Page 13 of Shadow King
Three customers stand up and head for the door. I don’t blame them.
Brian is staring at the ceiling with the expression of someone trying to solve a particularly difficult puzzle. “Felix, I really think we should check on whatever is happening up there.”
“We absolutely should not.”
“What if it’s a burglar?”
“It’s not a burglar.”
“What if it’s a ghost?”
I nearly laugh. If only it were that simple. “It’s not a ghost.”
“Then what is it?”
“It’s complicated.”
Another bang. This one makes the lights flicker.
The remaining customers exchange glances. One of them starts putting on their coat.
“Felix,” Brian says, with the kind of patience that suggests he’s dealt with much stranger situations than this and is willing to wait me out. “What is going on?”
I open my mouth to give him another excuse. Something about construction work, or a very large angry cat, or possibly poltergeists.
Then there’s a sound from upstairs that I can only describe as reality tearing.
It’s not loud. It’s worse than loud. It’s the kind of sound that makes your teeth ache and your skin prickle and your brain insist that something is very, very wrong with the fundamental nature of existence.
Every light in the coffee shop flickers. The espresso machine makes a sound like it’s dying. The temperature drops ten degrees in as many seconds.
The last three customers abandon their coffees and flee.
Brian and I are alone in the shop.
He looks at me. I look at him.
“So,” he says, with the calm of someone who grew up in a doomsday cult and has seen some shit. “Are you going to tell me what you’ve got trapped up there, or am I going to have to guess?”
My hands are gripping the counter so hard my knuckles are white. The sound upstairs has stopped, but the wrongness in the air hasn’t. I can feel it pressing down on the coffee shop like a weight.
I should lie. I should make up something convincing and send Brian home and deal with this myself.
But I’m so tired. And scared. And desperately out of my depth. And I can’t tell Adam because he’ll tell Hex, and the shadow prince will definitely get involved. And then my coven will find out and that won’t be good because I’m fairly certain I’ve broken about a billion rules.
I let out a heavy sigh. It would be nice to tell someone. I’m so weary of facing everything alone.
“If I tell you,” I say quietly, “you have to promise not to tell a soul.”
Brian’s expression goes serious in a way I didn’t think he was capable of. “I promise.”
I take a breath. Then another.
“I’ve bound a shadow being,” I say. “He’s trapped in my flat. And he’s trying to break free.”
Brian blinks at me. Once. Twice.
Then he grins. That enormous, face-splitting grin that I’m starting to recognise as his response to literally everything.
