Slightly ahead of Winter, I turned the corner towards the back door entrance and froze. Silhouetted against the darkening sky was a large man, standing at the threshold and smoking. I barely had a second to take him in before I pulled back and grabbed Winter’s arm, gesturing frantically. Because of the light and the fact that he’d been turned away I hadn’t seen the man’s face clearly – but there was definitely a shiny bald head and a bushy black beard.
Winter’s eyes darkened to a stormy blue and he dipped his head forward to look. Almost immediately he drew back in, his features and his body tense. We shared a glance of grim determination – coupled with a tiny edge of satisfaction. Although I’d felt the same as Winter and my gut had been telling me that Blackbeard’s trail would lead here, I hadn’t expected to find the man himself.
Winter tugged at my sleeve, pulling me further back into the main building. He didn’t speak until we were out of earshot. ‘He’s wearing a uniform,’ he whispered so quietly that I had to strain to hear. ‘He must be a security guard.’
I agreed. ‘And on the night shift, no less.’ It was perfect – if you wanted to secretly cremate bodies without being observed. ‘How do we do this? We can’t use magic against him because it won’t work. And if he’s a security guard, he’s probably armed.’ Not with a gun – this was middle England, after all – but there was a chance he had a Taser or a knife. Even a baton used by someone who knew what they were doing could cause us problems. Hell, for all we knew he could have a bloody submachine gun with him. It was unlikely, but nothing was impossible where Blackbeard was concerned. Besides, I was a plump woman of less than average height and rather dubious fitness. Winter, naturally, was in a better position to attack Blackbeard without a spell to back him up but even he would find it tough. The man was built like an oak tree.
‘You stay here,’ Winter said. ‘Call the police, the Ipsissimus and whoever you can get hold of at Arcane Branch. Tell them to advance here on the double. I’ll make sure Blackbeard doesn’t get away.’
‘You’re fit, Winter, but he has to be twice your size.’
‘I can do this.’
He was an idiot. ‘Actually,’ I said, ‘I don’t think you can. Look, just because we can’t use magic directly against him doesn’t mean we can’t use magic around him.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘We could weaken the building’s foundations to the point of collapse. I know a few spells for that. We bring several tonnes of concrete down onto his head, then he’ll stop moving. He’ll be as flat as a pancake.’
Winter nodded gravely, as if he were taking my suggestion seriously. ‘There’s just one tiny problem with that scenario, Ivy.’ He waved a hand. ‘We’re inside the same building and the only way out is the exit where Blackbeard is standing.’
Ah. Okay. I could concede that point. ‘Fine. But there must be a way.’
‘Well, I suppose we could—’
‘Who the fuck are you?’
Winter and I sprang backwards in shock. Then, without thinking, I let out a war cry and ran headfirst towards Blackbeard. My head smacked into his not-inconsiderable belly and he let out a loud oomph of surprise. He reached down, grabbed a hank of my hair and dragged me upwards. It felt like my scalp was being ripped out. I shrieked in pain and writhed, trying to kick my way to freedom. My feet connected with solid flesh several times but Blackbeard wasn’t letting go of my hair for anything.
While I swung ineffectually round like a doll being held by a giant, Winter leapt towards the pair of us with his fists raised. Blackbeard let out a guttural, inarticulate yell of rage, confusion and fear. The sound reverberated round my skull while I stared dumbly at his face. Arse. Double arse. Triple arse. Arsing hell with an arsing cherry on top for effort. This was very bad.
Unfortunately, before I got the chance to say or do anything, he flung me to the side so he was free to face Winter’s onslaught. I both felt and heard my head crack against the concrete wall. Pain shot through my body, rippling through me in waves that made it difficult to think coherently. I was dimly aware of Winter letting out a howl of rage of his own. I opened my mouth to speak but all that came out was a strange grunt. Blinking several times, I tried to focus but it was no good. My vision was blurred and two Winters and two bearded men were hovering and wobbling in front of me.
Winter threw the first punch, slamming into Blackbeard’s face. His jowls juddered and blood spurted out from his nose, splattering onto the floor in front of me.
