You feed off me and I let you
It’s a slow death and yet
We call this love
Sean sat upright, his back against a tree and his eyes burning from lack of sleep. The light was cold and livid, and the sky wintry white. He wondered why the Bialoweza forest was under snow in the human world, but not this one – and why there seemed to be a few hours’ difference between human time and shadow time. Or so they thought. But who knew? Maybe time here ran faster, or slower. Maybe it’d be like in one of those fairy tales in Harry’s book, where a man went to a fairy feast and when he returned to his home three hundred years had passed. He wondered how many other little differences there were between the two worlds that they might not notice now but that would later come to haunt them.
A thought hit him: they were all being given the chance to experience how human beings used to live before the Secret Families rose, when there was only one world and the Surari ruled it. Before the Secret children, the human tribes were constantly besieged, their lives so full of danger that they had no time left for anything but survival. It must have been like this – cold and dark and frightening. No shelter and never feeling quite safe enough for sleep.
Which sounded a lot like his life as a Gamekeeper, really.
Sean closed his eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. His body was battered and bruised, aching in ways he never thought possible, and the lack of sleep was slowly wearing him out. He feared he’d become so weary that he would not be able to think clearly, and would end up making the wrong decisions. But he had to keep going.
Absent-mindedly, he scratched his neck. Something wriggled against his skin. He scratched again. Suddenly, he let out a small groan and jumped to his feet, ripping his own jacket off in a frenzy.
“Demon-leeches!” he shouted. “Wake up!”
“Sean!” Sarah screamed, on her feet at once, her hands already scalding. She saw he was bare-chested, his clothes in a heap on the grass. She followed his gaze to the nest of clothes. Something was struggling beneath them, something tiny and black and writhing.
“Stay away!” Sean shouted, opening his arms to stop his friends from getting too close to the creature. He took a step back but it was too late. The demon had appeared from beneath the heap of clothes and bounded towards him with deadly speed, attaching itself to his skin. He ripped it off just one instant before it managed to sink its teeth into him, and kept tearing at his collarbone, scratching his skin. He took hold of his sgian-dubh and began murmuring words, gazing around to spot more demon-leeches. Not far away, Niall had started singing his deadly song, his eyes half-closed, arms outstretched. As he sang, a strange, unnatural wind made the trees shiver. Sean turned to face Sarah and saw something writhing in her hair, black against black. He leapt, but Elodie was faster. She ripped the Surari off Sarah’s hair, taking a lock of her hair with it. They watched in horror as the creature squirmed on the ground, black hairs – Sarah’s – trailing from its body.
Niall’s song was slowly killing it as it gasped like a fish out of water, with its round mouth full of minuscule suckers open and ready to attach itself. Sarah threw herself at the creature, ready to finish it off and melt it into Blackwater – but two things happened at once: another leech fell from a branch and bit Niall’s neck, interrupting his song, and the Surari on the ground, free from the torture of the song, righted itself before Sarah could touch it – towards Elodie’s face. On impulse, Sarah threw herself in front of Elodie, and the demon landed on Sarah’s neck, sinking into her skin with a horrible squelch.
Niall tore the leech away before it could properly attach itself, but his song had been interrupted so abruptly that he stood in a daze, panting, trying to summon his power once more.
On the ground, Sarah clawed at her neck as the Surari’s black body swelled with her blood. Elodie kneeled beside her at once. She knew she couldn’t place her lips on the creature as it would simply attach itself to her mouth, but she went to stab it with her dagger. She was about to lower the blade when another demon-leech fell on her head, and she missed. She jumped up, horrified. The Surari fell to the earth but pounced as soon as it landed, attaching itself to her thigh . . . and then the creature fell off her and onto the ground.
It didn’t want her blood.
Then, the realisation hit her. Everything slowed down around Elodie, as if the world was suddenly in slow motion. The Surari knew. It knew that her blood was tainted, ruined. She didn’t need any more proof now.
As Niall’s song rose higher and grew more lethal, Elodie winced and covered her ears. A few seconds later and the leech was still.
