A Witch Alone (The Winter Witch Trilogy #3) (24 page)

I stood in front of him, my arms bound, my legs bound, all the fight gone from my body, all my magic exhausted.

And he leaned down and towards me, his face very close, his lips just centimetres from mine.

‘What do you want?’ I asked, through gritted teeth.

‘Perhaps …’ I could feel his breath, soft on my face. Then he leaned even closer and put his cheek next to mine, so I could feel the warmth of his skin brushing my cheekbone and feel his lips moving next to my ear. My thighs were pressed against his, our bodies so close that I could feel the rise and fall of his chest against mine. My stomach heaved at the scent of his cologne.

‘Perhaps …’ he said again, very softly, ‘the question is, what do
you
want?’

He pulled back.

And suddenly it was Seth staring at me.

Seth. His grey eyes dark as a winter sky. His lips so close to mine I could have leaned forwards and kissed him.

There was no anger in his face. Only the steadfast love I remembered so well.

I heard my breath whimper from my lips.

‘Seth?’

‘Anna …’ he put out a hand to touch me. It brushed my cheek and for a moment I closed my eyes, melted into his touch, feeling the familiar painful desire explode within me like a consuming flame.

‘Oh Seth…’

His hand stroked lovingly down my cheek, my jaw, my throat … I couldn’t bear to move. I didn’t even breathe.

His hand was smooth. Soft.

It had never done a day’s work in its life, never hauled on a cable or struggled with an anchor.

I opened my eyes.

Seth’s grey eyes looked steadily into mine.

And I kneed him viciously in the crotch.

There was a sound like the scream of an injured cat and he doubled up, weeping with pain. I smiled.

‘Serves you right, you bastard.’

Marcus raised his head and his face, beneath the twisted mask of pain, was full of hate.

Then I really did run. Without waiting to see if he was OK. Without looking back. I just ran.

I
  crashed into the room I shared with Emmaline and slammed the door behind me, gasping. Emmaline wasn’t there, but Abe was sitting on the bed, his head in his hands, staring at a photo.

As soon as he saw me in the doorway he twitched it back into his wallet.

Then he registered my wild gasping breath and my face, and his expression turned to alarm.

‘What’s the matter? Is Marcus OK?’

I shook my head, almost unable to speak, and then managed, ‘It was him.’

‘What was him?’

‘He’s the sp-spy. He was the crow – the one who attacked me last year. He k-killed Corax.’ I took a huge shuddering lungful of air, trying to get control over my breathing. ‘He’s bargaining for control of the Ealdwitan. He’s been selling secrets to the Russian witches and in return they’re going to help him bring down the Ealdwitan and he’ll be the new head.’

‘No!’ Abe’s face was white with shock. ‘And did you tell him…? Does he know…?’

‘About me? Oh yes. He knows. He’s always known. I was the last thing to sell – he called me his “bargaining chip”.’ Nausea rose in my throat at the thought of his face leaning into mine, his smooth hands caressing my skin.

Abe made a noise that was close to a snarl, a wordless growl of hate and fury. Then he seemed to rein himself in.

‘Did he hurt you?’ he managed. ‘What happened to your face?’

I glanced in the dark little mirror and saw there was a friction burn all down one side of my face where Marcus had dragged me across the carpet.

‘We fought.’

‘But he’s injured – how could he fight?’

‘I was stupid,’ I said bitterly. ‘I healed him.’

Abe shook his head, but he could see I didn’t need his condemnation on top of everything else.

‘Pity,’ he said shortly. Then, ‘Is he still there?’

‘I don’t know.’ Fear prickled up and down my spine and I looked involuntarily at the door. Abe looked at me.

‘How did you get away?’ he asked.

‘I kneed him in the crotch.’ There was a grim satisfaction in the memory.

‘Good,’ Abe said. ‘Can you bear to go back?’

‘What – now?’ I tried to keep the shudder out of my voice. ‘Shouldn’t we wait for Em?’

Abe shook his head.

‘If he’s still hurt, we need to get back before he’s had a chance to recover. Basic rule of fighting: if you’ve landed a blow that hurt, you land another one before your opponent recovers. The sooner we go back, the better. Ready?’

‘OK,’ I said, feeling sick.

Abe opened the door and we looked cautiously out into the corridor, our joint shield flickering faintly in the light from the dim bulb.