‘Wait,’ I tried to croak. ‘Stop.’
Neither of them heard me – and even if they had, I doubt they would have paid any attention. I tried to stagger to my feet but I didn’t even make it to a crouching position before I collapsed again. ‘Rafe,’ I said.
Both versions of him ducked away from two swinging fists. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to clear my vision. It was making me incredibly nauseous but that was nothing compared to how I’d feel if either of these two got seriously hurt.
‘It’s not him.’
Blackbeard’s doppelganger reached down to his belt to unclip whatever weapon he was carrying. Winter was determined not to give him the chance, however, and shoulder-slammed him, knocking him to the ground. Unfortunately Winter fell with him and both men rolled around on the floor, grabbing, kicking and trying to hit each other. From this angle, it looked like they were making love rather than war but the grunts and yelps of pain told a different story.
My head felt like it was going to explode. It wasn’t a throbbing ache, it was an all-out, searing pain that made it difficult to think. And I was definitely going to throw up at any moment. I sucked in a breath and concentrated. I had to do something before these two killed each other and I should probably do it now before I passed out.
My rune was sloppy; truth be told, it would barely pass muster in the weakest non-Order coven. As long as it did what I needed it to do, though, that didn’t matter. I intended to douse them in icy water. A good drenching, as Winter well knew because he’d done the same to me in the past, was more than enough to jolt anyone back to reality.
Unfortunately, the blow to my head meant I was thrown off my game. From out of nowhere, a shower of ice cubes rained down not just on Winter and the security guard but across the whole room. Within seconds there were four inches of ice cubes carpeting the floor and I was shivering violently.
Winter managed to extricate himself from the fight and rushed over to me. ‘What are you doing? What’s wrong?’
Thank goodness. I raised my eyes to his, an action that took a lot of effort and energy, particularly as I still didn’t know which was the real Winter. ‘It’s not him,’ I croaked. ‘That’s not Blackbeard.’
He frowned. ‘What?’
I opened my mouth again but it was too late. The security guard raised his hand and thumped Winter on the back of the neck. Winter collapsed, his body sprawled heavily against mine.
‘I’ll try again,’ the guard said, blood streaming from his nose and into his beard. ‘Who the hell are you?’
I’d have answered him if I could. I really wanted to answer him but consciousness was too difficult to sustain and the lights dancing in front of my eyes were taking over. Another surge of nausea rippled through me then I passed out too.
***
I returned slowly to the world of the living. For the first few seconds nothing hurt and I wondered if I were still alive or if I’d joined the ranks of all those angry spirits. It didn’t take long, though, for the pain to make a comeback – and when it did, it was like being hit with a ten-ton truck.
I could have played dead and used the opportunity to learn more about the situation I was now in; that’s what a Hollywood heroine would have done. Instead I moaned loudly, then I threw up. Thanks to the fact that I was now trussed up like a chicken, the vomit ended up all down my front instead of anywhere moppable. I groaned again.
The security’s guard face loomed in front of me. At least there was now only one of him
and I was no longer seeing double – but I still blinked rapidly. His resemblance to Blackbeard was quite uncanny but, now I was close to him, it was obvious that this was a different man. He didn’t have an earring for one thing, and his ear didn’t have the tell-tale hole where an earring might once have been. His face was older, with laughter lines around his eyes and mouth, and his dark beard was speckled with grey. The real giveaway was the expression in his eyes; it was brimming with suspicion, worry and more than a little fear. It certainly was nothing like the dead emotion in Blackbeard’s gaze.
‘Ivy,’ I muttered to myself, ‘you’ve really screwed up this time.’
‘Ivy? That’s your name?’
I nodded, then wished I hadn’t because moving my head made me feel sick again.
‘Figures,’ he grunted. ‘I had a girlfriend called Ivy once and she was the craziest bitch you’ve ever met.’ He sucked on his teeth and regarded me through narrowed eyes. ‘Apart from you, of course. You’ve already outdone her. Well done.’
Uh, thanks?
