The Secret Dead (London Bones Book 1) (29 page)

58

I was still alive when I woke at seven, but I felt as if a whole herd of elephants had trampled me in my sleep. Everything ached, and everything throbbed. The ceiling spiralled above.

I pulled the duvet over my head, and everything went blissfully dark. I slept again and had hot breathless dreams in which I was being chased by body parts that crawled out of the ground.

I woke feverish and disorientated. My head thumped, and I was sticky with sweat. I threw the bedding onto the floor. Neil might have murdered his wife, but I wasn’t sure I cared any more. I just wanted to lie in bed—one made out of ice, with a snowflake duvet and a crushed ice pillow.

My foot no longer hurt, or at least it didn’t hurt any worse than the rest of me. I contemplated getting out of bed and undoing the bandage to look, but that felt like entirely too much effort. I just needed to get through this fever.

Two percent
. I held onto it. Incredible that two little words could hold so much, and so little, hope.

‘Psst. Hey, hag.’

I opened my eyes. The suited ghost was standing at the foot of my bed.

‘What?’

‘Do I still get movie choice for information?’

‘Sure. Whatever.’ If I’m not dead this time tomorrow. ‘You find the winged boy?’

‘No. But there’s something else.’

My throat was dry. I would kill for a glass of water. ‘What is it?’

‘I’m not going to tell you that until you agree to a deal.’

I lay back on the bed and closed my eyes. ‘Sure. Whatever you want.’

‘There’s an unnatural thing following you.’

I groaned. I no longer cared. All manner of unnatural things could follow me all round London if that was their bailiwick. I was going to stay in bed and do nothing interesting at all.

‘Yeah, you already said. I don’t care.’

The ghost looked around as if there actually was something there then sank onto his knees and whispered in my ear, ‘Are you sure? Because it’s in your house.’

59

I shuffled onto my elbows and looked around, but whatever the ghost had been looking at wasn’t visible to me. I sighed. I didn’t really care, but if there was something unnatural in the house, or rather something that wasn’t Stanley, Sigrid, or my mother, I was probably obliged to find it and tell it to go away before it did any damage.

‘Where is it?’

But the ghost, presumably satisfied that he had held up his end of the deal, had bogged off of his own accord.

I swung my legs over the side of the bed and stood up. Pain streaked through my foot. I put my hand out to steady myself. When I was sure I could walk without falling over, I hobbled to the bedroom door and pulled my dressing gown off the back.

The corridor was empty of unnatural phenomena, unless you counted Stanley’s winter sunflowers, so I followed the sound of voices into the kitchen. Sigrid sat in her wheelchair at the kitchen table. Lorraine sat across from her, scooping porridge with a plastic spoon and inserting it into Sigrid’s mouth. My sister ate each mouthful in the same manner: a look of confusion, then understanding, then a single swallow.

‘Goodness, sweetheart, you look awful!’

I scanned the kitchen. It was cleaner than usual, but nothing looked out of the ordinary. ‘Just flu.’

‘What happened to your foot?’

‘Harpies.’

‘I thought they normally drop from above.’

Suddenly everyone’s an expert. ‘Not always. Where’s Stanley?’

‘In his room, I think. He decided you were right about your mother. He was in a real snit when I left yesterday.’

I poked my head into the living room on the way, but if the unnatural forces were there, they were keeping a low profile.

I opened the door to Stanley’s room. He was a shapeless form under his duvet. The floor was clear for once, but not even a good bleaching could rid it of the usual stink of unwashed socks. I took a few more steps and became aware of an odd sound, almost like a rhythmic hissing:
he he he he he.

It came from under the blanket. I pulled it off.

It was Stanley. His mouth was a slit, and his eyes were puffy but half-closed. His breath came shallow and fast.

‘Stan, can you hear me?’

He groaned. ‘I don’t feel so good.’

I pulled at his arms and tried to get him to a sitting position so his upper body would be elevated. That’s when I saw them, right in the middle of his bloated arm: two little holes.