When we got to the door of the room, Abe looked at me and his voice spoke in my head.

I’m going to kick down the door. Ready? Five, four, three, two
 …

On ‘one’ he slammed his shoulder into the door along with a blast of magic. It gave with a crunch and we both stumbled into the room.

It was empty, the window swinging wide and the curtains blowing in a cold breeze.

‘He’s gone,’ Abe said. There was a mix of relief and disappointment in his voice as he pushed the windows shut and latched them. I felt neither – only a chilly foreboding as I remembered Marcus’ words:
They’ll come and get you. All of you.

‘He’ll be back,’ I said. ‘Probably with reinforcements. How soon until we can get home?’

‘Well, that’s proving a problem,’ Abe’s black brows furrowed in a frown and he ran his hand through his hair, rubbing his face distractedly so that his stubble rasped against his palm.

‘Why?’

He didn’t speak, just waved a hand at the window, and I saw what he meant. Outside, the afternoon was dark – very dark. Hail spattered in gusts down the street and I could hear the keening of the wind through the glass. I was cold, I realized suddenly. A shudder ran down the back of my neck.

‘But – it’s
May
,’ I said stupidly. ‘This isn’t normal!’

Abe only shrugged. When was anything normal where witches were concerned?

‘Is it real weather?’ I asked. ‘Or is someone messing with it?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said shortly. ‘I don’t think it’s real – but I can’t alter it. I’ve tried. It’s too big. This isn’t just some little local flurry – this is an ice storm that’s sweeping across half of northern Europe. It’s coming from right across Finland, probably all the way down from Svalbad, for all I know. There’s a weight behind this storm that’s unstoppable. All the airports are closed. Em’s been calling round but there’s nothing from here to Moscow. Even the ferries are down. She’s downstairs in the Internet café investigating transcontinental trains, but we don’t think they’ll be fast enough.’

‘They’re trying to stop us from getting away,’ I said. The wind howled outside the window. ‘They’re hemming us in.’

‘Maybe,’ Abe said. Something hovered in his black, unreadable eyes. Some shadow of an emotion he was trying not to give way to. I thought it might be fear.

‘Abe …’ I said, and I couldn’t help myself; my voice shook.

He put his arms around me and spoke into my hair. ‘It’ll be OK, I promise.’

His words didn’t reassure me – he had no way of knowing that. But there was something in his fierce grip, in the hard strength of his shoulders and his arms around me, that was comforting. It was beyond logic. If they came for us, Abe’s arms couldn’t shelter me. But perhaps I wouldn’t die alone.

The thought set a chill echo in my heart.

I
wouldn’t
die alone.

Because Abe and Emmaline would die alongside me. Just as Marcus had promised.

Carefully, so that Abe wouldn’t suspect my sudden panic, I eased myself out of his arms.

Think, Anna, think.

I walked to the window, pretending to look at the weather, but my heart was racing. The witches would come back. Abe and Emmaline would fight for me – like they always had. They would die. We’d all die.

Except – if Simon’s theory was right …

My heart thumped in my chest so hard I felt sick. What were my choices? Walk away and face – what? Marcus and an army of crazed witches? Alone? I’d be captured. Captured, and imprisoned, and probably enslaved. But if Simon was right, I might not die.

Perhaps, though … I pushed the thought away, trying not to let it taint my decision. But it forced its way back, a tiny frightened voice insisting,
Perhaps there are worse things than dying. Perhaps there’ll come a time when you’ll wish you could die.

I ground my fists into my eye sockets, welcoming the flare of pain as my nails scratched at the tender burnt skin.

I had to think.

Abe and Emmaline would never let me face this alone. And we couldn’t escape – at least,
I
couldn’t escape.

Which meant – I had to go without telling them. I had to be the lure – distract the hunt from their scent, entice the pursuers somewhere else completely so Em and Abe could survive.

‘Anna?’ Abe’s voice sounded from over my shoulder, suddenly wary. ‘What’s the matter? What just happened?’

‘Nothing,’ I said in a voice that sounded brittle and hard and untruthful, even to me. ‘Just tired.’

He came over to the window and turned me to face him, studying my torn, bloodied face in the dim grey light. Snow filled the air now, gusting past at a dizzying speed, drifting up against the ledges and the sill. I tried to concentrate on the snow, tried not to look at Abe, at his face, his worried frown, his eyes, black as oil. But I felt his gaze on me.

