Shadow Spell (24 page)

It was clear the device unnerved him and Nin realised that she could feel his fear of it. Focusing hard, she found she could sense Vispilio's ideas and emotions. They were sharp, full of edges and harsh, cruel colours. She tried to
pick up what he was going to do next. It wasn't hard. She was no threat and he didn't care what she found out from him because she could do nothing with the knowledge.

When he had finished here he was going to leave, before the fighting got started. She guessed the travelling boots must be in his pack, so he would use those to get away quickly. As to where he was going …

Burning in his head, Nin could sense his desire to find Simeon Dark. The feeling connected to the desire was one of safety, and suddenly she knew that when he found the sorcerer he was going steal him. She remembered from stories of the Final Gathering that Vispilio was said to be more powerful than Dark, though only by a little, so he must be counting on the magic in his spell being strong enough to let him take over Dark's body in the same way that he took over Quick.

It won't work
, snapped Nin, unheard. She deliberately whipped up her anger. It felt better than despair.

If Strood's right and it's all about knowing who Dark is
, she went on,
then as soon as you find him you'll know it's him, and his spell will break and he'll be back. And a REAL sorcerer has got to be better than your stupid old spell. Besides, you need Quick because you need their life to live on and even if Dark is disguised as a Quick, that's all it is. A disguise. What are you going to do about that, huh?

She got no answer, but there was something in the jumble of his mind about if he was in Dark, who was a sorcerer, then he'd
be
a sorcerer again and could use
Dark's magic to make everything all right. And then she understood.

Vispilio wanted his power back. And he wanted it so badly he was prepared to overlook holes in his plan you could drive a train through just so that he could fool himself it was possible. Even if a part of him knew it wouldn't work, he had to try. He would do anything, kill anyone, risk everything just to be a sorcerer again.

He even had an idea about where to find Dark. He'd already told Nin half of it.

Dark was a sorcerer and if he was going to live in disguise, then he wouldn't settle for just any old disguise. Vispilio was convinced that Dark would be hidden in some form that meant he could wield power.

Real power.

Power over life and death. The power to kill, to turn the world on its head if he felt like it.

Strood.

The surges of feeling and image that she was picking up from Vispilio told her the story. Vispilio thought that Dark had already used his sorcerer power long ago to undo the real Strood, or to hold him captive somehow. Then Dark had disguised himself as Strood and taken his place. After all, in the modern-day Drift, Strood was even more powerful than the Fabulous.

Nin gasped, struggling with the idea. It would mean that far from coming back and helping her save the Seven and the Drift, it was Dark who was killing them in the first place.

Suddenly, Vispilio raised his head and stared into a corner of the cellar, the opposite one to that occupied by the shining thing. On that side of the room it was still dark and Nin got the feeling that something had just arrived and was crouched there. Whatever it was, it sent a chill into Nin's captive mind. Vispilio's eyes, her eyes, couldn't see it in the shadows but they could both feel it, watching. And
it
could feel
her
.

It's looking for me
, thought Nin, horrified.

Vispilio frowned. ‘Skinkin,' he breathed out loud, and Nin felt his thoughts narrow, focusing, ready to run if he needed to. She also picked up something else. According to Vispilio, the thing, the skinkin or whatever he had called it, seemed puzzled.

It's looking for me
, Nin thought,
and it thinks it's found me, but I'm not ME right now so it's not sure. It can't see me properly because my mind is hidden behind Vispilio's.

The shadows shifted and the thing moved, flickering towards the bright hole in the ceiling that was the open trapdoor. Nin caught a glimpse of something leaping up into the room above, something that looked like a longlegged hare but … too thin. Too much bone.

Vispilio relaxed, ran a wary eye over the cellar, then turned back to stashing the bag of jewellery safely in his pack.

Nin reeled with shock yet again. As he scanned the scene, Vispilio's eye had passed over something lying on the floor. A small, lumpy man-shape. Jik. Dead.

WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO HIM!
screamed Nin, fury
burning through her. And this time Vispilio paused. She felt him smile.

‘I'm killing him,' said Vispilio, speaking out loud. To Nin, his voice sounded distorted and small, as if she was on the end of a bad telephone line.

‘Remember that cloth of fire?' he went on. ‘That cloth is the essence of the mudman. I spun it out of his body, like the bogeyman spun your mother's memory of you right out of her head. Technically the mud-rat's not dead yet, but his body can't exist without his essence, nor his essence without his body. So in a few hours that lump of mud will crumble and the cloth of fire will fade and go out, unless they are joined back together. I could save him. If I felt like it. But I won't.'

I HATE YOU
, screamed Nin again,
HATE YOU!

Vispilio laughed, and as he did, through the trapdoor the skinkin had just left by, someone else dropped into the cellar.

Startled, Vispilio spun around. Seeing Jonas land crouched and ready at the foot of the ladder, he left the pack and pulled a knife from Nin's belt.

Jonas leapt at Nin and she sprang to the left, dodging him and heading for the ladder. She made it up several rungs before he recovered and came after her. Grabbing at her jeans he pulled her down again, ripping her back pocket almost off.

A bright square of colour slithered from under his
fingers. Unnoticed, Jik's essence fluttered to the floor, drifting beneath the table. It lay there, its glow lost in the golden light of the unknown device.

