Demon Heart (The Darkworld Series Book 3) (11 page)

ince I’d already had several sleepless nights, I all but passed out when I got back, waking with a headache even worse than the day before. I didn’t usually get migraines, but the strange, horrible pressure on my forehead couldn’t have any other explanation. At least my dreams played nice this time. No more zombie-Ash apocalypses.

I spent the day in bed, alternately reading and napping, with the result that when midnight came, I felt wide awake and restless. I paced the room, checking my phone for messages every so often. Those anonymous texts still stood out in my inbox. I’d forgotten to tell Leo.
Does it matter? You don’t mention every time you get spam messages or e-mails.
But this was different, I knew. Either someone had something against me or the demons had something to do with it. Could they tap mobile phones? I didn’t think so, somehow, but it still felt like the kind of head game someone like the ghoul who’d impersonated me might come up with.

Paranoia. Stop being stupid and go to bed.

I picked up Melivia Blackstone’s journal again, hoping it would bore me enough to send me properly to sleep. Seven pages of Melivia’s monologuing about her new dress―seriously?―and it started to work. Reaching a new entry, my gaze skidded over the first paragraph. I had to reread it.

“I am concerned that I may be suffering hysteria or delusions. Nothing like this has ever happened to me before. Yesterday, Mother and I took the carriage to the town of Redthorne, and I saw a strange apparition. Mother is very concerned about me.”

Apparition.
Could she be talking about… a demon?

It must be
. The Blackstone family were magic-users, I knew that much―but they’d clearly kept their daughter in the dark, no pun intended. She had two older brothers who travelled a lot; one was a sailor, the other worked in London with their uncle. They must have known about demons and magic. Maybe it was because Melivia was their youngest daughter. Her mother certainly sounded overprotective.

Of course, it was 1868. Not exactly a time when women had a lot of freedom. What were the options for a female magic-user? As a member of the gentry, presumably Melivia was going to be married off to another high-class family. Yeuch. Another reason I was glad to live in the twenty-first century. For the first time I pitied the girl.

Sleep forgotten, I read on. A chill ran up my spine when I came to her description of the demon
. “It was like the landscape was a leaf of paper and someone had lifted it to reveal only a blank slate beneath. There was something stirring in the darkness. I saw a pair of violet eyes, not human eyes, but like a feral, ghastly wild animal. They looked at me, and I saw white teeth bared in a grin. I believe I must have fainted, because the next sight I saw was Mother bending over me. She told me that I should remain at home for a while.”

And so it went. I wanted to scream at Melivia’s mother to tell her the truth. Anything was better than thinking you were mad.

But this was a real-life authentic document from the time. It was probably worth a fortune to any historian, but I guessed the Venantium wouldn’t want it getting out there. At least, I assumed they’d been the ones to put it in the library. Who else could it have been?

My patience wore thin at Melivia’s ten-page description of her eighteenth birthday celebrations, but one interesting detail was that she had stolen a priceless necklace from her mother’s jewellery collection, an act that seemed out of character with her usual meekness. Not that you could tell everything about a person from their writing, but there was a simplicity to Melivia’s style that suggested the naivety of someone who’d been sheltered for most of her life. Which, I supposed, was why the mention of the crystal stuck out to me. “A glittering amethyst”, she called it.
“When I touch it, it gives me the most peculiar feeling. I do not know why, but I feel like it belongs to me.”

That sounded awfully familiar to me.

I was right in assuming that she was being groomed for a husband. This “Edgar Wilbury” who unexpectedly proposed to her sounded unbearably pompous, like a character from an Austen novel. I rolled my eyes at Melivia’s naivety;
“I do hope he will be kind to me and may learn to love me.”

Holy Jesus.
This girl defines “walkover.”

Although they became engaged, the wedding never happened. Edgar went away travelling for some reason―and that’s when things got interesting.

One day, every member of the Blackstone family arrived at the house without warning. They were clearly in some kind of panic, but of course Melivia had no idea what was going on. I would have guessed that it had something to do with demons or at least the Venantium. But Melivia’s diary stayed mundane as ever, describing such inane things as what shoes each of her relatives was wearing. That, as opposed to what they were actually talking about. The only clue was in the nightmares.

Every night, Melivia was plagued by strange dreams, of ice and fire, of voices whispering in her ears. It chilled me because so many of them echoed my own.

“I feel so languid and depressed. Mother says I must be coming down with a fever. I do often wake with my skin burning…”

“I must have forgotten to blow out the candle on my bedside table last night, because I awoke to find a flame burning my skin. I blew it out, but the incident shook me enormously. I felt compelled to check on the crystal on my bedside table…”

“I am concerned that I may be going mad. What if I am? Will Edgar no longer want me?”