‘You’re lying,’ he said slowly. ‘Why are you lying?’

‘I’m not lying.’

‘You are.’ He laid his hand on my chest, feeling the racing of my heart, and then drew my hand to lie on his chest, where his own heart thudded with a strong, ceaseless beat. ‘I can feel it in here. I know. I know something’s wrong.’

‘Of course something’s wrong!’ I burst out. ‘It’s all bloody wrong. We’re trapped, like rats, and there’s nothing we can do. And it’s all my fault.’

He put his arms around me, trying to hug me, comfort me, but I had only one thought: I had to get away, before he worked out what I was trying to do. I had to betray him, both of them, in order to save them.

My heart gave a great broken thud and I shut my eyes, unable to look at him.

‘Please let go of me,’ I said.

‘What?’ His hands dropped. He took a step back.

‘I’m sorry,’ I tried to keep my voice steady, hard. ‘I’m just … I want to get changed. I need to get out of these clothes.’ They were stained with blood from my head wound and covered with chunks of plaster from my fight with Marcus.

Abe looked at me, his black brows drawn into a worried frown, but he only nodded.

‘I’ll come. I’ll sit outside the door while you get changed.’

‘No.’ I shook my head, feeling numb and cold. ‘I want some time on my own. Anyway you –
we
– should pack. We should find another hotel, I think.’

‘OK …’ he said reluctantly. His eyes followed me as I went out of the room. Something was wrong. He just didn’t know what.

Back in the room I shared with Emmaline, I slammed and locked the door and then looked around, trying to work out what to do first. I didn’t have long. Emmaline might be back any minute.

First I took the smallest of the two rucksacks, shoved in all the warm clothes I’d thought to bring, along with my wallet and my phone. Then I slung it on my back and picked up Em’s pen from her bedside table.

There was nothing to write on except a printout of our airline tickets on the bed. I turned it over to the blank side – and got stuck.

Come on!
I told myself. Write!
Write!
Em would be back any second, or Abe would be along to check.
Write
something.

But the words wouldn’t come. They boiled up inside my heart – but my pen just hung in the air.

How could I put all the huge weight in my chest down on paper?

I couldn’t. There were no words for this huge tearing love and sadness.

Goodbye
, I wrote.
It’s best I do this alone. I love you. I’m sorry. Anna.

Then I whispered an invisibility charm and left, before my courage could fail.

T
he receptionist didn’t even raise his head when I tiptoed past. I waited until the phone rang and then I opened the door and slipped outside while his attention was on the call. The wind and snow hit me like a slap in the face.

The street was white with spiralling specks. The sky was grey as slate, and as dark, and the specks swirled and gusted in the light from the street lamps.

I pulled my thin summer coat around me and yanked the hood up to try to get some protection from the wind. What time was it? I glanced involuntarily at my wrist before I remembered the invisibility charm, but just then a clock struck: six loud, echoing notes.

Six o’clock. It would be night soon. Where would I sleep?

The thought gave me a shudder. At least I had money – not much, but Marcus had paid for the cab transfer and that had helped.

I turned my face to the wind and began to walk along the street. As I did, the lighted window of the Internet café drew my gaze and I caught a glimpse of Emmaline, hunched over a PC, her fingers flying furiously. Her back was to the window and I could see her screen. She was on a transcontinental rail site, running through lists of trains and destinations, trying to work out a way of getting out of Russia, fast.

Tears pricked at the back of my eyes and a huge longing came over me to run in and hug her, say goodbye. I could hardly bear to go like this – leaving them both without a word. It wasn’t like I’d be coming back. I’d never get the chance to explain.

Em looked up from the keyboard, rubbing the back of her neck, and then slowly, very slowly, pulled by some witchy instinct, she began to turn around.

I felt as if something inside me was breaking in two.

Then I ducked my head inside my invisible hood and walked on.

I walked, and walked, and walked. Mainly to keep warm, because if I stopped I was going to freeze. The Russians around me were all dressed in boots and furs – winter clothes hastily dug out of storage, I guessed. The odd tourist hurried past with pathetic summer gear clutched around them, thin cardigans that showed blue arms – shivering children wrapped in rugs and their parents’ jumpers.