Exhausted, Sarah had fainted, her eyes rolling back as more and more blood drained from her. Sean’s hands were moving faster and faster, sweat rolling off his forehead and into his eyes, the terrible knowledge that Sarah was being bled dry intensifying the power of the runes. Scarlet ribbons began appearing in the air, and one of them wrapped itself around the demon on Sarah’s neck, strangling it slowly, growing tighter and tighter. Finally its suckers began to lose their grip . . . when suddenly Sean felt something bite his bare back. He screamed and his sgian-dubh fell, the runes interrupted. The demon-leech bit Sarah’s unconscious body with renewed hunger.
“They’re falling off the trees! Get away from the trees!” Sean yelled, throwing himself against some rocks jutting out of the mossy undergrowth. He banged his back against the rocks, ignoring the pain in his ribs, until he felt the demon-leech being squashed and broken, a gush of blood – some of which was his – soaking his back.
“Come away!” Alvise echoed Sean’s words, and led Niall and Micol to a small clearing removed from the danger. But it was a mistake. Niall’s song came to a halt as he was dragged out of his trance, and a leech crept under his jacket. Niall screamed as the Surari sank its suckers into his back and began draining him at once.
Without hesitation, Alvise went to Niall, helping him remove his jacket and fleece. He shuddered when the leech appeared. The demon attacking Niall was fat with Niall’s blood, already as big as a rat. It looked different from the others, bigger, its skin thick and leathery. Niall doubled over in pain, while Alvise grabbed an arrow from his quiver and started stabbing the demon-leech with it. His arrow could not pierce the creature’s skin, and the Surari didn’t move an inch. It was as if the steel arrowhead wasn’t even causing it pain. Niall whimpered and fell face down on the undergrowth, the creature sucking his life away.
Alvise growled in frustration. He unsheathed his pugnale – his dagger – and tried piercing it again, to no avail. He tried prising it off, pulling it with all his strength . . . but nothing worked. Its skin seemed thicker and stronger than any other leech, a leathery hide that protected it from blades and arrowheads, and its suckers’ grip seemed unbreakable.
“Sean! Sarah! Help!” he called, but there was no reply.
“Sarah is on the ground!” Micol cried, intermittent charges of a million colours buzzing off her in her fear and distress; no demon-leech could attach itself to her without ending up burnt to a crisp.
“Micol! Help him!” Alvise pleaded.
“I can’t! I’d kill Niall along with the demon!”
“We have no choice but to try,” Alvise yelled back. “He doesn’t have long. Micol, you have to!”
“Alvise,” Niall coughed with bloodless lips, his grey eyes closing, shadowed by long black lashes. And Alvise’s heart broke in two.
A memory appeared in his mind – a long, warm summer evening in Venice a few years before. The Flynns had come to visit their family. Their parents had Secret business to attend to and a ball had been organised in their honour. They were all gathered in the gilded, frescoed ballroom of Palazzo Vendramin, the men in white ties or the ancestral attire of their families; the women in evening dresses, bright and colourful like spring flowers. And then Niall appeared down the grand stairs, in between with his parents, his auburn hair down to his shoulders, his eyes a colour Alvise had never seen – dark grey, like soft steel. He was wearing jeans and a white shirt – he’d refused evening dress. Alvise remembered the ripple in his heart as he saw Niall stepping down those stairs, a half smile dancing on his lips . . .
Now Micol was shaking. “I can’t do this, Alvise . . . please don’t make me . . .”
“Micol, listen to me,” Alvise said, looking her straight in the eye. He went to take her by the shoulders, but her electrical armour prevented anyone from touching her, and Alvise’s hands hung empty. “It’s his last chance,” he begged once again. “Look.” Micol followed his gaze. The demon-leech was swollen and tight with Niall’s blood, but its body kept expanding to accommodate more. It wouldn’t stop until there was nothing left.
A small sob left the girl’s lips. He was right. There was no other way.
