooms are intact?’ I asked the officer.

‘Just the one above,’ the officer said. ‘Firemen were saying it was reinforced. Only reason the whole place didn’t collapse.’

I nodded. ‘That’s where we’re going.’

The stairs up to the first floor had collapsed, and someone had put a ladder in place to get up to the first floor landing. I climbed it and stepped off carefully over what was left of the banisters. The landing creaked but held.

‘Hey!’ someone called down from above. I looked up to see a man in full-cover plastic gear on the landing above. ‘You’d better not come walking over my corpses!’

‘We’re staying here,’ my companion called as he climbed up behind me.

‘Good,’ the man in the mask called down. ‘Haven’t finished picking out the teeth yet.’ He turned back to the subject of his attention and I got a sickly whiff of burned flesh. I turned away before I got too close a look at what he was doing. I’m not squeamish, but I’ve got my limits.

The door to my safe room was blackened but didn’t seem damaged. ‘Have they had a go at it with a battering ram yet?’ I asked.

‘Didn’t have clearance,’ the SASU officer said. ‘This thing safe?’

‘Mostly.’ It wasn’t, but it would be once I deactivated the wards. I touched the key points and murmured the deactivation commands under my breath, keeping an eye on the defences in my magesight. The wards had taken a beating but weren’t malfunctioning, which was a relief; the last thing I wanted was for them to blow up some random PC who got too close to the door. Once I was sure it was safe I turned the handle and gave the door a shove. The heat had warped the metal and I had to thump it with my shoulder a couple of times before it gave way.

The contents of the safe room were the only part of my house that still looked the same. The heat obviously hadn’t lasted long enough to ignite the contents. ‘Got a torch?’ I asked the policeman.

The policeman pulled out a small Maglite and clicked it on, shining it around the safe room. The white circle of the beam flicked from one item to another. ‘You sure you want to stick around for this?’ I asked the policeman.

The policeman shrugged.

‘Suit yourself.’ I pulled on a pair of leather gloves, then pulled out a black sports bag from where it had been lying underneath the bench. The first item I went for was my mist cloak, hanging on a hook against the far wall. Once it was stowed in the bag I felt a little better. My mist cloak’s not entirely safe, but it’s saved my life enough times that I feel a lot more comfortable having it to hand.

‘What’s that thing?’ the policeman asked.

I glanced around to see that the officer was shining the torch on the scabbarded sword hanging on the wall. The circle of light picked out the crocodile carved into the hilt, and he was staring at it.

‘Bloodsword,’ I said. Interesting. The officer had to be a sensitive, if not an adept. That sword isn’t the most powerful imbued item I own, but it’s got the strongest aura, and I doubted he’d picked it out by coincidence. ‘Don’t touch it.’

The officer examined it from a careful distance. ‘What does it do?’

‘Cuts through just about anything, and gives its wielder enhanced strength and speed. It also sends pretty much anyone who picks it up on a murderous rampage.’

‘What do you use it for?’

‘I don’t,’ I said. ‘Frankly, I can’t think of many situations where turning into a psychopathic berserker would really improve things very much.’

‘So why are you keeping hold of it?’

‘So no one else can use it,’ I said. I didn’t mention the other powers it had. That sword is a very nasty piece of work, and I haven’t yet figured out any good solution as to what to do with the thing. Carefully, I took hold of it by the scabbard and lifted it off the hooks. For a moment I could hear a song somewhere at the back of my mind, wordless and voiceless, urging me to stop and listen. I blocked the impulse off and dropped the sword into the bag. The music in the back of my head lingered briefly, then faded.

I added the green egg and the locked darts, putting each in a separate pocket of the sports bag, then started scooping up the lower priority stuff. Once I was done clearing the tables I opened the weapons cabinet and took the MP7 off its hooks.

‘Have you got a licence for that?’ my companion asked.

‘If you’re going to ask me questions about everything here,’ I said, ‘this is going to take a while.’ I added the other handguns, followed by the ammo, the jian and most of the rest of the weapons. The officer stayed silent.

Once I was done I turned back to the tables. They’d been stripped nearly bare, apart from one item lying alone at the centre: a white and blue tube of lacquered wood, carved with flowers. I stared at it, exploring the futures in which I picked it up. Nothing. I rechecked – again nothing. I didn’t move forward. My magic might tell me that the thing was safe, but I still didn’t want to touch it.

‘Is there a problem?’ the officer asked.

‘I hope not.’ The thing in that tube had taken its last victim only a few months ago. Maybe it was still fed.

‘What is it?’

‘You’re better off not knowing,’ I said. ‘Trust me.’ I took a deep breath and picked the tube up. Nothing happened and I slid it into one of the side compartments in the bag. I didn’t like keeping it so close to the other items, but I liked the idea of having it in my pocket even less.

There were things still left in the safe room, but my bag was full and I had everything I really needed. I brushed past the officer, came out onto the landing and paused.

The remains of my shop and flat were all around me, the walls burned black and smelling of smoke and charcoal. From outside I could hear the policemen chatting, and above, the doctor was still working away on those bodies. The building didn’t feel like a shop. It felt like a crime scene – a wrecked crime scene. Nothing was familiar and I didn’t feel as though I belonged here.

There was no way to fix this. The building might still be standing, but it was gutted. Anyone wanting to replace the shop would have to wait for the police investigation to be over, then demolish all the parts of the old building that were left, then clear the ground and set new foundations, then build a new shop from the ground up.

I’d owned this shop for seven years. It had been a hobby at first, then a vocation, then my home, but it had always been part of my life. Now it was gone.

‘Is there a problem?’ the officer asked from behind me.

‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Just not one I can fix.’ I slung the bag over my back and started climbing down the ladder.

We made it out of the police cordon without incident. Once we were at the point at which the officer had met me, he stopped. ‘All right. Off you go.’

I gave him a nod. ‘Thanks for the help.’

‘Sure,’ the officer said. ‘Make sure I don’t have to do it again.’

I paused, looking at the man. The tone of voice had been neutral … a little too neutral. ‘You don’t like me very much, do you?’ I asked.

‘Not really.’

‘I didn’t start this.’

‘There were five dead bodies around that site,’ the man said. ‘Two on the roof and three on the stairwell. All killed by fire or gunshot wounds. You going to tell me you didn’t have anything to do with it?’

I was silent.

‘We like things quiet, here at the Met,’ the officer said. ‘Orderly. Every time you people get involved it gets a lot less orderly. Our lives would be easier if you all went away.’

‘You think that I wanted this?’ I said. ‘You think I wanted my house shot up and burned down?’

The officer shrugged.

‘You’re all heart,’ I said.

‘Don’t know who started it,’ the officer said. ‘Not really our business. But do us a favour and take your fighting somewhere else.’

I looked back at the officer in silence, then walked away.