I picked up his mobile from the bedside table and called 999. The emergency operator was quite emphatic in telling me not to try any cutting or sucking, which it hadn’t occurred to me to try. She promised me an ambulance within twenty minutes. It was there within ten, which gave me enough time to tell Lorraine what had happened and shove my poor foot into a boot. I opened the door to two green-uniformed men, one black and skinny, the other short and blond with an unconvincing moustache. I pointed them through to Stanley’s room and did what I hoped was a convincing portrayal of someone who didn’t have any injuries as I walked ahead of them. Lorraine poked her head out the kitchen when they arrived then ducked it back in.

The blond one’s name tag read ‘Payton.’ He kneeled next to the bed, felt for Stanley’s pulse, then shone a light into the old man’s eyes. The black skinny one—his tag read ‘Rickles’— turned Stanley’s arm over delicately and inspected the marks.

‘What happened?’ Rickles asked.

Stanley blinked in the light. ‘Something bit me.’

Rickles snapped open his bag and pulled out a pair of callipers. ‘Did you see what it was?’

Stanley shook his head. ‘I was sleeping.’

‘It was a snake,’ I said.

‘Did you see it?’ Rickles asked.

‘No, but I assumed it was a snake. Either that or a teeny tiny vampire.’

‘Those don’t exist, love.’ He laid the callipers next to the bite. ‘It’s more likely a fairy. We see a lot of this in winter. They’re attracted by the warmth.’ He stood up and put the callipers back in the bag. ‘The size isn’t right, but it’s difficult to tell with all the swelling. We’ll give him a shot of anti-fae. That should counteract it. All his vital signs are stable. If he was younger, I’d say he just needed to sleep it off, but we better take him in as a precaution.’

‘You his grand-daughter?’ Payton asked.

‘Yes.’ It was easier than explaining.

He gave me a look that was a little too appraising than I’d have liked from a medical professional. ‘You all right? You don’t look so good.’

‘It’s just flu.’

Neither looked convinced. ‘It didn’t bite you too?’ Rickles asked.

‘No. I’ve had a snotty nose for a week, and I think my body finally gave in to it this morning.’

The two exchanged glances, then Rickles said, ‘I’ve just got a few questions.’ I tensed, but he produced a clipboard and a ballpoint pen. ‘Has your grandfather got any allergies?’

I did my best to answer, giving them Stanley’s name and a chequered medical history, leaving out his suffocation in the trenches and making up a story about an industrial accident to explain the scars on his face. I hesitated a little over his date of birth, like a teenager trying to get into a nightclub, but neither of them seemed to notice. I remembered he’d broken his leg as a child, but I had no idea which one and it didn’t seem the sort of information that would be useful.

Rickles just smiled and said, ‘Anything could help, ma’am.’

A wave of dizziness washed over me. I sat on the bed. The men grew a little fuzzy.

Payton put his hand to my forehead. ‘You’re burning up. Normally we’d ask someone to come in with him, but I’m fairly certain your grandpa is going to be just fine. You’d better get back to bed.’

I nodded. They bundled him onto a stretcher and wheeled him out the door and into the back of the ambulance. I leaned heavily against the doorframe and watched them go. When the ambulance was out of sight, I closed the door and sank to the floor, shuddering. My skin burned, then froze.

This is it. This is the moment I burn off the fever and turn back to life.
A small voice in my brain said,
Or the fever burns off you.
I ignored it and waited for my energy to return. It didn’t. I struggled to my feet and hobbled back to the bedroom. I sat on the bed and tugged off my boot then the sock and bandages. I pulled up my pyjama bottoms and saw that my leg had turned purple from toe to calf. Angry red lines streaked towards my knee. Colourful, but not pretty.

‘Hey, dead girl.’ The suited ghost blinked into existence in front of me. ‘You got my movies sorted yet? I mean, no offence or anything, but you’ve probably not got much time left to do it, if you know what I mean.’

A streak of pain shot up my calf. I doubled over. ‘I will. I promise.’ I wheezed.

‘When will you do it? When you’re in the pit?’

‘Not going into the pit.’ I began breathing out in short huffs like I was about to give birth.