She placed her sparkling hands on Niall’s back, closed her eyes, and let go of an electrical charge with a soft buzz and a flash of orange. Niall’s body tensed and jumped, and Micol removed her hands, horrified. What was she doing? His heart would stop, and it’d be all her fault.
But his heart would stop anyway if they couldn’t remove the creature.
Steeling herself, she hit him once more, twice, until the demon-leech shrivelled up and fell off. An overwhelming stench of burning flesh filled the air, smoke coming off its black, swollen body. Micol let herself fall alongside Niall, without daring to touch him again. Alvise was on him at once, turning him around gently, placing his fingers on Niall’s throat.
“Wake up. Please wake up,” Micol whispered, tears drying up on her scalding skin as soon as they trickled out of her eyes.
Elodie recovered herself. The creature didn’t want her blood? Then she could use her power. Sean was lying prone, the demon-leech drinking his blood in pulsing gulps. Elodie placed her poisonous lips on its skin, gagging in revulsion at the feeling of the slick, wet hide against her mouth. It was strong. It didn’t stop guzzling down Sean’s blood, even as it was being slowly poisoned by Elodie.
Elodie gasped for air, but she didn’t lift her lips from the demon sucking away Sean’s life. Where is Nicholas, she asked herself in despair while her life force ebbed slowly into the venomous kiss. She felt weaker and weaker, her head spinning as she closed her eyes and a small prayer left her heart. Don’t let Sean die.
Finally, just as she thought she couldn’t take any more, she felt the Surari move slightly, loosening its grip. With a noise that was half growl, half sob, Elodie prised it off, and it detached itself from Sean with a wet, sloshing sound.
She dried the black slush from her lips with her sleeve and watched in disgust while the leech pulsed like a ripped-out heart, opening and closing its round mouth, until it was immobile. Only then did she let herself fall forward, her head on Sean’s chest, listening to his faintly beating heart. She was so tired. She was always so tired . . .
“Elodie,” whispered Sean, but she couldn’t move. He wrapped his arms around her and they lay together for a moment. Until a whimper made Elodie lift her head and roll herself away from Sean.
She gasped as a terrible scene appeared in front of her: Nicholas lay on the ground, covered in demon-leeches. On his neck, his arms, his legs. He lay open like in a crucifixion, his eyes closed and his face to the ruthless sky. Mustering the last of her strength, Elodie dragged herself on her hands and knees towards Nicholas and started placing her deadly kiss onto the creatures.
Sean pulled himself toward Nicholas too, dizzy from the loss of blood. He’d lost his sgian-dubh, he realised with dismay. He was lost without it. He began scrambling around when finally he saw a glint of silver in a branch. He lifted himself on his toes to reach his blade, and he saw them. The tree was full of leeches, dozing on the branches. His breaths coming out in ragged pants, expecting to be hit at any moment, Sean retrieved his sgian-dubh and began tracing his runes.
Sarah’s consciousness was ebbing and flowing, until finally she came to her senses. It took her a moment to realise what she was seeing – Nicholas on the ground, leeches all over him; Elodie poisoning them; and Sean, looking up at the tree, his hands weaving slow runes.
“Sean,” she slurred, dragging herself to her knees.
“Sarah. Listen. Elodie, you too,” he whispered urgently. “Get away from here. Take Nicholas with you. Try not to make a noise. The tree is full of them.”
All of a sudden a shower of leeches began falling on them, but right at the same time Sean’s red ribbons appeared and began cutting them, slashing the air underneath the trees, cutting up the leeches before they could hit the ground.
Sarah and Elodie dragged Nicholas’ unconscious body away from the death-laden trees, inch by inch, leaving a bloodied trail on the grass. Sarah looked over to Sean, who was walking backwards, whispering words in the Ancient language, his hands dancing faster than the eye could see. Little black bodies were being torn to pieces by whirling ribbons of light.
Elodie kissed the last demon off Nicholas’ chest and then, with a whimper, she let herself fall beside him, her hair soaked in black and red blood.