‘You’re a witch?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ I managed.
‘And your boyfriend?’
I could feel Winter’s familiar weight at my back. He was definitely breathing regularly but, given his lack of response, he was probably still unconscious. I weighed up the benefits of lying and decided there was no point; untruths would not aid our cause now. I needed the guard to realise we’d made an honest mistake. ‘He’s a witch as well.’
The guard’s pupils narrowed to pinpricks. ‘What does the Order want with a pet crematorium? And why would you attack me? We don’t do funerals for witch familiars here, you know. We’re not evil, either.’
My brain was sluggish and it took some time to get my tongue to form the right words. ‘I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. We thought you were someone else. Someone really dangerous. It was a genuine mistake.’
‘I’ve done nothing to you!’ he spat. ‘And look at me! I bruise easily and I’m going to be black and blue for weeks! My wife will kill me.’
‘I really am sorry.’ I licked my lips. ‘We’re looking for a murderer. A man with a bald head and a bushy black beard just like yours, who we thought might work here. He’s killed seven people already. We believe he’s planning to kill more. Believe me, no one is more upset than me that you’re not him.’
The security guard stared at me. Something about his expression made me sit up straight. ‘You know who I’m talking about,’ I breathed.
‘What if I do? How do I know you are who you say you are? Maybe you just have a thing against beards.’
‘You know that’s ridiculous, right?’ I hesitated. ‘Although I’ve always wondered whether you end up with lots of food in your beard when you eat. Do you find yourself picking out crumbs later on and having them as a snack?’
He looked me as if I were mad. Yeah, alright, but at least it was making him realise that I wasn’t a dangerous witch who’d turn him into a frog and that I was just nutty. Nutty enough to mistake him for someone else.
He wiped some of the blood onto his sleeve. ‘The police are coming. You can explain yourself to them.’
‘And I will! But, please, you have to tell me who I’m really looking for and where I can find him. More people will die if you don’t.’
He searched my face, as if seeking the truth of my words. ‘You could be anyone,’ he said finally. ‘You could be making all this up.’
‘You know I’m a witch. I cast a spell to make those ice cubes appear.’
He pursed his lips. ‘Yeah, why did you do that? It was a bit weird.’
Uh… ‘To cool you both off and get you to stop fighting, of course. That’s not the point. The point is I could easily cast another spell now and get myself out of this situation. I could hurt you if I wanted to but I haven’t done. Because I’m not a bad person. I’m on the tail of a very bad person and so is my boyfriend. We’ll wait for the police if it makes you feel safe but please,’ I pleaded, ‘tell me what you know.’
For a moment, I thought he was going to refuse but something about my desperate begging persuaded him. Whatever it was, when he started talking I sagged against Winter’s prone body in relief. Some good had to come out of this disaster.
‘He doesn’t work here. His family owns the place but he doesn’t have much to do with it. I’ve only met him a couple of times. It’s been a bit of a running joke among the lads that we look alike but Hal never seems to find it funny. I’ve only been working here for a month or so, but I’ve always had the impression he despises me. I assumed it was because we look similar.’
‘Hal,’ I pressed. ‘That’s his name?’
‘Yeah. Hal Prescott. He lives in that swanky new building a few miles down the road. We might look alike but we live very different lives.’
‘If you’ve only been working here for a month, who was in your job before you? Do you know?’
The guard shook his head. ‘No one. I mean, you wouldn’t think a crematorium would need security, would you?’ He gave me a pointed look and I cringed. ‘They hired me because there’d been some trouble with the furnaces. The Prescotts thought kids were maybe coming in and burning stuff. Or that maybe it was Travellers or someone, you know? They were definitely being used.’ He raised his massive shoulders in a shrug. ‘But until you and Blue Eyes here showed up, I’d seen nothing. No one comes here at night.’
I had a hunch that the reason Blackbeard despised him was because he was in the way, not because they resembled each other. Perhaps this was the real reason why he’d drawn out disposing of the coven’s remains. He couldn’t kill anyone else because now he couldn’t burn their bodies without being noticed, so he had to get his kicks where he could. He would have found it easy to sneak in on his own at night before the guard was hired. Now, whether his family owned the place or not, it would be next to impossible.
