Keys and Curses (Shadow Book 2) (38 page)

Nikifor waited by the side of the road, sunk in his own misery, until Shazza and Pinky rounded the bend and headed toward him. He couldn’t find anything of Mudface in the creature tripping along beside Shazza. Her pink hair was long and flowing. Her skirt and top were shocking pink, her lips pearly pink. She was at least a foot too tall for a Bloomin Fairy, maybe more. Even her walk was different. Where Mudface had always been hunched over and clutching her book, this girl walked with a straight back and a little sway. There was no book to be seen.

She greeted him with a bright, sunny smile and no sign of recognition. “Hello. You must be Nikifor.”

Shazza thrust a rough cloth bag at him. “Here, this is hers, but she won’t take it.”

Pinky made a face at the bag. “Can’t be mine. Silliest little book I ever saw.”

Nikifor took the bag.

“I’m going now, Pinky.”

“Oh?” the word was bright and chirpy. “Where are you going?”

“Away.” Shazza gave Nikifor a sidelong glance and clutched the key around her neck with one hand. “I’ve got things to do now I’m free. Don’t look me up, either of you.” She vanished, leaving only smoke on the road.

“Oh, she’s gone,” Pinky said. “What a pity, she was ever so nice.”

Nikifor was at a loss what to do with the bubbly pink thing. He set off back down the road in the direction of Ishtar Village, wondering if he still had time to meet Clockwork. Pinky trotted at his side. Her chatter battered at his skull, which was already too full of racing thoughts.

“Where are we going, Nikifor? Shazza said you’d take me someplace safe. I asked her why, everyone’s been so nice to me, but she said there was someone who wasn’t very nice and that’s why I don’t remember anything before I was in the cart with that nice lady and all those nice men in the silver masks. Isn’t memory loss a strange thing? All I know is my name and that I really love the colour pink.”

“Wait.” Nikifor helped her to jump a particularly deep pothole in the road. “What nice lady in the cart?”

“Her name was Flower,” Pinky said. “She didn’t remember anything either. Shazza said that man who wasn’t very nice was nasty to her too. I wonder who he was? Is he going to come after me?”

“What happened to Flower?”

Pinky shrugged. “She had to stay in the cart, only I was allowed to go with Shazza. I didn’t see where they went. Oh hey is that the end of this long road? I see grass!” She squealed.

Flower was alive. Or at least she had been. The darkness loosened its grip.

Pinky skipped ahead. “Oh look, there are fairies in the forest! Hello!” She waved madly.

Nikifor hurried to catch up with her, just as Clockwork jumped down onto the road. His band of Freakin Fairies, looking wearier than ever, looked on from the edge of the forest.

“Who are you?” Pinky’s voice was bright and chirpy. “I like your hat. Gosh, there are so many people in the forest today, are we all running away?”

Clockwork gave Nikifor a pained look. “What is that? We’re trying not to alert the Bloody Fairies here, and here goes your new friend with a voice like a foghorn.”

Nikifor prodded her gently toward the fairy. “She’s Mudface.”

“Who’s Mudface?” Pinky resisted the prodding.

Comprehension dawned on Clockwork’s face. “The pink curse,” he said. “It took that well?”

“Only after she escaped the king without her memory.” Nikifor firmly placed her at Clockwork’s side and gave him the bag. “She needs to be hidden in Dream. You know what he’ll do if she’s found.”

“King? What king?” Pinky looked from Nikifor to Clockwork. “Where’s Dream? Are we asleep?”

Clockwork edged away from her. “Alright, alright, Hippy can look after her. Now watch close, Muse, you’re going to need this sooner or later.”

Nikifor breathed a sigh of relief. He watched Clockwork draw a doorway in the air with his right hand. The air inside it shimmered and changed. Behind that square of air lay a paddock with a rusty bus parked at the far end.

Pinky’s mouth fell open. “How’d you do that?”

“Go through, Pinky.” Clockwork jerked his head at the doorway.

“Okay then. Bye Nikifor!” She waved cheerily and skipped through the door.

Nikifor and Clockwork stood to one side while the dour, bedraggled Freakin Fairies trooped through after her.

“I’m going to set them up as a bikie gang,” Clockwork confided in a low voice. “It’s perfect. They can still wear all the leather, and they’ll love motorbikes once they get the hang of them. Sure they’re a little shorter than the average human, but they’ll pass.” He looked at Nikifor closely. “Are you going to be okay out here?”