‘Well, what then? If you’re going to start eating, you’d better find an appropriate food source quick smart.’

Appropriate food source. He sounded like Patricia Stull. ‘No.’ He folded his arms, raised a bushy eyebrow. ‘I’ll do it now. I swear it. Stop hassling me.’

I reached for my phone. Sweat dripped onto the screen. He waited while I dialled the theatre and passed on his instructions. Xanadu this time.

I breathed out. ‘Happy?’

‘I’m dead. I’m never happy.’

‘Just tell me where the snake is and go away.’

‘Snake? Is that what it is? It just feels all wibbly to me.’

‘Where is it?’

He smirked and pointed up then blinked out again. I fell backwards onto the bed. The sweat froze on my face, and I shuddered. I lay still, listening, and heard nothing other than the distant sound of Lorraine chattering to Sigrid.

For some reason I couldn’t quite fathom through my soggy brain, it had already bitten Stanley. It might go for Sigrid or Lorraine next.

I hefted myself off the bed and climbed the stairs by the light of my phone, each step an effort. The steps creaked under my weight. Up ahead, in the dark, something rustled. I stopped. Listened. But there was silence, and the sound didn’t repeat. I reached the landing and shone my phone through the doorway. The darkness shifted just outside the beam of light.

I’m the hag,
I thought.
I may be almost a zombie. Stupid thing should be scared of me.

I risked electrocution and reached out to my left to flip the light switch. The fluorescent light overhead flickered to life, and I was uncomfortably reminded of the light in the pit.

The attic appeared empty. My mother lay exactly as I’d last seen her: a rotten, sunken corpse with one withered arm on her chest, the other buried in the gunk at the bottom of the coffin.

Stanley had changed the flowers. The roses from yesterday had been replaced by spiky giant nettles, passion flowers, and pink carnations. A
National Geographic
magazine lay spine up on his armchair.

It rustled.

The tension in my shoulders sank back into my spine, and I relaxed. It was a lot smaller than me.

I crept towards the chair.

I grabbed the magazine in one movement and ripped it away.

Underneath, curled into a defensive ball, was a small, green, ribbon-shaped snake.

I dropped the magazine. The snake darted towards me, a Barbie-pink mouth visible for the briefest of seconds before it sank its fangs into my wrist. And stayed there.

Pain shot up my arm. I grabbed the snake with my other hand and tugged at it, all the while shaking my arm and doing a little hopping dance on my injured leg around the room.

It dropped. And as it dropped, it changed in mid-air. Green became pale skin, the body lengthened and bulked out. He landed hard on his behind and scrambled backwards into the shadows, and I got my first real-world view of Alister Brannick.

And a lot more of Alister Brannick than I’d expected because he was completely naked. He had the same wiry body shape Samson did, but the resemblance ended there. In every other way, he was the male image of Leslie. Not the obese dead version, but the pretty smiling one I’d seen at dead Rosa’s barbeque. The hair that had been green tipped was now a solid green all over.

The twin punctures on my wrist ached all the way up to the elbow. I put pressure on them with my hand, but the pain didn’t diminish. My heart was racing, and my vision was a little blurry.

I swallowed. ‘I’ve been looking for you. Although I’m not sure what you’re doing in my house. Or why you bit my stepfather.’

He watched me with cautious eyes and didn’t answer.

‘Did you get my message from Margery? I’m Lipscombe. I’m not going to hurt you.’

In a blink he shifted, but I was ready. I raced to the door and shut it just as he got there. The green snake began to slither under the door, but I grabbed him by the tail with my right arm and pulled. With my left hand I reached out, and the first thing I felt was Stanley’s old army bag. I dropped the snake in and zipped it up.

He bumped against the canvas looking for a way out and then was still.

Snake in a case, part two. Sorry, Alister
. I hefted up the bag with my uninjured arm and carried it carefully downstairs. He weighed almost nothing, and only the bump hanging at the bottom of the bag convinced me he hadn’t somehow escaped.

I set the bag down on my bed and sat next to it. I had Alister Brannick. Now what did I do with him?