Another thought occurred to me. ‘You said that this place doesn’t provide cremation services for familiars. Why not?’
He bared his teeth in a grin, ‘Apparently they really don’t like witches. In fact, I heard they think the lot of you are scum.’ The guard seemed almost delighted to tell me this.
Fascinated, I had to ask the question. ‘Why?’
‘Dunno. No one knows.’
Hmm. Maybe they’d had a bad encounter in the past. Maybe there was a black sheep in the family who was a witch. Maybe they wanted to be witches and weren’t. I chewed the inside of my cheek. Maybe it was even something to do with the fact that little Hal was a null. In the end, the motive didn’t matter; finding and stopping Blackbeard did.
Behind me, Winter began stir. He groaned even louder than I had. The security guard shuffled, obviously nervous, so I leaned back my head. ‘Just relax, Rafe. It’s fine. We’re all fine. Don’t do anything silly.’
‘Are you okay?’
Concussed, bleary-eyed and covered in vomit, I replied, ‘I’m fine. Everything is fine. We’re all calm and we’re all happy. In fact—’
The door burst open and several men ran in, shouting and yelling. ‘Police! Nobody move!’ The nearest one jabbed a finger at me as if I were about to get up and do the cancan.
‘We’re tied up,’ I said helpfully. ‘We can’t move.’
The security guard raised a hand to his head. A moment later, a police officer was on top of him, yanking his arm behind his back in a manner that looked both incredibly painful and incredibly unnatural. The guard really wasn’t having a very good night.
‘He’s the one who called you guys,’ I said, in a bid to encourage the police to let him go. Watching his takedown was making me flinch and there was every possibility I would throw up again. ‘He’s the good guy.’ I realised what I’d just said. ‘I mean, we’re the good guys too. We’re all good guys. There are no bad guys. This has all been a terrible misunderstanding.’
‘Call the Ipsissimus,’ Winter said in a loud voice which commanded attention. He certainly came across a lot more coher
ently than I had. ‘We are here with the full knowledge of the Hallowed Order of Magical Enlightenment. We are also working with a large group of police officers on a serious matter which takes precedence over your jurisdiction.’
One of the policemen, who I took to be the one in charge because his shoes were the shiniest, gave Winter an assessing glance. Apparently deciding that he sounded credible, the officer muttered something into his walkie-talkie. This would all be sorted out in a jiffy. No harm done.
Yet another police officer entered the room. ‘The owner is on his way,’ he declared to no one in particular.
I immediately stiffened. Okay, that was bad. Very bad. ‘Rafe,’ I whispered, ‘we have a problem.’
The security guard started to yell and shout, trying to free himself. All the policemen focused their attention on him. They should have known better.
Winter replied to me over the tumult. ‘We’re tied up on the floor of a crematorium and surrounded by angry police officers, Ivy. Not to mention that I apparently beat up an innocent man. Yes, I’d say we have a problem. Several problems.’
Actually, I thought it was the innocent man who’d beaten up Winter rather than the other way around but I decided not to mention that. ‘I mean another problem. Blackbeard, the real Blackbeard, is a man called Hal Prescott. He’s the crematorium owner’s son and the whole family hate witches. If Blackbeard comes with his dad to see what the problem is and we’re tied up like this…’
Winter sucked in a breath. ‘Right.’ He paused. ‘Maybe he won’t come. Maybe it’ll just be the father.’
There was a crackle on the walkie-talkie, barely audible over the guard’s continued protests. ‘No confirmation yet. Hold the suspects.’
I grimaced. ‘Even if it is just the owner, he’ll see us and tell his family that two witches were caught breaking in. He won’t even need to describe us for Blackbeard to get suspicious. If we can persuade this lot that Blackbeard is the criminal we’ll be fine but I don’t think there’s time. I don’t think they’ll believe us. We need to buy ourselves an hour or two. We need the upper hand if we’re going to bring Blackbeard down.’