Paint it Black by W. V. Fitz-Simon

Author:W. V. Fitz-Simon [Fitz-Simon, W. V.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

28

“Alfie!”

Gosha ran down Canterbury Gardens to catch him, but the black Mini Cooper turned the corner onto Manor Road and disappeared.

Gosha had left the other witches sealed in the house where, hopefully, they could figure out a way to disarm Dropnick’s devices. The comforting weight of the switchblade bounced against her side in the pocket of her leather jacket. She adjusted her lipstick in its place, tucked into her bra. It was useless to her now, but perhaps, if the ladies figured out a solution, she’d be able to use it again, even if Eleanor and Nimuë did have faith in her ability to use the Between.

A procession of five number twenty-seven-B buses rumbled past her down Manor Road, but they wouldn’t take her where she needed to go. Joel Adair’s flat was a twenty minute walk away from the nearest tube station. At this hour of morning, it might take her upwards of forty-five minutes to get there if there were any delays on the line. She needed a faster mode of transportation and, of course, there wasn’t a cab anywhere to be found.

All right. She imagined Eleanor and Nimuë standing behind her, looking over her shoulder. You say I’ve got all the power I need. Let’s see.

In the Between, on the plain beneath the hill, was a labyrinth carved out in lines of white chalk by a witch whose name had been lost to antiquity, a making that, under the effects of spellshock, Gosha had used to summon all the witches in the British Isles to stand beside her in her time of need. Eleanor had shown her the path, a complex series of steps in the real world that opened up a passage that would allow her to pass bodily into the Between, an altogether different experience from allowing her mind to cross the veil that separated the real world from that other place. She’d walked the labyrinth twice. The first time, she’d been too preoccupied by the ethereal incarnation of Dropnick’s moth creature trying to consume her to pay much attention to the pattern of lefts and rights Eleanor had guided her through. The second time, however, was after the threat of Dropnick and the Convocation of Saints had been diffused. Gosha was pretty sure she could remember the sequence.

She took a deep breath and cleared her head. A young woman strolling down Manor Road walking a tiny Yorkshire terrier gave her a queer look, but she ignored it.

Two steps forward, turn to the right…

She stepped back from the curb so walking the labyrinth wouldn’t lead her into traffic and summoned the Between. A warm glow suffused the street, seeping out of the trees and the cracks in the pavement. With her third turn, amber lines spread out across the pavement and into the road. With her fourth, the sky darkened as if the day were ending a dozen hours too soon. With her fifth turn, she was no longer quite in the real world, nor fully in the Between.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.