Nin kicked and struggled, but Jonas held on, twisting her to pin her knife arm against the ladder so that he could focus on the other hand, the one with the ring. He wrenched her fist open, raising welts on the palm as he dug under her fingers to pull them out. On the third finger was a silver band with one blue stone in it. He seized it and pulled.

Nin screamed with rage as she tried to yank her hand free, and the ring flew off, hit the edge of the ladder and skittered away. Half expecting Nin to collapse, Jonas loosened his grip and smiled with relief.

He was celebrating too soon. There was always a moment, a couple of seconds, before Vispilio lost control of the body he was in.

Nin twisted sharply, jabbed Jonas hard and ran, heading for the ring. A look of shock on his face, Jonas staggered and fell to one knee. He forced himself up and got Nin in a tackle that brought her crashing to the floor.

She thrashed for a moment, biting and clawing, then suddenly the tension went out of her and she stopped.

‘Nin?' Jonas tried to move, but pain shot through his back and chest and his head spun. There was something sticky on his hands.

Nin looked up.

‘I stabbed you!' she gasped, her face white with fear.

Jonas struggled to sit. The stickiness was all over him,
coming from a wound in his side. Nin crawled over to him, getting blood on her hands and knees.

‘Help,' she shouted, trying to dam the flow with her hands. ‘SOMEONE HELP!'

‘They're outside.' Jonas was growing pale as more and more blood leaked from between their combined fingers.

‘I'll get Doctor Mel.' Nin scrambled up, her head spinning. ‘Don't die, Jonas, please don't die!'

She ran for the ladder and scrambled up it, leaving Jonas alone in the cellar.

Upstairs, Nin headed for the door, her heart hammering frantically as she yelled for Doctor Mel. Part of her registered how silent the town seemed with everyone gone to the battlefield, how her voice rang on the waiting air.

Hen and Hilary were further away, keeping watch on the edge of town, but Doctor Mel had stayed near their makeshift hospital. Hearing Nin's call, she turned and hurried inside.

‘No time to explain,' Nin gasped. ‘In the cellar. Jonas. Stabbed.'

Mel nodded and snatched up bandages. ‘Hot water,' she said, ‘bring a bowl.'

Nin darted towards the small kitchen room, off to the side of the main one, where a fire kept two cauldrons of water bubbling.

Halfway down the ladder, a gleam caught Mel's eye, a single shaft of light more focused and silver than the
glow of the unknown device and coming from a spot over by the wall. Jonas was lying on the floor, silent and unmoving, so she stepped off the ladder and towards him. But the gleam shone out again like a lighthouse beacon and something about it went straight into Mel's head, bypassing thought. Calling to her.

She changed direction and went to look. The gleam was coming from a ring that lay abandoned on the floor. Mel leaned down to pick it up.

She put it on.

Grabbing a bowl from the stack on the table, Nin was about to fill it with boiling water when something shifted in the darkness between the door and the cupboard next to it. The skinkin. She felt it see her, recognise her. This time there was no confusion. It had found its prey.

Nin had picked up enough from Vispilio's mind to know that the skinkin was unstoppable, that was its magic. It was made to kill its victim, so kill its victim was what it would do. And that meant Ninevah Redstone.

Dropping the bowl, she darted back out of the kitchen into the main hall, where she paused. Her instinct was to head for Jonas and Mel, but they couldn't help her and Mel needed to be free to tend to Jonas. So she turned to the door leading outside, intending to run to Hen. Hen would know what to do. Her hesitation was a mistake.

Out of the corner of her eye she saw the shadows shift. It was amazing how many shadows there were in a day-lit room. Under the beds, in corners, behind shelves or cupboards. She froze, her heart thudding and her skin chill and clammy. Was that a movement, over to the left of the door? She snapped her head around and saw … what? The pattern of dark and light resolved itself into the dips and hollows of a cat-like face only without eyes, with just sockets for eyes, watching her.

Another shift of light and it was gone.

Outside, Nin thought, it went outside and it's waiting for me to come out so it can get me before I can find Hen.

As silently as she could, Nin turned and ran to the ladder. She climbed, trying not to fumble the rungs with her trembling hands. At the top, she hurried towards the second ladder at the end of the corridor, the one that led to the roof. From there she could get across the rope bridge to the bell tower and then down the tower into the street, bypassing the skinkin while it watched the main entrance.

Icy with terror and shaking so badly she could barely hold the rungs, Nin made it to the top of the second ladder. Here was a small square room with a door out to the roof. Stumbling through, she felt air on her face and dragged in a breath.

In the last hour she had been a helpless prisoner in her own body and an unwilling accomplice in murder; she had seen one friend lying dead and had stabbed another;
and now she was being hunted by a relentless assassin. It was more than a Quick mind could cope with and the world was spinning about her as her body began to shut down from shock and exhaustion.

And then, rolling in from the hillside that overlooked the town, Nin heard a distant roar. It sounded like thunder, but she knew it wasn't. It was the shout of many voices raised in a cry that shook the air. There was no help coming any time soon. The battle had begun and Nin was on her own. Blackness swarmed in from the edges of her vision.

I'm passing out, she thought from somewhere far away in her head. She crashed to the roof floor and lay there, senseless.