We sang louder.
The silly man didn’t understand what the rest of us had already recognised. He thrust his pocket knife towards Slasher’s throat but it was too short and blunt to cause any real damage. The woman put up no defence but even so Leighton only scratched her skin; obviously close combat wasn’t his forte. It was one thing to attack someone from a distance, it was another to try and take their life when you could feel the warmth of their breath.
He tried throwing all his hatred and rage into his voice instead of his blade. ‘I’ll rip your magic from you. I’ll leave you as husks of people. Once I’m done, there’ll be nothing left of you. You’ll be useless hunks of flesh!’
I smiled, changed key and sang more loudly, as did the others. Leighton reached into his pockets again and this time produced a small grey sphere that throbbed with dark magic. There were sticky patches on its surface, traces of the same nasty gloop that had been left on the rooftops of Coldstream.
He held the sphere in both his hands and started to murmur an incantation.
Something sharp twisted in the centre of my chest as if a thin corkscrew had been thrust through my ribcage. I knew the others felt the same because the skirl of our voices faltered.
Panic lit Keres’ eyes for the first time since the bone box had smashed at her feet.
‘What?’ Slasher stepped backwards. ‘What are you doing?’
Arthur Dinsbury’s hands clutched his chest and he gave a strange noise that was half song, half croak. As I watched, he scrabbled at his shirt in growing panic. The drawstring linen bag was still looped around his thumb.
I pushed away the pain in my chest, and the urge to shriek and sing, and smiled. ‘He wants to try and kill us all,’ I said. ‘He’ll reach inside and yank out our magic. He’ll take what makes us what we are and leave us with nothing.’
‘You bet your fucking arse I will,’ Leighton snarled, breaking his incantation. ‘My collection is just about to grow even larger. I have plenty of boxes waiting for you.’
I tightened my grip on my knife hilt. There was a sudden loud thump as Slasher slid to the floor. Keres’ eyes were rolling back in her head. ‘The powder, Arthur,’ I whispered. ‘Use the death powder.’
At first I wasn’t sure he’d heard me but then, with an effort, he removed his hands from his chest. He managed to open the little black bag and throw it in Leighton’s direction. It smacked the bastard in the chest then fell to the floor.
Tears of pain streaming down her cheeks, Slasher reached for it. She hauled herself up to her feet and tossed the powdery contents into Leighton’s face. A moment later, she collapsed again.
I was already moving to the centre of the room. Leighton saw me coming. He turned to me, rage and desperation glittering in his eyes. ‘You,’ he spat. ‘You resisted me before. What are you?’
I opened my mouth and answered him with a high-pitched shriek that should have impressed even Keres.
Then I stabbed him in the chest.
‘Where’s the wolf?’ I asked. ‘Where did you put the wolf soul you stole a few hours ago?’
He didn’t answer, though his eyes flicked in the direction of the staircase. That was enough for me. I twisted my curved blade hard enough to be absolutely sure.
In the very moment that Jimmy Leighton’s heart stopped beating, the overwhelming urge inside me to sing and shriek at the top of my lungs vanished. He was dead. My skirl was no longer required.
Chapter
Thirty
Keres was moaning faintly from the corner of the room. I glanced at Slasher and Dinsbury; their eyes were closed but they wouldn’t stay that way.
I turned to Leighton’s body. The grey sphere had dropped to the floor by his side. I left it where it was then raised his arm and draped it across his chest to conceal the stab wound. I wiped the blade of my curved dagger and returned it to its sheath.
Keres was the first to recover fully. There was a large bruise on the side of her cheek and she was moving stiffly, but the return of her ban sith voice was more than enough to spur her into speedy consciousness.
I helped her to her feet and looked into her eyes. ‘Follow my finger,’ I ordered, moving it from left to right. ‘You might be concussed.’ She did as I asked. ‘What’s your name?’ I demanded.
‘Keres Johnson.’
‘What are you?’
She smiled. ‘A ban sith. And I’m fucking proud of it.’
She would be alright, but I was still squinting at her. ‘I don’t think that all your magic has returned to you.’