Nikifor watched the procession. “I’ll be fine.”

“What will you do?”

“Look for Flower. I find her, I find all the muses.”

“Fair enough, but just remember there are plenty of others who’ll need your help. Here.” Clockwork dug into his pocket, extracted a small, black object and put it in Nikifor’s hand.

Nikifor studied it, unsure what to make of the gift. It appeared to be a box with numbered buttons on it. “What is it?”

“It’s a phone.” Clockwork pushed a few buttons, and numbers came up on the screen. “Look, I’ve programmed my number only into it. If you need me, open a doorway into Dream and call that number. I’ll answer. I’ve fixed it up with a solar cell so you can charge the battery in sunlight. Just look after it, okay? And remember if you need to open a doorway, you’ve just got to draw it and think really, really hard about someone you know who’s in Dream. And don’t think about my daughter, because I’ll know.” He slapped Nikifor on the shoulder. “You did alright for your first time in the IA, mate. I’ll be seeing you.”

And just like that, he stepped through the doorway to the other side. The air shimmered behind him and closed, leaving Nikifor alone on the muddy road.

He dropped the phone into a pocket in his coat. The afternoon was quiet, cold and empty. The road was his to travel, alone, the last free muse in Shadow.

He didn’t want to be the last muse. He said a bad word he’d heard Flower use once, turned and headed in the direction of the Arch. He wouldn’t go there. He’d go past. He’d walk and search. Somewhere beyond, somewhere in the shimmering purple distance of mountains and horizons, he would find the missing muses.

Or die trying.

The End

Would you like to know more about Shadow? Then visit The Shadow Project at
http://ninasmithauthor.weebly.com/shadow.html
to keep up with all the latest news, and to look out for book three in the Shadow series, Shiny Things.

This is an independently published book, meaning it is produced solely from the author’s limited resources. Its success is dependent on you, the reader.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Nina Smith writes thrillers and fantasy novels by the light of the moon, obsesses over graphic art, performs theatrical dance, creates steampunk costumes, looks after a cat and thirty grouchy chickens and occasionally even manages to sleep.

She is the author of thrillers Hailstone and Dead Silent, and dark comic fantasy series Shadow Books 1 and 2, Bloody Fairies and Keys and Curses. Book 3: Shiny Things, is on the way.

Facebook: Nina Smith Author

Twitter:@Kilili13

Shadow Book 3: Shiny Things

A sneak peek.

CHAPTER ONE

Krysta Ishtar’s fixed smile was one camera flash away from turning into lockjaw. The lights made her squint. She looked sidelong at her publisher, who was grinning fit to crack a facial muscle. “How much longer do I have to keep this up?”

Jane Autumn was particularly good at speaking without moving her lips. “As long as you can. Your novel is the first thing to be published in five years that isn’t complete twaddle, dearie, so just keep smiling. Maybe you’ll even sell some copies.”

Krysta smiled into the flash of a particularly obnoxious bright pink camera held by a woman dressed in a hot pink tailored skirt suit and matching stiletto heels. She groaned under her breath. “Pinky’s here.”

“Of course Pinky’s here. A good review in Teen Scream will do you wonders. Teenage girls read too, you know.”

“Yes, but five minutes with Pinky will leave me needing a frontal lobotomy.”

Jane’s grin got just the slightest bit more pronounced. She was taller than Krysta, with white hair swept up in a neat coif and a pair of round glasses perched on the edge of her nose. “Speaking of frontal lobotomies, did I not ask you to change your hair colour last week? These publicity photos will be everywhere, you know.”

“I did change it.” Krysta resisted the urge to pat down her hair in case it was sticking up.

“I assumed you would dye it to your natural colour.”

“You’d be surprised how close to my natural colour this is.”

“Dearie nobody’s natural colour is purple.” Jane took a deep breath, then drew her hand sharply across her neck and stopped smiling.

The cameras stopped, just like that. Krysta relaxed her facial muscles and hid behind the copy of her book she was holding, so hot off the press the pages were still warm.

“Thank you my dears, that will be quite enough. Ms Ishtar is going to sign books now and will be available for interviews by appointment.”

The three photographers packed up their equipment so fast anyone would have thought they didn’t want to be there.