“Elodie!” Sarah whispered, and took the French girl in her arms. She didn’t see one of the Surari they’d prised off Nicholas’ skin leap up with its suckers ready. It blindly attached itself to Sarah’s neck and began sucking her blood, doubling its size in seconds.
Everything slowed down at once. She was on her back, gazing at the sky. She could hear voices shouting, calling, but they were coming from far away. Her life was flowing out of her and into the creature in a stream that could not be stopped. A sweet, heady scent filled her nostrils – blood – her blood. It was a sweet demise, to bleed out. It was peaceful. The sky was very white and very still, like death.
She heard a whisper in her ear. It was Sean’s voice, calling her name. Let me go, she wanted to say, but she couldn’t. It’s so peaceful. Let me go.
Something covered the sky – a girl’s face, surrounded by multi-coloured lightning. Micol.
The Falco girl had seized her moment to kill her then, Sarah thought. She saw sparkling hands rise to her throat, and a soft buzz started in her ears. She found a way. She found a way to kill me . . . What’s the point in trying to stop her? I’m dying anyway.
The pain was horrendous as the first charge hit her in an explosion of red and orange. She could smell burning, and she was sure it was her flesh. In a second, she was jolted out of her blood-loss-induced trance.
“No,” she begged. That was not the way she wanted to die. That was not oblivion. It was just more pain. “No!” she pleaded once more, her voice coming out weak and ragged. “Sean, help me . . .”
But Sean didn’t help her, and Micol didn’t stop. Again she hit Sarah, and again, this time with a blue charge that made her body convulse and her eyes roll into the back of her head. After that, she couldn’t feel any more.
Sarah blinked. Once. Twice. Slowly, the world came into focus.
There were trees above her. Trees are danger, she thought, and tried to move, but her body would not comply. Her arms and legs felt infinitely heavy, way too heavy to be lifted. A face appeared over her. Sean. She realised her head was resting on Sean’s lap, and relaxed slightly. “I’m alive?”
“Yes. Thank God, yes. You’re alive,” said Sean, caressing her face. She saw tears in his eyes and felt guilty – she never wanted to cause him pain. “You were out of it for a long time.”
“Was I?” And then she remembered. Micol, her hands sparkling . . . the pain. “She burnt me. Am I burnt?”
“Just a little. Your eyebrows.”
“My eyebrows? I’m going to kill her.” Sarah scrambled to get up, but couldn’t. Her head spun and her chest hurt.
“Hey, take it easy. Just lie down for a bit. Micol saved your life,” said Sean.
“She what? That stupid little girl electrocuted me!”
“She didn’t electrocute you. She fried the leech. She saved you,” Sean repeated.
“You should thank me, Sarah!” Micol came into focus, her arms folded, her expression dark. “I have saved you. And I’m not a little girl. I turned sixteen today. I think . . . Or maybe tomorrow. I lost track of time.”
“Happy birthday,” said an Irish voice. Niall – and he wasn’t even being sarcastic.
Sarah sat up, Sean’s arm around her shoulders. She saw Niall leaning against a tree, his clothes bloodied and torn. His skin had a blue tinge, and there were deep shadows under his eyes. He must have been bled half to death too. He had Alvise’s jacket around his shoulders, Sarah noticed, and felt another pang of guilt for not having been there to help them. Being in two places at the same time – now that would be a good power to have . . .
“Are we all alive?” she whispered.
“For now,” Sean replied tersely.
“Elodie?”
“I’m fine,” she said. Sarah gazed at her, sitting beside Nicholas with her back to a tree. Elodie’s breathing was shallow and her fingernails blue, and her exquisite, porcelain-like face was whiter than ever. Nicholas looked pretty shaken up, every visible part of his body bearing the marks of suckers. Sarah remembered him lying on the grass, covered in leeches. Nobody human could have survived such a thing. Could he walk?
“We need to go,” Nicholas said, as if he’d heard her thoughts.
Beyond the trees, in the west, the sun was setting. Night was falling on the Shadow World, and on them all.