“You’re better off without him,” I muttered. “He sounds like an obnoxious prick.”

She had been engaged to Edgar Wilbury for about eight months, but there was no mention of a wedding. Then…

“Something has happened, something so peculiar I would dismiss it as a dream if I doubted the evidence of my senses.

For some time I have been dreaming of a voice. Now I have met its owner. He is an extraordinary man, and words alone cannot do him justice, but I will try.

I awoke early yesterday morning. I do not know why, but I felt compelled to rise and open the curtains. He stood outside our front door, and when I looked out, he glanced up at me and smiled. I felt his face was familiar although I am sure we have never met.

I rushed to dress myself without calling for Emily. Something told me that he wanted me to answer the door, and I did so. I must have looked a frightful sight, but his smile was kind.

“Whom do I have the pleasure of addressing?” he asked.

“I… I am Melivia. Melivia Blackstone.”

“Charmed,” he said, and stooped to kiss my hand.

I was astounded. He sounded vaguely foreign, German or Austrian, I would guess, but his English was flawless. He was certainly very handsome, and his attire spoke of wealth and comfort.

“Are you the lady of the house?”

“My mother…” I looked back down the hallway. Mother was nowhere in sight. “I believe she must be out. Are you here to speak with her?”

“I am here to speak with Lady Blackstone. May I come inside?”

He was so handsome, and so charming, how could I refuse him? He came into the sitting room, and I sent Emily to prepare tea immediately.

“What are you here to talk to Mother about?” I said, embarrassed by the silence.

“I am not here to talk to your mother. But I would love to learn more about you. Tell me, Lady Blackstone.”

No one has ever called me “lady” before. I assume that was what led me to tell him, in five minutes, every detail of my life. It was most unexpected. I could not seem to stop myself from speaking. He listened politely and took an interest in my every word, far more than Mother or any of the others ever have. He stayed for an hour, then excused himself.

“Do you not want to speak to Mother?” I asked when he stood to leave.

“I find you more fascinating. May I visit again?”

“I… of course.”

What possessed me? This was most irregular. But it honestly happened, and as I sit writing this, I can still see his carriage retreating into the distance along the road to Blackstone.

It only now occurs to me that he did not tell me his name.”

I seemed to hear Mr. Priestley’s voice again, deep in the headquarters of the Venantium:

“Tell me, Miss Temple, are you acquainted with the story of the Blackstone family? The untold part is that around a century and a half ago, a stranger knocked on the door of the Blackstone family’s manor. He was a sorcerer, a traveller, and they were happy to let him into their home. He seduced their daughter, Melivia. When her father found out, he unleashed his wrath upon the man. But he was too late. He had already tricked Melivia into summoning a demon.”

This sorcerer was the man who had started the Demon Wars.

My phone buzzed on the other side of the room where I’d plugged it in. A rush of foreboding shot through me. I entered my passcode on the touch screen with shaking fingers. Two new messages.

Miss Temple. We request that you present yourself to us at 7 a.m. tomorrow for an emergency meeting along with your fellow unregistered magic-users.

The second message was from Leo:
The V have called a meeting 4 magic users tomorrow. Madame P is in trouble. We all have to be there at 7 xx

What the hell?
Who called emergency meetings at 7.00 a.m. on a Saturday?

What kind of trouble was the fortune-teller in?

Leo and Claudia looked about as much like death as I felt when they met me outside the flat at quarter past six. The early-morning mist enshrouded the buildings in the village, making it look quite eerie.

“You feeling better, Ash?” said Leo, hugging me. His hair was tousled as though he’d just got out of bed. I had to resist the urge to run my fingers through it.

“Yeah, I’m fine. What’s this about?”

“I don’t know, but I have a bad feeling. Maybe it’s about those shadow-beasts.”

“Do they know about it?”

“Wouldn’t surprise me if they did. Shit, I hope they don’t do a magic scan on us this time. Using Influence is illegal.”

“Oh crap,” said Claudia. “If they do… Well, you were attacked, weren’t you? There was no other way to get Howard out of there. He’d have died.”

“Of course,” said Leo. “But you know what they’re like.”

“Yeah, you guys weren’t here when they went psycho on that subliminalist cult last year,” said Claudia. “They were using subliminal magic to burgle people’s houses and make them forget they saw anyone. I think they’re still chained down in the dungeons.”

I winced. The memory of being locked in a cell and having my magic sealed was still fresh in my mind. The Venantium had gone as far as to block my connection to the Darkworld. I remembered the suffocating feeling, like something was squeezing the life out of me.

“I’m not going back in that Angel Box,” I said.

They both looked at me. “I can’t believe they put you through that,” said Leo, taking my hand. “If I’d known, I’d have moved hell to get you out.”